... There is a fine, and somewhat fuzzy, line between power-gaming and just being a dick,...
Ding !
Be creative
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If the DM doesn't like something, he can change it - he is entitled, it is his world.
The rules are actually the bits not carved in stone - they change every five years (these days) so tying oneself in knots over them seems a tad counterproductive.
I see Lich-Loved's approach not as a way to ignore broken rules, but to identify them. Once you've identified a situation that plainly could not be allowed to run unchecked, without destroying the setting, then you break it down, to see if there are any fluff-based ways it can be contained. That's the first stage, deciding if you even need to tinker with the rules.
Then, you start breaking it down further to establish which individual rules are contributing to the problem. And in doing so, you mostly find it's a typo, a rather 'creative' interpretation, a failure to read a rule from another section, it's already covered by an errata, or the problem only arises as a result of their group's own house-rules, introduced to 'correct' something else.
Far too many people (in the 3.5 and the Alpha boards) are leaping to amend rules that don't need amending, because they don't even understand the actual rule as written. Taking a step back to assess the situation will reduce a lot of unnecessary effort.
I think Kirth Gersen kind of said it right - is this a pissing contest? A player who used things in a rules lawyerly way to actively undermine my game would not be terribly welcome at my table, nor at many others. Sure, it might be clever, but it rather flies in the face of a cooperative game. There is a fine, and somewhat fuzzy, line between power-gaming and just being a dick, but a PC who cannot accept a reasonable ruling from a DM for balance purposes should wonder if he is cut out for this game.
I agree with the above, and with Kirth; that any player whose only intent was to break someone's campaign is the kind of person who would probably make himself unwelcome in many other ways (in and out of game), and as such, is a matter for the whole group to decide if an ultimatum is required.
Such a player could have a totally average-powered PC, and still derail the game, by playing stupid practical jokes, killing messengers (or putting their hands over their ears and going 'La, la, la, I can't hear you!'), insulting the party's employers or important friendly NPCs, refusing to aid another player's PC due to some imagined rivalry in another campaign, under another DM, years ago (yes; I have had the 'pleasure' of witnessing all of these...).Kick these wankers out, or if you can't (for whatever reason), just disband the group, and meet without telling them.
I think what is more common, though, is the type of player who likes the challenge of optimising a character, as the end in itself, far more than actually playing it. Oh, sure, using it in a game is a fine way of play-testing it and tweaking it, if only we could all do away with all that plot and role-playing (yuk!), and wandering around, and just get to the point of the game, which is to have a series of dice-rolling exercises to prove the superiority of their PC-building skill.
I think such a player would be far happier being sat in a corner, facing the wall, with a copy of the Monster Manual, and leave the other players to get on with the game. Every now and again, the DM can shout out an opponent, and the player can have his little solo game, bless him...
"You open the door, and see...an Aboleth!"
"Cool!"
<roll, roll, roll>
"Finished!"
"You open the door, and see...an Achaeirai!"
"Cool!"
<roll, roll, roll>
"Finished!"
<fast forward 6 weeks...>
"You open the door, and see...a Xill!"
"Cool!"
<roll, roll, roll>
I think people are more offended that he's attempted a logical argument that is instead a though-terminating cliche', a classic argumentative fallacy.
We all agree that broken things in the rules need to be addressed. His argument is that they don't because a DM can address them. That an informal fallacy from the old WotC Board that has been come to be called an Oberoni Fallacy.
For the love of Pelor, don't
Pelor? Who's Pelor?
(Maybe he means Iomedae?)
We all agree that broken things in the rules need to be addressed. His argument is that they don't because a DM can address them.
I took his argument to be more along the lines of, "when a player is using option D from splatbook Q and something seems broken, is there some way to look at this without waiting for the FAQ on it?" In other words, even if rules problems are "officially" addressed, it may be too late to do you any good. Lich-Loved has tried to come up with something to do in the meantime.
Is it horrendously subjective? Yes.
Is it mathematically rigorous? No.
Does it provide wink-wink-nod-nod naming of D&D messageboard "truisms" to prove that he's oh-so "in the know"? No.
He offers it as a potential stop-gap tool; some will choose to use it (or may already use something like it), others not.
Above, I tried to provide an anectdote illustrating how this type of thinking might come into play, in hopes that the feedback would help Lich-Loved improve his model. Maybe we can give him workable suggestions to improve on it, instead of merely hurling barrages of snide insults (which are the main reason I'm here and NOT on the D&D boards) and repeating "Oberoni!" over and over like a mantra.
I took his argument to be more along the lines of, "when a player is using option D from splatbook Q and something seems broken, is there some way to look at this without waiting for the FAQ on it?"Yeah, but his actual examples are:
- Without exception examples I have given, leading this entire thread to be an extremely thinly disguised personal attack against me.
- Not taken from obscure splat books at all, but all just core rules.
So no, I'm not impressed. I'd be offended if I respected it enough to bother.
-Frank
Yeah, but his actual examples are without exception examples I have given, leading this entire thread to be an extremely thinly disguised personal attack against me.
I'd missed that. Then again, you're the #1 guy when it comes to pointing out rules issues; nobody else approaches your score on that. LL at least, deep down, agrees with you that there are problems (despite any statements he makes to the contrary; if there weren't, this thread wouldn't exist). He just differs as to how to resolve them -- with fluff, in his case, instead of with better crunch.
I agree that providing splatbook examples (some of which make the "broken" mechanics in the core rules seem like minor peccadilos in comparison) would have strengthened his case.
P.S. Is "Gernsey" another messageboard reference that I'm too clueless to pick up on? Or did you just make it up? Either way, I kind of like it.
