Is there a right way to do "Failing Forward"?

The idea is that, say, suppose you're in a superhero game trying to stop a supervillain. You may not capture him, but you do get some sort of clue as to where he's going next, or something that can identify him, or something that will make him come towards you, rather than have failure not tie-in with future narratives.

OK, but you don't need to hijack the rules for that. Maybe instead like they fail to pick the lock, no more lockpicks, and here comes the guard. If they kill him they get the keys and can just open the door with those...

You don't need to change the rules.

It's not about changing the rules? It's purely a GMing style thing.

Well that other guy described a failed roll to pick lock as a success in picking the lock but you get ambushed while doing it. That's not changing the rules?

Fail forward was the worst name the concept could have been given. The basic idea is to never cause failure to stop the story or the game. Something must happen.

Faghots misinterpret "forward" as "towards PC goals".

Take the locked door example, when you don't fail forward, players just retry picking the lock until they roll a success. Failing forward is failing the lockpick roll means trouble happens or that instead of just hard moping until the party rolls 20 times to succeed anyway.

Hell. One method of Fail Forward is to go No And.

No, you fail to pick the lock And some tuckers kobolds come along, better get out of there!

The story moves forward.

That's a bad example of failing forward. Ignore that guy.

Star Wars RPGs do it right.
In fact, the Star Wars RPGs do a ton of things right.

So basically it's just "that didn't work, something else happens?"
How is this different from normal?
I have never been in a game where we got stumped by a locked door and then everything just stopped. But it wasnt the GM moving the players on, it was the players themselves.
>bash down door
>find the guy with the key
>climb in through window instead
>etc etc

Being fair, it could still be within the rules. The GM can call skill checks for what he likes, and define it however he chooses. The roll could be for 'Do you unlock it in time/smoothly enough' rather than just 'Do you pass or fail'.

Shitty GM's and shitty players. There are rather a lot of them.

Skill checks really should just be removed from RPGs altogether.

Why?

I agree. It's like, kids these days. The master plan/GM's railroad goes through the door, so players have to succeed even though they fail. Thinking outside the box? Finding another solution? Nah. Too difficult I suppose.

...But that isn't actually what failing forward means?

Limit it to specific circumstances. I use it as a consolation prize for missing a roll by 1. In a 2D6 system it significantly broadens the range of values which yield a response beyond "you fail", and reinforces the importance of not taking zero, much less a -1 buydown, in a stat.

See
What is the difference from normal?

I agree with you in a semantic sense, but Im curious what you mean by that.

>perception check to spot something
>oh you failed well I guess you don't see the cool island on the horizon to explore

>jump check
>well you invested in this skill since 1st level so you can jump 30 feet now lol
>you failed to jump over the gap? lol you fell and died roll a new character

>climb check
>okay you climb and fall

>knowledge check
>somehow a high level wizard has never heard of X monster that is very common
>obscuring actually cool information to drive the game forward

>lockpicking check
>fail
>ok I just roll again unless my lockpick broke or something

Also the existence of skills, in D&D at least, completely invalidated certain classes (like ranger, which has to be a glorified druid just to stay relevant now). Or rogue.

not that guy but yeah seems like it. Doesn't matter to me if the players don't open the door or whatever and they think of a other way cool but I think everybody is on the same page when its not a good idea to tell a player to keep rolling if it doesn't work the first time

because what you're describing as 'normal' isn't. It's a GMing technique that some people learned but other people didn't. Giving it a name and explaining it as part of GMing advice has value, especially for new or inexperienced GMs.

Unfortunately it's often explained badly, hence the misunderstandings and dumb stuff in this thread.

But that's nothing to do with including skill checks, for any of those examples. That's just shitty GMing and not knowing when to call a skill check. The idea behind skill checks isn't that you call them for everything, but that you call them for when there's an interesting consequence to both success and failure and an element of chance adds to the game. If something has to happen or be noticed, having skill checks in the game doesn't stop you offering automatic success anyway.

And can you explain the latter point? It doesn't make sense to me.

It's not a GM technique. It's just expecting the players to put some thought behind it.

