Warfare Notes

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

So I've been listening to Tyrant Series, I just finished funeral games and I'm now in King of the Bosphoros. I started reading all the Wikipedia about the Diadochi and all related articles. Christian Cameron and the Wikipedia has helped make these successor wars very interesting. Particularly the evolution of the Cavalry and Specialized unit roles. 

I find myself revising a lot of my understandings on man-power regarding some of the units. Basically the economics and psycho-mechanics of these units. Here are some key take aways: 

• Edit: From feedback from Ian Borchardt
• Pikemen, Halberders, Spearmen, swordsmen, etc... are all heavy infantry. the circumstancial modifiers will be detailed in my Warfare notes. 
• Professional/regular vs Conscript Forces/iregular are 2 : 1 better. Trade-offs and circumstantial bonus based on their equipment and training.  Veteran and Elite are 2:3 meaning Elite is only marginally better but can 
• With Open terrain where Regular vs Irregular have 2 vs 1 odds.  
• In GURPS mass combat there is Troop Strength. It doesnt really have any mechanic to represent Flexibility and Adaptability that comes with a well drilled machine and the cumbersomeness of some tactics. The closest work around is to give it conditional penalties when it comes to being flexible or adaptable or giving conditional advantages to other units who exploit their inflexibility/in-adaptability. 
• Wedge formation. Will be modeled as an Risky and Aggressive maneuver. Well armored units (and those with shields) are better at it than other units. Whats great about it is destroying cohession of the opposing unit and getting to more vulnerable units past it. 
• Regular would be 5x in cost and time to train and equip than Irregular (especially because of half of the cost and time will be Overhead to reach Regular status. 
• Heavy Infantry is not a unit but more of a role. A role that requires a lot of discipline and training.  
• The Hoplite or the Roman Legionaire are heavy infantry. Special Unit Qualities:
• Heavy to Light Shield
• Heavy to Light Armored
• Sword (defaults to Short sword)
• Spear
• Pike
• Pole or Great weapon
• Great, Strong, and Skirmishing Ranged
• Shock or Skirmishing
• Heavy (Closed formation), Medium (small group formations), to Light (Open Formation). 
• Shock Action as well as taking the brunt of shock action are parts of the Role. The byzantines called heavy infantry Defensores. Many armies depended on the role as an a morale anchor. 
• Taking the brunt of a Shock action is harder and takes more discipline.
• Charging to become the "shock action" is easier which is why more expendable Auxilia can be made to do it. (the Kurasores)
• So there will be Heavy "Armored" Infantry or Heavy Infantry Role to be more clear. 
• In GURPS Mass Combat Troop Strength can be further simplified with the following tool (which I'm using with Open Warfare system). 
• Ignore the previous TS method. 
• Start counting the (Professional) Warriors. You can set that as your TS of 1 per warrior. So 1,000 trained warriors is a TS 1000. 
• The most important table is the Relative TS Table. Relative TS table 
• next is the class superiority modifier. 
• limit to 2-3 key modifying circumstance modifiers. do not get too bogdown with
• Equipment. This is a conditional multiplier the way Special Classes superiority gives modifiers to the roll. If the Force has the Equipment superiority for the situation then they get the Special Class superiority.  
• Experience Level. consider the warrior the benchmark of quality of troop. non warriors count as 0.3TS, TS1.5 for veteran, to Elite of TS2, to a max of TS3 for heroes. 
•  this simplifies the situation to:
• what are the forces engaging? 
• no. and quality (which is the TS)
• what is the circumstances (who has superiority)?
• terrain, position, 
• their respective maneuvers, 
• equipment
• condition, initiative
• roll and check combat results table. 
• Remounts have a very very tangible effect in the Cavalry. The biomechanics of horses are very similar to humans, you can't expect them to carry a rider for more 4-6 hours (depending on horse's quality) without risking injury or getting injured if they go all-out. 
• There are some serious problems of making it reflect in GURPS mass combat mechanics. In fact mounted combat has been very hard to model, and only recently with games like Mount and blade, simulations in Total War, and books like those of Flavius Arrianus being recently getting the rounds  reworking a lot of the notions of how Mounted combat works. Allowing GMs to stress it as an advantage. 
• Any economic entity mechanics have to be pretty abstract as to leave the details of land usage, and focuses on the final products of a particular area. 
• Further readings and the limitations of Historical knowledge would be a great and helpful set of directions to get people to see for themselves. 
• The KPIs of the region can be a long list, but can have an order of details. Some details are more important and others are just dressing that help in immersion. A handy guide would be helpful because the details can be overwhelming (and powerfully immersive).
• So far I've figured out much of Roman and Greek systems. Trying to figure out  Persian and Near East traditions, as well as Chinese traditions. 
• Warfare system needs a checklist. The first checklist being: what are the Assets/Resources, and how they are employed/deployed. 
• then comes the overhead, logistics, and support of these resources. 
• step by step: from simplest combat in a narrative formula to levels of details.
• Much of Chinese warfare is conscripts as r/k strategies. It became much clearer when the profile of heavy infantry became more apparent and universal in many of my studies. They did have shields but The Art of War by Thomas Cleary the commentaries by the other generals stressed on conscripts infantry. 
• Its possible to have no heavy infantry units, especially given the population and man power in chinese history.  Its kind of telling how sun tzu resorts to tricking his own men and putting them in desperate situations vs western tradition of heroic combat.  Just my pet theory, googling around for contrary opinions (because that would mean I could find a heavy infantry). Their halberdiers arent exactly heavy infantry, still open to ideas. 
• There is a possibility there were Heavy Infantry in the Warring States. But the Qiin must have killed them off. 

