How do you feel Tome of Battle has let you down?

[Bhu]

Specifically, what are it's shortcomings? I wish to do a revamp allowing people to draft their own schools/maneuvers,, but first I'd like to know what you think they did wrong or left out.

[(Un)Inspired]

Probably could have used more karate chops.

[Fax Celestis]

Lack of ranged support and lack of imagination on what maneuvers can do are my big disappointments.

[Bhu]

What would you like to see maneuvers do that they don't do currently?

[Milodiah]

Personally I just don't appreciate the fact that there weren't provisions to incorporate ToB content into the non-ToB classes. I appreciate that the goal of ToB was to diversify melee combat beyond "roll to attack" while the wizard player is skimming over the pages' worth of things he can do, but the fact that it's primarily confined to the classes presented within rather defeats the purpose, as well as creates mechanical gulfs that I feel really can't be filled in by the fluff. I haven't played 4e or 5e, I understand martial maneuvers have been expanded there, but it just feels strange to me that one man has all sorts of maneuvers with proper names, specific conditions, and special effects, while the man next to him with ostensibly the same level of training has "power attack" and "attack" along with less than a dozen other options.

[Fax Celestis]

The majority of them fit into a couple categories:
"I hit harder"
"I hit more often"
"My buddy hits harder or more often"
"I move"

I want to inflict status effects against multiple opponents, alter the battlefield's actual terrain, summon or unsunmon creatures, break resistances and immunities, steal abilities and ongoing effects, or otherwise do things that I can't just do with a feat.

[Blackhawk748]

Lack of ranged support and lack of imagination on what maneuvers can do are my big disappointments.

Ill second Ranged support. I would LOVE to do crazy ranged shenanigans with a bow

[torrasque666]

I want to inflict status effects against multiple opponents, alter the battlefield's actual terrain, summon or unsunmon creatures, break resistances and immunities, steal abilities and ongoing effects, or otherwise do things that I can't just do with a feat.
So you want to use spells..........


I mean, I can actually see about all of those except summoning. Summoning just feels firmly planted in the realm of magic. Unsommoning them though, that could be feasible. And a couple disciplines already have moves that break DR and DR is really the only resistance that matters to any sort of melee character.

[Milodiah]

Ill second Ranged support. I would LOVE to do crazy ranged shenanigans with a bow

Third on that one. I'd love to see options for playing "John Woo at the Renaissance Faire".

[Amphetryon]

Throw my vote onto the pile for more ranged combat support.

[torrasque666]

Same here. I'd love to have the same amount of options with my archer as I do with my swordsman now.

[Milodiah]

It'd be interesting to see a D&D version of the Mad Minute (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DhjUrqH88s)...

[Fax Celestis]

So you want to use spells..........


I mean, I can actually see about all of those except summoning. Summoning just feels firmly planted in the realm of magic. Unsommoning them though, that could be feasible. And a couple disciplines already have moves that break DR and DR is really the only resistance that matters to any sort of melee character.
Yes, but no man lives in a vacuum. I don't care if SR doesn't apply to my maneuvers: if I can smack a dude upside the head and make him lose SR for one round, that is a thing I want to do.

[OldTrees1]

Lack of At Will abilities

Lack of enough Passive abilities(one stance is nice, but ...)

Lack of enough synergy between maneuvers(Even a maneuver that was "as a full round action, use 2 strike maneuvers" would have been nice)

Lack of Ranged options

Lack of enough Melee diversity(It is unfair to compare maneuvers to all the martial feats printed, but I do compare the two.)


These let downs(particularly the 1 and 2) are enough to make me prefer non ToB options. Yet even so, ToB is my favorite book from 3E.

[Troacctid]

More options to help combine it with existing classes. Jade Phoenix Mage and Ruby Knight Vindicator are cool, Shadow Sun Ninja works with Monks, and Song of the White Raven does a little bit of work to get Bard in the mix, but what about a prestige class for Druids or Warlocks or psionic characters etc? Or meldshapers, although I understand why they'd choose not to include that.

[Madfellow]

Probably could have used more karate chops.


Lack of ranged support and lack of imagination on what maneuvers can do are my big disappointments.


Personally I just don't appreciate the fact that there weren't provisions to incorporate ToB content into the non-ToB classes. I appreciate that the goal of ToB was to diversify melee combat beyond "roll to attack" while the wizard player is skimming over the pages' worth of things he can do, but the fact that it's primarily confined to the classes presented within rather defeats the purpose, as well as creates mechanical gulfs that I feel really can't be filled in by the fluff. I haven't played 4e or 5e, I understand martial maneuvers have been expanded there, but it just feels strange to me that one man has all sorts of maneuvers with proper names, specific conditions, and special effects, while the man next to him with ostensibly the same level of training has "power attack" and "attack" along with less than a dozen other options.


The majority of them fit into a couple categories:
"I hit harder"
"I hit more often"
"My buddy hits harder or more often"
"I move"

I want to inflict status effects against multiple opponents, alter the battlefield's actual terrain, summon or unsunmon creatures, break resistances and immunities, steal abilities and ongoing effects, or otherwise do things that I can't just do with a feat.


Ill second Ranged support. I would LOVE to do crazy ranged shenanigans with a bow


Third on that one. I'd love to see options for playing "John Woo at the Renaissance Faire".


Throw my vote onto the pile for more ranged combat support.


Same here. I'd love to have the same amount of options with my archer as I do with my swordsman now.

Sounds to me like you guys want to try out 5th.

Or 4th. :smalltongue:

[Milodiah]

Personally I'm just waiting for the DMG to come out before I take the plunge to modernity.

[Eldan]

More out of combat applications. There were some (Scent from Tiger Claw, some movement abilities in Shadow Hand), but not remotely enough.

[JusticeZero]

Mostly just it was late to the party and didn't get the support it needed. Take a look at the DSP Path of War stuff for a good "second draft" and back port it as needed, imo. I don't see much point in reinventing the wheel in that regard when all the work has been done already.

[Dienekes]

Sounds to me like you guys want to try out 5th.

Or 4th. :smalltongue:

I am very confused how you think 5e solved their complaints. Especially since the closes you get to maneuvers is the Battlemaster Fighter, which I can describe as: ToB, but you don't get a maneuver until level 3, they are far less interesting, and they're all only about as good as maneuver levels 1-3.

Anyway, specifics.

Iron Heart Surge is awesome in concept, but as written doesn't make sense.

There aren't enough. I like mundane combat that can be probably best described as mundane but greater (yes we can get maneuvers to fly and whatnot, I wouldn't use it but if they were there I wouldn't really complain). There should be maneuvers about bows, crossbows, polearms, all that cool stuff in a way that's action movie "realistic." There are a bunch of weapon based fighting styles that don't really fit with Iron Heart, Diamond Mind, and Stone Dragon. Go nuts, how about a knightly combat based one with taunts, duels, and mounted combat as it's focus? Or a soldier one all about shield walls, spears, and drawing benefits form those around you? They can be awesome.

Scaling, there are a bunch of maneuvers that either grant a cool status effect, but with a set DC that becomes irrelevant within a few levels, or there are multiple versions of the same ability that simply increase the bonus damage by some amount. This is poor design, the DCs should scale with the class so you can always use those cool status effects, and picking up the same maneuver repeatedly for it to remain competitive is boring.

[Fax Celestis]

Sounds to me like you guys want to try out 5th.

Or 4th. :smalltongue:

I like playing 4th for a beer and pretzels pick up and play game. I've got no interest in learning the ins and outs of a new system again, so 5th is out.

[Extra Anchovies]

For me, it's the fluff. The fluff is icky. The oft-used descriptor of "weeaboo fightan' magic" makes sense when you look at the lore surrounding the disciplines that the writers chose to include. Pseudo-asian mysticism shouldn't be forced on any character who wants to be non-[caster/meldshaper/psionic] and be good at melee.

Also the lack of ranged support. There should have been an archery/throwing-focused discipline available to all three classes.

[Ruethgar]

I would cast my vote for the status effects and ranged options, I also loved the idea of the Arcane Swordsage. On a related note, twisting wording around with the use of an elvencraft, bladed or bow bladed bow you can use several maneuvers with a ranged weapon though it does severely lack support for it.

[Blackhawk748]

Sounds to me like you guys want to try out 5th.

Or 4th. :smalltongue:

Tried 4th, only liked the Heroes of Shadow Assassin. I guess what i want is more "high powered" ranged options. Like shooting an arrow through multiple opponents (read: line attack) or shoot several for a standard action (read: cone attack) or bounce arrows off of several opponents.

Now im sure that 4th did stuff like this, i just wasnt a huge fan.

[Ruethgar]

Tried 4th, only liked the Heroes of Shadow Assassin. I guess what i want is more "high powered" ranged options. Like shooting an arrow through multiple opponents (read: line attack) or shoot several for a standard action (read: cone attack) or bounce arrows off of several opponents.

Now im sure that 4th did stuff like this, i just wasnt a huge fan.

There is a feat somewhere for a 60ft line arrow, let me check. Penetrating Shot, don't have the details as I'm AFB.

There is also(I think third party) a feat called ranged threat which makes you threaten and thus able to AoO in a 20ft radius.

Edit: The massive BaB requirement of Penetrating Shot normally makes me just cheat my way in with Martial Monk.

[Gray Mage]

I'd like to see some Mounted Combat support.

[Pex]

Stance progression of the classes do not match when stances are available. Crusader is the worst offender. It cannot get a 3rd level stance until level 8 and cannot get its 8th level stance at all. The 5th and 6th level stances compete with each other, at 14th level. Stance progressions of the classes need to be changed to match when available and adepts need to be able to switch a stance known like they can regular maneuvers. At level 5 and every 5 levels after is a good way to do it.

Specific maneuvers need to be clarified. Iron Heart Surge needs to specifically say what conditions it can remove and nothing else. It needs to be clear the character can remove nausea and paralysis/being held despite those conditions normally preventing use of a standard action and moving. It needs to be fixed it can remove a condition affecting the character but not anyone else even when they were all affected by the same effect that caused the condition and not end that effect. White Raven maneuvers needs to be specifically clear whether or not the character can use them on himself, especially White Raven Tactics and Order Forged From Chaos. Stone Dragon maneuvers should not care whether or not a character is touching the ground. Desert Wind maneuvers need the option to use energy damage aside from fire. It's ok if only one energy type period may be used for all applicable maneuvers, but the player should have a choice which one to use at character creation - fire, electricity, cold, or acid only. It would be nice to add a stance that negates resistance to energy used. A boost can remove immunity against the adept's attacks.

[Andion Isurand]

I wish the effect of maneuvers scaled with initiator level in some way more often, and that the existing disciplines had more maneuvers to choose from.

I've recently started dabbling with new and revised maneuvers (http://magerune.blogspot.com/2014_11_01_archive.html) this month on my blog.

[atemu1234]

I haven't had a PC use it or had a player try to use it, though I want to learn how.

[JusticeZero]

Still think that this counts as trying to re-invent the wheel. Is there a specific reason why you feel PoW material would not be suitable? If you have a reason, that's fine, but I haven't seen it yet. Backporting to 3.5 shouldn't be that hard, given that PF is just the more recent supported version of 3.x.

[Troacctid]

Path of War does have some ranged support.

[JusticeZero]

Well, yeah, and various other concerns. We've already had this discussion before during the development of PoW. If you want to know about the shortcomings of ToB, look at the earliest playtest thread material for PoW. So my confusion is simply that I haven't seen any reason for this fork, and i'm not sure that the person doing the work is aware that it is a fork.

[Extra Anchovies]

The OP has already explained why they're asking about ToB and not PoW:

I wish to do a revamp allowing people to draft their own schools/maneuvers

[SiuiS]

Lack of ranged support and lack of imagination on what maneuvers can do are my big disappointments.

Anything really good you can think of?


Personally I just don't appreciate the fact that there weren't provisions to incorporate ToB content into the non-ToB classes.

So more alternate class features, more using numbers or abilities of other classes to get benefits?


The majority of them fit into a couple categories:
"I hit harder"
"I hit more often"
"My buddy hits harder or more often"
"I move"

I want to inflict status effects against multiple opponents, alter the battlefield's actual terrain, summon or unsunmon creatures, break resistances and immunities, steal abilities and ongoing effects, or otherwise do things that I can't just do with a feat.

Hmm.



I mean, I can actually see about all of those except summoning. Summoning just feels firmly planted in the realm of magic. Unsommoning them though, that could be feasible. And a couple disciplines already have moves that break DR and DR is really the only resistance that matters to any sort of melee character.

What about the light energy samurai fight from big trouble little china?

This is also a silly distinction. No one is saying they should be nonmagical; warriors in folklore have always been supernatural, from the bullet proof monks to the flying wuxia fighters to the man who could run for days while leaping over shoulder high branches and ducking under ankle high roots without missing a step, to Achilles and his ilk... There's a difference between being magical your own self and casting spells after a life time of training and wearing bathrobes and a fanny pack of bat poop.


More out of combat applications. There were some (Scent from Tiger Claw, some movement abilities in Shadow Hand), but not remotely enough.

Oh yeah, totally.


I am very confused how you think 5e solved their complaints. Especially since the closes you get to maneuvers is the Battlemaster Fighter, which I can describe as: ToB, but you don't get a maneuver until level 3, they are far less interesting, and they're all only about as good as maneuver levels 1-3.

Fourth edition's "page 42" has been hard coded into the generic guiding principles. If you want a line effect from throwing you spear, you could haggle for a strength check after the first attack roll to penetrate each enemy in the line, say, with your only justification being "my character is based on cu Chulainn".



Scaling, there are a bunch of maneuvers that either grant a cool status effect, but with a set DC that becomes irrelevant within a few levels, or there are multiple versions of the same ability that simply increase the bonus damage by some amount. This is poor design, the DCs should scale with the class so you can always use those cool status effects, and picking up the same maneuver repeatedly for it to remain competitive is boring.

This was actually because of one of those weird things; you couldn't keep old maneuvers. You had to give them up for new ones as you leveled. You didn't have a choice. So they had 'replacements' for some core stuff.

[Extra Anchovies]

What about the light energy samurai fight from big trouble little china?

Nitpick: That's more of a fight between two spellcasters. It's the old bus driver and Lo Pan. Not exactly the best people to base martial characters on :smalltongue:

[JusticeZero]

The OP has already explained why they're asking about ToB and not PoW:
The core issue here is that I'm reading "I want to write PoW with one extra feature. Can people rehash the playtest thread for PoW here so I can spend a lot of effort designing PoW? I'm not going to mention whether I am aware that a reputable company already wrote PoW, let alone why I am going through all this time and hassle to design an existing product just to add one feature instead of designing the feature for the existing ruleset after spending about an hour tops scribbling back port notes." It's a very large amount of work to design the stuff that is being described, and it is unclear if the OP is aware of the extensively tested existing ruleset that can do most of what they want out of the box.

[georgie_leech]

Fourth edition's "page 42" has been hard coded into the generic guiding principles. If you want a line effect from throwing you spear, you could haggle for a strength check after the first attack roll to penetrate each enemy in the line, say, with your only justification being "my character is based on cu Chulainn".


Eh... As much as I'm a fan of minimalist design executed well, it seems to me that "ask your DM if you want other stuff" is more of a cop-out than anything. Of course you can do other things if the DM lets you (that's part of the point of a DM, after all), but I've seen plenty of DM's that prefer to run things by the book, and unless I've missed it, 5th doesn't seem to have much in the way of guidance for what sort of stunts are appropriate at which levels.

[Bhu]

Wow I didn't expect so many replies!!

In regards to PoW: I have not read it, nor have I read any Pathfinder material. This will be a homebrew project, not a published item (I don't have the finances for that). This will not be ToB, or even PoW with one extra feature. I have been deliberately vague as to what my intentions regarding the system, as I did not wish to prod discussion in one direction or another. Partly because those intentions may change depending upon the answers I receive.

[Malak'ai]

I'll once again echo the need for more ranged support and clearer guidelines on what some maneuvers are able to do.

@JusticeZero: I understand that Path of War is out there, but not everyone plays PathFinder, or has access to it's materials (and yes, I know that most of it is available online) enough to use it. Some people just straight out prefer the original 3.5 and don't wish to change, so, and I mean absolutely no offence by this, acting like a broken record about how PoW is already established and out there isn't helping the OP with his project.

[Eldariel]

My primary problems are as follows (keeping this really brief):

- Fighting styles: I want open "schools" for various fighting styles to encompass all the basic types of combat (heavy, multi-weapon, single-weapon [free-hand], shields, unarmed/natural weapon, wrestling/grappling, mounted, archery, thrown weapons) that I can pick on character creation and add with feats/whatever if desired. I find it stupid my class is determined by the weapons I want to wield. I'd want to pick class and then pick the schools that give me the basic competency with any given set of weapons rather than pick a class based on the weapon combo I wanna use.
- Mundane and magical schools: Currently the only way to go "stealth"/"rogue"/"opportunist" is a school that's 99% supernatural. I want to be able to build a mundane assassin if I so desire, that's still got some tricks up his sleeve. ToB-style maneuvers are a far more engaging way of doing Sneak Attack than "roll a stupid amount of d6 that will probably force you to use a computer or waste the whole evening, and opponent might or might not be immune". However, this was never explored aside from "conjure shadow" because...reasons?
- Archaic mechanics: ToB could very well just replace concepts like "attack of opportunity", "power attack", "sneak attack", "trip", "grapple", etc. with more precise, interesting and versatile options from a wealth of schools but it doesn't. The basic combat mechanics still remain the same.
- Scaling: Touched upon before, but the scaling of e.g. saving throws is horrid and would have to be fixed. It's ridiculously stupid that you're forced to "upgrade" maneuvers into the better version of the same maneuver to keep them even passably useful.
- Not enough anything: This is, of course, a byproduct of it being late in 3.5's cycle and never getting expansion, but one simply has far too few maneuvers known, maneuvers readied, different maneuvers period. You don't even have one counter option per level per school. If I had my way, I'd have ~2-4 different situational counters prepared (not counting counters-that-are-not-really-counters like One with Shadow, Rapid Counter, etc.) alongside a bunch of different offenses and a handful of utility abilities. As it stands, I can reach the bare minimum to be well overall prepared as a high level Warblade if I only stick to one mobile offense, one static offense, one defense & two utility.

To demonstrate the last point: When I was building the various base-Warblade Mage Slayers for instance, I basically had all my maneuvers occupied by the bare essentials: [Utility] Moment of Prescience, Order Forged From Chaos, Iron Heart Surge, Quicksilver Motion; [Defense] Diamond Defense, Moment of Perfect Mind; [Offense] Time Stands Still. Order Forged from Chaos is really the only at all replaceable of that bunch. And the only reason this worked was because the character was both, an archer and an Eternal Blade so he had a spontaneous access to the whole Diamond Mind school (including Diamond Nightmare Blade, Bounding Assault and Avalanche of Blades).

It'd be a much more interesting experience if I had meaningful choices to make in selecting my offense and defense, both in preparation (must know more than am able to prepare; this allows mid-fight adaptations with Adaptive Style as things change too, which makes for interesting, dynamic encounters) and in combat. Picking from a selection of maneuvers the one that best fits the situation, targeting enemy's weakness once I figure it out (an on-going process of figuring out which offenses and defenses he has available in turn) to find the gap and in turn picking the right defenses to deal with his offense. Something like Wall of Blades is cool but the relative lack of immediate actions (the most important resource in the game, ultimately) combined with the lack of maneuvers readied makes that a pipedream for anyone but Swordsages and even the Swordsages only have so many options available even if they only ever learn Counters.

