In my thread on rocket tag, it was opined that damage and HP was the real problem, thus here is an idea to rescale damage and HP.
The idea here is to have dice slots and dice ranks. The dice slots are so you can more easily establish mechanics to have multiple dice, each of which can advance separately.
For example, a weapon can have a die slot for the weapon’s damage, a die slot for enchantment damage (such as for a flaming sword), and a die slot for the wielder’s strength.
Additionally, this scales back magic a bit compared to melee, but that can always be scaled differently.
First, each die slot has a rank. The rank determines the size of the die to be rolled.
Rank 1 is a d4, rank 2 a d6, rank 3 a d8, rank 4 a d10, and rank 5 a d12. Higher ranks basically remove a multiple of 5 and roll that many d12s plus whatever die the remaining ranks dictate. For example, a rank 8 die slot rolls 1d12+1d8.
If a rank is reduced to 0, it becomes a d2, and if reduced lower it becomes a flat 1.
Second, HP. Each character gets 1 HD slot. That slot is rank 2 plus half the con modifier. Each character level increases the rank by 1. Classes can add additional HP each level. Classes with D8 gain +1 HP per lvl, D10 is +2, and D12 is +3.
With con modifier of 0, lvl 1 characters will have 8-11 HP, then at lvl 5 would have around 16-28 HP, while at lvl 20 will have 30-90 HP.
Third, weapons have one dice slot, their base dmg. Masterwork bonus increases the base weapon dmg rank by 1 (as well as the +1 to hit). An enhancement bonus increases the base dmg rank as well.
The base dmg slot starts off with the dmg as printed in the base rules (or the equivalent if the GM doesn’t want to make a ruling on advancing 2d4 and similar). Additional ranks then increase the dmg as described above. For example, a longsword (it’s an arming sword! Longswords are two handed!) has 3 ranks for base dmg for it’s printed d8 of damage, thus a +1 increase in it’s base dmg rank improves dmg from a d8 to a d10.
The strength modifier increases the base dmg rank. Some weapons, such as crossbows use their own strength instead of the character’s (which is +0 by default), and composite bows use the lesser of their own strength and the character’s.
Enhancement bonuses to weapons increase the dmg rank of all dice slots except strength. Thus a +1 longsword (still an arming sword!) gets a d10 dmg die.
Weapon abilities that add dmg, such as flaming and shocking, add an enchantment die slot with a rank equal to the enhancement bonus of the weapon. IE a +1 flaming longsword gets 1d4 fire dmg in addition to its other dmg.
The advanced version of such abilities, like shocking burst, increase the enchantment slot’s rank by two under the conditions that increase dmg.
Fourth, precision dmg, such as sneak attack, add a precision dmg slot with a rank equal to the number of dice that the ability gets under the normal rules. For example, 3d6 of sneak attack dmg becomes 3 ranks for 1d8 precision dmg.
This means a weapon can get up to three dmg dice slots, base, enchantment, and precision. IE a +2 flaming longsword wielded by a +1 str fighter gets d12+d4 slashing dmg and d6 fire damage.
Fifth, spells, effects, and such that deal a number of dice of dmg, instead have that number of dice as the rank of the dmg slot for that effect. This means that weapons will generally be doing more dmg than spells.
Sixth, effects that deal a number of dice but reduce the size of the dice, such as burning hands doing d4s instead of d6s, subtract ranks from the starting value. So Burning hands, doing d4s instead of d6s, is one rank less than CL rather than equal to CL, which at first level reduces rank 1 to rank 0 and thus deals a d2 dmg. This is not per level, so a CL 5 Burning Hands would do rank 4 dmg.
Likewise, something that increases dice size (can’t think of any off the top of my head) would improve starting rank.
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This would generally keep the lethality at low levels, and yet keep the high levels from devolving into rocket tag. It should also keep martials as the primary damage dealers, with damage magic being useful for AoE or bypassing resistances and exploiting weaknesses.
