Biggus Geekus: Combat
This week Joe and Randy talk about combat mechanics, which is something we've been focusing on quite a bit in an attempt to get the numbers for Defense, Armor Class, and Damage Resistance line up in a satisfactory manner. The topic doesn't get rolling until around the 20 minute mark, in case you want to skip the preamble.
The purpose for these posts is that I rarely get a chance to listen to a live episode. There are numerous parts where I would have liked to comment, but I tend to either miss them entirely, or only catch fragments live, so I figured I'd just blog my responses.
While I try to keep my comments in chronologically, I often rewind the video and get pulled away from my PC for potentially hours at a time, so it's possible some parts are out of order, and there might be some repetition (sometimes topics in the video are brought up multiple times and/or revisited).
My apologies for that.
It starts out with Joe talking about the process of designing a D&Dish game, taking a preferred version of D&D and then adding, removing, and changing parts of it. This was our approach with Dungeons & Delvers, though we started with 4th Edition and over the process of a few months discarded pretty much all of it.
"...mold it into something hopefully new, instead of being just another clone, because I don't think either one of us wants to just make an OSR clone."
An admirable goal. There are already too many vapidware trash offerings, some OSR (at least technically), many pretenders, that either just straight up copy an existing edition or tack on bizarre rules in an attempt to be different for its own sake. I can only hope that they don't utilize item slots and usage dice.
"There's already so many..."
There are so many bad games. Make the game you want, even if it's similar to an existing game, because if an existing game did what you wanted then you would just play that game, or houserule it. The only other reason would be attention and/or money, or to pretend to be a game designer, which I do not believe is the primary motivation for either Joe or Randy.
I lean towards emulation over simulation. We did change mechanics to make armor function in a more realistic manner, but we recognize that it's a game so plate armor isn't nearly as impenetrable or inconvenient to wear as it should be so as to avoid bogging things down (it's DR is only 10 and there's basically a flat 5% chance at minimum that an attack will bypass it).
I wouldn't consider 3rd Edition to be simulationism.
I've never liked how combat worked in Palladium games. The idea that every attack hits on, what, a 5 or higher is absurd. Plus you have to actively decide to try and block, dodge or parry the attack, as if that's not what you would be constantly trying to do, anyway.
Also not a fan of Hero Points (or Fate Points), as they don't make any sense in-game.
Having more options can be good, so long as those other options are comparable to an attack. Otherwise you end up in situations where the players look at the list, see that they can try to trip or grab the creature, but it's so convoluted and/or the benefits aren't worthwhile, so they just resort to attacking.
In Dungeons & Delvers we mostly solved this not only by making some conditions fairly potent, but allowing warrior-type classes to fold in these special attacks with a normal attack via Exploit Talents. If the fighter chooses an Exploit like Trip Attack, whenever his attack exceeds the target's Defense by a certain amount he can make a free trip attempt.
There is also a Ganging Up bonus, where each subsequent attack made against the same target during the course of a round gains a cumulative +1 bonus to hit. This attack doesn't need to hit, or even be a melee attack, so even wizards can automatically contribute. This can also influence the characters' attack order: fighters get the highest bonus, so they can strike first, then the wizard, and finally the rogue can slip in and get a +2 bonus to hit along with Sneak Attack damage.
This bonus also effectively penalizes a creatures saves (as well as some skill checks), so the wizard might want for the fighter and rogue to go, before dropping a spell on it so it's less likely to resist his magic.
I don't want any combat to drag on. I dealt with that crap plenty during 4th Edition. It was not fun pissing away my day off going through maybe 2-3 combat encounters before we had to pack it in for the night. I remember more than one session where we basically fought some wolves and then time was up. Worse, because combat takes so long it made players want to engage in social roleplay less.
Combat should be fast, because in real life the combat would be fast. It takes you out of it spending several minutes resolving the effects of a single sword swing or loosed arrow. It's even worse when that's several minutes on top of another batch of several minutes of a player hemming and hawing over what he's going to do.
You can avoid a player wasting time by removing lots of extraneous tactical elements. In 4th Edition you could eat up a lot of time fretting about positioning, how to best weave through combat whilst avoiding opportunity attacks. Wondering what the next player is going to do so you can synchronize your attacks in an optimal manner. Making sure you're not too close to avoid getting blasted by an attack or spell or miracle that affects everyone (not just enemies).
And having played 4th Edition for years? There wasn't much of a benefit to any of this. It made combat more dynamic I suppose, but in hindsight, I don't think it added to the enjoyment. Maybe some aspects were more realistic, like Opportunity Attacks, but the idea of a character counting spaces and trying to stay out of threatened areas? Not so much. While 3rd Edition had Opportunity Attacks, there wasn't much mobility, and monsters didn't all have weird schticks that you had to also account for so it ran faster and smoother.
I'm also not a fan of having a bunch of opposed rolls. We tried this for our Dice Pool version of Dungeons & Delvers, but it made things really swingy and bogged down combat. In the end we kept the Dice Pool mechanic, but had you roll against a target number. Much better.
Interrupts are fine. Even in 3rd and 4th Edition they didn't bog things down as the only one people really had access to was an Opportunity Attack, but then everyone just did stuff to avoid triggering one in the first place so it rarely mattered. 4E would have been worse, as there were Interrupt powers, but they weren't too common and you had to actively choose them.
