Top 12 jargon
From Sagataflwiki
This is still just a draft document, as it is non-trivial to determine exactly which 12 terms needs to be defined in this core article. Right now it's a top 12, but some entries might need to be replaced (moved the top 60 jargon article)...
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Compensatory points
Compensatory points are DPs and PPs that the player gets, during character creation, as a reward (it's essentially a bribe) for choosing that his character is to have a DisAdvantage (DP) or negPerk (PP), with the amount of compensatory points being intended to be roughly proportional to the predicted degree of inconvenience.
DP
DP, or aDvantage Point, is a kind of points used only during character creation, to purchase Advantages, traits that the characters are born with, or that are otherwise genetic or biological in nature, and thus highly unlikely to change.
ES
ES, or Essence, is a personal and non-renewable mystical ressource that each character is born with, and which is expended most often on performing permant magic, e.g. Enchanting a magical item, but Essence can also be sacrificed in other ways, and lost involuntarily. Essence is an in-world phenomenon, not metagame, and charaters can and should discuss it with each other, e.g.: "What did you spend your Essence on?" / "None of your business!".
f
Short for farthing, the monetary currency used in Sagatafl. Characters really talk about pennies, or drachma, or interstellar kredits, but players talk about farthings; kilo-farthings, mega-farthings or giga-farthings if necessary. 4f is 1 medieval penny, one medieval pound of silver is roughly 1000f. In modern currency, 1f is very approximately 25 Danish kroner, 2 2/3 UK Pound, 5 US$ or about 3.5 Euro.
Fumble
A Fumble is when a dice roll, such as a Skill roll, fails badly, so that there are negative consequences for the character (or sometimes an innocent bystander) above and beyond the direct consequences of non-Success. Fumbles range from Minor Fumble, coded F-2, to Disastrous Fumble, coded F-6. Some rolls, such as Sense rolls, are designated Safe Rolls; these can never Fumble. F-2 or worse is treated as f-1 (failure).
GP
Short for Goodie Point, GPs are the core currency if character creation. Each player has an amount of GPs to distribute between the four categories: aDvantages, Skills, Perks and Special. GPs put into the first three convert to category-specific points (DP, SP, PP) according to non-linear formulae. GPs spent on Special are, as the name implies, special. A character built on more Goodie Points can be expected to be more competent, and even a few GPs makes a big difference, e.g. an average person (white-collar job, owns home, normal mundane Skills) can be built on 40 Goodie Points, but someone built on 60 Goodie Points is noteworthy in some positive way, clearly different and more capable than a common person. A typical competent adventurer is built on 100 GP, and a great hero perhaps on 180 GP.
Overcome roll
PP
RD
Roll Difficulty, the difficulty that any Xd12 roll is made against, e.g. a Skill roll, Sense roll or Attribute roll (almost all rolls in fact; the main exceptions are damage rolls and Overcome rolls). Each dice showing a value equal to or higher than the RD is a Success; if there are no Successes, the RD is used to determine the degree of Fumble. A lower RD means an easier roll. Players need to learn to fear RD 12. A typical adventuring-difficulty task is RD 8, while total routine is RD 4. Note that for RD 6 and lower, the worst kinds of Fumbles cannot occur at all.
SP
Success
Abbreviated xS, e.g. 2S for two Successes or 5S for 5 Successes. Successes measure how well a successful activity is performed, whether an active activity (such as most Skill rolls) or a passive activity (most Sense rolls are passive). Any Xd12 roll produces a result of one or more Successes (there's no hard upper limit, but it is impossible to get more Successes than the number of dice rolled, e.g. 14 Successes on a roll of 14d12), or a Fumble (from F-2 to F-6), or a failure (f-1). More Successes are always better on a normal roll, and for Opposed Rolls Successes are compared, often subtracted from each other, e.g. an Attack roll vs a Defence roll in combat (such as Sword skill vs Dodge skill).
Task
A Task is a series of Skill rolls accumulating Progress towards completing a goal, such as picking a lock, casting a Spell, or doing an Invention. Each Successful roll adds a value equal to the number of Successes squared to Progress, e.g. a roll of 4S adds 16 to Progress. A Minor Fumble, F-2, is actually not a true Fumble in the context of a Task, since there are no ill consequences except that all accumulated Progress is lost. Therefore, in the context of Tasks, Fumbles of F-3 and worse are called Abortive Fumbles. Each roll (cycle) of a Task takes an amount of time, sometimes under the character's control (e.g. he can try to hurry, or he can work slowly and methodically), and so part of the purpose of the Task mechanic is to allow more skilled characters to complete some activities faster.
