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Eldan
2010-09-21, 12:19 PM
Okay, to make this short, I'm a huge fan of the Fewer Absolute effects (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/misc/variantfewerabsolutes2.html) article. Sadly, this doesn't appear to have ever been finished. So, I'm thinking of making a list of absolute effects and immunities in the core rules and writing alternatives for them. Help would be appreciated.

Classes:
Done by Reynolds, I think they work like this.

Effects:
Energy Immunity:
Here is one of the first things I would change. My suggestion:
Immunity to [Energy Type] instead provides energy resistance 100. Enough for all but the most extreme cases. Elementals of the appropriate type are an exception and still get full immunity.
Effects which let some energy damage (i.e. Piercing Cold) go through an immunity instead half the enemy's resistance for that attack.

Immunity to Critical hits and sneak attack:
A house rule I wrote a while ago:
Creatures which lack vital organs (Undead, constructs, plants) take -3d6 precision damage per hit. This means that low level rogues can't sneak them, and higher level rogues deal less damage, but still some. Additionally, the critical modifier of weapons is reduced by 1. This means that a weapon with a x2 critical don't deal additional damage, while weapons with a x3 modifier do double damage, and weapons with a x4 deal triple damage.
Creatures which also have amorphous anatomy (elementals and oozes) instead take -5d6 precision damage per hit, and take no extra damage from x2 and x3 weapons on a critical hit, and double damage from x4 weapons.
25% fortification reduces precision damage by 2d6 and does nothing against criticals. 75% fortification works like lack of vital organs, while full fortification works like amorphous anatomy.

Spells:
Longest part, still being updated. Help me find such effects here.

Freedom of Movement: Gives a circumstance bonus on escape artist checks to avoid grapples and similar effects equal to caster level.

Knock: As part of casting the Knock spell, the caster makes a Open Lock check against the DC of the lock to be opened. He gains an insight bonus equal to twice his caster level on the check. If the check succeeds, the lock is opened, if not, the spell fails.

Mage's Disjunction:: All spells and spell-like effects within the area are dispelled, as if with greater dispel magic, except that there is no limit to your caster level bonus and all effects (even multiple effects on the same creature) in the area are subject to being dispelled. Each magical item within the area is suppressed for 1 round per level if it fails its Will save (an attended item may use its possessor's Will save if it is higher). Any item failing its save with a natural 1 must save again; failure means that it is permanently changed into a normal (albeit masterwork, as appropriate), non-magical item. Minor artifacts may be affected like standard magical items, except that they cannot be permanently disenchanted. Major artifacts are completely beyond the power of disjunction.

You also have a 1% chance per caster level of destroying an antimagic field that overlaps the affected area. If an antimagic field survives the disjunction, no creatures or items within the antimagic field are affected.

Mind Blank: Gives a resistance bonus equal to caster level against all mind-affecting and divination effects. It allows saves even against divination effects and mind-affecting effects which would not normally allow one. For spells, the DC is 10+spell level+relevant casting attribute modifier, for creature abilities DC 10+1/2 HD+charisma, if no DC is given.

Solid Fog: A creature can make a strength check equal to 10+the solid fog's caster level to move at one-half it's normal speed instead of being slowed to a rate of five feet.


So, do these look okay, and are there any other absolute effects people think need changing? I'll be going over the spell list some more to find others, but these were the most obvious.

Morph Bark
2010-09-21, 12:58 PM
Sounds all about okay. I wouldn't use this or Reynolds' article, but it looks like a good effort and what you've done seems very much in line with the article you linked.

How about the Spell Immunity of Golem's?

bloodtide
2010-09-21, 04:30 PM
Well, I'm kind of split on absolute effects. I kind of like having some absolutes, but also like the idea of not having them.

I'm not sure Energy Immunity=Energy Resistance 100 will work out in most games. 100 damage is quite high for a normal game. Even with lots and lots of buffs getting to 100 damage is a lot. In most normal cases a spellcaster can't do 100 damage to a creature in an attack. Not only would they need good rolls and buffs, but it would also need to fail it's save.

And in a high level near Epic or full Epic game, then 100 resistance does not matter as they will just be hit with Twin Maximized Chain Spells of Doom.

I like the critical hit idea a bit. I do think a strike to a leg of a zombie should 'hurt' it more, even though it does not feel pain from the strike and all.

Oslecamo
2010-09-21, 04:36 PM
Yeah this is something I would like to implement myself if I had the patience to go trough all effects.

Another

Fly (and any other effects that allow you to fly)-You ignore all dificult terrain and ground obstacles, but people can still hit you with melee attacks, they just take -1 penalty for each CL, unless they're flying themselves.

Siosilvar
2010-09-21, 04:42 PM
Effects:
Energy Immunity:
Here is one of the first things I would change. My suggestion:
Immunity to [Energy Type] instead provides energy resistance 100. Enough for all but the most extreme cases. Elementals of the appropriate type are an exception and still get full immunity.
Effects which let some energy damage (i.e. Piercing Cold) go through an immunity instead half the enemy's resistance for that attack.I am unsure about this one; resistance 100 is fine (though perhaps a bit high), but the different between a 30 damage cone of cold and a 30 damage cone of piercing cold is exactly none against that resistance.


The rest seems fine, though balance is difficult to determine.

Pechvarry
2010-09-21, 04:50 PM
I think it's worth pointing out that creatures which normally have an immunity should also always force a save. You just have to figure out what to base the DC on. For example, a rogue uses the Frightening Strike ambush feat on a paladin. This should make him automatically shaken for one round. Since he has Aura of Courage, he gets to make a Will save (DC 10 + half Rogue's HD + ...nothing? cha? DM-abjudicates on the fly?) to shrug off the effect, remembering that he also gets +10 to the save.

It's also worth noting that fear-immune creatures should get a +10 on the level check to resist intimidate.

While I'm typing all about fear examples, I think it's worth noting how many fear effects still leave you suffering a lesser effect on a successful save. For this reason, I'd give Paladin a higher level class feature (somewhere between 8 and 12, likely) that allows them to ignore the 1st step of fear (take no penalties for being shaken, take shaken penalties when frightened, treat panicked as frightened).

EDIT: For energy immunity, I think I'd consider doing a few things: 1st, half damage from target energy type. 2nd, +10 on saves against effects of chosen energy type (and a forced Fortitude save for half damage -- after the auto-halving -- any time they'd normally have no save), and 3rd, evasion/mettle against damage from their element.

Probably more trouble than it's worth.

Glimbur
2010-09-21, 07:40 PM
Mechanically, is it such a big deal to just throw out immunity to crits and sneak attack? It will make rogues, and to a lesser extent anyone who makes attack rolls happy, and it slightly simplifies combat. Oozes and elementals are still hard to sneak attack because they are hard to flank.

Who are we to say if something is impossible to strike precisely? I'm not even a first level rogue, and I don't think I know any. Maybe oozes tend to be more susceptible to damage if you stab them low due to the extra weight pushing on their lower part compared to their upper part. Fire and lightning aren't homogeneous, perhaps the darker parts of a fire elemental can be stabbed for extra damage.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-09-21, 09:41 PM
Energy Immunity:
Here is one of the first things I would change. My suggestion:
Immunity to [Energy Type] instead provides energy resistance 100. Enough for all but the most extreme cases. Elementals of the appropriate type are an exception and still get full immunity.

I don't think elementals should necessarily retain immunity. Everyone says "Oh, you shouldn't be able to burn a fire elemental" and so forth, but why not? Someone's fist is made of the same stuff you are, and it hurts just fine; a gust of wind could easily disperse an air elemental's body, and the same for a wave and a water elemental.


Immunity to Critical hits and sneak attack:
A house rule I wrote a while ago:
Creatures which lack vital organs (Undead, constructs, plants) take -3d6 precision damage per hit. This means that low level rogues can't sneak them, and higher level rogues deal less damage, but still some. Additionally, the critical modifier of weapons is reduced by 1. This means that a weapon with a x2 critical don't deal additional damage, while weapons with a x3 modifier do double damage, and weapons with a x4 deal triple damage.
Creatures which also have amorphous anatomy (elementals and oozes) instead take -5d6 precision damage per hit, and take no extra damage from x2 and x3 weapons on a critical hit, and double damage from x4 weapons.
25% fortification reduces precision damage by 2d6 and does nothing against criticals. 75% fortification works like lack of vital organs, while full fortification works like amorphous anatomy.