I think Opportunity Attacks are necessary to avoid issues where a monster can just run right part the fighter to attack the wizard, or a guy just stands there while you aim a crossbow at him and pull the trigger, or a wizard begins chanting and waggling his fingers right in front of you.
I don't think spellcasters should ever have access to every spell of a given level. There really isn't any spellcasting class (or effectively a spellcasting class) where this makes sense to me. Even clerics, as I envision it more that his god grants him access to specific miracles. Always felt odd that he just got blanket access to everything, on top of everything else. It also felt odd that he pretty much always used these pseudo-Vancian miraculous powers for personal gain.
But if you restrict a spellcasting class to a handful of abilities at the start, and require him to gradually pick up new stuff as he levels up, there is less to memorize, and the player can get a better handle on his capabilities at each level (this is also made easier if it takes longer to gain a level).
Players doing "the optimal thing" is an issue, which is another reason why having too many options is bad, especially if many of those options suck or only useful in very specific situations, and/or only when the character is built a specific way (I seem to recall in 3E there were builds that made grappling useful, which says a lot about how useless it was).
At around 33 minutes initiative gets brought up. Back in my Dungeons & Dragons days we'd generally have each player roll, and then the GM would roll for his entire side, or perhaps by grouping (ie, goblins would roll, then the goblin leader would roll his own, and if they had worgs maybe they'd get a roll). Even if each player rolled and the GM just rolled for his entire side, this would grind the game to a halt.
What I ended up doing at one point was rolling four columns of iniaitive results, factoring in a character's Dexterity and feats and such, and then just roll a d4 each time combat broke out. Made things slightly predictable (I'd make a new set each session), but drastically sped things up.
What we do now is initiative per side and let players act in the order desired. This keeps things fair with the GM, who would basically be doing the exact same thing. There's never been any arguing, even among our kids. At most one player will say let me go first, then you so you get Sneak Attack or something to that effect. It's ridiculously fast and if you wanted to add a bit of chaos you could re-roll initiative every round (by side), that way it won't always be side 1, then 2, then 1, then 2, etc.
The only thing I'd change about this is maybe set it up so that characters that are moving must act first, then characters making ranged attacks, then melee attacks, and finally spells. If more than one character is performing the same type of action, they decide who goes first. Really though I'd love to do phased combat so that there's a better chance of spellcasters getting interrupted (I explain phased combat in more detail further down).
Rolling against a target number is how Dungeons & Dragons handles it and is the fastest way to resolve an attack. I think it's also perfectly fine, as the target number is influenced by Dexterity and shields, and in 3rd Edition by size as well. The only drawback is that it is further affected by armor, which results in bizarre results where an ogre smacks a guy in padded armor with a club and somehow the armor can effectively nullify the attack.
You don't need to add in actions or interrupts for dodging and blocking: you would logically assume that a character is already trying to do everything in his power to avoid harm. What we did in Dungeons & Delvers is give some classes Talents which allow you to use your Reaction to force the attacker to roll twice and take the lower result. Even better, these Talents are part of trees, which can allow you to suffer less damage even if hit, run away, or even make a counter attack if the attack misses.
If anything, I would put in an option that makes you easier to hit in exchange for a benefit. Such as suffering a penalty to Defense or just outright taking the hit, but you can try to grab the target, or even make an attack.
We've tinkered with Action Points before (read that post Randy). We have a system pretty much good to go, just haven't properly playtested it and don't really want to go through all the effort of overhauling everything with a point cost. But the foundation is that everyone has 6 Action Points, and a 5-foot step costs 1. Weapon attacks are 4, and you get +1 Action Point every 5 levels.
Fighters can reduce the AP cost of weapon attacks by 1 now and then, which replaces the Multiattack option. Wizards would be able to choose Talents or abilities that reduce the AP cost of spells, or a category of spells.
There were issues trying to structure it in a way where it functioned mostly like it does now, where you can make one attack at levels 1-4, two at levels 5-9, etc. And then you'd have issues where wizards might get to cast 2-3 spells per round, especially at higher levels. I think it could still work but it's definitively more convoluted than just saying "you get one action per round".
A better AP system is one I mentioned in a previous BG post, where you roll initiative to determine when you start on a "count", and then your action adds to your count, and you don't act until then (the die would be a d6 or something pretty small, a d20 would have people waiting for quite some time).
For example, let's say you have a fighter, rogue, wizard, and some orcs. Players roll a 3 on initiative, orcs roll a 5. This means that the characters all act on 3, while the orcs act on 4. However, the fighter wants to charge, which has a cost of, say, 3. The rogue wants to use his crossbow, which has a cost of 2, and the wizard wants to use fireblast, which has a cost of 6. All of the orcs just want to hit people with an axe, which has a cost of 4.
So, at count 5 the rogue fires his crossbow, hitting an orc. The fighter then charges in at 6. No one acts on 7, but on 8 the orcs get to go, and finally the wizard at 9. Everyone keeps their current count, and the new action pushes them back. They also get to declare actions right after acting, so it would be possible for a character to act twice before the monsters get to go, assuming using fast actions.
In this system characters would have Talents or options to reduce the cost of actions. For fighters their weapon attacks would get reduced, while wizards would be able to reduce their action cost for spells. This I think is still pretty fast and makes a lot of sense, while avoiding combat being too predictable. Hell, you could even set it up so that after a character acts, he has to roll an initiative die add to his count (probably 1d6 or something small, and you could say that each count is a second).
