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I am going to take the stance that a GM should not actually look at AC when choosing a target for a NPC or creature. At least not the specific numbers.
I thought about this because of the discussion about the -2 AC on the Taunt ability and whether it should have an affect on the choice a GM makes when choosing a target.
My conclusion is that taunt should be changed to match the flavor as described. Why does your remark, gesture, or shout get them to focus their Ire on you. Answer this and then decide on a mechanic that looks like it fits. If the -2 to defenses is the reason then the description should be updated to say something about drawing a foes attention to an opening the guardian leaves for them. Now you are tempting the foe and it starts to look a lot like come and get me. if guardians are an imposing sort such that when they shout gesture or make a cutting remark its difficult for enemies to ignore and that's the reason for the circumstance penalty then the drop in defenses is not part of the action and can be removed. If the design is to mechanically make the guardian more tempting a target the flavor doesn't incorporate that aspect of the mechanic. I also dont use numeric factors like AC to determine how foes target anymore than I expect my players to do so since they dont have that information. They can see foes with heavy armor and foes in robes, creatures that look slow and lumbering and ones that look agile. Even RK is not supposed to provide a number.
First when my players are deciding on what to attack they have a myriad of reasons for their choices. Some might think tactically and go after either the most dangerous looking target or the spell caster looking ones or the ones that can heal. Other reasons can be that one of the NPCs did something to infuriate their character. It could be they want to take on the big guy. They all have their reasons but I never give them the actual AC number (after rolling they might guess the ballpark and that's fine). So although as a GM I have all the numbers in front of me maybe that shouldn't be a reason to choose a target for an NPC either.
Second when i play the foes in an encounter I have them act based on what I designed them to do for the encounter along with a creature's predisposition toward behaviors. When behaviors make sense to players expectations i think the experience gels more for them. It also makes the odd situations stand out more and feed into and generate story hooks.
Here are three types of foes and how taunt might affect their decisions
Mindless creatures
- closest target generally unless it has a specific craving or mandate
- taunt will not change its target unless the guardian is just as easy
to reach as its current target. if guided by a craving or mandate
taunt will not change the target unless the guardian also fits the
same criteria or becomes an obstacle to it.
Intelligent NPCs
- Target they believe is either the most dangerous or
the one they are most effective at taking down
- an arrogant type might want to take on the strongest looking of the party
- They may also have other goals in combat like finding an escape path and taunt wont get them to stray.
Instinctual creatures of animal intelligence and maybe smart predators
- easiest prey for predators (less armored and weaker looking targets)
- most dangerous looking or most damaging if just defending itself
-taunt only changes the target if the creature changes from predator
to defending itself. It will take the penalty and continue after its
prey unless it is imposed on physically forcing it to defend itself
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I don't actually find myself agreeing with a lot of what's being said here: while the GM shouldn't need to look at exact AC numbers when looking at targets, if the party members can guess that the enemy Wizard in a bathrobe is probably going to be less likely to block a hit than the graveknight in full plate, then any reasonably intelligent NPC should be able to make that same basic observation and act on it.
The GM not looking at numbers is also why I disagree a with a lot of what the rest of the post goes into ignoring the effects of Taunt because AC penalties are invisible or the like. Taunting does pretty much what it says in the description: you're catching someone's attention, and the Guardian can do this even for mindless creatures. If you as the GM rule that monsters always ignore this because they can't see the stat modifiers going on, that I think is metagaming that completely ignores the in-universe mechanism of Taunt drawing someone's attention towards the taunter. This also applies for mindless enemies, and as the GM the implication is that you should have them react to the Taunt in proportion to how effective it was. Of course, it is still your prerogative to have enemies ignore this, particularly as Taunting isn't mind control and your NPCs can have good situational reasons for trying to ignore a Taunt, but if you consistently ignore Taunt and how it's meant to change target priorities, expect to be called out on it.
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Just wondering. Are you disagreeing?
I read your post a few times and I am not sure what you mean.
But i will say that the taunt is working 100% on the mindless creatures in my examples as well as on any other type creature i mentioned.
Mechanically this taunt isn't an agro pulling move. There is 0 expectation from the mechanics alone that an enemy will change its behavior because the the guardian taunted. The flavor says G gets thier ire but that's not repped in the mechanics at all. It does is give a consequence to attacking anything but the guardian and a reward for attacking the guardian. And those things happen no matter what behavior is followed. Not that the reward should be apparent without the flavor text describing to the GM what this ability will look like to NPCs and creatures. G is making noises at them, maybe they are imposing, or distracting, but whatever they do its causing the penalty. That part may be visable given the description.
That is actually exactly what I like about the move though.
Are you saying the -2 ac is something an NPC can notice and influences their choices? The yelling or remarks or whatever might get thier attention but its not guaranteed and shouldnt be guaranteed otherwise that would make it actual compulsion.
But i will say that the taunt is working 100% on the mindless creatures in my examples as well as on any other type creature i mentioned.
