Explain how it would be broke or abused with rules and classes that exist.
Not theoretical classes or Tome of Battle.
Why not? If already happened, cannot happen again?
Leaving aside the issue of recovery techniques, I guess I'd find it slightly annoying if a 5th level bard could automatically take 20 on every single Knowledge check (outside of combat). I don't like to use the word "broken", though.Explain how it would be broke or abused with rules and classes that exist.
Not theoretical classes or Tome of Battle.
See, that's an example.
There would obviously have to be some work to see which items can be changed to try and alleviate the 15 min adventuring day and which items are simply utilities and should stay at per day.
Why not? If already happened, cannot happen again?
Explain how it would be broke or abused with rules and classes that exist.
Not theoretical classes or Tome of Battle.
I tire of this; you obviously have nothing.
O_o just take every X/day feature like smite evil, challenge, knockout blow...
They are balanced for daily use, of course would be changed.
My concerns are:
1) Will encounter only powers interesting the same way?
2) What if an out of combat use is found? there is the risk it being troublesome.
This is why i bringed in an example with ToB.
Frankly, Cartigan, there is no reason to be so aggressive.
Two Items I would like to address.
Item 1: So no way for Spell casters to replenish their spells between encounters? Paladins, monks, ninja, etc...get to refresh their resources by taking short breaks but casters dont? Seems a bit unfair unless you are going with the basis that the noncasters need a boost to balance them.
The Pearl of Power feels sad that you've forgotten about him.
It's not really hard to follow a philosophy of "Don't tie good utility abilities to combat actions." Like jumping really far, or overcoming hardness, or teleporting.
And you know what? If you find a way to Smite Evil outside of combat, have at it.
It's not really hard to follow a philosophy of "Don't tie good utility abilities to combat actions." Like jumping really far, or overcoming hardness, or teleporting.
And you know what? If you find a way to Smite Evil outside of combat, have at it.
What if I am a paladin, use Aura of Justice on a crowd/military unit and then walk away?
Am I in combat?
It's not really hard to follow a philosophy of "Don't tie good utility abilities to combat actions." Like jumping really far, or overcoming hardness, or teleporting.
And you know what? If you find a way to Smite Evil outside of combat, have at it.
What if I am a paladin, use Aura of Justice on a crowd/military unit and then walk away?
Am I in combat?
I think I more or less already addressed this. Under my one proposal, Smite Evil is recharged at the start of combat. The Paladin would have to have 2 uses left of his Smite Evil in order to use Aura of Justice. If he never enters the 1 minute away combat, it never recharges and he loses 2 Smite Evil until he gets in a fight. But then again, who cares? It isn't like the ability doesn't have any other limits on it.
Also; If the Paladin can continue providing the ability over and over while the army fights, he is in the encounter so it is burns Smite Evil anyway. If he can only provide it once and they somehow engage in combat within 1 minute, then nothing is unbalanced.
You know the problem with ToB? Classes got all these great maneuvers that let them do cool stuff but ONLY in combat, of COURSE they were going to say "I punch my ally in the face so I can actually DO something."
You do realize the only time that comes up if the healing ability of the crusader. The rest of the abilities have no limit of combat since they don't require you fighting a foe.
Now, how do you define an ally as a foe I don't understand.That seems less ToB fault than that DM's fault for letting them redefine what an ally and foe is.
Explain bag of tricks?
And how it was abused.
Remember all ToB maneuvers says a foe must be a threat. So a bag of rats won't work.Error by my part. the two things were not linked together - were 2 different abuses.
I meant "Bag of rats". The whirlwind + Greatcleave abuse.
For the stone dragon, I was thinking to the ones ignoring hardness. Dig dig dig.
These abuses are silly, I just think that there is the risk of designing one thing with combat or out of combat only in mind, and you end up with strange situations of unwanted blends.
Um, that wasn't an abuse. Stone dragon was partly meant for you dig/break objects. Also to deal with constructs. That was why targets including objects.
It was not an abuse but the exact intention.
I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with there being daily abilities for fighting classes. I think it can make sense for there to be certain types of particularly strenuous activities or cumulative less-strenuous activities that can only be regained after a decent night's sleep. The barbarian's rage rounds is what I consider to be an excellent example of this. Sooner or later, he simply runs out of gas.
The trick with any of these is how they're designed. The changes to the paladin's smite in PF makes them a lot more useful than they were in 3.5 without making them a must-burn every single encounter. I think the barbarian rage rounds are also reasonably well done in that they don't burn too many relative resources at once to use. That's the idea of the daily powers I'd like to see.
