Never tell me the odds. Actually, scrap that.

[Urban Spaceman]

Hi people. Looking for some help on this one:

The next adventure I'm running will be featuring a swoop race or two, as one of the PC's is a swoop racer who is looking to get revenge on the head of a gambling syndicate, who he thinks set him up and sold him in to slavery (which he did,).

The first swoop race will be a big affair, and I'm going to have the other players take the roles of other racers (some of whom have been paid to influence the result). I've spent some time designing it, and think the players will like it.

However, it has occured to me that the players are likely to wager some money on this race (and maybe the subsequent one too), and I know nothing about gambling, so have no idea how to handle it.

I don't really want to spend too much time working out complicated odds for the racers, and can't even be sure the players will bet on their ship-mate either (at that point they won't know they are playing the other racers).

So, any tips, ideas or advice on how to deal with gambling/odds in this situation?
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Fallon Kell]

Well, the most crucial issue is if there is a favorite or not and how the racers stack up against one another. If the racers are all fairly evenly matched then the odds are probably even. However many racers to one.
If they're not evenly matched, and this is a known fact than the odds are better on the racers less likely to win. (A rank incompetent could be 100 to 1 or worse.)
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Or that excessively long "Noooooooooo" was the Whining Side of the Force leaving him. - Dustflier

Complete Starship Construction System

[CRMcNeill]

Check out Black Sands of Socorro for the rules on Swoop Chasing, which is Swoop Racing with a twist, in the the race occurs in an obstacle course.
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Urban Spaceman]

Really? Wow. My one is on an obstacle course too!

Unfortunately I don't have that book in my collection, which is a shame, as it could have saved me a lot of work!

Does it deal with the betting aspect?
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Guardian_A]

There is a lot of work that goes into determining the odds of something like this. I spent an afternoon figuring out the odds to run a fighting ring in my old World of Darkness campaign and that was for a group of 16 fighters.

After that first experience, I learned my lesson and have done things a much easier way. (Its not a perfect system, but its always worked well for me.) I choose the top three NPCs competing in the event and sort them based on who is most likely to win. Their odds look like this:
1st 2-1
2nd 3-1
3rd 4-1

Once I've done the first three that way, I start grouping the other NPCs into small groups (Usually into groups of 4-5 NPCs) based on their skill levels. Their odds look like this:
1st group 10-1
2nd group 25-1
3rd group 40-1
4th group 60-1

Of course, all of the above depends on a you creating racers of verious skill levels for the race. Likely, this will include a named NPC for each of the top three racers, then a single generic NPC for the racers in each tier below that.

By using the guidelines abive, the only people I need to worry much about the odds for is the PCs, and thats only if they are competing. Depending on their skill level(s) and reputation, their odds range from 3-1 to 10-1 in most cases.

I've found the above works very nicely for betting. If the characters bet on the contenders in the top three, they are likely to win a little money. If they bet on the lower groups, they arent very likely to win, but they have the potential to win BIG.

crmcneill is right about the Black Sands of Socorro book. It does have some information about Swoop racing that would probably prove useful to you. If you can get your hands on a copy, its defidently worth a look.

[Urban Spaceman]

Thanks Guardian_A, I think i'll use something like that for now.

Will definately be keeping my eye out for that book, as I do use Socorro quite a bit, based off a short story in one of the Adventure Journals.
I'd never looked in to the background of the place, so it definately will get used for more than Swoop racing!
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Urban Spaceman]

Ok, just an update, in case anyone is interested, I have designed the the course, and drawn it out.
Created 9 other racers for the player to race against.
Made up some counters to represent the racers on the circuit.
Displayed the betting odds (thanks again) and allowed all the characters to place their bets.

The last session finished as the racer was lined up on the starting grid.
The other players still don't know yet that thay'll be playing the other racers (some of whom their characters have bet on or against), but they'll find out next session.

The whole thing is an experiment, really, to make a swoop race interesting for all the players, and have it as a set-piece in the middle of this adventure.
It'll work quite well, or be a failure, but sometimes it's good to mix things up a little!
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Guardian_A]

We'll be looking forward to hearing your results!

[Urban Spaceman]

Should be next week!