And the fantasy of an interesting melee fight full of back'n'forth with the warriors actually jockeying for position and trying each other out and going for each others' weaknesses shouldn't have to wait until level 15; level 5 characters are already supposed to be great heroes capable of having an interesting martial combat encounter against other warriors and maguses alike. Speaking of which, more maneuvers which work against mages (beyond just "block rays" and "make saves") would make fights with casters way more dynamic.

The way I see it, warriors spend their lives honing their bodies while casters burn theirs to master magic so warriors should by default be quicker, more alert, more resilient and of course more powerful. Thus, various extra action shenanigans, more mobility, creative defenses and offenses, superior inherent stealth ability, various ways to make dying harder, etc. It's trivial to cherrypick awesome stuff from various heroic stories and implement them. It could even include stuff like reflecting rays or whatever even in the mundane disciplines; it's okay for even mundane warriors to do this with magic weapons - I find it perfectly okay to just have "magic weapon/shield" as a prerequisite for some maneuver and have it do more fantastic stuff in the hands of King Arthur even though he's no magus himself - skill at wielding a magic weapon doesn't need to be tied to being a magician oneself. Indeed, I feel a warrior with a magic weapon should be able to tangle with magical threats even if he's completely mundane in and of himself. And of course I feel it's a great injustice that only casters can forge enchanted weapons (indeed, I can't fathom casters caring too much about making implements they aren't interested in using, and I think it's silly to create a fantasy world where anything requires for Masamune to actually be able to wield magic to create weapons of great power).

[Hiro Protagonest]

While this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=205213) isn't meant to be a comprehensive list of ToB homebrew, it's a good list and has some extra homebrew rules as well.

[Forrestfire]

I'm a huge fan of Tome of Battle, but yeah, there are a bunch of issues (it is 3.5, after all)... A lot of people have said the stuff I would have, too. Off the top of my head:


Wonky stance progressions.
A whole lot of less-than-imaginative maneuvers.
I think that it could have added some nicely supernatural ones at the higher levels, to underline the point that by that point, everyone is magic, whether they like it or not, and whether or not they cast spells. You can't take someone who can wade through lava and call them "mundane".
Ranged support. I like archers and crossbowmen, and there isn't much to be had in there. The only decent way I know of that allows for ranged initiators is a funny interaction between Bloodstorm Blade's Thunderous Throw and an Elvencraft Shortbow, but even then, it still eats your swift action. Fully-str-based initiating archers are pretty neat, though, so there's that.

[ngilop]

The core issue here is that I'm reading "I want to write PoW with one extra feature. Can people rehash the playtest thread for PoW here so I can spend a lot of effort designing PoW? I'm not going to mention whether I am aware that a reputable company already wrote PoW, let alone why I am going through all this time and hassle to design an existing product just to add one feature instead of designing the feature for the existing ruleset after spending about an hour tops scribbling back port notes." It's a very large amount of work to design the stuff that is being described, and it is unclear if the OP is aware of the extensively tested existing ruleset that can do most of what they want out of the box.


dude, just shutup about POW, the OP never once mentioned anything about it or even hinted at being aware of its existence. the fact that you won't stop saying "POW POW POW POW POW DERP S'DERP YOU SO STUPID THERE IS ALREADY POW' is fregging annoying as hell, that's basically the only thing you've said in your what 4 posts?

I apologize if I am being a bit harsh here, but damn dude. the OP was very precise about what she/he wanted and you just want to focus on something that you seem to be absolutely in love with, that's fine but it has NO PLACE in this thread.

that getting out of my system.

Fax summed up a LOT of what I find wrong with ToB ( to keep justice zero happy to see some POW mentioned. I am never buying or ever looking at the POW crap. EVER)

But to expand upon it. There IS NO ranged support only 1 elemental discipline, that's poo :( why cannot there be more than 1.

Why does WoTC hate sword and board? woulda been nice to seen the classic Knight archetype having some love.

WHy no mounted combat support? what you mean I cannotbe a cavalier with this crap cuz!

and wtf?? stone dragon REQUIRES me to touch the ground constanty?

oh and no archery love WOO... that sucks

whata bout the fencer who uses only one weapon.. at least he has some support ig uess ( diamond mind)

what about things besides doing more dmg? what.. 85% or so of ToB is I do X more dmg YEAHH!!

[Phelix-Mu]

The book is generally a good series of concepts, with bad-to-terrible execution.

Suggestions:

1.) Solve the errata issue.

2.) Remove the fire element limitation of Desert Wind. Consider letting the character choose an element (and all the maneuvers that character has use that version), or a higher-powered option is to let the character choose the element whenever they use the maneuver. Alternatively, it's all non-elemental.

A similar issue may exist with Shadow Hand, but it's much less noticeable.

3.) Solve the issue with when new stances drop. The tables basically bork the initiator's options badly (varies by class).

4.) Consider whether a character can prepare the same maneuver multiple times. Later rules clarification ruled "no," but it might be a reasonable buff to allow them to do so (and brings them a step closer to wand-wielding casters that can spam useful stuff until the cows come home).

5.) Adopt homebrew stuff from this and other sites. New disciplines are very good for the subsystem, and help raise its stock in comparison with the casters. I believe I've used/seen used several disciplines by ErrantX on this site, but it has been some time, but I found those that I looked for excellent and innovative (and covering several glaring gaps in what ToB offers).

6.) Consider a feat or skill trick to improve the refresh mechanic of Martial Study (it currently is terrible, if sensible relative to initiators). This would encourage other classes to cherrypick from the subsystem, something that is generally very flavorful.

7.) Consider a feat or skill trick to allow the use of out-of-discipline weapons with the various class features and feats that involve them.

[Extra Anchovies]

@Phelix-Mu:
Regarding #6, you could back-port the Martial Training chain from Path of War, but with ToB disciplines. Lets non-adept classes get in on the fun.

Regarding PoW talk in general: ToB is easier to comprehend. Compared to ToB, PoW has twice as many maneuvers/stances (more than 400), and they're already planning an expansion to add more. That's too many for me to wrap my head around (whenever I go and try to make a PoW character, my system knowledge just locks up and I give up), especially since I don't like making characters dedicated to one and only one discipline (which is probably the only way I could get all the way through making a PoW character). I've already spent more time on trying to figure out PoW than I have on ToB, and I haven't really gotten anywhere.

[chaos_redefined]

Regarding PoW talk in general: ToB is easier to comprehend. Compared to ToB, PoW has twice as many maneuvers/stances (more than 400), and they're already planning an expansion to add more. That's too many for me to wrap my head around (whenever I go and try to make a PoW character, my system knowledge just locks up and I give up), especially since I don't like making characters dedicated to one and only one discipline (which is probably the only way I could get all the way through making a PoW character). I've already spent more time on trying to figure out PoW than I have on ToB, and I haven't really gotten anywhere.

You were almost looking at it the right way. The best choice is to pick two disciplines. That way, you have one maneuver from each at every level. Golden Lion is good for anyone in a melee-heavy party, and then you just pick the discipline that matches what you want to do best. Dual-weild? Go Thrashing Dragon. Einhander? Go Scarlet Blade. You get the trend. Easiest way to build a PoW character.

The biggest problem is that Solar Wind is the only discipline that gives a lot of ranged options, so if you wanna go ranged, you end up looking at the boosts from other schools a lot more than the strikes.

[Extra Anchovies]

You were almost looking at it the right way. The best choice is to pick two disciplines. That way, you have one maneuver from each at every level. Golden Lion is good for anyone in a melee-heavy party, and then you just pick the discipline that matches what you want to do best. Dual-weild? Go Thrashing Dragon. Einhander? Go Scarlet Blade. You get the trend. Easiest way to build a PoW character.

The biggest problem is that Solar Wind is the only discipline that gives a lot of ranged options, so if you wanna go ranged, you end up looking at the boosts from other schools a lot more than the strikes.

Hm. That's an interesting tactic. So then should my excess maneuvers at first level be purely for trading away at higher levels? Thanks for the suggestion, I may give it another crack.

[Twilightwyrm]

Lack of PrCs was one of the real killers for me. I know this was primarily a problem of the subsystem not getting any support after it came out, but there are some rather problematic holes in the PrC line-up ToB presents. I'll also second the problems some people had with the fluff. Don't get me wrong, I like a lot of it, but I would have liked some options for re-flavoring the subsystem as more European (or hell, Middle Eastern probably would have done just fine).

[Bhu]

The book is generally a good series of concepts, with bad-to-terrible execution.

Suggestions:

1.) Solve the errata issue.



Do you specifically mean Ironheart?

[Extra Anchovies]

Do you specifically mean Ironheart?

What's meant is the fact that after about two or three errata items the ToB errata doc is replaced by the text of the Complete Mage errata. It's been an outstanding error for years and has not only never been fixed but has never gotten a response from WotC. Shows how much they care.

[Coidzor]

Lack of ranged support was a major oversight, which the homebrew community took as a challenge and did a fairly good job though the first work that everyone thought was top-notch seems to have been lost to the mists of time and website upheavals.

Lack of updates/replacements for the other (core) mundanes in the way that Crusaders related to Paladins and Warblades related to Fighters is another area of disappointment, IIRC. I know some people wanted a way to incorporate martial initiating into other base classes without being limited to a handful of feats or multiclassing into an initiator, though how to add a track of progression is something that's not going to be necessarily all that straightforward, though it could also be simpler than one might think as well.

Lack of errata/support/editing is probably the most common issue, though the fan-errata covers most of the glaring issues, I think that's still floating around the minmaxboards forums somewhere.

IIRC it could use a little more support for natural weapons users, too.

[Petrocorus]

I add my voice about ranged combat support.

I will also add i would like more classes, we have a Fighter/Barbarian replacement, a Pally replacement, a Monk replacement, why not a Ranger replacement?


Personally I just don't appreciate the fact that there weren't provisions to incorporate ToB content into the non-ToB classes. I appreciate that the goal of ToB was to diversify melee combat beyond "roll to attack" while the wizard player is skimming over the pages' worth of things he can do, but the fact that it's primarily confined to the classes presented within rather defeats the purpose, as well as creates mechanical gulfs that I feel really can't be filled in by the fluff.

Yup, the ToB has basically no support. It's self-contained and if you want to combine it with something else, you have to homebrew it. I would like more PrC and notably hybrid PrC options.


More options to help combine it with existing classes. Jade Phoenix Mage and Ruby Knight Vindicator are cool, Shadow Sun Ninja works with Monks, and Song of the White Raven does a little bit of work to get Bard in the mix, but what about a prestige class for Druids or Warlocks or psionic characters etc? Or meldshapers, although I understand why they'd choose not to include that.

Totally second that. ToB definitely needs more PrC options, IMHO. For Druids, Rangers, Psionics, Warlocks, etc. Not to mention that the PrC are not really friendly with all base classes, the RKV with the Favoured Soul for exemple, despite the Crusader / FS combo being obvious.
The JPM is bonked by his really poor discipline choice, making it a bad choice for Wizblade (and not that good for Crusadin), and the 2 CL lost make it a bad choice for Crusadin. The JPM features are less good than the RKV's ones.

As a related note, i think that PrC having specific initiating progressions instead of "+1 level in a initiating class" like caster PrC is an useless complication and actually make PrCing more complex.

I would like and "alternate initiater" PrC like what the Vigilante is to caster. A PrC that does not require initiating but gives it to a non-initiating character.

[SparksMcGee]

I'm seeing what you guys are asking, and Path of War has all of that.

[OldTrees1]

I'm seeing what you guys are asking, and Path of War has all of that.

Really? I mean I assume they added more maneuver diversity and ranged compatibility.
What At Will Maneuvers does it have?
What Additional Passive abilities does it have (not counting the 1st stance)?
Evidence that there is more direct Maneuver:Maneuver synergy?
Where is the multiple Strike Maneuvers in one turn ability?

[sakuuya]

I'm seeing what you guys are asking, and Path of War has all of that.

One of the things they've asked for is "Not being Path of War." Does Path of War have that? :smalltongue:

[Petrocorus]

Apparently, PoW it the new ToB even in meta-gaming and forum posting.
I remember a few years ago, when someone was asking things like "how do i build a pally?" or 'how do you fix the monk?", there was always someone to just reply "ToB!". Now, when someone ask something about an issue of ToB, people just reply "PoW!".

[Psyren]

The majority of them fit into a couple categories:
"I hit harder"
"I hit more often"
"My buddy hits harder or more often"
"I move"

I want to inflict status effects against multiple opponents, alter the battlefield's actual terrain, summon or unsunmon creatures, break resistances and immunities, steal abilities and ongoing effects, or otherwise do things that I can't just do with a feat.

Most of these are fine. Strikeout is something I don't think any initiator should be doing under any circumstance. Bold would have to be very tightly controlled/limited in scope.

[atemu1234]

A lot of these complaints seem to be "I want to be a gish build without any creativity!" or "I want to be able to cast spells WITH MY FISTS!" or "I want to be a spellcaster, but with more hitting things!"

All of these are difficult to balance in game. Now, we all get that compared to normals, casters are OP. But your solution seems to be give full sorcerer spellcasting to a fighter. Which doesn't work.

[Morty]

I'm going to echo Eldariel here; ToB is great and all that, but it's still bogged down by being tied to 3.5's ineffective skeleton too much. I think some of it comes from the fact that they had to wrap it all in the 'weeaboo fightian magic' paper, since they couldn't just say 'core fighting classes blow; here's how you do it properly'.

[Invader]

Throw my vote onto the pile for more ranged combat support.

I'll 9th or 10th this, whatever we're up too.

[Petrocorus]

I'm going to echo Eldariel here; ToB is great and all that, but it's still bogged down by being tied to 3.5's ineffective skeleton too much. I think some of it comes from the fact that they had to wrap it all in the 'weeaboo fightian magic' paper, since they couldn't just say 'core fighting classes blow; here's how you do it properly'.

Several disciplines are not that much supernatural and can perfectly fluffed as completely mundane.

[atemu1234]

Several disciplines are not that much supernatural and can perfectly fluffed as completely mundane.

I hate it when people think mundane characters should be a thing. They really oughtn't be, because players always require magic to function properly anyway. So what if you don't have spellcasting? Being able to lift a planetoid or two makes you magic in my book.

Basically, I'm all for these classes having magical abilities. Nonspellcaster =/= mundane.

[Morty]

Several disciplines are not that much supernatural and can perfectly fluffed as completely mundane.

Obviously, but that's not what I or Eldariel are talking about.

[Kelb_Panthera]

I hate it when people think mundane characters should be a thing. They really oughtn't be, because players always require magic to function properly anyway. So what if you don't have spellcasting? Being able to lift a planetoid or two makes you magic in my book.

Basically, I'm all for these classes having magical abilities. Nonspellcaster =/= mundane.

Just to be clear, you mean that you object to the notion that characters without any innate magical abilities must be "mundane" in the sense that they should be limited to what's physically possible IRL. Not so much that all characters should have some innate magical power that can be interacted with via abjuration magic?

If that's the case, I wholly agree.

If you actually mean that -all- characters should have innate magic beyond a certain level then I have to disagree. While I have no problem with all characters being reliant on magic, that someone who has no innate magical ability can aquire the necessary magic in item form is as valid an option as someone training himself in some magical discipline and taking on inherent magics of his own.

Crazy as it sounds around these parts, I like my fighter class just the way it is. Same goes for my rogues and barbarians (spirit lion totem not withstanding [never take it anyway]).

[Fax Celestis]

Hey so that post I made on page 1? Aside from summoning/unsummoning, that's pretty much okay things that be done mundanely but are still relevant at most levels of play.

[Phelix-Mu]

Hey so that post I made on page 1? Aside from summoning/unsummoning, that's pretty much okay things that be done mundanely but are still relevant at most levels of play.

I actually like the concept of fluffy, mechanics-lite summons like that one Desert Wind maneuver that summons a little fire elemental in a flanking position to the initiator. Kind of reminds me of that ACF for hexblade that allows you to trade the familiar class feature for a spectral stalker thingy that can flank for you. Cool utility in combat, fluffy, and could have maybe one or two limited out-of-combat uses without turning it into a full-caliber summons; or just have a out-of-combat role play presence, which would be cool as well.

[Thiyr]

I actually like the concept of fluffy, mechanics-lite summons like that one Desert Wind maneuver that summons a little fire elemental in a flanking position to the initiator. Kind of reminds me of that ACF for hexblade that allows you to trade the familiar class feature for a spectral stalker thingy that can flank for you. Cool utility in combat, fluffy, and could have maybe one or two limited out-of-combat uses without turning it into a full-caliber summons; or just have a out-of-combat role play presence, which would be cool as well.

Agreed, I think martials could have summoning, and it could be interesting, it just shouldn't be no-frills summoning. Summoning from a meta-perspective, but in-universe make it an extension of martial skill. things that get limited to combat because they require a combatant. Using someone's own shadow as a weapon against them (by making it a shadow-y creature temporarily), moving fast enough to "summon" copies of yourself for a maneuver (i know a homebrew discipline did something like that). The latter actually feels like it should be a mix between make more copies to do stuff and mirror image, which I'd be even more down with as a higher level ability.

[Phelix-Mu]

Agreed, I think martials could have summoning, and it could be interesting, it just shouldn't be no-frills summoning. Summoning from a meta-perspective, but in-universe make it an extension of martial skill. things that get limited to combat because they require a combatant. Using someone's own shadow as a weapon against them (by making it a shadow-y creature temporarily), moving fast enough to "summon" copies of yourself for a maneuver (i know a homebrew discipline did something like that). The latter actually feels like it should be a mix between make more copies to do stuff and mirror image, which I'd be even more down with as a higher level ability.

Hehe, like afterimages or stuff. Yeah, that would be cool.

Frankly, I think the distinction between spells and combat-y mundane stuff is plenty murky. The key to making something one type or the other is some good fluff that is coherent and consistent with other abilities within a subsystem. After spending 1+ years playing Exalted recently, I have to say that I have a much better appreciation of how just any ability can reach the "magical" scope if extrapolated along a sufficiently aggressive curve. Now there is a game where swinging your sword is just as magical as knowing about magic, and where actual spells are still cool, but limited enough that sword-magic is still pretty damn effective in comparison (until higher levels, where out-of-combat spell utility once again starts to crush a combat-focus).

But I personally like both a sword-magic approach, and a pure skill approach. Some disciplines are decidedly magical in feeling, while others are pretty much just 150% badass skills. And I kind of like it that way.

Now, you just need to ratchet up non-initiators to the same level of effectiveness, but without ToB being necessary. Or, at least that would be my personal preference. No class should straight up suck in their specialty (or virtually so).

[Fax Celestis]

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?103406-Army-of-One-Discipline Here's that discipline y'all are talking about. One of my favorites.

[Jormengand]

It's let me down by not bothering to disguise the fact it's closer to wizard casting than the psion is. And at least the psion admits that it's basically the same thing as Vancian casting. It doesn't feel like me actually using the weapon - the sword attack itself feels kinda incidental to the effect a lot of the time.

[Blackhawk748]

Crazy as it sounds around these parts, I like my fighter class just the way it is. Same goes for my rogues and barbarians (spirit lion totem not withstanding [never take it anyway]).

Ya, im this way too. I only snag Lion Totem if i am Dual Wielding because i feel like i need to, even then i dont do it all the time, i have to feel like the characters fits fluff-wise with a BarBar dip. Honestly after joining this site i had my run of powergaming and now i just make stuff for shiggles no matter how unerpowered they are, but they are always good at at least one thing, whether that thing is optimal or not.

As to the complaint about having to be on the Ground for Stone Dragon: I get why they did it, as its a fighting style invented by dwarves, and not being able to use it while flying sucks, but honestly i dont fly all that often. Obviously that isnt true for every group but my group never feels like we need flying.

