This is an excellent method for any kind of challenge. Not just a boss fight.
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- Feb 2026
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www.mindstormpress.com www.mindstormpress.com
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www.failforward.moe www.failforward.moe
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Solution 2 : Sicko's Lagoon
This solution seems to revolve around the following
- Loot being constant but not generous. This menas the player will always be picoing things up but everything matters.
- Loot being losable. So that everything they have muat be guarded but of course that playing the game is inevitably risking losing it.
- Interdependent. This means that there's no 'win button'. Very little will actually win you the game and as such you're looking for something thatauits your needs. And when you don't find it you're doing your best to use what you have.
- Indirectly supportive og your goal. The racing game here is an excellent example because going faster won't help you win if your turning circle is rubbish. So the core challenge or test must require an interaction of different abilities to overcome.
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- Jan 2026
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www.explorersdesign.com www.explorersdesign.com
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What's important to recognize is that Advantage/Disadvantage doesn't technically ban or even replace the diegetic conversation. In theory the two procedures can co-exist, but in practice—with player priorities, optimal play, and finite time—A/D takes precedence.
One solution might be to. Have NPCs use the mechanics in ways that teach the player how effective they are. Similar to the way that Pokemon uses mechanics to teach people how to play the Pokemon game and helps them to avoid the trap of simply getting large damage moves and using only them.
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whiskeybloodanddust.substack.com whiskeybloodanddust.substack.com
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Resource dice are an excellent idea.
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whiskeybloodanddust.substack.com whiskeybloodanddust.substack.com
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Very good enounter tables to use.
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Niv Lova does include an encounter range table. The encounter might be very close, giving you little opportunity to hide. You might also see them from afar, giving you ample time to position yourself for an ambush or avoid the encounter entirely.
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- Dec 2025
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gamedesignskills.com gamedesignskills.com
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It is not a stable state because the “perfect” balancing point is dynamic – even a 4,000 year old game like Go still has had balance adjustments in the past twenty years.
It's actually acceptable to tweak as the game matures and people find new ways to play it. Don't think you have to get it perfect first time.
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mythlands-erce.blogspot.com mythlands-erce.blogspot.com
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Opening Stuck Doors. 2-in-6 -> STR check with disadvantage.
While I agree that rolling for things you want them to succeed at can unecessarily stunt the narrative, when combined with the idea in this article of rolling to see how well or poorly you do it could be used to give you narrative fodder. Like this example of the door. You don'tneed to roll but rolling might give you a nice connecting moment so you'renot skipping through the adventure to the 'good' stuff not having any fibre in amongst the sugar.
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When players are attempting something that you have already determined will succeed, it can happen that circumstances suggest there could be a cost to it. For example, climbing a very difficult surface. The cost could be lost time (always a precious resource when you track time with the random encounter die), broken tools, exhaustion, injury, etc. Or the inverse - even faster than expected, went up real quiet, etc.
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mythlands-erce.blogspot.com mythlands-erce.blogspot.com
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"Can I use Stealth to climb down the well?" "No," I said, "No, you may not. You can use a rope to climb down the well."
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The DM gives another +2 for the handsome tip and decides 18 is good enough to make a good impression.
You could also make the roll a part of the solution. i.e. if they'retryong to do something hard it might tilt the balance ratger than it being the focus.
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Actually a Persuasion roll
One weakness is trying to fit everything into specific boxes. I woukd argue this isn't persuasion.
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- Oct 2025
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wol.jw.org wol.jw.org
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Doing something for loved ones can allay our anxiety about them
I suppose this is what I discovered. What I wasn't doing was the thing I should have been doing. Even though that thing was only touching base and not actually doing anything major it was still what I should have been doing.
See this note front he beginning of the article. and this one
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