What's the point of separating attack rolls from damage rolls?

[Argothair]

What's the advantage to having characters roll twice on every attack -- once to see if they hit and once to see how much damage they deal?

One obvious advantage is that rolling twice lets you vary how much damage gets dealt from one hit to the next -- it'd be boring if every sword attack either missed or dealt exactly 5 damage. But it seems to me you could get the same effect by rolling once, subtracting armor class from the roll, and then assigning whatever's left as damage. For example, if your attack dice total is 18 and your opponent's AC is 15, you deal 3 damage.

In other words, Attack Roll + Offensive Bonuses - Armor Class - Defensive Bonuses = Damage.

If you want swingy damage (e.g. for a flail) you can use 2d12 for the attack roll, and if you want predictable damage (e.g. for a club) you can use 6d4 for the attack roll. Bonuses that improve your accuracy could be modeled as a flat bonus (e.g. +2) and bonuses that improve your damage could be modeled as a swingy bonus (e.g. +1d4). Bonuses that improve your damage at the cost of your accuracy, ala Sharpshooter and Great Weapon Master, could be modeled as a swingy bonus plus a flat penalty (e.g. +2d6 - 5).

Wouldn't rolling only once save a lot of time compared to the rules as written? Would anything be lost if you only rolled once for attack and damage?

For extra credit, if you do like the two-roll system, can you explain why Armor Class reduces accuracy instead of reducing damage?

[Mellack]

If you get rid of rolling a separate die for damage you remove the effects of having different weapons. An attack total of 19 vs defense 15 does 4 damage, regardless of them using a small knife or a greatsword. It gives an additional way to give variety.

[Naanomi]

Sounds like a great basis for a system that doesn't feel like DnD

[Broken Twin]

The biggest reason for separate rolls in systems that function that way is for abilities that modify the attack roll. The power of such riders can be skewed when you know the damage of the attack before choosing to use them (in relation to abilities such as rerolls or bonus to-hit).

Personally, when playing d20 systems, I always prefer to roll both attack and damage at once. If the attack misses, no harm. If it hits, then I don't need to make another roll.

In regards to armor reducing accuracy, that's primarily a D&D thing. Most other systems I've played have armor function as a modifier to toughness, or, to put it in D&D terms, damage reduction. If anything, wearing heavy armor would penalize your ability to dodge.

[JNAProductions]

Quick question-Strength increases damage. Dexterity increases accuracy. How is that handled?

[Slipperychicken]

In other words, Attack Roll + Offensive Bonuses - Armor Class - Defensive Bonuses = Damage.


This is the basic idea of what Shadowrun does, albeit with diepools instead of d20.

You make your attack roll, then the defender makes a defense roll (if applicable). If your attack exceeds the defense roll, you deal damage equal to the difference plus your weapon's base damage. Then the defender rolls to "soak" the damage with his armor or natural toughness, which can potentially reduce the damage to zero. Each weapon has an armor-penetration value which reduces (or increases, if negative) the number of dice the defender uses to soak damage. As you can imagine, this is slower than d20's way of doing things, but a little more simulationist. Also, everything comes out in bell-curve distributions, which is pretty neat.

And I agree with armor as damage-reduction. I don't like the way D&D handles it (i.e. An unlcad baby and a fully-armored knight take the same damage from my dagger).

[Symphony]

And I agree with armor as damage-reduction. I don't like the way D&D handles it (i.e. An unlcad baby and a fully-armored knight take the same damage from my dagger).

The difference is that it's pretty easy to find and hit a vulnerable spot to stick a dagger into an unclad baby, but quite a bit more difficult to find and hit that vulnerable spot on a fully-armored knight.

Furthermore, while they take the "same" damage numerically, relatively the baby's going to take far more damage (less hp), reflecting the fact that baby's are so much easier to kill.

Why did you choose a baby for your example, damn it.

[dev6500]

Another way I could imagine damage working is to just replace weapon damage rolls with the average number for the die rounded up or down. So d8s become 4, d10s 5, etc. Then if you want damage variability, make it based off of the attack roll. For every 2 points your exceed the ac with your attack roll, damage goes up by 1(if you wield a weapon 2 handed, damage goes up by 2 instead). Fewer rolls that way but some people like rolling damage die. Which I think might be the main reason. Just imagine if you turned fireball into a attack with no damage dice. I know most sorcerer players live for when they get to roll 10d6 on 10 enemies.

