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falconflicker
2009-09-29, 03:47 PM
I've been struggling with coming up with an in-character reason for a martial daily power, and been coming up with nothing, so I've decided to try to come up with a house rule to fix that.

Currently, my thoughts are based on the psion power point feature.

Martial classes gain at-wills and encounter powers as normal, and they have a pool of "augment points" that recharges with each extended rest.
You may spend one "augment point" per action.
Spending an "augment point" has one of the following effects:
(1) After you make an attack roll for a martial power, you may spend one "augment point" to reroll it.
(2) Before you roll damage for a martial power, you may spend one "augment point" to assume maximum damage for that attack.
(3) Spend an "augment point" to use any at-will attack power you know as a minor action.
(4) After the attack roll is made spend an "augment point" to add 1[W] damage to all attacks made until the start of your next turn (2[W] at 11th level, and 3[W] at 21st level).
(5) Spend an "augment point" to shift one square as an immediate interrupt. You may use this ability to shift into an ally's square; if you do, the ally shifts into the square you vacated.
(6) Spend an "augment point" as a minor action to end one effect on you that a save can end. If you're a warlord, you may use this on an adjacent ally.
(7) Spend an "augment point" to deal Sneak Attack/Hunter's Quarry/Other Striker Damage Boost again this round.
You may also spend "augment points to perform other actions.
(1) Spend an "augment point" as a minor action to activate a stance your level or lower. (At levels 5, 15, and 25 you may pick one stance.)
Pick any three of these, and gain an additional one of your choice at level 5, 9 and 15, or by spending a feat. Also, you may spend a feat (once) to add +3 "augment points".

The number of "augment points" is either as follows:
lvl 1 --- 2
lvl 5 --- 4
lvl 9 --- 6
lvl 15 -- 8
lvl 19 -- 9
lvl 20 -- 11
lvl 25 -- 13
lvl 29 -- 15
or as follows:
lvl 1 --- 1
lvl 5 --- 2
lvl 9 --- 3
lvl 15 -- 4
lvl 19 -- 5
lvl 20 -- 6
lvl 25 -- 7
lvl 29 -- 8

Any suggestions?

EDIT: Kurald's augment point suggestions replaced my old version almost entirely.

Cainen
2009-09-29, 03:54 PM
My suggestion is that you're looking at it from the wrong angle.

tcrudisi
2009-09-29, 03:54 PM
I realize this won't help much, but I will throw out this suggestion: don't just change martial daily powers. If you are going to change one groups dailies, change them all. After all, what is your in-character reason for primals and arcanes to only be able to use a daily once in a given day? And why can't it be the same for martials? Really, 4e is about balance, and I think it would detract if you allowed that flexibility to martials but not to everyone else. It does have the possibility to either make martial classes more or less powerful than the others, so if you really want to "fix" it, do it by changing them all.

Indon
2009-09-29, 04:02 PM
It does have the possibility to either make martial classes more or less powerful than the others, so if you really want to "fix" it, do it by changing them all.

Furthermore, if you think the 4E system is so silly that you can't fix it without extensively houseruling it, use a different system instead.

falconflicker
2009-09-29, 04:09 PM
I like the system, and I'm playing with it.
This is just an itch that's been scratching me, and I can justify anything magical as working within it's own specific rules (ie the diety/spirit is not going to grant more of those types of favors, or the arcane character must prepare the spell beforehand, or don't have the stamina to be capable of manipulating such large forces often), while martial powers are exaggerations of what normal people can do, and combat techniques are not limited to one use a day in the real world, although if an opponent has fallen for a particular technique, they're not likely to fall for it again (encounter powers).

Boci
2009-09-29, 04:13 PM
I like the system, and I'm playing with it.
This is just an itch that's been scratching me, and I can justify anything magical as working within it's own specific rules (ie the diety/spirit is not going to grant more of those types of favors, or the arcane character must prepare the spell beforehand, or don't have the stamina to be capable of manipulating such large forces often), while martial powers are exaggerations of what normal people can do, and combat techniques are not limited to one use a day in the real world, although if an opponent has fallen for a particular technique, they're not likely to fall for it again (encounter powers).

