"Retrys" on failed faction missions

[Christopher Rowe]

So this is something that came up last night when I ran PFS #2-13 Murder on the Throaty Mermaid. A new player (new to Pathfinder and to the Society, he's a 3.5 veteran, which I am not) playing an Andoran character didn't succeed on one of his two faction missions.

Spoiler:

He was incensed that the navigator Ulamon "just handed him" the ring (and was later incensed that he didn't get to keep it and that it wasn't magical, but whatevs on that) but that he was expected, as a 1st level character, to make a DC 20 Diplomacy check to convince the wererat stowaway Snig to leave the ship.

At the end of the scenario, he wanted to "go back and try again" but I ruled that he'd missed his shot when he didn't make the roll the first time.

I advised him (and the other players, some of whom made both components of their faction missions and some of whom didn't) not to expect automatic success in the faction missions in the scenarios anymore than they should expect automatic success for the overall adventures, even death is a possibility, etc etc.

But I did get to thinking that perhaps my ruling, which I stand by, was perhaps situational? Which is to say, are there some circumstances in which retrying is reasonable and some in which it is not?

(This same player also told me he'd just read the Guide to Organized Play and was happy to find out that any character can use any wand. That was an easy one, at least, I just told him to show it to me in his copy.)

[hogarth]

Just to clarify -- he tried to make the check and he missed it?

Here's what the rules say about retrying Diplomacy checks: "If a request is refused, the result does not change with additional checks, although other requests might be made." So changing it from a request to a bribe might work, for instance.

[Off in the Shower]

Chris, in my experience the one thing that players will whine and complain about to no end, is losing one prestige to a faction mission. It sucks.

You have to be firm. They have to learn that there are times when their PC just doesn't have what it takes to get the job done.

[Christopher Rowe]

hogarth wrote:

Just to clarify -- he tried to make the check and he missed it?

Yes, he tried to make the check and missed it.

[hogarth]

Off in the Shower wrote:

You have to be firm. They have to learn that there are times when their PC just doesn't have what it takes to get the job done.

I agree you should be firm when it's appropriate to be firm (e.g. if a player is trying to ignore the rules). I don't agree that a GM should refuse to let a PC come up with a creative solution that's clearly allowed by the rules.

For instance, my PC's faction once had a faction mission to recover a particular painting, but the painting was accidentally destroyed by fire. We thought "no problem, we'll get it fixed with Make Whole", but the GM balked and basically told us that faction missions aren't supposed to allow second chances so Make Whole mysteriously failed. That left a bad taste in my mouth, frankly.

[Off in the Shower]

hogarth wrote:

I don't agree that a GM should refuse to let a PC come up with a creative solution that's clearly allowed by the rules.

OK?

[Red-Assassin]

hogarth wrote:

We thought "no problem, we'll get it fixed with Make Whole", but the GM balked and basically told us that faction missions aren't supposed to allow second chances so Make Whole mysteriously failed. That left a bad taste in my mouth, frankly...

I would rule the same.

First there are "Dozens" of paintings. In the room there are ALLOT of other objects that would of turned to ash.

Worse case, unless a party wanted to spend allot of time I would think the chances for them to Identify the correct piece of ash would be very slime 1% chance. I would describe it to the PC's the amount of ash.

Best case the PC's see the one single column of and prevent surround objects burning. This may make it easier. Again there are numerous objects in that 5 ft area.

[Christopher Rowe]

Here are the Mission Notes for this particular encounter/faction mission:

Spoiler:

Andoran faction PCs should be interested in convincing Snig to abandon the Throaty Mermaid to work as a shipboard spy for the Eagle Knights. Snig is unreceptive to the idea, citing extreme agoraphobia as his reason for not leaving the ship. PCs may change his mind with a DC 20 Diplomacy check.

It seems to me to have exactly one very particular and precisely worded success condition clearly defined. Failing to meet it shouldn't equal failing the mission if some arbitrarily judged "creative solution" is applied? Honest question.

[Red-Assassin]

Faction missions are not supposed to be completed 100% of the time.