[Broken Twin]

The difference is that it's pretty easy to find and hit a vulnerable spot to stick a dagger into an unclad baby, but quite a bit more difficult to find and hit that vulnerable spot on a fully-armored knight.

Furthermore, while they take the "same" damage numerically, relatively the baby's going to take far more damage (less hp), reflecting the fact that baby's are so much easier to kill.

Why did you choose a baby for your example, damn it.

Yeah, baby's probably not the best example. D&D's equivalent of Toughness is technically the variable hit die. So a paladin is "tougher" and takes relatively less damage from a sword than a wizard does, in terms of total hit points remaining. The frequently suggested armor as DR would actually function a lot better in 5E than it did in 3E, given the significant reduction in number bloat that made it unusable in that edition.

[ISitOnGnomes]

How would you represent a character type that could reliably hit for relatively little damage? If you boost their attack so that they hit the majority of the time that would necessarily cause them to do ever larger amounts of damage.

Every fightery type character would almost feel the same. You would just use whatever means to increase your chance to hit since it would equally increase damage, until you always hit for more and more massive damage.

Sounds awefuly boring to me.

[JAL_1138]

If you want swingy damage (e.g. for a flail)

I see what you did there

[Person_Man]

In real life a big weapon that hits you deals more damage then a small weapon that hits you (all other things being equal, like accuracy and force). Some players want their roleplaying games to simulate this aspect of real life, even if it is a magical fantasy land. D&D in particular grew out of historical tabletop miniature games, which went to great lengths to simulate the various differences between particular weapons, armor, the effect of weather, morale, etc.

[burninatortrog]

You can roll the attack and damage dice at the same time if you want to save time.

[goto124]

Make sure the dice are of different color?

[ProphetSword]

So, if you have four attacks across several turns and roll (with modifiers) 18, 10, 16, and 22 a creature with AC 18 would take 2 points on two hits across four attacks from a guy with a greatsword and a creature with an AC of 13 would take 17 damage across three hits on four attacks to a guy with a stick he picked up off the ground.

Sure.

[Psikerlord]

What's the advantage to having characters roll twice on every attack -- once to see if they hit and once to see how much damage they deal?

One obvious advantage is that rolling twice lets you vary how much damage gets dealt from one hit to the next -- it'd be boring if every sword attack either missed or dealt exactly 5 damage. But it seems to me you could get the same effect by rolling once, subtracting armor class from the roll, and then assigning whatever's left as damage. For example, if your attack dice total is 18 and your opponent's AC is 15, you deal 3 damage.

In other words, Attack Roll + Offensive Bonuses - Armor Class - Defensive Bonuses = Damage.

If you want swingy damage (e.g. for a flail) you can use 2d12 for the attack roll, and if you want predictable damage (e.g. for a club) you can use 6d4 for the attack roll. Bonuses that improve your accuracy could be modeled as a flat bonus (e.g. +2) and bonuses that improve your damage could be modeled as a swingy bonus (e.g. +1d4). Bonuses that improve your damage at the cost of your accuracy, ala Sharpshooter and Great Weapon Master, could be modeled as a swingy bonus plus a flat penalty (e.g. +2d6 - 5).

Wouldn't rolling only once save a lot of time compared to the rules as written? Would anything be lost if you only rolled once for attack and damage?

For extra credit, if you do like the two-roll system, can you explain why Armor Class reduces accuracy instead of reducing damage?
I find most people roll their d20 and damage dice at the same time. If you miss, just ignore the damage roll.

[Knaight]

In real life a big weapon that hits you deals more damage then a small weapon that hits you (all other things being equal, like accuracy and force). Some players want their roleplaying games to simulate this aspect of real life, even if it is a magical fantasy land. D&D in particular grew out of historical tabletop miniature games, which went to great lengths to simulate the various differences between particular weapons, armor, the effect of weather, morale, etc.