Is this all about when things don't make sense,find a logical in game conclusion and run with that?
That doesn't seem so bad.And to hell with all those wacky b~&+~*%$ builds...and anything else that doesn't make sense.
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Yeah, but his actual examples are ...Without exception examples I have given, leading this entire thread to be an extremely thinly disguised personal attack against me.
Ahh Frank I am not attacking you at all. If I were I would just come out and do it directly. I know, I have done the like before to other people that I had a direct beef with. If I wanted to come after you, your name would have appeared in my post with each example I used. With that out, let me clarify a few things regarding my use of your examples.
First I fully acknowledge that you are a rules expert. Secondly, I feel that as such your examples are by far and away the very best examples to which my approach can apply. This isn't an attack, it just eliminates all of the "no the RAW does/doesn't allow that" type arguments that would naturally arise if I used any of a number of other examples people have used here. In essence, if I base my point of view on a Frank Trollman posting, then I can at least be assured that there is sound thought behind the example and that the example as given will be a most grievous one indeed. That is your forte, Frank; real-RAW examples that hurt to think about. So, no personal attack is intended, really. As a person with "hubris of the first order", you can rest assured I am confident enough to be honest with you and attack you directly if I thought you needed it.
And since my purpose still remains unclear, let me try again to state it so we don't rehash old ground.
(1)I believe the 3.5 RAW is full of holes
(2)I believe these holes, to a degree need to fixed in the RAW
(3)Because fixing every problem with 3.5 would result in a massive undertaking, would likely be cost and compatibility prohibitive and would fail to fix all issues for everyone (since we can't agree on the seriousness of all issues)
(4) I created the Argument to help separate the chaff from the wheat, in the special case that the RAW allows something wonky to happen that no one would allow in game anyway.
All the Argument asks is for the reader of any example playtest situation or any build proposal to step back for a moment and consider how practical the situation is before investing a lot of time in something that really may not matter all that much. I am not sure what you and others find so threatening about that, but that is all that it does.
The Argument:
(1)Does not claim to address non-corner case issues
(2)Does not advocate replacing all RAW fixes with DM justification and readily admits the RAW is broken and should (ideally) be fixed (and thus it has nothing to do with the Oberoni Fallacy except both have to do with rules and house rules).
(4)Is not a formal argument but it is a logical process
If you and others want to mischaracterize my effort in order to debunk it by continuing to refuse to accept what I have written here then I guess the problem you have isn't with my Argument, it is with your ability to believe what I have written.
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Yeah, but his actual examples are:
- Without exception examples I have given, leading this entire thread to be an extremely thinly disguised personal attack against me.
- Not taken from obscure splat books at all, but all just core rules.
So no, I'm not impressed. I'd be offended if I respected it enough to bother.
-Frank
To be honest, Frank, if you can't post here without getting all hot, bothered and defensive about this, can I humbly suggest you leave the debating to K, with whom one can actually have a civilised debate (and who expresses himself more clearly). You simply undermine your argument this way. This isn't the Wizards board, the invective isn't necessary.
Yeah, but his actual examples are:To be honest, Frank, if you can't post here without getting all hot, bothered and defensive about this, can I humbly suggest you leave the debating to K, with whom one can actually have a civilised debate (and who expresses himself more clearly). You simply undermine your argument this way. This isn't the Wizards board, the invective isn't necessary.
- Without exception examples I have given, leading this entire thread to be an extremely thinly disguised personal attack against me.
- Not taken from obscure splat books at all, but all just core rules.
So no, I'm not impressed. I'd be offended if I respected it enough to bother.
-Frank
How is he being defensive? He's deriding a spurious argument used to explain why the problems Frank finds in the system aren't really problems.
(4)Is not a formal argument but it is a logical processIf you and others want to mischaracterize my effort in order to debunk it by continuing to refuse to accept what I have written here then I guess the problem you have isn't with my Argument, it is with your ability to believe what I have written.
I was going to try and refute this, but I couldn't actually parse it. We're trying to debunk your argument by not "believing" in it, although our problem isn't with your argument, which isn't actually an argument?
At this point I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, mind you. Part of me still suspects that you're just backpedaling on an elaborate flame, but at this point I think it's more likely that you came up with a simple, and probably true, idea that not all rules flaws need to be fixed, dubiously applied it to some undiplomatically chosen examples, and then misrepresented the whole thing as a logical process.
I do apologize if this comes across as harsh, but I can never seem to hit the right tone around here.
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Lich-Loved has actually hit on something. Frank et al always look for a mechanical solution to problems they perceive, which is their bias. Lich-Loved suggests, instead, solving them in the game.
The dual-currency model, for example, in the economics thread is classic Frank, but unattractive to many people not because it doesn't work (which it does, as a game balance tool) but because it feels contrived (and so feels unrealistic and an obvious "game patch"), more so than the current, equally faulted system in the DMG (which at least people can relate to if they don't think about it too much). I would solve the problems of the latter by having stuff happen to the PCs that try to exploit or break it, like inflation and so on, and that is the sugested approach of Lich-Loved.
In effect, if you have a default medieval world (homebrew, Greyhawk, FR, Eberron, or whatever) then the things which medium level casters can achieve in terms of milking the system cannot work, because otherwise the world, as it stands, would not exist as written. Would all the local traders be driven out of business by inter-planar merchants? If so, where are they in the marketplace? Why isn't there raging inflation as all these characters pop over to the elemental plane of earth and hoover up diamonds?