I'd just remove crit/SA immunity, as Glimbur suggested. You can hack off a part of an ooze, slash a plant so that sap sprays everywhere, jam a construct's gears, and headshot a zombie just fine. It's not really a big deal mechanically, and all it does is make precision damage less than stellar, which in turn just screws over rogues, archers, and other characters who don't need to deal with lowered damage potential against so many enemies.


Knock: As part of casting the Knock spell, the caster makes a Open Lock check against the DC of the lock to be opened. He gains an insight bonus equal to twice his caster level on the check. If the check succeeds, the lock is opened, if not, the spell fails.

Instead of making an Open Lock check with a bonus, I'd have the spell simply let you make a Spellcraft check in place of an Open Lock check. Much more elegant, I think.


Solid Fog: A creature can make a strength check equal to 10+the solid fog's caster level to move at one-half it's normal speed instead of being slowed to a rate of five feet.

Should probably be a Str or Dex check, target's choice; you can slip through openings as much as you can push through thinner areas.


Fly (and any other effects that allow you to fly)-You ignore all dificult terrain and ground obstacles, but people can still hit you with melee attacks, they just take -1 penalty for each CL, unless they're flying themselves.

This...makes absolutely no sense. Changing the spell to hover, a version of levitate that allows only horizontal movement, might make this work, but as it is this just says you can fly while not actually letting you do what you'd want to use flying for. Flight isn't an "absolute effect" in the same way the others here are, where you perfectly counter something or overshadow someone else; instead, the problem with flight is that it's too east to get too soon, not that what it does is too good. Simply moving any flight-granting abilities back 2 or 3 spell levels should be fine.

Oslecamo
2010-09-22, 04:29 AM
I'd just remove crit/SA immunity, as Glimbur suggested. You can hack off a part of an ooze, slash a plant so that sap sprays everywhere, jam a construct's gears, and headshot a zombie just fine.

This is D&D. Golems do not have gears and zombies don't work in some weird virus that animates their brains. Vorpal makes it pretty clear that neither of them even slows down if you chop off their heads.




This...makes absolutely no sense. Changing the spell to hover, a version of levitate that allows only horizontal movement, might make this work, but as it is this just says you can fly while not actually letting you do what you'd want to use flying for.

And that's pretty much the idea here if I'm not mistaken. If you're puting cogs on golems when they're just animated blocks of stone/metal and zombies suddenly need their brains instead of running on negative energy, why does my version doesn't make sense?

Plus, if I'm not mistaken the main intention behind fly was to allow the user to evade terrain obstacles, and my version allows precisely that.



Flight isn't an "absolute effect" in the same way the others here are, where you perfectly counter something or overshadow someone else;

By all means, tell me how all the melee-only non-flying monsters out there are suposed to even hurt a flying oponent right now.



instead, the problem with flight is that it's too east to get too soon, not that what it does is too good. Simply moving any flight-granting abilities back 2 or 3 spell levels should be fine.

It isn't because there's plenty of classes and monsters that don't get flight at all. Plus if zombies are head-shotable and contructs become robots it's only fair for a ground-based melee character to be a viable concept don't you think?

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-09-22, 10:50 AM
This is D&D. Golems do not have gears and zombies don't work in some weird virus that animates their brains. Vorpal makes it pretty clear that neither of them even slows down if you chop off their heads.

No, they don't actually have gears; I was throwing out examples to make the point that you can always rationalize what a crit or SA does, that "construct" doesn't necessarily imply "no weak points." Even something made of pure rock (earth elemental/stone golem) has a point where if you hit it, something falls off or cracks a whole lot--I have no idea how you'd find that spot while you're fighting it, but then, I'm not a rogue. Chopping a limb off really screws you up whether you're a humanoid, an outsider, a plant, or an undead.

Basically, it comes down to the issue of called shots. Called shots, limb damage, and that sort of thing don't work in D&D because the combat system is too abstract. We usually expect crits or SAs to mean headshots, thrusts through the heart, and so on. Yet saying on the one hand that deliberately targeting X part isn't possible, and saying on the other that one can't crit/SA constructs/undead because they don't need part X, doesn't really work; D&D has been contradictory on that point for a while. If you don't say that and simply take crits for what they are--a lucky/precise hit that deals a bunch more damage--there's no reason not to let them affect currently-crit-immune creatures.


And that's pretty much the idea here if I'm not mistaken. If you're puting cogs on golems when they're just animated blocks of stone/metal and zombies suddenly need their brains instead of running on negative energy, why does my version doesn't make sense?

It's a difference between game mechanical change and in-world change. If you can suddenly deal more damage to a golem, there's no real difference in-world; HP are abstract. If all flight suddenly means you can be hit with melee weapons, you can't fly over chasms, etc., that's a drastic in-game change that really breaks verisimilitude. Now, if you just mean to change the fly spell, that's one thing--rename it to something appropriate, leaving real flight for later, and you're fine. But you proposed changing all other flight effects as well, which means either only unfairly boosting the monsters and simply reversing the problem (if PCs can't fly magically but monsters flying naturally are unchanged) or making huge swaths of monsters useless (if even natural flight is changed).

Again, flight isn't inherently problematic. It's like teleport in that, at a certain level, you should be able to just fly past things and ignore minor encounters. Anything that's a challenge will either have good ranged attacks or be able to fly too. The problem is that fly comes too early; change it to a 5th level spell, and you no longer have that problem.


It isn't because there's plenty of classes and monsters that don't get flight at all. Plus if zombies are head-shotable and contructs become robots it's only fair for a ground-based melee character to be a viable concept don't you think?

By 9th level, any character can buy or otherwise obtain flight. Of the CR 9-11 monsters in the SRD, only the animated object, delver, bebilith, hamatula, triceratops, earth elemental, formian myrmarch, clay golem, stone golem, hydra, monstrous vermin, salamander, troll, and water elemental don't have ranged attacks or means of flight. 14 of 73 monsters, and most of them are the bland melee bruisers that can be easily overcome even within melee range.

Oslecamo
2010-09-22, 11:51 AM
I have no idea how you'd find that spot while you're fighting it, but then, I'm not a rogue.

Well, that's precisely the point. A rogue is trained to spot the weak points of creatures with "normal" anatomy. When the rogue faces a plant/golem/undead/ooze, he goes WTF because they don't have usual animal anatomies. Those things may have weak points, but the rogue's training didn't cover them.



Chopping a limb off really screws you up whether you're a humanoid, an outsider, a plant, or an undead.
Does it? The zombie still throws itself at you. The plant has more vines from where that other one came from. The ooze doesn't even have limbs to be chopped off.



Basically, it comes down to the issue of called shots. Called shots, limb damage, and that sort of thing don't work in D&D because the combat system is too abstract.

No, they don't work in D&D because monsters have a million diferent anatomies.

So you specialized in cuting limbs, and then find an ooze? Sucks to be you. Chop of a limb of the wizard? He still has the other to do somatic components.

The psion doesn't give a damn as long as his head is over his shoulders.

For a called shot system to work you would need to consider all the exotic anatomies out there, and that would be more hassle than anything.



We usually expect crits or SAs to mean headshots, thrusts through the heart, and so on. Yet saying on the one hand that deliberately targeting X part isn't possible, and saying on the other that one can't crit/SA constructs/undead because they don't need part X, doesn't really work; D&D has been contradictory on that point for a while.

Has it now? I didn't notice anything. I did notice people claiming human beings are weaklings wich should go down if you just stare too much at them, wich ignores the real world people who took great injuries and still kept going.



If you don't say that and simply take crits for what they are--a lucky/precise hit that deals a bunch more damage--there's no reason not to let them affect currently-crit-immune creatures.

There is. The crit is still hiting a "normal" vital organ. But if you're a badass like Julius Caesar or Black Beard you can srugg off around twenty or something fatal blows.

Golems, oozes and undeads on the other hand may have "weak points", but they're much harder to find than those of fleshy beings.



If all flight suddenly means you can be hit with melee weapons, you can't fly over chasms, etc., that's a drastic in-game change that really breaks verisimilitude.

