Alternate Scrutiny and Revelation

[Moinen]

So I’ve came to a conclusion that existing mechanics are boring on their own (like most of the extended actions) and while you can create in-story tension that makes use of those mechanics to spice the story there is a lot of moments where it is really not so interesting to roll so much.
I could say that characters simply discover everything after enough time but this not fun either.
This is my very early draft of one-roll mechanics

Mage that has a luxury of time can just relax and slowly unwind the mystery. It’s an extended action but with only one roll. Modifiers are capped at 5 each
Dice pool: Gnosis + Arcanum
Modifiers: +1 die for every point of mana spent; +1 die for every additional gnosis interval spent; 1-5 feeling observed or hastened; ??
Exceptional Success: Add one success

Compare result with Opacity. One success can be allocated to uncover Surface Informations and the rest is the number of steps of uncovered Opacity/Deep Information.
Example: Master Ged takes time to understand the Mystery of the invisible paintings on the walls of the always dark tombs of Atuan. He rolls Gnosis 6 + Arcanum 5 + 5 Gnosis Intervals acquiring 5 successes which is Exceptional, he adds one more for this fact. With 6 points he can easily uncover the truth that lies behind Opacity 5 Mystery (1 point goes for Surface and 5 for Deep)

What do you think?

[Justin Sane]

So, Revelation would use Opacity as a penalty to the roll, while Scrutiny would use Opacity as a "Withstand"? Could work (and is better than how we run it at my table), I'll run some math when I get off work.

[Moinen]

Hmm. Revelation could still be rolled like it is by RAW I think. But Opacity in this case is not really a Withstand (my bad, I should have point it out in an Example) since it wouldn't be very good to have a all or nothing scenario after a day of scrutiny. You rather uncover Opacity up to acquired successes: 4 successes will uncover 4 Steps of 7 Opacity Mystery leaving 3 Steps unknown.

[Justin Sane]

I think Withstand would work better. As you're saying, a starting mage (Gnosis 1 + Arcana 2) could, given enough time, completely Scrutinize an Opacity 10 Mystery. If you're okay with that run with it, but it wouldn't fly at my table
Using Withstand, in your example, those 4 Successes vs Opacity 7 wouldn't be enough, but 7 Successes vs Opacity 4 would reduce the Opacity to 1.

[Moinen]

Let's see. Remember that modifiers can be no higher then 5 each. Gnosis 1 + Arcanum 2 + 5 Gnosis intervals + 5 mana spent = 13 which makes ~4 successes.

Edit: If you want it harsher you can cap all modifiers together at +5 like in spellcasting.
I might be wrong but isn't it possible for a gnosis 1, arcanum 2 mage to uncover any Opacity given enough time? I know that number of rolls is capped on his pool size but he can come back after a while with a fresh mind. Can he?

[Justin Sane]

I think I misunderstood something then.
Starting Mage vs Opacity 10, can reliably reduce it to Opacity 6. Can he continue the next day? At which Opacity would he start?

[Moinen]

Yes. That is a problem I'm thinking about too. The whole idea about this system is that you roll once not that you increase the interval. I think that the next day it should still be Opacity 10 so if you don't have new modifiers you shouldn't roll.

[Mrmdubois]

I put my players (Beginning Mages) up against Opacity 4 series of spells. They couldn't crack it. At some point I just called it and said the mystery was too complex for them to crack at the moment.

[nofather]

Yeah we've actually had a lot of fun with the Scrutiny Mage Sight, it was probably some of the most tense rolling situations in the game outside of combat. And knowing that failing just made the mystery more opaque, potentially impossible to see through, really helped.

[Justin Sane]

Moinen Actually, I don't think the breakpoint for a new roll should be having a new dicepool - instead, it should be getting another clue on the Mystery (I think there's something in the corebook that mentions this, or it might be one of my houserules, investigation can reveal clues which lower the Mystery's Opacity). That way, a failure isn't a roadblock, it just leads to more plot.

I'll just say using extra Ritual Intervals for extra dice is the same as "exceeding safe allotment of rolls" and will contaminate the Mystery with the mage's Nimbus (after the roll, of course), and say there's no cap on adding dice with Mana (that said, I already require a Wisdom roll to see if you can recover spent mana).

I think this will work out great at my table, let me know how it goes on yours

[Moinen]

I believe that it was a sneak peak from Signs of Sorcery but I can't find it. I've read it but wasn't really ready for this mechanics. Thaumaturgy took a priority. Maybe someone could post it here?

I really dig your Wisdom roll to recover some mana. I'll be playing this week and I look forward to see this mechanics in play.

[arthexis]

In my games I use the same roll for both scrutiny and revelation, each consumes 1 minute of Mage Sight and the roll is simply resisted by Obscurity (my equivalent to Opacity).
The only difference between the two is that in Scrutiny you ask the ST 1 question per success, and in revelation the ST tells you 1 useful fact of their choice per success. Obscurity never goes down until the Mystery is finally resolved. (Though I do have a prime spell that can reduce it). Spending Mana is a gamble that gives 1 auto-success per mana if you got at least 1 success.

Also, in my system there is never a certain number of things you need to resolve the mystery, and you may even solve it without any MS. The mystery is resolved as soon as the players and ST agreed that they have sufficiently explored it. Rolling for scrutiny and revelation is simply something you can do to get clues.

[Moinen]

How do you determine Obscurity?

[Justin Sane]

I really dig your Wisdom roll to recover some mana.

Context: you know that rule when, if a Mystery is plot-relevant (as determined by the ST), you get the mana you spend with Scrutiny back? My group really doesn't like those "if the ST says so" blanket rules (as in, they're fine for an on-the-fly ruling, awful for a core mechanic), so we went with that.
Has the side effects of One-More-Roll Syndrome, and opens up Channel Mana shenanigans (we've ruled you have 1 turn to recover that mana by... alternate means).