1. Daily powers require a fair amount of luck to use. You can try to use it as many times as you want, but you only manage successfuly once (the times you fail is when you use at will or encounter powers)

2. It strains the muscles in a very specific way and they must be rested before it can be performed again.

4E is not about realism. Martial daily powers are only one of the many things that do not make sense if you stop and think about it.

Djinn_in_Tonic
2009-09-29, 04:14 PM
Some Barbarian, Paladin, and Avenger (Primal, Divine, and Divine respectively) are also just exaggerations of what normal people can do. Why should these classes be treated differently from other martial classes?

The system works, within its own little brand of logic. I wouldn't mess with it to much, as 4e relies heavily on its precious balance.

Kurald Galain
2009-09-29, 05:45 PM
Spending an "augment point" is a free action that either adds 1[W] damage or a keyword such as reliable, invigorating, or rattling to the attack.
That strikes me as very underwhelming. First, it's not nearly as flashy as a good daily; second, it's not nearly as effective, either.

So what about in-character reasons for martial encounter powers, anyway? Is there a reason why you can only trip someone once every five minutes? (a rogue/3 encounter power)

Artanis
2009-09-29, 06:50 PM
After all, what is your in-character reason for primals and arcanes to only be able to use a daily once in a given day? And why can't it be the same for martials?

Because arcane, divine, and primal are magic. Any oddities in how they work (such as dailies only being usable once per day) are explained by the fact that they're magic, and as such can work however WotC says they work.

The problem with the martial power source is that it's not magic, but physical. If my muscles can handle swinging a sword five times in six seconds one time, it's hard to explain why they can't handle doing so again until after I take a nap. It's one of the hardest aspects of 4e to suspend disbelief for, and some people, like the OP, dislike it.

Ashdate
2009-09-29, 07:46 PM
Because arcane, divine, and primal are magic. Any oddities in how they work (such as dailies only being usable once per day) are explained by the fact that they're magic, and as such can work however WotC says they work.

The problem with the martial power source is that it's not magic, but physical. If my muscles can handle swinging a sword five times in six seconds one time, it's hard to explain why they can't handle doing so again until after I take a nap. It's one of the hardest aspects of 4e to suspend disbelief for, and some people, like the OP, dislike it.

I think believing that it's unrealistic that a Fighter can only do their Daily Power 'once' a day is fine, but it's important to recognize that there is a mechanical reason why that is.

If you make any changes to the way Martial Powers work, then you'll also have to change how Divine and Arcane (and whatever) powers work as well. Otherwise, you make Martial characters stronger or weaker than non-martial ones, which ruins the game balance.

It wouldn't be that hard; if the OP is fine creating "augment points" then why not "divine points" or "magic points"?

- Eddie

falconflicker
2009-09-29, 08:13 PM
The reason that I don't mind martial encounter powers is that I used to be a practicing martial artist, and in my experience, a number of the tricks and gimmick moves that would be extremely effective relied on a specific situation or me making an easily telagraphed move, thus, once an enemy has seen it once, they tend not to fall for it again. It's not that I couldn't try to keep spamming it, but it's significantly less likely to work.

Also, I was looking for some help tweaking this rule, not people coming and complaining that the rule is stupid. The closest to what I'd intended was Kurald, who said that the rule I suggested was underpowered. How so, and what would you do to fix it?

nightwyrm
2009-09-29, 10:58 PM
Because arcane, divine, and primal are magic. Any oddities in how they work (such as dailies only being usable once per day) are explained by the fact that they're magic, and as such can work however WotC says they work.

The problem with the martial power source is that it's not magic, but physical. If my muscles can handle swinging a sword five times in six seconds one time, it's hard to explain why they can't handle doing so again until after I take a nap. It's one of the hardest aspects of 4e to suspend disbelief for, and some people, like the OP, dislike it.