Sigh, again I said you would still be able to pass over natural obstacles.

Plus don't tell me you never saw media where the grounded hero jumps/feints/climbs to hit the flying oponent.



But you proposed changing all other flight effects as well, which means either only unfairly boosting the monsters and simply reversing the problem (if PCs can't fly magically but monsters flying naturally are unchanged) or making huge swaths of monsters useless (if even natural flight is changed).

What monsters exactly would ne nerfed for not being able to laugh at melees anymore? Ok, they wouldn't be able to laugh at melees anymore before actualy killing them, but you get the idea.



Again, flight isn't inherently problematic. It's like teleport in that, at a certain level, you should be able to just fly past things and ignore minor encounters.

Then what you're doing here? If you believe PCs should be able to ignore "minor" things why not ignore grapple, energy attacks and all the other stuff that appears at low level as well? So you reach lv9 and now laugh at half the stuff CR 8 and below?



Anything that's a challenge will either have good ranged attacks or be able to fly too. The problem is that fly comes too early; change it to a 5th level spell, and you no longer have that problem.

We still have as casters simply cheese out other ways to gain super mobility.



By 9th level, any character can buy or otherwise obtain flight. Of the CR 9-11 monsters in the SRD, only the animated object, delver, bebilith, hamatula, triceratops, earth elemental, formian myrmarch, clay golem, stone golem, hydra, monstrous vermin, salamander, troll, and water elemental don't have ranged attacks or means of flight. 14 of 73 monsters, and most of them are the bland melee bruisers that can be easily overcome even within melee range.

Again, if you're fine with throwing 20% of the monsters out of the window, then why aren't you fine with throwing all grapple/mind affecting/energy based monsters and tactics out of the window as well? I bet each of those make an even lower percentage than ground bruisers. All "minor" stuff that should be easily ignorable by the PCs.

This is, the rogue is just 9% of the core classes! Should be ignored then right?

This thread is for the people who think stuff shouldn't be ignorable! No to Absolute Effects!:smallwink:

Eldan
2010-09-22, 12:52 PM
Well, here's my opinion on the entire critical hit/precision damage issue:

Looking at most golems, and especially elementals, they consist of pretty homogeneous matter, animated into a crudely humanoid shape. There's no reason a rogue, being trained to attack weak points on humanoid and animal-like opponents would know where to attack them. Higher level rogues, with their better training, still can do precision damage to opponents like that, just left. For being trained against such opponents, there's special items and alternate class features.

On the issue of knock, I settled on open lock checks especially for the reason that it helps skill monkey/caster hybrids being especially good at it.

Duke of URL
2010-09-22, 01:00 PM
Re: fly -- one approach is to make the spell "anchored" so that the character can only fly within a set radius to the anchor point. Good for a specific situation, but not to the point where the caster can fly all day. (Note that this is a nice buff for the Warlock, who can simply re-invoke it at the cost of a standard action.

Overland flight, similarly, gets degraded in maneuverability so as to not just be a higher-level substitute.

Latronis
2010-09-22, 04:09 PM
Well, here's my opinion on the entire critical hit/precision damage issue:

Looking at most golems, and especially elementals, they consist of pretty homogeneous matter, animated into a crudely humanoid shape. There's no reason a rogue, being trained to attack weak points on humanoid and animal-like opponents would know where to attack them. Higher level rogues, with their better training, still can do precision damage to opponents like that, just left. For being trained against such opponents, there's special items and alternate class features.

For constructs and undead sure, even if they don't have vital organs as such it's no stretch to say they have structurally important points. But can you truly say the same of elementals? You stab a fire and it just goes around the blade, bearing a vague resemblance to a humanoid doesn't mean stabbing it in the 'face' is anymore effective than anywhere else

Eldan
2010-09-22, 04:14 PM
Sure. But here, I think, verisimilitude just has to stand behind game mechanics a little. Perhaps elementals have a core of essence buried somewhere in the animated elemental matter. Perhaps the clay golem can be stabbed in the magic words engraved on his head. Who knows.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-09-22, 04:28 PM
Well, that's precisely the point. A rogue is trained to spot the weak points of creatures with "normal" anatomy. When the rogue faces a plant/golem/undead/ooze, he goes WTF because they don't have usual animal anatomies. Those things may have weak points, but the rogue's training didn't cover them.

Bash a humanoid or a golem in the head, it can't see you. Cut off a humanoid's or undead's limbs, and it can't get to you nearly as fast. You don't have to hit a flesh and blood organ to deal extra damage, and it doesn't even have to be the same anatomy.

You can sneak attack a hydra, with its many heads and special rules for attacking the heads and the body. You can sneak attack a phasm, which is an ooze in all but name. You can sneak attack a tojanida, which is plenty weird compared to a humanoid. And yet a garden-variety humanoid zombie or humanoid golem has an unusual anatomy?


Does it? The zombie still throws itself at you. The plant has more vines from where that other one came from. The ooze doesn't even have limbs to be chopped off.

The zombie is reduced to a crawl; the plant only has nine vines instead of ten; the ooze is split into pieces. Cut off a humanoid's arm and they still have another to fight with, sure, but they're not going to be nearly as effective. If the zombie has to crawl or the ooze is in a bunch of pieces, that's what low HP represents for them.


No, they don't work in D&D because monsters have a million diferent anatomies.

Everything (or almost everything) has a head; why don't headshot mechanics work? Not because you'd have to worry about who has a head and who doesn't, but because bypassing HP with an insta-crit or insta-death effect (the exact thing we're trying to avoid here!) is too good. HP is supposed to represent every sort of damage from exhaustion to decapitation--that's why crits and SA just deal more damage as opposed to inflicting status effects.


Has it now? I didn't notice anything. I did notice people claiming human beings are weaklings wich should go down if you just stare too much at them, wich ignores the real world people who took great injuries and still kept going.

There is. The crit is still hiting a "normal" vital organ. But if you're a badass like Julius Caesar or Black Beard you can srugg off around twenty or something fatal blows.

Of course, against someone of moderate level, a crit is only going to inflict a slash on the arm or make them winded or whatever; that doesn't change the fact that a crit is defined as "hitting a vital area," regardless of their current level of HP requiring refluffing to the contrary.


Golems, oozes and undeads on the other hand may have "weak points", but they're much harder to find than those of fleshy beings.

Harder to find ≠ impossible to find. Immunity to crits means they're impossible to find, and we all agree that crit and SA immunity should be lessened in some way. I just feel that D&D is abstract enough to justify removing crit and SA immunity altogether and their bodies aren't different enough to justify more than a token resistance to it.


Sigh, again I said you would still be able to pass over natural obstacles.

So you can fly over a chasm which is, say, 100 feet above the ground...but you can't fly 100 feet over your opponent?


Plus don't tell me you never saw media where the grounded hero jumps/feints/climbs to hit the flying oponent.

That's where the Jump rules come in. Just saying all flight puts you within jump/climb range without accounting for higher terrain, Jump mods, etc. doesn't work.


What monsters exactly would ne nerfed for not being able to laugh at melees anymore? Ok, they wouldn't be able to laugh at melees anymore before actualy killing them, but you get the idea.

Melee characters do the most damage in the game at comparable levels of optimization--uberchargers beat out mailman sorcerers, frenzied berserkers beat out blaster wizards, and so on. Making it so that every monster is subject to melee characters (A) makes them weaker and (B) encourages more one-trick pony melee characters.

Have you ever run or fought a dragon? Have you noticed that a dragon that buzzes overhead with its breath weapon, rarely coming into weapon range, lasts a whole lot longer than one who just lands in the middle of the party and starts clawing at the PCs? The same holds for most other flying creatures--their advantage is flight and mobility, and if you take that away they're pushovers.


Then what you're doing here? If you believe PCs should be able to ignore "minor" things why not ignore grapple, energy attacks and all the other stuff that appears at low level as well? So you reach lv9 and now laugh at half the stuff CR 8 and below?

There's a difference between ignoring things in a fight and ignoring the fight altogether. If you can teleport or fly, you can bypass an encounter; no one is rendered ineffective. Once you're in that combat, though, you have undead screwing over the rogues, golems screwing over casters, and so forth.


We still have as casters simply cheese out other ways to gain super mobility.