Some missions state they can't be retried or only on faction member can try.

Some of faction mission are secret, other factions "Aiding" equals auto fail.

I like Faction Missions. They keep getting better and better.

[CRobledo]

In this specific case, I would not allow him to retry, UNLESS he had a creative solution on top. A hefty bribe? maybe. Casting suggestion on him? Better.

[Red-Assassin]

I haven't ran that scenario, Chris. But I think it would be the GM's call at that point. Perhaps the DC gets harder for failing by 4 or more. Perhaps the PC's have left the ship. Just talk with your GM, expect table variation.

[hogarth]

Chris Bonnet wrote:

hogarth wrote:

We thought "no problem, we'll get it fixed with Make Whole", but the GM balked and basically told us that faction missions aren't supposed to allow second chances so Make Whole mysteriously failed. That left a bad taste in my mouth, frankly...

I would rule the same.

First there are "Dozens" of paintings. In the room there are A LOT of other objects that would of turned to ash.

If the GM had said "the painting is instantly reduced to ashes and you can't distinguish it from the other ashes", I probably would have been fine with that (although it would have sounded a bit gimmicky).

But the discussion was more along the lines of:

"The painting is ruined."

"No problem, we'll get it fixed with Make Whole."

"Wait, that doesn't sound fair. I meant to say that the painting is completely destroyed and you can't fix it with Make Whole."

Actions like that just make me stop wanting to come up with creative solutions. That's a bad thing.

[Red-Assassin]

Hmmm bad discussion.

[Akerlof]

Chris Bonnet wrote:

Some missions state they can't be retried or only on faction member can try.

Because of this, I always thought that, if it wasn't explicitly stated that the player only gets one try, they could take a reasonable number (maybe 2, maybe 1 per skill option) of tries if they could come up with another way to approach the subject. Or in some cases, allow a second try after the mission ends or a significant amount of time passes.

Some faction missions are straightforward: "The player has to make a DC 8 heal check to harvest this monster's cornea, two failed checks destroys both eyes and they fail." Or "The PC has to say this phrase to that NPC and do a DC 42 Sense Motive check on his reaction. He only gets one try." I can't see cutting them slack on those.

But when the mission says something like "The PC must make a DC 20 Diplomacy check or DC 16 Intimidate check on a secretary to get an audience with this official..." If the PC fails the diplomacy check at the beginning of the adventure, and the adventure leaves them in the same town after they finish, I don't see why they couldn't make one more attempt the next day; Reminding the secretary of the great service he did for the town, or going there straight after getting out of the dungeon and trying to intimidate his way in while covered in viscera, or bringing along the bard to do the talking (as long as it isn't a secret mission.)

I don't have a problem giving players a second chance like that, since they're trying something at least a little different and the mission doesn't explicitely say they can't retry. Especially if their mission has wildly different DCs and skills than the other faction missions. (The last scenario I ran, I think one mission required a DC 15 diplomacy or Knowledge Nobility (with bonuses for bribes) followed by a DC 12 diplomacy while another mission required a DC 20 sense motive. My first scenario required one player succeed at 3 of 5 DC 16 perception checks while another faction was allowed to take 20 and auto succeed!)

You don't want to let the player keep rolling until the magic number comes up, but I don't think you want just one bad roll to ruin their whole day unless it's explicitly called out in the scenario.

[Christopher Rowe]

Akerlof wrote:

You don't want to let the player keep rolling until the magic number comes up, but I don't think you want just one bad roll to ruin their whole day unless it's explicitly called out in the scenario.

I sympathize with most of what you said, but I guess I just can't see failing at one of two faction missions as having a whole day ruined.

[Kristen Gipson]

There are a lot of times people are not able to even attempt the rolls.

Blakros Matrimony:

One of my players had a fighter in the silver crusade who was trying to persuade the head of security to help provide people in the fight against the Lissalans. The head wanted some details of the history about Lissala. The player was doing a great job explaining how the Lissalan cultists were trying to raise a runelord and how if they were successful that it would be a bad thing. The check that has to be made was a knowledge history or nobility. No one at the table had ranks in either of those.

