Reading the Rules, Part I

I'm currently reading through the rules, which is good since my game starts tomorrow. So far so good, though some of the first stuff they talk about seems to be where they hid the normal "This is how you play an rpg" bullshit that I thought they'd done without. So far the only rpg book that just assumes that if you just blew $60 or more on a game book you may just know what an rpg actually is has been RuneQuest 6. Oh well. Once you get to the actual rules is when it gets good.

Everything (and I do mean everything- the guy trying to shank you for your last copper, trying to jump from rooftop to rooftop, even debating philosophy with an antediluvian machine intelligence) has a difficulty level from 1 to 10. Various things like training, equipment and special powers can adjust the difficulty, usually by 1 at a time. If the difficulty is reduced to less than 1 it's considered a routine task and doesn't need to be rolled for, if not then the resulting number is multiplied by 3 and that is the number rolled against. Something to note is that the players roll everything. The DM doesn't roll anything at all, just assigns difficulty levels to things and adjudicates if and how the level is modified. So far so good.

So it appears that some rolls have special effects. a 17-20 are all beneficial with a 19 giving you a "Minor Effect" and 20 netting you a "Major Effect". Rolling a 1 gives a free "GM Intrusion", which apparently lets me manipulate the story. I'm not sure how I feel about this to be honest since manipulating the story and setting are what I'm supposed to be doing as the GM. I'll have to think about this more. [Edit: It appears that the GM Intrusions are specifically supposed to be altering the game in a meta-gamey, pseudo-adversarial way. I'm more okay with them now.] A description of Major & Minor Effects and the kinds of things you can do with them. Apparently if the player wants to do something very unlikely then I can call for a roll to confirm the effect.