Possibly. However, more things are equipped to deal with flight by the mid levels, and the other mobility options already exist so flight isn't adding much by that point.


Again, if you're fine with throwing 20% of the monsters out of the window, then why aren't you fine with throwing all grapple/mind affecting/energy based monsters and tactics out of the window as well? I bet each of those make an even lower percentage than ground bruisers. All "minor" stuff that should be easily ignorable by the PCs.

This is, the rogue is just 9% of the core classes! Should be ignored then right?

This thread is for the people who think stuff shouldn't be ignorable! No to Absolute Effects!:smallwink:

I didn't say it was good that 20% of monsters can't deal with flight out of the box, just that it was a lot smaller than at 5th level where you get it. There will always be monsters that can't deal with flight, and that's fine; there will always be monsters that can't deal with high AC or a miss chance or the like.


Looking at most golems, and especially elementals, they consist of pretty homogeneous matter, animated into a crudely humanoid shape. There's no reason a rogue, being trained to attack weak points on humanoid and animal-like opponents would know where to attack them. Higher level rogues, with their better training, still can do precision damage to opponents like that, just left. For being trained against such opponents, there's special items and alternate class features.

All rogues are trained against humanoids and animals? So if in your backstory you train against golems, you can sneak attack them but not humanoids? Weak points are weak points are weak points. Brick walls can be shattered, air can be displaced, water can be splattered around.

Eldan
2010-09-22, 04:36 PM
Generally, it is most often the case that you train against humanoids. More than 90% of all the PC rogues will have trained against animals. (Animals in the biological sense, including various types such as humanoid in D&D). You know joints, blood vessels, the positions of major organs. It's much easier to sneak attack those than the typical stone golem, which might have a head, but no important organs there, eyes to be blinded or throat to be cut.
Now, if you have, in your backstory, trained against golems for years? Take a class feature that allows you to sneak golems. Tadaa!

Knaight
2010-09-22, 04:53 PM
This is D&D. Golems do not have gears and zombies don't work in some weird virus that animates their brains. Vorpal makes it pretty clear that neither of them even slows down if you chop off their heads.

Zombies have a skeletal structure however, a strike to the ribcage is going to do much, much less than turning a section of the calf to powder. And most Golems have variations in limb thickness and such, which would have a similar effect.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-09-22, 07:08 PM
Generally, it is most often the case that you train against humanoids. More than 90% of all the PC rogues will have trained against animals. (Animals in the biological sense, including various types such as humanoid in D&D). You know joints, blood vessels, the positions of major organs. It's much easier to sneak attack those than the typical stone golem, which might have a head, but no important organs there, eyes to be blinded or throat to be cut.
Now, if you have, in your backstory, trained against golems for years? Take a class feature that allows you to sneak golems. Tadaa!

Which then raises the question of why you can sneak attack magical beasts and dragons (similar anatomy to animals, but different in significant ways), monstrous humanoids and giants (similar anatomy to humanoids, but different in significant ways), and aberrations (not similar at all), but not humanoid undead and constructs (similar anatomy to humanoids, but different animation source) or elementals (not similar at all). I don't think the anatomical similarity argument really works, because type isn't a good indicator of distance from humanoids and animals.

If some sort of critical resistance or immunity must be kept, I'd much rather see type-based immunity removed and instead have abilities particular to specific monsters, like the phasm's amorphous ability:

Amorphous (Ex): A phasm in its natural form has immunity to poison, sleep, paralysis, polymorph, and stunning effects. It is not subject to critical hits and, having no clear front or back, cannot be flanked.
Oozes get Amorphous Form, the weirder aberrations get something like "Alien Form: 50% chance to ignore critical hits, half sneak attack damage," and so forth.

Chambers
2010-09-22, 11:51 PM
I support this. :smallsmile:

I'd like to throw the Mindsight feat up on the chopping block. One dip into Mindbender and suddenly your character can automatically pinpoint someone trying to sneak. The Mindbender with Mindsight can detect, with no dice roll, the god of sneakiness. Mindblank does not even stop Mindsight.

I think that every intelligence that the feat detects should get a Will save before registering on the telepathy. If they make the save then they don't show up on the glowing lights mental radar.

DC something like the standard: 10 +1/2 HD +Ability Mod. It's a Mind-Affecting Effect, so people with the former Immunity to Mind Affecting get to apply their new +10.

---

Thought of another one. Antimagic. Huge No-Save-Just-Suck ability. Not sure what to do with it, but it could probably use some work.

Oslecamo
2010-09-23, 08:02 AM
Bash a humanoid or a golem in the head, it can't see you. Cut off a humanoid's or undead's limbs, and it can't get to you nearly as fast. You don't have to hit a flesh and blood organ to deal extra damage, and it doesn't even have to be the same anatomy.

Again, the D&D's golem head is just for looks. Chop it off and it keeps going whitout trouble.

Plus the golem is made of solid rock/metal, and not soft tendons and muscles, wich yes, makes it much harder to effectively cut his leg. The undead on the other hand may or may not have tendons, but as skeletons demonstrate they don't really need them.



You can sneak attack a hydra, with its many heads and special rules for attacking the heads and the body. You can sneak attack a phasm, which is an ooze in all but name. You can sneak attack a tojanida, which is plenty weird compared to a humanoid. And yet a garden-variety humanoid zombie or humanoid golem has an unusual anatomy?

What part of "no fleshy delicate internal vital organs" did you miss?



The zombie is reduced to a crawl; the plant only has nine vines instead of ten; the ooze is split into pieces. Cut off a humanoid's arm and they still have another to fight with, sure, but they're not going to be nearly as effective. If the zombie has to crawl or the ooze is in a bunch of pieces, that's what low HP represents for them.

Great, now you just need actual rules for each of those. How many HP, saves, AC has each vine? What if I shoot an area effect? Cleave? Does the zombie really cares as much for a chopped off limb as a living being?

I don't think anyone wants even bigger monster entries.

And above all, do the PCs even care about this or do they just want to finish the enemy ASAP?

Because even in systems where you can do called shots, I see the players simply going for "biggest damage option because dead oponents can't fight back at all".



Everything (or almost everything) has a head; why don't headshot mechanics work? Not because you'd have to worry about who has a head and who doesn't, but because bypassing HP with an insta-crit or insta-death effect (the exact thing we're trying to avoid here!) is too good. HP is supposed to represent every sort of damage from exhaustion to decapitation--that's why crits and SA just deal more damage as opposed to inflicting status effects.

You're being contradictory there. You're claiming sneak attack shouldn't kill enemies faster, then you say that's the reason why it deals extra damage. Well extra damage means oponents dead faster.

Again, why bother inflicting status effects? The few times my groups have fought hhydras, nobody even bothered tried to cut off it's heads and just went for the body.



Of course, against someone of moderate level, a crit is only going to inflict a slash on the arm or make them winded or whatever; that doesn't change the fact that a crit is defined as "hitting a vital area," regardless of their current level of HP requiring refluffing to the contrary.

Nope. Black Beard went down fighting and they had to hit him several times before he finally died. Heroic WW II soldiers kept fighting despite being riddled with bullets and/or blow off limbs. That's what distingues commoners and legends, one falls dying when stabbed on the chest, the other keeps going.



Harder to find ≠ impossible to find. Immunity to crits means they're impossible to find, and we all agree that crit and SA immunity should be lessened in some way. I just feel that D&D is abstract enough to justify removing crit and SA immunity altogether and their bodies aren't different enough to justify more than a token resistance to it.

And everybody else is saying that's simply too abstract that the solid-mass golem is as squishy as any animal.



So you can fly over a chasm which is, say, 100 feet above the ground...but you can't fly 100 feet over your opponent?

You can, but if the oponent is badass enough he can still reach you (remember, I sugested penalty to melee attacks equal to CL).



That's where the Jump rules come in.

Except that they're quite limited, while a single fly spell and there's no limit for how high the caster can get.



Just saying all flight puts you within jump/climb range without accounting for higher terrain, Jump mods, etc. doesn't work.

But claiming golems and skeletons have all tendons and complex internal systems that can be easily crippled works?:smallwink:



Melee characters do the most damage in the game at comparable levels of optimization--uberchargers beat out mailman sorcerers, frenzied berserkers beat out blaster wizards, and so on. Making it so that every monster is subject to melee characters (A) makes them weaker and (B) encourages more one-trick pony melee characters.