Martial is also magic. Magic granted by Charles Atlas Superpower (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CharlesAtlasSuperpower), but to an average commoner like you and I, it's so fantastic that it's indistinguishable from magic.

Mando Knight
2009-09-29, 11:17 PM
Martial is also magic. Magic granted by Charles Atlas Superpower (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CharlesAtlasSuperpower), but to an average commoner like you and I, it's so fantastic that it's indistinguishable from magic.

Martial heroes have the magic of SHOWING THEIR MOVES!

YES!

See also: Pretty much every fighting game ever.

Ashdate
2009-09-29, 11:24 PM
Also, I was looking for some help tweaking this rule, not people coming and complaining that the rule is stupid. The closest to what I'd intended was Kurald, who said that the rule I suggested was underpowered. How so, and what would you do to fix it?

I think the problem many people are having here is grasping why you think only Martial characters should get this rule change.

If you want it for flavor reasons, sure, but by 'fixing' one problem you're potentially opening up another one. If your "Martial fix" is too weak, then people aren't going to be as willing to play a Martial class. If it's too strong, then the non-martial characters are going to feel cheated. Why should Martial Characters get the cool stuff and they don't?

If you're beef with Martial Daily Encounter Powers is that it doesn't make sense to only use it once a day, why not houserule in something that allows you to use it more than once a day? For example, perhaps you could allow a character to 'recharge' their Daily by spending healing surges. Make it apply to all classes, and voila.

- Eddie

Asbestos
2009-09-30, 12:26 AM
Sounds like you're basically turning Martial Classes into Psionic Classes, with the augmentation points and all...

Draz74
2009-09-30, 12:29 AM
Sounds like you're basically turning Martial Classes into Psionic Classes, with the augmentation points and all...

Well, yeah. The OP openly admits he's cribbing the idea from the Psionic power source.

Personally I don't see anything wrong with the concept. The execution, however ... pretty much, you need to go through every Martial Encounter Power and spell out what Augmenting it will do on a case-by-case basis if you want Martial to still be a balanced group. Otherwise, like Kurald said ... it's lacking.

Artanis
2009-09-30, 01:19 AM
I think believing that it's unrealistic that a Fighter can only do their Daily Power 'once' a day is fine, but it's important to recognize that there is a mechanical reason why that is.

If you make any changes to the way Martial Powers work, then you'll also have to change how Divine and Arcane (and whatever) powers work as well. Otherwise, you make Martial characters stronger or weaker than non-martial ones, which ruins the game balance.

It wouldn't be that hard; if the OP is fine creating "augment points" then why not "divine points" or "magic points"?

- Eddie

Just to clear things up:

I know there's a mechanical reason for Martial powers working like those of the other power sources. In fact, I like that it works the same way: I like that it's fundamentally balanced and I like that it's less mechanics to have to keep track of.

I was just stating what makes Martial different from the others that causes people like the OP to dislike it having the same mechanics.

Kurald Galain
2009-09-30, 04:01 AM
Because arcane, divine, and primal are magic. Any oddities in how they work (such as dailies only being usable once per day) are explained by the fact that they're magic,
I actually disagree with that. "Magic does whatever we want because it's magic" is one of the hallmarks of bad fiction. So I don't think the concept of a "martial daily power" is any more or any less valid than the concept of e.g. a "primal daily power".