Also, does anybody else think its odd that the Hobgoblin fighting style is centered around moving and attacking quickly? Ive always seen them as the Heavy Armor shield wall types. Though that may just be KoK coloring my impression of them, but most of the Hobgoblin armies ive seen seem to take advantage of large pike walls and heavy armor.

[SiuiS]

Still think that this counts as trying to re-invent the wheel. Is there a specific reason why you feel PoW material would not be suitable? If you have a reason, that's fine, but I haven't seen it yet. Backporting to 3.5 shouldn't be that hard, given that PF is just the more recent supported version of 3.x.

I don't like pathfinder, I don't think some of the design decisions for pathfinder were good or even informed, and I don't think the solution to 'I want to make something in D&D' is 'go play pathfinder'.


Nitpick: That's more of a fight between two spellcasters. It's the old bus driver and Lo Pan. Not exactly the best people to base martial characters on :smalltongue:

Yeah, almost. One is a sorcerer but the other is a monk alchemist. That's a chi fight right there; heck, you could say it already exists in D&D – the duel of wills.


The core issue here is that I'm reading "I want to write PoW with one extra feature. Can people rehash the playtest thread for PoW here so I can spend a lot of effort designing PoW? I'm not going to mention whether I am aware that a reputable company already wrote PoW, let alone why I am going through all this time and hassle to design an existing product just to add one feature instead of designing the feature for the existing ruleset after spending about an hour tops scribbling back port notes." It's a very large amount of work to design the stuff that is being described, and it is unclear if the OP is aware of the extensively tested existing ruleset that can do most of what they want out of the box.

This just sounds like "I like pathfinder. Why don't you like pathfinder? Go play pathfinder. Pathfinder did this. You want pathfinder." Which is equally frustrating to listen to when the start was clearly 'I want 3e not pathfinder'.


Eh... As much as I'm a fan of minimalist design executed well, it seems to me that "ask your DM if you want other stuff" is more of a cop-out than anything. Of course you can do other things if the DM lets you (that's part of the point of a DM, after all), but I've seen plenty of DM's that prefer to run things by the book, and unless I've missed it, 5th doesn't seem to have much in the way of guidance for what sort of stunts are appropriate at which levels.

That's understandable. It's a step on the path toward cataphatic design, but it's not there yet and it flies in the face of tradition which makes it unintuitive. It is open enough for use by those who have experience with the concept but that means it's useful rule structure for people who haven't played only D&D.


My primary problems are as follows (keeping this really brief):

- Fighting styles: I want open "schools" for various fighting styles to encompass all the basic types of combat (heavy, multi-weapon, single-weapon [free-hand], shields, unarmed/natural weapon, wrestling/grappling, mounted, archery, thrown weapons) that I can pick on character creation and add with feats/whatever if desired. I find it stupid my class is determined by the weapons I want to wield. I'd want to pick class and then pick the schools that give me the basic competency with any given set of weapons rather than pick a class based on the weapon combo I wanna use.

Wait, back up. I think you have exactly what you want and just aren't parsing it that way. Each class is a specific martial art combo; your class isn't a job that also gets martial arts, it is your martial art and how you must bend to it in order to be proficient at it.


- Archaic mechanics: ToB could very well just replace concepts like "attack of opportunity", "power attack", "sneak attack", "trip", "grapple", etc. with more precise, interesting and versatile options from a wealth of schools but it doesn't. The basic combat mechanics still remain the same.

This I just plum don't understand. The basic chassis is a good one. Why throw it out? What would you like instead of the base mechanics? Please answer, I can't even imagine what you'd think. That's rare for me.


I'm seeing what you guys are asking, and Path of War has all of that.

So does the world of darkness changeling splat, but we aren't interested in switching to that other system either. Even though it is in some ways easier than switching to pathfinder.


Most of these are fine. Strikeout is something I don't think any initiator should be doing under any circumstance. Bold would have to be very tightly controlled/limited in scope.

Why so? Jade Empires had it well enough. Jade Empires was definitely about martial characters with magical styles.


I'm going to echo Eldariel here; ToB is great and all that, but it's still bogged down by being tied to 3.5's ineffective skeleton too much. I think some of it comes from the fact that they had to wrap it all in the 'weeaboo fightian magic' paper, since they couldn't just say 'core fighting classes blow; here's how you do it properly'.

I don't see it. The core melee system works beautifully for what it's intended to do – model fights between melee characters. It falls apart against magic because when the game originally released that was a feature not a bug, but patching stuff on top of that mechanic should be fine.



Crazy as it sounds around these parts, I like my fighter class just the way it is. Same goes for my rogues and barbarians (spirit lion totem not withstanding [never take it anyway]).

:D *hug* I'm not alone!

[lsfreak]

Not enough to do.

With basically every class (Incarnum might be the sole exception), you have the problem that they start out with a hugely restricted ability to do anything. It's just plain not fun to play one below about 5th level, because you have such a restricted set of things you can do in a give day that it becomes either an exercise in monotony OR a demonstration of the DM's and/or players ability to ignore the bulk of the rules (i.e. the printed combat rules) and come up with interesting stuff anyway. By the time you get to 10th level, though, the prepared spellcasters (and several of the non-prepared) have such a vast wealth of options it's overwhelming, and even if you pick a small number of effective things, you don't really *have* to. Mundanes, on the other have, largely never upgrade from monotony. ToB fares better than the other mundanes, but still suffers a severe lack of options: for the most part, you're going to have the same 3-5 maneuvers readied, every day, several levels at a time, and they fail even to vary much based on character (though that's partly an issue of never getting further support, as others have pointed out). Now, I recognize that having a lot of choices is a) not player-friendly (or at least, they're made so by 3e's rewarding of system mastery and inclusion of trap options) and b) personal preference. But at 1st level, you shouldn't be restricted to about three things you can do, whether mundane or magical, and that's your entire skillset. In order to keep low-level play interesting, you'd really need to up it to about 5-8 maneuvers known and half that many readied at 1st level, and get to around 10-15 readied at a time by the time you reach early-mid levels (5-8th). That way your abilities aren't mostly the same required things on every character, especially at very early levels.

Of course, this is at odds with the entire rest of 3e, so it's understandable by they didn't do this in the original printing, and understandable why someone would be reluctant to tackle it now either. It would be a lot of work to rework the whole system to be in this same vein.

[Psyren]

Why so? Jade Empires had it well enough. Jade Empires was definitely about martial characters with magical styles.


Magic and Transformation styles in JE are taught by spirits (or passed on by those who received that teaching themselves.) They are not attainable by anyone who simply flexes Y times. Ultimately, they are just as much magic as spellcasting (and with roughly the same degree of exclusivity), and so I don't have a problem there.

[Eldan]

Agreed, I think martials could have summoning, and it could be interesting, it just shouldn't be no-frills summoning. Summoning from a meta-perspective, but in-universe make it an extension of martial skill. things that get limited to combat because they require a combatant. Using someone's own shadow as a weapon against them (by making it a shadow-y creature temporarily), moving fast enough to "summon" copies of yourself for a maneuver (i know a homebrew discipline did something like that). The latter actually feels like it should be a mix between make more copies to do stuff and mirror image, which I'd be even more down with as a higher level ability.

I don't know... there's this horn in the DMG that summons a horde of extraplanar barbarians to help you. I could see something like that. "I'm so awesome at fighting, an Einherjar or Valkyrie will descend to assist me."

[Coidzor]

Magic and Transformation styles in JE are taught by spirits (or passed on by those who received that teaching themselves.) They are not attainable by anyone who simply flexes Y times. Ultimately, they are just as much magic as spellcasting (and with roughly the same degree of exclusivity), and so I don't have a problem there.

Yes, more explicitly supernatural fighting styles, more explicitly mundane fighting styles, and more fighting styles that blur the lines between mundane and supernatural would be good, come to think of it.

[Psyren]

Yes, more explicitly supernatural fighting styles, more explicitly mundane fighting styles, and more fighting styles that blur the lines between mundane and supernatural would be good, come to think of it.

So long as they interact with the magic system - detectable, susceptible to antimagic, and the ones that really duplicate spells should be spell-like and thus susceptible to those weaknesses too. And given the examples of things like Jade Empire and Airbender, I would expect many of them to have at least somatic components as well.

[Tvtyrant]

A lot of these complaints seem to be "I want to be a gish build without any creativity!" or "I want to be able to cast spells WITH MY FISTS!" or "I want to be a spellcaster, but with more hitting things!"

All of these are difficult to balance in game. Now, we all get that compared to normals, casters are OP. But your solution seems to be give full sorcerer spellcasting to a fighter. Which doesn't work.

ToB doesn't even have effects like strangling someone, putting out their eyes, or mounting a larger beast using a rope. There are tons of things that are tropes of adventuring that it could have given some time to.

When I think of what I would want ToB to be I actually tend to think One Pieces mundanes, honestly.

http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/original/10/104544/3869504-7144478479-0194-.png

[Eldariel]

Wait, back up. I think you have exactly what you want and just aren't parsing it that way. Each class is a specific martial art combo; your class isn't a job that also gets martial arts, it is your martial art and how you must bend to it in order to be proficient at it.

I feel I'm making too many choices at once with the base classes. First of all, I can't not pick schools that come with a certain class - or I don't get anything to replace what I'm giving up anyways. Sure, I can just not pick maneuvers from them but that's not a satisfactory solution, nor interesting; then I'm just intentionally not utilizing part of the material available to me. I can't play a non-magical assassin, for instance, since picking the assassination-geared class inherently comes with mostly supernatural options if I want to actually pick the stealthy tools. Sword'n'board is tied to Devoted Spirit, which means I have to be a Crusader to efficiently wield a shield. TWF is tied to Tiger Claw.

I'd rather be able to pick whether I'm TWFing, THFing, sword&boarding or whatever for each of the archetypes. I don't think each combat style should be locked behind a class that gets access to the appropriate school(s). I think the selection of weapons should be independent of the class (indeed, they all get full martial weapon proficiencies aside from the bows) and as such, I think the basic "weapon moves"-schools should exist independently (Tiger Claw is a combination of a feral school and TWFing for instance; those could easily be two independent schools and you just pick 'em together when it makes sense) and be modal; pick which weapon style you want to specialize in. There are more relevant differences between the classes than guided weapon selection after all.


This I just plum don't understand. The basic chassis is a good one. Why throw it out? What would you like instead of the base mechanics? Please answer, I can't even imagine what you'd think. That's rare for me.

Well, for instance, sneak attack is a boring, binary mechanic. You either hit for a ton of damage or you do nothing (if the enemy is e.g. immune). There's no real reason for it to exist as such. It scales linearly, which means it'll inevitably be unrewarding early on, and later on it becomes very binary "You die if you are vulnerable or nothing happens if you're not". Not to mention, adding extra damage independent of the weapon and its wielder makes it synch poorly with the rest of the system; the only real way to improve your ability to Sneak Attack someone is to get more attacks.

If you think of backstabbing and attacking weak points as a concept, it could be so much more. ToB-style system offers you an option to do that: classes getting sneak attack could be replaced with just a school of maneuvers that offer interesting options you can use on flat-footed opponents. Shadow Hand does that but for whatever reason it's a mystical school that mostly binds shadows. There are plenty of Rogue-feats that kinda-sorta do these already but they're way too expensive to pick, slow and honestly, generally you could just use the damage you're giving up to kill your opponent instead of causing status ailments. If there was no base damage to start with and it was all down to an array of options on how you'd prefer to use your advantage. How to best maim the opponent.

Attacks of opportunities are similarly a fairly restricted, binary mechanic. Instead, you could have a bunch of maneuvers you can use when you get an opening; thus you can exploit the opening in any number of ways. All the feat chains built around it could be simple options; restricting opponent's movement, making it hard to cast spells near you, making a surprise move to catch an opponent who thought you couldn't reach them with an AoO seemingly out of range (because you're just that good), etc.

Power Attack, well, again, I don't think it needs to exist in addition to maneuvers. Maneuvers can handle "I take wild swings"-line of options just fine. They can even get more additional effects such as perhaps a stun on hit or whatever (because it's a heavy, wild swing). If base damage suddenly becomes insufficient, it can be added elsewhere. Overall, I feel these options are archaic and obsolete if creating a more robust, elegant system such as ToB. If they exist, you'll have to design everything around them too; maneuvers adding damage will simply add on top of those options thus creating an even more out-of-control damage scaling in a system where the damage output of a single character can easily outstrip most level appropriate encounters' composite HP.

The binary systems still remain in place and constrict design. I don't really see the need for them if making an expansive system to make for more interesting melee combat. They can all be wiped under the rug alongside abominations like "full attack" and the system can be designed off a clean slate that does not restrict and tie down mundane character design so heavily to few option lines and makes melee combat more than simple competition of "who gets one-shot first?"

[Morty]

I don't see it. The core melee system works beautifully for what it's intended to do – model fights between melee characters. It falls apart against magic because when the game originally released that was a feature not a bug, but patching stuff on top of that mechanic should be fine.

Eldariel basically explained my point more eloquently than I would have at this point. The core melee system does not work beautifully for anything, even if, or maybe especially, if you take magic out of the equation. It's shallow and binary - you just roll to-hit and damage until someone falls over. It also has serious problems with scaling. At the lowest levels, a good roll can send someone into negative hit points - but as you get to high levels, combatants will whale on each other for rounds. A raging bersekrer with a two-handed axe and an armoured, shielded knight are effectively identical - they only have different numbers. And the former is a more effective combatant, because the math is out of whack. There's very little room for round-by-round tactics; everything is resolved by build and luck.


Not enough to do.

With basically every class (Incarnum might be the sole exception), you have the problem that they start out with a hugely restricted ability to do anything. It's just plain not fun to play one below about 5th level, because you have such a restricted set of things you can do in a give day that it becomes either an exercise in monotony OR a demonstration of the DM's and/or players ability to ignore the bulk of the rules (i.e. the printed combat rules) and come up with interesting stuff anyway. By the time you get to 10th level, though, the prepared spellcasters (and several of the non-prepared) have such a vast wealth of options it's overwhelming, and even if you pick a small number of effective things, you don't really *have* to. Mundanes, on the other have, largely never upgrade from monotony. ToB fares better than the other mundanes, but still suffers a severe lack of options: for the most part, you're going to have the same 3-5 maneuvers readied, every day, several levels at a time, and they fail even to vary much based on character (though that's partly an issue of never getting further support, as others have pointed out). Now, I recognize that having a lot of choices is a) not player-friendly (or at least, they're made so by 3e's rewarding of system mastery and inclusion of trap options) and b) personal preference. But at 1st level, you shouldn't be restricted to about three things you can do, whether mundane or magical, and that's your entire skillset. In order to keep low-level play interesting, you'd really need to up it to about 5-8 maneuvers known and half that many readied at 1st level, and get to around 10-15 readied at a time by the time you reach early-mid levels (5-8th). That way your abilities aren't mostly the same required things on every character, especially at very early levels.

Of course, this is at odds with the entire rest of 3e, so it's understandable by they didn't do this in the original printing, and understandable why someone would be reluctant to tackle it now either. It would be a lot of work to rework the whole system to be in this same vein.

That's also very true.

[Psyren]

"Nothing to do before level 5" is a bit harsh - Totemists can get going just fine at level 2. Incarnates do a lot of spitting early on but they can cope too.

[Ssalarn]

I hate it when people think mundane characters should be a thing. They really oughtn't be, because players always require magic to function properly anyway. So what if you don't have spellcasting? Being able to lift a planetoid or two makes you magic in my book.

Basically, I'm all for these classes having magical abilities. Nonspellcaster =/= mundane.

Wasn't their actually an OotS where they did the joke about how Roy walked away from being impaled by a triceratops and was strong enough to bench-press a building?
There tends to be too much emphasis on keeping certain classes/character archetypes "mundane" in a world where

1) They literally can't be mundane after a certain point (see triceratops anecdote above)
2) No one else plays in the mundane ballpark anymore
3) Even Sean Reynolds stated that anything over 6th level has abilities that equate to superhuman in the real world

I actually really liked Book of Nine Swords because WotC basically came out and said "Okay, we're going to stop pretending that Gimli from Lord of the Rings and Naruto from the last season of Shippuden belong in the same party. Here's what a Gimli who actually adventures with someone like that should look like". I know it caught flak for being "too Wu-Xia" but I honestly didn't really get that. The primary discipline that much of the lore presented in the book kind of orbitted around was Iron Heart, which didn't really have any asian elements to it. I also liked that it was willing to change the action economy dynamic substantially, giving martial classes an avenue to enjoy the same advantages that casters enjoy by default, like being able to move and attack effectively.


"Nothing to do before level 5" is a bit harsh - Totemists can get going just fine at level 2. Incarnates do a lot of spitting early on but they can cope too.

I've actually played Incarnates in groups who thought they were too strong during the lower levels of play because of their adaptability and little perks like unlimited elemental damage. At those levels, BAB also plays a much smaller role in your ability to connect (more than compensated for with unlimited at-will touch attacks), and the Incarnum focus on Constitution meant that even the squishy Incarnate generally had more than enough hp to get by.

[Oko and Qailee]

Lack of ranged support and lack of imagination on what maneuvers can do are my big disappointments.

This. So much this.

There just isn't enough Tome of Battle IMO.

-Nothing for ranged
-Very little other than "I do more damage". There should be more options at every level. Maybe an AOE trip at level 1 in a radius equal to your reach, at level 15 maybe you can hit the ground so hard you cause an earthquake. Perhaps a ranged ability that permanently blinds and a melee ability that temporarily deafens.

[Oko and Qailee]

1) They literally can't be mundane after a certain point (see triceratops anecdote above)


At level 2 a rogue, a "normal non-magic mundane" human being, can stand in a room with nothing in it. The room can explode into flames, covering the entire room, down to every cubic micrometer, and the rogue..... can still dodge the explosion.

That's pretty dang crazy, and that's level 2.

IMO, if a rogue can do that at level 2, a level 17 barbarian should be able to just reach across time and space, through sheer force of badass, and pull someone across the planes to him, just so he can give them a good womping.

[Ssalarn]

This. So much this.

There just isn't enough Tome of Battle IMO.

-Nothing for ranged
-Very little other than "I do more damage". There should be more options at every level. Maybe an AOE trip at level 1 in a radius equal to your reach, at level 15 maybe you can hit the ground so hard you cause an earthquake. Perhaps a ranged ability that permanently blinds and a melee ability that temporarily deafens.

I always forget about how limited the ranged options were in ToB, because the very first ToB character ever played in our group took the PrC that lets you throw a melee around the room and bounce it off of multiple opponents and all kinds of other crazy nonsense, so my first impression of the book was how you could make such a cool ranged character. You're right though, there's not a lot there, which is why I was so excited when DSP did Path of War for Pathfinder and the Solar Wind discipline was in the very first playtest. With the change to Manyshot between editions, it was actually fairly hard to combine mobility and ranged combat while keeping any kind of respectable damage up (unless you were combining archery with mounted combat), so being able to build more skirmisher and sniper type builds that maximized the benefits of their standard actions was (is) just amazing.

[Nightraiderx]

Adding a few new things/ complaints:

-Move action type manuevers.
-Poor synergy with schools. (why does desert wind get a swift action flanking manuever that would be more in line with shadow hand's need to flank?)
-Limitation of standard action manuevers (this becomes a larger problem at lvl 20 when you could be swinging full attack action or... use a single attack manevuer?)
-Limitation of stances (they did one thing and only one thing, they could be used a utility as well a stance could trigger differently in different situations)
-Poor balance of manevuer levels (granting greater invisibility as a second level shadow hand boost outweighs the horrible +1d6 fire damage to weapons stance of a higher level desert wind manuever)
-Lack of Sequence/ Combos (a school should be able to combo off of itself for greater effect. for example, stopping someone's movement with a Stone Dragon Manuever and then dealing extra damage with a Stone Dragon Bullrush maneuver forcing them off balance.)