One commenter said that during a turn everyone should get a move and attack, or two moves. I used to think this way but not anymore. The superior method is everyone gets one action, with the following structure:
- Attack: You make an attack.
- Charge: You move up to your Speed and attack, but are -2 Defense until start of next turn.
- Move: You move up to twice your Speed (or move up to your Speed at a lower cost)
- Spell: You cast a spell.
You cannot normally move while making an attack or casting a spell. The exception to this is charging, which lets you move but you are penalized for doing so. There would be other options, such as drinking potions and using items, but these would generally also require you to remain stationary.
This avoids the issue my group had since 3rd Edition (at the latest), where you can make a single melee attack, and then walk around your opponent (assuming Medium-sized or smaller). Forcing a charge in order to move makes it more likely players will bother in the first place (as you can otherwise just walk up to the enemy and attack), and prevents situation where characters might move towards an enemy, enemy moves away, characters move again, enemies move again, etc.
I've never understood the mother-may-I thing for combat, as being able to move 30 feet and still do something in your typical dungeon environment virtually guarantees that you'd be able to close the distance. We've used a lot of maps, and with my kids we've also used minis and Dwarven Forge, and there's never been a situation where we were like, damn, if only you could move 5 more feet. Usually it's 10-15 feet and then attack.
Or you are using a missile weapon with a range of 200+ feet, or a spell with a range of 30-60 feet so the only question is whether you have a clear shot or not.
I guess Action Points are brought up again 40 minutes in, or maybe I got confused outlining this, but I have a note about tracking and spending points, and this is another reason I'd be opposed to it: in 4E I had players trying to figure out how to spend their Minor Action of all things, which generally had no purpose unless you specifically chose a power that could be activated via a Minor Action, and I can only imagine the logistical nightmare of players trying to figure out how far they can move while still having enough AP to do this or that, or trying to otherwise optimize AP expenditures on a round-by-round basis.
The target number [to hit something] should vary depending on what you are facing. It doesn't make any sense to have equal odds hitting a goblin, bandit, orc champion, ogre, skilled assassin, and a dragon. Unless whatever modifiers are used to determine the difficulty just so happen to add up the same.
A commenter mentions something about blow-by-blow attacks and DR for armor, with a chance to ignore it. This is precisely how it works in Dungeons & Delvers 2nd Edtiion: every armor has a DR and AC value. DR is what gets reduced, AC is added to your Defense to get a total AC value. If you are hit, your armor absorbs some damage, but if the attack rolls meets-or-beats your total AC, it manages to bypass the armor and nothing is absorbed.
Example:
A 1st-level fighter has a base Defense of 12. If his Dexterity is +1 and he is using a shield (+2 Defense), his total Defense is 15. This is what a monster has to roll in order to strike him. Light armor is DR 3 and AC +3, so if he is wearing that then his statline would look like this:
Defense 15 DR 3 AC 18 (DR 0)
When attacked, and attack roll of 15-17 scores a hit, but its damage is reduced by 3, while an attack roll of 18+ inflicts full damage.
Heavier armor grants more DR and has a higher AC modifier, with plate being the best at DR 10 and AC +10. This might sound extreme, but nat 20s automatically bypass armor, and there is a Ganging Up bonus where you get a cumulative +1 to hit by ganging up on the same target, so while still very useful it's not as impenetrable as it might seem.
(We've considered reducing DR all around and categories to light, medium, and heavy, but the idea of an arming sword being able to reliably penetrate plate armor rubs me wrong. But I understand it's a game and might have to make a concession, there. We'll see.)
Also weapons have can have Armor Penetration, which allows them to effectively reduce the amount of DR absorbed. It's usually only a point or two, with class-based Talents granting AP or increasing existing DR values (ie, a rogue's Chink in the Armor and a fighter's Sundering Strikes).
While I think that even with six-second rounds an attack roll can reflect more than one attack attempt in the game narrative, the minute-long round doesn't make any sense.
46 minutes in Randy brings up Index Card, a terrible game by any and every metric that offers less than even board games like Zombicide (even there you can level up). Specifically he brings up the godawful mechanic where a given scene has a DC that is kinda-sorta-but-not-really static and universal, as you can on a whim give it a +3 or -3 modifier, and can even just change the kinda-sorta-but-not-really universal DC whenever you feel like it.
So, like kinda-sorta-but-not-really real-time torches in DarkityDark, it's a gimmick mechanic without any real teeth or purpose.
Randy thinks that's not a bad way to do it, but it's horrible because A) it lets the players know precisely how hard anything is, except when the GM changes things on a whim, and B) it makes no sense. Is hitting a goblin really the same difficulty as trying to seal an unstable magical portal? Is trying to pick a lock the same difficulty as evading a dragon's breath weapon? Is hitting a goblin the same difficulty as hitting a dragon?
Of course not.
I've written a blog post addressing THAC0. It isn't fine. It's functional, sure, but less intuitive and elegant than just comparing your attack roll to what amounts to a DC. Previously when THAC0 was mentioned Joe said that you can use it to determine what AC you hit, but you can even more easily determine what AC you hit by using ascending AC: roll, add your modifiers, and that's the best AC you hit.
