Epinephrine
2014-10-08, 12:29 PM
Setting the scene, when I started this campaign I was not really thinking ahead at how this decision might shape things. I don't know if I always did this, but I've fallen into the habit of announcing to-hit rolls, "27 versus Fortitude" or something and the player looks it up, and say whether it was a hit or not. This was in part because of the variability of defenses. The players all seem to have bonuses that come up sometimes - if they've shifted, teleported, hit a cursed target, in or out of a zone, activated a power, how many milestones we are on (meliorating armour) etc. It was easier to let them track their own bonuses than to try to continually update my numbers.
One party member, the githzerai avenger, would often avoid injury with his iron mind. I didn't pay too much attention to it, it wasn't that big a deal. But it's gotten a bit crazy, as a few players now have interrupting abilities, and they were discussing who should interrupt an attack, since it was going to hit by X, and you don't want to use the power that grants (X+1) on it if you can get away with (X), etc.
Without meaning to, I've altered the way they play and the powers they've selected. If you know all the rolls ahead of time, you can decide whether to interrupt or not based on whether it will work. My impression is that these powers are not meant to be infallible.
Do other DMs deal with this? Do you announce rolls, or ask for defenses? Do you let them know of critical hits before they use an interrupt, or do you allow them to waste them? I ran the last session asking for defenses and it greatly frustrated the players, who complained that the powers aren't any good if you don't know if they'll work. I pointed out that they can have a good idea if they'll work; if it's a high defense, the hit probably isn't by much. If it's a low defense (say, the dump stat defense on a character) a +2 will be much less likely to change it to a miss. So you don't throw a small bonus to the goliath to help him avoid a fireball (he's hit on a 2), but if they hit his Fortitude, it might be worth doing.
One party member, the githzerai avenger, would often avoid injury with his iron mind. I didn't pay too much attention to it, it wasn't that big a deal. But it's gotten a bit crazy, as a few players now have interrupting abilities, and they were discussing who should interrupt an attack, since it was going to hit by X, and you don't want to use the power that grants (X+1) on it if you can get away with (X), etc.
Without meaning to, I've altered the way they play and the powers they've selected. If you know all the rolls ahead of time, you can decide whether to interrupt or not based on whether it will work. My impression is that these powers are not meant to be infallible.
Do other DMs deal with this? Do you announce rolls, or ask for defenses? Do you let them know of critical hits before they use an interrupt, or do you allow them to waste them? I ran the last session asking for defenses and it greatly frustrated the players, who complained that the powers aren't any good if you don't know if they'll work. I pointed out that they can have a good idea if they'll work; if it's a high defense, the hit probably isn't by much. If it's a low defense (say, the dump stat defense on a character) a +2 will be much less likely to change it to a miss. So you don't throw a small bonus to the goliath to help him avoid a fireball (he's hit on a 2), but if they hit his Fortitude, it might be worth doing.