Failure and Consequences

Typically, failure is not fun. Sure, occasionally it results in a more interesting story, but often the player who rolled a 1 feels frustrated or humiliated. He is supposed to be a hero, but in this moment he feels like anything but!

Some games advocate different ways to handle failure. Some say that failure shouldn't really mean failure, but instead be a chance to introduce a complication; other games prefer the simplicity offered by a "yes or no" approach to situations. Both have their merits, but that is not what this article will be about.

Often, when discussing "failing forward", another major component of skill checks is ignored. Regardless of the result, every action taken by the characters in your game should have consequences.

What's the Difference?

Consequence is not the same as success/failure. Regardless of how it goes for you, lying to a guard in order to convince him to let you pass will result in consequences when that guard eventually learns the truth. Failure tends to move up the timetable on consequences, but success doesn't entirely eliminate them.

Take the common example of a locked door barring the party's passage. There are several ways to get through that door: pick the lock, break it down, knock and politely ask to be let in... the list goes on. Without consequences, it does not matter how the party seeks passage; all that matters is whether they wind up on the other side of the door. Essentially, the choice is rendered a non-issue; you may as well just pick the highest number every time.

Consequences breathe a sense of verisimilitude into the game. In our above example, each approach results in further complications beyond opening the door. Picking the lock is the subtlest but it takes time, tools, and skill; however, in addition to being the least likely to give away your presence to anyone who may be on the other side of the door, it also leaves the door and the lock intact, so that the players can then close it behind them. Breaking down the door is quick and dirty, requiring nothing more than brute force; it is also loud, and gives any enemies plenty of time to prepare if the door doesn't go down on the first hit. Knocking and asking to be let in may seem ridiculous, but in some situations it is the best approach; perhaps the characters are great at impersonation, or learned a password earlier in the adventure. In each case, success means the party winds up on the other side of the door, but the circumstances surrounding them are vastly different.

Now imagine the party must get past a guard. Once again, there are several options: maybe they forge authorization and bluff their way in, maybe they try to sneak past unnoticed, or maybe they knock the guard out. Maybe they try to bribe the guard, or try to befriend him so he'll let them in as a favor. Without consequence, it comes down to which approach has the most favorable numbers; though the players may still choose to roleplay, the GM is declaring through her actions that this session is more about the metagame than the story.

Now imagine how she introduces consequences. While it is likely the hardest, an attempt to befriend the guard is least likely to come back and bite the party. Lying may be easy, but eventually the truth will come out and then, at the very least, they will have made a new enemy. Sneaking past circumvents any interaction and allows a chance at anonymity, but means not having a safety net if they're caught where they don't belong. And so on.

Get On With It!

The good news is, most of us already introduce consequences without thinking about it. It comes naturally as part of imagining the world of the game; sneaking past the guard in our example means you have to stay hidden, while forging authorization and bluffing your way past means you can work out in the open... at least for a little while. Some consequences are obvious extensions of the triggering action.

The bad news is, it's not always quite that easy. Sometimes, the consequences can be greatly delayed and thus are easy to forget or unintentionally ignore, such as our door example: breaking it down means the party's passage is obvious when an enemy patrol wanders by an hour later. The more often consequences go unmentioned or unnoticed, the more the GM reinforces the mechanics of the game at the expense of the story.

That's not to say that every single action needs to carry a consequence. Sometimes a cigar can just be a cigar; if the party sleeps at the Red Dragon Inn rather than the Chartreuse Cow Cottage, they may wind up attracting the attention of the Coalition Against Generic Names, or maybe they just get a night's sleep and continue on through the story the following day. At the end of the day, it's all about what makes for a better story.

But if you're going to ignore potential consequences for an action, do so intentionally and knowingly.

So What About Failure? The Title Says...

Fair enough. There are three general camps on how you can handle failure.

"Failing forward" means that, rather than bring the pace to a halt because Lady Luck is giving the players a cold shoulder, use a failed check as a chance to introduce a complication while still allowing the obstacle to be circumvented. Rather than failing a Lockpicking check resulting in a still-locked door, the rogue manages to pick the lock... just in time for a patrol of monsters to round the corner and notice them.

This keeps the game exciting by keeping the action moving, and also mitigates any hard feelings a player may have when he has a bad night with the Dice Gods. The problem is, it can lock a GM into thinking that consequences and complications are only the result of failure, and thus avoid using them when the action succeeds.

The second approach is to not roll the dice when an obstacle positively has to be overcome. After all, if a failure brings everything to a screeching halt, why even allow that failure to happen in the first place? If a locked door bars the only route forward in your environment, then the rogue automatically picks the lock when he tries; it's as if the door isn't locked at all. A similar approach is to allow unlimited attempts, letting the player re-roll until he finally succeeds.

The advantage with this approach is that the pace is never at risk. The obvious disadvantage is that it renders the player character skills less important; if the character is always going to succeed when it matters most, then why even bother putting points in the skills necessary to accomplish such tasks? Essentially, "why bother learning to pick locks if every door is unlocked?"

Finally, you can let the dice fall where they may. If a skill check fails, the character fails. The rogue breaks his lockpick off in the keyhole, the door remains locked, and no further attempt can be made.

This grants actions a sense of gravity: you'd better roll well, or you're not going to accomplish what you want. It does, however, carry a risk of stymieing the story's pace, or even shutting it down altogether. The GM has to design things in such a way that there are always alternatives to try, whether different paths to take or multiple approaches to each obstacle. Nonetheless, on those rare nights when Lady Luck isn't even answering your calls, even the best-prepared game could wind up stuck after countless failed rolls.

What Do You Recommend?

There is no one right answer: it depends on the situation.

Sometimes, the risk inherent in a check isn't about whether it will succeed or fail, but lies in external circumstances; in this case, "failing forward" is probably the way to go. It's only a matter of time before a character with the right tools can set fire to something flammable, but if the cops have received an anonymous tip about an arson attempt, and are coming to investigate, you'd better hope you succeed your Pyromaniac check, lest you get caught red-handed.

When an action is mundane, or there is no imminent danger, it's probably better not to call for a die roll at all; it would just serve as an unnecessary loading screen.

If the GM has several strong ideas for potential consequences for a variety of approaches, or if the path taken by the party has a severe impact on how the story progresses, then it's best to let failure be failure. The party can always regroup and find another way around the obstacle.

So That's It Then.

That's it then.

How do you handle failure in your games? Do you have any stories about a night when you just could not roll for the life of you? Leave them in the comments.