I think believing that it's unrealistic that a Fighter can only do their Daily Power 'once' a day is fine, but it's important to recognize that there is a mechanical reason why that is.
I don't believe that's true. It's certainly possible to have different systems for different classes and still have them balanced, it's just that 3.5 fails at that, and 4.0 hasn't tried it. Furthermore, the "balance" of the game isn't as unstable as you seem to think. For instance, if I houserule that all members of class X gain a +1 to hit, then I'm sure half of this forum would cry "omg! unbalanaced!!1", but in practice it doesn't affect gameplay much.


a number of the tricks and gimmick moves that would be extremely effective relied on a specific situation or me making an easily telagraphed move, thus, once an enemy has seen it once, they tend not to fall for it again.
...so how does that work against zombies, again? :smallbiggrin:


The closest to what I'd intended was Kurald, who said that the rule I suggested was underpowered. How so, and what would you do to fix it?
I would make them stronger. For instance,

(1) After you make an attack roll for a martial power, you may spend one martial point to reroll it.
(2) Before you roll damage for a martial power, you may spend one martial point to assume maximum damage for that attack.
(3) Spend a martial point to use any at-will power you know as a minor action.
(4) Spend a martial point to add +2 to all your damage rolls until the end of the encounter (+4 at paragon, +6 at epic)
(5) Spend a martial point to shift one square as an immediate interrupt. You may use this ability to shift into an ally's square; if you do, the ally shifts into the square you vacated.
(6) Spend a martial point as a minor action to end one effect on you that a save can end. If you're a warlord, you may use this on an adjacent ally.

Pick any three of these, and gain an additional one of your choice at level 5, 9 and 15, or by spending a feat. Also, you may spend a feat (once) to add +3 martial points.

Master_Rahl22
2009-09-30, 09:34 AM
I like Kurald's idea for a fix. Also if you'd rather just have an IC reason, then you can always RP it that the particular move requires a very specific set of circumstances to work, and those circumstances generally only show up a few times per day. Example would be that your opponent has to miss with a strike that carries him off balance, while your weapon is held above your head after your parry, allowing you to bring it crashing down and perform X maneuver.

Yakk
2009-09-30, 09:45 AM
Metagame notes:
One of the things that daily powers provide is a way for players to deal with bad luck.

Daily attack powers either involve lots of attacks (ie, large area/burst), are reliable, do half damage on a miss, have an encounter-long boosting effect, or have other partial effects on a miss. This is a pretty universal design pattern in 4e.

This lets a party who is in a bad situation (be it bad dice rolls, or a hard fight) 'oomph up' and burn daily resources to deal with the bad luck, without risking that the very resource they saved for the bad luck is burned.

Your system is merely a collection of extra power to be allocated once per day -- so it lacks this feature. Even allowing half-on-miss and reliable doesn't help that much -- daily powers are supposed to be low variance.

Other problems:
Your system allows a level 29 fighter to burn an encounter power (3[W]) and then make a 29 [W] attack with it. Or a 27 [W] attack that is reliable (I assume the points come back if you miss with a reliable power? If not, reliable is pretty much garbage).

Your system has the same "why do I only have so many augment points per day" issue that the original "you have a certain number of exploits you can use once per day". I don't see the difference? (other than yours is a point system, which is nearly guaranteed to have corner-cases that are unbalanced, or to uniformly suck).

Kaiyanwang
2009-09-30, 10:19 AM
My 4th edition-fu is very weak.. but..

could make sense allow the martial to re-use an expended daily if accepts a malus on attacks, defenses and the such? this to represent fatigue. Too powerful, isn't it?

Kurald Galain
2009-09-30, 10:28 AM
My 4th edition-fu is very weak.. but..

could make sense allow the martial to re-use an expended daily if accepts a malus on attacks, defenses and the such? this to represent fatigue. Too powerful, isn't it?

The thing is, if you have an issue with certain powers being limited to once-every-five-minutes or once-every-day (e.g. because it breaks verisimilitude, or because it's too gamist) then the only good answer I can give you is not to play 4E.

Neither replacing "1/day" with "1/day but 2/day if you take a penalty" (as you suggest), or "X/day where X represents a pool of points that refreshes each day" (as the OP suggests) does anything to address this problem. It just doesn't work that way. 4E is built on the MST3K mantra ("it's only a game, you should really just relax"). This means that you shouldn't attempt to explain several abilities from an in-character perspective, because you will end up with something that contradicts the actual rules. And there isn't anything wrong with that, it's just not everybody's cuppa tea.