Is it hard? No. But ascending AC is easier.
At 49 minutes Joe asks Randy if he wants to go really old school and have each attack inflict d6 damage. Not that either actually advocated for it, but this doesn't make any sense, especially when weapons have no other statistics or properties beyond weight. I might as well just use a rock. Or a spoon. Doesn't matter, right?
Weapon speed factor is also pretty dumb. I actually argued with a retard on Twitter for awhile about two weeks ago I think, but don't have any links to it. The only edition I'm familiar with was 2nd Edition, and I don't think we ever used it. But from the book it's a measure of the weapon's...clumsiness, and a lower number means the weapon is quicker and easier to use.
So daggers have a Speed Factor of 2, while a longsword (referred to as a two-handed sword) has a whopping Speed Factor of 10. But then it the book also states that a longsword weighs 15 pounds even though real longsword only had an average weight of around 3.5 pounds, relegates weapon speed to an optional rule, and in the sidebar describes a warhammer as heavy, even though the book only gives it a weight of 6 pounds (realistically it would have weighed about half as much), and its Speed Factor is a measly 4.
A better measure of who gets to strike first in melee is the weapon's reach. Doesn't matter who wins the initiative roll: if you're packing a dagger or arming sword and rush a guy with a longsword? And assuming he's paying attention and ready to go? He's going to get the first swing in. Ditto for a guy with a spear or poleaxe.
This is yet another mechanic we've introduced in Dungeons & Delvers 2nd Edition, and a way to use up your Reaction: when a creature strikes to attack another in melee, you compare the weapon's Reach values. If the defender's is higher (not equal to, but higher), then he can use his Reaction to make what is essentially an Opportunity Attack.
This makes some overlooked weapons such as spears more useful, especially since they have Armor Penetration 1 and Impale, which grants a bonus when used while charging and when enemies provoke Opportunity Attacks.
How you can get around this is by distracting the enemy: when engaged by another melee combatant, you cannot make Opportunity Attacks. So if you're fighting a guy with a spear or weapon with a high Reach value, have the fighter rush in first (ideally one with a shield to mitigate the chance of being struck), then everyone else can flank and backstab without worrying about getting smacked around.
(This also provides some very simple tactical options for players to consider.)
Phases is something we've tried, and created a system that worked but was more complex than what we would have liked. Basically combat is divided into Missile, Move, Melee and Magic (just realized that they are all M's, heh).
At the start of the round everyone declares actions and rolls initiative (this assumes you are using initiative per side). Whoever wins resolves Missile attacks first. Then the other side resolves theirs. Then the first side resolves Move actions, which can include Charge attacks (these still impose penalties, but since you can otherwise only Move or attack still useful). Then the other side resolves Move actions, etc.
This resolves a few issues, the first being that one side won't just stand there while the other completes a series of actions. This is especially true for those armed with missile weapons and would have probably lossed an arrow at a guy just meandering about. You also avoid the fighter just standing there while an orc or goblin runs right past him to beat up the wizard.
Finally, this structure provides a clear opportunity to interrupt spellcasters, as all magical effects only trigger at the end of the round. Since actions must be declared at the start, characters can see the enemy prepping a spell and attempt to do something to stop him.
Another benefit is that this provides opportunities for class abilities to mess with when certain actions are resolved. For example, you could have goblins being able to resolve Move actions during the Missile phase, giving them a chance to duck out of sight. Wizards could also burn Willpower to finish casting a spell in the Missile or Melee phase. Fighters could have a Spring Attack Talent that lets them resolve Charges in the Missile phase. Stuff like that.
The downside? Pretty complicated and would greatly benefit from a battle mat. I guess it depends on the group if the benefits are worth it.
At 51 minutes Randy mentions weapons versus armor. Again armor as DR is the best system, and here you could make things slightly granular by having different armor materials and types have added DR against certain damage types.
For example, a gambeson is DR 3, and while they weren't as effective against blunt and piercing attacks, you could just instead give them +1 DR against slashing and call it good. I forget what chain ideal against (probably blunt and slashing), but for plate you could up its DR against slashing and piercing weapons. You could do something similar for natural defenses as well, which would provide yet another tactical element for players to consider, but not really break anything if they bring the "wrong" weapon along.
Ah, Joe mentions that without weapons versus armor and speed factor that weapons don't really differentiate from one another. I agree, which is why we added Reach and weapon properties: swords get +1 to hit, axes, spears and hammers get AP 1. Daggers get +2 to hit when grappling someone. Spears deal bonus damage when charging or attacking someone charging you. Stuff like that.
At 52 minutes weapon reach is brought up, which I've already addressed a few times but yes you should consider it because it's trivially easy to implement without overly bogging the game down. The only other thing I might do that could bog the game down is impose attack penalties when you are using a weapon with a high Reach against someone with a lower Reach, because while a spear will get the first hit in against a guy with a dagger, if the dagger guy closes the distance you will have a harder time hitting him with your spear, especially if you are doing so one-handed.
But I'm having a hard time thinking of a simple way to do this. Perhaps by every 3 points you get a -1 to hit? 2? Arming swords have a Reach of 3 so if the difference required is 3+ that would guarantee that you don't have problems and would add yet another tactical layer: bring a spear and sword, and drop the spear if you get locked in combat. But then when you are factoring this in with Reach and Ganging Up and all these other mechanics, does it become overwhelming? Does it overtly punish spear users, when spears only have a few situational benefits?
