Talk:Saves

Okay, here's my real-and-true pitch for the creation of a fourth Saving Throw, the "Mental Reflex Save," which still needs a bloody name.

1. Using it would bring a sense of balance to the Saves. Six of the Abilities have saves attached to them; Charisma and Intuition do not. This "Mental Reflex Save" would fix that.
2. It would provide a way for characters to intuitively disbelieve illusions, rather than willfully. The key here would be a door that has been changed to look like the wall. A successful BLANK save would let a character instantly know that something's wrong with the door.
   1. This differs from a Will save (as a Will save would not be helpful in the door situation) as a Will save is most applicable for resisting the effects of something that a character knows to be false, the save is just there to convince the subconscious.
   2. BLANK is the opposite, it's the subconscious alerting the conscious part of the mind of something.
3. It would allow characters to subconsciously avoid the probes of another looking for active minds.
   1. The dice role would effectively serve as that feeling one gets when something isn't quite right.
   2. It could also be used as a way to let characters know that they are being mentally attacked. Failing your BLANK save when telepath tries to look into your mind would mean that you're not even aware that your thoughts are being observed or sifted through. This would need some serious rule finagling (such as a mental attacker declaring that they are trying to fly under-the-radar).
4. Finally, it could be used as a very interesting tie into the world by allowing characters the chance to feel magical presences. Everything that emits a magical aura would have a DC attached to that aura, the DC being what a character would have to roll for their BLANK save to detect the aura.
   1. Auras within more powerful auras (such as an area of the landscape that gives off magical energy) could be masked, requiring a higher Save result to differentiate between them.
   2. Results could be tiered. For example, a simple success would tell the character that there is simply the presence of energy. Larger successes would tell the character which general direction, and so on.

The best part about this, in my opinion, would be that in simply asking the players to roll the save, it would very wonderfully simulate that "shiver down the back of the neck" feeling you get when your subconscious feels like something is off, but has no idea what. Once players have been asked to roll the save, they will be in a general sense of unease, and will tend to be more cautious.

• This could also create a slight paranoia if the GM kept giving the characters false positives. Also, if large sections of the world are soaked in magical energy (and that would be a REALLY awesome thing to use) there would be a lot of those cases when characters stumble into a clearing with a pool that simply has a magical aura about it for no reason.

I hope I've demonstrated that the addition of the new save (that still desperately needs a name) would be not only a good addition from a conceptual rules balance, but that it would also provide an interesting and new layer to supernatural interactions that doesn't exist in other games. My two or three cents --Drizztmainsword 22:35, 12 May 2011 (MDT)