In real life, a hit you just barely land is going to do a lot less than a really solid one you were able to line up. Simulating that would involve something akin to the attack-defense paradigm, with some modification. Having just attack-defense is a problem, because it removes an avenue of mechanical differentiation. It's no longer possible to mechanically distinguish between someone who is skilled and strikes frequently, and someone who is just really big and hits hard when they do hit.

Basically, the simulation aspect is a bit of a wash. The mechanical differentiation is where the real difference lies, and it's a fairly important differentiation. It's far from the only way to do it: Attack-Defense+Variable 1-Variable 2, where the variables reflect weaponry, character size, character strength, armor, etc. works pretty well. Something like Burning Wheel's IMS system with three tiers of damage based on how far you beat defense by works pretty well too.

[ISitOnGnomes]

In real life a big weapon that hits you deals more damage then a small weapon that hits you (all other things being equal, like accuracy and force). Some players want their roleplaying games to simulate this aspect of real life, even if it is a magical fantasy land. D&D in particular grew out of historical tabletop miniature games, which went to great lengths to simulate the various differences between particular weapons, armor, the effect of weather, morale, etc.

In D&D the roll of the damage die is what determines whether you barely hit or not. If you roll a 1 it was a grazing blow for minimal damage. If you roll max then it was a well aimed and brutal blow. Attack just determines whether or not an attack landed.

[Balor777]

Yeah DnD has many things that could be changed..

1)Why you take a natural 10+Armor(+dex) when soneome attacks you and you dont do a defensive roll?Why you HAVE to be passive at 9 out of 10 turns on a 5v5 fight?A defensive D20 roll+armor mods would be much better.Even IF we use the rulles the exact opposite way and your attack is a static 10+str/dex+prof, and the defence be d20+armor modifiers would be BETTER. Because of the "im bored until its my turn" mechanism.With the "reverse roll system" at your turn if you hit you would still roll the damage rolls.And you have a beautiful feeling that you DO something even if its not your turn.
I tried this at one session.It was very fun and enjoyable.
Exactly why spell fights are better.The enemy does a spell?You do the defensive roll.


2)Why someone with 12 str performs exactly the same with someone with 13?

3)Why armors give AC?All armors should give damage reduction not AC.
AC should be only by DEX.
So AC(Named evasion) should be 10+DEX(if any)+shield(if equiped)
Damage reduction:Depending on armor.Plate: 8DR, scale mail 4DR, leather 1DR etc etc.STILL using the maximum DEX depending on armor.
It far more realistic, because the plate guy CHOOSES less agility for damage reduction and agile guy CHOOSES cause he can to let his body try to evade the hits, and bases his luck less on the armor.
Also make it that critical hits ignore Damage reduction.


So a full plate fighter with a shield would have 12AC and damage reduction 8 for "My armor will keep me alive NOT my reflexes" fighting style
and a 18 DEX ranger with studded leather and a shield would have 16AC and damage reduction 2 for"My reactions will make me evade the hits not taking damage and my armor is second layer of insurance in case i wont manage to evade the hit"

Name what we use today as AC to Evasion
And make ArmorClass(AC) the Damage reduction you have from the armor.Sounds better and makes more sense doesnt it?

This system makes easier and BETTER system for the DM describing the hits players suffer.As a DM how would you describe the same 10 hp damage hit to a rogue with 18 AC and to a heavy armor guy?
The way we use the AC today, all the full plate guys allways take serious blows here and there but the armor reduces the damage and the Dex guys allways take scartch damage.The same ogre dealing 20 damage to the plate fighter and to the leather rogue:The ogre allways looses his strength when attacks the rogue, but its allmighty again when he hits the fighter...
Calculating mosters Evasion and AC(damage reduction)
Look at the monster AC in the monster manual.Substract the DEX modifier for the AC as writen in the book.The result -10 is the damage reduction.For evasion its 10+DEX modifier.
Its very easy.
An enemy with 18 AC and 14(+2) DEX has 18(ac) -2(dex modif) -10 = 6damage reduction and it has evasion of 10+2(dex modif)=12
For total 12 Evasion and 6 AC(damage reduction, natural or armor weared)
Flexible attacking:
With this system you can let the PC choose how to attack every opponent.Players will be able to add the proficiensy bonus either to the Attack or the damage roll.
So if the are fighting a dragon with high natural armor(high damage reduction) they choose to add their proficiency to the damage rolls to bypass that hard scales in the cost of accurasy,
and if they are fighting that very evasive rogue they would add the prof modfier to the attack roll because in this case manage to hit him is crusial and enough(light armor) and they should focus on the attack.
Using this method of flexible attacking will add great strategy and flavour to the game depending on type of enemies and during the fight itself(A fighter knows his time is close to die fighting that big stone giant
and for his maybe last attack tries to hit the throat of the giant(adds the prof bonus to damage))

