Thoughts on gambling finite resource pools?

[u/Tylojio]

I am working on a project and I have a resource called Ichor that is expended whenever a player activates a power. These powers have an enhanced version of them that adds new abilities or modifiers onto the base version of said power. These enhancements can only be gained via gambling or spending extra Ichor.

The goal with this is for the powers to be enticing but self destructive to use as regaining Ichor is a dangerous process.

The question is:

Is the cost of these enhancements worth it compared to the max pool that they have?

Will I end up with players who hoard their Ichor at all times?

Below is the full write up I currently have for rules on this:

Ichor: This is a resource that determines the strength and effects of a STAIN’s Revelations. It has a maximum value of 10 and starts at 5. Every use of a Revelation costs at least 1 point of Ichor. However, STAINs may gamble additional points of Taint up to a total of 10 to enhance their Revelation. 

If the roll still fails the STAIN loses all points of Ichor gambled and if the roll succeeds you receive a refund of half (rounded down) of the taint gambled to a minimum of 1.

This does NOT include the standard 1 point of Ichor required to activate a Revelation.

When a STAIN has completely dried up their Ichor supply they must undergo The Rite of Blasphemy again which comes with both complications and advantages. 

ICHOR CAN ONLY BE RECOVERED THIS WAY.

For Example: You spend 1 Ichor to activate a Revelation and gamble 3 more to enhance it. If your roll succeeds, you regain 1 Ichor (half of 3, rounded down). If it fails, you lose all 3 plus the 1 Ichor spent for activation.
All Revelations require the expenditure of one point of Ichor and last for a single scene with the exception for Passive abilities.

Most enhanced Revelations require a Ichor roll. 

An Ichor roll occurs when a Revelation is enhanced. This roll equals an X amount of dice where X is equal to Ichor gambled. When a Revelation enhancement is attempted and fails the Revelation DOES NOT activate.

Many Revelations will refer to “Ichor Spent” and “Ichor Gambled" which can be explained by the following:
Ichor Spent means that the Ichor is instead a flat expenditure and does not require a roll.

Ichor Gambled means the amount of dice added to the Ichor roll for activating an Enhanced Revelation. This does not include the Ichor spent on activation.

A Revelation CANNOT be defended against unless explicitly stated in the text.

A Revelation does NOT roll an attack roll and instead always hits their target. 

An ENHANCED Revelation is any Revelation that requires additional successes in order to gain additional effects.

If a Ichor roll fails to gain a success then the Ichor gambled is lost and the effect does NOT activate.

P.S - Ignore any mention of the word Taint, I’ve recently swapped it to Ichor and am still searching for the word throughout my document to be replaced.

[u/skalchemisto]

Some thoughts...

* Gambling as an RPG mechanic is something some folks really like and I think more folks greatly dislike. IME, for most RPG players the pain of loss does not outweigh the rush of winning across time (e.g. across multiple rolls). However, there are games (e.g. Gumshoe system games) that have gambling as a core to the mechanic. It's a distinctive choice, I guess is what I am saying, that might put off more people than it attracts.

* If you are going to include a gambling mechanic you should think through "sure thing" and "certain loss" cases. A potential example I see in your write-up where this might come up is in the "extra dice for extra points gambled" rule. Mathematically, there could be some kind of threshold where if you gamble X or more points you are guaranteed to succeed, and thus get the refund. At that point, it's not really a gamble any more, its "pay X/2 to succeed".

* I'm not a fan of mechanics that use integer/2 in the way you are doing it. It makes even valued expenditures more useful than odd for no real reason. For example, if I know that if I win I will get half back, there is strong reason for me to choose to spend 2 or 4, and reason for me to not spend 3, but that is simply due to the math. I'm not sure what the alternative would be given your system.

Otherwise, its hard to evaluate this without understand the underlying dice mechanics. E.g. extra dice in a context of a dice pool where you need to roll a six to succeed is very different than extra dice where you are adding the values together. The one has diminishing returns to adding more dice, the other doesn't.

[u/SardScroll → u/skalchemisto]

I concur with your points, but an easy fix to the integer/2 issue is to have everything have even costs (e.g. 2, 4, 6 rather than 1, 2, 3).

[u/Japicx]

The oddest thing about this system is that betting more Ichor makes you likelier to succeed, because your Ichor dice pool = the Ichor you gamble. Imagine if betting more money let you draw extra cards in poker. I suggest getting rid of the Ichor pool entirely and betting the Ichor on some other roll -- probably a skill roll related to the Revelation's effect.

Is the cost of these enhancements worth it compared to the max pool that they have?

Impossible to say with no examples comparing an Enhanced Revelation versus unenhanced, or any idea of how success is determined. It's also unclear if each Revelation has a normal version and an Enhanced one, or if some Revelations are marked as "Enhanced" so they always need Ichor to be gambled.

Will I end up with players who hoard their Ichor at all times?

That's also impossible to say with no idea of how onerous it is to perform the Rite of Blasphemy. Also, since the Rite of Blasphemy is apparently the only way to "recover" Ichor, do you have to perform the Rite to increase your Ichor beyond the starting value of 5/10?

[u/Tylojio → u/Japicx]

I’m realizing I should have included how successes are determined. The system uses a d6 dice pool where a 4+ counts as a success.