(I don't really care to make daggers a viable primary weapon. They weren't and shouldn't be, but a fallback or something you use against a guy in plate so you can try to jam it in a weak point, which is reflected by its Close Quarters bonus.)
I find it amusing that around 54 minutes Joe brings up two combatants, one wielding a dagger and the other an arming sword or long sword and I've already addressed all this. But dagger versus a stone giant? Depends on its inherent DR (I'd give it 2-3 points at the least, probably 5+), but I give them AP 1 so that helps bypass it to a degree. And if you let a high roll bypass DR the dagger's Close Quarters would also make it useful in that regard. But it's probably going to be better just smacking the giant with a poleaxe, which in our game inflicts 1d12 damage and has AP 1.
In an Action Point system, a commenter suggest 2 points to swing, 1 for light weapons. My issue is that I've seen people wield longswords and they can do it pretty damned fast. Maybe for something like polearms, but then you don't need to do a wide swing for it to work, and I'm guessing there are combat techniques for dealing with guys using arming swords and the like (plus you could just half-sword, effectively changing your longsword into something akin to a dagger).
However, going back to my idea for having action types increase your initiative count, you could give weapons different damage values and types, with different Action Point costs.
For example, a longsword could have the following profile:
- Swing: Reach 4, 2d6 slashing, cost 4
- Thrust: Reach 5, 1d6 piercing (AP 1), cost 4
- Stab: Reach 2, 1d6 piercing (AP 1), cost 3
- Club: Reach 3, 1d6 bludgeoning (AP 1), cost 5
Different damage types might be more effective against an enemy. Fighting skeletons? Whelp, if its DR versus slashing and blunt weapons is high enough, this could be worthwhile. Ditto if the enemy is made of stone, or has a hard shell like a giant crab, maybe a spider. You could also use a different attack method due to the lower cost, so you act sooner/more often. Could be handy against an enemy with slower attacks, like a stone golem, zombie, or ogre.
You could also give weapons a heavier swing profile, so the action cost is higher (and there is maybe a penalty to Defense or something) but so is the damage, which could also be useful when fighting slower enemies, or something that you think you could just pulverize or cut in half with one attack so there's little risk.
At 57 minutes someone suggests having damage be based on character, and give weapons properties. I like the latter but not the former, as it doesn't make any sense why a dagger inflicts the same amount of damage as, say, a two-handed axe. Instead, you give weapons properties to help differentiate them, and give classes scaling damage bonuses.
In Dungeons & Delvers fighters get damage bonuses at various levels. This coupled with their scaling attack bonus and possible weapon Talents means that while any character can be competent with a weapon, fighters will be the best.
Around an hour and change in the talk shifts to lethality, and I feel that I should clarify the game we play with our kids:
Dungeons & Delvers is quite lethal. Think 3rd Edition, but your Constitution modifier is only added to hit points one time and clerics aren't an adventuring class. Instead, you have to rely on alchemical potions, which we're considering bringing back a mechanic I used before 1st Edition was published where you have to make Constitution saves when drinking too many potions to avoid poisoning yourself.
The only things that make the game easier are you can short rest to get a handful of hit points back three times per day, and you don't fall unconscious at negative hit points, though you start bleeding out, recover far more slowly, and suffer ongoing penalties the whole time. So while not dead you're not going to be much of a help until you rest for a few days (some classes have Talents that let them ignore these penalties and bleed out more slowly).
Melissa and I game with our kids to see if the mechanics are too difficult or complex to remember and understand. If they can follow along, then so can an adult. The game isn't easy, and they've learned in a very short time that adventuring is dangerous and to tread carefully.
A few minute later and a commenter asks if wounds should affect your ability to fight. In theory, yes. In practice...well, we did devise a Wound Level system that worked really well. Pretty much perfectly. The issue is having to use it in a game where characters can fight many monsters. I can't imagine a GM trying to track wound penalties on a half dozen or so enemies, even after removing clerics as an adventuring class so it's unlikely characters and monsters will be healing in the course of the fight.
I'm even opposed to setting it up so that when you are missing a Wound Point, or Wound Points based on Constitution or some such (this I hadn't considered but reflects high Con characters being able to ignore the pain longer), you just suffer a penalty like -1, because this will only really impact the characters. Sure, you might just injure an orc to where it gets the -1, but then it's going to die. Your fighter missing half his WP or whatever? He's going to have to deal with that for awhile.
But then this wouldn't be terribly difficult to implement, just punishing to one side of the screen. Doable if your group is fine with it. Actually, we'll give it a shot. I'll set it up like 4E: at half Wound Points, modified by Constitution and Constitution save modifier, you get a -1 penalty. The Endurance skill could also modify this, and then a class Talent could just let you ignore it. Oh, and barbarians could have a Talent or feature where when they are suffering from the penalty, it not only doesn't apply to attacks or damage, but adds to it.
Another idea that adds the dice rolling and bookkeeping is when you suffer WP damage, you have to make a DC 10 + WP lost Constitution save (which could benefit from an Endurance skill), and on a failure you suffer a penalty from the pain based on how much you fail by. The modifier would tick down by 1 each round, but could be increased by suffering more damage and failing the save or check.