Hurrah, melee gets nice things!:smallbiggrin:



Have you ever run or fought a dragon? Have you noticed that a dragon that buzzes overhead with its breath weapon, rarely coming into weapon range, lasts a whole lot longer than one who just lands in the middle of the party and starts clawing at the PCs?

The reverse is true as well. If you stay whitin melee range of the dragon he'll do you in mincemeat if you start trading full attacks with it.

Plus strafing-running dragon can easily end up in a TPK if the party isn't properly prepared and/or the dragon does it too well. Even if it doesn't end in TPK, you can be sure the melee dudes will contribute a lot less than everybody else, as they can't keep up with the dragon's speed



The same holds for most other flying creatures--their advantage is flight and mobility, and if you take that away they're pushovers.

They would retain their mobility advantage by being able to ignore hard terrain and obstacles while ground-based characters are still slowed by it.

Plus casters aren't really hindered by mobility as most of their spells all have massive ranges, while melees need to stand still to full attack. Again those who need a buff get it.




There's a difference between ignoring things in a fight and ignoring the fight altogether. If you can teleport or fly, you can bypass an encounter; no one is rendered ineffective.

On the contrary, everybody but the teleporter is rendered innefective. Why do you need the rogue and cleric and fighter again? They can just go play poker while the wizard scries and teleports towards the treasure!



Once you're in that combat, though, you have undead screwing over the rogues, golems screwing over casters, and so forth.

Well, golems don't really screw over casters since 3.5 as they've only got half-magic immunity and pathetic mobility now. Rogues would still deal extra damage to undeads, just less.



Possibly. However, more things are equipped to deal with flight by the mid levels, and the other mobility options already exist so flight isn't adding much by that point.

It is. Every monster needs high mobility of his own or becomes just caster fodder mainly becaue of flight.



I didn't say it was good that 20% of monsters can't deal with flight out of the box, just that it was a lot smaller than at 5th level where you get it. There will always be monsters that can't deal with flight, and that's fine; there will always be monsters that can't deal with high AC or a miss chance or the like.

By that logic, then there's perfectly fine that there's monsters the rogue can nevah sneak attack.



Which then raises the question of why you can sneak attack magical beasts and dragons (similar anatomy to animals, but different in significant ways), monstrous humanoids and giants (similar anatomy to humanoids, but different in significant ways), and aberrations (not similar at all), but not humanoid undead and constructs (similar anatomy to humanoids, but different animation source) or elementals (not similar at all). I don't think the anatomical similarity argument really works, because type isn't a good indicator of distance from humanoids and animals.


Biology disagrees with you. Most animals look quite diferent on the outside, but in the inside a good observer can see that we still follow the same basic blueprint. Torax and head filled with squishy vital things, softer bellies, stronger backs, there's a pattern. Even aberrations share them as demonstrated on Lords of Madness.

An undead or golem just looks humanoid. It's internal structure is completely diferent however. There's no squishy organs to cut and pierce, no circulatory systems to make them bleed, no visible sensory parts. Magic energies make them move, and the rogue cannot see/cut them by default.

Exterior is just for looks. It's what's inside that matters.:smallwink:

Eldan
2010-09-23, 08:48 AM
I support this. :smallsmile:

I'd like to throw the Mindsight feat up on the chopping block. One dip into Mindbender and suddenly your character can automatically pinpoint someone trying to sneak. The Mindbender with Mindsight can detect, with no dice roll, the god of sneakiness. Mindblank does not even stop Mindsight.

I think that every intelligence that the feat detects should get a Will save before registering on the telepathy. If they make the save then they don't show up on the glowing lights mental radar.

DC something like the standard: 10 +1/2 HD +Ability Mod. It's a Mind-Affecting Effect, so people with the former Immunity to Mind Affecting get to apply their new +10.

---

Thought of another one. Antimagic. Huge No-Save-Just-Suck ability. Not sure what to do with it, but it could probably use some work.


Let's throw out some ideas:
Mindsight: make a bluff check against the caster's caster level or sense motive, whichever is higher, to "hide your thoughts"? This is done automatically by anyone approaching, without them knowing.

Antimagic: how about every applicable spell entering the field gets a dispel check against it?


As for the anatomy thing: I'm with Oslecamo here. I've cut open enough small squiggly things to know that you can stab all of them in the eyes. Kidneys (well, nephridia) are pretty universal as well. If it has a head, it probably has a throat, since the head needs blood vessels. Joints tend to have tendons or equivalent structures.

Chambers
2010-09-23, 08:51 AM
I like the 'make a dispel check' for the antimagic field, but I don't like the bluff check for Mindsight.

I think it should just be a Will save vs Mind-Affecting Effect. Bluff...seems strange to me in this situation. It's more feasible that someone could blank out their presence through force of will than through tricking the other person into not noticing them.

DragoonWraith
2010-09-23, 10:28 AM
I feel like AMF has to be an absolute effect. It's not an AMF otherwise. Now, AMF may be a higher level effect if absolute effects are rarer - and you might want an 8th level Dispel Magic Field, which is about what's been suggested, but the actual Anti-Magic Field should be absolute, IMO.

Eldan
2010-09-23, 10:31 AM
On the subject of Antimagic field:
What about Mordenkainen's Mutually Assured Destruction, i.e. Mage's Disjunction?
My suggestion would be: dispel check against all the affected spells and items (possibly with a bonus), items are suppressed for a few minutes. Alternatively, a ritual use to permanently destroy a magical item (longer casting time?)

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-09-23, 10:42 AM
What part of "no fleshy delicate internal vital organs" did you miss?

I was responding to the argument that the rogue can't sneak attack golems and such because they aren't trained for that anatomy. Whether you have internal organs underneath flesh or not, humanoids and zombies are a hell of a lot closer than, say, humanoids and aboleths, or dogs and hydras, and so on.


Great, now you just need actual rules for each of those. How many HP, saves, AC has each vine? What if I shoot an area effect? Cleave? Does the zombie really cares as much for a chopped off limb as a living being?

I don't think anyone wants even bigger monster entries.

No, you don't, that's what HP is for. Stick a humanoid with thirty arrows, he keeps going, because he's not at 0 HP yet, and the same for other creature types. That's my whole point--everything is HP. "Riddling the man's chest with crossbow bolts" = lots of HP damage. "Smashing the skeleton's leg to powder" = lots of HP damage. All of the weak points/vital organs/everything else mentioned for crits and SA is simply justification for why you're dealing more HP damage.


You're being contradictory there. You're claiming sneak attack shouldn't kill enemies faster, then you say that's the reason why it deals extra damage. Well extra damage means oponents dead faster.

Where did I say sneak attack shouldn't kill them faster? I said that any of the various instant kill houserules that bypass HP are too good. Sneak attack uses HP, which is exactly what it should do. You don't want to inflict status effects, you don't want to keep track of hit locations--everything deals with HP for a reason, and if you're not differentiating between different kinds of hits there's no reason to disallow crits and SA for any creature type.


Nope. Black Beard went down fighting and they had to hit him several times before he finally died. Heroic WW II soldiers kept fighting despite being riddled with bullets and/or blow off limbs. That's what distingues commoners and legends, one falls dying when stabbed on the chest, the other keeps going.

That's all very nice, but I'm not the one who said crits and SA are hitting vital areas. In fact, you're proving my point. Blackbeard gets stabbed a lot? He's not at 0 HP, he keeps going. WW2 soldier's limb gets blown off? It's all a matter of HP, he keeps going.


And everybody else is saying that's simply too abstract that the solid-mass golem is as squishy as any animal.

Why? Think of all the possible varieties of squishy flesh-and-blood things in D&D. Now think of a sculpture, or brick wall, or something else that's basically a shaped chunk of rock that's weaker in some spots than others. Why is it that you can easily strike any and every flesh-and-blood creature in a vital spot, even if you've never run into one of them before, yet you can't find the weak spot in the inanimate object?


You can, but if the oponent is badass enough he can still reach you (remember, I sugested penalty to melee attacks equal to CL).

