“JTA attempts Willsave Vs. Sleep (3) (+1, CON) -3 penalty=1. CRITICAL FAIL”
I’ve just realised that if I don’t get lots of sleep I actually become ill.
I’ve realised this because we went to London yesterday (note to self: apologise at this point for bad typing), and had a great time and went to bed at about 02-45.
The alarm went off at 05-30 and we were out of Owen’s flat by 05-40 and in search of an overland to get us onto nhte tube and thence to, er, Victoria to get the Oxford Tube (bby which they mean bus) bus back to Oxofrd.
I slept a bit on the bus, as well – I can, as various people have noticed, sleep anywhere; my two most random were, “on a coach, on the isla seat, bent over the armrest at the waist with my torso handing down and my head swinging into the floor when the bus accellerated” and “Sitting cross-legged on the grass in a field, tipped forwards onto my head” – but I don’t sleep very well in that situation.
I’ve pulled a fair few all-nighters in my time, for one reason or another, and on one horrible occasion I spent about forty-eight hours running on five hours sleep, which was very hard, but I’ve never done a full days work on three-and-a-bit hours sleep before.
Frankly, I’ve spent today getting paid to stay awake, so I’d just like to share with you my patent 4-AM special.
Normally it keeps me going like a dream, but not so much today, I think there is only so far the bounteous gift of God’s great coffeetreebush can take you, but what the hey.
You will need:
1) A big mug.
2) Some freeze-dried coffee.
3) About 40 pee in silver coins.
4) A Coffee Machine that gives out little plastic cups of coffee.
5) Some hot water.
6) A spoon.
Method:
1) Fill bottom of mug with freeze-dried coffee, at about 1 and a half the strength you’d normally use.
2) Put sufficient money into coffee machine to cover purchase
3) Order an “ExpressoChoc” with sugar. That is to say, get the machine to make you an expresso, with some hot chocolate in it.
4) Collect mug of ExpressoChoc. If money inserted into machine exceeded purchase, push retrive change button and retrive change. Otherwise, skip to 5.
5) Pour ExpressoChoc into mug of instant coffee grains.
6) Dispose of instant coffee cup.
7) Add hot water to mug of ExpressoChoc-with-strong-instant-coffee-in-it.
8) Stir freshly crafted beverage.
9) Drink 4AM Special, allowing to cool if necessary.
Those things normally fire me up so much I have trouble sitting especially still. Today… nothing. Except I occasionally feel a bit more tired. I’ve had about four so far. This is alwarminhg.
More allarming is the fact I feel drunk, when I’m not, and ill when I don’t think I am.
I’m having to put most of my energy into not falling flat onto the keyboard and waking up tomorrow, but I don’t think I can do it much longer, so I’ll shove off and go to bed once I get home, assuming I can wake up enough to get onto the bus, off the bus at the other end and then make it back to the houes.
Meanwhile, I thought I’d share the 4AM special recipie, just in case it will do anyione else any good. Wishi it still worked on ,me…
Comments
What does the post title mean?
You can explain tomorrow if it will mean it’s more coherent!
So… a double strength mocha?
Statto: I’ve probably got the mechanics wrong. What I’m trying to illustrate, however is the Critical Fail I’ve made on a Saving Throw vs. Sleep. Not sure I can explain that very well, either, but here goes:
Bear in mind, however, that I’m not an expert, I’ve only ever actually used the computer RPGs, with a crazy mix of the TSR 1980s RPGs, through Baldurs Gate & Icewind Dale to Neverwinter Nights, so my understanding of the mechanics is based on the feedback those games give on what’s going on behind the scenes. I’m certainly not a Rules Lawyer…
In AD&D (using, as I know those best, the 3.5 ed. rules) a character can be affected by Sleep, a spell that puts them, er, asleep for a number of rounds. Say a fighter is attacking a group of wizards, a wizard might cast sleep, with the hope of making the fighter miss attack rounds for a while, giving them time to escape, or soften him up a bit.
So what I’m trying to illustrate is me rolling a d20 to see if I successfully make a “will” save against the Sleep (spell) (ie, think ‘My God! I’m about to fall asleep! Must Stay Awake!!”)
For my Saving Throw I roll a 1. This is a Critical Fail, because I can’t do any worse that roll 1 on a d20. (likewise a Critical Hit is when you roll for attack and roll the highest possible, meaning the attack is as devastating as possible).
Actually, however, I do not roll 1 on the die. I roll 3. To this 3 I add 1, because I’ve made a rough guess and decided I probably have a CON (constitution) of about 14, which is sufficiently higher than average that I gain +1 on all CON-related throws. (If I had a CON of 18, I’d get +4). I’m using CON because I think constitution is probably the stat people use to work out how likely someone is to fall asleep. (That makes sense to me; if you’re really tough, you can keep going for longer)
So now, because I get a +1 bonus to all CON rolls, I’ve scored 4. That’s still not going to be enough for me to avoid the Sleep spell, though, I’d guess I need 10 or more, but never mind.
However I’ve somehow sustained a -3 penalty on the roll as well. That means even if I rolled a 10 [11 with my CON bonus] I’d still fail the save, because with the penalty in account I’ve only rolled an 8. The penalty – and I have no idea if this is in things post 2nd edition (or post 1st, possibly, I’ve not really seen it since EoB, unless it was BG, it’s all a bit mixed, in my head. Sorry) – anyway, the penalty is as a result of my having gone so long without resting. I’m knackered as it is; I actually want to sleep, so it’s much harder to make a willsave. (because thinking “Must Not Sleep!” is much harder when you’ve spent so long thinking “I’m really tired! Must Sleep!”).
So taking that into account, I roll (3 +1 [from CON bonus])=4. That roll doesn’t account for the penalty, though, so (4-3)=1. Which is a Critical Fail. So I sleep for something like 5 minutes. (If we say we’ve got a medium-low skill wizard). And then I wake up, unless I’ve been paralysed or something else in the middle.
That might *still* not make any sense, but it’s as good an explanation as you’re likely to get from me. Doubtless skilled players could take it to little tiny bits, but as I say it’s basically a kludge I’ve lumped together from the random bits of 2nd, 3rd & 3.5 edition rules I know, so it’s probably got no end of anacronisms.
Hopefully, though, you get the general idea.
Paul: I have no idea. I drink two types of coffee: black instant, and black filter. The latter seems to be called expresso when it’s small, and americano when it’s a lot weaker but bigger. The whole “what isthis particular type of coffee called?” question has never really bothered come up beyond that. Sorry.
I prefer ludo…
Yeah, my all-night special used to be fairly similar… a pint mug and a centimetre or two of instant coffee, hot chocolate power and sugar. Add boiling water, then add milk until you can stand the taste… done right, it produces glistening oily bubbles and kills appetite.