Can I take 6 (or even 12)?

[E W Dawson]

To the best of my knowledge, Coda does not have a mechanic where you can assume that you roll a certain number on 2d6 (rolling a 6 or 12 in this case) with out actually rolling dice. If certain criteria are met (spending extra time for example), could I implement such a mechanic into my game in applicable situations?
What would be the consequences of adding such a rule?

(For clarifiation, I am trying to adapt the take 10 and take 20 rules from the d20 system to the Coda system.)

As always, thank's for the help.

[Balok]

I think you'd need to consider it carefully. Taking 20 essentially assumes that if you can try somethign 20 times, you will eventually get a 20. So, it takes 20 times as long, and, you can't do it on a skill that has bad effects on failure (because the other assumption is that you also roll a "1" in there somewhere).

In a 2d6 system, the chance of rolling a 12 is 1 in 36. So, you'd have to start by saying that it would take (roughly) 40 times as long to "take 12" on a skill as it does to roll it normally. And I think you'd need to disallow it for any attempt where failure has bad consequences.

I hold the opinion that these rules were created to efficiently handle the situation where "I'll just try again" is appropriate, to avoid a lot of needless die rolling. If you've got a long time to attempt something, you usually *can* succeed.

My philosophy tends toward not requiring a die roll at all in that kind of situation, at least for Trek. I see D&D as mostly above overcoming (possibly linked) obstacles, whereas I see Trek as mostly about building a good story from a framework and character actions. Since good stories occasionally do call for catastrophic failures, I do require skill rolls at dramatic moments -- but I tend to assume that a trained professional (i.e. someone who has the skill) will succeed at ordinary tasks, sooner or later.

It's true that how efficient a professional is can affect their chances of promotion/advancement, but in game, other things tend to have far more of an impact on that.

[Sho-sa Kurita]

I think that if you're going to "force" a success, which is essentially the purpose of Taking 10/20 in 3E, then there's no point in rolling the dice in the first place. I've always viewed the Take 10/20 rules as a fallback for groups that don't trust their DM to make a good plot-driven decision.

If it's a Take 20/12 situation, just decide on a plot-appropriate length of time for the action to take.

A common Take 20 house rule in D&D is to roll a die and multiply by the usual amount of time the action takes. You could do something similar for CODA, but I still fall back on my first paragraph.

- Daniel

[Polanski]

On a risk of being pedantic ...

1)

There is no critical failures in D&D on skill checks (they only take place in combat on attack rolls) therfore rolling 1 in the simulated taking 20 is/would be irrelevant.

Check PHB for a proper description of the skill checks and taking 20.

2)

Average of 2d6 in actually 7 since you can never roll 1 , but you can roll snake eyes
So as David Weber said in "Flag in Exile" the law of probability plays no favours... (only author does)

Anyway, I allow my players to take 7 in any either extended or non combat/emergency situations. As for taking 12, that is a different story...

Kind Regards
Daniel