Would it be more realistic to allow reuse of dailies with an attack penalty? Nope. Would it be unbalanced? Probably not, actually. Would it be more fun? That's up to you, why don't you give it a shot?

Dekkah
2009-09-30, 10:30 AM
Kurald idas seems good if you realy want to change the system.

If you need a reason for daily martial, in my mind, it is the same a an arcane power. Arcane Daily power are limited (in my opinion) by fatigue. The wizard know the arcane formula, but can only use it once a day because it tire their mind and using it again would make them too weak.

The way i see Daily martial is a "give all you've got" move. Yeah you know how to pull it off, but doing so is extremly hard and use a lot of strenght/energy.
It is comparable to most sports (let use a marathon runner).
He can run all day at a certain speed (at-will), form time to time during the race et might give a little bit more to pass an other runner (encounter) and near the end of the race he might give all he've got to win it (Daily).
After the race, if he rest a bit, he should be able to run at his cruise speed (at-will) and even use some short burst (encounter), but he wont have the energy to use that incredible push he gave at the end of the race (wich was all he got - Daily) since he is still tired from sooner that day. The physical body has it's limit, and the way i see it, using a daily power is straining the limits.

Yakk
2009-09-30, 10:57 AM
As a plug, I tossed together a plot-based pacing variant for 4e. It removes the 1/day problem you have with martial powers, but treats all power sources the same.

It makes daily powers inspired powers, that have a chance of refreshing at each milestone.

As party members advance the plot, they get inspiration. Resting for a night in the plot-based pacing system only heals you a handful of healing surges (determined by an endurance check), while advancing the plot (and getting a milestone) restores (some) inspired powers (on a 456 on a d6) and gives you half of your healing surges back (sort of a half night's rest).

This also eliminates the 15 minute adventuring day (as unless you are critically short of healing surges, taking a night's rest doesn't do much for you), and lets you run a 20 encounter "oh no, the world is going to end" adventuring day, or a 2 days between encounters long-distance travel adventure.

I can drum up a link to it if you'd like.

loopy
2009-09-30, 11:21 AM
I just always justified it by assuming encounter powers were moves requiring a specific set of circumstances that didn't come up very often... and daily's were the "pushing yourself that extra-step" combo-move.

The New Bruceski
2009-09-30, 02:07 PM
I just always justified it by assuming encounter powers were moves requiring a specific set of circumstances that didn't come up very often... and daily's were the "pushing yourself that extra-step" combo-move.

And thus the players get to influence the plot of the game, by making that situation happen when they use their powers.

4e is Narrativist!

falconflicker
2009-09-30, 10:42 PM
1st off, it's not that i mind the system. I'm currently playing and enjoying an unmodded game.

2nd off, Loopy's explanation is the best I've heard so far, and while Kurald derides the idea of this exercise, his ideas are the best I've seen so far.


(1) After you make an attack roll for a martial power, you may spend one martial point to reroll it.
(2) Before you roll damage for a martial power, you may spend one martial point to assume maximum damage for that attack.
(3) Spend a martial point to use any at-will power you know as a minor action.
(4) Spend a martial point to add +2 to all your damage rolls until the end of the encounter (+4 at paragon, +6 at epic)
(5) Spend a martial point to shift one square as an immediate interrupt. You may use this ability to shift into an ally's square; if you do, the ally shifts into the square you vacated.
(6) Spend a martial point as a minor action to end one effect on you that a save can end. If you're a warlord, you may use this on an adjacent ally.

Pick any three of these, and gain an additional one of your choice at level 5, 9 and 15, or by spending a feat. Also, you may spend a feat (once) to add +3 martial points.

I like this idea, it's a lot more thought out than what I'd originally came up with, although I'd replace (4) with After the attack roll is made spend an "augment point" to add 1[W] damage to the attack (2[W] at 11th level, and 3[W] at 21st level).
Another option that I've come up with along this line is (7) Spend an "augment point" to deal Sneak Attack/Hunter's Quarry/Other Striker Damage Boost again this round.

