I need some help with a gaming scenario.

[Northern Ranger]

My current campaign, in which my wife is my only player, has her elven archer being forced to join an archery tournament. If she loses, let's just say it will be very... unpleasant for this beauty. If she wins, she and her sister will go free. (Her sister having been captured is her reason for joining the tournament.) Anyway, my problem lies in not knowing how best to handle the tournament. In a combat situation, archery is pretty easy to deal with. One roll versus another roll, highest roll wins. I'm having trouble wrapping my mind around firing at a stationary target and competing against others in the process. How should I handle this? (Have I even explained the problem adequately?) I can't think of a way to score the competition fairly, or even to decide who's made the better shot. Help!

[Yisterwald]

Well, if you decide that you want things to go a certain way then you simply skew the results in that direction and take the story where you want it to go. If you are truly willing to go either way, and want to play it out and see what happens, then I'd look to other game systems for inspiration.

D&D 3/3.5 has a nice mechanic with opposed rolls. Rolls that are opposed are significant for the amount by which they beat (or fail to beat) their opposing roll, not for the absolute number.

Porting something similar over to Palladium -- at least for the purposes of running a nice, tense competition -- should be a piece of cake.

[Northern Ranger]

Well, if you decide that you want things to go a certain way then you simply skew the results in that direction and take the story where you want it to go. If you are truly willing to go either way, and want to play it out and see what happens, then I'd look to other game systems for inspiration.

D&D 3/3.5 has a nice mechanic with opposed rolls. Rolls that are opposed are significant for the amount by which they beat (or fail to beat) their opposing roll, not for the absolute number.

Porting something similar over to Palladium -- at least for the purposes of running a nice, tense competition -- should be a piece of cake.

Noted, and thanx. I'll check out the D&D rules.

[rrank5377]

I'm not familiar with the D&D rules, so take what I say with a grain of salt...the D&D ones may be better.

I have two different solutions (which ultimately end up being the same...just one is more detailed than the other). In both cases, don't worry about two arrows hitting each other. That is so unlikely that it's not worth the effort.

Simple solution: Simply roll a strike roll, D20 plus character bonuses. Whoever rolls higher wins.

More complicated solution: Assign AR's to each of the rings of the bullseye. For instance, assuming a 5 ring bullseye (I'm pulling a number out of a hat here),
5th (outer) ring: AR 4
4th ring: AR 7
3rd ring: AR 11
2nd ring: AR 14
Center: AR 17

For example: you have 3 participants. They roll a 9, 11, 13. The 9 will hit the 4th ring, the 11 and 13 will hit the 3rd ring. Even though the 13 is a better roll, it's still the same ring and thus counts for the same score. Then assign point values to each ring and have a set amount of shots.

Again, an example. 5th ring = 1 point, Center = 5, each ring is a 1 point step. Your wife rolls 2, 18 and 15. The first arrow is a complete miss, 0 points. The second arrow is a bullseye, 5 points. The final arrow is not quite a bullseye, 4 points. She pulled in a total of 9 points, respectable.

The complicated method adds a little more tension to the situation, as I think there should be since it's an archery contest for the freedom of the character. Did I sufficiently explain what I'm talking about here?

And if you want to try to skew the results a bit, you can mess with the bonuses of the NPC, such as making him relatively inept with a bow...although you would then have to explain why in the world he was selected for such a contest...but I digress.

This entire situation is kind of cool. I like the idea of what you're doing here. I can see many directions this can go if she gets her freedom (angry noble bent on throwing her back in prison, looking for an excuse; humiliated local archer bent on revenge; known criminal going into society and wanting to integrate back in). Plus if she doesn't win, she still needs to escape and is then a fugitive. So many possibilities! I'm curious to see how it turns out.

You put your wife in prison? Kinda puts a whole new spin on the term "the old ball & chain..."

[Library Ogre]

I'd go with rrank's suggestion. Saying "whoever rolls highest is the winner" is a little boring... for one thing, you have to wonder... did they hit MORE in the bullseye?

You might also try other feats than stationary targets. How about sand-filled sacks, swinging on ropes?

[Northern Ranger]

Rrank, you are a genius! I think you just solved my problem! Thanks so much!

NEXX, there will be more than just the stationary targets. I had already planned on a contest involving "trick shooting". The real problem I was having was with the stationary targets.

Rrank, it's not my wife's character that was in jail. It's her sister, and she's not actually in jail. She was kidnapped specifically to get my wife's character to come after her. The villain then told her she had to win the contest to gain her sisters freedom. However, if she loses, she is herself going to be enslaved by the villain. (Of course, her character has made some powerful friends recently who might have something to say about this!) I'll let you know how it turns out.

[J. Lionheart]

Rrank - that's a great idea, about assigning AR's the the rings of the target. Kudos!

If I find myself with a similar situation as a GM, I will happily adapt your suggestion to fit it.