There are rules for hitting things high up in the air with a melee weapon. It's called a Jump check. Joe Wizard is flying 30 feet up in the air with an AC of 15 and a CL of 5. Bob Fighter is trying to hit him with a total attack bonus of 21 plus the -5 CL penalty. Bob Fighter's Jump modifier is 20.

The Jump DC to jump 30 feet is 120. Let's be nice and say he only needs to jump 20 feet, because he has a long reach, which puts it at 80. He can, on a natural 20, jump half that height...yet with your rules, he hits Joe Wizard on anything but a natural 1. Replacing Jump with attack penalties, or anything that still lets a melee character hit a flying character with no regard for verisimilitude, does not work.


Except that they're quite limited, while a single fly spell and there's no limit for how high the caster can get.

Yes, the Jump rules are limited, because (A) they're for all jumping, everywhere and (B) they're realistic when they're supposed to be (for the first ~6 levels). If you want to revise the Jump rules, revise the Jump rules, don't make something that replaces them in one instance that's totally out of line with everything else.

Now, one idea for that would be limiting the max height based on CL. In that case, Bob Fighter above would only need to make a DC ~16 Jump, which is easily within his capacity, and can attack Joe Wizard without breaking verisimilitude. The problem with that is that that only works with magical flight, but that's good enough for me, at least.


But claiming golems and skeletons have all tendons and complex internal systems that can be easily crippled works?:smallwink:

You don't need internal organs to cripple a golem or skeleton. Stop with the internal organs, already. Internal organs are a weak point for us because we need them, but internal organ ≠ weak point. Smash a leg bone, chop a chunk out of an arm, crack a torso, whatever--it's all HP damage and D&D doesn't get any more specific than that.


Hurrah, melee gets nice things!:smallbiggrin:

While melee getting nice things is an admirable goal, ruining realism to do that is not the right approach. Plus, it doesn't give melee nice things so much as it gives the already-good melee builds more traction (since there's less they can't attack) and further discourages the others.


The reverse is true as well. If you stay whitin melee range of the dragon he'll do you in mincemeat if you start trading full attacks with it.

If you stay within melee range. Four on one odds, where at least two of the classic party members can stay at range, most likely mean that the dragon goes down, the melee characters are badly hurt, and the casters are fine. Not exactly nice things for melee, huh?


Plus strafing-running dragon can easily end up in a TPK if the party isn't properly prepared and/or the dragon does it too well. Even if it doesn't end in TPK, you can be sure the melee dudes will contribute a lot less than everybody else, as they can't keep up with the dragon's speed

And? Dragons are supposed to be hard; most ways of running them can end up with a TPK. It's a lot easier to hold back when running a monster than to add things on the fly, the same way you could always have a dragon land to claw things but you can't take a flightless dragon and let it fly away to safety.


They would retain their mobility advantage by being able to ignore hard terrain and obstacles while ground-based characters are still slowed by it.

Plus casters aren't really hindered by mobility as most of their spells all have massive ranges, while melees need to stand still to full attack. Again those who need a buff get it.

If you want to buff melee, buff melee. I can indulge in hyperbole, too: If you're going to remove flight to buff the melee characters, why not remove AC and DR? The answer to buffing melee is not nerfing everything else.


On the contrary, everybody but the teleporter is rendered innefective. Why do you need the rogue and cleric and fighter again? They can just go play poker while the wizard scries and teleports towards the treasure!

Anything you can teleport past isn't an appropriate encounter. When you hit the teleport wards/need to kill something/get attacked yourselves/whatever, the melee characters should be just as useful as everyone else.


Well, golems don't really screw over casters since 3.5 as they've only got half-magic immunity and pathetic mobility now. Rogues would still deal extra damage to undeads, just less.

They don't screw over anyone who has orb spells or other SR: No spells, and not everyone has them.


It is. Every monster needs high mobility of his own or becomes just caster fodder mainly becaue of flight.

No, it's mainly because many spells have a longer range than monsters' movement speeds. If spells had shorter ranges, you can let the wizard fly all he wants, but he can't contribute unless he stays close.


By that logic, then there's perfectly fine that there's monsters the rogue can nevah sneak attack.

Sneak attack is an inherent feature of rogues, and something only rogues have to worry about. Flight is something no one class relies upon and that every class can get.


Biology disagrees with you. Most animals look quite diferent on the outside, but in the inside a good observer can see that we still follow the same basic blueprint. Torax and head filled with squishy vital things, softer bellies, stronger backs, there's a pattern. Even aberrations share them as demonstrated on Lords of Madness.

An undead or golem just looks humanoid. It's internal structure is completely diferent however. There's no squishy organs to cut and pierce, no circulatory systems to make them bleed, no visible sensory parts. Magic energies make them move, and the rogue cannot see/cut them by default.

Exterior is just for looks. It's what's inside that matters.:smallwink:

Once again, you're falling for the similarity trap. Yes, aberrations have organs. Are they the same organs as humanoids? Are they in the same place as humanoid organs? Do they have the same external structures protecting those organs? In contrast, a humanoid zombie may not have organs, but it can be dismembered the same way a humanoid can. The idea that a rogue knows exactly how to attack each and every living thing the first time it sees them, but can't figure out how to lop off a zombie arm, is ludicrous.


As for the anatomy thing: I'm with Oslecamo here. I've cut open enough small squiggly things to know that you can stab all of them in the eyes. Kidneys (well, nephridia) are pretty universal as well. If it has a head, it probably has a throat, since the head needs blood vessels. Joints tend to have tendons or equivalent structures.

Given your knowledge of anatomy, which is easier: figuring out where a human skeleton is weakest (without any pesky skin hiding it, even!) to make its arm fall off, or figuring out where a neogi is weakest to make its leg fall off?

Duke of URL
2010-09-23, 11:43 AM
On the subject of Antimagic field:
What about Mordenkainen's Mutually Assured Destruction, i.e. Mage's Disjunction?
My suggestion would be: dispel check against all the affected spells and items (possibly with a bonus), items are suppressed for a few minutes. Alternatively, a ritual use to permanently destroy a magical item (longer casting time?)

Pretty much exactly what Boundless Horizons does, actually (minus the ritual use). It turns into dispel magic on steroids (and with no caster level limit), rather than being the neutron bomb. No chance to destroy artifacts and only a limited chance to destroy magic items:


All spells and spell-like effects within the area are dispelled, as if with greater dispel magic, except that there is no limit to your caster level bonus and all effects (even multiple effects on the same creature) in the area are subject to being dispelled. Each magical item within the area is suppressed for 1 round per level if it fails its Will save (an attended item may use its possessor's Will save if it is higher). Any item failing its save with a natural 1 must save again; failure means that it is permanently changed into a normal (albeit masterwork, as appropriate), non-magical item. Minor artifacts may be affected like standard magical items, except that they cannot be permanently disenchanted. Major artifacts are completely beyond the power of disjunction.▲

You also have a 1% chance per caster level of destroying an antimagic field that overlaps the affected area. If an antimagic field survives the disjunction, no creatures or items within the antimagic field are affected.

▲Alternatively, at the referee's discretion, major artifacts may be affected like minor artifacts; if so, major artifacts would have an effective caster level of 30 with regard to caster levels check to suppress their functions.

Oslecamo
2010-09-23, 12:44 PM
I was responding to the argument that the rogue can't sneak attack golems and such because they aren't trained for that anatomy. Whether you have internal organs underneath flesh or not, humanoids and zombies are a hell of a lot closer than, say, humanoids and aboleths, or dogs and hydras, and so on.

Again, they aren't. Hydras, dogs and aboleths are still living beings. Undead are not, and thus take completely diferent ways to "kill".



No, you don't, that's what HP is for. Stick a humanoid with thirty arrows, he keeps going, because he's not at 0 HP yet, and the same for other creature types. That's my whole point--everything is HP. "Riddling the man's chest with crossbow bolts" = lots of HP damage. "Smashing the skeleton's leg to powder" = lots of HP damage. All of the weak points/vital organs/everything else mentioned for crits and SA is simply justification for why you're dealing more HP damage.

Except that crushing a skeleton to fine powder is that much harder than cuting some soft tissue here and there.

Using your example, crushing the men's leg to fine powder means the poor dude already died long ago because of the trauma and blood loss you needed to get to the leg bone, but riddling the skeleton with arrows is a minor incovenience to it.