Seeing that my player was upset with this, I gave my player the option "If they could tell me which of the runelords the Lissalans were trying raise?" The player was unsuccessful in identifying that Krune (runelord of sloth) is the runelord trying to be raised. This gave me as a GM an opportunity to teach my players a little bit of lore about Golarion.

[Akerlof]

Christopher Rowe wrote:

Akerlof wrote:

You don't want to let the player keep rolling until the magic number comes up, but I don't think you want just one bad roll to ruin their whole day unless it's explicitly called out in the scenario.

I sympathize with most of what you said, but I guess I just can't see failing at one of two faction missions as having a whole day ruined.

Not the best choice of words. I don't like permanent repercussions based on a single die roll for an arbitrary skill, minor as they may be. It's different than failing a disable device roll by a ton and triggering the trap: You expect to take HP damage et al, and your ingame decisions put you in that situation. And while combat may boil down to 1 die roll being life or death, it's almost invariable that a lot of other rolls and decisions got you to that point, that one roll is only the tip of the iceberg.

As for permanent repercussions, even if you did everything right, spread out your skill points to a variety of things and didn't dump any stats, a DC20 Sense Motive means a 95% chance of not having a wand of Cure light Wounds for an awful lot of characters second adventure. Even if, by some chance, you're a 20 wis person who trained it as a class skill, you're still only 50/50 for getting that wand. Not having a wand can really impact your chances of survival, and it takes a lot of the ability to control your own fate out of your hands for another adventure.

Failing that one roll might also mean a third or fourth level PC, someone you've invested 8 or 10 games in (that's two months of playing time for a lot of people who are regulars,) being unable to get a res and perma-die. Maybe I'm more conscious of that because my first character is only alive today because I had exactly 16 prestige when he ran into a large earth Elemental. I had a lot invested in that character, I would not have felt that it was a trivial thing if forcefully retired because some GM told me "You have one shot at passing this high DC skill check in a non class skill for your character that only gets two points per level. Tough luck."

I haven't GM'd much higher level stuff, I would probably be a lot more strict on 6th or 7th level characters' faction missions. But first, second, even third level characters? If they're putting forth some effort and imagination, and it isn't explicitly ruled out, I'm going to give them every reasonable opportunity to succeed.

[Kerney]

CRobledo wrote:

In this specific case, I would not allow him to retry, UNLESS he had a creative solution on top. A hefty bribe? maybe. Casting suggestion on him? Better.

Think this is the right approach. Other options, pay for the ship's

Spoiler:

whore

to visit him, intimidate him in memorable way, for example.

hogarth wrote:

For instance, my PC's faction once had a faction mission to recover a particular painting, but the painting was accidentally destroyed by fire. We thought "no problem, we'll get it fixed with Make Whole", but the GM balked and basically told us that faction missions aren't supposed to allow second chances so Make Whole mysteriously failed. That left a bad taste in my mouth, frankly.

There are GM's who try to nix any creative solutions. I think anyone who goes too far in that direction can cross the line into cheating. However, the GM's have a lot of leeway on this. I've only had one GM who crossed the line on this IMHO with 100 plus tables.

[Sesharan]

I'm very much on the supporting side for creative solutions to faction missions, as long as they make sense. Asking for a reroll with no real justification, as in the OP, is neither creative nor entertaining for the party, and would never have my support.

Creative solutions should absolutely have to make sense and fit the situation, but if what the PCs are trying to do would work when they're not trying to do a faction mission, it ought to work just as well when they are. Pathfinders have access to a large pool of resources, and using those resources effectively should be rewarded. The guy they need to talk to is dead? Fine, have the cleric prep Speak With Dead once all the fighting is over. It's not like he'll get any deader in the meanwhile.

[Grumpus]

In this particular case I would allow retries for the faction mission.

Since this module takes place over many days at sea, I would allow the PC to maybe try to convince the guy once per day. And possibly adding a circumstance penalty for the retry.