This also keeps defenses relevant, as even the DR 2/- of adamantine as noticeable through the mid levels, and even at high levels that DR 2 accounts for nearly 10% of a spell’s average damage. And resist 5 and resist 10 remain as defenses to get around rather than overpower.
That said, I haven’t been able to run my normal number analysis, so tell me if I’m missing something, and tell me what you think.
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Man, that seems like a huge overcomplication of... everything. As we've discussed in your other thread, the issue with rocket tag is indeed a discrepancy of offensive options versus defensive ones, but a lot of the contributing issues can be solved just by the GM tweaking his campaign accordingly to avoid "abusive" approaches (like 15min day or min/max with challenging the max instead of the min).
If the GM does the above (or can't) and it is still an issue, then the easiest idea is simply to max hp, which many GMs already do. Adding extra enemies also increases the effective hp of the encounter.
If all the above fail, then it is still far easier to just work other increases on defensive options than to revamp the whole damage system.
As in most things in life, less is more. Never go for a complicated solution when a simpler one would work. Change for change's sake is not good.
First, I don’t really see how it is complicated. Most of the complication is noting how to convert existing materials.
Second, I have a very big problem with the idea of just making numbers bigger. Especially when doing so renders other elements of the game useless or pointless.
For example, when doing 100 dmg, who cares about resistance? Even resistance 10 against 100 dmg is so small that there is no reason to find a different attack to avoid the resistance. As far as I’m concerned, that breaks combat. It turns combat into a game of just increasing dmg.
Combat should be, and was originally designed to be, more strategic and puzzle-like. If encountering an enemy with resistance, the whole point is to make attacking them with what they are resistant the hard and difficult slog way of fighting. But when dmg skyrockets, it renders resistance as a trait pointless and it no longer does it’s job as a game mechanic.
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Well, if you think it is simple, good for you. I don't really see other GMs coming nearly close to it though and I know a good amount of them.
Your proposed idea would deeply alter the whole damage system and it would take a lot of effort to 1) come up with the right numbers after extensive testing, and 2) convert all damage to it. The change is so massive that I can't even imagine how other secondary aspects of the game will be affected.
On the other hand, just tweaking the existing defensive numbers up is far easier and can be done in a way to solve the same problem without unintended effects, and can easily be undone. If you ask 10 GMs here on the boards about how they deal with high level combat you'll likely hear "I give max hp, add some mooks and it works just fine" 6-7 out of 10. Why? Because it works and it is easy.
To use your example, comparing 100 damage to 10 resistance might seem a lot, but the circumstances around this could vary wildly. The same damage done in 2-4 instances would mean resistances much higher. 10 resistance might be enough to stop most low level spells, environment, elemental weapons, some auras, and so on, but not a very high level ability/spell. IMO this is working as intended, but if you don't feel like it is, buffing it to 15 or 20 is far easier than rescaling all damage dealing spells to make resist 10 work.
It is important to keep in mind that rocket tag is not ALWAYS present. Some combats work just fine. In fact it is also a general complaint about high level play that combats just take forever to resolve and this would exacerbate it.
It is also important to remember that you can't work on the extreme cases, because making them "balanced" would most of the time make the average useless. Using your example again if the average is 50 damage against resistance 10 and you change the system to the extreme case of 100 damage seems balanced, most likely the average of 50 is now irrelevant. This circles back to may point of you don't threat min/maxers through their "max".
All in all, if you like your idea, please test it in your games. I personally don't see using it or a variation of it. Small tweaks is the way, not massive changes.
@Sir Longears
I’m not discounting your statements, simply responding with my thoughts.
I’m not the best at talking anyway, and sometimes things are more complicated to describe doing than actually doing, like taking 1/5 of a value. A lot to describe doing it, but it’s actually easy to do.
Edit: Oh, ninja’s. I’ll be back.
My question is why is the idea of high level play being rocket tag a bad thing. High level play is supposed to be different than the earlier levels. It represents the fact the characters have become legendary heroes. They are on the level of Achilles, Cu Chulainn or Hercules. All of them were capable of taking on armies single handed and normal threats were almost meaningless. The only thing that gave them any challenge was something as powerful as they were. Trying to fix high level play’s rocket tag is like trying to fix planed obsolesce.