Ill make a big thread on the homebrew section about this Armor class system.Ive done the calculations almost but i need another week to finish.
Ill be in touch.

[Alefiend]

Rolemaster solved the hit/damage split back in the '80s. They solved it the same way they solved every problem: with charts. Every weapon type had a chart matching the possible attack roll outcomes ((d100 + attack modifiers) - defense modifiers) for each of 20 types of armor. Better rolls = more damage dealt and a better column on the appropriate critical damage chart.

D20 is fine as is. Not perfect, not realistic, but fine for my games.


EDIT: misremembered mechanic

[Person_Man]

In real life, a hit you just barely land is going to do a lot less than a really solid one you were able to line up. Simulating that would involve something akin to the attack-defense paradigm, with some modification. Having just attack-defense is a problem, because it removes an avenue of mechanical differentiation. It's no longer possible to mechanically distinguish between someone who is skilled and strikes frequently, and someone who is just really big and hits hard when they do hit.

Basically, the simulation aspect is a bit of a wash. The mechanical differentiation is where the real difference lies, and it's a fairly important differentiation. It's far from the only way to do it: Attack-Defense+Variable 1-Variable 2, where the variables reflect weaponry, character size, character strength, armor, etc. works pretty well. Something like Burning Wheel's IMS system with three tiers of damage based on how far you beat defense by works pretty well too.

I agree. Also, I don't support the fiddly simulationist aspects of the game. I was just pointing out where they came from. If you go back and read through the historical tabletop miniature games of the 1960's-1970's, virtually all of them involved rolling to-hit and rolling separately for damage, with some kind of modifier to one or both for the type of weapon being used and/or the type of armor it is being used against. D&D grew out of that paradigm.

[DireSickFish]

I don't think it would save any time. Instead of one person being told they hit then just rolling damage you have to communicate how much you hit and subtract that from the AC. I could see a system based on this but it would have to be designed from the ground up, as the classes damage are balanced around when they hit dealing a certain amount of damage.

A lot of system with dice pools do the hitting for more deals more damage. Shadowrun was mentioned. Star Wars Edge of The Empire does something similar.

[Doug Lampert]

I don't think it would save any time. Instead of one person being told they hit then just rolling damage you have to communicate how much you hit and subtract that from the AC. I could see a system based on this but it would have to be designed from the ground up, as the classes damage are balanced around when they hit dealing a certain amount of damage.

A lot of system with dice pools do the hitting for more deals more damage. Shadowrun was mentioned. Star Wars Edge of The Empire does something similar.

Subtraction slows things down far more than people seem to believe. Yes, it's easy to do, so is grabbing two sets of dice and rolling them together and that also slows things down more than most people seem to believe.

If you want variable damage and a single roll then you should try for something simple.

"Roll under" and the value on the die is also the damage works fine for example (you can even give bonuses to damage for some weapons so you don't lose any of the ability to have separate modifiers to hit and damage). This loses the idea that a natural 20 is good, but in fact older versions of the game had any number of "roll low is good" rules (ability rolls and thief abilities for instance), and changing that didn't make 3.0 "not D&D" to very many people, you could probably go with roll under, but you'd need to rebuild the system.

A "more D&D" approach would be to have flat damage for normal hits, declare that a roll of exactly AC is a "marginal hit" and a 20 a "critical hit" and give a bonus or penalty for a marginal or critical. If you hit about 60% of the time then roughly 1/6th of all hits will not do the "constant" damage which means that most fighter types will do varied damage on most battles rather than having it always be the same. This could be done with hardly any modifications to the current systems.

[Fwiffo86]

I can see benefits in large scale battles of using this method. It allows you to figure out exactly how many rounds before Army A defeats Army B.

