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ken-do-nim
2010-01-17, 02:10 PM
I was just looking at the 1E monk and I realized that quivering palm didn't allow a save. Just needed a successful to hit roll within 3 rounds of announcing that you'll use the power, and if the foe was within 200% of the hit points of you and didn't require magic weapons to hit, you could kill him with a thought from that point on.

Knowing that, would you update the abysmally poor yet also once-a-week 3.5 ability of the same name?

Bayar
2010-01-17, 02:39 PM
Even if you fix the Quivering palm ability to work as in 1E, that wont likely make the monk suddenly playable. You get that at level 15. And it is painful to play an inefficient character that much for an ability that now kills if you hit it.

Sinfire Titan
2010-01-17, 03:20 PM
It still only works 1/week. Consider:


A 1st level party of 4 can level up to level 20 in 2 months if they fight nothing but equal CR'ed opponents 4 times/day. Assuming both months are about 30 days in length, that's 120 encounters of their level.

The ability works 1/week. Even if it didn't allow a save, that's a mamximum of 1 creature/week. Most encounters should be more than one enemy, so you're not even ending an encounter.

The ability requires an attack roll, and if you miss it's wasted. Monks have horrid attack bonuses for various reasons (MAD, expensive enhancement bonuses, low BAB, penalties to attack rolls using Flurry, etc).


Compare this to a 7th level spell, FInger of Death, obtained at the same level. No attack roll, save or die every day (possibly multiple times/day if the caster prepares it enough). Even if they save, they're takling damage. The Monk's class feature is replicated fourfold every day by a 7th level spell. Hell, a 5th level Cleric spell does the same thing (Slay Living).


The Devs had no idea how underpowered the Monk was when they designed it. They didn't get that until Tome of Battle, and even the Swordsage suffers some of the same problems.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-01-17, 03:45 PM
The ability requires an attack roll, and if you miss it's wasted. Monks have horrid attack bonuses for various reasons (MAD, expensive enhancement bonuses, low BAB, penalties to attack rolls using Flurry, etc).

If you change it to needing to hit within 3 rounds, this point isn't actually so bad--I'm sure a monk can pick up something to ensure he hits once in 3 rounds once a week.

Other than that minor objection, yeah, I agree it wouldn't help much.

lsfreak
2010-01-17, 03:48 PM
If I wanted to fix Quivering Palm, I'd do this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=98238).

JonestheSpy
2010-01-17, 05:02 PM
Given that the whole class needs serious tweaking, my opinion is that Quivering Palm would be worthwhile if it's changed to no save or at least a harder one based on the monk's full level instead of half.

Zaq
2010-01-17, 05:26 PM
One ability, gained late in the game, that does so little (sure, instant death is nice, but as previously stated, it's unlikely to even be an encounter-ender) so infrequently is not enough to bring a class as horrible as the monk up to par with even a rogue or a barbarian.

Healers get Gate when they get 9th level spells. That doesn't mean they have a good spell list, or that they're interesting to play.

Zaydos
2010-01-17, 05:34 PM
I'd say make it once per day too. Spell preparation took a lot more time back in the earlier editions (10 minutes per spell per spell level I think) so it took you a day to re-prepare spells. Still won't fix monks but would make them more useful.

ken-do-nim
2010-01-17, 07:01 PM
... so, everybody responding had a roundabout way of saying, "Yes, restore this 1E rule to the 3.5E monk". Okay, I'll update my house rules. What I'll do is that creatures above 200% of the monk's hit points get a save, those below don't, and the monk is charged for 3 rounds with the power to give him additional chances to hit.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-01-17, 11:20 PM
... so, everybody responding had a roundabout way of saying, "Yes, restore this 1E rule to the 3.5E monk".

I think the consensus is "Yes, restore the 1e rule to the 3e monk...but you'll really need to do more than that." Adding it is fine and a good idea, but don't stop there.

ken-do-nim
2010-01-18, 09:41 AM
I think the consensus is "Yes, restore the 1e rule to the 3e monk...but you'll really need to do more than that." Adding it is fine and a good idea, but don't stop there.

I could also restore the 1E rule that monks add half their level to damage done when using a weapon.

Edit: and that includes when using a missile weapon, making the monk crossbowman formidable.

Noble Savant
2010-02-23, 01:51 PM
Of course, darters were the legendary fighters of the earlier editions, especially with monks, though regular fighters had their advantages.

Ah mighty dart, how you have fallen over the years. Your monstrous hail of tiny meteorites has been reduced to a wimpy hail of nothingness.