I'm going to edit the original post with this new way of doing things

Any opinions?

Also, the number of points I chose was a straight lift from the Psion playtest, so any modifications to that to balance it would be appreciated.

ericgrau
2009-09-30, 11:53 PM
The only way I can think of handling the martial non-magical magic is to just call it magic and be done with it. Or call it chi, the "force", or whatever. That's the only way you'll be able to talk strategy in character.

falconflicker
2009-10-01, 12:02 AM
I'm sorry if this sounds rude, but I'd rather not have people post here complaining that my house rule is unnecessary. I've seen a few on-topic constructive posts here, interspersed amid some posts that are very interesting and useful explanations for why martial characters get daily powers, and a number saying that I shouldn't be doing this. I'm tired of the negativity.

I know it's not necessary. This is primarily an intellectual exercise to see if it's possible to make a simple and balanced modification to the system that would scratch the minor itch I have.

Also, to the previous poster, they already have that, as another power source, Psi. Since monk was added to psi, it includes the various and sundry ways of referring to ki, as well as the more standard psion-type stuff.

/rant

Mando Knight
2009-10-01, 12:37 AM
Also, the number of points I chose was a straight lift from the Psion playtest, so any modifications to that to balance it would be appreciated.

The points given in the Psion preview were for upgrading At-Wills to Encounter powers, so the number of points given there is balanced towards that. The cost for each augmentation also increases for the Psion's higher level powers. I'd drop all of the point reserve increases by 1, excepting possibly the Lv. 19 boost.

It's an interesting change, I'll grant, but there's a few things that bug me about it: are you going to change the Utility powers? Ban the Daily ones? How about Stance powers (where you shift from your normal fighting style to another, somewhat more taxing one), which are all Dailies, several of which are attack powers? Is there a limit to the number of Points you can spend in one round or encounter? (Otherwise you could end up with a Ranger dealing two strikes of 5[W]+ damage 13 times a day, or go all-out and deal two attacks of 38[W]+ damage... not counting the possibility of a Vorpal enchantment...)

falconflicker
2009-10-01, 09:02 PM
Alright, 1 point per daily power gain/mandated retrain, interesting idea, why did you say so?

Also, I was under the impression that it was clear that you could only spend 1 point per action as a sort of rider to the action the power takes (with the possible exception of ability 7, though maybe not). I'll make this more specific.

Daily utility powers would be left alone, I was only concerned with daily attack powers.

Also, I'm leaving paragon path powers alone.

Also, I may add some point uses that simulate stances (maybe adding the one I changed back in.)

Don the Bastard
2009-10-01, 09:04 PM
Perhaps you should limit the augments by level, 1 augment point/power at heroic, 2 at paragon and 3 at epic maybe? Meaning at most the theoretical ranger could pump the attack up to 5[W] per attack.

Kurald Galain
2009-10-02, 03:50 AM
(4) After the attack roll is made spend an "augment point" to add 1[W] damage to all attacks made until the end of your next turn (2[W] at 11th level, and 3[W] at 21st level).
(7) Spend an "augment point" to deal Sneak Attack/Hunter's Quarry/Other Striker Damage Boost again this round.
#7 doesn't appear to be worth it compared to #4 and #2.


(1) Spend an "augment point" as a minor action to activate a stance your level or lower. (At levels 5, 15, and 25 you may pick one stance.)
I would be careful with this one, since several of the stances are very good daily powers; this essentially allows you to use one of your best dailies in every single combat, which is so good that it renders the rest of the system obsolete. For instance, at level 5 you can pick up Rain of Steel (one of the best martial heroic powers in the game), and use it in four combats per day.

falconflicker
2009-10-02, 11:40 PM
Alright, the stance section could use a little (read: lot of) tweaking. Any suggestions on more specifics?

(7) was designed with strikers in mind, though I should tone (4) down to until the start of your next turn.