[lsfreak]

"Nothing to do before level 5" is a bit harsh - Totemists can get going just fine at level 2. Incarnates do a lot of spitting early on but they can cope too.

I did explicitly say Incarnum might be the sole exception :smalltongue:

[Coidzor]

So long as they interact with the magic system - detectable, susceptible to antimagic, and the ones that really duplicate spells should be spell-like and thus susceptible to those weaknesses too. And given the examples of things like Jade Empire and Airbender, I would expect many of them to have at least somatic components as well.

As long as you're not suggesting expanding Arcane Spell Failure %, yes, I believe we are in agreement here. I mean, the majority of them have a "I'm moving my limbs and various implements to cause you painful death" component already.

[Bhu]

SUGGESTIONS SO FAR

1: lack of support for various fighting styles (ranged, mounted, heavy, multi-weapon, single-weapon [free-hand], shields, unarmed/natural weapon, wrestling/grappling, etc)
2: Elemental styles not restricted to fire or requiring contact with the earth
3: lack of support for using ToB material with non-ToB classes (perhaps alternate class features)
4: lack of versatility with maneuvers/stances
5: needs more out of combat abilities
6: Lack of At Will abilities
7: Lack of enough Passive abilities(one stance is nice, but ...)
8: Lack of enough synergy between maneuvers
9: Lack of PrC's
10: Lack of scaling
11: Poor Save DC's
12: less supernatural abilities
13: more supernatural abilities
14: could be used to replace archaic combat mechanics
15: fix stance progressions
16: move away from wuxia flavor
17: consider allowing maneuvers to bu used multiple times
18: Consider a feat or skill trick to improve the refresh mechanic of Martial Study
19: Consider a feat or skill trick to allow the use of out-of-discipline weapons with the various class features and feats that involve them.
20: Solve the errata issue.
21: Possbly remove maneuver prerequisites
22: More maneuvers that aren't full attacks
23: clarity
24: more Move action type manuevers.
25: Poor synergy with schools
26: Lack of Sequence/ Combos
27: Poor balance of manevuer levels (granting greater invisibility as a second level shadow hand boost outweighs the horrible +1d6 fire damage to weapons stance of a higher level desert wind manuever)
28: Limitation of stances (they did one thing and only one thing, they could be used a utility as well a stance could trigger differently in different situations)


Does that about cover it?

[SiuiS]

Magic and Transformation styles in JE are taught by spirits (or passed on by those who received that teaching themselves.) They are not attainable by anyone who simply flexes Y times. Ultimately, they are just as much magic as spellcasting (and with roughly the same degree of exclusivity), and so I don't have a problem there.

So what? This applies to all martial styles as well. Specifically and explicitly. You don't flex Y times and gain diamond mind maneuvers. You learn about and understand fundamental underpinnings of the mind and focus in combat, the nature of what a weapon is and means, and juxtapose them with physical actions honed to a precise motion to perfectly capture archetypes embedded in reality. That goes for stone dragon and iron heart and white raven too.

To put it as a friend of mine did once, "no, you cannot make this style your own. The elemental dragon does not bend; either you become one with the dragon of storms or else you are simply a strong and fast martial artist".

You basically go through wizard training with a sword anyway. Why make "actual" magic somehow separate? If I want to do a white raven rush where I emulate an archetypal general and am archetypal army appears and attacks with me, that's pretty easy to accommodate - certainly no harder than "attack a bunch of times" or "your allies stack six times in as many seconds".


I don't know... there's this horn in the DMG that summons a horde of extraplanar barbarians to help you. I could see something like that. "I'm so awesome at fighting, an Einherjar or Valkyrie will descend to assist me."

Good catch!


So long as they interact with the magic system - detectable, susceptible to antimagic, and the ones that really duplicate spells should be spell-like and thus susceptible to those weaknesses too. And given the examples of things like Jade Empire and Airbender, I would expect many of them to have at least somatic components as well.

As duskblade demonstrates, and dragon breath as well, 'somatic component' can be an already existing action. In this case, sword swings or bow shots.


ToB doesn't even have effects like strangling someone, putting out their eyes, or mounting a larger beast using a rope. There are tons of things that are tropes of adventuring that it could have given some time to.

When I think of what I would want ToB to be I actually tend to think One Pieces mundanes, honestly.

God of war style huh? You can kinda do that anyway, just not as maneuvers, and it takes a lot of system mastery and finagling.


I feel I'm making too many choices at once with the base classes.

Okay. That is a legitimate company and is often find myself agreeing with it.



I'd rather be able to pick whether I'm TWFing, THFing, sword&boarding or whatever for each of the archetypes. I don't think each combat style should be locked behind a class that gets access to the appropriate school(s). I think the selection of weapons should be independent of the class (indeed, they all get full martial weapon proficiencies aside from the bows) and as such, I think the basic "weapon moves"-schools should exist independently (Tiger Claw is a combination of a feral school and TWFing for instance; those could easily be two independent schools and you just pick 'em together when it makes sense) and be modal; pick which weapon style you want to specialize in. There are more relevant differences between the classes than guided weapon selection after all.


Interesting. Will retain for further study.



Well, for instance, sneak attack is a boring, binary mechanic. You either hit for a ton of damage or you do nothing (if the enemy is e.g. immune). There's no real reason for it to exist as such. It scales linearly, which means it'll inevitably be unrewarding early on, and later on it becomes very binary "You die if you are vulnerable or nothing happens if you're not". Not to mention, adding extra damage independent of the weapon and its wielder makes it synch poorly with the rest of the system; the only real way to improve your ability to Sneak Attack someone is to get more attacks.

Interesting. I don't see the problem here though. It affects the same concepts as a prison shanking. You've got three seconds to do as much harm to vitals that aren't protected as you can, so make it count. That linear advancement doesn't bother me. I do wish the ambush feats weren't feats however; they would make grand skill tricks.

Many feats would make grand skill tricks.



Attacks of opportunities are similarly a fairly restricted, binary mechanic. Instead, you could have a bunch of maneuvers you can use when you get an opening; thus you can exploit the opening in any number of ways. All the feat chains built around it could be simple options; restricting opponent's movement, making it hard to cast spells near you, making a surprise move to catch an opponent who thought you couldn't reach them with an AoO seemingly out of range (because you're just that good), etc.

Again, sounds preference over fact. You already can trip/grapple/sunder/bullrush* as an AoO. They could do more with it if you focus, yes, but this strikes me as merging every current melee option together into "roll and hit" which is a disservice to existing options.


Power Attack, well, again, I don't think it needs to exist in addition to maneuvers. Maneuvers can handle "I take wild swings"-line of options just fine. They can even get more additional effects such as perhaps a stun on hit or whatever (because it's a heavy, wild swing). If base damage suddenly becomes insufficient, it can be added elsewhere. Overall, I feel these options are archaic and obsolete if creating a more robust, elegant system such as ToB.

This is perhaps your clearest explanation and the one that makes me grok your concept. I'm not going to go back and edit my responses but they may have changed. I'll meditate on this, thank you.


The core melee system does not work beautifully for anything, even if, or maybe especially, if you take magic out of the equation. It's shallow and binary - you just roll to-hit and damage until someone falls over.

That is poor use by player, not poor rules. As I've demonstrated elsewhere, the only reason you aren't doing god of war style shenanigans is because of this ridiculous "I attack and move, or move and attack, that's all" mentality.


There's very little room for round-by-round tactics; everything is resolved by build and luck.

I don't know man. This sounds like white room statistics. I've seen some pretty damn epic fights using round by round tactics, from levels 2 to 13, because the fighters thought about their maneuvers, didn't play the "since there's no penalty to damage I don't need to RP concern for safety" card, and used terrain and situation to advantage.

And while #2 may be useless puling on my part ("RP better if you don't like fighters!!1!" Is silly) the other two are sound.


"Nothing to do before level 5" is a bit harsh - Totemists can get going just fine at level 2. Incarnates do a lot of spitting early on but they can cope too.

Incarnates don't suffer a lack of options, they suffer a lack of mattering. You can fly! 10 feet. You can spit acid! For 2d6. You can teleport! 20 feet. You get DR! Of 1. Etc.

They scale up but at first it's possible to be useless at worst and redundant at best.


At level 2 a rogue, a "normal non-magic mundane" human being, can stand in a room with nothing in it. The room can explode into flames, covering the entire room, down to every cubic micrometer, and the rogue..... can still dodge the explosion.

Depends. I don't believe the 3.0 ruling that if dodging is impossible, it doesn't happen was ever directly overturned, but that's a quibble. :smalltongue:

[Just to Browse]

All I'm here to say is that I am 100% a supporter of a Bhu-revamp of ToB and I'm willing to provide whatever help you need. PDF formatting, art-hunting, whatever.

[georgie_leech]

Depends. I don't believe the 3.0 ruling that if dodging is impossible, it doesn't happen was ever directly overturned, but that's a quibble. :smalltongue:

Yes it was. The Rogue was updated in the 3.5 PHB and it's Evasion Class Feature lacks any such language.

[Coidzor]

SUGGESTIONS SO FAR

1: lack of support for various fighting styles (ranged, mounted, heavy, multi-weapon, single-weapon [free-hand], shields, unarmed/natural weapon, wrestling/grappling, etc)
2: Elemental styles not restricted to fire or requiring contact with the earth
3: lack of support for using ToB material with non-ToB classes (perhaps alternate class features)
4: lack of versatility with maneuvers/stances
5: needs more out of combat abilities
6: Lack of At Will abilities
7: Lack of enough Passive abilities(one stance is nice, but ...)
8: Lack of enough synergy between maneuvers
9: Lack of PrC's
10: Lack of scaling
11: Poor Save DC's
12: less supernatural abilities
13: more supernatural abilities
14: could be used to replace archaic combat mechanics
15: fix stance progressions
16: move away from wuxia flavor
17: consider allowing maneuvers to bu used multiple times
18: Consider a feat or skill trick to improve the refresh mechanic of Martial Study
19: Consider a feat or skill trick to allow the use of out-of-discipline weapons with the various class features and feats that involve them.
20: Solve the errata issue.
21: Possbly remove maneuver prerequisites
22: More maneuvers that aren't full attacks
23: clarity
24: more Move action type manuevers.
25: Poor synergy with schools
26: Lack of Sequence/ Combos
27: Poor balance of manevuer levels (granting greater invisibility as a second level shadow hand boost outweighs the horrible +1d6 fire damage to weapons stance of a higher level desert wind manuever)
28: Limitation of stances (they did one thing and only one thing, they could be used a utility as well a stance could trigger differently in different situations)


Does that about cover it?

Pretty much. Nice, consistent desires, right?

An alternate set of rules for things like grapple, trip, disarm, etc. does sound like it would be interesting even setting the ToB aspect aside.

[Petrocorus]

Concerning at-will abilities, It may be a lack of understanding on my part, but outside an encounter, what do prevent a martial adept to use his stance or maneuvers?

[Troacctid]

Concerning at-will abilities, It may be a lack of understanding on my part, but outside an encounter, what do prevent a martial adept to use his stance or maneuvers?

Usually a lack of targets. You can't sneak attack an empty room.

[Coidzor]

Concerning at-will abilities, It may be a lack of understanding on my part, but outside an encounter, what do prevent a martial adept to use his stance or maneuvers?

Applicability, mostly. I mean, sure, if you have the right set up you can Mountain Hammer your way through objects every other turn or do a little bit of teleporting to get around jump and climb checks for platforming, but there's not all that much for out of combat utility.

[Dienekes]

Concerning at-will abilities, It may be a lack of understanding on my part, but outside an encounter, what do prevent a martial adept to use his stance or maneuvers?

That particular comment was made by Oldtrees, a very talented optimizer, but he specifically likes abilities that he can do repeatedly every round over and over without restriction. ToB does not have that, and honestly, it's not designed to.

Personally, I like that maneuvers can't be done over and over. In a fight, if you only do the same attack again and again, you'll lose. ToB maneuvers force you to vary up your abilities like an actual fighter would. But it does lose you the option to say, punch someone in the kidneys or head repeatedly (which, especially if you have the opponent in a hold, can be a very good strategy).

[Coidzor]

That particular comment was made by Oldtrees, a very talented optimizer, but he specifically likes abilities that he can do repeatedly every round over and over without restriction. ToB does not have that, and honestly, it's not designed to.

Personally, I like that maneuvers can't be done over and over. In a fight, if you only do the same attack again and again, you'll lose. ToB maneuvers force you to vary up your abilities like an actual fighter would. But it does lose you the option to say, punch someone in the kidneys or head repeatedly (which, especially if you have the opponent in a hold, can be a very good strategy).

Or, say, focus on a particular type of ability damage to non-lethally subdue an enemy without having to have several maneuvers or characters readied for that purpose.

[Petrocorus]

I was more particularly thinking to those maneuvers that gives invisibility and short-range teleport.

[OldTrees1]

That particular comment was made by Oldtrees, a very talented optimizer, but he specifically likes abilities that he can do repeatedly every round over and over without restriction. ToB does not have that, and honestly, it's not designed to.

Personally, I like that maneuvers can't be done over and over. In a fight, if you only do the same attack again and again, you'll lose. ToB maneuvers force you to vary up your abilities like an actual fighter would. But it does lose you the option to say, punch someone in the kidneys or head repeatedly (which, especially if you have the opponent in a hold, can be a very good strategy).

Thank you both for the complement and explaining for me.


Personally I prefer my fights to go ABCCDBCA rather than ABCDEFGH, ABCDABCD, or AAAAAAAA. This gives both the feeling that you know the abilities and have meaningful choices on a turn by turn basis. ToB could have had a skeleton that accommodated both repetition and variety but instead WotC went a different way. The idea of level ranked maneuvers was a good idea. I just wish they were At-Will and some substituted for melee attacks. But the maneuvers, terrain and foes would need to create meaningful choices(this would be how spamming an ability would only be appropriate when tactically appropriate).

Still, ToB is my favorite D&D book so far.

[Psyren]

Yes it was. The Rogue was updated in the 3.5 PHB and it's Evasion Class Feature lacks any such language.

That language was added back in Rules Compendium. You must have "room to move" to use evasion.

[SiuiS]

Yes it was. The Rogue was updated in the 3.5 PHB and it's Evasion Class Feature lacks any such language.

Doesn't matter. It's not in evasion, it's in the DMG explanation of how saving throws interact with the game reality. And because of how the rewrite works, lack of text explicitly leaves room for old text to be counted because it's not overwritten but ignored.


Concerning at-will abilities, It may be a lack of understanding on my part, but outside an encounter, what do prevent a martial adept to use his stance or maneuvers?

Nothing. Go hog wild. Teleport every five minutes. Be routinely invisible just in case someone is scrying you. Mechanically, it won't make a difference until it does.

[Amphetryon]

That language was added back in Rules Compendium. You must have "room to move" to use evasion.

Did it make it into the Deluxe PhB released after the RC?

[Psyren]

Did it make it into the Deluxe PhB released after the RC?

That would only matter if there was a contradiction. Nothing in the PHB actually contradicts that line, they simply don't mention it.

[SiuiS]

Did it make it into the Deluxe PhB released after the RC?

It wouldn't have. Rules compendium is supposed to be (but failed at being) all the rules for a subject from all sources. The players hand book wouldn't get the DMG half of the updated text even if they did specifically upgrade it.

It's also unnecessary. If you're helpless (which being unable to move would render you) then you can't make saves. Well, not reflex ones.

Actually, shoot. I should go back and check. I'm not sure if that's true.

[Fax Celestis]

It wouldn't have. Rules compendium is supposed to be (but failed at being) all the rules for a subject from all sources. The players hand book wouldn't get the DMG half of the updated text even if they did specifically upgrade it.

It's also unnecessary. If you're helpless (which being unable to move would render you) then you can't make saves. Well, not reflex ones.

Actually, shoot. I should go back and check. I'm not sure if that's true.


Helpless
A helpless character is paralyzed, held, bound, sleeping, unconscious, or otherwise completely at an opponent’s mercy. A helpless target is treated as having a Dexterity of 0 (-5 modifier). Melee attacks against a helpless target get a +4 bonus (equivalent to attacking a prone target). Ranged attacks gets no special bonus against helpless targets. Rogues can sneak attack helpless targets.

As a full-round action, an enemy can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless foe. An enemy can also use a bow or crossbow, provided he is adjacent to the target. The attacker automatically hits and scores a critical hit. (A rogue also gets her sneak attack damage bonus against a helpless foe when delivering a coup de grace.) If the defender survives, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die.

Delivering a coup de grace provokes attacks of opportunity.

Creatures that are immune to critical hits do not take critical damage, nor do they need to make Fortitude saves to avoid being killed by a coup de grace.


Saving Throws
Generally, when you are subject to an unusual or magical attack, you get a saving throw to avoid or reduce the effect. Like an attack roll, a saving throw is a d20 roll plus a bonus based on your class, level, and an ability score. Your saving throw modifier is:

Base save bonus + ability modifier

Base Save Bonus
A saving throw modifier derived from character class and level. Base save bonuses increase at different rates for different character classes. Base save bonuses gained from different classes, such as when a character is a multiclass character, stack.

Saving Throw Types
The three different kinds of saving throws are Fortitude, Reflex, and Will:

Fortitude
These saves measure your ability to stand up to physical punishment or attacks against your vitality and health. Apply your Constitution modifier to your Fortitude saving throws.

Reflex
These saves test your ability to dodge area attacks. Apply your Dexterity modifier to your Reflex saving throws.

Will
These saves reflect your resistance to mental influence as well as many magical effects. Apply your Wisdom modifier to your Will saving throws.

Saving Throw Difficulty Class
The DC for a save is determined by the attack itself.

Automatic Failures and Successes
A natural 1 (the d20 comes up 1) on a saving throw is always a failure (and may cause damage to exposed items; see Items Surviving after a Saving Throw). A natural 20 (the d20 comes up 20) is always a success.

Nope. You take a huge hit to your Ref save because your Dex drops to effectively 0, but you can still save.

EDIT: And per FAQ:


Exactly when can a character make a Reflex saving throw? The saving throw section on the PH says Reflex saves depend on a character’s ability to dodge out of the way. Does that mean you can’t make Reflex saves if you can’t move?

A character can attempt a Reflex save anytime she is subjected to an effect that allows a Reflex save. A Reflex save usually involves some dodging, but a Reflex save does not depend completely on a character’s ability to move around. It also can depend on luck, variations in the effect that makes the save necessary in the first place, and a host of other miraculous factors that keep heroic characters in the D&D game from meeting an untimely fate.

In most cases, you make Reflex saves normally, no matter how bad your circumstances are, but a few conditions interfere with Reflex saves:
• If you’ve suffered Dexterity damage or Dexterity drain, you must use your current, lower Dexterity modifier for your Reflex saves.
• If you’re cowering, you lose your Dexterity bonus (if any). The maximum Dexterity bonus you can have while cowering is +0, and that affects your Reflex saves accordingly.
• If you’re dead, you become an object. Unattended objects can’t make saving throws.
• If you’re entangled, your effective Dexterity score drops by –4, and you must use your lower Dexterity modifier for Reflex saves.
• If you’re exhausted, your effective Strength and Dexterity scores drop by –6, and you must use your lower Dexterity modifier for Reflex saves.
• If you’re fatigued, your effective Strength and Dexterity scores drop by –2, and you must use your lower Dexterity modifier for Reflex saves.
• If you’re frightened or panicked, you have a –2 penalty on all saving throws, including Reflex saving throws.
• If you’re helpless, your Dexterity score is effectively 0. You still can make Reflex saves, but your Dexterity modifier is –5. You’re helpless whenever you are paralyzed, unconscious, or asleep.

