Call of Cthulhu 7e Push the Roll Guide: Pushed Rolls and Hard and Extreme Difficulty

Introduction

A failed roll does not have to stall an investigation. In Call of Cthulhu 7e, a pushed roll gives an investigator one second and final attempt at the same goal. The price is that the scene changes: time passes, the investigator takes a riskier approach, or something is exposed.

Every roll, pushed or not, also has a difficulty: Regular, Hard, or Extreme. This guide covers both halves, because the difficulty tells you how demanding a task is and the push tells you what happens when an investigator refuses to leave it alone.

Hot Take

A pushed roll is not insurance against an unlucky die. It is the player agreeing that this moment matters enough to make things worse.

"I try again" is not a push. "I stay in the evidence room after closing, take the cabinet apart instead of picking it, and accept that the night watchman may hear me" is a push. It gives the Keeper a playable situation and explains why the final roll carries weight. The same logic applies to difficulty: Hard and Extreme should describe the obstacle, not punish a player for investing in a skill. When the task is ordinary, a strong investigator should get to be strong.

Regular, Hard, and Extreme Difficulty

Call of Cthulhu 7e has three difficulty levels for skill and characteristic rolls. The Keeper sets the level after the player states a goal and method.

The Three Difficulty Levels

The first question is still whether a roll is needed. The Keeper Rulebook says that if a task is easy, no roll is called for. Driving to a known address or reading a plain sign needs no dice. Difficulty only matters when an uncertain outcome creates real tension.

Start with a Goal, Not a Number

"I use Locksmith" does not give enough information to set a difficulty. "I want to open the side door quietly before the night watchman returns" does. The goal sets the constraint (quiet, time, secrecy, speed, or safety) and the method sets the skill.

If the goal changes, the difficulty may change. The rulebook contrasts "break the door down" with "lever the door open quietly" as two different goals. A result can only be read fairly when the table agreed on the objective before the roll.

Calculate the Target

Write the full, half, and fifth values on the sheet at character creation, rounded down, so nobody does arithmetic in the middle of a chase.

An investigator with 70% Climb succeeds on a Regular Climb roll with 70 or lower, a Hard roll with 35 or lower, and an Extreme roll with 14 or lower. The same method applies to characteristics. The rulebook's example is a STR 20 investigator forcing a thick oak door: the Keeper sets Hard difficulty, so the target is 10.

The Threshold Is the Requirement

If the Keeper calls for a Hard roll, a result under the full skill but above half is a failure. The required number stays at the level of success this task needs; a push does not drop it back to Regular.

This is also why skills above 50% stay valuable. A high full value still leaves a usable Hard target when conditions turn bad.

Fumbles shift with the target too. If the number needed is 50 or more, only 100 is a fumble; if it is below 50, anything from 96 to 100 is. The rulebook's example: a 55% Library Use fumbles only on 100 in a normal search, but a Hard search by candlelight (target 27) fumbles on 96 to 100.

Set Difficulty from the Actual Obstacle

Regular is the default for a meaningful but ordinary challenge. Hard appears when the task would test someone who already knows what they are doing. Extreme is for dire situations, such as working while being shot at or pursued, or when conditions are uniquely appalling.

Look at the whole situation, not a single adjective. Darkness alone may justify a penalty die. Darkness plus a collapsing floor, armed pursuit, and fragile evidence may justify Hard or Extreme, depending on what the investigator is attempting. Explain the main constraint so the player can decide whether to go ahead or change the plan.

Non-Living Obstacles Need Judgment

For a locked door, machine, cliff, or environmental danger, the Keeper weighs the relevant facts. A standard challenge is Regular. A challenge clearly beyond that is Hard. An exceptionally difficult task that is still humanly possible is Extreme.

Do not make a task Extreme just because the scenario wants drama. Show why it is extraordinary: the tool is inadequate, the structure is failing, the target is uniquely protected. The rulebook's Extreme examples include defusing an explosive of alien design and diagnosing an alien illness.

Living Opposition Without an Opposed Roll

When a living being resists, the Keeper sets the difficulty from the opponent's relevant skill or characteristic instead of rolling for both sides.

The Keeper chooses what counters the action, and it need not be the same skill. An investigator tailing someone rolls Stealth against a difficulty set by the target's Spot Hidden. In the rulebook's library example, the librarian's Persuade and Psychology are both under 50, so the investigator's Persuade roll is Regular. The rules say players should roll the dice more often than the Keeper.

There is a ceiling. The most an investigator can face with an Extreme success is an opposing value of 100 plus their own skill or characteristic; beyond that, no roll is allowed. For physical tasks such as lifting, several investigators can combine by subtracting their STR from the opposing value, lowest first, until someone else can make the roll.