Star Wars does this better by separating rolls that determine whether an action succeeds, and rolls that determine how well or poorly an action succeeds or fails.

So you can succeed excellently and blow open the door instantly
Or you can succeed poorly and blow up your multitool as the door opens
Or you can fail excellently and stall the turbolifts to slow your pursuers while attempting to open the door again
Or you can fail utterly and electrocute yourself

But it is a GMing technique. The GM putting thought into alternate solutions, or different ways things could go if the primary one fails, is useful. Even the most proactive players might get stumped sometimes, and having something to present to the players as an alternative is useful for keeping the pace of the game up.

Nope, those dice are garbage and your example is a pretty good reason as to why.

What I described as normal isn't a GM technique. It's just executing the rules. You failed picking the lock, now what? Now you find another way in. What is it? The ball is now in the players' court. Not the GM's.

What you describe on the other hand is the GM getting them through the door regardless of what they roll or do. Sounds gay to me as I said.

...But that's not what failing forward is. As has been explained multiple times in this thread.

>What you describe on the other hand is the GM getting them through the door regardless of what they roll or do
But the players are the ones trying to get through the door in the first place

Then what makes it different?? Because that the players simply fail picking a lock and then the entire campaign is over - that simply does not happen. They will do something else if they cant pick the lock.

But that isn't true. There are cases, with bad or inexperienced players and bad or inexperienced GMs, where things will just end.

It might not be the end of the campaign, but it's something that has plagued attempts at mysteries in games a lot, too, which is why GUMSHOE is famous for solving them by having important clues being found automatically. An inexperienced or thoughtless GM asks for a roll, everyone fails, and they simply abandon the plot hook because of it.

It's dumb, bad GMing but it does happen.

As a more general point, it's still valuable as a GM to consider 'What happens if the players fail here?'. If events don't go their way, how does that lead the story forward, what does that lead into happening next. That's what failing forward is about. Taking the time and consideration to keep the campaign moving rather than getting bogged down.

It's not a new concept. But it's a succinct name for a concept that's useful for new GMs to learn.

This kind of criticism is always funny to me; that people hate the only PnP that focuses on narrative and not autistically trying to make your numbers bigger like you're playing a fucking video game, and when you ask them why it's because they don't like the dice.

Wow. Stop thinking. Obviously it's not a good idea to put a name on it, especially this name. I mean look at the thread. The GM should keep a possibility for the story to keep moving? Sure. But what you suggest as advice for new GMs is something that says that it's the GM's responsibility to move said story forward. Your advice will just result in GMs being more willing to railroad.

But that's not what failing forward means. Read the damn thread again. There are shit examples, but there are a few good ones which should help you understand what you're misunderstanding. Failing forward is not railroading.

>The GM should keep a possibility for the story to keep moving? Sure
You'd be surprised at how many GMs don't do this.
Yes, user, YOU know this, there are others who do not. You are speaking from a position of knowledge, and can't see how someone would not know what you do, or would need to learn about it themselves.
You need to check yourself a moment, and not think what is obvious to you is obvious to everyone.

Then tell me a good example. The players failed a lock picking roll. Now what.

Yes, but then that should be the advice. A possibility. Something for the players to find. Not something forced on them, unless there is only one chance at it.

Not enough information for a meaningful answer.

And, as had been said above, it's up to the GM to define what success and failure on a roll actually mean.

Every good DM already does it without having to say it and retards on Veeky Forums use the term as bait.

An example is something that you make up. I already made up mine, in which the players had some choices between bashing down the door, finding the key and climbing in through the window. All of these are player initiatives. Now its your turn though.

Yes, the GM makes up everything. He can take a "fail" roll to mean perfect success if he wants to. We both know that we are now talking about a pick lock roll that is made openly with all players knowing about the roll target.

Look, just give an example of what you call the GM technique.