Currently Reading

• People Land and Politics Demographic developments and transformation of roman itally 300 BCE to 14 CE Luuk de Ligt and SJ Nortwood 
• The Beginnings of Rome Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars 1000 to 264 BCE by TJ Cornell
• A History of the Roman World HH Scullard and TJ Cornell
• Hanson The Other Greeks The Family Farm and the Agrarian Roots of Western Civilization
• Women in the Ancient World The Arethusa Papers SUNY series in Classical Studies by John Perdaotto and JP Sullivan
• Ancient Chinese Warfare Ralph D. Sawyer
• The Roman Empire Economy Society and Culture by Peter Garnesy and Richard Saller 
• The Roman market Economy by Peter Temin
• Ancient Mesopotamia New Perspectives by Peter Knight
• Millet Cultivation in China by Francesca Bray
• Warfare and Agriculture in Classical Greece by Victor Davis Hanson
• Rome at War Farm Family and Death in the Middle Republic by Nathan Rosenstein 
• History of the ROman Legion (a self published book in google play that is very poorly sourced but aggregates a lot of secondary sources)

what I miss about gaming

what free time I have is being on call with the new baby. Otherwise its trying to corral my son to do his homework or pull him from the vice grip of youtube. if not that it would be so many other things like studies, errands, chores, and obligations. I dont think there would be more freetime until my son is old enough to have the self control to do his own "character building" exercises (if he has my attention problems then that would be all through his teens lolz).

What i miss first off is the World Building. Particularly fleshing out people and places based on recently learned psycho-mechanics Economics, Logistics, Risk, Behavior, and Operations. As a Player being part of a GM's world building = creating the tables (or automated spreadsheets) that would help flesh out the Setting and Populate it with characters that meet the variability and predictability of various demographic studies that explains so much of the world to me. 

Then there is the Character Building. While I consider groups or communities as part of world building, parties or cadres or (what has been popularized currently) squads of personalities and their dynamics, conflicts, and failures of coordination (in wants, motives, needs they are not aware of etc..).

So alot of my reading has been World Building Inspirational.
Recently I've had the Tyrant Series and the Long War by Christian Cameron as inspiration. I learned to appreciate intrigue and political from GRRM, I learned to appreciate Classical Antiquity as a setting with Christian Cameron. I went through his bibliography, and found the Other Greeks, particularly Hanson Victor Davis as a source of other material. I discovered Shelly Waschmann's Seagoing Ships and Seamanship in the Bronze Age levant (not yet read but looking for a copy) at the end of Salamis (Book 5 of the long war).
These got me thinking of Bronze Age era, particularly past lectures Ancient Empires Before Alexander, and Origin of Civilization. Thanks to wikipedia I was able to reread and find more books on the matter: Basically read all the stuff on Bronze Age, Mesopotamia, Sargon of Akkad, Medes, and all the entries related that dealt with Civilizations. Then I went farther back with the Neolitihic Wikipedia Article where I discovered Aşıklı Höyük in Central Anatolia, Göbekli Tepe in Turkey (check out Kurzegsagt in youtube) the date for the Holocene calendar that marks human civilization at 12,016.

