Skills
There are two kinds of skills: general skills, that anyone can use, and advanced skills, that require specialist training. All skills are described in detail further on in this chapter. Each skill is tied to one of your four attributes: strength, agility, wits and empathy.
Both attributes and skills are measured on a scale of 1 to 5. A higher score is better.
◆ Your gear
◆ The difficulty of your action
◆ Assistance from others
◆ Prayer and preparatory prayer (page 55)
ROLLING DICE
When you are in danger and attempt to accomplish something difficult, your fate is in the hands of the Icons. It is time to bring out some dice! Any six-sided dice will do.SIXES MEAN SUCCESS
When you perform an action, start by describing what your PC tries to accomplish. Then, take as many dice as your skill level in the appropriate skill plus its corresponding attribute. The dice total can be modified by your gear and other external factors. Then, roll your (modified) dice total, all dice at once. For your action to succeed, at least one die must come out a six. If you roll more than one six, you unlock bonus effects. Advanced Skills: You can always test a general skill, even if your skill level is zero – simply roll a number of dice equal to the corresponding attribute only. This is called your Base Chance. To use an advanced skill however, your skill level must be at least 1, otherwise you can’t roll for the skill at all.LEVELS OF SUCCESS
One six is enough for your action to succeed, but it means you made it just barely. If you roll three or more sixes, you achieve what is called a critical success. Each skill lists its own results corresponding to your level of success later in this chapter. Bonus Effects: Some skills, like ranged combat, melee combat and pilot, allow for bonus effects to be “bought” using your extra sixes (if you rolled more than one). These effects and how many sixes they cost are described in Chapter 5 (combat) and Chapter 7 (space combat).THE ART OF FAILING
If you roll no sixes, something goes wrong. You are now in the hands of the GM, and he decides what happens to you. The only thing he cannot say is “nothing happens”. Failure should always have consequences. In some cases, the rules outline what the failure means, but most times, the GM gets to decide. Maybe you hurt yourself, lose an important pos-session, are forced to take another route to your destination, or maybe a new threat arises. You have one last chance if you are truly desperate to avoid failing a roll – you can pray to the Icons (page 55). Combat: In combat (Chapter 5), the GM doesn’t have to give every failure too much of a consequence. The fact that your attack missed is usually enough, as it is now your enemy’s turn to retaliate. The GM can of course penalize you with extra consequences in combat as well – maybe your missed shot hits someone else instead?PRAYING TO THE ICONS
When your need is most dire, you can pray to the Icons for help. This means you get to reroll all dice not showing sixes. Which Icon you pray to depends on the skill you just tested – see table 3.2. The prayer doesn’t count towards your actions in the turn (see Chapter 5) and takes no time to perform – you just open yourself up to the energy of the Icons. But this doesn’t come without risk, see below. You will usually only pray to the Icons when your roll has failed, but you could pray even if there were sixes in your initial roll, to get more sixes and unlock more bonus effects. You can only pray to the Icons when testing a skill, not for any other roll. You can only pray once for each roll.PREPARATORY PRAYER AND CHAPELS
If you make time for preparatory prayers to a specific Icon before lunging into the fray, you get a +1 modifier to rerolls when you pray to that same Icon anytime later during the session. If the prayer takes place in a chapel, your modifier becomes +2. This is in effect for the rest of the session, but only when you pray to that specific Icon (see table 3.2).THE DARK BETWEEN THE STARS
The Universe strives towards balance. If you use the power of the Icons to help you, you will sooner or later suffer the backlash, something represented in the game by Darkness Points (DP). Every time you pray to the Icons for a reroll, the GM gets 1 DP. He can use these in a number of ways – see the adjacent list. You can use any token you like to keep track of DP – there are many types of gaming markers available in hobby stores; if you don’t have access to those you can use coins, for exam-ple. DP can be saved between sessions, so the GM should make a note of his pool at the end of each session. There is no cap on how many DP the GM can have. Darkness Points Without Prayer: The GM can acquire DPs in other ways as well – at portal jumps, during travel in the Dark between the Stars, and when players use mystical powers. Read more in Chapter 15.ONLY ONE CHANCE