Frank's economic model is an attempt to solve this for game-balance purposes. Lich-Loved's approach would be that there is obviously some problem with the basic idea, and therefore it doesn't work (in-game - maybe brutal inter-planar cartels rub out the opposition, or the inevitables who smite those who bust the laws of economics show up and vaporise you and your stock), also for game balance purposes. Personally, I find Lich-Loved's solution far more interesting that someone foisting a new ruleset on me. As a DM, it fuels my inspiration far more than some clunky new currency (where I have to suspend disbelief that no one can exchange it for gold, even though that is pure DM fiat and far from an "organic solution").
So Frank and Lich-Loved are basically doing for the same thing. Lich-Loved is being attacked for using his creativity in tweaking the world, Frank uses his creativity for tweaking the rules. Whatever floats your boat.
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there is a problem with using blink to gain sneak attack. it does not work because it gives the attacker a 20% miss chance and you can not sneak attack if you have any miss chance, you could alway buy improved blink but that is worth 120000gp so hard to get and even if you do you have to forgo a lot of other treasure. Power builds are not a problem what percentage of Adventures actually live to a high enough level for them to work. 5% it is a random number point is not many, to obtain the rorts you are extremely weak at low level so you die that keeps the world in balance not this survival of the fittest scenariosSneak attack doesn't work if the target has concealment. Blink gives a flat miss chance unrelated to concealment (probably because there are plenty of ways to ignore concealment).
Sorry, just noticed this. So because an effect has exactly the same effect as concealment, but isn't called "concealment" in this particular piece of text, you are therefore saying that it isn't concealment and therefore a rogue can sneak attack while under the effects of Blink? I know you give an excuse, but suggesting that they "deliberately" didn't call it concealment because it is (imputed to be) somehow qualitatively different is just daft (and makes a very hefty, and unwarranted in my view, assumption in a fairly game-breaking way). It also fails to grasp what concealment actually is - you can't see properly to strike with accuracy. Well, the Blink spell description suggests to me that you can't see properly, flickering in and out of the ethereal plane as you do - so even if it isn't "concealment", it acts the same way, including with regards to sneak attacks. 20% miss chance = concealment = no sneak attack.
I think it was Daniel Dennett (I might be wrong) who proposed, "If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck". No wonder you guys have such issues with the rules, when you read them like that. Wow, I'm impressed with the ingenuity, if not with the utterly bogus reason for giving rogues sneak attack under the effect of Blink. (And K, I want you as my lawyer.)
Whatever works in your game, to be sure, but.... Frankly, I would call this cheating if a PC of mine came up with this.
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He's deriding a spurious argument used to explain why the problems Frank finds in the system aren't really problems.
Well, exactly. He isn't explaining why it is wrong, he is deriding it. I also question his readings of the rules (I assume - Frank and K are buddies, after all) if the above comment with Blink is an example of their approach. A major dose of common sense seems needed.
Sorry, just noticed this. So because an effect has exactly the same effect as concealment, but isn't called "concealment" in this particular piece of text, you are therefore saying that it isn't concealment and therefore a rogue can sneak attack while under the effects of Blink? I know you give an excuse, but suggesting that they "deliberately" didn't call it concealment because it is (imputed to be) somehow qualitatively different is just daft (and makes a very hefty, and unwarranted in my view, assumption in a fairly game-breaking way). It also fails to grasp what concealment actually is - you can't see properly to strike with accuracy. Well, the Blink spell description suggests to me that you can't see properly, flickering in and out of the ethereal plane as you do - so even if it isn't "concealment", it acts the same way, including with regards to sneak attacks. 20% miss chance = concealment = no sneak attack.
Not at all. The ethereal/material plane barrier has a bunch of weird one-way properties. Ethereal creatures can see the material plane just fine, but are invisible to material creatures (under normal circumstances). Ethereal and material creatures cannot normally interact; exceptions to this include some creatures with the incorporeal subtype, who can manifest on the material plane, and force effects, which fully affect creatures on both planes. The blinking character retains full visual capabilities, but other creatures can't see him half the time. This is fairly well covered in the spell description, which covers the various ways the miss chance against the rogue can be reduced. The blinking character's 20% miss chance doesn't come from concealment - an inability to fully see his target. It comes from the fact that there's a 20% chance that, when the character attacks, he won't be on the right plane. If you were using some manner of force effect requiring an attack roll, you'd lose that 20% miss chance, because your attack would be fully effective no matter which plane you (or your target) was on.
This isn't rules lawyering; this is an example of how poorly-documented and poorly-understood incorporeality is. (It doesn't help that a creature being incorporeal doesn't always mean having the incorporeal subtype. What's worse is that sometimes it does. The worst part of all is that half the time incorporeality is mentioned there's no good way to tell if it's referring to the subtype or the status.) The rules are confusingly written, but they aren't particularly ambiguous, and us Lawful Neutral types hate to see the two be confused.
Hypothetical rules lawyering, like the CharOp boards, is Lawful Neutral with Evil Tendencies. Serious attempts at implementation of CharOp builds is straight-up Lawful Evil.
(And I think this whole Blink/Sneak Attack thing is addressed in the FAQ, but theoretically I'm doing my homework, so I can't be arsed to check.)
So because an effect has exactly the same effect as concealment, but isn't called "concealment" in this particular piece of text, you are therefore saying that it isn't concealment and therefore a rogue can sneak attack while under the effects of Blink? I know you give an excuse, but suggesting that they "deliberately" didn't call it concealment because it is (imputed to be) somehow qualitatively different is just daft (and makes a very hefty, and unwarranted in my view, assumption in a fairly game-breaking way).
I just needed to single this bit out. "Concealment" is a status. An illusion spell isn't a glamer unless it has the "glamer" subschool; a miss chance isn't a concealment effect unless it uses the word "concealment". It's the difference between blinking your eyes and blinking as per the spell. When concealment effects are mentioned in the rules, it's always "concealment (20% miss chance)", and never "20% concealment miss chance".