>The idea behind skill checks isn't that you call them for everything, but that you call them for when there's an interesting consequence to both success and failure and an element of chance adds to the game.
That happens so rarely, though. And it is also rarely explained as such in an RPG book. And rules-heavy games often leave out rules for the kinds of things that character actually use the fucking skills for, while rules-light RPGs just give a bland list of TNs in increments of 2 or 5, with "hard" "very hard" and other miscellaneous bullshit adjectives alongside it. The result is, the GM having to use his own judgement in either instance, in which case he might as well forgo the skill check because by the time he says "uhh you should probably make a Notice check for that" he has to decide the TN in his head, and even with a default he has to decide exactly what success means. Shit like EotE () makes this even worse where the GM has to improvise what happens and ALSO add qualifiers based on what some gay-ass dice say, for the result of "haha you electrocute yourself cause nat1" or else make up new shit that wasn't even in the area to try to follow the rules which say something interesting MUST happen here.

So many skill checks are just boring. I can see why they exist but honestly they just serve as a "can I continue the story" moment if you use them as the book says. Or if you use them narratively, you can sometimes get better results. But "fail forward" is fucking retarded because sometimes a PC says "I want to do X and roll for it" and if they fuck up there really aren't any consequences. They just failed to do it. Just because you failed to disable a lock, doesn't mean it explodes in your face, or a guard materializes out of nowhere even though you killed them all already.

None of that is an argument against skill checks existing, and most of it is just you expressing your preferred playstyle. Which is fine! But a lot of people disagree. Which is why skill checks are a thing a lot of people like in RPGs.

As for the last point, ranger is invalidated by the fact that other classes can take the survival (and, worse, tracking) skills if they want to. Ranger is all about outdoor survival and being able to scout around in the wilderness. Take that away from him, and what niche does he fill? He's a worse fighter, he's a weak druid, and his animal companion is shit. Might as well dump him in the trash. He'd only be tier 2-3 in 5e if morons who think spellcasting automatically equals tier 2-3 without realizing most of his spells aren't even that good. Ranger has gotten more and more spellcasting as the editions went on because the devs realized the class was shit otherwise. Whereas in AD&D if you wanted to track and survive outside, you wanted a ranger. A 3.5 barbarian can be just as good at survival and tracking as a ranger can by taking a feat and a skill that almost all barbarians take, and completely obliviate the ranger's role. It gets almost as bad in Pathfinder where a wizard can not only do knock but probably spare the skill points to do disable device and only be 15% worse at it than the rogue, which rapidly disappears at higher levels when a +3 difference in bonus just doesn't matter that much anymore.

Blame D&D but I've had similar issues in GURPS and Savage Worlds.

Not that user, but it's simple. If your player fails his lockpicking check, rather than fail to pick the lock, he made enough noise that the troll sleeping behind the door got curious and pulled it off its hinges. Something like that. The point is task resolution doesn't need to result in success or failure at the task. It's an important rule to learn for systems like DnD 5e, where the RNG is king because the mechanics are game-like and you can't make a rogue that will never fail at picking a lock at level 1. Making the rogue be shit at picking locks against the player's will because he's got shit luck is shit GMing.

I don't think that invalidates ranger at all? Having skills doesn't mean other people can capture the same conceptual space, where it's a blend of all the capabilities you listed, a mix of the martial and magical with a strong focus on working with nature.

It's not always well designed, but it's perfectly possible to have a ranger class with its own distinct, interesting identity regardless of the presence of survival and nature as skills.

So again, as I said, it's the GM getting them through the door, instead of letting them fail and then leaving it up to the players how to proceed. Which is awful.
(I assume here that he players can deal with a troll, right? Otherwise the whole thing really would end...)

Why is it awful? The players made a choice, and there were consequences for that choice.

Honestly this. It feels like everyone in this thread is being deliberately obtuse.

If you can't wrap your head around what "failing forward" looks like, then watch any episode of Archer.

>why is railroading awful
Gee, I dunno

How is that any more of a railroad then, "here's this new way forward that's easier but you didn't notice before because I didn't need you to"?

...But it's not railroading?

Railroading is forcing the players down a path you choose.

This is having things happen based on player choices and actions. It's literally the opposite of railroading.

I leave it up to the players on how to proceed with dealing with a troll. If you don't understand why changing the situation is an important GM skill, you're a shit GM, or a retard pretending he can tell GMs what's what.

