Weighing What Matters

Once Intention and its consequences are visible, the table must bring its view into agreement, then temporarily fix what matters here and now.

This phase gathers steps 3 and 4: Harmony for the Focus, Zoom, and two outcomes; Stasis for Frame Factors and Bets.

3. Harmony

Choose the Focus and put two outcomes in the balance

The Focus is the question the roll must answer.

It concerns only what remains genuinely uncertain. If the fiction has already established that a possibility is open or closed, the dice do not revisit that fact.

The Focus puts two possible outcomes in the balance. They define what the resolution must decide, not everything that may happen next.

Conversely, once the Focus is accepted, its two outcomes commit the table:

What is closed by the fiction is closed before the roll. What is genuinely put into resolution must be able to happen.

Do not ask the dice what the fiction already knows

In Talimar's Road, Tal meets Hendrik, a Grey Sage of Lhankor Mhy, beside an inscribed stone. Nothing requires the uncertainty to be framed as “Does Tal manage to make contact with Hendrik?”.

If the Situation already makes their exchange natural, the Focus can lie elsewhere:

What first impression does Tal make on Hendrik?

A favourable outcome may lead Hendrik to recognize a promising mind quickly. The other may make him see a curious but presumptuous young man, making his future teaching colder or more demanding.

In both cases, the meeting happens. Resolution does not decide whether the fiction may continue; it discovers the form of what remains genuinely uncertain.

The same principle applies to an already certain failure. If a king is bound to refuse a request, the Focus may concern what the Protagonists preserve of their relationship with him. If a ship is going to sink, resolution may concern what can still be saved.

Choose the Zoom

The Zoom sets the scale of the Focus: Action, Sequence, or Script.

The Focus says what we resolve. The Zoom says at what scale we resolve it.

The same system can decide a gesture, a whole scene, a journey, or a complex operation. Do not multiply rolls if one resolution answers the question the table actually cares about.

Zoom does not set difficulty. It determines which dimensions of the fiction remain distinct at that scale.

Action Zoom

The Focus concerns a gesture or a precise moment.

Pass through the door before it closes.

The space of Bets is naturally restricted. Several phrasings of the same advantage tend to be redundant because the resolution is looking at a narrow instant.

Sequence Zoom

The Focus concerns a coherent succession of actions.

Cross the rooftops and lose the guards before reaching the temple.

Elements that would have been redundant in a single action can become distinct because they concern different dimensions of the Sequence: endurance, knowledge of the neighbourhood, help from an accomplice, rain making the tiles slippery, fear of being recognized.

Script Zoom

The Focus covers a broader whole: journey, investigation, military campaign, prolonged negotiation, complex project.

Get a caravan through to the besieged city.

The Protagonist or group can then bring several genuinely different dimensions into play: relationships, logistics, reputation, knowledge, endurance, wealth, political protection, preparation, or sacrifices.

These are not more bonuses because the conflict lasts longer. They are more relevant dimensions because the question itself is broader.

A Script does not, by itself, add a special procedure: it widens the view taken by the Focus.

Choose the Zoom before rolling

The Zoom must be understood before the roll. A player should know whether they risk losing one exchange of blows, the whole duel, or the entire plan.

When several scales would make sense, choose the one that leaves the most room for the decisions you actually want to play.

One raid, several ways to look at it

Imagine a cattle raid between two clans. The same event can be resolved at very different scales.

Action Zoom. The Focus concerns one precise moment:

Does Jarstang silence the guard before he raises the alarm?

At this scale, few dimensions matter: Jarstang's long spear, Element of surprise, The guard's large shield, Waterlogged ground.

Sequence Zoom. The Focus embraces one coherent part of the raid:

Do the riders seize the herd before the opposing warriors arrive?

Other dimensions become distinct: Knowledge of the pastures, Fresh horses, Sparse sentries, Morning fog, A shepherd accomplice, Opposing warriors already close.

Script Zoom. The table does not want to play each moment and wants to know how the raid went overall:

When the riders return, can the clan consider that the raid went well?

The two outcomes might be stated as:

• the raid leaves the clan clearly strengthened;
• its price and consequences outweigh what it brought back.

At this width, many more dimensions can legitimately enter the balance. For example, favouring the first outcome: Experienced leader who knows these lands, Twenty trained riders, Blessing of Orlanth Adventurous, Local shepherd who owes us a favour, Moonless night, Fresh horses. On the other side: Pastures far from the border, Thane known for vigilance, Three days of rain, Young warrior hungry for glory, Herds kept near a sanctuary of Ernalda, Enemy already alert after earlier raids.

This large set is not a problem to break into several sub-tests. It simply represents everything the table recognizes as significant to the broad question it is asking reality.

A wider Zoom does not provide more bonuses. It reveals more relevant dimensions because the question itself is wider.

In return, the answer is also global. If the table wants to know separately who was wounded, how much cattle was taken, whether the raiders were identified, and what religious consequences followed, those distinctions deserve other Focuses or a narrower Zoom.

The useful criterion is therefore: which differences do we still want to distinguish?

And if the raid's success itself is already established, the Focus can move again:

Will this successful raid strengthen the clan in the long run, or will its price open more problems than it solves?

Success is no longer what the dice must decide. It becomes the starting point of the question.

4. Stasis

Identify Frame Factors

Before counting dice, ask whether a truth closes a possibility, makes a means inadmissible, or imposes a condition.

A Frame Factor is not a bonus or penalty: it changes the space of possibilities. The fiction must change before a closed possibility can become an acceptable Focus.

An ordinary human does not kill a Dragon with a toothpick by accumulating enough Bets. If that possibility is not open in Glorantha, the table does not frame “Do we kill it?” and then downgrade a Victory to a scratch after the roll.

Instead, frame honestly what remains possible: survive, drive it back, reach a weakness, accomplish a necessary step, or transform the Situation.

When the frame makes one side markedly more or less powerful without closing the action entirely, weakened or heroic modes may be used when the relevant Worldview rule provides for them.

Gather the Bets on each side

Identify the elements that genuinely matter to the Focus. Each becomes a Bet and gives one die on the side of the outcome it favours.

Check two things:

• the Bet is genuinely relevant to this Focus and Zoom;
• it is not a restatement of a dimension already counted.

A Bet is not favourable or unfavourable in the abstract. Its meaning depends on the question being asked. Young warrior hungry for glory may help break defenders in one Focus and, in another, threaten discretion, discipline, or future peace.

The Focus does not only select what matters. It determines which outcome it matters toward.

An outcome may have no Bet and be represented by zero dice. A 0 / N resolution is valid; a 0 / 0 tells you to return to framing rather than roll dice that represent nothing.

The Bets page explains relevance, non-redundancy, counter-Bets, and when to stop gathering them.

The Fate Gauge

The Fate Gauge is an optional shared tool that remembers successive asymmetries.

It contains dice of two colours: one for the Protagonists, one for adversity. Opposing colours cancel each other.

Before the roll, when the number of Bets differs between the two sides, add the difference to the Gauge in favour of the currently disadvantaged side. These dice do not change the current resolution.

Example: the Protagonists have 5 Bets and adversity 3. The resolution remains 5 against 3, but the Gauge receives 2 adversity dice. They may be spent later when a difficulty coherent with the fiction appears, according to the authority agreed by the table.

The Gauge is a visible safety net, not an account that must be balanced after every scene. A table that does not need it may leave it out.

The balance is now fixed for this resolution. The table can read reality's answer.