A downside I see is that (and I could be wrong, I haven't actually done the math here) victory is always guaranteed no matter what you throw at your party. If you know that the party will do say 57 damage every round, day in and day out, you're encounters are going to have to deal more than that to be any sort of threat to the party.

There also really isn't any need for combat. You already know that the party will take X rounds to defeat their target. You also know they will take X damage during that time.

Might look something like this:

Ok, your group engages the dragon. You slay it in 4 rounds. The mage takes 25 damage, the rogue 12, the fighter 50, and the cleric 25. What do you do next?

[Knaight]

A lot of system with dice pools do the hitting for more deals more damage. Shadowrun was mentioned. Star Wars Edge of The Empire does something similar.

The ORE is particularly good about this. What you're looking for there is matching sets, and matching sets of more dice hurt more. Getting hit by a set of 2 is generally not too bad (though if the set is 10, 10 you get hit in the head, which generally sucks). Getting hit by a set of four? Sucks to be you.

[Safety Sword]

Bring back THAC0!

It's the only way!

This post is 100% sarcasm.

[SiuiS]

If you get rid of rolling a separate die for damage you remove the effects of having different weapons. An attack total of 19 vs defense 15 does 4 damage, regardless of them using a small knife or a greatsword. It gives an additional way to give variety.

Aye. Then weapons exist solely for their riders – damage type, range, speed, proficiency, feats.


Sounds like a great basis for a system that doesn't feel like DnD

Hehehehe.
You do know original D&D had every weapon do d6 damage, period? The hit roll was strictly to see if your skill was greater than the target's classification of armor and proficiency with it. The "damage roll" was how accurate your attack was at getting by those skills and striking true.

It's not that much "not like DnD" after all, really.



And I agree with armor as damage-reduction. I don't like the way D&D handles it (i.e. An unlcad baby and a fully-armored knight take the same damage from my dagger).

Yes, you take the same damage from six inches of steel through the neck regardless of your age, sex, ethnicity, fashion, manner of comportment, etc., that's intentional. HP is not and has never been relative health; HP is not relative to the person. It's a measure of how many hits you can take before dying.

Really, the idea that a vital stab should hurt less through armor misses the entire point of hitting despite the armor.


Yeah, baby's probably not the best example. D&D's equivalent of Toughness is technically the variable hit die.

Just so, and literally; a "hit die" was the exact same as a damage die, and every level have you additional "hits" you could survive, relatively speaking. A fighter with three hit dice could take three hits on average. From that perspective it's quote an elegant system, although it starts to fall apart when you tweak weapon outputs.


How would you represent a character type that could reliably hit for relatively little damage? If you boost their attack so that they hit the majority of the time that would necessarily cause them to do ever larger amounts of damage.

Simple. "This monster always takes only X damage from a hit unless struck with [appropriate damage type/weapon type]". Reverse minions, really.



Every fightery type character would almost feel the same. You would just use whatever means to increase your chance to hit since it would equally increase damage, until you always hit for more and more massive damage.

Sounds awefuly boring to me.

Back in my day you didn't differentiate your character by their numbers and feats and rules gibbets. You differentiated them by their character.

It's a sad and ironic thing that the game now is so focused on getting goodies that a lot of the feel seems to be gone. Once, you picked fighter because it have you proficiency, health and that was it. You didn't do it for the feat chain combos or anything. Now? Now everyone plans out a build until max level and never seem to a top and enjoy where they're at.

Quite a sad sight if you ask me.

[Fwiffo86]

Back in my day you didn't differentiate your character by their numbers and feats and rules gibbets. You differentiated them by their character.

It's a sad and ironic thing that the game now is so focused on getting goodies that a lot of the feel seems to be gone. Once, you picked fighter because it have you proficiency, health and that was it. You didn't do it for the feat chain combos or anything. Now? Now everyone plans out a build until max level and never seem to a top and enjoy where they're at.

Quite a sad sight if you ask me.

I second this. You are my new hero. Don't listen to the naysayers.

[Naanomi]

You do know original D&D had every weapon do d6 damage, period? The hit roll was strictly to see if your skill was greater than the target's classification of armor and proficiency with it. The "damage roll" was how accurate your attack was at getting by those skills and striking true.