No, seriously, I'm totally doing my homework. It's coming along great. Really.
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Well, maybe - as I say, whatever seems reasonable in your game. But I'm totally unconvinced. Arguably, you could go for that kidney strike - and just happen to be in the ethereal plane as you thrust. Is that concealment? And the creatures you see are grey and misty - is that concealment?
Dunno, I take your point that it is more nuanced than I first thought, but as a point I would say that a 20% miss chance is functionally identical to concealment, and should be treated as such without a good reason, and considering the broader consequences (applying the Lich-Loved Argument, Origami Fallacy or whatever). I'm not fond of legalistic readings of rules as they often create more trouble than they are worth, but I can see that the alternative interpretation is plausible. I'm unfamiliar with the spell in practice, so I don't know how unbalancing it is. But if it allows a rogue to effectively do five, six or seven times the normal amount of damage they should in normal combat, irrespective of positioning, then I would say that has a big impact on the power of rogues versus the other PCs, and therefore a good candidate for unbalancing the game.
But it boils down to interpretation, and I would still not allow sneak attacks under the effect of Blink. One of the points with the spell changes between 3.0 and 3.5 was to try to eliminate those "killer" spell you would have to be an idiot not to take. A rogue would have to be an idiot not to take a Ring of Blinking (as Frank points out above). So does that suggest that actually either the spell (or perhaps, more strictly in this case, the item), as written (and very strictly interpreted), is wrong, or that the legalistic interpretation is faulted because it does not adequately consider game balance? I can kind of guess who would answer which way.
Sorry, just noticed this. So because an effect has exactly the same effect as concealment, but isn't called "concealment" in this particular piece of text, you are therefore saying that it isn't concealment and therefore a rogue can sneak attack while under the effects of Blink? I know you give an excuse, but suggesting that they "deliberately" didn't call it concealment because it is (imputed to be) somehow qualitatively different is just daft (and makes a very hefty, and unwarranted in my view, assumption in a fairly game-breaking way). It also fails to grasp what concealment actually is - you can't see properly to strike with accuracy. Well, the Blink spell description suggests to me that you can't see properly, flickering in and out of the ethereal plane as you do - so even if it isn't "concealment", it acts the same way, including with regards to sneak attacks. 20% miss chance = concealment = no sneak attack.Not at all. The ethereal/material plane barrier has a bunch of weird one-way properties. Ethereal creatures can see the material plane just fine, but are invisible to material creatures (under normal circumstances). Ethereal and material creatures cannot normally interact; exceptions to this include some creatures with the incorporeal subtype, who can manifest on the material plane, and force effects, which fully affect creatures on both planes. The blinking character retains full visual capabilities, but other creatures can't see him half the time. This is fairly well covered in the spell description, which covers the various ways the miss chance against the rogue can be reduced. The blinking character's 20% miss chance doesn't come from concealment - an inability to fully see his target. It comes from the fact that there's a 20% chance that, when the character attacks, he won't be on the right plane. If you were using some manner of force effect requiring an attack roll, you'd lose that 20% miss chance, because your attack would be fully effective no...
Right on all points, except Force effects don't extend from the Ethereal to the Material, but they do from the Material to the Ethereal.
For people that need more proof, also note that the FAQ(p. 23) allows a Blinking character to be sneak attacked, which is pretty clear evidence that the blink effect does not interfere with sneak attacks even though the attacker can't see the blinker some of the time (which is not true in the reverse) and a higher miss chance.
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No, seriously, I'm totally doing my homework. It's coming along great. Really.
I'm telling your mum.
For people that need more proof, also note that the FAQ(p. 23) allows a Blinking character to be sneak attacked, which is pretty clear evidence that the blink effect does not interfere with sneak attacks even though the attacker can't see the blinker some of the time (which is not true in the reverse) and a higher miss chance.
Hmm - I've often seen stuff in the FAQ I have disagreed with, especially when Andy Collins was doing it, but I guess it is official. I guess that unless you load up on Blink spells or the Ring of Blinking is mispriced, the impact is probably containable (certainly not like the 3.0 Haste spell, for example).
Well, maybe - as I say, whatever seems reasonable in your game. But I'm totally unconvinced. Arguably, you could go for that kidney strike - and just happen to be in the ethereal plane as you thrust. Is that concealment?
That's an academic question, since presumably you'd then miss. :3 But no; concealment prevents sneak attacks because you can't see them well enough to find their weak points, and there's no visual interference of significance.
And the creatures you see are grey and misty - is that concealment?
An ethereal creature can see and hear on the Material Plane, but everything looks gray and ephemeral.
Now, how something can look short-lived is beyond me, but I don't see any mention of "misty" at a glance, and there's no mention of material enemies gaining concealment in any extended-period ethereal effects, like Ethereal Jaunt.
The crucial point here seems to be a misunderstanding of the relationship between having a 20% miss chance and having concealment. Concealment is a status effect of being partially concealed; this grants your enemies a 20% miss chance against you. If I had a magical force shield that had a 20% chance to deflect any attack made against me, then you'd have a 20% miss chance against me; you could still sneak attack me, however, because I'm not concealed.
Or, let me try to put it another way; the 20% miss chance and the inability to make sneak attacks against a creature with concealment are two discrete effects of concealment, which do not interact except inasmuch as that they are both affecting attacks which would otherwise be sneak attacks.
All attacks against creatures with concealment suffer a 20% miss chance, but not all attacks suffering a 20% miss chance are against creatures with concealment.