Sinfire Titan
2010-02-23, 02:10 PM
Of course, darters were the legendary fighters of the earlier editions, especially with monks, though regular fighters had their advantages.

Ah mighty dart, how you have fallen over the years. Your monstrous hail of tiny meteorites has been reduced to a wimpy hail of nothingness.

Thanks for the history lesson, Mister Necromancer!

Noble Savant
2010-02-24, 03:51 AM
Madness... How did that happen? I was sure this thread was on the first page when I posted...

Sophismata
2010-02-24, 04:33 AM
Worth it for the memories.

RIP The Dartmaster.

(And to think that some people claim there was no powergaming before third edition...)

Fenix_of_Doom
2010-02-24, 07:05 AM
Thanks for the history lesson, Mister Necromancer!

Maybe it's me, but this thread is only slightly more than a month old, that doesn't count as necromancy right? It's more like saving the thread from the brink of death.

mikej
2010-02-24, 07:21 AM
I believe it's only 6 weeks limit. Although, this would be the least offencive thread necromancy I've ever seen.

Sinfire Titan
2010-02-24, 07:26 AM
Maybe it's me, but this thread is only slightly more than a month old, that doesn't count as necromancy right? It's more like saving the thread from the brink of death.

I'm under the impression that any thread after page 4 is considered dead.

Optimystik
2010-02-24, 07:48 AM
I'm under the impression that any thread after page 4 is considered dead.

This forum tends to have higher turnover than any of the others.

Nevertheless, it's Roland's call. I'll just say that 3.x Quivering Palm is plain ridiculous. Did they update it to 4e?

The Rose Dragon
2010-02-24, 08:54 AM
I'm under the impression that any thread after page 4 is considered dead.

A month and a half and three pages. It has to be both.

Sinfire Titan
2010-02-24, 09:00 AM
A month and a half and three pages. It has to be both.

1-18 and it's 2-24. More than a month, and I'm sure this was at least three pages. Not technically dead, but close enough. Better safe than sorry.

Kobold-Bard
2010-02-24, 10:06 AM
I completely forgot this ability when I did my Monk houserules. Shows how much use it gets. I'll be adding this, thanks.

Roderick_BR
2010-02-24, 10:49 AM
I was just looking at the 1E monk and I realized that quivering palm didn't allow a save. Just needed a successful to hit roll within 3 rounds of announcing that you'll use the power, and if the foe was within 200% of the hit points of you and didn't require magic weapons to hit, you could kill him with a thought from that point on.

Knowing that, would you update the abysmally poor yet also once-a-week 3.5 ability of the same name?
Because it would be something nice for a non-caster, and no one wants that, right?

The devs probably thought it would be "too powerful", since monks are "overpowered". hmm. Sounds like it worked like the Assassin's death attack.

ericgrau
2010-02-24, 12:54 PM
1. It scales as fast as a strong save. Great for anything with class levels, or certain monsters too of course.
2. It's a non-action, made as part of another action. People tend to forget about action economy and how powerful free actions and non-actions are.
3. Any bonus is still a bonus. Say the monk sucks for things he doesn't have, but not for the abilities he has.
4. Do you really want the BBEG to die with no save? Heck, if I were a monk I'd take a level in wizard or UMD a magic item purely to true strike this. Maybe grab a rod of lesser quicken too; it is high levels.
5. Claiming casters are broken is no excuse to break the system more. It's a reason to fix casters if anything. Or maybe to give interesting (not OP) things to non-casters.

Beowulf DW
2010-02-24, 01:07 PM
5. Claiming casters are broken is no excuse to break the system more. It's a reason to fix casters if anything. Or maybe to give interesting (not OP) things to non-casters.

Why does everything have to be "fixed"? Or balanced?

I don't know if anyone here plays Dragonfable, but this came up on their forums a few months ago, during speculation on an update which would re-work the base classes. Everyone was tossing around the word "balance" until a member of the staff came and told everyone that the classes wouldn't be re-balanced, they would made to be more awesome.

Personally, I like that idea. Instead of trying to enforce a balance of power between numerous classes (that never seems to work), why not make the classes more awesome at what they already do? Leave the classes that are already awesome the way they are, and make the other classes even better at what they already do.

ericgrau
2010-02-24, 01:12 PM
Why does everything have to be "fixed"? Or balanced?
It doesn't if you don't want to. But anyone making such a claim should be trying to make things better not worse.

