When do you really need a contest roll?

First, when we talk about a contest in the Go Time worlds we mean a 2d6 roll (plus bonuses) by the character versus a 2d6 roll (plus bonuses) by the GM. The highest roll succeeds and ties go to the GM.

Contest rolls are used whenever there is a doubt about the outcome of an Action the player or cast member want to perform. On the surface that appears to be a simple statement, but when does "doubt" creep in? We need some generic guidelines to help the GM call for just the contest rolls that are important.

GM's, of course, are welcome to come up with their own guidelines, or to modify my thoughts to fit their campaign.

There are a group of Actions which do not have an opposing force, and therefore are not contested. That means no contest roll is necessary, the character simply performs the Action. Getting up from the ground after falling, drawing a weapon, moving, walking up a hill, climbing an easy to climb tree, and many more mundane Actions fall in this category.

The first class of doubtful situations I want to address are those which cause damage to an unsuspecting target. What do you do when a cast member has successfully snuck up on a character and they want to slice open the characters throat and kill them? The character is unaware, or surprised, yet in a very real sense, they are opposed to dying. What is the GM going to do? My answer is Luck. The player just might get Lucky and survive. I call for a Luck contest. The player rolls 2d6 and the GM rolls 2d6. If the character is lucky and wins the contest, the GM determines the result. I suggest that the character takes damage equal to half of their remaining Toughness. If the GM wins the contest, the character goes to zero Toughness and falls to the ground, dead. That is unlucky, indeed. (Note: The other characters do have time, under the Go Time death rules, to save their comrades life.) I have put this in terms of what happens to characters to bring home the point. This same procedure can be used by characters when they get the drop on cast members.

The second class of doubtful situations involve the role-playing of a character during the game. If a player is able to present an interesting and logical series of Actions performed by the character the GM may decide that the player succeeds and that no roll is necessary. I do not have the words to explain this, so I will use some examples to clarify this class of doubtful situations. Keep in mind that if the players description of the characters actions are not entertaining, these become just a contest roll.

A character wants to obtain knowledge from a local farmer. The player proceeds to assist the farmer, explaining how she will cause the farmer to feel good about the character. The explanation is entertaining for the GM and for the other players, who may even help. As a GM, I decide that the explanation replaces a successful contest roll, and the player gets the information they want, or an idea of where the information is.

A character wants to obtain knowledge from a defeated and unconscious enemy Horror. The series of Actions they use includes the rousing of the Horror and some unique descriptions of their skills with a knife plus a healthy bit of acting. Once again I find myself entertained and decide that the character has successfully completed an intimidation contest. They get the information they want.

The character wants to hide in a thicket and ambush a Fiend. She may well be assisted by other characters distracting the fiends. The Fiends are walking down the path, tracking the party. One of the characters gives an entertaining explanation of how they will proceed to hide and ambush the last bad guy in the enemy party. As a GM I may well decide that the characters careful preparation replaces a contest roll. For the actual attack on the fiend, I would use the luck roll, as I described earlier. How many times have we seen the good guys trim down their enemies this way? Well, we can see it again.

The third class of doubtful situations have to do with adventure goals, knowledge, and clues needed to triumph in the end. Some of the information that is provided through ancient glyphs or ingenious puzzles is essential for the characters to obtain. Therefore the GM must, in some situations, abandon the contest rolls and let the characters earn the answers through role-playing and skill use, no matter what the dice say.

The bottom line here is that in the Go Time RPG worlds, including Crypt Crawl, are Role-Playing games. As a GM you need to allow the role-playing aspect of the games to have real value and become more important than the games mechanics. We can do this by making entertaining role-playing into successful contest rolls.