Use a full opposed roll when both sides have mutually exclusive goals and the contest itself is the scene. Opposed rolls are standard in melee but should be rare outside it. The Skills Guide covers opposed-roll results.

Difficulty Is Not Quality

The rulebook states that the fifth, half, and full divisions do not equal grades of success. If the goal needs a Hard success, a roll under half achieves the goal. If the goal only needs Regular, rolling under a fifth still achieves the same goal unless the Keeper decides the fiction supports something extra.

A critical is separate. A roll of 01 means something beneficial beyond the goal, chosen by the Keeper, though players can suggest ideas: more time, cleaner access, a useful connection, or a hidden implication.

An initial failure should not usually cause damage or Sanity loss. The rules suggest failure can simply mean failing to act, like a climber who hesitates at a loose drainpipe. Save "what's the worst that could happen?" for a failed push.

Hard and Extreme Scenes That Work

These examples pair a reason for the threshold with a failure that keeps play moving.

The last two show why Extreme should be rare. It tells the group that direct action is possible but unlikely, which should invite preparation, teamwork, or a different route rather than a reflexive roll.

Bonus Dice, Penalty Dice, and Difficulty

Difficulty changes the target number. A bonus or penalty die changes which tens die you keep: roll an extra tens die and keep the lower result for a bonus, the higher for a penalty. One of each cancels, and highly favorable or dire conditions can justify a second die.

A professional with ideal tools on a demanding repair might make a Hard roll with a bonus die. A rushed attempt in poor light might be Regular with a penalty die. The rules warn that these dice are not small tweaks: light rain is no reason for a penalty die, but racing another driver through torrential rain is. Do not stack modifiers to make a scene feel serious. If every meaningful action is Hard with a penalty die, high skills stop meaning anything.

Player Tactics for Difficult Rolls

Before accepting a Hard or Extreme roll, ask questions that change the fiction:

1. What exactly makes this task Hard or Extreme?
2. Can we remove a constraint with time, tools, information, or help?
3. Is a different skill or approach more fitting?
4. Can another investigator handle a separate part of the task?
5. What happens on an ordinary failure, and could we push it?

This is good investigation, not an argument with the Keeper. Better tools, a diversion, a contact's trust, or a narrower objective can turn Extreme into Hard, Hard into Regular, or remove the need for a roll.

What a Pushed Roll Is

After failing a skill or characteristic roll, an investigator may make one more attempt at the original goal. The player must explain what the investigator does differently. When a player asks "Can I push?", the rulebook says the Keeper should answer with a question: "What action are you taking to push the situation?" If the player is stuck, the other players or the Keeper can suggest something.

Time always passes between the first attempt and the push: a few seconds while a lockpick bends, an extra hour in an attic, or a whole night following a lead through unsafe streets. The rest of the world gets a chance to react.

The skill and difficulty normally stay the same. A researcher who digs deeper still uses Library Use at the same difficulty. Both can change if the situation changes. Forcing a stuck door with your shoulder instead of picking the lock may become a STR roll, and it makes noise the quiet first attempt did not.

The goal must still be achievable. A push escalates an attempt; it does not make an impossible request possible. The rulebook's example is a failed Jump across an abyss that cannot be pushed at all. An investigator also cannot push Spot Hidden to find a clue that is not there, which is why a healthy investigation offers more than one path to essential information.

The Push Procedure

The first failure is information. It says the simple approach did not work: the keyhole is corroded, the witness is suspicious, the trail is fading. Build the push from that result instead of pretending it never happened.

Keep the objective narrow. "Get into the hotel" is often too broad. "Open the service door before the patrol comes around the corner" gives success and failure clear meanings.

Justify a Changed Situation

The justification is the heart of the rule. It does not need a speech, but it needs a real change. The rulebook's own examples: throwing yourself at a door with no heed for safety, persuading a police officer at the risk of arrest, turning a room over and risking breakage, or reading a tome obsessively until the contents make sense.

Keep the change in the current scene. "I telephone my professor contact at midnight and tell her why I need the restricted files" changes both method and stakes.

Other players can suggest approaches, but the investigator making the roll owns the decision. When several investigators are working on the same task, the rules treat a repeat attempt at the same goal as a push. In the rulebook's good cop, bad cop example, once each interrogator has rolled, they either give up or one of them pushes.

Foreshadow the Consequence

Before a pushed roll, the Keeper may foreshadow failure by saying "If you fail..." and adding as much detail as they like. The rulebook gives two reasons to do it: the player asks, to judge the risk, or the Keeper wants to raise the drama. Highlight what the investigator would notice, even if the player has not thought of it; things the investigator could not know can stay as hints. Players can suggest consequences too, especially scarier ones.