Mongoose87
2010-02-24, 01:24 PM
Of course, darters were the legendary fighters of the earlier editions, especially with monks, though regular fighters had their advantages.

Ah mighty dart, how you have fallen over the years. Your monstrous hail of tiny meteorites has been reduced to a wimpy hail of nothingness.

Anyone ever play Baldur's Gate? They had a fight with the "Fastest Dart Thrower in the West." If you arrived early, or didn't take the two fighters seriously, they could wreck you.

FafnerMorell
2010-02-24, 01:26 PM
Boy, this brings back some fond memories of playing 1st edition some 30 years ago. And yeah, everyone knew back then that this was insanely overpowered, but hey, we also knew a lot of 1E didn't make a lot of sense without house rules:

- Druids having to fight each other in a Highlander style winnowing process starting at level 11 (there can only be ONE level 14. Unless he becomes level 15, at which point things get wierd).
- The rules for becoming a bard were insane (advance 5 levels as fighter, then start over as a rogue for 5 levels (no new HP), then go to the druids (who are busy killing each other off, in a Darwinian passive-aggressive way), and hang out with them, and THEN you'll have some interesting stories to sing.
- You needed a CHA of 17 to be a Paladin. Which was a stat that was never used.

But the thinking (at least for the folks I played with) was the D&D was more of a starting set of ideas & concepts rather than a clear, easy to use set of rules.

Beowulf DW
2010-02-24, 01:36 PM
It doesn't if you don't want to. But anyone making such a claim should be trying to make things better not worse.

I'm not trying to make things worse, I'm just suggesting a different philosophy regarding the creation of classes.

Eldariel
2010-02-24, 03:09 PM
1. It scales as fast as a strong save. Great for anything with class levels, or certain monsters too of course.
2. It's a non-action, made as part of another action. People tend to forget about action economy and how powerful free actions and non-actions are.
3. Any bonus is still a bonus. Say the monk sucks for things he doesn't have, but not for the abilities he has.
4. Do you really want the BBEG to die with no save? Heck, if I were a monk I'd take a level in wizard or UMD a magic item purely to true strike this. Maybe grab a rod of lesser quicken too; it is high levels.
5. Claiming casters are broken is no excuse to break the system more. It's a reason to fix casters if anything. Or maybe to give interesting (not OP) things to non-casters.

It's eminently defensible even without a save. See Quivering Palm (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/classes/monk.htm#quiveringPalm). "Constructs, oozes, plants, undead, incorporeal creatures, and creatures immune to critical hits cannot be affected." The thing?

Immunity to critical hits is easy to acquire for anyone truly strong enough to use this on, and something you should strive for anyways (Greater Fortifications are the cheapest way). Oh, and you have to hit; there are many ways that make hitting harder, from Teleportation Contingencies to Illusions to AC to Incorporeality to...well, you know.


Nobody really complains about Irresistible Dance (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/irresistibleDance.htm) even though it's a Touch Attack with no save. Why? Well, 'cause it's Mind-Affecting and the same time Irresistible Dance comes into play, Mind Blank makes its grand entrance too.

Noble Savant
2010-02-24, 05:16 PM
- You needed a CHA of 17 to be a Paladin. Which was a stat that was never used.


Everyone seemed to forget the godliness of the earlier edition charisma. Sure, reaction rolls were a joke that nobody ever payed attention to, but Charisma had a very important hold over from the earlier Arneson wargame days. Maximum number of henchman. Back then, when curses were rampant, traps were everywhere, falling rocks were a reality, and darters could mow through a single target in seconds, having a solid wall of meat to lead was pure gold.

The problem was that you hardly ever rolled a 17 in charisma, the odds were horribly poor with the old 3d6 natural rolls.

Also, yes, the Druid's survival of the fittest was very awesome and random. Didn't monks have a similar system? (Not that anyone ever rolled the magical ability scores required to be a monk)

Kobold-Bard
2010-02-24, 05:21 PM
I played 2 sessions of 1st edition (I think, it was D&D basic). I was a Thief but I didn't roll higher than an 8 for my stats. I tried to pick a pocket and a guard saw me, I had 4HP and he did 13 damage. I literally stepped out the door and was dead within 2 minutes.

Volkov
2010-02-24, 05:23 PM
To fix monks, make their wisdom score give an armor, attack, and damage bonus. And make their power to heal themselves work like this, 3 (as it only works on themselves) times their HD multiplied by their wisdom score. Lastly, make their DR 15/Magic and Chaos.