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In the current rules it states on page 56:

When surprise is possible, roll 1d6 for each side which might be surprised; most normal characters are surprised on a roll of 1–2. Surprised characters are unable to act for one Round.

This makes sense; my PCs are hidden in a room, a group of goblins come in and the gerblins might be surprised, so they rolled and are surprised on a 1 or 2 (only a 1 if they were really elves).

The next sentence states:

Characters or creatures which are well hidden and prepared to perform an ambush act from surprise on a roll of 1–4 on 1d6.

I don't get this. So if the PCs successfully roll stealth before the goblins appear don't automatically ambush the goblins on their (goblins) roll of 1 or 2? Is the 1-4 an Ambush skill check that's the same for everyone? This seems a little at odds with a successful stealth check followed by a unsuccessful notice check on the part of the goblins.

chooban
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1 Answers1

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Even if you are prepared for someone to show up, you still might be surprised and/or unnable to react properly like planned.

On an ambush, those being surprised have a 33% chance to being able to react quick enough (not surprised). While those ambushing have a 66% chance of being able to react.

This does seem odd, but that is because the system has no Perception/Notice skill (or a skill system, actually), and thus things like that are left for a random dice to decide. Here, the developer decided that even if you are ambushing another party, some people from your group might be distracted or zoning out and aren't able to react quickly enough when the enemies finally show up.

Elves, being perceptive and such, will only ever be surprised around 17% of the ambushes (1 in 6).

ShadowKras
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  • Okay, that makes sense. I did wonder if I'd just got the point of reading the sentence so many times I'd rendered it unreadable to myself! I was wondering how useful this would make a specialist with a garrotte in that case, but that multiplier is deadly in the cases you do successfully ambush someone. – chooban Apr 25 '17 at 11:38
  • Supplementary: Hidden party members might be unable to unhide themselves fast enough to have a turn. – godskook Apr 25 '17 at 12:56