For people that need more proof, also note that the FAQ(p. 23) allows a Blinking character to be sneak attacked, which is pretty clear evidence that the blink effect does not interfere with sneak attacks even though the attacker can't see the blinker some of the time (which is not true in the reverse) and a higher miss chance.
That must only be if the person attacking the blinking character can see invisible creatures, though:
If the attack is capable of striking ethereal creatures, the miss chance is only 20% (for concealment).
If the FAQ claims that any attacker targeting a blinking character can make sneak attacks, then that's just janky and I blame Skip Williams. This wouldn't be the first time he made up rules wholesale and claimed they were real.
(True story! There's entire columns of All About The Game, still in the WOTC archives, which are now formatted entirely in strikethrough because somebody realized Skip was making s*%% up again! Which was especially fun because, until the Rules Compendium, All About The Game was the only place with any comprehensible rules about how flying worked, and we still couldn't trust that we were getting it right.
But I love Skip Williams anyways. At the very least you have to admit he had a good mini.)
Right on all points, except Force effects don't extend from the Ethereal to the Material, but they do from the Material to the Ethereal.
See? This is exactly the kind of crazy one-way s@!$ I was talking about.
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An ethereal creature can see and hear on the Material Plane, but everything looks gray and ephemeral.
Now, how something can look short-lived is beyond me...
:-)
... but I don't see any mention of "misty" at a glance, and there's no mention of material enemies gaining concealment in any extended-period ethereal effects, like Ethereal Jaunt.
Fair enough. I was being facetious, mostly.
The crucial point here seems to be a misunderstanding of the relationship between having a 20% miss chance and having concealment. Concealment is a status effect of being partially concealed; this grants your enemies a 20% miss chance against you. If I had a magical force shield that had a 20% chance to deflect any attack made against me, then you'd have a 20% miss chance against me; you could still sneak attack me, however, because I'm not concealed.
Or, let me try to put it another way; the 20% miss chance and the inability to make sneak attacks against a creature with concealment are two discrete effects of concealment, which do not interact except inasmuch as that they are both affecting attacks which would otherwise be sneak attacks.
All attacks against creatures with concealment suffer a 20% miss chance, but not all attacks suffering a 20% miss chance are against creatures with concealment.
Again, correct from a logical view. My rule of thumb on this would be - would my PCs start complaining because the rogue totally owned the battlefield? He can barely be touched in combat without specific magics, and can sneak attack at will. If the answer is no, then we have no problem, but if it is yes then maybe we have an issue.
For example, I have seen here threads saying that fighters don't do enough damage. Well, in a world where every rogue has a ring of blinking, I can see that. But is the problem the fighter, or the rogue? Do we bend over backwards to beef up the fighter in elaborate ways, or do we add one word ("concealment") to the Blink description and take away the potential problem? (And for those who dislike the notion of nerfing spells, they did loads of it between 3.0 and 3.5 and I think the game is better for it.)
On this specific instance, I'm not sure if Blink really is a problem - my players don't use it (I never bothered to read it properly before today, so the possibilities did not present themselves, and in any case if I had I would have made the assumption that 20% miss chance = concealment) so it is of academic interest to me, mostly. Interestingly, this is at the heart of the Lich-Loved Argument in its broader sense - are the rules sacrosanct and worthy of detailed interpretation, or do we just nerf the rules we don't like because, as DMs, we don't like the implications. I think it brings out the issue, even if it does not (and nothing could - the issue is one largely of aesthetics) bring it to anything like a conclusion.
Actually, I can address the balance question from personal experience. I played a rogue/assassin in a 3.0 epic game once. Probably my first really great character. He had a perpetual haste effect, a ring of blinking, and a weapon of speed, so he was making some absurd number of sneak attacks every round - I think it was five.
Anyways, there was one combat in particular I recall. As I recall it, we were on some sort of airship, and P'sharr (my character) was in the crow's nest, on account of his climb speed and spot/listen class skills. Some enemies boarded us, and I spent the first three rounds of the combat just sitting there, staring at their leader. Of course, this was a large party, at epic level, so "three rounds" was something like a half hour. Then, I leapt from the crow's nest, delivering my now-prepared death strike with a vertical charge... and blinked out of existence right above him.
Rings of blinking are pretty balanced.
(There's also a less fun reason why they're balanced; if you can see invisible creatures, you can see ethereal creatures, and the blinking character no longer denies you your dex bonus. A ring of blinking is basically the next step up from a ring of invisibility.)
No, my DM is a wise and benevolent tyrant who uses his powers for the good of all mankind.
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Lich-Loved could if properly worded be law. Kinda like e=mc^2 but
DM=F(fluff)/(supported by)P(players). There is an ultimate truth hidden in here sort of like a catch all of things that dont make sense. There are a few flaws in arguements from both sides but the point still remains the same, if by its very existance the world wouldnt be as it is then therefor it does not exist. Actually that is is making into Jareds laws of Adventuring.1. Never take your pants off (yes you can pull down but no further then half way.)
2. ALWAYS carry spare shoes and socks(this has saved lives.)
3. Do not tease the barbarian.
4. Do not sleep with vampires (this has happened in most imagenable ways never ending well.)
5. If you see the Paladin running do try and keep up. (For what is behind him is far worse then any fear effect.)
6. Protect the Cleric (duh).
7. If he wants to go first let him (this is sort of a natural selection law.)
8. NO fires on ships (including but not limited to airships, and seacraft.)
9. Have trapfinding, someone somehow needs to have it for all traps that matter are over 20 DCs.
10. Identify items before wearing them.
11. If by its very existance the world would not be the same (and this is not the plot of the story) then it cannot exist.
12. If you dot know the story behind your character either one will be thrusted apon you or you do not exist (DMs call).
13. There is no law 13, its bad luck.
14. Killing any living thing (this omits undead, constructs, elementals, and creatures with the evil subtype) is an evil act, only incase of self defense is it excusable (DMs call).
