Recharging encounter powers

[JSL]

In a recent discussion regarding 4e, one of my players mentioned his dislike for encounter powers. He did not seem to mind at-will or daily powers, but definitely felt that the "encounter" abstraction was, for lack of a better term, too abstract.

At-will powers are realistic and make a ton of sense. "I can swing my sword all day long". Daily powers, for good or ill, have long been a staple of D&D. "I can cast fireball once per day because that is what I prepared this morning over breakfast." But encounter powers just seem odd. "Sorry, can't do that again until the next fight."

Furthermore, I think alot of people have trouble applying the concepts of daily and encounter powers to martial powers in general. There was a "science", no matter how dumb you think it was, around casters preparing spells. But the game never put that kind of limit on martial characters.

Also, one more thing: encounter powers are basically use-it-or-lose-it. You can't save them for the next encounter, so you should plan to exhaust your encounter powers every fight. Some players like to sit on powers. I think the whole point of encounter powers is to get players to use them frequently. I don't want to go against that idea.

I know powers in 4e has been discussed before by both proponents and detractors. I am not looking to rehash that, but rather to propose a way for encounter powers to seem less arbitrarily limited.

I would like to come up with a mechanism for each class to recharge encounter powers. These are the guidelines:

1. I would like the mechanism to be realted to the class flavor and abilities.

2. The mechanism should be such that the PC can continuously strive to trigger it, but will most likely succeed about once or twice per encounter.

3. It should not require the expenditure of another limited power, though that may certainly help.

4. It should not be overly contingent upon fickle dice or happenstance - the player should have the ability to influence the chance of success through smart play.

5. It should not favor one class or type of ability over another. For example: controllers make more attack rolls than strikers, so they are likely to score more criticals.

6. It is okay if the recharge is not likely to happen in a solo fight or is not triggered by minions.

Ideas so far:

Fighter:

Recharge an encounter power by killing a marked enemy that the fighter damaged in the previous round (basically excludes minions).

Recharge a daily power by killing a marked enemy (as above) and another enemy in the same round. This works best with cleave against a minion - though note that that requires killing the marked target (not a minion) with the paltry damage of the cleave attack.

Rogue:

Recharge an encounter power if, at the start of your turn, you have combat advantage against more than one enemy.

Recharge a daily power if, at the start of your turn, you have combat advantage against all enemies. (e.g., by being invisible or hidden)

Wizard:

Recharge an encounter power as a standard action if, at the start of your turn, there are no enemies within 5 squares and you do not have line of sight to any enemies. (i.e., the wizard hides behind a rock to read his spellbook.) Note that requiring a standard action, prevents the wizard from playing hide-and-shoot. And if the wizard spends too much time behind that rock, someone in the party should give him a stern talking to.

Recharge a daily power by spending a healing surge as a standard action (you gain no hit points) if, at the start of your turn, there are no enemies within 10 squares and you do not have line of sight to any enemies.

[joela]

JSL wrote:

I would like to come up with a mechanism for each class to recharge encounter powers. These are the guidelines:

<snikt>

I've thought of similar systems and would curious to see the playtest results of your houserules.

[vance]

Martial Powers are really, really hard to justify as 'per encounter' since they're explicitly trained maneuvers and not anything super-natural or otherwise have a cost associated with them. Really, it depends on how you WANT to handle them.

One thing I've seen is to start adding 'fatigue' to power use, throwing on some negatives, and so on, to show that these things are draining (no penalty the first time, -2 the next time, -4, and so on). The fatigue ends when you're out of combat.

I'm not quite sure where the best balance would EXACTLY be, as it's still fairly arbitrary where 'encounters' are.

[CPEvilref]

JSL wrote:

Recharge a daily power by spending a healing surge as a standard action (you gain no hit points) if, at the start of your turn, there are no enemies within 10 squares and you do not have line of sight to any enemies.

Healing charges, in general, look like a great resource mechanic that can be used in a lot of different ways. However, 1 healing charge to do X is advantageous to the fighter and punishing to the wizard. If your X is a purely physical thing then it might be fine (but what about the 16 Str wizard planning to multiclass, etc).

Albeit this might be more math-crunchy than you want, but charging 1/4 (or 1/3 or 1/2 or whatever you want) of their daily healing charges is kinda more balanced (the wiz with 8 spends 2, the fighter with 12 spends 3, but they have the same percentage of charges left).

You can have it represent making an extreme effort, bringing down the pain, going to the wire or whatever phrase/training/magical endurance/divine mandate fits for the character/campaign.

[tadkil]

I would allow the expenditure of an action point to recharge an encounter power. I would not allow the AP to recharge and give another action. It shoulsd just give you a recharge.

Everybody gets the same amount, so it is fair. From a balance perspective, the player trades an extra action for access to their power.

[veector]

JSL wrote:

In a recent discussion regarding 4e, one of my players mentioned his dislike for encounter powers. He did not seem to mind at-will or daily powers, but definitely felt that the "encounter" abstraction was, for lack of a better term, too abstract.

This discussion seems so familiar for some reason. ;)

[Azigen]

The Players Handbook wrote:

Encounter Powers
An encounter power can be used once per encounter.
You need to take a short rest (page 263) before you can
use one again. Encounter powers produce more powerful,
more dramatic effects than at-will powers. If you’re
a martial character, they are exploits you’ve practiced
extensively but can pull off only once in a while. If
you’re an arcane or divine character, these are spells or
prayers of such power that they take time to re-form in
your mind after you unleash their magic energy.