It's not that much "not like DnD" after all, really.
Chainmail dueling rules had a big chart of weapon vs armor type for a to-hit system that was largely carried into DnD. Damage was 2d6 and hit points didn't exist; just a roll on a chart to see if you killed them outright or not.

Besides, the feel of DnD has built through many editions; it isn't just a reflection of the original source. To hit and damage rolls are part of the flow of DnD combat (along with AC and Savingthrows; which I would make more similar if I redesigned the system from the ground up) that are not necessary for a good system but are necessary for DnD to feel like itself for 90+% of players.

[Safety Sword]

Chainmail dueling rules had a big chart of weapon vs armor type for a to-hit system that was largely carried into DnD. Damage was 2d6 and hit points didn't exist; just a roll on a chart to see if you killed them outright or not.

As a player of a character, that sounds unfun... I mean, I like making characters, but not every combat.

[Morty]

Every fightery type character would almost feel the same. You would just use whatever means to increase your chance to hit since it would equally increase damage, until you always hit for more and more massive damage.

Sounds awefuly boring to me.

You seem to be implying they don't already feel the same, mechanically. Either way you roll to hit and damage until the cows come home. All that changes is where you get your bonuses.

This thread does a good job at showcasing that D&D's combat system is really shallow under layers of fake complexity. Indeed, doing what the OP proposes to cut down the 'do you strike home and harm your opponent' part of combat resolution would make sense. Then one could use the time you save this way to add some actual diversity.

[Fwiffo86]

You seem to be implying they don't already feel the same, mechanically. Either way you roll to hit and damage until the cows come home. All that changes is where you get your bonuses.

This thread does a good job at showcasing that D&D's combat system is really shallow under layers of fake complexity. Indeed, doing what the OP proposes to cut down the 'do you strike home and harm your opponent' part of combat resolution would make sense. Then one could use the time you save this way to add some actual diversity.

I agree with the complexity statement over all. The only problem is that using the OP's suggestion makes combat completely unnecessary. You already know how often you hit, exactly the amount of damage you deal, and thus how many rounds it takes to kill something. There is no need for the rolls in the first place. The DM could literally just tell you how combat went.

[Knaight]

I agree with the complexity statement over all. The only problem is that using the OP's suggestion makes combat completely unnecessary. You already know how often you hit, exactly the amount of damage you deal, and thus how many rounds it takes to kill something. There is no need for the rolls in the first place. The DM could literally just tell you how combat went.

This doesn't follow at all. There's still variation in how often you hit (regession to the mean takes a lot of rolls), events that happen in combat affect who can hit whom when, if you're doing anything beyond standing in one place and fighting there's likely variation in what needs to be rolled, so on and so forth. Also you don't know exactly the amount of damage you deal, since it's determined by how well you hit. You know an average, but you know that anyways.

[Doug Lampert]

I can see benefits in large scale battles of using this method. It allows you to figure out exactly how many rounds before Army A defeats Army B.

Huh? The variance need not change at all. Hit and miss chance defeats everything you claim.

The suggestion is COMBINING the effects of the two rolls, not eliminating rolls.


As a player of a character, that sounds unfun... I mean, I like making characters, but not every combat.

But in Chainmail you WERE NOT A PLAYER CHARACTER! You were running an army. It might have a hero, or superhero, or wizard, or dragon in it, and the dueling rules were for resolving special character vs. special character combat.

But all heroes were assumed to be more or less the same, because they were game pieces in army vs. army combat. You didn't roll up a chainmail hero at all.

The game D&D grew out of wanting to play the individual named character types and needing a bit more complexity.

Hero was a level 4 fighter (explicitly) in original D&D, and they gave using chainmail as an alternate combat system, in which case IIRC a level 1 fighter was a hero with a -3 to the 2d6 dueling roll.

[Fwiffo86]

Huh? The variance need not change at all. Hit and miss chance defeats everything you claim.

The suggestion is COMBINING the effects of the two rolls, not eliminating rolls.