If you want to avoid the idea of rocket tag the best way is to avoid high level play. The E6 system was designed specifically for this purpose.
Because
A) there are many more elements to high level play than just combat
B) because the best part of combat is the puzzle-like need to find good ways to fight and avoid bad ways to fight. When combat is reduced to who has the highest DPR or who strikes first, that removes basically everything else and therefore removes most of the fun. High level should have more options, not fewer.
Focusing on changing combat only reinforces the idea that high level play is only about combat. If you really want to bring those other things into play, than simply do so. The things you are proposing do nothing to advance alternatives to combat.
There are already ways to survive the rocket tag effect. They do require some prep and effort on the part of the players, but are available. A well prepared party is actually fairly hard to take out easily. The big expeption to this is the optional mythic rules. The mythic rules are specifically designed to be not just rocket tag, but nuclear rocket tag.
You rather miss the point.
Your suggestion to avoid rocket tag is to not play high level, so I mentioned that high level is not just combat, as in there are reasons to play high level other than just the combat, and therefore simply avoiding high level is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Next is that what people want to do and what they actually do are two different things. Often in games, people feel like they need to follow certain courses of action, regardless of whether it is actually necessary or not, and for most people what they really want is harmony between what they feel they need to do and what they want to do. For example, if they feel they need to play rocket tag, they will play rocket tag whether they want rocket tag or not, and if they don’t want rocket tag, they will play rocket tag while complaining that it’s a problem in need of solving, or they just won’t play. Especially if it’s a multiplayer game. The ability to not feel the need to play a game in a certain way is something that must be learned but can not be taught.
Therefore, there is a need to solve problems like rocket tag and actually solve them rather than just avoid them.
First, I do not present these ideas purely as a solution to something, but rather for several purposes. A) So they can spark additional ideas in others, B) someone else might actually like them, C) because it helps me dig deeper into the ideas myself, D) to get feedback not just on the ideas directly but also different perspectives in how people think about the mechanics and gameplay involved, etc.
Second, I am working on a couple systems of my own, complete systems. Therefore, I’m not worried about how easily they fit into pf1. If they would work well in their own right as part of the core design of a system, then that is good enough, even if converting is a little on the complex side. Converting is useful however for testing ideas in a limited scope of an otherwise well known system.
Third, I have zero interest in taking the easy way out. To me, GMing is an art, like music or writing, and thus worthy of doing things the hard way if the results are worth it. Solving a problem with a simple hack is not good enough. As a game, I have no problem with the idea that most want to be lazy and just use the simplest solutions, but to me it is an art, and thus I am more than willing to go through the hard work of finding a great solution and not just an easy one. So revamping the whole dmg system is absolutely worth it if the end result is better (naturally the end result should be easy to use in play, but the steps to get there need not be as easy).
Fourth,
Your proposed idea would deeply alter the whole damage system and it would take a lot of effort to 1) come up with the right numbers after extensive testing, and 2) convert all damage to it.
Not sure where you get this idea. The design I presented is straightforward (even if my attempt at explaining it is not). There is a conversion straight from existing numbers to new numbers, no need to fiddle around with them for balance as the ratio between any two values of the same type from the original mechanics would remain the same in the new mechanics. If the balance between dmg vs hp is off (isn’t supposed to be the same anyway), then it is much easier, and very simple, to adjust HP for how many average hits they can take. And the conversion isn’t that complicated, counting dice then adjusting the count up or down a couple points or less.
As for revamping the whole dmg system, well yea, that was the whole point. Can I make a better dmg setup for my system? Aside from hopefully inspiring others to have their own ideas, I am looking for ideas and refinements for my system.
It is also important to remember that you can't work on the extreme cases, because making them "balanced" would most of the time make the average useless. Using your example again if the average is 50 damage against resistance 10 and you change the system to the extreme case of 100 damage seems balanced, most likely the average of 50 is now irrelevant. This circles back to may point of you don't threat min/maxers through their "max".