Mechanically this taunt isn't an agro pulling move. There is 0 expectation from the mechanics alone that an enemy will change its behavior because the the guardian taunted.
This is what I'm disagreeing with. Taunt is an aggro-pulling move; that's what the action is meant to do both mechanically and thematically. Choosing to deliberately ignore this and state that, as the GM, you wouldn't have Taunt alter a monster's target priorities out of certain extremely specific situations to me reads as hostile GMing, even if that is not your intention, as you are deliberately going against the intent of the ability. To be clear: you can do this if you want to, but aside from annoying your Guardian player, you're also going to be running into trouble with your monsters, who are going to be attacking with constant penalties the whole time. Your stated choice of how you'd run encounters with Taunt would make gameplay worse for everyone involved, in my opinion.
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If there's some kind of meta understanding that the ability that doesn't force a target change should in fact force a target change based on the social contract at the table, I would rather it were built into the rules text.
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If there's some kind of meta understanding that the ability that doesn't force a target change should in fact force a target change based on the social contract at the table, I would rather it were built into the rules text.
Agreed. I see the mechanical effect of the Taunt as the new difference that the GM is supposed have effect their "who to hit" decisions. If a foe would not have their actions change due to changing the to-hit numbers, then it is quite likely the foe will completely ignore a Taunt, in an "honest" (not GM hostile) manner.
And that works. It is intuitive that a support caster is not going to abandon a buff spell to blast the Guardian. Meanwhile, foes that are more attack-focused will be more inclined to change their behavior because of an imposed "to hit" effect.
- - - -
However, this is why I really do think the idea of the Guardian lowering their defenses is rather important to Taunt.
That does give plausible reason why a support caster might choose to instead shoot Needle Darts at the Guardian. They genuinely have a better chance to hit than normal. If the Guardian does *not* make themself a more appealing target in some way, then supports/casters/ect will "honestly" ignore the Guardian's Taunt effect much more often. I certainly would like the class to have a bit more dmg resistance and even more HP to better reflect that, but that's a bit off-topic.
IMO, if the GM is supposed to act beyond the written rules, that's just an incomplete rule.
I really don't think mind control or mandatory self-debuffs are the only ways of making Taunt work, and I think one can thread the needle by incentivizing the GM themselves to respond to a monster getting Taunted. A simple way to enable this, in my opinion, is to change how Taunt lasts and ends so that it's conditional on the target acting against the Guardian: right now, Taunt lasts for a round regardless of what happens, so a GM could conceivably just power through the penalty and force the Guardian to spend actions Taunting again on their next turn, which would be particularly easy to do with a relatively minor -1.
By contrast, if Taunt's effects lasted until the creature targeted the Guardian with a hostile action, that creates a different choice for the GM: do you power through, avoid your monster spending actions and switching targets in the short-term, and lower your accuracy for a potentially longer duration, or do you switch focus to the Guardian, make an attack or impose a save with no penalty against them, and eliminate the debuff that would limit your ability to affect other party members? This stickiness I think would help bridge the current dissonance, because it sets clear tradeoffs for the GM and benefits for the party either way that reflect how a monster would actually deal with getting taunted. If the monster keeps focusing the same target, then they'll be incurring this constant penalty, so the Guardian would have contributed and their allies would be protected, and if the monster switches to the Guardian just to get rid of that penalty, then the Guardian would also have contributed, and the Taunt would have been effective at its intended purpose.
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If there's some kind of meta understanding that the ability that doesn't force a target change should in fact force a target change based on the social contract at the table, I would rather it were built into the rules text.Agreed. I see the mechanical effect of the Taunt as the new difference that the GM is supposed have effect their "who to hit" decisions. If a foe would not have their actions change due to changing the to-hit numbers, then it is quite likely the foe will completely ignore a Taunt, in an "honest" (not GM hostile) manner.
And that works. It is intuitive that a support caster is not going to abandon a buff spell to blast the Guardian. Meanwhile, foes that are more attack-focused will be more inclined to change their behavior because of an imposed "to hit" effect.
- - - -
However, this is why I really do think the idea of the Guardian lowering their defenses is rather important to Taunt.
That does give plausible reason why a support caster might choose to instead shoot Needle Darts at the Guardian. They genuinely have a better chance to hit than normal. If the Guardian does *not* make themself a more appealing target in some way, then supports/casters/ect will "honestly" ignore the Guardian's Taunt effect much more often. I certainly would like the class to have a bit more dmg resistance and even more HP to better reflect that, but that's a bit off-topic.
IMO, if the GM is supposed to act beyond the written rules, that's just an incomplete rule.
I don't mind having an enemy change their behavior because the guardian is now easier to hit but I would like the description of the ability to match the mechanic of leaving an opening (or however it is described) if it is a visible thing foes should be acting on. The concept from the description right now is gaining the foes Ire. An angry foe is more likely to make mistakes and not going to better at hitting so i didnt buy that as describing the -2 AC and worse DCs. The guardian meanwhile is making a gesture or remark or something and that on its own does not describe to me lowering ones defenses to become a more tempting target. At the same time even if the ability describes an opening it is no guarantee that any particular enemy will see that vulnerability as more tempting than what they already are trying to do. A more vulnerable target is only one drive for targeting and if the creature or NPC is not driven by vulnerability then it wont change who they plan to go after.