Assume the following: All hits of 16 or higher inflict damage in the following ways:

16 - 0 damage
17 - 1 damage
18 - 2 damage
19 - 3 damage
20 - 4 damage

Vs. HP totals of 10, 20, 30

16 - infinate rounds
17 - 10 rounds 20 rounds 30 rounds
18 - 5 rounds 10 rounds 15 rounds
19 - 3.3 rounds 6.6 rounds 10 rounds
20 - 2.5 rounds 5 rounds 7.5 rounds

Find the minimum hit roll needed to inflict damage based on STR/DEX weapon damage. It tells you the number of rounds.

Same formula for Spell damage, except you add in all damage or no damage if you "hit".

Figure combat for minimum damage = rounds of combat and there is no need to actually play it out. The DM can tell you what happens.

[JAL_1138]

As a player of a character, that sounds unfun... I mean, I like making characters, but not every combat.

Also known as low-level wizards (and most other classes really) in the TSR era...good Lord I went through so many character sheets before I finally rolled well enough on HP to survive getting hit even once. I had more than a few with 1hp, back when 0hp was instant death. I could have died in one round to a squirrel.

Back in my day we died like flies and we liked it, dagnabbit!

[Talderas]

Personally, when playing d20 systems, I always prefer to roll both attack and damage at once. If the attack misses, no harm. If it hits, then I don't need to make another roll.

I actually dislike doing this for a meta-game reason. There are enough effects in 5th edition that can be used when you see the roll but not the outcome. If you have a bardic inspiration die and see you rolled low enough that you will probably miss but you can likely hit by expending the die then you also rolled minimum damage on your damage roll, you may decide not to use the bardic inspiration die in that case.

[Knaight]

Assume the following: All hits of 16 or higher inflict damage in the following ways:

16 - 0 damage
17 - 1 damage
18 - 2 damage
19 - 3 damage
20 - 4 damage

Vs. HP totals of 10, 20, 30

16 - infinate rounds
17 - 10 rounds 20 rounds 30 rounds
18 - 5 rounds 10 rounds 15 rounds
19 - 3.3 rounds 6.6 rounds 10 rounds
20 - 2.5 rounds 5 rounds 7.5 rounds

Find the minimum hit roll needed to inflict damage based on STR/DEX weapon damage. It tells you the number of rounds.

Same formula for Spell damage, except you add in all damage or no damage if you "hit".

Figure combat for minimum damage = rounds of combat and there is no need to actually play it out. The DM can tell you what happens.
This doesn't make any sense. You're still rolling every round, and you're not going to roll the same thing over and over and over again very reliably. Sure, if you roll a 17 every round then you could just calculate how long things take (assuming that factors like who can attack whom with what don't change, which is a terrible assumption). In practice, the very fact that you are still rolling to attack prevents this.

[Talderas]

In other words, Attack Roll + Offensive Bonuses - Armor Class - Defensive Bonuses = Damage.

Makes the 3rd level valor bard ability pointless since attack roll and damage roll are the same thing. BI normally can increase attack roll but 3rd level valor bards permit the recipient to use the BI dice to add damage directly. On the same note, this also greatly increases the power of cutting words for lore bards by essentially lowering the target's potential damage by lowering their attack roll even though they normally get one or the other.

[Fwiffo86]

This doesn't make any sense. You're still rolling every round, and you're not going to roll the same thing over and over and over again very reliably. Sure, if you roll a 17 every round then you could just calculate how long things take (assuming that factors like who can attack whom with what don't change, which is a terrible assumption). In practice, the very fact that you are still rolling to attack prevents this.

I'm just saying that you don't need to roll at all. Its great for figuring out huge battles instead of making 739 rolls.

[Myzz]

This doesn't make any sense. You're still rolling every round, and you're not going to roll the same thing over and over and over again very reliably. Sure, if you roll a 17 every round then you could just calculate how long things take (assuming that factors like who can attack whom with what don't change, which is a terrible assumption). In practice, the very fact that you are still rolling to attack prevents this.

I believe (and correct me if I'm wrong Fiffo) the idea is that there is an average number your roll + mods is going to produce. Over the course of an extended combat your rolls are more likely to come in line with the average. Over the course of several encounters your rolls will come to represent the average.

So if the point is to simplify.... why bother rolling in the first place since you know what the party average will be over the course of the encounters.

