Skill checks

A skill check event rolls dice against a skill and a DC you author, classifies the result into one of four outcome bands (critical success, success, failure, critical failure), and fires the events you wired to whichever band came up. Modifiers, retry rules, and the shape of the dice are all knobs you set on the event, and each of the four branches is its own event list.

What’s not here: the field-by-field reference for each knob (Skill check event reference), and the Skill entity that supplies the value the dice roll against (Skill reference).

Anatomy of a skill check

1. Skill + DC: the two mechanics fields the check rolls against. The picker’s skill supplies the base value; the DC is the expression the roll has to meet.
2. Modifiers: a list of situational adjustments, each row a value plus an optional condition. The Wearing a suit row applies +2 when var_wearing_suit is true.
3. Success + Failure events: the two outcome branches that fire on every non-critical roll. Every check ships with these.
4. Critical success + Critical fail events: the two override branches. When one of these lists is non-empty, it fires instead of the corresponding Success or Failure list on a critical roll; the ordinary list does not also fire.

This is Talk your way past the doorman on node_doorman. Persuasion 4 versus DC 11, with a +2 modifier when var_wearing_suit is true. Every knob above lives on the Skill check event reference.

Build a check end to end

Use node_doorman in the skill-check sample as the worked example.

1. Open node_doorman and add a Skill check event. In the node’s event stack, click Add event and pick Skill check. Set Title to Talk your way past the doorman. Description is optional; fill it if you want a longer prompt line than the title, or leave it blank to have the host fall back to the title.

2. Wire the mechanics. Set Skill to Persuasion from the picker. Set DC (expression) to 11. DC is an expression, so a bare number, a variable name, or an arithmetic combination all work; the runtime evaluates it when the check fires.

3. Wire the two outcome branches. Under Success events, click Add event and pick Dialogue. Character: char_doorman. Text: "Right this way, sir." The doorman steps aside. Under Failure events, do the same with "No suit, no service. Move along." Save.

4. Simulate. Open the simulator, turn on Debug in the Toolbar so the skill-check resolution shows up as a debug row, then start the sample and click node_doorman. The debug row shows the roll (skill + modifiers versus DC) and the outcome band, and the dialogue that fired follows on the next line.

Field-by-field detail for every knob above lives on the Skill check event reference. Modifiers and the two critical branches, covered below, come next.

Refine with modifiers

The Modifiers list lets each row apply only when a condition holds. Use it whenever a check should get a bump from some earlier state: an item picked up, a clue found, a bribe carried.

1. In the Data View’s Variables tab, add var_wearing_suit as a bool with default false.
2. On the skill-check event, expand Modifiers and click Add modifier. Fill in:
   • Modifier name: Wearing a suit
   • Value (expression): 2
   • Condition (optional): var_wearing_suit
3. Simulate. In the debug row, the modifier lists as Wearing a suit: skipped (italicized, muted) while the variable is false. Toggle var_wearing_suit in the simulator and reroll: the row flips to Wearing a suit: +2 and folds into the roll total.

1. Modifier badge: the applied Wearing a suit: +2 entry in the breakdown.
2. Roll math: the modifier folded into the total, at the end of the roll line.

A modifier without a condition applies every time and behaves like a permanent difficulty shift on this check alone. Use the conditional form when the shift only makes sense in a specific state; use the unconditional form when the check permanently sits at a different difficulty than its raw skill-minus-DC math would suggest.

Author the four outcome bands

Every check has two outcome branches, Success events and Failure events, which fire on ordinary passes and fails. The two critical bands are optional:

• Critical success events: on a critical roll that would ordinarily pass, this list fires instead of Success events. The Success list does not also fire.
• Critical fail events: on a critical roll that would ordinarily fail, this list fires instead of Failure events. The Failure list does not also fire.

Leave the critical lists empty and criticals fall through to the corresponding ordinary list; the check just runs as pass or fail. Fill them and you get four distinct authored reactions to the same roll.

1. Under Critical success events, click Add event and pick Dialogue. Character: char_doorman. Text: "Sir, please. Let me show you to our private lounge."
2. Under Critical fail events, do the same with "Boys, we've got a live one." Two more doormen appear. Save.
3. Simulate. With default dice (2d6), a critical fail lands on a raw roll of 2 and a critical success on a raw roll of 12. Reroll until each band comes up. The debug row shows the band (Critical success / Critical fail) and only the critical branch’s line fires.

1. Outcome band: the debug row names the band that came up (Critical success here).
2. Critical branch line: the critical-success dialogue, firing instead of the ordinary Success line.

Retryable checks and Max attempts are the other knobs on this event; tick Retryable and set Max attempts when the player should get more than one shot at the same DC. Full field detail is on the Skill check event reference.

See also

• Skill check event reference: field-by-field detail for every knob on the event, including Passive and Dice override.
• Skill: the entity the check rolls against; defines the Min / Max range that bounds DCs and the auto-managed skill_<id> variable that holds the current value.
• Project settings: where the default dice and critical thresholds live; every skill check falls back to these unless the event’s Dice override overrides them.
• Simulator: the Debug section covers the debug rows the payoff screenshots use.
• Expressions: DC and Modifier condition syntax.
• Error messages: Skill checks: panel messages about nested checks, unknown skills, DC or dice range, modifier fields, and shape faults on the check itself.