Speaking from many years of D&D - the whole "running away" aspect of turning (and fear effects in general) is lame, hateful, and drags out combats.
Even just turning undead, either they run deeper into the dungeon and "pull" other stuff, or spend some rounds running then just run back, making "zombie mopup" take way too long. Our clerics seldom turn unless they're sure of a "D" result.
There's a lot of other choices; do like the new eyebite spell does - sickened, panicked, "comatose" (quiescent, for undead I guess.. Back in the coffin vamps!). But the unfettered running is always one of the worst parts of turning and other fear effects in general.
I totally agree. Other than the turning mechanic being overly complicated and often useless, when it does work it just doesn't make sense from an rp perspective. As a classic cleric of Pelor (or other anti-undead deity), I have awesome powers over any undead who dare to show their evil visages to me! Pelor's might shines through me and those mockeries of life flee in fear for their lives...and then become some poor commoner's problem! Gee, I hope that commoner has a cleric of Pelor nearby to protect him...oh wait :(
TS
If anything, shouldnt the "undead flee but come back later" result be most thematically appropriate to a negative energy channeling cleric who fails to command them? The idea being they feel his power about to dominate them completely, only to barely slip away. I'd sure turn tail and get away from the guy who was about to make a puppet out of me. And I can see an evil cleric not really caring if the undead come back; ten to one odds he's done with his buisiness and long gone, or he just sets up another "capture" attempt.
I think this has merit, at least a smidgen perhaps, anyone else?
Maybe:
Positive Channeling- Undead are damaged and those that fail saves refuse to come within 10 feet? Fits the huddle around the cleric image well (8 squares of saftey), especially for a tense "we cant fight them all but the cleric could get us out to the exit and daylight". Obviously, enough damage can destroy them flat out.
Negative Channeling- Undead are healed. Maybe a temp hit point mechanic for "excess healing", with say any undead NOT under your control who receive "excess" healing above their normal limit make a save or run for their unlives and self-autonomy? Or maybe thats even the result of a made save, with failure being commanded? That could balance the "adventuring capabilities" so that the evil cleric can bypass a "undead encounter": the good cleric adds to damage and tactical choices, the evil cleric scatters them for a few rounds and possibly commands some, buying time to prepare a counterattack. Overall, a similar "cost/profit" paradigm.
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Positive Channeling- Undead are damaged and those that fail saves refuse to come within 10 feet? Fits the huddle around the cleric image well (8 squares of saftey), especially for a tense "we cant fight them all but the cleric could get us out to the exit and daylight". Obviously, enough damage can destroy them flat out.
I agree with this. I much prefer the huddling/shaken effect over fleeing. I often try to convince the cleric to not turn the undead most of the time. If we do damage, or make them retreat a few steps (10-15 feet) then that is much more beneficial than trying to play tag through a dungeon of other monsters.
Positive Channeling- Undead are damaged and those that fail saves refuse to come within 10 feet? Fits the huddle around the cleric image well (8 squares of saftey), especially for a tense "we cant fight them all but the cleric could get us out to the exit and daylight". Obviously, enough damage can destroy them flat out.
I too find that to be a pretty cool image. I think I will try Black Bard's way in my new campaign and see how it goes.
And yeah, making undead flee is just annoying. Particularly when it's not in a dungeon, but outdoors, my first thought was always, "Oh great, now they're going to go eat the first non-cleric they find, and we'll have that to answer for." Adventurers usually have enough things to feel bad about already.
Positive Channeling- Undead are damaged and those that fail saves refuse to come within 10 feet? Fits the huddle around the cleric image well (8 squares of saftey), especially for a tense "we cant fight them all but the cleric could get us out to the exit and daylight". Obviously, enough damage can destroy them flat out.
Sort of a like the Sanctuary spell but with a radius effect? I like.
That being said, I like where you are going thematically. I do have some questions on the mechanics of this.
1. for clarification are the undead maintaining 1 5-foot square between themselves and the cleric or 2?
2. if the cleric moves toward the undead, will they attack if in range before moving away? What about attacks of Opportunity for the characters moving through areas threatened by the undead?
3. can the undead attack characters within this radius but within reach from their position just outside?
4. I take it that the duration of this effect would still be 1d4+Cha rounds, am I correct?
5. How would a Cleric channeling Negative energy supporting the undead interact with this effect?
I don't mean to appear overly critical and I apologize if this comes across as such. As I said, I like the concept. I would just like some detailed clarifications on the mechanics implementation.
I'd think it would work similar to 3.5e just without the fleeing.
d20 SRD:
Effect and Duration of Turning
Turned undead flee from you by the best and fastest means available to them. They flee for 10 rounds (1 minute). If they cannot flee, they cower (giving any attack rolls against them a +2 bonus). If you approach within 10 feet of them, however, they overcome being turned and act normally. (You can stand within 10 feet without breaking the turning effect—you just can’t approach them.) You can attack them with ranged attacks (from at least 10 feet away), and others can attack them in any fashion, without breaking the turning effect.
Cowering
The character is frozen in fear and can take no actions. A cowering character takes a -2 penalty to Armor Class and loses her Dexterity bonus (if any).
It's very related to the current "fear hierarchy" of shaken (-2), frightened (-2 and must flee, but can fight if it can't flee), panicked (-2 and must flee, or cower if it can't flee).
Random thoughts. Why not use all three "levels" depending on how well you turn? Why not integrate this better with the Intimidate mechanics? Why not get rid of, or minimize, the fleeing part?
