Heroic Lands

Skill Tests and Opposed Tests

Overview

Most actions in SoHL are resolved through skill tests — rolling dice against a target number derived from a character’s skill mastery level. When two characters compete, the system uses opposed tests to determine the winner.

See also: Skills, Combat Basics

Performing a Skill Test

  1. Open the character’s sheet and go to the Skills tab.
  2. Click the name of the skill you want to test.
  3. A Success Test Dialog appears showing:
    • The skill’s effective mastery level (EML)
    • Any situational modifiers
    • Options for the test
  4. Adjust modifiers if needed and click OK.
  5. The result appears in the chat window.

Understanding Results

A skill test rolls against the effective mastery level. The result is one of:

  • Critical Success (CS) — an exceptional success (roll of 5 or divisor of EML)
  • Marginal Success (MS) — a success by a narrow margin
  • Marginal Failure (MF) — a failure by a narrow margin
  • Critical Failure (CF) — a significant failure (roll of 96+)

The exact thresholds depend on the effective mastery level.

See also

  • Skill and Attribute — the items these tests are run from, and their own test actions.
  • Base Item — the standard test dialog every roll opens, and the GM’s result edit.
  • Token — starting and answering an opposed test between two tokens.
  • The Fate System — improving a result after it has settled.
  • Icon Legend — the Victory Stars and Value Diamonds a result card draws.
  • Resolution (rules) — what a Mastery Level, a success level, and a Victory Star actually are.
  • User Guide — back to the index.

Effective Mastery Level

The effective mastery level (EML) is the target number for a skill test. It starts from the skill’s base mastery level and is modified by:

  • Situational modifiers — bonuses or penalties from the environment, equipment, or conditions
  • Injury penalties — wounds reduce skill effectiveness
  • Fatigue — exhaustion penalties
  • Equipment bonuses — some gear provides skill bonuses

The EML is shown in the Success Test Dialog before you roll.

Success Value Tests

Some tasks represent sustained effort — crafting an item, sailing a passage, researching a question — where rolling dozens of individual tests would be tedious and swingy. A Success Value Test resolves the whole task with one roll, producing a graded outcome instead of a simple pass or fail.

Run one from a skill the same way you run a Success Test: click the skill’s Success Value Test action. The system makes an ordinary success test, then reads the result on a graded scale. The chat card shows:

  • Success Value — the graded number, derived from the skill’s Index (its mastery level ÷ 10) plus a modifier for how well the roll went.
  • Value Diamonds — how far the work exceeds an ordinary result, from zero up to five diamonds.
  • Result — the plain-language meaning of that Success Value (no value, little value, base value, or a bonus value carrying diamonds).

The card also shows the underlying roll and target, so you can see how the grade was reached. See the Success Value Tests rules for the full scale.

Editing a Test Result (GM)

Every posted test result card carries a small edit pencil in its header. This is a GM-only tool — players do not see it — and it is the GM’s higher-fidelity counterpart to a player spending Fate: it lets you correct or adjust a result you have already rolled without re-rolling the dice.

To edit a result:

  1. On the test result card in chat, click the edit pencil in the card header.
  2. The Success Test Dialog reopens, pre-filled with that result’s current Situational Modifier and Success Level Modifier.
  3. Change either value — for example, apply a circumstance you forgot, or nudge the outcome up or down.
  4. Click OK. The test is re-evaluated against the same die roll and the card updates in place with the new outcome.

Clicking OK without changing anything leaves the result untouched.

How the edit is applied:

  • The die is never re-rolled. The original d100 is kept; only the target and the outcome are recomputed.
  • Changing the Situational Modifier changes the effective target, so the success level is re-derived from the same roll (a larger penalty can turn a success into a failure, and vice versa).
  • Changing the Success Level Modifier shifts the outcome up or down a fixed number of steps (for example, Marginal Success → Critical Success) without touching the target.

Unlike Fate, a GM edit costs nothing and can move a result in either direction. Use it to apply a ruling, fix a mistaken modifier, or reflect a circumstance that came to light after the roll.

Opposed Tests

When two characters compete directly, the system uses an opposed test:

  1. The initiating character performs a skill test.
  2. The opposing character performs a counter-test.
  3. The system compares the results to determine the winner.

Opposed tests are used for:

  • Combat — attack vs. defense
  • Social contests — persuasion vs. resistance
  • Stealth — hiding vs. perception
  • Any situation where two characters directly compete

Skill Base and Attributes

Every skill has a skill base formula that determines its starting value from the character’s attributes. For example, the Sword skill might have a base formula of sb(attr.str, attr.dex) — meaning it averages Strength and Dexterity.

The skill base is calculated automatically when attributes are set. The mastery level builds on top of the skill base through training and experience.

See Skills for more about how skill bases work.