I've always like the argument that martial characters are trying to pull off once in a while during combat.

I know not everyone is an anime fan but, its not like naruto can use ransegan against everyone and have it be effective all the time. When it does, its powerful.

I like tadkills approach becuase it endorses the mechanic of this is the general rule across the board. That being said, you can always add some fluff to it to make it class specific.

The fighter draws in a deep breath, and moves his body into a stance he has practiced thousands of times

However, I wouldnt allow any mechanic until they reach level 5 or paragon tier.

That being said you could also rule that a power is recharged during use like monsters powers sort of. Have your players role a 1d6 (or d8) during the use of a power and a 6 (or 8) allows to to use the power and not expend its use. You could also do 1d8 for heroic tier, and 1d6 for paragon. Not sure about epic though

[DudeMonkey]

Per-encounter martial encounters make sense from the standpoint of "it's difficult to pull the same trick twice" during lethal melee combat. In my experience, you can only get away with a trick once per fight before it catches on.

From a game standpoint, I don't have the time to get worked up over whether or not per-encounter powers make sense in my fantasy roleplaying game featuring seething pits of evil right outside of town, wizards, raise dead spells, magic item shops, acid breathing dragons, and giants. At the end of the day, the game ends, I go home to my girlfriend, and real life starts.

[Jeremy Mac Donald]

This sort of thing is not my cup of tea. I just view all the special moves as a different kind of action point - player spends it and gets cool move. Comes with a slow down of the action and everything as the DM goes nuts with the flavour verbiage.

Still if it is yours check out *Grimcleavers daily and encounter power house rules*

[swirler]

DudeMonkey wrote:

Per-encounter martial encounters make sense from the standpoint of "it's difficult to pull the same trick twice" during lethal melee combat. In my experience, you can only get away with a trick once per fight before it catches on.

that is kind of how I've made it make sense in my mind also.

[Shroomy]

A ten round combat is still only a minute long. How many times can you execute complicated manuevers in a minute?

[tadkil]

Shroomy wrote:

A ten round combat is still only a minute long. How many times can you execute complicated manuevers in a minute?

I worked as a bouncer from the time I was 18-25 (college jobs rock) and can honestly say this depends on your opponents. Sometimes the forearm smash/foot stomp uncorks well and many times on teh same guy, sometimes it does not. Some folks are suckers for finger locks, some folks are not.

One of the problems of applying any logical real world argument to the game is that there is always another take or material experience that contradicts your own.

As for the OPs post, the issue for me is the aesthetic of his group. It messes with thier supsension of disbeleief. He wants to build a house rule to address it. That's excellent as he is serving his players.

Let's support his need.

[Pete Apple]

Grimcleavers houserules are good, you should check them out.

Alternatively, if you review the monster stat blocks, you'll find that they don't seem to have encounter powers.

What they do have is a "recharge" mechanism using a d6, whereby at the start of each round they roll a d6 to see if that power "recharged".

The simple answer is for you to houserule a similar mechanism for your players encounter powers. You can use a d6/6 - I'd recommend initially to make them all require a "6" on the recharge. If you think that's too often use a d10/10. That adds some additional drama to the combat.

Another alternative might be to allow spending an action point to recharge an encounter power. So instead of an extra standard action, one of their encounter powers is usable again.

I know these don't meet all the criteria you laid out, but I think either (or both) of these would be much simpler for you and your players.

Pete

[David Marks]

Pete Apple wrote:

Grimcleavers houserules are good, you should check them out.

Alternatively, if you review the monster stat blocks, you'll find that they don't seem to have encounter powers.

What they do have is a "recharge" mechanism using a d6, whereby at the start of each round they roll a d6 to see if that power "recharged".

The simple answer is for you to houserule a similar mechanism for your players encounter powers. You can use a d6/6 - I'd recommend initially to make them all require a "6" on the recharge. If you think that's too often use a d10/10. That adds some additional drama to the combat.

Another alternative might be to allow spending an action point to recharge an encounter power. So instead of an extra standard action, one of their encounter powers is usable again.

I know these don't meet all the criteria you laid out, but I think either (or both) of these would be much simpler for you and your players.

Pete

Some monsters DO have encounter powers, just to be clear Pete. I think they can even have dailies, if you give them a class template (but I haven't read that area too closely so ...)

I think letting PC encounters recharge on 1/6th of the time is a bit too strong, although 1/10th might be ok. Either way though, you're giving the PCs a leg up so be warned.

Using an AP to get back an encounter sounds more reasonable to me, but still be careful. Playing with fire tends to burn. :)

[mandisaw]

Hmm, maybe figure it's like lactic-acid buildup. If you're exercising or exerting your muscles too hard for too long continuously (doing a hard maneuver in the heat of battle), your muscles start to build-up lactic acid and ache. A brief pause to get some fresh oxygen (catch your breath = short rest) gets rid of the buildup and you're ready to pump-iron again. That's how I'd interpret per-encounter abilities in a "real world" perspective.

As for the mechanic itself, I suppose it's a question of how long/complicated your "encounters" are. It's a DM-call, but the intention I got was that a PC shouldn't need/want to use their per-encounter powers more frequently. Maybe if your PCs do feel the need to use their mid-level powers frequently in a single encounter, then your "encounters" need to be divided up a little more finely.

I think the point of restricting power usage by level is to encourage players to think up clever ways to beat monsters & solve problems, and not become (or remain) one-trick ponies. It's a good idea, IMO, but it takes some getting used to, on both sides of the table.