The Sage’s Answers, Part 6
It must be Tuesday! Just to remind everyone, here we’ll be answering questions players and GMs have asked about The Witcher TRPG with the goal of turning them into an errata and updating the book down the line. Today we’re answering five questions!
Cody Pondsmith, our line developer, will be answering five to ten questions each time we post. We’re going to shoot for either every day or every other weekday, schedules allowing, and when there’s going to be longer breaks, we’ll try our best to let you know in advance. We’ll be posting each The Sage’s Answers on our blog, our Facebook, and on the r/WitcherTRPG subreddit. On our blog, I’ll be tagging each entry with “sagesanswers” to make them easy to find.
I’ve edited the text above to note we’ll always be taking the weekend off. Even game designers need time to recharge their batteries!
And on we go!
Pavlakis S asks…
I read at sage’s column that skills don’t have fumble and critical effects and that’s logical. But do you still get to roll the “d10” for minus (fumble) or bonus (critical) when you roll “1” or “10” respectively and remove or add the roll on your base skill? Or a “1” and “10” counts as that and there are no further rolls?
Cody answers…
Hey, Pavlakis! You are correct. Unless otherwise noted, there are no Critical or Fumble effects (the sort which require you to consult a table) for Skills unless otherwise noted.
However, you can still critical when you roll a Skill (in which case, the d10 explodes. You reroll the d10 and add that value to the value of the first roll and the BASE and keep going for as long as you roll 10s) or fumble when you roll a Skill (in which case you reroll a d10 and subtract the value from the BASE, with the lowest possible outcome being 0. Again, if you roll a d10 on this “fumble die” you roll again and add all the values before subtracting it from the BASE).
JasontheRand asks…
Just want to confirm this. On page 154 it says a monster’s resistance is accounted for BEFORE an armor’s SP is applied. On page 78, it says an armor’s resistance is accounted for AFTER the armor’s SP is applied. Is this accurate (innate resistance before, resistance from worn armor after) or is one (before SP is applied or after SP is applied) right for both?
Cody answers…
Hey, JasontheRand! All resistances, no matter the source, should be applied AFTER the armor is applied. We will go back and change that. So SP first, then halve for resistance in all cases. If you don’t crack the armor, the resistance doesn’t matter.
Mgshammer asks…
Can a spell effect BOTH hit the target and Fumble? For example, say the DC is 10, and you roll a total of 11. You succeed, but you also rolled a Nat 1. It’s a fumble! Does the spell still go off and you fumble? Does it go off only when the fumble results say so, or does it fail only when the fumble result says so?
Cody answers…
Hey, Mgshammer! If you fumble a spell roll the spell only goes off if you roll a 1-6 on the “fumble die”, as noted the Magic Fumble Outcome table. If you roll any higher than that the spell fails to be cast as noted on the table. Keep in mind, if the spell is targeted on an enemy, you must still beat their defense roll with your roll to hit them. The spell might go off if you roll a 1-6 but it isn’t guaranteed to hit.
Mgshammer asks…
Hexes. On page 120, it says that when you Miscast a hex, there’s a chance it’ll effect you rather than the target. “Miscast” is not defined anywhere in the book. However, in the Magic Combat chapter on page 168, it talks about a Hex Fumble. I presume this is what it means by Miscast.
Cody answers…
Miscasting a hex means you fumbled it (rolled a 1 in casting the hex). So, if you fumble the hex there is a chance that it will be applied to you. See the next answer for specifics.
Mgshammer asks…
It says that when you fumble, you roll a 50% chance for the hex to affect yourself. Is this INSTEAD of the target, or is it in ADDITION to the target? What happens if you both fumble and beat the DC? It doesn’t specify here, but back on page 120 it does say that the “miscast” chance is you INSTEAD of the target (or perhaps they meant this happens when you fail the spell AND roll a fumble?). Also, is this 50% chance INSTEAD of the normal fumble rules, or is it in ADDITION to the normal Fumble rules?
Cody answers…
If you fumble a hex there is a 50% chance the hex affects you INSTEAD of the target. The 50% is what you suffer instead of the normal fumble rules. The power for hexes comes from a different source so the result of failure is different. We’ll make a note about that.
So, to be clear here. If you fumble a hex, one of four things will happen:
- If you still beat the target’s defense AND the 50% chance described above rolls in your favor, the hex goes off as planned.
- If you still beat the target’s defense BUT the 50% chance described above doesn’t roll in your favor, the hex goes off but you are affected, not the target.
- If you don’t beat the target’s defense AND the 50% chance described above rolls in your favor, the hex simply fails.
- If you don’t beat the target’s defense BUT the 50% chance described above doesn’t roll in your favor, the hex goes off but you are affected, not the target.
Under no circumstances do you deal with additional consequences from the Magic Fumble Outcome table on page 166.
That’s five down! Keep your blades sharp and join us tomorrow for another five!
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I have a question for future sage answers, on the character sheets and damage location tables it has arms, legs, torso, and head as possible locations to land a hit, and the character sheets has corresponding armor listings. My question is, in the armor and weapon section only legs, head, and torso armor is available- how are we to determine arm armor? Is it to be part of torso, or should we use leg armor?
Good question. We’ll be answering it.
Hello,
It’s me again. This time I have questions regarding the I.P rules. I did not see that these questions were asked before. If they were then I apologize for the repetition.
The page 59 is the only place in the book where the rules address I.P. and how players gain it and
how to spend it. Now I have to admit that English is not my groups first language so this might just be
us misunderstanding the rules as they are written.