[SiuiS]

I'm not willing to accept the faq as valid but the quotes are sufficient. Thanks.


Part of our problem is we play from the book; so our succubi have polymorph instead of just really nifty disguises, and drowning reduces your hp to 0 (but only if it's an actual reduction) and the juxtaposition gets subtle but confusing sometimes.

[Amphetryon]

That would only matter if there was a contradiction. Nothing in the PHB actually contradicts that line, they simply don't mention it.
So it's your position that when rules get written in a more recent text, with part of the previous text omitted, that omission is not to be read as any meaningful change to the rules? That's got some fun consequences.

[Psyren]

So it's your position that when rules get written in a more recent text, with part of the previous text omitted, that omission is not to be read as any meaningful change to the rules? That's got some fun consequences.

And yours doesn't? So anything in a splat that isn't in the PHB gets thrown out?

RC says you can use Sleight of Hand to hide your spellcasting. Oops, that's not in the Deluxe PHB - gone.
RC says you can use Hide to blend into a crowd. Oops, not in the PHB - gone.
RC says you can make a Balance check to avoid being tripped. Oops, not in the PHB - gone.

Why even have splats, in your opinion? At least ones that try and add new text to existing rules?

[Thiyr]

And yours doesn't? So anything in a splat that isn't in the PHB gets thrown out?

RC says you can use Sleight of Hand to hide your spellcasting. Oops, that's not in the Deluxe PHB - gone.
RC says you can use Hide to blend into a crowd. Oops, not in the PHB - gone.
RC says you can make a Balance check to avoid being tripped. Oops, not in the PHB - gone.

Why even have splats, in your opinion? At least ones that try and add new text to existing rules?

There's a difference between adding new content and editing preexisting content, which is the point being made. If you have CAdv, it specifies that the new uses for skills are just that, new. It also has some reprinted rules from elsewhere (notably in the Craft section). That distinction is important. Now, normally it doesn't matter because they don't reprint things to edit them, they errata, and even when they do a reprint-edit they spell out that it supersedes prior printings (see: polymorph, the aforementioned craft rules in CAdv). And in this case it doesn't matter for an even better reason: because the Premium PHB only accounts for the existing errata, and no other sources (including things that would make sense to include, like -swift actions-), it needs to be considered from the timeframe of the original PHB's publication date rather than its own. But the absence of something in a reprint otherwise does mean that the omitted text is removed. Otherwise the three Compendiums aren't really that useful (as I'm certain there is removed rules text in them. I'm not gonna bookdive to figure out where.)

EDIT: Another good way to demonstrate this: When playing in 3.5, did you have to take the Ambidexterity feat when using two weapons? I get the feeling the answer is not. It's pretty stinkin' obvious that the 3.0 -> 3.5 update's omissions of certain things (including said feat) were meant to indicate that their absence was an intentional choice to demonstrate their lack of relevance.

[Psyren]

There's a difference between adding new content and editing preexisting content, which is the point being made.

But those are edits to pre-existing content too. They didn't create a new skill that lets you hide in crowds, they edited the function of Hide to let you do that. The primary source for how Hide works is the PHB. There is no distinction.



EDIT: Another good way to demonstrate this: When playing in 3.5, did you have to take the Ambidexterity feat when using two weapons? I get the feeling the answer is not. It's pretty stinkin' obvious that the 3.0 -> 3.5 update's omissions of certain things (including said feat) were meant to indicate that their absence was an intentional choice to demonstrate their lack of relevance.

If they meant it to be irrelevant, why put it in Rules Compendium, which came long after 3.0 was dead and gone?

For your analogy to work, they would have had to bring Ambidextrous back in a 3.5 splat and then get rid of it. They have not done so - it was left out of 3.5 completely. But they chose to bring back the line about needing room to move, and even put it in the FAQ. It's disingenuous to ignore everything they do and then claim they intended differently than they, you know, did.

[Bhu]

All I'm here to say is that I am 100% a supporter of a Bhu-revamp of ToB and I'm willing to provide whatever help you need. PDF formatting, art-hunting, whatever.

It's always nice to know that there are people who enjoy my work :D

[Coidzor]

And yours doesn't? So anything in a splat that isn't in the PHB gets thrown out?

I don't follow the conclusion you draw here. How does Old Text is X+2, New Text is X+1 and so it's just X+1 rather than X+2 now mean that Text A has 1, 2, and 3 while Text B has 4 and Text C has 5 and Text D has 6 mean that instead of having 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 if one has Texts A through D, one would only have 1 to 3?

[Nightraiderx]

It's always nice to know that there are people who enjoy my work :D

If you are intending on revamping the main 3 classes, I have some word files with some ideas for Crusader/Swordsage/Warblade.
I can PM you at a later time if you want to look at the stuff.

Also adding another greivance: ARCANE SWORDSAGE, WHY U NO REAL ALT?

I do plan on doing an Arcane swordsage homebrew sometime in the future, but still seems like it could've been expanded/more specific.

[Psyren]

I don't follow the conclusion you draw here. How does Old Text is X+2, New Text is X+1 and so it's just X+1 rather than X+2 now mean that Text A has 1, 2, and 3 while Text B has 4 and Text C has 5 and Text D has 6 mean that instead of having 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 if one has Texts A through D, one would only have 1 to 3?

Chewbacca Defense?

The thing is, X+2 and X+1 are not mutually exclusive in this context. "Its X+1, therefore it cannot be X+2" is thus an erroneous conclusion.

[SiuiS]

So it's your position that when rules get written in a more recent text, with part of the previous text omitted, that omission is not to be read as any meaningful change to the rules? That's got some fun consequences.

Well, for the 3.0 to 3.5 conversion that is explicitly what they did, on purpose, and made clear in design notes.



EDIT: Another good way to demonstrate this: When playing in 3.5, did you have to take the Ambidexterity feat when using two weapons? I get the feeling the answer is not. It's pretty stinkin' obvious that the 3.0 -> 3.5 update's omissions of certain things (including said feat) were meant to indicate that their absence was an intentional choice to demonstrate their lack of relevance.

Ambidexterity (and alchemy as a skill, and intuit direction, and innuendo) were explicit in their removal. Your example is that you find it weird that somethig not removed is included still because they don't include something definitely removed.



For your analogy to work, they would have had to bring Ambidextrous back in a 3.5 splat and then get rid of it. They have not done so - it was left out of 3.5 completely. But they chose to bring back the line about needing room to move, and even put it in the FAQ. It's disingenuous to ignore everything they do and then claim they intended differently than they, you know, did.

They did actually. It's a class feature from time of battle I think. I lost my copy but as I recall it allows you to reduce your TWF penalties by your dex bonus, and I always house ruled that into the class gets the feat for free and it still exists.


Chewbacca Defense?

The thing is, X+2 and X+1 are not mutually exclusive in this context. "Its X+1, therefore it cannot be X+2" is thus an erroneous conclusion.

Yes. Cataphatic discourse not apophatic.

[Bhu]

Okay we're straying slightly off topic, and nothing new is much being brought up problem wise, so time for the next set of questions:

Would you prefer a list of maneuvers from which to make your own schools, or would you prefer a system for making your own schools and maneuvers as well?

[Temotei]

Would you prefer a list of maneuvers from which to make your own schools, or would you prefer a system for making your own schools and maneuvers as well?

I think a system for making one's own schools could be really fun.

[Petrocorus]

Would you prefer a list of maneuvers from which to make your own schools, or would you prefer a system for making your own schools and maneuvers as well?

Clearly the second one for me. Designing new maneuvers would certainly be better than just selecting some to build a new school.

[torrasque666]

I think a system for making one's own schools could be really fun.

also rapidly leads to abuse. frankly, any time where players are allowed to either create new things or cherry pick what they want for a list tends to lead to abuse.

[Thiyr]

Making one's own maneuvers, eh? I like that idea, more than I like the idea of mix and match "schools", which just seems...well, like there's no point for school distinctions to begin with. I'm also reminded of Dungeons: The Dragoning, which does the entire make-your-own-maneuver thing. So yea, I like that idea more. I doubt the importance of school-distinction without them being pre-existing though.



But those are edits to pre-existing content too. They didn't create a new skill that lets you hide in crowds, they edited the function of Hide to let you do that. The primary source for how Hide works is the PHB. There is no distinction.



If they meant it to be irrelevant, why put it in Rules Compendium, which came long after 3.0 was dead and gone?

For your analogy to work, they would have had to bring Ambidextrous back in a 3.5 splat and then get rid of it. They have not done so - it was left out of 3.5 completely. But they chose to bring back the line about needing room to move, and even put it in the FAQ. It's disingenuous to ignore everything they do and then claim they intended differently than they, you know, did.

For the record, because the second bit you quoted has me a tad confused: I'm not trying to say anything on the matter of evasion specifically. I am in agreement that the wording in RC takes precedence, and thus you do need to be able to move to use evasion. I am just talking about the general idea of the irrelevance of the omission of content. Assuming that's what you're talking about in the second quote, that is. I'm not trying to argue against your point, just your method of getting there.

That said, post-3.5, pre-RC, evasion did not require room to move. Until RC re-instated that rule, its omission is sign that it was intended to be removed. That's editing. The first quote, though? There's a reason I brought up CAdv. Because it is explicitly an addition. It -says- it's is an addition, in clear text. That is a clear difference from reprinting something outright with a section missing. That's my point. If it was trying to claim those were the only uses for a skill, then it's an edit, but if it's saying "add this to the rest of what the skill can do", then it's an addition. I mean, it's such an obvious difference that it was almost painful to type that sentence.

Heck, another example, cutting out any edition stuff. I did some minor book diving. The spell Sign was first printed in Miniatures handbook, and essentially let you take 20 on your initiative. When it was reprinted in SpC, instead it just gave a +4 to your init. The general rule that you seem to be espousing is that Sign lets you take 24 on your initiative (taking 20 with an extra +4). This is, at least as far as I am concerned, basically crazy talk. The "Set your initiative to 20+init modifier" language was removed because it's no longer relevant to the spell. And if a reprinting from an even later source changed it back, it'd be changed back (just like evasion in RC). But if text is omitted when something is reprinted (And I mean reprinted in full. CAdv doesn't claim to have a comprehensive listing of skill usages, just additions), then the omission is -important-.

Hence why it's more important that the premium phb is timed based on the original phb's publication date. Otherwise we have to deal with stuff like Quicken Spell working off of free actions again, and down that path is madness.

[Coidzor]

I always like the idea of guidelines for making new content in line with existing content, so I'm definitely on board with those, even though from what I recall those are often much harder on the person doing the writing than creating and then balancing the content in the first place so I understand their absence in many cases. Although there are definitely some cases where those were needed and they didn't get made for whatever reason, too...

[Bhu]

Making one's own maneuvers, eh? I like that idea, more than I like the idea of mix and match "schools", which just seems...well, like there's no point for school distinctions to begin with. I'm also reminded of Dungeons: The Dragoning, which does the entire make-your-own-maneuver thing. So yea, I like that idea more. I doubt the importance of school-distinction without them being pre-existing though.



Feats. A lot of Feats are still "give x bonus when using maneuvers/weapons of your school"

[Dienekes]

In my eyes, disciplines are supposed to be unified as a means of organizing concepts. This discipline is for stealthy guys, this one for mystic guys, and so on. While I would not be opposed to creating your own school, in theory, it will probably lead to just picking the strongest abilities. Now doing so is not necessarily overpowered, as I don't see maneuvers ever breaking into tier 2 territory, but it can lead to more utility than may be reasonably handled. So I dunno. If you have a cool concept for a discipline that doesn't fit the pre-established ones I don't see a problem with rules about making your own.

However, I like the idea of making your own manuevers, though this one could potentially be game breaking depending on how it all works.

So, I guess to sum up. Both are cool, can lead to being screwy though.

[Thiyr]

Feats. A lot of Feats are still "give x bonus when using maneuvers/weapons of your school"

The problem is that if your school is hand-made, those feats could just be "give x bonus", unless the schools are somewhat pre-defined and variation within the school is in some way limited. I mean, if I could swap around what school a maneuver is in with the system as is, I could just decide "I want to use a kukri/shadow blade, but I want Iron Heart maneuvers instead. Let's just swap all of shadow hand into iron heart and vice versa. Now it's the same school in all but name and favored weapon, so I'm set!"

It's part of why I brought up Dungeons: The Dragoning. They give a handful of basic maneuver seeds, which modify your dice pool. There's a handful of generic ones, and then each school has specific ones. That way you can mix-n-match to get what you want, but it has a cost, and because it's a point buy system, you need to level your abilities in each school separately. Means that school distinctions are still relevant, but they aren't a straightjacket to what you're capable of. Something similar to that I think could work (assuming, of course, it was tweaked to work within a d20 based system), but just shuffling around what maneuvers are in what schools feels...well, it feels like it makes things a bit more shallow. It takes out complexity to a degree that the distinction doesn't seem worth the effort for me.

[Bhu]

This will not lack for complexity. Indeed, it will be lacking enough in complexity that I am procrastinating by doing thread polls first...

[Gemini476]

The problem is that if your school is hand-made, those feats could just be "give x bonus", unless the schools are somewhat pre-defined and variation within the school is in some way limited. I mean, if I could swap around what school a maneuver is in with the system as is, I could just decide "I want to use a kukri/shadow blade, but I want Iron Heart maneuvers instead. Let's just swap all of shadow hand into iron heart and vice versa. Now it's the same school in all but name and favored weapon, so I'm set!"

It's part of why I brought up Dungeons: The Dragoning. They give a handful of basic maneuver seeds, which modify your dice pool. There's a handful of generic ones, and then each school has specific ones. That way you can mix-n-match to get what you want, but it has a cost, and because it's a point buy system, you need to level your abilities in each school separately. Means that school distinctions are still relevant, but they aren't a straightjacket to what you're capable of. Something similar to that I think could work (assuming, of course, it was tweaked to work within a d20 based system), but just shuffling around what maneuvers are in what schools feels...well, it feels like it makes things a bit more shallow. It takes out complexity to a degree that the distinction doesn't seem worth the effort for me.
The system for Sword Schools/Gun Kata that DtD40k7,6e (and DtD40k7,6eB2FaFSM) use is pretty interesting, yeah. I mean, it's basically a point-buy system where you first buy access to your schools to get your building blocks and then pay up to make those building blocks into Special Attacks. And you can go wide with lots of schools or tall by focusing on a few and getting those 5-dot Special Attacks out in the open.

I'm not entirely sure how to convert that over into something usable in a d20-based system, though. You'd need to make those building blocks weak enough that they don't break in the hands of a low-level character, but also strong enough that they stay relatively relevant throughout and in the higher levels let you stand toe-to-toe with tier 3 classes.
Not to mention the whole issue with how you level up separately in each school in DtD and that's not really something you could do in d20 is it.


One thing that I've been thinking on recently on this topic is adopting Paizo's abandoned Words of Power system for the purposes of Blade Magic. I mean, it gives you a bunch of standard attacks that you can combine together in inventive ways to strike at your opponents. That seems pretty fitting for a martial arts theme. Not to mention how it kind of lets you build your own school, in some ways. You'd probably either need an extensive conversion document or just write up a whole new subsystem loosely based on it before you could make it suitable for use by Initiators, though.

[SiuiS]

The system for Sword Schools/Gun Kata that DtD40k7,6e (and DtD40k7,6eB2FaFSM) use is pretty interesting, yeah. I mean, it's basically a point-buy system where you first buy access to your schools to get your building blocks and then pay up to make those building blocks into Special Attacks. And you can go wide with lots of schools or tall by focusing on a few and getting those 5-dot Special Attacks out in the open.

I'm not entirely sure how to convert that over into something usable in a d20-based system, though. You'd need to make those building blocks weak enough that they don't break in the hands of a low-level character, but also strong enough that they stay relatively relevant throughout and in the higher levels let you stand toe-to-toe with tier 3 classes.

Feat chains which scale and escalate. Think stuff like mobility/spring attack, the improved [maneuver] lines, and reg/improved/greater [fighting style], only instead of "you get +4", it's "add half your level rounded up. If you have 3 feats in this chain, you can also perform X maneuver. If you have five feats in this chain, add your entire level instead to the thing, and you may also perform Y maneuver or choose to do Z durig other unrelated maneuvers".

Imagine two weapon fighting that let you make additional attacks during spring attacks, AoOs, and eventually during standard actions, or a two weapon defense that for a free attack when you were unsuccessfully tripped or successfully disarmed. Imagine improved trip that let you knock down grappled opponents, get a free power attack against downed foes, or trip does into each other for rough terrain. Imagine grappling that let you use targets for cover, or trip them a few squares away ("throwing"), or lock them in place and treat them as terrain such as standing on or hiding under them?

And that's just me thinking about adding scaling and escalating to the existing maneuver system from the PHB. With ToB stuff the sky is the limit. Whether they're feats, abilities or maneuvers doesn't matter so much as their interactive mechanisms.

[Thiyr]

Feat chains which scale and escalate. Think stuff like mobility/spring attack, the improved [maneuver] lines, and reg/improved/greater [fighting style], only instead of "you get +4", it's "add half your level rounded up. If you have 3 feats in this chain, you can also perform X maneuver. If you have five feats in this chain, add your entire level instead to the thing, and you may also perform Y maneuver or choose to do Z durig other unrelated maneuvers".

Imagine two weapon fighting that let you make additional attacks during spring attacks, AoOs, and eventually during standard actions, or a two weapon defense that for a free attack when you were unsuccessfully tripped or successfully disarmed. Imagine improved trip that let you knock down grappled opponents, get a free power attack against downed foes, or trip does into each other for rough terrain. Imagine grappling that let you use targets for cover, or trip them a few squares away ("throwing"), or lock them in place and treat them as terrain such as standing on or hiding under them?

And that's just me thinking about adding scaling and escalating to the existing maneuver system from the PHB. With ToB stuff the sky is the limit. Whether they're feats, abilities or maneuvers doesn't matter so much as their interactive mechanisms.

Not necessarily feat chains, but having them scale is the real trick. Actually, chalk that up as another thing that bugged me about ToB: Maneuvers by and large didn't scale. Take mountain hammer three times, chump! That said, I'd almost say the easiest way may be to use something similar to psionics, where you scale them based on how much you want to pay in the moment, thus letting you do a wide range of cheap, weak things at once as combo-type attack, or do one thing really well in depth, and then key it off of "stamina points" or something. Make the various pieces things you learn as you progress through a class as we have now, reducing quantity but giving a few stock generic options, and you're good.

Other idea to look at: the A:tLA d20 project that was on here a while back did a similar sort of mix-n-match idea, based around skill checks of all things. From what I've seen it looks to be pretty solid stuff, as well.

[Extra Anchovies]

Take mountain hammer three times, chump!

Actually, take Mountain Hammer, then take the upgraded version and swap out base-level Mountain Hammer for something else Stone Dragon.

Also, there's an advantage to having multiple versions of Mountain Hammer: You can use it more often without having to refresh maneuvers. Useful for Swordsages and Crusaders, even with adaptive style.

[SiuiS]

Not necessarily feat chains, but having them scale is the real trick.

Scaling alone is not enough. That keeps the individual maneuver relevant (ish), but it does absolutely nothing for cohesiveness of style. You WILL have one or two maneuvers which are First In Class. If they do not reinforce the other, lesser maneuvers (and in turn get reinforced by them) then people will never master any style, instead taking just the best from each school. That's what went wrong with 1e/2e martial arts. There was no reason no to end up with the best of everything and no chaff.