Upside is that this would help deal with higher armor DR, as you can overcome it by a high attack roll, downside is that it might affect characters more than anything. But have to give this a shot as well. Helps avoid the death spiral Joe mentioned, because when combat ends you can wait until the pain modifier goes away before proceeding. You could also have a prolonged pain penalty, something that lasts until your WP are recovered, though this could get out of control.
But that's what playtesting is for.
In any case I should note that these streams have been great for brainstorming mechanics.
A minute after that a commenter states that he likes the idea that a single hit can kill you. I have no problem with this up to a point. Level 1 character with 10 hit points gets hit for something like 20 and gets splattered? Eh, okay. But not like the optional 3E rule where two or three nat 20s in a row means instant death.
At an hour and five someone brings up critical hit charts. Even though Dungeons & Delvers 1st Edition has a pretty extensive critical chart by damage type that spans across multiple pages, these I'm less enamored with because these can have results that don't make any sense, and also don't fully account for a creature's physiology.
For example, what if you critically hit a zombie? It doesn't bleed, so a bleeding effect doesn't mean anything. What if you critically hit a dragon and get a result where you sever a limb? Or a giant and you can't even reach its arm? Would severing a spider's leg make much of a difference? What if you roll a severed limb on a snake? But then what if the creature has a bunch of tentacles, or wings, or a tail, and those aren't even on the chart?
Our game also has options to let characters impose various conditions such as stunned and bleeding, so we're just going to make it so that critical hits inflict max damage and ignore DR from armor, and perhaps other effects based on weapon and class (so fighters might add their level to crit damage). This makes things easier and less swingy, which is good for characters since they're the ones that suffer from critical hits the most.
Ran than have it so that two nat 20s is an instant kill, which wouldn't always make sense, just do it like this: nat 20 is max damage, and every nat 20 just adds the max damage again. In other words, two nat 20s doubles your damage, three triples it, etc.
At an hour and thirteen Wound (levels) get brought up, specifically how many Wounds a given character should have based on class or archetype. Here's a link to where we playtested our Wound Level mechanic, which was specifically intended for d20 games, but in case you don't want to read that after reading all of this, basically everyone has seven as a baseline, but the first is being perfectly fine and the last is being dead, so you can really only take six "damage". Though, one is unconscious and dying, and another is critically injured where you have to keep making checks to fall unconscious, so it's probably better to imagine it as being able to suffer four "damage".
Anyway, the levels are based on size, so smaller things get less, while bigger things get more. Warrior types also get bonus levels. The levels penalize you -1, -2, -3, and -5 (and then dying, and then dead). Smaller things lose the lower modifiers first, so goblins would have -2, -3, -5, dying, dead while bigger things gain added levels at the lower end first, so an ogre would have something like -1, -2, -2, -3, -3, -5, dying, dead (you even out the -1 to -3 levels before adding more).
Humans would have -1, -2, -3, -5, dying, dead, so a fighter would have -1, -2, -3, -3, -5, dying, dead.
Constitution doesn't add levels. Instead, when you get hit, you reduce damage from armor, and then the leftover forces a Con save equal to 10 + damage suffered. If you succeed, you're fine. If you fail, you lose a wound, plus another wound for every 5 points you fail by. So if you're a fighter with a Con modifier of +1 and a +1 to Con saves due to class, you'd roll a +2. If a goblin stabs you for 6 damage, and your armor absorbs 4, you have to make a DC 12 Con save.
If you get a 12+, you're fine, but if you fail you suffer 1 Wound, or 2 Wounds if you roll a 3-7 (since you failed by 5 points), and 3 if you roll a 1 or 2 (since you would have failed by 10 points). I think there's a rule where a nat 1 is +1 Wound, so if you natural 1'd this save you'd suffer a whopping 4 Wounds, which would immediately knock the fighter down to -3 penalties.
I ran a bunch of playtests and in the end the results were similar to how it would have played out using AC and hit points, which was nice. The only downside was healing: creatures with more Wound levels would take longer to heal, though I suppose this could be resolved by having all wounds of the same penalty being restored at once (so if you had two -3 wounds, healing one would restore both). Though this is a similar issue in hit point systems, so if you don't mind that then this should also be fine.
The only other potential issue is restructuring spells and other effects that inflict high damage, as they could be far more devastating than intended. I think I ran more playtests using spells but can't remember. Some monster damage would definitely need to be adjusted, to avoid them either not doing anything or doing too much.
But do answer Joe's question: level wouldn't need to influence wounds, though if you wanted it to I would so so sparingly. I think with the right numbers my Wound Level system would avoid having to add new Wound Levels at all. Constitution doesn't need to adjust Wounds, instead your ability to shrug off damage and recover (you could do a Con check when resting to see how much you recover).
I wouldn't have magic or magic items add more Wounds, but help resist damage and recover from them. Oh, some magic items could add something like buffer wounds, like a force field or somesuch, with its own value to check when resisting damage.
Something else I just thought of is that since you wouldn't use Vitality Points in this system, some characters would be able to ignore the penalties of Wounds. Maybe fighters reduce the penalty by -1 or something. Could definitely see barbarians doing this. Though...I guess you could have something like Vitality Levels to give you a buffer as well. Might be necessary since in my game you wouldn't have clerics healing people all the time.