Christian Camerons difference of opinion with Victor Davis Hanson got me thinking about Agriculture and carrying capacity. leading me to study the literature on Agricuture again, from the wikipedia to source books. A world building exercise that got me thinking about the fraglity of their economy and the need for trade (and empire to cement it).
Christian Cameron got me to start thinking about Hema again. but More of HMA (not centrally focused on ) Manchuarchery.org's article on the Last Manchu Archer got me thinking about incorporating archery to my Hiit Routine and of course thinking more about Archer characters. So did Nikolas Tomihama and his Backyard Bowyer give some ideas in practicing archery with such a small space.

Current events was depressing and in the philippines we have terrible unimplementable laws. the discovery and understanding that we exist in this fragile state that confidence in the law leads to order, but if we look closely at how easily it is to game and how hard it is to fix, and how difficult it is for even to perform actions that move things (not just protests). Drug addicts or even drug criminality related people are considered subhuman, and can be killed without repercussion has gotten me to read up on a lot of laws, the terribly written constitution of the philippines, and more about the analysis of various groups that really go down to investigate the problems. The Philippine center of investigative journalism do their due dilligence more than most, Rappler comes second and the mainstream media here is just click bait (no sources or actionable items).The logic of political survival has come into my reading list.

On some lighter reading all the fitness related articles in Wikipedia. I highly recommend strength training and overtraining, and taking note of all the Psychomechanical interplay of those exercise articles with Taylorism/Scientific management. Reading it along with all the Management Sciences like Arthur V. Hills Encylopdia of Operations, Books on Lean Management, and as I'm delving deep into more Production Manufacturing books is coloring and detailing another part of the world for me. When I think about a filipino laborer and "productivity" i realize what little rest they have comes from a light hand and a well experienced technician who plans very well (which makes their rest comes from the incompetence of their leaders). an interesting picture since I apply it to Corve labor and that in my low tech studies.

I've started watching and studying the biomechanics of the HMA and archery. Particularly with the other notes of work sciences in mind. Of course this gets the gears of imagination working about what kind of character I would like and what kind of life he would have had or can have. Its brought me to thinking of the training more and more, and the painfully slow improvement and how mindset plays in the improvement (it doesnt feel slow to me, it happens when various things fall right and to expect that with certain lifepaths - like a family man on call will have serious limitaitons to meet this). Another key thing I think about its "Making Time" for me and my character. I realize elaborating our priorities doesnt get to the bottom of what we really prioritize unless time, pressure, and others make us realize what our real priorities is. and when I think of characters having a misleading idea of what their priorities are I wonder how to model it in the game and how players may not like that level of complexity.

It will be a while when I realistically have the time to game and even get into world building again. I would really love to flesh out a world with my new knowledge because thats how I memorize it and make it part of me: get new knowledge and reframe and rewrite it again and again till i have a portable model I can carry with me or a model I can tuck away in my notes and decompress when I need it.

Core Mechanics can get complicated.

I almost take for-granted how complicated the basic mechanics can be:

Determine relevant Scores or Stats for the roll. This has a lot of implied knowledge. They can be intuitive but when you go down to nitty-gritty there are counter intuitive exceptions to everything and there are ways to frame and approach a problem or challenge.

It gets complicated since there are so many ways to frame the scene, narrative, problem, challenge, and situation and the practice that comes in rearranging Facts to frame something in a manipulative way. It may lead down the rabbit hole of Non-Fiction Writing techniques, Cognitive Biases, Arguments, and even (legal) Objections.

Determine the Situational Modifiers or Scope of Objective of the roll. Determine if the Character has any relevant modifiers from his capabilities, the environmental's or timing's or circumstantial modifiers, and then the Scope of the objective - relative to the resources and time that an action or roll.

One thing that is not usually comes up unless the GM plays Hard Mode is going into the details of the Cost or Opportunity Cost of the Action. Does it consume time, patience of another person or relationship credit, and consumable materials and how each attempt alters the circumstances.

Determine the Consequences of the Roll. If failure, success, or set backs happen. There is the Game's System way to resolve it and there is the best way to resolve it based on the story, the player, the party, and the long game of enjoying the hobby.

Then there is elements of Risk and Chance. if you've heard of a GM who killed a PC on rolling a 1 lighting a torch on a D20, after a basic review on Risk (reading wikiarticles on Probablity, OSHA, and system processes) this becomes something someone more informed would not do. And by Informed this can mean 3000-30k worth of words bits of data of Informed.

Something as Basic as Core or Basic Mechanics can get pretty complicated. so my Gming gdoc keeps getting longer

World Building is a Skill

It was only recently I realized World building as a Skill. As a skill it has many components with the goal making an immersive setting. Immersive settings have many traits that make it so: ideals, mechanics (it has laws that can be acceptable or makes sense), and engages us in many levels.

To some gamers, like myself, Science and the understanding the world we live in all contributes to my World building. When I read about current events, cultures, people, economics, psychology, history, politics, etc... all contribute to my World Building because I work these all in the narrative and details of the worlds I make.

Other gamers find Literature, Stories, Characters, ironies, tragedies, sufferings, Ideologies, human virtues, etc... are more the focus of their World building. We all have very different values and focus or clarity in an aspect of the world we live in that make it engaging to us and we reflect that back into our World Building.

Understanding the Fantasy

below are a couple of key information I try to look for that is absent in most RPGs. While most RPGs deal with Characters and Peoples, i like looking at demography and economics. With these two very broad elements the world becomes more real for me.

Currently my studies are about the Axial Age in 5-4C BCE China and Hellio Centric World (from the Balkans to India) and their economies and demography. I'm butchering Middle Ages data to create my made up data for this era. A mixed blessing that I'm too busy to play but I can do some research into some worthwhile answers to these questions. 

Demography

Demography helps in painting a picture of the population and the kind of life the people lived. It gets the world builder quickly into what matters and the mortality of the population. 

1. Child mortality, ex. ~33% before reaching the age of 5 in pre modern times and in poor undeveloped states and regions. 
2. Maternal Death ex. 20%. It makes one think of the role and value of women and mothers in society. their challenges and risks. 
3. Median average life expectancy. Ex. mid-40s. this limits the ages of the characters and gets the players thinking of what maturity means. 
4. Median Population Age, Family starting age, 
5. Family Size 

Useful sources

1. Dorsey Armstrong The Medieval World (i forgot her sources)
2. Life Expectancy in the Middle Ages (quick search on the web)

Basic Economics

At the most basic level, economics deals with the reality of having to prioritize where the next meals is going to come from and what it is going to taste like. Tackling the most basic elements of the economy: food production and the patterns and exchanges make deviations to the norm all the more special. It also allows the world builders to frame the risk, rewards, transactions, value, and

1. What is the most common crop and why?
2. What is the output of land to weight of crop produced, in its basic usable form?
3. What is the amount of man days it takes to Prepare and Harvest the land?
4. What is the supplementary diet of the people?
5. What is the sizes of the household?
6. What is the cost of living? What are their buying and spending habits, what do people spend on which they shouldn't, and what are their key economic virtues and practices?
7. What are the Patrons, the Elite, Indentured Servants, Servants, Slaves, and Clients like?
8. What is their technology like?

Useful Sources

1. GURPS Low Tech Companion 3: Daily Life and Economics
2. Harn Manor

Table-top Role Playing Game Knowledge Bits or Skills

I was supposed to write about making Mass Combat or Warfare easier but I realized I needed to tackle elements of TRPGs. I can’t make warfare easier if we cannot define and limit the scope of what such a game can be about. Identifying what makes games different in how we play is one thing, the next is breaking down the little skills that make up playing TRPGs.

Assumptions

1. We can categorize and enumerate the skills, techniques, mechanics, and means in playing and running TRPGs. I'll be using the term mechanics since it seems adequately broad to describe both the rules, opportunities, conditions, and options players and the GM tend to learn.  
2. We have a scarce capacity in the things we can do in preparing and learning to play TRPGs.

Thesis

1. That we can plan how better to spend our time, in what TRPG elements we are pursuing..

Actionable 

So to make this less overwhelming and easier to do, here is an example of a breakdown and tools to measure. Another example of a knowledge, technique, or skill breakdown is this GMing skill list I've been working on for a year.  I didn't do everything in one go, all of it (if you can check the document history) is a little at a time. What makes it look like a lot of work is that I have one bucket and I just dump and dump everything I learned: from stupid, basic, incomplete, and esoteric into it.

In case you dont check out the links and the details I worked on, you can still build you won list of stuff relating to TRPGs and plan out what is the best use of your time. I didnt put it in this post because it would be too much of a deep dive and the post serves better to just make you consider all the things you'd want to learn, understand, identify and master when running games. If you have a problem of having too much game in the brain then this more organized approach will help optimize your time and effort. So you can more easily pick up and put down the hobby when real life gets in the way, like the family gamers who have a little too much to juggle.

How we game

Finding out how we game as objectively and precisely as possible would mean a lot of self reflection, note-taking, and feedback from your players or Gms.

This is my notes on how I have observed others, myself (recording through hanouts on air, video, and exporting it to audio and listening to it), and experimentation on determining how we game.

I can say that there are two primary activities in running a TRPG and that is: Role-playing and Gaming. Roleplaying is the activities that are made up of Immersion, storytelling, visualization, drama, etc... Gaming is the simpler and faster paced feedback cycle that happens between players and GM.

These two elements blend together to make a game, and are rarely are they so extreme as to be divorced from the other. There is interplay with the most extreme of Role-playing and Storytelling, and there is a story and immersion in the most gaming focused activities in a session.

How are they measured:

We measure Roleplaying by measuring the amount of time we take getting into character, playing off each other’s character, “role-playing”, storytelling, and pursuing scenes to push one of the many story streams in the game forward (either the game’s over-arcing narrative, each player’s personal narrative, the narrative of the world, their adversary etc...).

We measure the Gaming by the amount of Feedback and Adaptation we do in the game and its circumstances. We normally measure it in the amount of combat we have in the session, but it can also mix with the other high action events where the Players feedback quickly between the circumstance or adversary or each other.

How the two are used:

Usinig these two conventions, we can use them to do the following:

1. How we spend our time playing. to look at the amount of time we, the players, or the gm, spend their time in each one.
2. Preferences. It helps track preferences and tailor the game more for all those participating.
3. Focus. It helps focus on geting the most enjoyment when we transition or vasilate between the two.
4. Description. It helps describe and work on a variety of blends of the two.

Role-Playing

1. Immersion. Lettiing the Players (and even the GM) get into character and the setting.
   
2. Storytelling. When one of the many story streams in the game gets focus, relevance, moved forward, influences other stories, and becomes the one of the causes of the circumstance, happenings and events.
   
3. Spotlight. Giving the Player or part of the story some focus. Particularly pushing the story forward. It clarifies and expresses the story, giving it the chance to get deeper in the immersion, and make events and action have more impact.
   
4. Emotion and Empathy. Role-playing is an opportunity to display, express, and to feel a particular emotional tone for the scene and story. It takes time for certain emotions to be felt and expressed, and Role-playing builds to that opportunity.
   

Gaming

1. Interaction. Gaming is notable when the Players, Setting or World, NPCs, etc... adapt to each other. Their actions feed back and change the situation.
   
2. Tension and Conflict. When events get complicated, setting up risks and threats, and incentives and penalties.
   
3. Uncertainty. Uncertainty is one of the sources of conflict which muddies the situation and makes threats, penalties, pain, and peril disproportionately worse. Ambiguity also does this, leaving the quantity and quality of any threat or danger unknown and left to the sensitivities of bias and emotion.
   
4. Small Wins. When the feedback gives small wins or gains. Small wins can also be some mental closure on other matters.
   
5. Clarity and Simplification. Like the benefit of mental closure, there is the simplification of some issues, information that removes ambiguity, sharpening of focus on priorities or action. New information or events may give clarity, simplification, or focus.
   

What this post does not answer or help with:

1. Defining how one really plays and how flexible their prefences are. These are arbitrary tools and conventions, and it does not apply to all or many not apply to most. Its hypothetical. Tools by which to self examine and improve are found in other books – particularly in self improvement books that work with practical activity instead of motivation and emotion.
   
2. Defining the various mixes of the two. The mixed versions of them would be:
   
3. Mass Combat or Warfare Focused Games. The story and roleplaying with large groups, the scale that goes with such groups (conquering more and more people, places, treasures, and affecting more of the world).
   
4. Intrigue and Social Games. Games that have a very particular blend of Gaming and Role-playing when Emotion, Expression, and Relationships are to tools of conflict and conquest.
   
5. Logistics and how it can be given the elements of both Game and Role-playing (Story).
   

Feedback

Feedback is the limit by which we can know ourselves and surroundings. If I dont express and know how it tests against reality then I would never know what would be better or best. Feel free to give some feed back, ask, or comment.

Conditional Success, Significant Actions

Conditional Success is basically replacing failure with an Extreme cost for Success. The Margin of Failure determined how much it would have cost to succeed and if the Player or Party are willing to pay that cost.