Actually, chalk that up as another thing that bugged me about ToB: Maneuvers by and large didn't scale. Take mountain hammer three times, chump!

That was bad design, yes, but they did scale. It was built into the class and not the individual maneuvers though; Mountain Hammer scaled every, say, five levels; they did this by forcing you to forget mountain hammer and encouraging you to grab Better Mountain Hammer with that open slot.


That said, I'd almost say the easiest way may be to use something similar to psionics, where you scale them based on how much you want to pay in the moment, thus letting you do a wide range of cheap, weak things at once as combo-type attack, or do one thing really well in depth, and then key it off of "stamina points" or something. Make the various pieces things you learn as you progress through a class as we have now, reducing quantity but giving a few stock generic options, and you're good.

That would work. Or like incarnum, where your focus is "permanent" but changes by round if necessary. I see a problem with this but I cannot articulate it yet. I will percolate.


Actually, take Mountain Hammer, then take the upgraded version and swap out base-level Mountain Hammer for something else Stone Dragon.

Also, there's an advantage to having multiple versions of Mountain Hammer: You can use it more often without having to refresh maneuvers. Useful for Swordsages and Crusaders, even with adaptive style.

Exactly.

[Thiyr]

Actually, take Mountain Hammer, then take the upgraded version and swap out base-level Mountain Hammer for something else Stone Dragon.

Also, there's an advantage to having multiple versions of Mountain Hammer: You can use it more often without having to refresh maneuvers. Useful for Swordsages and Crusaders, even with adaptive style.

Except you could be using that swap on something else, instead. And even outside of that, it just kinda felt like lazy design. Three maneuvers for the price of one, just add d6s! (they did that a few times, tbh, mountain hammer is just the one that pops out at first glance.)


As far as the concerns for never mastering a school, that can be dealt with by way of...well, prerequisites. DtD40k7ed had vastly simplified schools of 5 seed abilities, and you had to progress up the chain to get better ones. That could easily solve that problem. Plus, if the higher level ones cost more in the now, it may be ideal to use more of lesser ones if you design the abilities to be non-equivocal. So long as you don't do "Level 1 maneuver: Do 1d6 damage, level 7 maneuver: Do 15d6 damage", it can work. Heck, that's why sudden leap is easily my most-used maneuver from ToB, it's a needed effect that's useful at any level.

[Petrocorus]

Imagine two weapon fighting that let you make additional attacks during spring attacks, AoOs, and eventually during standard actions, or a two weapon defense that for a free attack when you were unsuccessfully tripped or successfully disarmed.

I agree with this. Scaling and synergising feats would actually make the fighter a much more decent class.
Concerning TWF, the first thing to do IMHO, is to let higher level feat cancel or lower the penalty to hit and to damage for the off-hand attack. Improved / Greater TWF should include Oversized TWF / Dual Strike / Double Hit / TW Pounce and some other feats. And why not include the TW Defense line into the TWF line.

[ngilop]

Bhu, take a look at my DIsciplines for my own fighter fix (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?318268-My-Latest-big-project!-(-a-big-deal-fighter-fix)), and see if there are any there that might give you imagination a start jump:)

I have things like SiuiS mentioned ( the 2-weapon fighting thingies). I never finished it on this site. but theres enough there to be a good start. and it came out of my own desire for how ToB failed, and how 3rd ed itself FAILED to capture the 'essence' of a mundane warrior of legend.

[SiuiS]

Indeed. I think many fighter fixes stem from that. Need to retry my old one. I stopped encause the 5e playtest was once really close in concept.

[YossarianLives]

I want to inflict status effects against multiple opponents, alter the battlefield's actual terrain, summon or unsunmon creatures, break resistances and immunities, steal abilities and ongoing effects, or otherwise do things that I can't just do with a feat.

Iron. Heart. Surrrrrrrrgge.

[Bhu]

Round 3: Specific Maneuvers you would like to see added. I will hint that I will have more than strikes/boosts/counters.

[Eldan]

More movement effects. Flight is absolutely not out of the question for me, for a magical discipline. I wouldn't have a problem with gaseous form or incorporeality for high-level shadow hand, either. As far as I'm concerned, Stone Dragon characters can just bull rush their way through walls, too.

[Nightraiderx]

movement style boosts:

desert wind type movement boost where you move and you make a fire wall in the process.

moar shield bash and sword and board type synergy. (sword/bash 1-2 punch)

manuevers that disable armor.

bull-rush type style that relied on movement speed and dex, not strength.

making it a point system would help with full attack actions. (replace normal attack with manuever by spending points.) this makes AoO's alot more interesting as well.

[DarkSonic1337]

More move action maneuvers in general would be awesome. Alternate movement modes and movement with perks (like negating AoOs, gaining concealment, creating difficult terrain, ect).

Stone Dragon needs tremorsense and burrow. Also it should be able to do it's maneuvers while not grounded (though maybe give it a slight bonus if you are grounded for the "immovable object" feel.)

All of the unofficial ToB errata.

Have maneuver DCs be based off of class, not the school.

More ability damage and status ailments.

[Bhu]

Where is the unofficial ToB errata?

[Rijan_Sai]

Where is the unofficial ToB errata?

I carry it with me! (in my sig)

[Bhu]

*grumbles something about getting old...*

Next topic: Maneuvers lasting more than one round, yea or nay!

[Coidzor]

*grumbles something about getting old...*

Next topic: Maneuvers lasting more than one round, yea or nay!

Maneuvers with a "casting time" measured in more than a single round?

Maneuvers where the effect lasts for several rounds after the initiator has used the maneuver?

Maneuvers where performing the maneuver and having it take effect is broken up across multiple actions and multiple rounds, like, say, a maneuver where one did a standard action attack once a round for three rounds but the manuever effect of the strike would increase or multiply? Or like a maneuver where on turn one an enemy is grappled and damaged, on the second turn is used as a weapon for a full attack, taking half of the damage dealt by the martial adept, and then on the third turn is thrown to another square X distance from the martial adept?

[Bhu]

The second two are closer to what i had in mind

[Eldan]

Sounds fun. I was working on something similar too, actually. Conditional maneuvers, I called them, temporarily. There's maneuvers that give the enemy a condition and maneuvers that you use when the enemy has a certain condition, for combos.

[Nightraiderx]

I'm sure you can make boosts that last longer than a round.

I'm wary of having manuevers cost a standard action because then we go back to the "obviously I'm going to use my full attack at lvl 20 instead of a maneuver"

I just think manuevers should augment any attack action that way you get around some of the melee/ranged restriction, AoO use and setting up combos with your full attack procedure.

descriptor tags and new enemy conditions would make it feel fresh as well, as well as incorporating the usual trip/grapple/disarm/flat-footed conditions into new ways.

[OldTrees1]

I'm sure you can make boosts that last longer than a round.

I'm wary of having manuevers cost a standard action because then we go back to the "obviously I'm going to use my full attack at lvl 20 instead of a maneuver"

I just think manuevers should augment any attack action that way you get around some of the melee/ranged restriction, AoO use and setting up combos with your full attack procedure.

To avoid the "full attack instead" problem, you could also have non action maneuvers that either replace an attack or alter an attack. Thus a 11th level warrior would be able to do 3 interesting things per turn rather than 1 interesting thing or 3 uninteresting attacks.

[Tvtyrant]

One thing which I always thought would be cool is to have a system of at-will strikes based on situational aspects and a limited pool of strike points, using up which would cause you to become first fatigued, then exhausted, then unconscious.

So a Rogue who is in a situation where they can sneak attack can blind an opponent as a standard action, but then loses 1 strike point. After they use up all 4 they are fatigued, the next time they use a strike that combat they become exhausted, and the 6th strike they drop. Give them a big list they can pick from for the at-will ones.

Then they get special ones which take up multiple strike points and can only be used when critting while they could sneak attack, say. So you crit on an opponent, and you get to make an additional attack which does something like (make a Save or Die), but then the Rogue instantly loses a bunch of strike points from the exertion.

[Extra Anchovies]

I'm sure you can make boosts that last longer than a round.

I'm wary of having manuevers cost a standard action because then we go back to the "obviously I'm going to use my full attack at lvl 20 instead of a maneuver"

Multi-round boosts raises the issue of potentially stacking up boosts until things get crazy. If there were any boosts that lasted beyond the round's end, I'd want them to be standard or move actions to enact. Casting already has huge balance issues from buff stacking, we don't need that with initiating. (every multi-round boost would need to be compared to every other boost in the game to make sure they don't get broken when used together)

Standard-action maneuvers should be good enough that they're worth giving up your full attack for. Path of War has some good examples of this, such as strikes that deal piles of bonus damage and impose status conditions. Being able to wallop an opponent, daze them for a round, and have your move action left over might be worth trading away your full attack for the turn, and that's the point.

[Coidzor]

Sounds fun. I was working on something similar too, actually. Conditional maneuvers, I called them, temporarily. There's maneuvers that give the enemy a condition and maneuvers that you use when the enemy has a certain condition, for combos.

Oh, that does sound like a nifty way to do things somtimes. :smallsmile:


I'm sure you can make boosts that last longer than a round.

I'm wary of having manuevers cost a standard action because then we go back to the "obviously I'm going to use my full attack at lvl 20 instead of a maneuver"

I just think manuevers should augment any attack action that way you get around some of the melee/ranged restriction, AoO use and setting up combos with your full attack procedure.

descriptor tags and new enemy conditions would make it feel fresh as well, as well as incorporating the usual trip/grapple/disarm/flat-footed conditions into new ways.

Hmm, having some maneuvers which are activated by full attacking which are compatible with swift actions and others which take a full-round action and allow a full-attack or full-attack equivalent but are not compatible with swift actions seem like two ways of doing that, although the latter would seem to be incompatible with moving, which is probably less than optimal. I suppose having them cost one's standard and one's swift to allow a full-attack-maneuver might be one way to do that, too.


The second two are closer to what i had in mind

Sounds neat, then.

[Petrocorus]

Multi-round boosts raises the issue of potentially stacking up boosts until things get crazy. If there were any boosts that lasted beyond the round's end, I'd want them to be standard or move actions to enact. Casting already has huge balance issues from buff stacking, we don't need that with initiating. (every multi-round boost would need to be compared to every other boost in the game to make sure they don't get broken when used together)

Standard-action maneuvers should be good enough that they're worth giving up your full attack for. Path of War has some good examples of this, such as strikes that deal piles of bonus damage and impose status conditions. Being able to wallop an opponent, daze them for a round, and have your move action left over might be worth trading away your full attack for the turn, and that's the point.

I personally would like a boost which can be used in combination with a full attack. Not forcibly a big one, but something to allow you to actually use full attack without renouncing to use maneuvers.

[Extra Anchovies]

I personally would like a boost which can be used in combination with a full attack. Not forcibly a big one, but something to allow you to actually use full attack without renouncing to use maneuvers.

Boosts are swift actions. You can already use them with full attacks, and that's what they're for. Strikes are the ones that can't be used with a full attack, and are the ones I address in my post.

[gooddragon1]

What would you like to see maneuvers do that they don't do currently?

I'd like to see more of them scale past level 20 and better. I'd like to see elemental damage that doesn't die against resistance and immunity. I'd also like to see more prestige classes that hone in on one specific discipline (iron heart, diamond mind, etc.).

[Eldan]

Oh, that does sound like a nifty way to do things somtimes. :smallsmile:

I think so, yes. Of course, you'd probably need to give people more maneuvers, if some are very situational. Still, a lot of them can be very small things. Like a Setting Sun strike that ends up with the enemy prone followed by a Stone Dragon strike that deals extra damage to prone enemies.

[Nightraiderx]

Hmm, having some maneuvers which are activated by full attacking which are compatible with swift actions and others which take a full-round action and allow a full-attack or full-attack equivalent but are not compatible with swift actions seem like two ways of doing that, although the latter would seem to be incompatible with moving, which is probably less than optimal. I suppose having them cost one's standard and one's swift to allow a full-attack-maneuver might be one way to do that, too.


What makes them incompatible? I never said that the maneuver idea I presented are activated by a full attack, what I was trying to say is that strike manuevers can be used as non-actions to augment any attack action instead of limiting them to standard action/full attack action. You can limit the power by introducing stamina points (points you use that regenerate each round) so you can't go and spam a bunch of 9th/8th's in a full attack action. It would also open the path for sucky fighter feats to have some affect. (spring attack now becomes run by maneuver strike). The option I presented still allows you to move, use a boost and smack someone with a high level 9th manuever. It also brings new play styles from the regular rules. (AoO tripper, Karma Strike AoO, Robilar's Gambit, Weapon Style /two-weapon fighting feats/ sword and board/ ranged/ touch spells/ ranged touch spell) without having the limitation of (this is the only school that will allow you to use ranged attacks)


I think so, yes. Of course, you'd probably need to give people more maneuvers, if some are very situational. Still, a lot of them can be very small things. Like a Setting Sun strike that ends up with the enemy prone followed by a Stone Dragon strike that deals extra damage to prone enemies.

This is why I also suggested the non-action, replace an attack action maneuver thing. under the old system you'd have to wait until your next turn, or use standard action stacking. (factotem/psionic). In this system you'd be allowed to do both with a two-attack full attack or do one the previous round and into the other. That way it adds more tactics in a full attack and standard attacks.

[Eldan]

Hmm. Not sure how comfortable I am with that, really. I don't want to see level 20 warblades throwing around four maneveuvers per turn (yes, I know they'd be weaker, but they would still all have some effect and putting four effects on an enemy just has giant abuse potential).

[OldTrees1]

Hmm. Not sure how comfortable I am with that, really. I don't want to see level 20 warblades throwing around four maneveuvers per turn (yes, I know they'd be weaker, but they would still all have some effect and putting four effects on an enemy just has giant abuse potential).

I am confused. Why don't you want to see 20th level Warblades do 4 different interesting things(4 maneuvers) on their turn? Wizards can do 2 interesting things per turn and their interesting things have durations and are a bigger impact.

[Nightraiderx]

Hmm. Not sure how comfortable I am with that, really. I don't want to see level 20 warblades throwing around four maneveuvers per turn (yes, I know they'd be weaker, but they would still all have some effect and putting four effects on an enemy just has giant abuse potential).

Abuse in what way? a level 20 warblade still would have to get into range in order to use his full attack, at the moment can only target one foe at a time,
and people said they didn't want a (hurr durr I have +xd6 to damage) montage. The most potential he would have would be able to lock down several enemies (three if I burned feats to get the spring attack line), or to combo enough damage to take someone out with a pouncing/full attack manuever (barbarians can easily do this at level 20), ranged attacks are sorely lacking power in 3.5 so a little damage/condition boost would be kind of cool for them. And you'd still have to hit them with the full attack (at level 20, AC becomes less relevant to miss chance stuff). The abuse would come more from the maneuver levels themselves (and whether they either scale well and are leveled appropriately for balance of power. Meanwhile at level 20, a wizard casts meteor for lulz while Battle controlling everything with in sight with no save- suck or die.


edit: that being said the condition staple could make some interesting combo and tag team combinations rather than. (we flank the enemy and attack them)

[ZamielVanWeber]

I forgot: I would love for there to be a feat that let me do non-lethal with maneuvers if I so choose. Wanted that for ages.

[Eldan]

I am confused. Why don't you want to see 20th level Warblades do 4 different interesting things(4 maneuvers) on their turn? Wizards can do 2 interesting things per turn and their interesting things have durations and are a bigger impact.

Dunno. In my head, that would translate to slapping four status effects on an enemy, which seems very, very crippling.

Hey, I'm also not comfortable with a lot of stuff the wizard can do.

[Curmudgeon]

Lack of ranged support, as others have already mentioned.

Vancian mechanics for readied maneuvers, only worse: whereas a spellcaster can prepare the same spell multiple times, the martial adept gets to ready and use a maneuver just once in an encounter (leaving out the refresh shenanigans). Essentially, they're saying Chuck Norris forgets how to perform a roundhouse kick because he's just done one and it's fresh in his mind. :confused:

[Nightraiderx]

Dunno. In my head, that would translate to slapping four status effects on an enemy, which seems very, very crippling.

Hey, I'm also not comfortable with a lot of stuff the wizard can do.

A fighter can at least inflict a couple at level 20 with a full attack action. 1. Trips the opponent (prone condition) 2. Disarms on the second attack. 3. Sunder's the opponent's Armor. So if he is successful the opponent is unarmed, prone, and has lower AC due to his armor being cleaved into. I assume that like Disarm/Sunder and Trip that the conditions will either have saves associated with them or be able to his with lower attacks.

[Alent]

Lack of ranged support, as others have already mentioned.

Vancian mechanics for readied maneuvers, only worse: whereas a spellcaster can prepare the same spell multiple times, the martial adept gets to ready and use a maneuver just once in an encounter (leaving out the refresh shenanigans). Essentially, they're saying Chuck Norris forgets how to perform a roundhouse kick because he's just done one and it's fresh in his mind. :confused:

This mostly.

I would rather have one mountain hammer that scales with initiator level, rather than four different grades of mountain hammer.

I also think patterning the system after 9th's casters was silly when spontaneous casters and invocations are a closer match to the essence of the idea. Having 4 grades of maneuver would both help kill some of the redundancy and encourage making each discipline tree a wide oak rather than a slender christmas tree with a Five shadow creepy ice enervation star on top.

I've been playing around with the idea of a spontaneous initiator in my homebrew, but I have nothing edited enough to be post. :smallfrown:

[Petrocorus]

This mostly.

I would rather have one mountain hammer that scales with initiator level, rather than four different grades of mountain hammer.

I also think patterning the system after 9th's casters was silly when spontaneous casters and invocations are a closer match to the essence of the idea. Having 4 grades of maneuver would both help kill some of the redundancy and encourage making each discipline tree a wide oak rather than a slender christmas tree with a Five shadow creepy ice enervation star on top.

I've been playing around with the idea of a spontaneous initiator in my homebrew, but I have nothing edited enough to be post. :smallfrown:

This is something i really agree with. Scaling with level would simplify the things. Being inspired by Invocations would be appropriate too. I believe Invocations are actually a pretty good mechanics. I was myself working on a Paladin class with divine invocations. I understand why they used the spellcasting pattern, though. It's a commoner and better known system, and it might be easier for the developers to scale the maneuvers on 9 level than on 4 ou 5 grades.

[OldTrees1]

Dunno. In my head, that would translate to slapping four status effects on an enemy, which seems very, very crippling.

Hey, I'm also not comfortable with a lot of stuff the wizard can do.

Do you allow single target save or lose spells(normally 4th-6th level spells) at 20th level? (I am assuming the four status effects are sufficient to be considered a save or lose rather than save or very very crippling)

[Gemini476]

This mostly.

I would rather have one mountain hammer that scales with initiator level, rather than four different grades of mountain hammer.

I also think patterning the system after 9th's casters was silly when spontaneous casters and invocations are a closer match to the essence of the idea. Having 4 grades of maneuver would both help kill some of the redundancy and encourage making each discipline tree a wide oak rather than a slender christmas tree with a Five shadow creepy ice enervation star on top.

I've been playing around with the idea of a spontaneous initiator in my homebrew, but I have nothing edited enough to be post. :smallfrown:

Well, four grades maps out roughly to 1st level, 6th level, 11th level and 15th level. So 1st, 3rdish, 6th and 8th level spells, if you want a rough reference for what casters are capable of at those levels.