At the hour and sixteen mark we're back to actions. If you're using actions this is how we do it: you get one action, a swift action, and a reaction. Your action lets you move, attack, cast a spell, most things you want to do. If you move you can't do anything else unless you are charging. Swift Action is used by specific abilities, but you can do a 5-foot reposition before doing anything else. Reaction is for when it isn't your turn.
If using action points I would only do that with the method I described before, where you roll initiative and actions add to your count. Sounds better than spending points.
Randy mentions getting one action and then at a higher level you get multiple attacks. Check out Delvers man: you get two attacks at level 5, three at 10, and then four at 20th (and all warrior types can choose Talents to do neat stuff with their weapons). Bards and rogues can spend a Talent to get multiple attacks at certain levels, for a maximum of three I think at like 17th-level.
Alternatively, if you think multiple attacks are too much (we've playtested Delvers up to 17th-level and never had an issue), you can instead let the fighter roll multiple d20s and pick the best result. So at level 5 he rolls 2d20, 3d20 and 10th-level, and 4d20 at 20th-level. Virtually guarantees a high roll (and a crit), but at lest throttles him to one attack and damage roll per round.
Randy expresses concern that he won't be able to "fix" analysis paralysis, or choice paralysis. I think you can and this was a design goal in Dungeons & Delvers. In our game you get to choose Talents fairly often in order to organically grow your character in a desired fashion, but we implemented something that I referred to as controlled complexity.
In Dungeons & Dragons you could end up with many complicated abilities that you might not want or don't really use. In Dungeons & Delvers if you don't want to think too much you can just pick simple passive Talents that just add modifiers to rolls and forget about them. For example, a fighter can choose special maneuver Talents, but if you don't want them you can just ignore them. Or take simple stuff at first, and then Exploits later when you're more comfortable.
So I think this is possible, just give players simple and complex options to choose from so they can better tailor their characters. Magic might pose an issue, but it depends on how spells are structured.
Joe references Champions, a game I've heard of but never played, and how it that game if you attack you can't move. This does sound silly, though I'd also question why I can't attack twice if I don't want to move. As for consequences from moving away from your target, that's easy: opportunity attack!
Of course I'd also just restrict everyone to a single action.
Grabbing something off of your belt and dropping stuff is where Swift and Free Actions come into play. I think drawing a weapon from a scabbard is something, but not "full action" worthy, so Swift fits. Dropping something should probably be Free. If you have a potion on a belt, that should also be Swift, but rummaging through a pack would be your normal action. This would require players to determine what they are carrying out in the open, which would make it vulnerable to theft and destruction.
I'm with Joe on spell duration. Not a fan of things lasting for "scenes", because that can technically mean a few seconds to a minute to ten minutes to an hour or more. I don't think spells need to be meticulously tracked, but it would break immersion for a spell to last until a fight is over and then just arbitrarily shut down, even if was only for a few seconds, but then later it lasts several minutes.
Having spells take multiple actions is something we're doing in 2nd Edition. This way they can be interrupted, though wizards can funnel more Willpower into them to speed it up. The only "balancing" that needs to be done is ensure that damage wise it's better than the wizard simply stabbing something for several rounds, which generally isn't the case for most spells.
Of course opportunity attacks could interrupt a spell, as could a creature readying an action to shoot or rush the wizard when he gets going.
At an hour and thirty-three minutes we're talking about armor and who can wear it. Easy answer: anyone.
Even wizards.
The limitation here is Strength: are you strong enough to wear it? Then I don't see why not. I also don't see why it would impede a wizard's spellcasting abilities given that properly made armor doesn't restrict much at all, and metal doesn't have any adverse effect on magic. In Dungeons & Delvers 1st Edition armor would adversely affect some spellcasting and throttle Dexterity, but in 2nd Edition there won't be any penalties at all, so long as you're strong enough (otherwise there are encumbrance penalties).
I also agree with Joe about the idea of wizards wearing robes everywhere as being a tiresome trope, especially since there is no benefit to any of it. There isn't even a benefit to having a staff, which makes you wonder why wizards are depicted the way they are in Dungeons & Dragons. Now in Dungeons & Delvers there is a benefit to having a staff, so that makes sense, but not so for robes so expect to see our wizards rocking gambesons at the least.
I also see no reason to restrict weapons, though in Dungeons & Delvers you have to be proficient with a weapon to add your attack bonus (otherwise it's just +Dexterity), but this only takes a skill point so a wizard could easily use a longsword, and with some wizard-specific Talents be pretty good at it (though not as good or as tough as the fighter, at least not without certain Terraturgy spells and Talents).
Someone mentions armor imposing a spell failure chance, and I'm with Joe: I don't see how that makes any sense at all, unless the wizard isn't strong enough to properly move in the armor being worn in the first place.
Randy: reject tradition in this case, embrace armored wizards!
At an hour and forty minutes someone comments on that "full" plate is incredibly restrictive. No it's not. At least, not when properly made and fitted. Also, being unable to quickly and easily don plate armor by yourself isn't due to a lack of flexibility but difficulty securing straps and aligning pins without another pair of hands and eyes.
Really the only restriction on armor is the weight, and what makes plate even better is that it's only 60 or so pounds distributed all over your body. It's not like you're carrying it all in your arms or on your back.