A direct statement works well: "You can force the door, but if it goes badly, the noise will bring whoever is inside." Consequences commonly involve:

• Attention: A guard, rival, police officer, cultist, or neighbor notices.
• Loss: A tool breaks, evidence is destroyed, or a valuable favor is spent.
• Position: The group is trapped, separated, delayed, or exposed.
• Physical danger: Injury, exhaustion, or an immediately dangerous predicament.
• Social fallout: A witness turns hostile, a cover identity burns, or a suspect retaliates.
• Horror: The investigator attracts notice, learns something terrible at the wrong moment, or makes contact they cannot undo.
• Moral cost: The attempt endangers an innocent person or breaks an important promise.

Keep some surprise. The Keeper need not name the cultist behind the door, but "someone is listening" is fair warning. The consequence should grow from the pressure the investigator chose to increase, not arrive as a random disaster.

What Can and Cannot Be Pushed

Only skill and characteristic rolls can be pushed. Spell casting has its own version, covered below.

You cannot push:

• Luck rolls. Luck is fortune, not an action an investigator can escalate. The Luck guide covers that system.
• Sanity rolls, damage rolls, or rolls that set Sanity loss.
• Combat rolls, including Fighting and Firearms. The skill entries say so directly.
• Opposed rolls. The rulebook's chess game between two investigators is its example: once one wins, the result stands.
• A fumble. Its effects apply immediately and cannot be pushed away.
• A goal that is impossible or no longer achievable.

If your table uses the optional rule for spending Luck, a failed skill roll gives the player a choice: push it or spend Luck. Luck points cannot change the result of a pushed roll.

This does not stop creative follow-up. After a failed attack or opposed roll, an investigator can retreat, create a distraction, bargain, or set a trap. That is a new action, not a pushed version of the old one.

Pushing a Casting Roll

Casting a spell for the first time takes a Hard POW roll. If it fails, nothing happens, and the caster can push by paying the spell's costs again, either immediately or later. A successful pushed casting works with no side effects. A failed one still works, but the caster pays the cost multiplied by 1D6, with any Magic point overspend coming out of hit points, and the Keeper adds side effects. The magic, mythos, and tomes guide covers spells in more depth.

Success, Failure, and Paying the Cost

On a successful push, the investigator achieves the goal as the original roll would have, and none of the foreshadowed consequences happen. If the push was to get into the archive before the guard returns, they get inside.

A failed push gives the Keeper free rein. The rulebook lists damage, Sanity checks, lost equipment, isolation from the group, and capture, and says the consequence should steer toward horror. Do not just say "you fail again." The guard catches the group in the archive, the forced door alerts the thing inside, or the investigator falls through the roof into the room they were trying to avoid.

Failure can still grant the goal at a cost, which the rules explicitly allow. The researcher finds the name in the ledger, but the librarian now knows exactly what they wanted. The investigator gets through the door, but leaves blood, broken tools, and a clear trail.

The rules also advise against outcomes that end the game when another option exists. Instead of a sudden death, consider a setback such as lost equipment or a dead ally, capture, a deal offered by the enemy, or fainting and waking to a changed situation. The rulebook's example is an investigator who fails to leap a chasm and washes up injured and lost in an underground river instead of dying.

Match the price to the action. A pushed attempt to read a faded receipt should not summon a cosmic entity out of nowhere. A pushed exploration of a drowned crypt at low tide can justify something much harsher.

Strong Pushes by Skill Type

Use the complete skills list to find the relevant skill, then build the escalation from the fiction in front of you.

Investigation and Research

For Library Use, History, Science, or Occult, push through time, access, or intellectual danger. Stay after hours, open a sealed archive box, contact a dubious expert, or chase a source that is already disturbing the investigator's sleep. Good consequences make knowledge costly: an interested reader, damaged material, lost time, or information that cannot be forgotten. With Cthulhu Mythos, the rulebook's phrasing for a push is staring into the abyss so long that something looks back.

For Spot Hidden or Listen, move from observing to exposure. Crawl closer to a broken wall, search a corpse more thoroughly, or wait alone in the dark until the sound returns. The cost may be discovery, contamination, or seeing something that shakes the investigator's certainty.

Physical and Technical Work

For Locksmith, Mechanical Repair, Electrical Repair, or a characteristic roll, the push is usually force or improvisation. Use a crowbar, strip a wire, bypass a safety measure, or keep working after the weather makes precision impossible. The rulebook's lockpicking example asks what breaks under too much force: the lock or the picks. Foreshadow noise, breakage, fire, or injury.

For Drive Auto, Navigate, Swim, Climb, and similar skills, make the route worse. Drive faster in the storm, cut across unmarked roads, or keep climbing when the wall feels unsafe. Failure should change position in a way the group can act on: a wreck, a wrong turn, a lost companion, or somewhere that strands them.