As a rule, you only have one chance at succeeding with an action. When you have rolled the dice – and prayed to your Icon – you can’t take another shot at doing the exact same thing again. You must change your approach to reaching the goal, or wait for the circumstances to change in some tangible way. Another PC could attempt to succeed where you failed, though. In combat (Chapter 5), the GM should be more permissive. You can keep attacking the same enemy turn after turn, as long as you describe what you do differently to up your chances.MODIFICATION
Sometimes, external factors help you reach your goal, giving you extra dice to roll. Sometimes, they work against you, lowering your dice total. These factors are called modifiers. A +1 modifier means you get 1 extra die, a +2 modifi-ers means you get 2 extra dice, and so on. A -1 modifier means you roll 1 less die, a -2 modifier means 2 less dice, and so on. There can be several active modifiers at once – add them together to get your modifier total. A +2 and a -1 equals a +1. There are four things that can result in modifiers:◆ Your gear
◆ The difficulty of your action
◆ Assistance from others
◆ Prayer and preparatory prayer (page 55)
GEAR
Good gear can give you positive modifiers – usually between +1 and +3. Lists of weapons and other gear can be found in Chapter 6. Modifiers to Medicurgy from medical gear are listed on page 95.DIFFICULTY
The exact difficulty of your action is often not that important – only challenging actions should demand dice rolls in the first place, after all. But there may be situations when the GM wishes to emphasize that some circumstance or other either makes your action harder or easier to do. Use Table 3.4 for guidance. In combat (Chapter 5), the rules often give you modifiers, for example, depending on the distance between your firing position and your target, or when you set up an ambush for your enemies. Some talents (Chapter 4) can also give you positive modifiers.HELP FROM OTHERS
Other PCs or NPCs with at least a level 1 in the skill you are about to test can help you succeed. They must state that they are helping you before you roll the dice. It must also fit with the story – the person assisting you must be where you are and have a reasonable chance of affecting your action. The GM has final say. For every person helping you, you get a +1 modifier. A maximum of three people can help with any one roll, which means that the highest modifier others can give you is +3. Combat: Helping someone perform a slow action counts as a slow action for you as well. Helping someone with a normal or fast action counts as a normal action for you. Command: The Command skill (page 63) can be used for more effective assistance. Instead of the automatic +1, a Commander provides a modifier equal to the number of sixes on her Command roll – given that you follow her order, that is. Commanding is always a normal action in combat NPCs can help each other just like PCs. Having NPCs act as groups rather than individuals is a good way to manage large groups of NPCs in combat (Chapter 5).SIMULTANEOUS ACTIONS
You and the other PCs cannot help each other when you are acting simultaneously, that is when you are performing the same action at the same time – for example when you are trying to sneak past a guard (infiltration), or when you walk into an ambush (observation). Then you must all roll separately. If the outcome of your roll is really good, some skills allow you to share your success with a friend, who in turn does not have to roll. You can help someone this way even if that person has already failed her roll.OPPOSED ROLLS
Sometimes, a six will not be enough to pass a skill test. In these cases, you also have to beat an enemy’s roll. This is called an opposed roll. To win an opposed roll, you have to roll more sixes than your opponent. Each of your opponent’s sixes cancels out one of yours. Only you (the attacker) can pray to the Icons on an opposed roll. Sometimes, you and your opponent will test different skills, sometimes the same. Opposed rolls are always used when you roll for manipula-tion or infiltration, and when someone uses these skills against you. The GM can also call for an opposed roll when he deems it appropriate, for example force vs force to resolve some armwrestling. Combat: In combat (Chapter 5), an opposed roll only counts as an action for you (the attacker), not for your opponent (the defender).Describe your action
In Coriolis, you create your story together. Testing a skill should be a dramatic high point. Start by describing what you intend to do so that everyone knows what is at stake. Then roll the dice. Read the result and describe the outcome – what you do, what you say, what you think, how your enemy reacts. If you send a prayer to the Icons, describe your prayer. Take the dramatic initiative, don’t wait for the GM – only if you overstep your dice result should he stop you.
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