Where did I say sneak attack shouldn't kill them faster? I said that any of the various instant kill houserules that bypass HP are too good. Sneak attack uses HP, which is exactly what it should do. You don't want to inflict status effects, you don't want to keep track of hit locations--everything deals with HP for a reason, and if you're not differentiating between different kinds of hits there's no reason to disallow crits and SA for any creature type.

But you're diferentiating. Sneak attack/criticals represents you hiting more vital parts. But undeads/constructs don't have such vital parts, or at least they're much harder to spot and reach.



Why? Think of all the possible varieties of squishy flesh-and-blood things in D&D. Now think of a sculpture, or brick wall, or something else that's basically a shaped chunk of rock that's weaker in some spots than others. Why is it that you can easily strike any and every flesh-and-blood creature in a vital spot, even if you've never run into one of them before, yet you can't find the weak spot in the inanimate object?

Humans hunted pretty much everything that moves in this planet for millenia, of all shapes and sizes. Heck there's studies that support we drove the mammoths extinct!

But how long did it take for us to be able to make big buildings that don't colapse over their own weight?:smallamused:

Yes, identifying weak spots on a inanimate structure is that much harder than visceral knowledge developed trough millenias of evolution. It may sound easy to you nowadays that you have detailed books and stuff, but for the hunters 5000 years ago they knew how to kill bigger beasts with pointy wooden sticks, but couldn't build a proper structure to save their lifes.

That's why the civil engineer gets paid a lot more than the meat butcher. :smallwink:



There are rules for hitting things high up in the air with a melee weapon. It's called a Jump check. Joe Wizard is flying 30 feet up in the air with an AC of 15 and a CL of 5. Bob Fighter is trying to hit him with a total attack bonus of 21 plus the -5 CL penalty. Bob Fighter's Jump modifier is 20.

The Jump DC to jump 30 feet is 120. Let's be nice and say he only needs to jump 20 feet, because he has a long reach, which puts it at 80. He can, on a natural 20, jump half that height...yet with your rules, he hits Joe Wizard on anything but a natural 1. Replacing Jump with attack penalties, or anything that still lets a melee character hit a flying character with no regard for verisimilitude, does not work.

Well I guess we're even then, you think rogues should be expert civil engineers, I think fighters should be able to jump higher to wipe the smirk out of the caster's face.:smalltongue:



Yes, the Jump rules are limited, because (A) they're for all jumping, everywhere and (B) they're realistic when they're supposed to be (for the first ~6 levels). If you want to revise the Jump rules, revise the Jump rules, don't make something that replaces them in one instance that's totally out of line with everything else.

Except that flight effects have no limit. It doesn't matter if I make a jumpmancer, the wizard can still get higher.



Now, one idea for that would be limiting the max height based on CL. In that case, Bob Fighter above would only need to make a DC ~16 Jump, which is easily within his capacity, and can attack Joe Wizard without breaking verisimilitude. The problem with that is that that only works with magical flight, but that's good enough for me, at least.

Well that looks like a good compromise.



You don't need internal organs to cripple a golem or skeleton. Stop with the internal organs, already. Internal organs are a weak point for us because we need them, but internal organ ≠ weak point. Smash a leg bone, chop a chunk out of an arm, crack a torso, whatever--it's all HP damage and D&D doesn't get any more specific than that.

Yes, but does the golem really cares if you cracked his chest plate? You don't need to grind a living leg to dust to cripple it, but you sure need to to do it to cripple the skeleton. Just a crack is a minor (if at all) incovenience. But for a living being, it's an horrible crippling pain and the muscles and tendons over it are crippled whitout doubt.

If you do deal enough damage to grind it to dust, congratulations, you dealt enough damage to fully destroy it!



While melee getting nice things is an admirable goal, ruining realism to do that is not the right approach. Plus, it doesn't give melee nice things so much as it gives the already-good melee builds more traction (since there's less they can't attack) and further discourages the others.

Wizards and dragons rule the skies and animated skeletons roam the land. Realism was thrown out of the window long ago I believe. Now we're talking verssmilitude if anything, and hell, if the wizard can fly by magic, why can't the fighter's fighting spirit allow him to leap at great heights to reach his foes?(altough I do prefer the flying height cap mind you).



If you stay within melee range. Four on one odds, where at least two of the classic party members can stay at range, most likely mean that the dragon goes down, the melee characters are badly hurt, and the casters are fine. Not exactly nice things for melee, huh?

Well, the dragon would start by landing near over the squishy caster, not the armored maniac waving a sword.



And? Dragons are supposed to be hard; most ways of running them can end up with a TPK. It's a lot easier to hold back when running a monster than to add things on the fly, the same way you could always have a dragon land to claw things but you can't take a flightless dragon and let it fly away to safety.

If the dragon's forced to flee, then by all means the party should have a good shot at finishing it.



If you want to buff melee, buff melee. I can indulge in hyperbole, too: If you're going to remove flight to buff the melee characters, why not remove AC and DR? The answer to buffing melee is not nerfing everything else.

Actualy it would be, since melee is kinda at bottom right now.



Anything you can teleport past isn't an appropriate encounter. When you hit the teleport wards/need to kill something/get attacked yourselves/whatever, the melee characters should be just as useful as everyone else.

It doesn't change that all the survival ranks the ranger invested, the tumbling of the rogue, the fast movement of the barbarian, they're all useless now.



They don't screw over anyone who has orb spells or other SR: No spells, and not everyone has them.

They're slow and pratically blind. If nothing else, you can easily sneak by them with an invisibility spell.



No, it's mainly because many spells have a longer range than monsters' movement speeds. If spells had shorter ranges, you can let the wizard fly all he wants, but he can't contribute unless he stays close.

This would be another good idea, but I believe it's easier to nerf flying spells than to nerf every other spell out there.



Sneak attack is an inherent feature of rogues, and something only rogues have to worry about. Flight is something no one class relies upon and that every class can get.

But undead/golem doesn't just screw over rogues. It also screws the improved crit fighter, the keen edge gish, the enchanter and several other stuff spread over the classes.

By your logics, should we also remove all golem and undead immunities since we're at it? Golems can now be mind raped and undeads can be stunned? What's the point of making them again? Why don't get some normal mooks instead of those useless piles of stone that are as squishy as kobolds?



Once again, you're falling for the similarity trap. Yes, aberrations have organs. Are they the same organs as humanoids?

The ones that matter yes



Are they in the same place as humanoid organs?

Close enough.



Do they have the same external structures protecting those organs?

The drawer of the aberration skeletons won't exactly get an award for originality.



In contrast, a humanoid zombie may not have organs, but it can be dismembered the same way a humanoid can.

It cannot. It has no soft tissues. Wich means magic is holding the bones togheter. Considerably harder to cut with a dagger than tendons.



The idea that a rogue knows exactly how to attack each and every living thing the first time it sees them, but can't figure out how to lop off a zombie arm, is ludicrous.

Well, a rogue that aims for the arms would be a pretty lousy rogue to begin with. That's hardly the best place to quickly finish an oponent. They would be aiming for the heart/brain/throat. Wich the skeleton is sorely lacking.




Given your knowledge of anatomy, which is easier: figuring out where a human skeleton is weakest (without any pesky skin hiding it, even!) to make its arm fall off, or figuring out where a neogi is weakest to make its leg fall off?
The neogi still has squishy bits visible and a clear head. The skeleton is behind holded togheter by dark invisible magic and won't give a damn if you crush it's head or rib cage, wich means you must desesperately improvise, dealing less sneak attack damage.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-09-23, 02:20 PM
Again, they aren't. Hydras, dogs and aboleths are still living beings. Undead are not, and thus take completely diferent ways to "kill".

Except that crushing a skeleton to fine powder is that much harder than cuting some soft tissue here and there.

Using your example, crushing the men's leg to fine powder means the poor dude already died long ago because of the trauma and blood loss you needed to get to the leg bone, but riddling the skeleton with arrows is a minor incovenience to it.

Undead and humanoids take completely different means to kill, but all of them can fall under crits and SA. Crushing the skeleton's leg completely takes about as much damage as beheading a man or stabbing him through the chest or whatever.