Another important GMing rule, at least for me, is to majorly change the situation at every turn in combat. Either new enemies appear, the battlefield is transformed by some means, hazards become apparent, enemies change their tactics, allies come under attack, etc. Stagnating the game and making the players come up with a way to keep it moving is shit GMing because you're the one with the cards. They can't introduce anything new without your permission.

Hey, at least you chose to shitpost with a Veeky Forums meme.
Good hustle, Asspats all around.

You know, it would save everyone a lot of headaches if galling forward was instead called "the show must go on"

Maybe it should be rule 0.5 or something.

It's called walking.

I dunno, pulling shit out of your ass, especially so blatantly, doesn't sound like good GMing. The situation should change if appropriate. If you're fighting through a castle then obviously it makes sense if more guys start showing up. But if they're fighting some orcs in the woods and you just go "nah this is too boring, okay guys three dozen more orcs show up!" when you're just kinda being an asshole GM.

>Every good DM already does it

Does what, exactly?

>without having to say it

Can you at least say how it's done?

Who said anything about that? It's up to the players to ask "can I bash the door in?", "is there a window", etc

We already established that they won't fail to deal with the troll. So yes, the GM decided that they are going through that door, regardless of how.

My aim when GMing is to make the players feel good. I have noticed that sure, sometimes, having a troll rip out the door from inside will do that. But usually, it's when they feel that they overcame problems together. If the main obstacle here is getting in, not fighting the troll, then letting them fail and finding another way is, in my experience, more likely to end up making them feel good.

Don't call it anything. The show will go on anyway. Or what, the players and GM would just sit there and stare at each other for three hours and then go home?

>We already established that they won't fail to deal with the troll. So yes, the GM decided that they are going through that door, regardless of how.

...No? The whole thing starts with 'The player tries to pick the lock'. It's a player driven action.

In a way that satisfies players and eliminates the boring treadmill of people attempting the same check (especially when that doesn't make sense).

I find that generally it can be a good idea for the players to have at least a vague idea of what's at stake or how things might go South should they fail. Sometimes it can be useful to give them input on it as well, which also lets them feel more involved and have a small degree of coauthorship of things.
You won't feel bad about 's trolls if they were your idea, right?

Obviously, if you make the door open anyway but have them be attacked by a troll, it's to have them pass the door. Are you saying you'd put a troll there if it would beat them?

If you tried it you'd be singing a different tune. I don't play roleplaying games for the tactical combat, especially not if it's boring trash like DnD. I play it for the characters and the collaboation in telling the story, and constantly shifting stakes is the way the game stays fun for me. If I wanted to put a bunch of stat blocks on squares and play fights with miniatures I'd go buy a wargame.

You fight orcs in the forest? Well, it turns out you attracted the attention of the rest of the orcs. Eventually the orcs get tired of trying to fight you straight on, so they start a fire to smoke you out of your formation. The fire scares the woodland inhabitants, causing a stampede. The fire becomes a hazard as even the orcs start to retreat. Now you have to get away from the fire while animals struggle to get away at the same time. A PC gets pinned under a fallen branch if they fail a check. Etc, etc

No? But that doesn't make it railroading. You're reacting to player action, not forcing them down a predetermined path.

Explain in 20 words or less how you make 'you fail to progress past the door' fun and interesting for the players. 'I dont' is not a valid response.

>I have never been in a game where we got stumped by a locked door
Luckily you've never had a DM who lets players reroll until they succeed
>Player: I pick the lock. 8.
>DM: you fail to pick the lock.
>Player: I'll try again. 6.
>DM:you fail to pick the lock.
>Player: I'll try again.
Repeat.
There are seriously DMs who do this.

You're attempting to be deconstructionist to proclaim his idea railroading, but you fail to realize that it makes literally all prepared or curated game content railroading. Especially other ways of bypassing the locked door like windows or brute force: "You're just adding a meaningless imposition that superficially impedes them but they just get past anyways because you want them to."

Even if the idea is "they might run away from a hard guy" or "they might come back when they're stronger" this dishonest line of reasoning ultimately just comes out to "you're thinking about how things can resolve or progress, therefore railroading."