It was not an abuse but the exact intention.
For some DM was (say, for the current Kaiyanwang no problem, but for the noob 3.5 fresh Kaiyanwang of some time ago...)
There would obviously have to be some work to see which items can be changed to try and alleviate the 15 min adventuring day and which items are simply utilities and should stay at per day.
Likewise, there are some cleric X/day domain abilities that I wouldn't really like to see spammed every round (e.g. Touch of Good or Bit of Luck). I'm already not crazy about the ability to cast Guidance over and over again.
An example of a poorly-written "per encounter" (or "per combat") rule is the Judgment ability from the APG playtest version of the Inquisitor. The bonus you received was contingent on the number of rounds that a combat lasted, so it would be in your best interest to keep the "combat" going (maybe by turning it into a sissy slap-fight with another member of your party) until you meet another monster. Jason rightfully rewrote it for the final version, of course.
It still works that way somewhat. Mainly, for example, in the healing judgment. I get 3hp per round as long as the fight lasts, therefore I purposely don't kill the bad guy when I know I could just so I can keep healing because the instant he's dead, the healing stops. Annoyingly meta I know.
And then you remember even level 1 nobodies do more than 3 a round, so you still lose HP and not gain them.
Sure, but if..
1) I'm not hit in a round, its +3 hp
2) I'm going to be hit regardless, its still better than +0 hp or spending an action to heal myself
If it's not you, they can hit someone else. Still a net loss.
If you finish the fight, you don't get hit.
Now if the ability were actually significant, but combat only you'd have a point. 3 HP doesn't count as such.
I can't speak for the Inquisitor, but I remember a fight where a Tome of Battle character tried to drag out a fight with an undead skeleton (which could only hit him on a 20) for as long as possible for a measly 2 HP of healing each round. Tedious.
If it's not you, they can hit someone else. Still a net loss.
If you finish the fight, you don't get hit.
Now if the ability were actually significant, but combat only you'd have a point. 3 HP doesn't count as such.
If the opponent is fighting me and misses and I heal 3hp, net gain +3hp.
If the opponent is fighting me and is going to hit, regardless of ac, and I heal 3hp, net result, its damage - 3hp. Same could be accomplished of course by doing DR but that only works if it hits. If I heal, I heal regardless of it it hits or not.
Not saying I don't dislike the "per encounter" concept because I do, I'm just saying that the heal 3hp per round of an encounter has caused me to artificially try to stretch out easy encounters in the past in order to milk the healing.
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I can't speak for the Inquisitor, but I remember a fight where a Tome of Battle character tried to drag out a fight with an undead skeleton (which could only hit him on a 20) for as long as possible for a measly 2 HP of healing each round. Tedious.
This is why Kirth gave out Fast Healing 1 at 5th. Stops the melee character from being a healing sink sucking up party resources.
I can't speak for the Inquisitor, but I remember a fight where a Tome of Battle character tried to drag out a fight with an undead skeleton (which could only hit him on a 20) for as long as possible for a measly 2 HP of healing each round. Tedious.
Tedious yes, and annoyingly "meta-gaming" even from the player of the character doing it, but if the party is out of healing and a critical encounter is known to be coming, its better than a sharp stick in the eye.
Unlimited uses per day might require a skill check or something, or a DC to use. They can use it x per day then start to accrue penalties to the check. Kind of blending the two ideas a bit.
Unlimited uses per day might require a skill check or something, or a DC to use. They can use it x per day then start to accrue penalties to the check. Kind of blending the two ideas a bit.
+1
Well. I didn't expect someone to actually agree with me...
I do.
This is why Kirth gave out Fast Healing 1 at 5th. Stops the melee character from being a healing sink sucking up party resources.
I can't speak for the Inquisitor, but I remember a fight where a Tome of Battle character tried to drag out a fight with an undead skeleton (which could only hit him on a 20) for as long as possible for a measly 2 HP of healing each round. Tedious.
Do a modified fast healing mechanic so that full healing between fights given a reasonable breathing period is possible but if I want to string a bunch of independent yet connected encounters such as 4-5 encounters in a 5 minute period as reinforcements keep showing up there will still be an ablative effect on HPs and a need for magical healing.
Available at first level though.
While I think that limited healing between encounters might be nice. I still want to see characters taking wounds that will last a few days without magical healing. I want magical healing to be important outside of combat for roleplaying reasons and the like.
Nobody ever wants to go there because it breaks to many other things but a WP/VP system would probably simulate that type of scenario.