Compulsion alone is going to universally force a change, incentives will be situational as not everything cares as much about any particular incentive. But I think the ability as is works best when the enemy does ignore the G. That gives an ally a better chance of not getting hit and if in range an opportunity for the G to use their reaction.Edit: I conflated two concepts. The idea of becoming a more attractive target and the idea of changing behavior. They are different in that taunt will get a foes attention and apply a penalty even if it doesn't result in changing the foes behavior.
The flip side to this is looking at taunt as a GM controlling an NPC with taunt.
I feel I would need to tell the player targeted the NPC makes a gesture at you to attempt to gain your ire. It succeeded, you get a -2 to hit enemies other than the NPC but you gain a +2 to hit this NPC and 2 better for DCs against them. I would tell them the numeric shift even if I dont tell them the actual AC.
So with that I have shown my thought process was a bit off.
As a GM i would take into account the shift as information to choose targets, I still would like the -2 ac to be described in the description though and not just in the mechanics. Each creature and NPC however will still choose behavior depending on all the factors i mentioned but with this info in mind as well. Mindless foes probably still will go after the closes target that meets their craving (a zombie isnt thinking about easy or difficult targets they are just trying to feed on whatever is closest to them, of targets equally close it might go for the one trying to get thier attention. A ghoul is intelligent and can make more tactical decisions that fulfill their craving needs) or mandates if they have them (a golem set to protect a particular area isnt going outside that area because of this taunt).
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OK I think this question will come back up as playtesting goes on.
Taunt is going to do different things depending on how the GM chooses a target.
If a GM treats taunt as an aggro pulling move that might end up with a dead champion at times.
If a GM treats it as an debuff and doesnt change targets ever then it probably is a better move.
This mechanic might end up with too much variability in the way GMs run it.
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I pointed this in another topic. The Taunt works differently depending from the GM who you are playing. Probably you need to talk to the GM first to see how it will deal with Taunt before take the class. For PFS this can give a very different experience each time you play.
Basically:
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If there's some kind of meta understanding that the ability that doesn't force a target change should in fact force a target change based on the social contract at the table, I would rather it were built into the rules text.Agreed. I see the mechanical effect of the Taunt as the new difference that the GM is supposed have effect their "who to hit" decisions. If a foe would not have their actions change due to changing the to-hit numbers, then it is quite likely the foe will completely ignore a Taunt, in an "honest" (not GM hostile) manner.
My intuition as a GM is that if I were in a situation where I was going to roll randomly on who to target, now I'll automatically target the Taunting Guardian. And emotional/honorable (depending on how the Taunt is worded) opponents might decide to primarily target the Guardian. But otherwise I'll probably use the same criteria I always use -- at least for the first attack. I generally will have opponents change their tactics based on how the first round or two of combat goes.
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Taunt, as written, isn't really taunt. It's a broken wing gambit. You lower your defenses to invite an attack. It's hard to make that the conceptual center of the guardian's control mechanic. Being weak and vulnerable is not their thing.
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The threat technique was a bit wasted in terms of incentivizing taunt.
Taunt would be better if for example ferocious vengeance gave its damage boost to a taunted target period and not just after that foe ignored the guardian. Then taunting on top of its own mechanic is an action to increase damage.
Damage mitigation needs to change all together.
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Taunt, as written, isn't really taunt. It's a broken wing gambit. You lower your defenses to invite an attack. It's hard to make that the conceptual center of the guardian's control mechanic. Being weak and vulnerable is not their thing.The narrative reason why Taunt functions how it does mechanical need not be pretending to be vulnerable. In fact, it makes less sense if it is explained as a "broken wing gambit" because that only justifies the bonus to attack the guardian, it doesn't really explain the penalty to attack anyone else.
It can be an aggressive distraction. That causes the penalty to other targets because you've caused some hesitation by drawing attention, forcefully, to yourself and/or have physically interposed yourself. And it causes the bonus to target you because you are inherently off your own defensive because of (figuratively) jumping in front of the attack.
Okay, but bottom line, to make it work, the guardian gives up their area of strength (defense) to invite an attack. It doesn't work.
It would be better if the guardian could just pick someone to punish, and do extra damage against that mark. Then the mark would have a legitimate reason to want to neutralize them.
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As long as guardian has to cripple himself to do his job, he will be bad at his job.
On a mechanical level, taunt is just bad.
1. based on class DC. Guardian does not have best class DC, and its core feature relies on it.
2. Higher level enemies, when you would want to taunt the most, will most commonly succeed or crit succeed against you. So in either case you cripple yourself, and the enemy maybe has -1 to hit whoever they wanted to hit anyways.
3. If you are not supposed to use taunt all the time, why are the (poor) benefits from your subclasses tied to targeting taunted enemies?