15. If it does not understand then therefor not...
In the spirit of this thread, to be entirely antagonistic I present...
1. Don't wear pants at all! Dragons and draconians look silly in them.
I haven't played a character that wore pants since the early nineties.
2. Once again don't wear em. I'd much rather have a spare weapon.
3. I'd tease the barbarian if someone actually played one. As most people don't the point is rather moot. }: P
4. Ok that I can't argue with. I don't need the Lich loved feat anyway.
5. If the paladin is running it's away from me and I'm already trying to keep up.
6. The cleric can protect himself. He's that guy over there with all the buffs.
7. Can't argue with that.
8. You realize that ship wood is treated right? People smoked all the time on sailing ships. Since you're surrounded by water and you have a crew, putting out fires really isn't as hard as you think it is.
9. Find traps wand with extended metamagic. It's far cheaper than giving a rogue a cut. Actually if you do it correctly you don't even need the wand.
10. I'd add the caveat, unless you're about to die anyway.
11. You're thinking about this sentence. Therefore it exists.
12. After you hear my character's story you'll wish I didn't exist. "...then he went into illegal puppet shows to make some money."
13. This is not the sentence you're looking for. Move along.
14. This one boggles the mind. You're so far off base you're not even in the stadium. Tell that to my lobster burrito. Oh sorry, my "evil" lobster burrito. Good and evil are entirely subjective.
15. Understand you I do. Talk like Yoda I must.
Ethereal creatures can move through solid objects, but they don't inherent fall through the floor, specifically.
Also note that the Dex negating thing is a property of them being ethereal, not just of them being invisible. So you need something ghost touch and the ability to see the invisible to stop the dex negating. It is the kind of thing that high level characters have, but very few monstes are equipped with.
But the most important part of this equation is that once you let loose a thrown object, it becomes physical entirely. So a thrown weapon or arrow doesn't even have a miss chance if you are blinking at the time. So even if it was the same as Concealment, which it is not, it wouldn't stop the Rogue's sneak attack.
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That being said, I have no problem with Blink Rogues. I've DMed them at high levels, and while they are very very good, they aren't as game defining as any character who can cast polymorph any object.
-Frank
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But the most important part of this equation is that once you let loose a thrown object, it becomes physical entirely. So a thrown weapon or arrow doesn't even have a miss chance if you are blinking at the time. So even if it was the same as Concealment, which it is not, it wouldn't stop the Rogue's sneak attack.
Really? I would assume that you could fire it off accidentally into the ethereal plane by blinking just as you released the bowstring/pulled the trigger or whatever. Unless the FAQ has ruled, of course.
That being said, I have no problem with Blink Rogues. I've DMed them at high levels, and while they are very very good, they aren't as game defining as any character who can cast polymorph any object.
-Frank
I'm sure that is correct. The impact of Blink is narrow, effectively for a single class.
But the most important part of this equation is that once you let loose a thrown object, it becomes physical entirely. So a thrown weapon or arrow doesn't even have a miss chance if you are blinking at the time. So even if it was the same as Concealment, which it is not, it wouldn't stop the Rogue's sneak attack.Really? I would assume that you could fire it off accidentally into the ethereal plane by blinking just as you released the bowstring/pulled the trigger or whatever. Unless the FAQ has ruled, of course.
In such cases, an item that an incorporeal creature carries or hold also is incorporeal until the incorporeal creature, drops it, throws it, or puts it down
Skip on Ethereality and Incorporeality
Ghostform + Sword = Failure
Ghostform + Bow = Win
The blink rogue focuses on ranged weapons, while the invisible pounce rogue (the other popular high level rogue combat style) focuses on melee weapons. The halfling blink rogue focuses on thrown weapons, because halflings get racial bonuses with thrown weapons. The elven blink rogue focuses on bows because they get racial bonuses for using bows. The whole thing is being blown wildly out of perspective. In other news, the dwarven pounce rogue uses boot blades, the nezumi pounce rogue uses tail spikes. Anything you can use to get access to multiweapon fighting is par for the course for that archetype.
-Frank
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We are hijacking the thread here, I know, but...
I had a glance at the link, but didn't have the inclination to read it in detail, and in any case I don't disbelieve you that Skip said precisely what you say. However, while I would give Skip his due weight, it does seem a bit illogical to differentiate between melee and missile like this, given the described mechanic of the spell. I accept there is a presumption in similar spells (like Invisibility) that they act like this, but for flavour reasons I'd prefer to keep a miss chance for missile attacks, and as a limiter for the power of the spell. (Having given it some thought, I can see Blink isn't all that powerful - Greater Invisibility is better, and a higher level, as would be appropriate.)
Actually, since my entire point is that openly discussing the rules and formulating a mature and preemptive response to broken pieces while getting everyone on solid and mutually agreeable grounds as regards what the rules actually are is the best plan, I do not regard this as a thread jack.
The idea is that once an object leaves your person it stops benefiting from your effects. So you can't use blink to drop objects off on the ethereal plane where no one can get them, because objects become non-blinking as soon as you let go. On the flip side, this means that you can't shoot arrows at ethereal filchers while blinking, because the arrows go physical.
Weirdly, the spells you cast while blinking also stay on their plane of origin (ethereal or physical). But that's defined as where you happen to be when the spell is completed, so they can target ethereal or physical opponents and they have a miss chance either way.
As a general rule, blur < blink < Improved Invisibility < Greater Blink - which is just as well because those spells come in at 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th level respectively. But blink happens to have a lot of synergy with a Rogue Archer and is available as an affordable core item, so it gets used a lot with characters in the Over Seventh Level brackets.