VP recovers to full with a short rest (say 15 minute) but damage to WP takes x amount of time to heal so that if you get really really injured during a fight you are laid up for x amount of time.
If you are willing to make some alterations here is a halfway measure that I kinda like.
Divide HPs into two tracks.
One track represent physical damage. It's equal to Base Constitution with some modifier based on size.
The other track measures almost hits. It's equal to class HD + con bonus per level.
Incoming damage always goes to the virtual pile before spilling over to the base HP pile. Damage to the virtual pile is restored to maximum given a short rest. Damage to the core track requires x amount of time to heal. Make sure that it does not scale with level like normal D&D natural healing.
That's a moderately workable system that eliminates most of the wonkiness of the WP/VP system such as crits bypassing VP. It ends up boosting base HPs a fairly significant margin so you probably have to make it so that at 1st level you don't get "virtual" HPs but it will work okay.
Vuron - you just described Healing Surges, at least to some extent ;p
Essentially, healing surges don't come back until you've had a nice, long, extended rest. And healing without expending one is pretty dang rare. The end result is that, at first, you seem to have plenty and the healing will go just fine, but by the time you're running out, things are getting frantic and quite worrisome.
It reminds me of how some pulp books from the 70's went - you have just enough to get you into trouble, and not quite enough to get you out :p
Contrast this with 3.x's healing, which is basically infinite - so long as someone has Healing Juice, you can be healed no problem.
Vuron - you just described Healing Surges, at least to some extent ;p
Essentially, healing surges don't come back until you've had a nice, long, extended rest. And healing without expending one is pretty dang rare. The end result is that, at first, you seem to have plenty and the healing will go just fine, but by the time you're running out, things are getting frantic and quite worrisome.
It reminds me of how some pulp books from the 70's went - you have just enough to get you into trouble, and not quite enough to get you out :p
Contrast this with 3.x's healing, which is basically infinite - so long as someone has Healing Juice, you can be healed no problem.
Heh, I like 4e man and I'm not above stealing Surges as they are definitely one of the best innovations of that system.
I think it would be fantastic to swipe rituals as well. Almost all the balance issues between casters and noncasters could be resolved if the martials had some access to personal magic via rituals and incantations.
Vuron - you just described Healing Surges, at least to some extent ;p
Essentially, healing surges don't come back until you've had a nice, long, extended rest. And healing without expending one is pretty dang rare. The end result is that, at first, you seem to have plenty and the healing will go just fine, but by the time you're running out, things are getting frantic and quite worrisome.
It reminds me of how some pulp books from the 70's went - you have just enough to get you into trouble, and not quite enough to get you out :p
Contrast this with 3.x's healing, which is basically infinite - so long as someone has Healing Juice, you can be healed no problem.
Heh, I like 4e man and I'm not above stealing Surges as they are definitely one of the best innovations of that system.
I think it would be fantastic to swipe rituals as well. Almost all the balance issues between casters and noncasters could be resolved if the martials had some access to personal magic via rituals and incantations.
3.5 SRD has in-built a system for that. Look for Incantations.
They need A LOT of work and maybe RE-work as they are, 'though.
I really liked the UA incantation system in theory. In practice it's pretty half-baked.
Thematically I like the idea of a low-level NPC being able to use ritual magic and a ton of followers to achieve high end effects like summoning and binding extraplanar entities.
Think crazed CoC Cultist summoning the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young or some evil empire looking to summon Azathoth as a doomsday weapon.
That sort of over the top stuff without needing to be a level 17 Wizard is appealing.
The reason why I think rituals could be useful for martial characters while avoiding the "everyone is a spellcaster" is that martial characters already engage in ritual behavior all over the world throughout time. Whether it's performing a centering ritual or a cleansing ritual or a pre-fight amp yo self up ritual it's common throughout the world.
If these rituals provide tangible benefits and take x amount of time so that characters cannot "cast" them during combat the amount of niche protection that they infringe on remains minimal.
So rather than needing a caster to buff you or make magic items for you the martial character actually has the ability to help himself out. It increases martial character agency.
Yes it's a buff to their power but honestly tightening the gap between martials and casters is a good thing.
On the other hand, the D&D magic system (including healing, which it has been noted is a particularly important type of casting since it determines when the fighters have to stop and rest) is essentially a per-day system, and one that I don't think we could change significantly and still be a form of D&D. Considering the balance issues between casters and hitters, giving hitters some abilities too powerful to be unlimited in use seems like an easy solution.