Personally I think five grades might be better, though - 1st, 5th, 9th, 13th and 17th. It's easier to reference to what a Wizard etc. is capable of at those levels, and has the fifth level of competence coincide with the craziness that is 9th level spells.

More granularity gives you more opportunities to keep the character relevant in the Wacky Wizard World, since you don't have (to use Pathfinder's Rogue as an example) a 8th-level character choosing options from the same pool that was available at 2nd level. If you have four levels, there's 2.5 spell levels that go by for each of those. A lot happens in 2.5 spell levels.

Although nine levels does have the advantage of giving you a new tier every other level (with a weird gap at 19th level because I guess Gygax wasn't expecting people to actually play to those levels?). It's in a pretty good place, to be honest, and I can understand why they cribbed from it for Maneuvers.


In my personal opinion, at least.


I also rather like what 4E ended up with, where rather than having a 9th-level spell you have a 17th-level spell because that's the level where you get access to it and balancing everything around "this is how strong options should be at this level" rather than "this is how strong options should be at this spell level, never mind that some classes get them six level later". That seems like a pretty great idea, to be honest.

[Andion Isurand]

I'd like to see more of them scale past level 20 and better. I'd like to see elemental damage that doesn't die against resistance and immunity. I'd also like to see more prestige classes that hone in on one specific discipline (iron heart, diamond mind, etc.).

What if the existing disciplines were expanded?

I've been dabbling with making more Shadow Hand maneuvers that deal cold damage, and perhaps Desert Wind could have more that deal desiccation damage.

[Bhu]

Rough idea for school making:

Choose whether the school will be melee, ranged, or natural weapons or based on grapples. Or any of the above two categories. If you go this route (say you choose melee and ranged), choose which is the dominant factor in the schools teaching as 2/3rds of the maneuvers will be used with that choice. I.e. if you get 6 level 5 maneuvers, an d melee is the dominant teaching style, then 4 of those maneuvers will be melee and 2 ranged.

Choose a key skill and 5 associated weapons (if you chose natural weapons then any natural weapon you have is an associated weapon, if you chose grapple then grapples and unarmed strikes are).

You then make 6 maneuvers of each level. Sound good as a starting point?

[Nightraiderx]

6 per level seems a bit excessive, unless you are using the "Fire damage X" and "Fire damage mk II x" formula

I would say 4 is a good max limit to impose.

[Extra Anchovies]

6 per level seems a bit excessive, unless you are using the "Fire damage X" and "Fire damage mk II x" formula

I would say 4 is a good max limit to impose.

It might be better to have 4 of levels 1-3, 3 of levels 4-6, and 2 of levels 7-9. Remember, a character will only ever learn two ninth-level maneuvers (four if they swap out lower-level ones), so there is not much reason for there to be six.

[Bhu]

Will explain and revise after work tonight.

[Bhu]

1st: 6
2nd: 4
3rd: 4
4th: 3
5th: 3
6th: 3
7th: 3
8th; 3
9th: 2

Okay hows this for total maneuvers/stances per school per level?

And a Maneuver example:


Power Attack
Maneuver Type Strike
Level: 1st
Prerequisite: None
Initiation Action: 1 Standard Action
Range: Melee Attack
Target: One creature
Ability Type Ex

As part of this maneuver you make a melee Attack. If your strike is successful the opponent also suffers one of the following effects chosen at the time of this Maneuvers creation:

Allies gain a +4 Bonus on Attacks against the target

You get a +4 Bonus on the attack roll, but opponents gain a +4 Bonus on their attack rolls against you

Charging Bull Rush deals damage, ignores attacks of opportunity

Target cannot make attacks of opportunity for 1 round

Make a Sunder attempt against an object carried or worn by the target. If you hit, the target must make a Fortitude save or be knocked backwards 10'. (This is in addition to the damage to the object)

an additional 1d6 points of damage.

causes opponent to suffer -4 to hit any target but you.

You get the general idea. Maneuvers would now be a generic attack or effect of some sort with the option of one of several different effects based around a theme. You might even have the option of making them EX or SU or adding descriptors, and could take the same maneuver twice in a school, but with a different option.

I was considering the extra maneuvers to reflect the difficulty in truly mastering one school unless yo spent feats or took PrC levels to do so, and to give an option for regional sub-schools.

[Bhu]

I'm petitioning for a subforum over on min max to fire off the project. Will post link when available!

[Kristinn]

My grief with Tome of Battle can roughly be divided into two groups.

The first, and less important one, is how powerful it is at lower levels. Lets compare a low level Warblade with a Fighter. At these levels small numerical bonuses make a big difference. F.ex. the Warblade inexplicably has a larger Hit Die than the Fighter. The only other class I can think of that has a d12 is a Barbarian, and he doesn't get Heavy Armor proficiency, and looses further AC when raging. Secondly all these low level maneuvers increases damage output a whole lot more than fighter feats. So you have a character that is numerically superior to the Fighter on the only levels fighters did halfway decently. There was no need to give essentially numerical improvements to low level martial characters.

The second, and more serious contention I have is how the per encounter/day attack options taste. In essence the ToB system is basically the same as 4E, as has been pointed out before. And I hate 4E, it feels like a video game, it's not grounded in fantastical realism. If a character is not magical there should be no reason for him not to be able to use the same technique/attack repeatedly. (Even if they refluff the ToB classes as magical, per encounter limitations still don't make sense, an encounter is a metaconcept, not a quantifiable in-game time period.)

The changes I would like to see to ToB classes is the following:

1. Don't make them numerically superior to other mundane classes with strikes/stances on top. Give the Warblade a d8 HD and medium armor proficiencies. His strikes and stances will compensate both for lower numbers and fewer feats compared to fighter.

2. Make all strikes "at-will", and make them compatible with full-attacks. Basically strikes will most of the time be optional attack options, to Daze an opponent, deal ability damage, etc. Make other higher-level "strikes" options for full-attacks that have even more powerful effects.

[torrasque666]

Warblades don't get Heavy Armor.

[SiuiS]

The knight class has d12 hit die and heavy armor.

[torrasque666]

And honestly the reasons you can't do the same maneuvers over and over again makes sense. Anyone who has fought with a melee weapon can tell you that making the same move over and over again is what gets you killed. A Warblade or a Swordsage knows this and thus doesn't perform the same maneuvers over and over again. As for the refresh for a warblade, I don't think it makes sense at higher levels, but it does at lower levels. You need to take a quick second to focus yourself back into your strategy. This is something that can be done in the heat of battle. Possibly give them a few maneuvers every 4th level(where they'd normally be able to switch out one) that they no longer have to refresh consciously. That it just does it automatically once they get through them all. Same with a swordsage.

Crusaders on the other hand are described as getting their maneuvers from a flash of insight. Insight doesn't always strike the same way twice(hence the randomness of the order) so it doesn't make sense for them to constantly be able to do the same thing over and over again.

[Vhaidara]

1. Don't make them numerically superior to other mundane classes with strikes/stances on top. Give the Warblade a d8 HD and medium armor proficiencies. His strikes and stances will compensate both for lower numbers and fewer feats compared to fighter.

So, ignore the entire point of the book? The purpose of the Warblade was to replace the Fighter, just like the Crusader replaces the Paladin and the Swordsage replaces the Rogue in combat (and Unarmed Swordsage replaces the Monk)

[Prime32]

The second, and more serious contention I have is how the per encounter/day attack options taste. In essence the ToB system is basically the same as 4E, as has been pointed out before. And I hate 4E, it feels like a video game, it's not grounded in fantastical realism. If a character is not magical there should be no reason for him not to be able to use the same technique/attack repeatedly. (Even if they refluff the ToB classes as magical, per encounter limitations still don't make sense, an encounter is a metaconcept, not a quantifiable in-game time period.):smallconfused: Have you ever seen a fight between two people of approximately equal skill, where someone won by using the same attack over and over?

Since you mentioned video games, have you ever seen a fighting game where professional players win by using the same attack over and over?

[georgie_leech]

:smallconfused: Have you ever seen a fight between two people of approximately equal skill, where someone won by using the same attack over and over?

Since you mentioned video games, have you ever seen a fighting game where professional players win by using the same attack over and over?

Come to think of it, RPG's are the only games I've ever seen where someone wins by using the same move over and over.

[Kristinn]

Warblades don't get Heavy Armor.

Excuse my mistake then. I don't have the book, and after DnDtools disappeared I've resorted to google searches, which apparently aren't always accurate (dnd.sendric.com/charref/classes/warblade.html).

That's actually a little better, although I still don't like that they have such a large hit die.

[Petrocorus]

Excuse my mistake then. I don't have the book, and after DnDtools disappeared I've resorted to google searches, which apparently aren't always accurate (dnd.sendric.com/charref/classes/warblade.html).

That's actually a little better, although I still don't like that they have such a large hit die.

So, your problem with ToB is that its classes are better than the core classes that they were made to replace, a replacement decided because the said core classes where not good enough.
So, basically, your problem with ToB is that its doing its job to improve melee classes well, isn't it?

[OldTrees1]

:smallconfused: Have you ever seen a fight between two people of approximately equal skill, where someone won by using the same attack over and over?

Since you mentioned video games, have you ever seen a fighting game where professional players win by using the same attack over and over?

Have you ever met someone that loses their ability to swing a sword after swinging their sword? Spamming attacks can be invalidated based on circumstances and tactics. I do not think it should be invalidated arbitrarily by using amnesia mechanics.

Having only 1 ability that you must spam is BAD design.
Having no persistent abilities can be bad taste to some people (other people, like you, have no problems with it).
Just becuase ToB made improvements to martial combat, does not mean that it was perfect or that its skeleton was not flawed.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Have you ever met someone that loses their ability to swing a sword after swinging their sword? Spamming attacks can be invalidated based on circumstances and tactics. I do not think it should be invalidated arbitrarily by using amnesia mechanics.

In a real swordfight, spamming will just get your attacked blocked, and at some point they'll block it well enough that they can successfully deflect it and you'll be wide open.

[OldTrees1]

In a real swordfight, spamming will just get your attacked blocked, and at some point they'll block it well enough that they can successfully deflect it and you'll be wide open.

It will only be blocked if the opponent changes tactics. The double thrust low for instance would not be blocked merely by repetition. It requires the opponent shifting to a different counterattack (double crossdown -> crossdown and jumpkick).

It is unrealistic for a warrior to be unable to remember the double thrust low 6 seconds after using it especially when the opponent is still using the double crossdown counterattack.

Some people find this breaking of verisimilitude as or more distasteful than you find Fighter's spam attack distasteful.


PS: If you are willing to abstract the defender varying their counterattack without mechanical representation, then you can abstract the attacker varying their attack without mechanical representation.

[Vhaidara]

It will only be blocked if the opponent changes tactics. The double thrust low for instance would not be blocked merely by repetition. It requires the opponent shifting to a different counterattack (double crossdown -> crossdown and jumpkick).

It is unrealistic for a warrior to be unable to remember the double thrust low 6 seconds after using it especially when the opponent is still using the double crossdown counterattack.

Okay, here is the idea (I don't know specific names, but can follow theory)
You are fighting Bob.
Bob is using stance A, which is neutral, because he doesn't know your fighting style.
You use Maneuver B. Bob now knows that how you will come at stance A with maneuver B. Therefore, maneuver B no longer works.
You use maneuver C. Again, Bob learns how to counter your Maneuver C.
You take the time to refresh, reobserving how Bob has changed his stance and how he has blocked you attacks. You now bring a different approach to Maneuvers B and C, allowing them to work again.

[OldTrees1]

Okay, here is the idea (I don't know specific names, but can follow theory)
You are fighting Bob.
Bob is using stance A, which is neutral, because he doesn't know your fighting style.
You use Maneuver B. Bob now knows that how you will come at stance A with maneuver B. Therefore, maneuver B no longer works.
You use maneuver C. Again, Bob learns how to counter your Maneuver C.
You take the time to refresh, reobserving how Bob has changed his stance and how he has blocked you attacks. You now bring a different approach to Maneuvers B and C, allowing them to work again.

If you are willing to abstract the defender's varying response, then you are capable of abstracting the attacker's varying method. Partial abstraction leads to the absurdity of arbitrary amnesia

You may or may not find the absurdity of arbitrary amnesia to be distasteful. Some do.

[NEO|Phyte]

If you are willing to abstract the defender's varying response, then you are capable of abstracting the attacker's varying method. Partial abstraction leads to the absurdity of arbitrary amnesia

You may or may not find the absurdity of arbitrary amnesia to be distasteful. Some do.
Where exactly do you get the notion that it's some sort of arbitrary amnesia? You don't forget how to swing your sword in that one cool way, you just aren't properly prepared to do it, until you take whatever action is needed to refresh your maneuvers.*



*Been a while since I've cracked my ToB, but I think the crusader's default fluff may actually have their random maneuver granted mechanics described as flashes of inspiration, so they kinda sorta DO forget how to, until they suddenly remember again.

[OldTrees1]

Where exactly do you get the notion that it's some sort of arbitrary amnesia? You don't forget how to swing your sword in that one cool way, you just aren't properly prepared to do it, until you take whatever action is needed to refresh your maneuvers.*



*Been a while since I've cracked my ToB, but I think the crusader's default fluff may actually have their random maneuver granted mechanics described as flashes of inspiration, so they kinda sorta DO forget how to, until they suddenly remember again.

If a Warblade uses a Strike maneuver and the victim does not make any defensive adjustment, then can the Warblade use the same maneuver next turn? No, somehow they "forgot" that maneuver until they refresh. (Crusaders fluff makes sense. Swordsage and Warblade do not have such justifications)

If we abstract the defender's defense to the point that we can assume they made a defensive adjustment despite the lack of mechanical change, then we are at the point where we abstract the attacker's offense to the point that we assume they made an offensive adjustment despite the lack of mechanical change. Aka if the defender doesn't need to do anything to prepare for a particular maneuver, then the attacker doesn't need to do anything to prepare the maneuver against the new defense.

Again, this breaking of verisimilitude by ToB is not distasteful to everyone. Only to some.

[Vhaidara]

Except that isn't how it works. Defense is abstracted. So is offense. Do you think low level combat literally consists of two guys swinging once each at the other guy every six seconds? No. The entire event is abstracted.

[OldTrees1]

Except that isn't how it works. Defense is abstracted. So is offense. Do you think low level combat literally consists of two guys swinging once each at the other guy every six seconds? No. The entire event is abstracted.

Are you agreeing with me? When offense is abstracted there is no reason to think a maneuver (a family of techniques at this abstraction level) would become unreadied.

[Vhaidara]

Are you agreeing with me? When offense is abstracted there is no reason to think a maneuver (a family of techniques at this abstraction level) would become unreadied.

Except that the maneuver based offense isn't abstracted. It is the specific use of a maneuver. The defense is abstracted, allowing the defender to adapt. However, until he refreshes the maneuver, the initiator is trying to use the same, unabstracted offense that your opponents abstracted defense can counter.

[OldTrees1]

Except that the maneuver based offense isn't abstracted. It is the specific use of a maneuver. The defense is abstracted, allowing the defender to adapt. However, until he refreshes the maneuver, the initiator is trying to use the same, unabstracted offense that your opponents abstracted defense can counter.

Yes. I was explaining that the clash of the 2 abstraction levels is distasteful to some. Not to everyone. Just to some.

[SiuiS]

Have you ever met someone that loses their ability to swing a sword after swinging their sword? Spamming attacks can be invalidated based on circumstances and tactics. I do not think it should be invalidated arbitrarily by using amnesia mechanics.

Yes, I have seen actual fighters move from the fool's guard into a specific strike when the enemy falls for it and then be unable to do that same strike again.


If a Warblade uses a Strike maneuver and the victim does not make any defensive adjustment, then can the Warblade use the same maneuver next turn? No, somehow they "forgot" that maneuver until they refresh. (Crusaders fluff makes sense. Swordsage and Warblade do not have such justifications)

If you move from a sheathed sword into a left-forward rising cut with a twist that leaves you in jodan-no-kamae, you do not forget how to do a rising cut to jodan-no-kamae, you just cannot do it until you move out of that from back into a form receptive to the rising cut. This is done in real life just like it is in time of battle; you either stop everything entirely and reset; you perform a basic melee attack to refresh yourself into the sword behind you on your left side position; you do not return here and simply continue forward using different techniques as the situation demands.

That's perfectly accurate to reality.

You're also very wrong about the defender needing to adjust their defense. This is a drill done in many martial arts and it teaches you that openings exist for varying fractions. Take two people of roughly similar rank, and have one do nothing but alternate right and left straight punches. The other does nothing but alternate the appropriate blocks. You will see one of two things happen;

• the attacker is fast enough and powerful enough that the defender cannot set completely each time, losing cumulative fractions of a second until they simply cannot block and get hit
• the defender is fast enough and diverts force enough that eventually the attacker will be unable to reset and punch again while the defender is open

In both cases, repetition creates an opening that would go entirely unnoticed if the practitioners had not bothered with the drill. Cycles do not synch forever. I've won mock sword fights this way; the other guy locked me down so I couldn't move without getting hit so we traded mostly vertical strikes. My form was better so I eventually began to parry and then strike his head, then eventually his shoulders, until he got fed up and stormed off. Because my technique was tighter the whole way through, I got milliseconds each exchange that I cashed in for victory.

[OldTrees1]

@SiuiS
You are abstracting the offense less than you are abstracting the defense. Many are fine with that, some don't like the resulting taste.



I find it strange that some fans of ToB can't stand anyone(even lesser fans) disliking a fundamental part of it. How much repetition is needed? (If this criticism of the fans does not apply to you then ignore it.)

[Vhaidara]

I find it strange that some fans of ToB can't stand anyone(even lesser fans) disliking a fundamental part of it. How much repetition is needed? If this does not apply to you then ignore it.

Actually, from what I've seen, it's a case of people objecting to your comments on the realism of it. You are claiming that it is unrealistic, while they are saying otherwise, and providing personal experiences to back it up.

It's kind of like (and I understand this is taking it to an extreme) you said that barbarian's move speed was stupid because no one could possibly run that fast (160ft/6 seconds), and someone posted that they had done a 100 yard dash in under 12 seconds (has been done), then you kept saying that it was impossible.

[OldTrees1]

Actually, from what I've seen, it's a case of people objecting to your comments on the realism of it. You are claiming that it is unrealistic, while they are saying otherwise, and providing personal experiences to back it up.

It's kind of like (and I understand this is taking it to an extreme) you said that barbarian's move speed was stupid because no one could possibly run that fast (160ft/6 seconds), and someone posted that they had done a 100 yard dash in under 12 seconds (has been done), then you kept saying that it was impossible.

Rewind a bit further back. Someone else said they did not like the taste of refresh mechanics. They were jumped. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal. Someone jumped me. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal. Someone jumped me. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal.Someone jumped me. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal.Someone jumped me. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal.Someone jumped me. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal.Someone jumped me. I responded with an explanation from someone with a similar dislike with a qualifier that the distaste is not universal. (edit: I think I missed a few copies)

If you really dislike spamming attacks, perhaps stop spamming something that isn't working? I have listened to every response. Yet they continue to favor the defender by using different levels of abstraction between attack and defense. This is natural since that is what ToB uses. However it is that disparity that I find distasteful. Claiming that it makes sense while presuming I accept such a disparity will not make the disparity palatable for me.

[Kelb_Panthera]

So, ignore the entire point of the book? The purpose of the Warblade was to replace the Fighter, just like the Crusader replaces the Paladin and the Swordsage replaces the Rogue in combat (and Unarmed Swordsage replaces the Monk)

This was -not- the point of the book and I utterly loathe how the idea is so readily accepted.

