Thinking About Skills n Dice in TTRPGs
I have been thinking about a little houserule I have kinda been using related to Cyclopeatron's blog post on ability checks. I even wrote up a houserule in my wiki about it.
Skill Checks
Skills can be checked for success by rolling your ability score or under on a d6 scale. You can combine two ability scores if it calls for it and roll d12. The difficulty of the check is solely at the discretion of the GM.
Single Ability Score Check
| Difficulty | Success is ability score or under |
|---|---|
| Easy | 2d6 |
| Standard | 3d6 |
| Difficult | 4d6 |
| Very Difficult | 5d6 |
| Arduous | 6d6 |
| Nigh-Impossible | 7d6 |
| Difficulty | Success is total ability score or under |
|---|---|
| Easy | 2d12 |
| Standard | 3d12 |
| Difficult | 4d12 |
| Very Difficult | 5d12 |
| Arduous | 6d12 |
| Nigh-Impossible | 7d12 |
Any percentage-type abilities can be calculated in the way above. for each 5% in an ability (rounded down) counts as a +1 point bonus to the ability score rolled against. So a 3rd level Elf Thief attempting to pick pockets (40% + 5% Elf bonus) with a 15 Dexterity would need to roll a 24 or below with Xd6 (X being the number of die rolled based on difficulty). They have 45%, so there is a +9 to the ability.
However, the more I think about it, the more I think some of the Thief skills make the checks more wonky and wonder how to address that wile still throwing lots of bones. The wonkiness starts happening when one looks for sure at climbing surfaces. Even if one takes each 5% as a +1 it just gets ludicrously huge.
I still plan on using it, but definitely looking for ideas/suggestions.
Any suggestions or thoughts? Feel free to lemme know!