Way Awful failures and Boxcars results House rules

Games Discussion Feng Shui
1

I have been a bit frustrated by the "wishy washy" nature of the rules concerning Boxcars and Way Awful results so I have created/modified them for my game.

Boxcars
When you roll boxcars, meaning that both the plus and minus dice come up as 6s, something especially remarkable happens. Re-roll both dice. If another boxcars result comes up, ignore that, too, rolling until you get something other than boxcars. Boxcars wildly pump up successes and horribly worsen failures. The GM may describe this crazy event or ask you to do it, maybe adjusting your description to better fit her knowledge of the situation.

If you get a positive serve from a boxcars result and your action check succeeds, your opponent/s lose shots equal to your swerve. And if you kill your opponent in the attack and he can not, therefore, take shot loss you gain an immediate 0 shot cost extra attack.

If you get a negative swerve from a boxcars result and your action check fails, you lose shots equal to the absolute value your swerve. These "lost" shots can carry forward to the next sequence.
Sorcery is treated slightly differently in that when the negative swerve results in the failure of the action, you suffer Backlash but do not lose shots.

Example: You roll boxcars then roll again and get a 2 on the positive die and a 5 on the negative die, a swerve of -3, this results in your action check failing. This costs you another 3 shots in addition to the action shot cost.

<<<<>>>>

Way Awful Failures
You get a Way Awful failure when you get a negative Action Result (almost invariably from one or more rerolled sixes on your minus die).*

You lose shots equal to the absolute value your negative action result.
Sorcery is treated differently on a Way Awful failure, you suffer Backlash but do not lose shots.

Example: After rolling a string of negative sixes for your swerve and adding your skill you end up with a total of -5, a Way Awful result! This costs you another 5 shots in addition to the action shot cost.

* Please note this is now the ONLY way you can get a Way Awful result.
** Ignore the Gun Malfunction rules for Way Awful results, this is replaced by these "new" rules above :wink:

Now these shot losses may exceed the "normal" penalty for Boxcars and Way Awful results but I think it gives degrees of failure or success. Just how wildly your success was pumped up and how horribly worst your failure was :slight_smile:

2

Edited to fix up some errors.

3

Personally this sounds like it would make it easy to take the simple, mechanical path whenever boxcars are rolled. I don't think I'd prefer this method to the standard method of just improvising some crazy stuff that happens.

But if you think it's worth doing, definitely try it out and see how it feels! Nothing wrong with that.

4

I had the same problem.

In my first two sessions, I houseruled that the first positive 6 counts (rather than being cancelled by the negative 6), but I feel it's not enough. I mean, it's a +6 to the outcome, but that's only one more than if they'd rolled -1 and +6 ; there's hardly any Oomph in rolling boxcars if the result is that close to a normal, if optimal, outcome.

Then I though I'd rather do something like doubling the weapon damage (or adding half the weapon damage, because doubling sounds a bit much), or auto-disarming the Foe (but there are Schticks to do that so it steals their thunder).

Eventually, I devised this.

it's not that big mechanically (especially if the first 6 doesn't count), but wouldn't it feel big to the player to think "woah, my hit is so perfect I negate his Toughness" ?

Do you think that's balanced ? Should I count the first 6 AND ignore the Toughness ?

5

Well boxcars is not really that big a thing in FS2. Yes it has the potential to be awesome but seldom is.
That is why I like my shot cost solution, it gives you degrees of awesomeness.

6

And outside of combat, how would you do it ? Since shots don't matter.

7

Just go with what the rules currently say - make something up :wink:

That being said FS2 is all about action, so the number of times you actually roll outside of combat are very few, in my games hardly ever, if at all ......
Between action scenes you are just setting up the next action scene, so making players roll in that situation is actually pointless, just point them in the right direction and let them go for it :smiley:
If you really need a reason just pick on a character or characters with the right skill/background/melodramatic hook and have them automatically discover the "clue" that gets them to the next turn. Making someone roll to discover it, allows for the for the chance of failure, this doesn't happen in Action Movies, the heroes go where they are needed or think they are needed.

8

Yeah you're right, mechanics don't really matter outside combat. I was thinking of, for example, a way awful failure on a roll to avoid a car or jumping from a building, you know ? I'll just worsen the damage, like upping the level of damage.

9

In both these examples, losing shots works well, I see no need to increase damage.

  1. Avoiding the car :"You jump behind a dumpster to avoid being rundown by the car, the car sideswipes the dumpster pinning you between the now mangled dumpster and the wall. As you struggle to free yourself, you lose ?? shots."
  2. Jumping from a building: "You make a spectacular failure as your jump goes wrong and you plummet towards the group, entangling yourself in this week's washing, advertisings banners and TV cables. It takes you ?? shots to free yourself."

Very Jackie Chanish :wink:

10

No, I meant, these situations would be outside combat ; in a foot chase or a simple, non-combat action sequence, you know ?

11

Well, in FS2 a foot chase is only a mobile combat sequence, same as a car chase. :wink: