Many systems have these or similar rules. I’m sure folks with a broad library of games will find this old hat. But porting them into a rather traditional game has made it so much more fun for the table.

When you make a check for something, and the dice say No, the players have options.

Dramatic Failure: Something goes wrong that makes the situation Worse, but you get XP or similar for it. Set off an alarm. The would be pickpocket mark is more than just a little old lady. Whatever you all can come up with, so long as it makes the situation worse and more complicated. You don’t get what you actually wanted, and the hazards are real, but at least you get something.

Succeed at a cost: You get what you want, but something undesirable happens. Set off an alarm when opening the door. Jump the chasm but drop your backpack. Whatever you all can think of, so long as it makes things worse. You get what you were after, but…

Just Fail: You can’t retry. This solution is blocked off. No dithering on “what if I…”. You can’t pick the lock. You can force the door or find another entrance, but you can’t just keep fussing with it. Let’s keep moving.

This has been working great. When the players fail, we usually get something exciting instead of a dead end. It has really sped up the pace of the game, even if sometimes it sends us down wild tangents that rose out of failures.

I think some players would hate this. Probably in part because it’s all pretty zoomed out. These are player choices, not character choices. But that’s where I like to sit in RPGs - a writer building a story more than an actor living a role.

I don’t think I would be happy going back to a vanilla dnd-like where the dice just dropped us off at dead ends.