System Agnostic. You can apply this to any game system (better with bell curve dice systems). I recommend Squaring the margin of Failure as the Cost of Success on bell curve dice system or square then half when using a d20.

How this is resolved is basically the Player rolls to attempt to perform the Task, Action or Activity but on a failure realizes there is more work and cost to making it work given his circumstances. It can be multiple attempts built in, much more work and resources needed because of the variables of the circumstance, timing, particularities of the scope of work, etc...

Usefulness. The main reason behind the mechanic are the following:
1) Pacing - the feedback loop of the Roll does not end with the player knowing if they Failed, it now becomes a much harder and ambiguous question:
          i) can I pay the cost of success.
          ii) is it worth it? is success at this point worth it?
          iii) what are my opportunity costs?
          iv) the player has more agency since they can make more of a call instead of having to ask the GM what can he do about it.
2) Heightened Tension. Because of how it leaves an ambiguous answer that requires more thought on the Player it affects the tension. Uncertainty and Ambiguity ramps up tensions (and frustration of players) used skillfully it adjusts level of tension for the players.

This mechanic requires the GM to recallibrate how the System deterines what is a Significant Action.

Significant Actions

the 2 min rule  of David Allen's getting shit done, Kal Newports Deepwork on 4-6 hours concentration blocks, the definition of Shallow Work (Kal Newport) and my own experience in Operation man hour metrics got me thinking about Significant Action. In a Day one of the most productive things we can make maybe progress in a difficult task OR juggling many small "shallow" tasks. So I proceeded to define A ROLL or a Significant Action to be at default 1 Workload or 4-6 manhour task. From this anchor I proceeded to make the following Definition:

The GM doesnt bother with insignificant tasks. He looks at the Gross Cost or Final Cost of the Action in Time and Resources.

You'll notice that the Definition give you a better anchor when researching what can be done with a Roll or a Skill use, because in real life no matter how capable or skilled, and what industry one works in, people still have to break down tasks in these small do-able chunks.

Few people can block of Months or Weeks for a tasks without Personal Life getting in the way, few businesses allow people to concentrate uninterrupted in their work without throwing a LOT of distracted firefighting and shallow work. Even the best people in their fields have to make time for distractions from personal, the world, or their superiors to get their core tasks done

Definitions.

• Task or Activity. 
• Insignificant: 1-5 mins. The GM doesnt bother with such tasks and they serve purely for immersion, visualization, and RP.  
• Minor Task. 45mins to 15mins (maybe margin of success lessens the number of mins)
• Partial. 3 to 1 man-hours (defaults at 3 unless specfied)
• Workload: 4-6 man-hours, we use 5 to simplify
• Standard: 1 workload (standard difficulty). 
• Man-Day is 2 Workloads
• Complex Task: 4-6 Man Days, we use 5 to simplify. 
• Concentrated Work Rule. Basically doing things broken up when it can be done in one block of time results to excesss time. Breaking up an Activity multiplies the activity by x1.5 more time. This can get worse as failure adds more and more sub activities.  
• other rules not discussed: Equipment (Capital and Infra requirement) and Consumables (materials spent in the activity). 

* the System may make can make the tasks that take less time have a bonus to success or fall under the easier task difficulties.
Beyond Complex Task level is a level of uncertainty thats best RPed and played out. If its being used to measure Downtime tasks and activities half the level of efficiency and assume there are a ton of distractions. Reserve the level of focus and clarity to period of "Adventure" or the Campaign.
Beyond this level the GM and the Player works on a Bill of Resources and various Operations Technical Estimates and Planning metrics.

Consequences.

• Now the occasion to roll tends to be something that eats up a work load and a failure may cost the character up to 4x to 9x or WAY more work, resources, or time.
• The GM or Player can better identify critical tasks and duties.
• The player delegates and plans how to tackle the problem.  
• The Player has to sort Significant Rolls from less important tasks. a level of frustration and tension from the disfluency of having to arrange tasks by priority and consequence. The players really have to prioritize and adapt. When a Petty Tasks 
• The GM can calibrate tasks appropriately since he looks at the Workload vs Distracting Busy work of the Job or Role. It becomes a world building tool. 
• Skills being benchmarked against a Partial or Standard Task. Some skills tend to be mostly shallow tasks (see Deepwork) while others require Deepwork or requires the full standard task and more. In a scifi setting AI aided deepwork will be the kind of work humans will have left. 

Quick Take Away.

• Magin of Failure is now the Inflated cost of Conditional Success
• Recallibrate what is a Significant Action