A fighter and a warblade both built with an equal eye towards optimizing them will be fairly comparable. The same is largely true of monk/rogue and swordsage. A paladin is not only comparable to a crusader at the same optimization level but the paladin has so much higher an optimization ceiling that it's laughable.

The ToB classes have more interesting mechanics. I can't deny that. The idea that they're inherently better to the point of warranting the title of outright replacement just pisses me right off.

[aleucard]

One potential idea to make for a sensible reason to why some attacks can't be spammed would be to implement a sort of combo-system. Basically, things you've done in previous turns modify the things that you can do in the next turn. Split the maneuvers into separate categories along these lines, and have it so that performing a maneuver from group A is a prerequisite for group B, but you can't perform a maneuver from Group C in the next place after a Group B maneuver, and some maneuvers either require or are boosted by being in a stance from their school, and any number of things that cause the maneuvers to interact between themselves. Complicated? Hell Yes. However, if you're going to be diving into the pool anyway, it doesn't matter much where you dive in from.

[sonofzeal]

However, if you're going to be diving into the pool anyway, it doesn't matter much where you dive in from.

Down that path lies madness. There's no way to fully simulate combat short of LARP. There'll always be more details to to cover. You'll have to draw the line somewhere.

[SiuiS]

@SiuiS
You are abstracting the offense less than you are abstracting the defense. Many are fine with that, some don't like the resulting taste.


No I'm not. I am literally using one specific attack and one specific defense. Those are equal abstraction levels. I think you're rationalizing your position at this point.

[OldTrees1]

No I'm not. I am literally using one specific attack and one specific defense. Those are equal abstraction levels. I think you're rationalizing your position at this point.

You are right, when I reread you post you were not using abstraction at all. You were talking about 2 specific attacks and 2 specific blocks with no room for any meaningful variation.

However I have trouble matching maneuvers to specific attacks. With effort I could get one to be on the same level as "straight punch" but that 1 level of abstraction removes the cycle you were talking about. When we are talking about things like "Steel Wind" we are a few abstraction levels above "punching straight with the right fist". No longer is it bound to a specific arm or even a specific angle of attack.

At this point though, I am once again fed up with the intolerance for differing tastes. This is not entirely your fault but a simple explanation of taste should not devolve into pages of back and forth repetition. Don't you agree?

[aleucard]

Down that path lies madness. There's no way to fully simulate combat short of LARP. There'll always be more details to to cover. You'll have to draw the line somewhere.

For me, the line is wherever it is the most fun. Is this too fiddly to be fun? If yes, then scrap it and dial it back a bit. If no, then all's well. Can't figure that out without giving it a shot, though.

[SiuiS]

I don't see why you feel an explanation of something is somehow intolerance? You asked a question, involving a fairly simple to evaluate situation. The answer given doesn't support your premise. That's all.

[OldTrees1]

I don't see why you feel an explanation of something is somehow intolerance? You asked a question, involving a fairly simple to evaluate situation. The answer given doesn't support your premise. That's all.

I did not ask a question. I answered a question about a personal taste by explained a personal taste and stated that the personal taste was not universal. Your inability to accept your taste not being universal does not authorize your crusade.[/conversation]

[georgie_leech]

I did not ask a question. I answered a question about a personal taste by explained a personal taste and stated that the personal taste was not universal. Your inability to accept your taste not being universal does not authorize your crusade.[/conversation]

I'm all for encouraging more rational discourse, but could you have possibly found a more condescending way to phrase that? :smallannoyed:

While both sides may be fine in liking or disliking it for whatever reasons, it's hard to not see what appears to be a common misconception as a misunderstanding, rather than a reasoned outlook.

[LudicSavant]

In most fighting games, you have to take time to reset to a neutral position before you can do the same move again... yet tend to be able to chain other, DIFFERENT moves immediately. This is true in real life as well: Each move you make changes your stance, and there is an array of moves available from any given stance... which generally don't include the same move. Moreover, the position of your enemy and the general situation changes what kind of maneuvers are available to you. Of course, ToB doesn't truly model all of this complexity, but some degree of abstraction is necessary.

Which CRPG looks like it has more natural combat?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAFwMFBYbvs (cannot repeat the same move without foregoing actions)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GY_-6kyjfLQ (can do the same exact move repeatedly with no delay)

[Nightraiderx]

I like the stances grant access to certain strikes ability. There would be more stances, but could allow for some interesting things.
Make strikes at will but limited by the stances make three tiers of strikes, stances.

Strike I , Strike II, Strike III
Stance I, Stance II, Stance III

I'd make it a free action to initiate a Stance I while using a Strike I, switching from stance to stance as a free action to go into Strike II and Strike III maneuvers, or you stay in your stance and use another Strike I manuever. This way however would make a stance act more like a boost than a buff (minor things that effect the next attack roll). You can also use counters in this way, I'd make counter's minor but more based on AoO's than immediate actions. (maybe a scaling IL per use). Long standing buffs would probably be separate and be called styles. So all in all one would have Strikes, Counters, Stances, Rushes, and Styles (rushes being move style initiator things)


Edit: Also adding in descriptors to simulate it more [prone] [air-borne] [grappled] [stunned] [disarmed] [bull-rushed] if you add those general kind of descriptors then you limit it to real combat. not to mention descriptors for the initiator. [turned on side] [prone] [in-air] [moved] [crouched]

[sonofzeal]

I think the easier way would be something like....

Guards: Low, Middle, High.

Each ToB stance could probably have one of these labels slapped on it, and there'd be a generic one of each that everyone knows. Generic Low prioritizes attack rolls, Generic Middle prioritizes AC, and Generic High prioritizes damage, each likely with a small penalty to the other areas. I suppose it might be useful to also have a "Neutral Guard" that does nothing.

Each strike is given a "starting guard" and an "ending guard". Crushing Mountain Blow might require High Guard and move you to Low Guard, and you'd select a Low Guard Stance you know (or the generic one).

With this, you could adapt the existing ToB maneuvers, scrap the recovery mechanics, only add a bit more complexity to each, and... eh. Might be more fun. Might be more realistic. Personally I'm fine with the existing ToB mechanics and don't see the need, but I'm sure it'll appeal to some here.

[Susano-wo]

I'm fine with the current system, but that sounds pretty freaking sweet. adds an additional feeling of verisimilitude to the attacks without cluttering things up terribly

[LudicSavant]

I think the easier way would be something like....

Guards: Low, Middle, High.

Each ToB stance could probably have one of these labels slapped on it, and there'd be a generic one of each that everyone knows. Generic Low prioritizes attack rolls, Generic Middle prioritizes AC, and Generic High prioritizes damage, each likely with a small penalty to the other areas. I suppose it might be useful to also have a "Neutral Guard" that does nothing.

Each strike is given a "starting guard" and an "ending guard". Crushing Mountain Blow might require High Guard and move you to Low Guard, and you'd select a Low Guard Stance you know (or the generic one).

With this, you could adapt the existing ToB maneuvers, scrap the recovery mechanics, only add a bit more complexity to each, and... eh. Might be more fun. Might be more realistic. Personally I'm fine with the existing ToB mechanics and don't see the need, but I'm sure it'll appeal to some here.

The trick there would be to have a way of presenting that information in a way that you wouldn't have to regularly remind other players which guard a given character was in, in order to avoid bogging down gameplay.

[Nightraiderx]

The trick there would be to have a way of presenting that information in a way that you wouldn't have to regularly remind other players which guard a given character was in, in order to avoid bogging down gameplay.

I feel the I,II,III system would be easier, because it would be just based on the stance not a stance and figuring out what bonus a low/middle/high guard was in.
At lower levels, you only have 1-2 attacks so it would make sense to not bother with II or III strikes until 3rd level manuevers and above.

[sonofzeal]

The trick there would be to have a way of presenting that information in a way that you wouldn't have to regularly remind other players which guard a given character was in, in order to avoid bogging down gameplay.

ToB characters already have to remember what stance they're in. How is this any different?

[Bhu]

http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?board=233.0 and we're live :D

Alas it's in the wee hours here which means content posting will have to come tomorrow.

[LudicSavant]

ToB characters already have to remember what stance they're in. How is this any different?

Count the number of player operations per round with each mechanic. Start with the bit where you change stances with every maneuver instead of only when you use up a Swift Action to change. Factor in people having to be reminded more often of state changes, or checking what moves people can go into from a low guard and which they can't in order to utilize their own counterplay.

Not a massive difference, but it's there.

[Bhu]

I has some rough draft stuff up, including some level 1 boosts. Keep in mind this is the basics. I want to get those done before adding the fiddly bits that let you modify them.

[SiuiS]

I did not ask a question.[/quoye]

No sir, you did indeed ask a question.

[QUOTE=OldTrees1;18558838]Have you ever met someone that loses their ability to swing a sword after swinging their sword?

This is a question. You received answers you didn't like and began to fabricate ways in which you were still correct. Those fabrications were corrected and you technically agreed you were wrong but then suggested it didn't matter because I was, by association, being "intolerant". Somehow. When I asked why a question you raised being answered, you say you didn't ask a question? All this here;


I answered a question about a personal taste by explained a personal taste and stated that the personal taste was not universal. Your inability to accept your taste not being universal does not authorize your crusade.[/conversation]

Is completely false and easily verifiable as such by following the citation arrows. All you had to do was respond to the statement on techniques being unavailable after use with 'my experiences differ'. Trying to make me into some sort of villain, repeatedly, is poor form. :smallfrown:


*



Count the number of player operations per round with each mechanic. Start with the bit where you change stances with every maneuver instead of only when you use up a Swift Action to change. Factor in people having to be reminded more often of state changes, or checking what moves people can go into from a low guard and which they can't in order to utilize their own counterplay.

Not a massive difference, but it's there.

I think where we get lost is that for some of us, this level of intricacy is the draw. So, as it is the point, it doesn't feel like extra work. The whole do something fun and you'll never work a day in your life thing.

[Ashtagon]

I'm actually okay with tob not modellingevery stype of stance, guard, riposte, and whatever that happens in real swordfighting.

That would make ita cumbersome model to use when fighting with weapons other than swords for one, and for another, it wuld reduce melee to a rock-paper-scissors game. I'd rather the specific details of each attack be abstracted, and details only if the character is trying for something specialthat isnt "I hit him really hard". Sadlt, asome tob maneuvers are exactly that.

[Morty]

This was -not- the point of the book and I utterly loathe how the idea is so readily accepted.

A fighter and a warblade both built with an equal eye towards optimizing them will be fairly comparable. The same is largely true of monk/rogue and swordsage. A paladin is not only comparable to a crusader at the same optimization level but the paladin has so much higher an optimization ceiling that it's laughable.

The ToB classes have more interesting mechanics. I can't deny that. The idea that they're inherently better to the point of warranting the title of outright replacement just pisses me right off.

That the ToB classes largely replace the old ones from Player's Handbook and other earlier books isn't only because the ToB classes are strong or well-designed, but because the old classes are all-around crappy and designed around a needlessly restrictive paradigm.


One potential idea to make for a sensible reason to why some attacks can't be spammed would be to implement a sort of combo-system. Basically, things you've done in previous turns modify the things that you can do in the next turn. Split the maneuvers into separate categories along these lines, and have it so that performing a maneuver from group A is a prerequisite for group B, but you can't perform a maneuver from Group C in the next place after a Group B maneuver, and some maneuvers either require or are boosted by being in a stance from their school, and any number of things that cause the maneuvers to interact between themselves. Complicated? Hell Yes. However, if you're going to be diving into the pool anyway, it doesn't matter much where you dive in from.

That would require scrapping 3.x's combat model and replacing it with a better one. A noble (if perhaps doomed) endeavour, but on a scope rather beyond a single book.

[Bhu]

I'm tackling Boosts first and we have our first issue: Boulder Roll. Boulder Roll is a 4th Level Maneuver that basically temporarily allows you the use of the Improved Overrun feat. That shouldn't be more than 1st Level.

[Bhu]

Iron Heart Endurance lets you heal double your level in HP, if you are at 50% or lower. For a 6th Level Boost this is absolute crap. Would you guys prefer I lower the Level, or buff it till it's appropriate for 6th level?

[OldTrees1]

Iron Heart Endurance lets you heal double your level in HP, if you are at 50% or lower. For a 6th Level Boost this is absolute crap. Would you guys prefer I lower the Level, or buff it till it's appropriate for 6th level?

Um. Why not do both? Let the manuever be available early but scale as your IL grows. That way you have a meaningful decision when it comes to dropping it or keeping it as a maneuver known.

[SiuiS]

Because the value of a single level-equivalent resource is measured in magnitudes. A "heal 2 hp/level when under 51% HP" maneuver is a valid choice for a 2nd level maneuver, say (where when it comes online it's valuable; it would be useless as a level 1 maneuver), but a level 6 maneuver doing somehing eg similar couldn't scale because simply increasing the amount of HP per level wouldn't work to make it worthwhile. Sixth level maneuvers come online at level 11 where petrification, death, paralysis and fear locks are all things that are just as important to shuck, if not more so, than some damage. Ability damage and drain, too.

[OldTrees1]

Because the value of a single level-equivalent resource is measured in magnitudes. A "heal 2 hp/level when under 51% HP" maneuver is a valid choice for a 2nd level maneuver, say (where when it comes online it's valuable; it would be useless as a level 1 maneuver), but a level 6 maneuver doing somehing eg similar couldn't scale because simply increasing the amount of HP per level wouldn't work to make it worthwhile. Sixth level maneuvers come online at level 11 where petrification, death, paralysis and fear locks are all things that are just as important to shuck, if not more so, than some damage. Ability damage and drain, too.

You have two separate arguments here.

One is about quantitative scaling. Aka 6hp at 3rd is fine but 22hp at 11th is not. This is work to fix but not something to be discouraged about. You just use a different scale. IL2/2 for example.

The other is about qualitative scaling. Aka condition/effect A is important at 3rd but not at 11th and vice versa. This might be impassable but then again it might not. The ability to reroll a saving throw or the ability to remove a condition would both keep up with much of this scaling(as we have already seen).

[SiuiS]

They aren't separate at all. Both increased quantity and quality are implicit in spell level increases. Every four levels of character brings a new magnitude of capacity.

[OldTrees1]

They aren't separate at all. Both increased quantity and quality are implicit in spell level increases. Every four levels of character brings a new magnitude of capacity.

*Confused* Did I disagree with you on this? No, I did not. I highlighted that your 1 paragraph contained 2 valid criticisms that result from spell level increase and then addressed each of them in turn. I even conceded that while one of the criticisms necessarily has a solution, the other does not necessarily have a solution.

[SiuiS]

You're right actually. I misunderstood your "why not both", when you just meant lower the level and also increase it's ability to scale. I don't even remember what I originally thought you meant, but aye, that's a good idea.

[OldTrees1]

You're right actually. I misunderstood your "why not both", when you just meant lower the level and also increase it's ability to scale. I don't even remember what I originally thought you meant, but aye, that's a good idea.

Huh. Your initial feedback was spot on though. There are limitations as you pointed out. Mere healing no matter the scaling will be less useful after some point as more alternative threats (petrification, death, paralysis and fear locks) show up.

[SiuiS]

Mmhmm. I'm assuming a similar system to the old maneuvers list; by the time one becomes suboptimal another comes along that handles the next level of things.

So we need more feedback from Bhu? Are maneuvers going to grow or overlap or expire? Would having a sixth level "compound" maneuver work? Like "clear any one of the following conditions; stun, paralysis, petrification, daze, or death from a death effect, plus one of the following;
Clear another condition from the above list
Use a lower level (same school) maneuver which recovers HP as part of this maneuver

Special: you can use this maneuver to recover from a condition that would otherwise prevent you from using this maneuver (such as being paralyzed, petrified, or dead) as a full round action within one round of suffering the condition and only if this maneuver is used to end the condition that prevents you from using this maneuver, ie a character who is paralyzed, petrified, and killed by a [Death] effect could not use this maneuver because one of the three conditions would remain"

[Bhu]

There will be something similar to the current maneuver swap. For example i nthe current maneuvers thread you'll see I have Energy Enhancement 1 and an Energy Enhancement 4. Once you gain access to 4th Level Maneuvers you can swap the energy enhancement 1 for 4.

[Bhu]

How about I make it identical to Iron Heart Surge (a level 3 maneuver) but that it also heals 2d8 damage?

Speaking of which should I still leave Iron Heart Surge at level 3?

[OldTrees1]

How about I make it identical to Iron Heart Surge (a level 3 maneuver) but that it also heals 2d8 damage?

Speaking of which should I still leave Iron Heart Surge at level 3?

I would have expected the healing to scale.

Iron Heart Surge, when properly edited to avoid cheese, deals with conditions. So it should be placed relative to them. Lagging merely 1 spell level behind Glitterdust, Web, and Fog Cloud seems reasonable to me.

[Bhu]

Quicksilver Motion gives you an extra Move Action as a 7th level power. 7th Level seems mildly excessive for just a move action. I have the renamed Boosts from ToB up over on minmax. Not too many of them by the look of it, so I'll be having to expand the boosts a bit.

[Bhu]

No thoughts on the Boosts as they are? If so I'll be moving on to Counters.

[Bhu]

One with the Shadow lets you be incorporeal until the beginning of your next turn as an 8th level counter. Does anyone else find that to be a little off?

[Nightraiderx]

Problems with boosts as they are: (I'm late to the party)

Windstride: Make bonus increase by IL (+10/+20/+30/+30)
Distracting ember doesn't make sense (as in cool flanking I guess?) I feel setting the enemy on fire would be a cool effect. as a bonus to flanking also have a chance to set them on fire
Skirmish damage boosts are welcome as well as tumble as a swift action

Devoted Spirit lacks in boosts, Defensive Rebuke is alright,
Some kind of early level provoke-type boost would be cool

I could see a scaling boost that gives temporary HP for a round at the expense of AC (setting up crusaders for using their special ability more)

Diamond Mind's quicksilver motion is very weak, I'd move it down lower.

Some boosts around increasing accuracy for an attack or ignoring concealment would be good to have.

Iron Heart was already touched upon.

A boost to increase damage when several creatures threaten you would be cool, as a bonus to want to be ganged up on.
Also maybe a boost to deny enemy movement away from you.
More AoO type stuff (you have stormguard warrior geez)

Setting Sun
This style isn't much for the boost department being more of a counter school in general.
but it could be cool getting swift action stunning type stuff (maybe stuff like sickening/nauseous)
body part striking would could also be a boost (called shot: head for example could put a confusion status on the enemy)
(called shot: arm for a disarm + stun effect)

Shadow Hand
Has some excellent boosts, I think feinting boosts would really work with shadow hand's style (using concealment)

It should have an early lvl 1 boost to feint, or a boost to deal extra damage when foe is flanked/flat-footed
boosts that add slow would be perfect.
Cloak of deception is powerful for a lvl 2 effect i'd probably make it a higher lvl possibly.

Stone Dragon
it has very few good boosts, fatigue is an interesting boost thing as well as boosts to trip as a swift action (stomping your foot on the ground)
or increasing your critical threat range (hitting hard)

Tiger Claw
Has a few but potent boosts, not much to change here. might add a boost for bleeding damage

White Raven

WRT is a powerful boost, lesser effects that grant bonuses to move or giving allies AoO's if you successfully attack an enemy.
WRT will probably have to be limited to ally only, or be pushed up.


I feel that every discipline should have a good 3rd lvl boost so it's not an instant gimme to take Cloak of deception or White Raven Tactics or Iron Heart Surge

I can write up some thoughts about counters in a bit.

[Bhu]

Scorpion Parry and Fools Strike are the same maneuver with two differences:

One lets you deflect the attack into an adjacent opponent, one lets you reflect the attack back at the original attacker


one is 6th level, one is 8th level