The question is how much should the GM give I.P to the players? The general improvement section says that this should not be more than 6 I.p. but the rewards table goes as high as 9.
How we used these rules yesterday were that we decided that there would be a flat base of 6 improvements points for everyone and then everyone got extra from the reward table based on their highest achievement on that table. Is this the correct way to do it?
Then how are the general improvement points used? The rules state that these can be used to raise any skill that you used during the adventure. So what if I cannot raise any skills for whatever reason before the next adventure begins? Are the points that I could not use wasted? Can I store these points for later use and if I can then how do I determine what skills these points can be used? Do I need to keep a separate record of skills I have used during every adventure so I know which skills I can use points on? Or can the general improvement I.P be used on anything the player wants, skills, stats, spells etc.?
Are the reward I.p. and general improvement I.P two separate pools? Can the reward I.P be used however the player wants? And since raising stats costs 10 times the level this would mean that even for a Witcher who wants to raise their EMP from 1 to 2 this would cost 10 points. But if I cannot use general improvement points on this then I would have to get at least 5 reward points from two
seperate adventures to raise even the lowest stat by one if the general improvement I.P can only be used on skills.
Again this confusion on how the I.P points can be used and if they can be stored might just be because of us misunderstanding the rules but as a group of non-native English speakers we would appreciate if this page could be looked over and made more easily understandable.
Thanks again for your time and for the awesome game.
Not a confusing question at all. We’ll see if we can hunt up some answers for you.
I understand the I.P. section as follows: You should give a certain, equal amount of I.P. to each player for participating in the session. This value should not be greater than 6 I.P. per session. Personally, I would reward fewer I.P. for shorter scenarios/sessions, but it is up to you (and how fast you want your group to progress). On top of that, players get additional I.P. according to the “I.P. Rewards” table, when they contributed in the way described. E.g. you have a group of three players. One was rather passive and just did what everyone did (fought along, helped in group efforts, but did not contribute with own ideas), one brought in ideas that may or may not have helped to progress the story and one had this spectacular idea that astounded you as a GM and helped the group a lot. The first player would just get the “basic” amount of I.P., the second one would get 1-2 additional I.P. (depending how helpful his ideas were) and the third one gets additional 5 I.P. for thinking out of the box and doing something really great.
The I.P. granted this way are “General I.P.” (so to answer your specific question: rewarded I.P. = General I.P.) that can be used to raise any skill or stat you like. It is more immersive if the player raises skills that were actually used or if he explicitly states that he wants to train the skill, but personally I would not insist on it.
Apart from the General I.P., there is a second I.P. pool that is seperate from this: This is the I.P. you get by getting taught (I think the “Training I.P.” section on the character sheet is used for that). These I.P. are restricted for use on the talent you have been taught.
From my experience with RPGs I.P. (or experience points in other systems) are generally kept until used. So, it is not necessary to spend these points right away and they will never simply go to waste. Otherwise, you would not be able to raise higher skills and/or stats. If you want to raise a stat from 7 to 8 you need 70 I.P. and it is impossible to get this amount in one session.
This is pretty much how I understood the rules and how we decided to use them. My initial confusion came from the rules where it is stated that “At the end of a session your GM gives out general Improvement Points to apply on any skill that you used during that adventure.”.
So if this is to be taken literally then you could only use I.P to raise skills you used during the adventure. At least that is how I initially understood the rules. And this would not address the situation where you would have points leftover that you could not use.
But like I said we pretty much came to the same conclusion on how to use and store I.P. as you did Destined. I just wanted to let the devs know with my extremely confusing question that the section was a bit hard to understand first time around and if taken literally it made little sense. At least to me. 🙂
Yeah OK, I have a question but first of all, thanks for all the hard work.
My question is on the subject of Critical Wounds. I get that “Stabilised” status happens when someone with First aid gets to it and slaps on a plaster and maybe kisses it better but what moves it over to “Treated”?
There are numerous references to things that “heal” a Critical Wound and I’m guessing that this is what tips things over from Stabilised to Treated but is this the case?
If so, is there any way that the negatives inherent in being Critically wounded can be removed?
Thanks again
I’m very confused about the battle fumble descrition on pg 156. Tried googling to no avail…
So does the natural 1 mean I have to roll the fumble table (like in CP2020)? If so, why am I subtracting stuff from my base if I fail anyways? How does the subtracting from base affect anything?
The paragraph ends with “depending on how high your negative was”: what negative? If I can’t drop my base below 0?
I’ve played a lot of CP2020 (over 20 years), and I thought this was to mitigate the exploding natural 1, so that you only see the fumble table if your base goes to negative, and then depeding on how far below zero, but I guess this isn’t the case? Can you clarify?
When you roll a 1 in battle on a Check.
Step 1. Roll a second d10 (or reroll the first) and subtract the number rolled from the your Base (Stat+Skill). You do this because even if you fumble, you still have a chance of succeeding if your Base – the fumble die is high enough. Remember, d10s explode so if your second d10/reroll is a 10, roll it again and add that number to 10 before subtracting.
Step 2. Compare the result of your fumble die (the second d10/the reroll) roll to the Fumble table. This determines if there is an additional bad result due to the fumble.
Example:
Yuna is attacking someone with her crossbow. Her player rolls 1d10 and gets a 1! Groaning, her player rolls a second d10 and the result is a 9. She subtracts this from her Base (17) for a total of 8. Needless to say, she didn’t hit. In addition, her GM declares her crossbow has jammed and she must spend one full round action to unjam it if she wants to continue.