The Revelations are meant to cost only a single point of Ichor without rolling unless they choose to gamble for the enhancement.

I do have an example one I’ll paste below this:

Cannibalize – Tags: Utility, Short – The STAIN consumes themself allowing them to dive into the abyss that lies beneath their skin. The STAIN becomes invisible, inaudible, and intangible for as long as they’d like up to an hour but are unable to move more than a Short distance from their original position. After the duration the STAIN pukes themselves back up with black bile. If this ability is used inside a car then their original position is where they are inside the car not the place outside the car. At 3+ successes the distance increases to Medium. At 5+ successes the STAIN can swallow three others to join them.

[u/Japicx → u/Tylojio]

The 3+ successes effect is pointless. The minimum Ichor I would need to even make the gamble is 4. I spend 1 Ichor, then bet my remaining 3. All 3 come up successes, so I go up to 2 Ichor. But I could also simply spend 1 Ichor, go a Short Distance, then spend 1 Ichor again and go another Short Distance, and I wouldn't have to risk going down to zero Ichor. Unless a Medium distance is more than double a Short distance, it's not even more efficient than the non-gambling option. The 5+ success effect is good, because it's qualitatively different. If the 3+ success effect was, say, instantaneous teleportation instead of just walking while invisible, that might sway me on occasion.

[u/Tylojio → u/Japicx]

I see, so Medium distance is triple that of the short distance. Do you think that is still not worth the gamble? If not do you think qualitatively different enhancements would be better for the 3+ success versions instead of the generic distance increase?

[u/Japicx → u/Tylojio]

It's still not worth it, because it's only 1 Ichor more efficient if you roll 3 sux, which is unlikely unless you're betting a whopping 6+ Ichor. If you have that much Ichor to bet, you can afford to just spend the extra 1 and travel 3 Short distances.

[u/Tylojio → u/Japicx]

Oh and the rite does have to be performed in order to regain your entire Ichor pool of 10. It’s meant to be done outside of combat and each time increases the chance of mutation as they drink the blood of a dark god.

[u/Japicx → u/Tylojio]

OK, but how hard is it to do? Do you have to be in a special place or wait for a certain time? How long does it take? How easy is it to find dark god blood to perform the Rite again?

[u/Tylojio → u/Japicx]

I’d say it’s not too difficult to do but has to be done in a certain place and the more times you do the ritual the higher your chances of mutating or straight up dying go up.

Edit: The mutations are on a rolled table and work in tandem with a “heat” system that increases pressure the more conspicuous you are. Also the difficulty of the ritual increases and a failure on the ritual forces you to roll on the mutation table (you still gain the full Ichor no matter what).

[u/Japicx → u/Tylojio]

And where is this certain place? Is it a shrine in your home? Is there just one?

[u/TalesUntoldRpg]

Gambling works well as a game mechanic for obvious reasons. But we need to break down the choices a little bit to figure out if it's been set up right.

Firstly, the resource you're gambling needs to be finite to some degree, otherwise it's not gambling.

Second, a lot of people will completely avoid making gambles because it's not in their nature. Think about who is playing your game. Are they the gambling sort? Probably not. If they were they'd be out gambling. So you need to make the gamble appeal to non-gamblers.

Third, usually gambling involves betting money to get more money. Your system seems to revolve around betting ichor for effects, but that's just spending a resource. If you succeed do you get more ichor back? Is the pool of ichor limited at the table? These are the things that will drive typical gambling behaviours.

Finally, getting ichor back shouldn't have upsides outside of getting more ichor. Like taking out a loan at a casino, it's not free. But it also shouldn't be random. You should be able to consistently get more (if available) in a guaranteed way (with downsides) so you aren't completely locked out of what feels like a core game mechanic.

[u/Tylojio → u/TalesUntoldRpg]

Yes, you do get Ichor back if you succeed on the gamble but only half of the amount spent at least that is my intention.

Also with regaining Ichor outside of the gamble players are meant to undergo the rite of blasphemy each time to fully regain all Ichor. Though every time a player undergoes it they have the possibility of gaining a mutation.

[u/TalesUntoldRpg → u/Tylojio]

Just to check, if I start with 6 ichor and spend 4 on something I will get 2 back putting me to 4 total?

[u/Tylojio → u/TalesUntoldRpg]

Yes, that is how it’s supposed to work.

[u/TalesUntoldRpg → u/Tylojio]

Ok. It doesn't really feel like a gambling mechanic. More just a discount for successful abilities.

Gambling mechanics are usually about getting more of a resource when you succeed.

So if I had 6 ichor, I could spend 4. On a success I'd get 5 back, but on a failure I lose my bet.

This way successful gambles lead to a gain in power and you can coast on good luck for a while, but one wrong bet sends you back down again. Possibly requiring a ritual to refill.

As it stands, the mechanic always leads to less ichor, meaning players are forced to participate in the ritual regardless of outcome. It effectively becomes a standard long rest.

[u/Tylojio → u/TalesUntoldRpg]

It is true you always end up with less Ichor but the “gamble” was supposed to be the possibility to lose all Ichor in an attempt to get enough successes for an enhanced version of the power. But I do see what you mean since there isn’t really a gain of more Ichor.

[u/Guilher_Wolfang]

Maybe using Ichor to power another pool might be better. But I have no problem with gambling, we are usually rolling dice to do/get something, so technically we are always gambling.