The problem here is that you're comparing the same means for two different things: crushing a skeleton leg vs. crushing a human leg, smashing a golem's head vs. smashing a human's skull, etc. I'm not claiming anything of the sort; the only thing I'm claiming is that creatures have weak points that allow you to deal additional damage, however hard those might be to find or hit, however different they may be between creatures.


But you're diferentiating. Sneak attack/criticals represents you hiting more vital parts. But undeads/constructs don't have such vital parts, or at least they're much harder to spot and reach.

Yes they do. Undead have regular humanoid/other bodies; the only difference is that they're animated by negative energy where humanoids are animated by positive energy. Constructs have weak points just like statues have weak points, just like cars do, just like anything inanimate does that's not a perfectly uniform, perfectly formed sphere.


Humans hunted pretty much everything that moves in this planet for millenia, of all shapes and sizes. Heck there's studies that support we drove the mammoths extinct!

But how long did it take for us to be able to make big buildings that don't colapse over their own weight?:smallamused:

Yes, identifying weak spots on a inanimate structure is that much harder than visceral knowledge developed trough millenias of evolution. It may sound easy to you nowadays that you have detailed books and stuff, but for the hunters 5000 years ago they knew how to kill bigger beasts with pointy wooden sticks, but couldn't build a proper structure to save their lifes.

That's why the civil engineer gets paid a lot more than the meat butcher. :smallwink:

1) On this planet. Animals are easy. Magical beasts are easy. Aberrations and outsiders are not. Again, I have no problem with sneak attacking all the animals and such because they work the same way, but I still haven't seen convincing proof that critting undead with humanoid anatomy should be harder than critting aberrations with nonhuman anatomy.

2) Your point about buildings is irrelevant. Finding existing weak spots is vastly easier than creating something from whole cloth--by your argument, it should be harder to SA animals because we can make buildings but we can't make animals.

3) D&D has that detailed knowledge. There's Renaissance-era technology, magic out the wazoo, literal gods that will answer your questions, and all that. Neither anatomy nor engineering are all that esoteric.

4) What is this "evolution" that gives humanoids all this knowledge? Dwarves didn't evolve, they were forged by Moradin. Analogies to real-world history and development don't always hold water in these scenarios.


Except that flight effects have no limit. It doesn't matter if I make a jumpmancer, the wizard can still get higher.

That is the case now, yes. As I said, given the choice between limiting flight in such a way as to make Jump both useless and inconsistent and improving Jump such that they can deal with it, the latter is always preferable.

Face it: flight will always be better than jumping, because when you jump you have to come down eventually. That doesn't mean, however, that you should turn true flight into some mockery of itself or just grant random jumping abilities. Instead, do one or more of the following:
Give magical flight a ceiling; 5ft per CL is a nice value. Jumping now can eventually match and exceed magical flight with high enough modifiers.
Change Jump and Balance so the epic DCs aren't so stupidly high. Balancing on a cloud is something a 20th level fighter should be able to do, so make it DC 40 or something so it's within the martial characters' reach.
Grant abilities that let people interfere with flight or otherwise make flight more hazardous. In AD&D, if flight was dispelled, you just fell, period, no sissy slow falling effect. You could do that, or make flight require concentration so they can't fly and attack simultaneously, or something like that.


Yes, but does the golem really cares if you cracked his chest plate? You don't need to grind a living leg to dust to cripple it, but you sure need to to do it to cripple the skeleton. Just a crack is a minor (if at all) incovenience. But for a living being, it's an horrible crippling pain and the muscles and tendons over it are crippled whitout doubt.

It cares. Cracking the chest plate creates another weak spot to exploit.


Wizards and dragons rule the skies and animated skeletons roam the land. Realism was thrown out of the window long ago I believe. Now we're talking verssmilitude if anything, and hell, if the wizard can fly by magic, why can't the fighter's fighting spirit allow him to leap at great heights to reach his foes?(altough I do prefer the flying height cap mind you).

I meant verisimilitude, sorry. And the difference is in justification and internal consistency. In terms of justification, if the fighter's "fighting spirit" can let him do that, it might also let him heal his own wounds, see invisible things, etc. Basically, you have turned the fighter into the monk. That's fine, and giving everyone some supernatural stuff would do wonders for balance, but right now, you're breaking internal consistency: the fighter can do that in this instance only--he can jump that high to hit things, but not jump over a very wide canyon or the like, and nothing but jumping is affected.


Actualy it would be, since melee is kinda at bottom right now.

Not in that respect, at least. Nerfing problem spells is good. Nerfing every single flying creature, spell, and item in the game is not. The one takes overpowered things and reins them in; the other takes a valid tactic/ability and removes it.

Plus, bringing everything down to the level of the fighter leads to homogeneity; you want to nerf overpowered things and buff the fighter.


It doesn't change that all the survival ranks the ranger invested, the tumbling of the rogue, the fast movement of the barbarian, they're all useless now.

For the Survival ranks: By mid-levels, "We're walking across the world to do X" is not the kind of plot PCs should be dealing with. You've progressed past the point of worrying about finding food, finding the right path, etc. and progressed to the level of mythological heroes.

For the others: Teleportation won't help you avoid AoOs in combat and won't help you maneuver quicker (unless you have one of the multiple-short-range-teleport spells, but those aren't the encounter-avoiding type).


They're slow and pratically blind. If nothing else, you can easily sneak by them with an invisibility spell.

Well, obviously, if you're sneaking by constructs, rogues don't have a SA problem at all, do they? :smallwink:


This would be another good idea, but I believe it's easier to nerf flying spells than to nerf every other spell out there.

Granted. My point is that the problem with flight is that they can both avoid combat and still contribute, not simply that they can fly at all. Limiting height, limiting spell ranges, preventing attacking and flight at the same time, and others are all valid solutions.


But undead/golem doesn't just screw over rogues. It also screws the improved crit fighter, the keen edge gish, the enchanter and several other stuff spread over the classes.

I've been mentioning both crits and SA this whole time. The difference between the two is that (A) all classes can get crits, whereas only rogues/scouts/ninjas/etc. get precision damage and (B) focusing on crits is one option, whereas SA is really all a rogue gets.


By your logics, should we also remove all golem and undead immunities since we're at it? Golems can now be mind raped and undeads can be stunned? What's the point of making them again? Why don't get some normal mooks instead of those useless piles of stone that are as squishy as kobolds?

Um...yes? Isn't removing mind-affecting immunity, instant death, etc. the point of this thread? I'm not trying to nerf undead and constructs in particular, I'm saying SA/crit immunity doesn't make sense for broad creature types because of the variation in creatures and they way SA/crits work. I still advocate crit and SA resistance or even immunity for certain creatures, but doing it by type just doesn't work.


The ones that matter yes

Close enough.

The drawer of the aberration skeletons won't exactly get an award for originality.

Well, I'm certainly glad to hear the beholder, gibbering mouther, phasm, and will o' wisp are basically rearranged humans. So much easier to find their weak points than zombies.


It cannot. It has no soft tissues. Wich means magic is holding the bones togheter. Considerably harder to cut with a dagger than tendons.

You're assuming magic is stronger than connective tissues. Remember, in D&D, humanoids are animated by positive energy just as skeletons are animated by negative energy; "magic keeps it alive" does not imply "it's harder to kill than normal."


Well, a rogue that aims for the arms would be a pretty lousy rogue to begin with. That's hardly the best place to quickly finish an oponent. They would be aiming for the heart/brain/throat. Wich the skeleton is sorely lacking.

They're probably aiming for the arm because it doesn't have one of those in the first place. :smallwink: In pretty much every appearance, skeletons are destroyed by knocking their bones apart, not necessarily crushing them to powder, so in that sense their limbs are their weak points.

Chambers
2010-09-23, 03:17 PM
Pretty much exactly what Boundless Horizons does, actually (minus the ritual use). It turns into dispel magic on steroids (and with no caster level limit), rather than being the neutron bomb. No chance to destroy artifacts and only a limited chance to destroy magic items:

This. I agree and support this. With no limit on the caster level check you can still dispel into the higher levels and it targets each item and spell, just like AMF. So...it's not really an AMF then, which is okay. But I'd also agree with DW in that if we do this option, then the real AMF should be a higher level spell, like 8th or so.

Eldan
2010-09-23, 03:23 PM
True, then. An absolute antimagic field on higher levels. The dispel field could probably be lower then, even.