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That being said, the rules on Ethereality and Incorporeality are way too complicated. If it wasn't, Skip Williams would not have had to write an addendum that was over eleven thousand words long explaining some of the ins and outs of those states. I would not be at all opposed to a complete rewrite of those conditions and the adjoining spells. I've never seen anyone cast ethereal jaunt and I don't expect to see it any time soon.
The backward compatibility issues raised by simplifying and even combining the rules for Ethereality and Incorporeality are essentially nonexistent because no one knows how those rules work anyway.
-Frank
---That being said, the rules on Ethereality and Incorporeality are way too complicated. If it wasn't, Skip Williams would not have had to write an addendum that was over eleven thousand words long explaining some of the ins and outs of those states. I would not be at all opposed to a complete rewrite of those conditions and the adjoining spells. I've never seen anyone cast ethereal jaunt and I don't expect to see it any time soon.
The backward compatibility issues raised by simplifying and even combining the rules for Ethereality and Incorporeality are essentially nonexistent because no one knows how those rules work anyway.
-Frank
Does no one include skip williams... 11k of wording seems an awful mouthful on a subject you know nothing about... however, i agree w/you that the simplification of this section of the rules would be of benefit to most of us.
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That being said, the rules on Ethereality and Incorporeality are way too complicated. If it wasn't, Skip Williams would not have had to write an addendum that was over eleven thousand words long explaining some of the ins and outs of those states. I would not be at all opposed to a complete rewrite of those conditions and the adjoining spells. I've never seen anyone cast ethereal jaunt and I don't expect to see it any time soon.
The backward compatibility issues raised by simplifying and even combining the rules for Ethereality and Incorporeality are essentially nonexistent because no one knows how those rules work anyway.
-Frank
Amen Brother Frank! Amen and well said. That stuff always gives me a headache, so I try to avoid it as much as possible. I certainly hope that Paizo has been considering a revision.
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Actually, since my entire point is that openly discussing the rules and formulating a mature and preemptive response to broken pieces while getting everyone on solid and mutually agreeable grounds as regards what the rules actually are is the best plan, I do not regard this as a thread jack.
Welllll... :)
One thing this latter discussion shows is that I was correct in using a Frank Trollman example. Hopefully you can see why I chose your work in an attempt to avoid lengthy rules debates about the rules rather than the substance of my position. It looks like we held the debate anyway (and your example withstood it nicely) so the purpose of making that choice was met. Do you still think I am attacking you after all of this?
That being said, the rules on Ethereality and Incorporeality are way too complicated. If it wasn't, Skip Williams would not have had to write an addendum that was over eleven thousand words long explaining some of the ins and outs of those states. I would not be at all opposed to a complete rewrite of those conditions and the adjoining spells. I've never seen anyone cast ethereal jaunt and I don't expect to see it any time soon.
The backward compatibility issues raised by simplifying and even combining the rules for Ethereality and Incorporeality are essentially nonexistent because no one knows how those rules work anyway.
I agree with you here. These rules are in bad shape and I do not see where rewriting these would break compatibility. It would also resolve a number of things that personally give me a headache as a DM.
My only caveat to this is: what if, for time, budget or other reasons, these rules are not rewritten or introduce another problem when they are rewritten? Should DM's allow the gaps in these rules to break their game and just live with the consequences because the "rules are the rules"? I advocate no, and my Argument (I regret calling it that now, it should have been the Lich-Loved Process to avoid debates based on formal logic while maintaining 100% hubris) attempts to address these types of issues that will not be fixed in the RAW.
Nobody disagrees with your assertion that broken mechanics can, should and must be dealt with by individual DMs during play.
All we're saying is that, since we're, you know, actually *designing a game* now, that's hardly relevant. The designers can't know or care what house rules people will play with.
All designers can do is make the actual rules as free of brokenness as possible. And besides, if we can head off problems during design, isn't that better than during play? In fact, isn't that the *entire reason* we even have design?
You do know that a single shadow can run around killing all the cattle, ducks, chickens, etc and then attack this one-cleric village with hundreds of his shadow spawn that can walk through walls and can't be hurt by anything thats not magic? A million shadow army is not even unlikely, and if the high level characters of the game world conform to what the DMG says should be there, then the world is over quickly.
And yes, people houserule that away.
But imagine where instead of everyone houseruling away the same problem, we all just played by A RULE. Wouldn't that be good for the game?
And the fact that these are chaotic evil undead spirits, creatures that are cursed to live a bodiless existence as literally a shadow of their former selves, never enters into it?
As CE undead spirits, they don't haunt places they knew in life, only preying on the living when they disturb their reprieve, but rather, they get together and say, "you know, the Monster Manual says we are monsters, so I think we should band together and systematically slaughter every being on the planet."
Heck, maybe once one of these one cleric towns gets nuked by Shadows with no heroes around, that's when the good aligned gods set loose their angels/guardinals/eladrin to wipe up the mess.
Rich Baker actually referred to D&D as "a storytelling game with wargaming elements." Shadows in my campaign don't act like they are game pieces, they act like chaotic evil forlorn spirits. Yeah, they attack PCs if they wander into a dungeon that they haunt, but they don't form legions to march on unsuspecting towns.
umn so creatures without souls can become shadows ?? sorry ad&d player / dm who converts 3.5 to ad&d being confused.
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All we're saying is that, since we're, you know, actually *designing a game* now, that's hardly relevant. The designers can't know or care what house rules people will play with.