[Lord_Dalgard]

Chello!

And if they do the old "Move the Targets back another 50 Feet" because of a tie, add a -3 small target penalty!

Tony

[Library Ogre]

Another good one is a wrestling or boxing competition... medieval fairs would often have bare-handed combat which would be a combination of the two.

Of course, there's simply open combat between two people... a grand melee.

[Northern Ranger]

The archery contest my wife's character is in is part of a much larger event that includes both armed and un-armed combat, test of lock picking skill and a magical mastery tournament. (How do you prove you're the more powerful mage without killing anyone? Interesting challenge, no?) There are also more mundane contests going on in the background, like cook offs, fashion shows and the like. The only aspect of the "fair" that she's interested in is the archery contests (there are actually three.)

[Library Ogre]

The archery contest my wife's character is in is part of a much larger event that includes both armed and un-armed combat, test of lock picking skill and a magical mastery tournament. (How do you prove you're the more powerful mage without killing anyone? Interesting challenge, no?) There are also more mundane contests going on in the background, like cook offs, fashion shows and the like. The only aspect of the "fair" that she's interested in is the archery contests (there are actually three.)

Actually, on the contest of magical mastery, I'd considered adapting rules from Ninjas and Superspies Chi Combat to allow for PPE combat between wizards. However, I never fully developed it to allow for different styles and strengths.

[Yisterwald]

I'd go with rrank's suggestion. Saying "whoever rolls highest is the winner" is a little boring... for one thing, you have to wonder... did they hit MORE in the bullseye?

You might also try other feats than stationary targets. How about sand-filled sacks, swinging on ropes?

Heh -- well, it was never my intention to have it simply be "whoever rolls highest is the winner", as that doesn't make for any competition at all.

Opposed rolls introduce the idea of relative success to your die-rolling, which is the key to the whole scenario. Once relative, rather than absolute, success can be determined, details like point scores, targets at different ranges, and so on are simple to fill in. I like rrank's suggestion just fine, but conceptually it's little different. It's simply a way to make each roll meaningful. It does break down if the contest doesn't involve hitting a target, though, and for that reaason I'd take a pass on it in my own game in favor of a more general-purpose solution. Opposed rolls provide that.

FWIW I think it's important take both target size (the rings) and range into account when figuring out the details of the archery contest, but that seemed to me to be the easy part. Opposed rolls, meanwhile, are a very useful idea -- applicable to lots of situations both combat and non-combat, easy to implement, and easy to steal. But they do represent a small conceptual departure from Palladium's rules set, which is why I mentioned them.

Call me a big picture guy...

[The Dark Elf]

I would have gone with a "dodge" roll for the distance of the Boss (the straw targets).

ie you need say for 50m away - a 12 or higher hits the target, 75m 14 or higher etc.

The amount you roll over the target is where abouts on the boss you score - you could allocate points here or simply just say that each strike roll above the targets "dodge" equivalent equals one point

EG: 100m distance to target you need (for eg) to roll above 16. you roll 18 including ur bonuses - u therefore score 2 points. NPC rolls 15 and misses, scores FA. u win! yey u!

Keeps things fast and ensure u have to be of a certain skill to compete.

GL!

[Northern Ranger]

I knew I'd get a lot of good stuff out of you folks. I think I'm going to incorporate some of everyone's ideas, though I'm not a hundred percent certain how as yet. (Better figure it out soon, as we're doing this thin tonight!) I'll keep you all posted, and thanks again for your help!

[Northern Ranger]

All right, so we played out the archery contest, using Rranks' suggestion, and it went awesome! (Thanks dude.) My wife was impressed with how smoothly it all went and I felt pretty good about the whole session. (Her character came away the champ of the tournament, by the way, and I didn't even have to fudge it in her favor. And in case your wondering, the only other "finalist" running against her was given the exact same bonuses as she had. Damn dice were malfunctioning on me! lol) Anyways, this session was one for the record books, as her winning of the tournament caused quite a brawl when the former champion accused her of cheating and she and her friends had to fight their way out of the tournament grounds. It was a royal rumble to be sure, and I loved playing it! Thanks for all your help folks.

[rrank5377]

It's really cool that the session went well. I'm glad that my suggestion helped you out.

So, now...even though this may go off topic...where does the campaign go from here?

[Northern Ranger]

ah, well. This archery tournament was a small part of a much larger campaign of mine that I call the Vampire Wars. Now that the archer has managed to rescue her sister (a Beastmaster), they are heading to the Western Empire, where other friends are already embroiled in a massive battle against a legion of undead lead by a master vamp with delusions of grandeur. (He plans to replace Vald Tegor as the God of Vampires. Problem is, his plan could just work!) Things are getting pretty sticky from here. (The tournament was nothing compared to what's ahead. So I may be asking for more advice in the future.)

[Marcethus]

And we will be glad to assist