Perhaps an alternate solution is in order. For example, we could redefine "day" to be somewhat abstract rather than consisting of a 24 hour period of in-game time. Having been on a few adventures myself in real life, getting a night's sleep is not always assured, and neither is being completely rested and recharged by it.
I don't think you want 3.x casters being able to hit with their best spell every fight or multiple times every fight all day long. 4e casters don't even get to do this and their power level is remarkably tame in comparison to the high level 3.x Wizard.
That being said I think you can strip out a bunch of the downtime mechanics out from spellcasting and improve gameplay.
For me these largely revolve around pre-fight buffing and post-fight healing. I don't particular care for the healbot archetype of 1e-2e or the healing battery tax that is the 3.x Wand of CLW.
If casters don't have to expend resources on buffing before fights or healing after fights, or even better if the martial characters can do that for themselves then casters can focus on actions during encounters. In some cases that means rapid magical healing or buffing and debuffing.
By offloading healing and buffing duties (not every buff should be outsourced) you can then balance the combat options of caster closer to the combat options of martial characters. Right now it's tricky to nerf the caster effectively without making the whole team suffer as a result.
Almost every game mechanic in 4E seemed artificial, or gamey, and for what the designers said in the Dragon magazine 4E was intentionally gamey.
Yet, there are many nice ideas, the exact rules used are artificial, but the ideas aren't. I like healing surges and with some modifications it should stop being so gamey.
Also note that some cleric powers allow you to heal characters without using healing surges.The Wound points + Vitality points was used in Star Wars d20, I didn't play the game enough to say that it worked, but I didn't find any problem and I liked it too.
About rituals, I wouldn't give rituals to non-casters but I would make some utility spells into rituals, for flavor and game balance.
Well, everything in D&D is artificial. The game is an abstract at large. HP itself is and has always been an abstract, as has combat in it's entirety.
Well, everything in D&D is artificial. The game is an abstract at large. HP itself is and has always been an abstract, as has combat in it's entirety.
Indeed, 4e has basically said that concerns about "realism" are extraneous to making a good game. While 4e has said death to simulationist play from the standpoint of having the ruleset define every aspect of gameworld physics it is still simulationist from the standpoint of simulating the types of high fantasy and sword and sorcery narratives D&D has always been inspired by.
If the baseline 3.x mechanics can be modified in manner that retains some of the essential feel of 3.x and previous editions while also improving the gameplay and narrative flexibility of the ruleset then I think those changes are positive.
However, the fracturing of the hobby around OSR, 3.x/PF and 4e camps has definitely indicated to me that individual tolerance levels vary significantly and a change that is desirable or palatable to you and me might not be warmly regarded by others.
In regards to the guns and gunslinger this largely means that either realism will be abandoned in favor of gameplay concerns which will irritate the "realism" crowd or there will be a nod to the real world and the guns will end up being rubbish that is useless outside of the hands of 1st level commoners ;)
I feel there's two ways of looking at it.
3.5 can vaguely be said for trying to "simulate" an actual world. I really, really don't think that was the goal, but people have given it this label regardless. If it's true, however, they failed horribly. Nevermind the screwiness of the economy or the other weird rule bendiness, the idea that you can just plop magic and the literal and physical existence of gods into the world and it wouldn't change anything is utter madness.
4e on the other hand "simulates" the narrative perspective of the equivilent story. To put it in other terms, in a 3e Star Trek game, the Klingons attack and part of the ship explodes. Your bridge member is just as likely to go down as any red shirt because, well, part of the ship exploded. In a 4e game, the red shirt dies first, because he's a freaking red shirt and that's the reason he's there in the first place. There could even be something for the DM to illustrate or use a mechanic to utilize the red shirt dying first.
It's not really about realism. Do you want to try to simulate a vague "world" or do you want to simulate a vague "narrative?" The way I see it, even if 3e was trying to simulate a world, it doesn't do a good job. Ironically, the places where this is ignored is where the game succeeded best. When you ignore the "realism" aspect and get down to saying "Look I'm fine with flying wizards and castles coinciding," the game works better. I feel like previous editions want to have their cake and eat it too - they want "realism" right up until magic gets involved, and then it's ok to throw out all semblance of realism or trying to simulate anything. But you can't throw out realism half-way, because it just makes the un-realistic parts stick out like a sore thumb.
In other words, the amount of detail needed to "simulate" a vaguely realistic setting is absolutely staggering - and the amount of work needed to be done to "realistically" simulate how magic would interact is neigh impossible to do. Verisimilitude is the practice of ignoring reality because you want fun.