Actually, I’m not working on extreme cases at all. I’m looking at the average range, not a min/maxed range. Heck, I’m even working on the old school idea of 10-11 being an average score rather than a minimum score.
The values I gave in the OP are average values, or occasionally the range for average values.
You also assume that having 400HPs and taking 100 damage is an issue, it's not. Most middle schoolers can do that math.
That is not what I assume. The example with 100 dmg said nothing about hp as it had nothing to do with hp. It was the about the relevance of other factors for which resistance was an example.
Dmg vs hp ratio is a different issue entirely, though arguably the centerpiece of the rocket tag problem, which was not actually the point of this thread, even if that discussion inspired the idea.
The use of a "slot" and "rank" simply make things more complicated than a summing idN format and create the opportunity for an exponential function.
Those are just a couple terms because I didn’t have any better. But all that is really denoted there is multiple dice (slots) and dice of different sizes (ranks). Not exactly rocket science.
There are a limited range of dice(d) of sides(N)
Irrelevant as only five sizes are used, with a sixth for rare circumstances. Thus who cares about the various sizes of dice beyond that?
Lvl(idN) at 1st is usually MAX with others adding avg(dN) for that class. addt'l would be any traits, fvd cls bns, feats, etc. The results span a limited range with limited variance for most creatures.
Exactly. That is intentional and also true of my idea.
What you propose creates a multiplicative effect in the terms within the summation
You mean like how con modifier is multiplied by level in the standard rules? Yea, I know.
producing results that may have no physical die on hand.
Clearly you missed a few key points, the only dice needed are d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, and rarely d2. All of which have physical versions which are in almost any dice set save d2 which is usually handled via odds and evens on any other die.
Thus your statement is incorrect. Any conclusions you’ve drawn based on this are therefore also flawed.
I'm assuming you're brainstorming as there isn't a small table showing examples
Actually that’s because I can’t access a real computer at the moment and therefore my options are rather limited for doing spreadsheets. Even more limited for c&p and especially typing (hence taking over a day to type this post).
I did however check various points in my head for a few reference point values.
Check out the Wounds and Vigor alternative system which is a simplification.
Seen it, have the book actually, and really my system already uses something far more similar to it than the idea in this thread.
There seems to be a lot of doublespeak and/or internal confusion in your posts. I'll reserve further comment until I see some actual tables of examples across classes, Cons, and levels.
None intended but I’m autistic and thus not the best at writing.
It might be a while but get tables and examples when I’m able.
1. it's too complicated a fix for something that's not really that broken.
2. it's not the dice damage that's usually the problem, it's the bonus damage. things like Power attack, and Piranha Strike, Weapon Specialization, etc. are where the real damage from a weapon is at.
it's not uncommon to see a weapon deal 2d6+57 (etc) in our games.
How do you get +57? Do they make every supplement stack or something?
Edit: In refreshing my memory on things I never actually use, did you know that in base d20, power attack only gives bonus dmg equal to the attack penalty, while in pf1, the bonus dmg is twice that? Another example of pf going for stronger characters.
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I don't believe the rules as they are are broken to the point of needing your proposed "fix", and also that this idea won't fix anything but instead create more problems.
If you are seeing problems with rocket tag, just prepare your campaign in a different way. I agree high level isn't just about combat, so I prepare my games with fewer but more meaningful combats.
And that is it. I completely agree with Mysterious Maker in that there are already built in ways to avoid rocket tag as long as you don't touch Mythic. Mythic is indeed nonsense and need a total reformulation to become viable. Normal rules are certainly not.
High level play isn't necessarily rocket tag, but it can become. When it does it is either because of some disconnect between the idealized campaign and the one being played or between the players and the GM.