I agree to this in principle but given that one of the key goals of this design is backward compatibility, changing the game overmuch regardless of intentions must be done with great care and in some cases the game cannot be changed at all to maintain this design goal even if the rule in question is badly broken. In this case, having some common sense in your toolbox would be a Good Thing. Furthermore, use of overly esoteric examples to find fault with the rules may serve to illuminate a broken area of the rules, but if such examples are not acceptable to the mainstream audience in the first place, then their introduction only serves to detract from the rules issues that should be addressed.
All designers can do is make the actual rules as free of brokenness as possible. And besides, if we can head off problems during design, isn't that better than during play? In fact, isn't that the *entire reason* we even have design?
Somewhere in the time that Paizo announced that they were creating a Pathfinder RPG to continue to tell Pathfinder stories in the manner they felt best and today, we have managed to unearth every game designer, wanna-be designer, rules lawyer, "this-class-is-too pathetic/powerful/whatever" zealot and "the rules are useless without Feature X" proponent on the planet. Pathfinder RPG is not a fantasy rules set in open design, it is in Alpha and based upon the D&D 3.5 rule set with backward compatibility as a key design goal. Perhaps in a perfect world PRPG would be what some here are trying to make it, but it isn't now nor will it be. Keeping an eye on real world things like backward compatibility (will it still work with 3.5 core and splatbooks), financial impact of each proposed change (how much time and money must Paizo spend to fix the problem and what will it do to their page counts), the cost/benefit trade off of making a change (is the change materially better than the previous version and will the average player even care about it? Will they just houserule it anyway regardless of the proposed rule?) and the like are practical concerns that every business needs to be thinking about and no amount of pulpit-pounding is going to change that. By application of thoughtful, measured approach to DMing, we can facilitate a sound rules modification discussion without treading into the morass of "fix this or else it will all be ruined" thinking seen far too often on this board.
So to answer your question directly, no, fixing the rules to be as free of brokenness as possible and heading off problems during play is *not* the entire reason to have a design except perhaps in a perfect world. It is merely one of a number of design goals that someone actually doing a design for a real world company spending real world money with real deadlines needs to keep in mind. In some cases the design isn't going to change even if the issue is grievous because of the costs involved. These tradeoffs happen all of the time. Through the use of my argument, things that fall outside the norm to the degree that they are nonsensical or well outside the mainstream of how the game is played can be safely ignored. This saves money during design by dismissing spurious builds/examples and provides DMs with a tool to help them handle some of rules areas that will not receive the fix they may very well need.
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Somewhere in the time that Paizo announced that they were creating a Pathfinder RPG to continue to tell Pathfinder stories in the manner they felt best and today, we have managed to unearth every game designer, wanna-be designer, rules lawyer, "this-class-is-too pathetic/powerful/whatever" zealot and "the rules are useless without Feature X" proponent on the planet.
And it's up to them to decide which sort of poster is providing them with useful information in line with their goals.
Not me. Not you. Them.
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And it's up to them to decide which sort of poster is providing them with useful information in line with their goals.
Not me. Not you. Them.
Obviously you have read Jason's posts on wanting playtest feedback referencing page numbers and concrete feedback related to what has been printed in the Alpha rules. The most he has said concerning the other posts is that he reads some but not all of them. Elsewhere Eric Mona has said that radical changes like armor as DR and loss of Vancian magic were not even being considered.
You can draw any conclusion you want to from that. But if someone would give me some odds, I have a bet I want to place.
Once you accept that the game is not going to change as much as some think it might, applying a bit of common sense to the decision making process becomes very handy.
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Once you accept that the game is not going to change as much as some think it might, applying a bit of common sense to the decision making process becomes very handy.
As much as possible, broken things should be fixed. Sure, they can't all be addressed, but allowing something to continue to be broken and hoping that the groups that use it will use 'common sense' takes too much on faith. Common sense isn't that common.
I certainly agree that there are a lot of posters that are talking about things that are far outside the necessity of the core-rules, but I don't think that the object of 'backward compatability' should be the axe that kills all the good changes that have been considered.
I don't want Pathfinder to be just 3.5. I've been very happy with the game, but I already have all of those books. I don't know how easy they would be to get for 'new players', but if Pathfinder is just the rules we've been using, it would fail to deliver the promise. Pathfinder RPG should be 'Bionic 3.5'. We can make it faster, stronger, better. And if a change makes the game less compatible with 3.5 but it makes the game faster, easier and better, that change really should be made.
Now, sure, some people are 'out there'. Most of that stuff will fail to gain traction and you'll see a thread that has 5 posts, but the stuff that is really being talked about will have 100+ posts. I agree with you that there are people that are just plain wrong and are fighting to 'win converts'. But, I expect the Paizo staff won't be swayed by foolish arguments. I guess that instead of hoping the rules allow us to use some common sense (which would be bad) I expect that Paizo can use some common sense and figure out what makes sense to consider changing, and what doesn't.
Sure, I hope that more posters follow the 'rules' of the boards with the Alpha 2 release. I'd be willing to see some real 'restrictions' on new threads, for instance. I think that having every new thread go through a 'moderator' for approval would be good. Thus, if you propose a new thread topic, the moderators will reject it if you don't include a page reference, or if there is another thread on the same subject already available. The reason I would support that is that it does reduce the ratio of 'noise' on the boards, and I'd rather that 'good ideas' get the consideration they deserve, and don't get lost in the multitudes of shouts. But because Paizo has always been so active on the boards, I expect that they will at least get an overview of anything that they should see. Maybe they'll miss some of the finer points of the 'argument', but they do mostly really good work. I don't expect that to change.
PS - Paizo Staff - It is my birthday today. I'd like an Alpha 2 Document. It's the only thing on my list. If you have an Alpha 2 Document, say, ready for release, it would be awesome to get it today.