I like the idea of a circle of protection around the cleric vs undead being created against those who failed their saves. Maybe a 15' radius.
I never liked the original wording on turn in 3.5 anyway. The rest of the party can engage the undead that are cowering just fine, but if the cleric tries to they break the turn. I'd rather see turn deal damage to the undead, not necessarily make them gibbering idiots afterwards.
I really dislike the healing effect that it generates now, but thats another matter all-together. I guess I'm just in the minority that thinks that the new PFRPG channel positive energy mechanic will mean that undead encounters will be trivialized, and they should be something scary again.... Long Live Ravenloft!
I guess I'm just in the minority that thinks that the new PFRPG channel positive energy mechanic will mean that undead encounters will be trivialized, and they should be something scary again.... Long Live Ravenloft!
I know what you mean KR - I was thinking the same thing when I read it the first time. I've been convinced otherwise however, consider this:
- Undead typically have *at least* as many HD as the cleric.
Undead get d12 HD.
The cleric gets d6 damage every *two* cleric levels.
The Undead gets a save for half damage.
This means if the undead creature has as many HD as the cleric, even failing its save, it will only take about 1/4 of its hp in damage (slightly higher on the odd levels), 1/8th if it succeeds. The Will save for half and to avoid fleeing is also fairly easy, especially considering most undead have Good Will saves.
I don't think there will be anything trivial about undead encounters because of this.
I can easily see Empower and Maximize turning feats, will use up most of the turn attempts for the day while doing a good bit extra damage.
I know what you mean KR - I was thinking the same thing when I read it the first time. I've been convinced otherwise however, consider this:
Undead typically have *at least* as many HD as the cleric.
Undead get d12 HD.
The cleric gets d6 damage every *two* cleric levels.
The Undead gets a save for half damage.
This means if the undead creature has as many HD as the cleric, even failing its save, it will only take about 1/4 of its hp in damage (slightly higher on the odd levels), 1/8th if it succeeds. The Will save for half and to avoid fleeing is also fairly easy, especially considering most undead have Good Will saves.I don't think there will be anything trivial about undead encounters because of this.
I can easily see Empower and Maximize turning feats, will use up most of the turn attempts for the day while doing a good bit extra damage.
I have little problem with the amount of damage it delivers to undead. I have a huge problem with how much it heals the group of adventurers, at the exact same time. Waaaaaay too efficient.
I can guarantee you I will see munchkin clerics based around the turn ability alone if this current phase of channel positive energy stands.
Dont forget, there is also the extra turn ability which gives an additional 4 uses of turn undead. Who gives a craptastic about the cleric spells, his turn undead ability is by far the biggest bomb he can deliver, both inside combat with undead, or not.
One of my biggest turnoffs of 4E is the healing ability that all characters get.... with Pathfinder, the cleric can handle that extreme while cleaning his fingernails and still have alot left over. I understand the intention behind it, freeing up the cleric to use his spells elsewhere is an admirable and difficult task. However the new turn undead makes me think that every character should take some levels in cleric, take practiced spell caster and just have superfluous amounts of healing all around and never worry about a thing except for single round damage or save or die spells.
Heck lets just let bygones be bygones and fill in a party of complete clerics. Put that with empowered or maximized turning for more added frills.
Area of effect spells against adventurers will be completely negated... and I guarantee you, my players will be SCREAMING at me when I introduce them to their first pair of enemy clerics healing their group against them.
I'd have to say one of my largest drawbacks to PFRPG is the unbalancing issue of the channeling positive energy mechanic. It replaces 4E's healing surge by giving the ability to one person, rather than individuals healing themselves by taking a 5 minute smoke break.
Back in the Fall of 07 when we knew little of where the 4e project was going, I suggested the following approach to turning.
The main concept of the idea is to have a track that has both a positive and negative value on it.
Every Undead in an encounter contributes so much 'negative energy' to the tracks initial position. A holy or unholy site would also contribute either an initial amount of positive or negative energy to the track (could even assign special creatures like angels to contribute positive energy to the track).
After this initial determination of the starting point of the track, every cleric gets a free action (or minor action depending on what is felt to be the right game play) to make a knowledge (religion) check to influence the position of the counter on the track. The better the roll then the more the counter would move either positive or negative.
Different levels of the track would be noted as providing the undead in the encounter with either positives or negatives to their health and abilities.
Powerful undead like Vampires and Liches would have an inherent ability to move the marker so many spots to the negative without making a turn check to represent their turn resistance.
The result of this is that it is a battle to demonstrate the cleric's faith and bring light to the darkness.
The initial position of negatives would favour undead causing them to heal wounds or get extra attacks while the positive end of the track would result in all undead taking automatic damage on each of their turns.
A fight would thus normally be very vicious in the beginning as the Cleric struggles to bring the power of their god to bear when the undead are at their peak and it would speed up the mopping up of the last couple of undead at the end of the fight when all the intrest value has really gone out of the encounter and it is now a numbers game of rolling dice.
The presence of an evil cleric would also be a great problem without a good cleric to counter as the evil cleric is going to make the undead stronger every round to a maximum value making the evil cleric a priority to reach.
There should also be a natural bleed of energy back to a normal background value which occurs every round or minute to avoid undead hyped up by a necromancer running around all over the place.
Game wise, I think this would be a much better simulation of the fight and game play between to opposing clerics.