I... yes? Why wouldn't I? I put the troll there to create an encounter. Maybe they choose to escape from the troll because it's too strong. Maybe the troll's struggling threatens damaging the dungeon's foundations, and the ceiling starts to collapse. You're thinking too small because you don't know any better. Learn the technique, then you can shit on it if you don't like it, but don't make a strawman of it in your head purposefully stupid so you can hate it for no reason, you stupid faggot.

>"After your third attempt, you accidentally break your lockpick."
There, now they have to try something else to get inside. This isn't rocket surgery.

Their path is through the door though. And you the GM makes that happen.

I don't... but the players do. They are making the story happen. I as GM just provide the canvas for them to paint on.

On some rulesets, it's OK I guess.

>backup lockpicks
>adamantine lockpick
>buying a thieve's kit
Back to the lock picking.

...Do you know what the term 'Railroading' means, in an RPG context?

That's a meaningful consequence of failure that redirects them to other solutions. Which is failing forward.

Let's play a game.

I'll describe an attempted action, and you describe how to properly have it "fail forward," followed by you describing another action.

If another person agrees with how you decided to fail forward, they'll then fail forward your action before describing a new action, and so on and so on.

>Player tries to discover the bandit's lair by gathering information at the guard barracks

>I don't
Shit DM.

Who said the path is through the door, you simpering retard. This is reacting to the players' interest in the door, not my railroad going through it. You are so goddamn stupid.

Yes. You do it in a game, instead of never, ever playing games and instead spending all your time complaining on Veeky Forums.

I hope I cleared that up for all of you.

Then the lock is broken by the adamantine pick, or the lockpick breaks whilst inside the lock, there are plenty of ways to get them to try something else.

I'm not the guy arguing against it, I just came to this thread because I had no idea what the term meant, but the examples given made me pretty confused.

>The bandits have an informant in the barracks, and the PCs spot them inconspicuously checking to see if he's being followed on the way to tell the bandits about the PCs trying to find them.

They made you confused because you're a shit GM or not even a GM at all

I meant conspicuously. My bad.
.

'The players failing a roll/challenge/encounter should not leave them without a way to progress'

It's that simple. It's not always true, and there's a lot of nuance in its application, but it basically boils down to that. If, for whatever reason, the players have to get through a door for the story to continue, 'You can't get through the door' and being presented no alternative path is boring, shitty GMing.

The difference is it's allowing them to come up with their own solutions, not ones presented by the GM.

Yes. see who is saying that it's the GM who is supposed to create the story, not the players.

Obviously they are trying to get through, and now the troll opened the door for them. If the troll is going to kill them all, that's not "failing forwards" in any respect.

>I'm not the guy arguing against it
Oh, didn't necessarily think you were, I just meant that bit's not a bad example of failing forward. Didn't mean to come across as curt as I did. It's a bad habit of mine when speaking only in text.

>Learn the technique, then you can shit on it
Learning railroading is the first thing you do. Then you leave it behind since it's not fun for the players.

Well, I'll bite. What makes me so bad?

...No? That's not what's being said at all?

You cannot be this stupid

Which post of the ones I quoted are you referring to?

Not what I said dum dum. Watch, I can do the same thing.

>I don't have a stake in the story or fun of the players at my table.

Since this is what you believe you are a shit DM.

The idea that the GM should be creating the story, not the players.

Which is absolutely nothing to do with, and not supported by, the concept of failing forward.

It's failing forward into the troll encounter. Failing forward into a situation that isn't just trying to get through a stupid fucking door, because trying to get through a door is boring as shit. I don't want to sit there watching you try to kick it down, or set it on fire, or hammer away at the hinges. You're not cleverer for it, and I don't give a shit about that kind of challenge. As a player I wouldn't want to have the game grind to a halt so we can examine our options to get through a stupid door not even knowing what's behind it.

>The difference is it's allowing them to come up with their own solutions, not ones presented by the GM.
You're assuming failing forward precludes player self direction.

> thinking that railroading is fun for the players
Yeah maybe if you are like Tolkien or something. But you are not.

Of course I as GM also wants to have fun. And I do, in the worldbuilding, and whenever the players enjoy the world that I created for them.