Social Pressure

Charm, Fast Talk, Intimidate, Persuade, and Credit Rating make good pushes when the player names what they are spending: an embarrassing truth, a favor, a reputation, or someone the investigator hoped to protect. For Psychology, the rulebook's push is studying someone a little too closely or asking prying questions.

Be clear before a social push. The player should know whether failure risks an alarm, a hostile witness, a ruined cover story, or a debt to a dangerous person. Keep the consequence about the fiction and NPC choices, not about forcing a player character into unwanted behavior. The table's safety boundaries matter more than a dramatic complication.

Pushing While Insane

The rulebook's skill entries include ideas for what happens when an insane investigator fails a push, and they are stranger and harsher than usual: a Track user who follows any trail until restrained, a Law user who now believes they are above the law. An insane investigator's failed push is also a natural moment to introduce a delusion. The temporary insanity guide covers how insanity plays out.

Player Guidance

When you fail, do not grab the dice straight away. Ask what your investigator can do that makes the situation less safe, more urgent, or more personal. Strong pushes reveal character: a skeptical doctor risks her standing to reach an asylum file, and a detective threatens a source he promised to protect.

Ask the Keeper direct questions:

• Is the original goal still possible?
• What must change for this to count as a push?
• What should my investigator fear if it fails?
• Does the new approach use the same skill and difficulty, or has the action changed enough to use another?

Declining a push is not giving up. Find another route, bring in another investigator, come back with equipment, or let the scene develop. A push works because it is a deliberate choice under pressure, not the default answer to every failure.

Keeper Guidance

Allow pushes generously when a player has a plausible escalation. Do not make players solve a puzzle to earn permission. Ask what they are doing differently, then help connect a reasonable answer to the scene.

When setting difficulty before any roll, use a repeatable process:

1. Ask the player for a concise goal and method.
2. Decide whether the moment has enough tension to need dice.
3. Identify the obstacle: a condition, a non-living challenge, or an opposing value.
4. Set Regular, Hard, or Extreme from that obstacle.
5. State the requirement and the stakes before the roll.
6. Treat success as achieving the agreed goal.
7. Make failure change the situation without ending the investigation.

When unsure, choose the lower difficulty and let the fiction supply a consequence. A Regular roll with a real complication usually beats an Extreme roll that just tells players their plan had no chance.

Set the push consequence before the roll and keep it proportional. The hotel patrol is near, forcing the door is noisy, so a failed push means the patrol finds the investigators at the threshold. Rotate among attention, resources, time pressure, social fallout, physical danger, and supernatural escalation; constant damage teaches players that bold choices only create bookkeeping. Make the outcome playable: capture can lead to an interrogation, a broken car can strand the group in a hostile town, and a frightened witness can call someone important.

Pushed Rolls and Horror

Horror gets stronger when people choose to go further than they should, and a pushed roll puts that choice into the rules. The easy route failed, and the investigator decides to stay in the basement, touch the evidence, pull harder on the sealed hatch, or keep asking questions after the witness wants them gone. In the rulebook's words, the player pushes the roll and the Keeper gets to push the horror back.

Use the moment to pace revelation. Foreshadow the immediate danger honestly while keeping the larger mystery. A player may know that forcing the hatch could alert something below without knowing what it is or what it wants. The choice stays informed, and the unknown stays frightening.

Pushed Roll and Difficulty Checklist

Before calling a Hard or Extreme roll, confirm:

1. There is real tension, not a routine task.
2. The player has stated a precise goal and method.
3. The fiction shows why a professional or expert would be challenged.
4. The target and stakes are clear before the roll.
5. An opposed roll is really needed, or the opponent's value can set the difficulty instead.
6. Ordinary failure moves the case instead of erasing the next lead.

Before a pushed roll, confirm:

• The investigator failed a skill or characteristic roll and the goal is still achievable.
• The roll was not a fumble, and no Luck was spent on it.
• The player described a concrete new action, extra effort, or greater exposure.
• Enough time passes for the world to react.
• The Keeper has foreshadowed the consequence if anyone asked.
• Everyone knows whether the skill and difficulty stay the same or change.
• The roll is not Luck, Sanity, damage, combat, or an opposed roll.
• Success achieves the goal, and failure moves the scene somewhere new.

When those answers are clear, roll once and let the situation change. One more attempt becomes a decision the group will remember.

Related Guides

• Call of Cthulhu 7e Skills Guide
• Call of Cthulhu 7e Complete Skills List
• Call of Cthulhu 7e Skill Points Guide
• Call of Cthulhu 7e How to Play Guide