Example: The players are dealing a huge amount of damage and the GM feels he needs to put higher level enemies and it is becoming rocket tag. Why is this happening? Probably because combat is such a major part of the campaign that the players are overspending their resources into combat options and thus outpacing the enemies. This can be fixed by a) decrease the amount of combat and increase other encounters, b) talk to the players and inform them that they are powerful enough and should avoid further power creep, c) redesign your encounters to target the party's weakness so they focus on non offensive options, d) increase the power of the enemies to force the players to get creative.
Your fix is not needed. At all.
This is not intended as a fix to rocket tag. It was inspired by that conversation but that is the limit of involvement between the two discussions.
Edit: I did have that idea that it would probably reduce rocket tag since people wouldn’t be relying on just skyrocketing one dmg type since that would not be as useful anymore, but that wasn’t really the goal.
The idea here is to A) reduce the number of dice rolled at high level, notably from spells and abilities like sneak attack which can end up with 20+ dice to roll (Might just be me, but adding up 20+ dice is just a bit too much unless it is very rare and special), and B) to scale back the numerical growth rate so that things like DR, resistance, etc remain major factors into high level. That is why I also rescaled HP.
I saw an opportunity to also adjust the scale between magic vs melee to make melee stronger than spells so spells are no longer spike dmg, a factor that is important in how I try to rebalance magic vs martials. So I included that.
Needed?
Not everything must be a need. I prefer DR and resistance being viable from low to high level without changing it all the time. This helps that. If you don’t care, then no it isn’t needed, but why would that matter?
How do you get +57? Do they make every supplement stack or something?
Edit: In refreshing my memory on things I never actually use, did you know that in base d20, power attack only gives bonus dmg equal to the attack penalty, while in pf1, the bonus dmg is twice that? Another example of pf going for stronger characters.
20th level half Orc Blood rager, Amplified Rage, Arcane Strike, Raging, Demonic Bulk, 18 Base STR, Power Attack, +5 Furious Weapon, +6 STR belt.
with everything going the "bonus damage" was +51
What am I missing? I only get the mid 20s for all that.
I prefer DR and resistance being viable from low to high level without changing it all the time.
Hrm, you could go with of x percent reduction, from older editions. It works for any level and rewards fighting a challenging foe in different ways than usual. A demilich with DR 20/- just encourages Power Attack further (YAWN). A demilich with 75% reduction of physical damage has a chance to make players of martials think out of the box (once they are done with complaining).
I have to agree about the bonus damage especially on any kind of marital character. I can easily get 2d4 +35 points of damage on a 12th level paladin with just power attack and a +2 weapon. This assumes a 22 STR (with a +4 belt) for +9, Power Attack +12, Smite Evil +12, and a +2 falchion. If it is the first strike vs an evil dragon, outsider or undead the smite evil goes up to +24, and I can use weapon bond to increase the weapon enchantment to +5, that puts the damage to 2d4+50 for the first hit. Even without smite evil the paladin is doing 2d4+23 per strike on every attack.
Compare this to a 15th level draconic sorcerer casting an intensified, empowered fire ball. The damage of the fireball is going to be (15d6 +15)*1.5 for 10.25 damage. Assume the target makes its save to reduce that to 50.625. If the target has resist energy cast by an 11th level caster that is further reduced to 20.625. There are a lot of creatures with high energy resistances, and some are completely immune to specific energy types. By contrast most DR is at best 15 if not lower. At high level many creatures also have spell resistance which can often allow them to completely ignore damage. The 15th level sorcerer has about a 25% chance of his spell working vs a Pit Fiend.
High level characters should have high level equipment. That means they will have things that give them energy resistance and other protections up most of the time. There are a lot of items like rings and armor that can give energy resistance. At this level spells like resist energy last for hours and can be further extended with the extend spell feat. A resist energy cast by a 15-level caster with a lesser rod of extend spell last for 10 hours.
The only time the high-level game really becomes rocket tag is if one side catches the other completely unprepared. And by unprepared, I mean out of out of combat during down time. If you manage to catch a character completely naked and asleep with no magic items on them, they should be taken out in one strike.
What am I missing? I only get the mid 20s for all that.
Be sure to use a 2-handed weapon, a great axe is a good choice.