Being as part of this involves them trying to get revenge on someone who runs a gambling syndicate, some of the racers who will be played by the other players will not be trying to win.
I have done little sheets for them with relevant information (movement dice, speed ranges and definitions), and also what their "goal" is. In some cases this is to prevent a particular racer from winning, rather than win themselves.
The best racer is being paid not to win, with a bonus if another particular racer wins.

Characters points will be awarded for players trying to achieve those goals.

I'm looking forward to seeing the look on the swoop players face when people start trying to force him off the track!
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Urban Spaceman]

Ok, well, as promised, the update!
The previous week the characters had all placed money on various racers (I used the betting odds suggested by Guardian_A). The players were greatly looking forward to seeing what their Swoop pilot could do, so the atmosphere was already good at the start of the evening.
They were intrigued when I placed a map down in front of them, with a crudely drawn course laid out. I explained to them all that rather than just sit and watch one person roll some dice, they were going to be taking part as some of the other racers.
The idea intrigued them, and I handed out some character information to each player. This was boiled down to only the information they needed (Racers name, total dice they needed to roll to pilot the swoop, Body strength of the swoop, and Strength of the swoop pilot). I also included a grid to show them the speed ranges, and descriptions, as well as the characters goal for the race.

Each section of the track had a difficulty rating/number, which was unknown to the players. The faster they went through each section, the higher the number. Some parts of the track contained hazards (a jump, a force field which funnelled different racers through different routes, and an Ion turret which fired at them down a long straight which finished with a 90 degree turn).
To keep the spirit of the “no vehicle dodge when at All-Out speed” rule, they were all allowed to have a free re-roll, so long as they weren’t going All-Out. Of course, this was still a race, so they had to balance those two things for themselves.
The character goal section was there to reflect that these races did have an element of corruption involved. A few betting syndicates and other elements were in play, and these special instructions reflected that. Examples were “You have been paid not to win. With a bonus if racer XXXX wins”, or “You want to stay out of trouble, and do your best to win”, or “Make sure racer XXXX doesn’t win. Bonus if they don’t finish”.
The players really liked these goals. Until they realised that the racer they had bet on before the race was actively trying not to win. Then I got called rude names, but they still went with it.

I made it very clear that I was not using exact distances, just relative ones, as I didn’t want the evening to be a wargaming session. In general, the higher you roll the further up the field you are, relative to everyone else travelling at the same speed.
To successfully knock someone out the way, you had to beat their roll by more than 10. The difference between the rolls was taken as the result on the movement mishap table.

One last rule was that only the player character could use character points, and force points. All the players would be earning points for their usual character, but they could not use any of their points during the race, as they were basically playing NPC’s for me.

All in all, this all worked well. The players had a good time, and played the goals of each racer to the best of their ability.
The player character burned up 8 character points and a force point over the course of the three laps. He would have won the race (just), except that his bike had been tampered with before the race (which they failed to spot), and suffered an “accident” just short of the finish line.

Overall, as a one-off, this worked. It could be refined and improved upon, but I don’t intend to run every race like this. It was a one-off as a showcase of one player characters abilities, during a story which focuses largely on his background.

Oh, and the head of the gambling syndicate visited the Swoop character after the race, to express his concern for him. He mentioned how unlucky he had been and that in racing sometimes you have to accept a loss, that any crash you walk away from is a good one, and so on. He left the character with those two pieces of wisdom again; “Accept the loss and walk away”.
The characters will now do anything to get at this guy! Just as I hoped.

Hope some people liked reading about this Swoop scenario, and that others might find inspiration in it. The lesson I took away from this is that it is worth trying to do something different, as your players might get kick out it too.
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Guardian_A]

Sounds like you had a good race and everyone had fun!

You said you plan to refine/improve your racing rules. What kind of changes are you thinking about making?

[Bren]

Sounds like a fun race and a good play session.

“Accept the loss and walk away”. Nice bit of reverse psychology.

[Urban Spaceman]

[Urban Spaceman]

[Matthias777]

The more I lurk in this thread, the more I like your GMing (both mindset and implementation), Urban Spaceman. Kinda awesome.

Oops, no longer lurking.
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Arek | Kage