At one hour and forty four minutes they bring up classes using skills that you normally wouldn't expect them to. I see no reason to restrict skills by class, you just make certain classes better. Fighter wants to sneak? Let him (and armor isn't as impactful as you might think so long as you move slowly enough). Cleric wants to pick pockets? Let him. You just give rogues Talents and other options to make him better at both tasks.
You can resolve the issue if characters stepping out of their niche at lower levels, and getting knocked into them at higher levels by adjusting how monster math scales. This way wizards can wear plate armor and step into melee, and still contribute (though not nearly as well as fighters). A way we improved this was making it so that for every 5 points you exceed the monster's Defense, you deal +1 damage. This way fighters still see some benefit even when their attack bonus is absurdly high.
Hard lanes doesn't get you much except for seemingly arbitrary restrictions and a lot of questions. Restricting wizards from wearing armor and using weapons artificially reinforces an archetype of a guy in robes with a staff that, again, doesn't actually have any functional purpose.
Now in our game the staff has a mechanical function, helping the wizard harness and focus magical energies. But this is no reason for him to not wear armor if he has the strength. There's also no reason for him not to use an actual weapon, so he isn't entirely relying on magic or being a worthless liability. Saying that the fighter cannot learn how to pick locks is absurd when even modern locks are trivially easy to pick, as is saying that he cannot know anything about magic even though all he would need to do is read a book.
Lines are fine when they make sense, but Dungeons & Dragons is filled with nonsense restrictions, like armor somehow magically limiting his ability to use magic, or only thieves being able to climb walls or try to sneak around. Except in 3rd Edition, where you could cross-class but the bonuses ended up being so crappy why bother? 4th Edition ended up fixing this to a point: you just had to burn a feat to get a new skill, and you'd be about as good as anyone else since the only modifier that really mattered was the half-level one that everyone got.
In Dungeons & Delvers skills aren't class-locked or throttled. A fighter can start out with a proficiency in Stealth and Thievery, it's just that the rogue has options that make him better, and throughout all our playtesting and campaigns there's never been an issue.
Can a wizard stack armor? Depends on if you even have an armor spell, or if you instead have a spell that generates a barrier that absorbs damage. Easy workaround, I think.
Armor causing fatigue is a good idea, though it could be an issue over time purely due to tedious bookkeeping. I think instead you just have it so that the characters must rest after a period of time (10 minutes for every hour, something like that), and armor can impose a penalty to Con checks in order to resist fatigue. Also a penalty to resisting heatstroke if in a warm area.
You don't give armor a Strength requirement. Strength determines what you can carry, and that's your weight limit. Able to carry 60 pounds without a fuss? Then you can wear plate, but not anything else without some sort of encumbrance penalty. Though, maybe plate's effective weight needs to be reduced since its being distributed all over your body.
Over time Constitution can come into play, but it depends on how long a fight goes on, what you're doing, what you're wearing, etc. I think you should just have it so that every minute of prolonged combat you make a slowly scaling Con check to avoid fatigue, but afterwards you can rest to reduce and remove the penalty. Heavy armor would obviously penalize this.
I've tinkered with the idea of suffering Vitality damage due to fatigue, or imposing a fatigue penalty when your VP runs out, but in Delvers at least VP is typically low enough to the point where it'll get whittled away pretty quickly (generally 1-4 points at 1st-level, and only goes up by 1-2 points each level after that). So either it won't matter or you'll have a near-constant fatigue penalty. I've considered instead setting it up so that fatigue penalties reduce your maximum VP, which would matter more so long as you can't easily rest to remove it.
I will point out again that you can sneak in plate armor, just gotta move slow and avoid moving your arms too much. If you want to be a stickler though go with brigandine, which is incredibly durable and almost completely silent. As for group sneak, there's a rogue Talent in Delvers called Stay Close and Keep Quiet, which lets the rogue roll a Stealth check, and everyone can just use it so long as they remain within 30 feet of him and move slowly.
Another way to circumvent this is letting everyone Take 10: so long as you don't unfairly punish the fighter with a penalty that he wouldn't normally have, and even let him take Stealth, which is a skill I imagine most adventurers would have, it wouldn't be so wonky. Really the issue is the absurd penalties and forcing everyone to roll: the more dice get rolled, the more likely someone is going to botch and ruin everyone's good time.
At one hour and fifty-three minutes someone comments that any adventurer should be able to hide, pick locks, check for traps, etc. Yep, and in Dungeons & Delvers anyone can spend the skill points and do so competently. Even if you're a wizard who spends his time studying tomes and such, doesn't mean he didn't learn how to pick locks before, during, or after his studies (again, modern locks are relatively easy to pick, and most medieval locks just needed a pick or a skeleton key, if that).
Near the end Randy summarizes his wants, and hit points come up. One way you can keep hit points low is have Constitution only modify the total, not every level. Wound Points should also recover slowly (we're doing a kind of Recovery check mechanic, so the amount regained isn't even consistent), and you should incorporate a disease mechanic when characters get injured.
You can of course have them trickle in slowly instead of rolling a d10 or whatever, perhaps something like:
- Wizards 2 WP, 1 VP (so WP exceeds VP)
- Rogues 3 WP, 1 VP
- Fighters 4 WP, 2 VP
- Wizards 1 WP, 1 VP
- Rogues 2 WP, 1 VP
- Fighters 3 WP, 2 VP
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