AND if your rolls dont represent the average, your either very lucky, a cheater, or a liar. After working in a casino for a few years (blackjack, poker, and roulette) I can tell you, there is no such thing as luck... its an illusion.

[Knaight]

AND if your rolls dont represent the average, your either very lucky, a cheater, or a liar. After working in a casino for a few years (blackjack, poker, and roulette) I can tell you, there is no such thing as luck... its an illusion.
I'm not saying that "my rolls don't represent the average" overall. They probably don't, for the simple reason that most polyhedral dice are weighted poorly (you've work in a casino, you know exactly what I mean regarding the standards to which they are manufactured). I'm saying that in the course of an individual encounter, there are few enough dice rolled that it's still chaotic. If you roll 100,000d20 with perfect dice, then you'd expect extremely close to 5,000 of each result. In a single combat, you might roll closer to 10d20. That's few enough that the odds of getting a fair number of higher rolls are still significant.

[Fwiffo86]

I'm not saying that "my rolls don't represent the average" overall. They probably don't, for the simple reason that most polyhedral dice are weighted poorly (you've work in a casino, you know exactly what I mean regarding the standards to which they are manufactured). I'm saying that in the course of an individual encounter, there are few enough dice rolled that it's still chaotic. If you roll 100,000d20 with perfect dice, then you'd expect extremely close to 5,000 of each result. In a single combat, you might roll closer to 10d20. That's few enough that the odds of getting a fair number of higher rolls are still significant.

That is certainly true. That doesn't change the fact that this change to the system takes out a majority of the random factor. You don't have superior hits (20) that only deal a fraction of their potential damage (1+1+STR). Or innocuous hits (any non-crit) that deal spectacular damage (12+STR). All the damage is predictable. Every hit deals a predictable amount of damage. Because of this, all combat (a series of 10 rolls over 20 combats as an example) you can just say "The fight lasted for 8 rounds, you all take X damage". Based on nothing more than minimum damage inflicted per hit, and HP totals of targets.

[hawklost]

That is certainly true. That doesn't change the fact that this change to the system takes out a majority of the random factor. You don't have superior hits (20) that only deal a fraction of their potential damage (1+1+STR). Or innocuous hits (any non-crit) that deal spectacular damage (12+STR). All the damage is predictable. Every hit deals a predictable amount of damage. Because of this, all combat (a series of 10 rolls over 20 combats as an example) you can just say "The fight lasted for 8 rounds, you all take X damage". Based on nothing more than minimum damage inflicted per hit, and HP totals of targets.

yes you are capable of doing that.
You are also capable of removing classes and making them all just do different styles of damage.
Removing all weapon types (which you effectively have done)
Remove any actual adventuring in a dungeon (if players say they go in, just calculate all battles based on your idea and tell them how much loot they find and how many things they kill and how many days they take up.)

You could also just start reading your book you have written as a DM and hope they enjoy it.

Your idea might be interesting but it is not dnd. It ruins the enjoyment people have when their characters barely defeat a tough enemy through luck, it ruins the sadness that occurs when they lose out on a roll that should have been an easy kill. All it becomes is a pure number game (If I fight 10 goblins I will win because their avg is this and mine is this, there ac is that and mine is this. yup, I can win against 10 but not 11. Oh, there are only 10 there, well, I will)

[Fwiffo86]

yes you are capable of doing that.
You are also capable of removing classes and making them all just do different styles of damage.
Removing all weapon types (which you effectively have done)
Remove any actual adventuring in a dungeon (if players say they go in, just calculate all battles based on your idea and tell them how much loot they find and how many things they kill and how many days they take up.)

You could also just start reading your book you have written as a DM and hope they enjoy it.

Your idea might be interesting but it is not dnd. It ruins the enjoyment people have when their characters barely defeat a tough enemy through luck, it ruins the sadness that occurs when they lose out on a roll that should have been an easy kill. All it becomes is a pure number game (If I fight 10 goblins I will win because their avg is this and mine is this, there ac is that and mine is this. yup, I can win against 10 but not 11. Oh, there are only 10 there, well, I will)

The modification to the combat system is not my idea. I am simply pointing out a possible side effect of using it. Thank you for the snark in either case. It was fun to read.

[SiuiS]

I agree with the complexity statement over all. The only problem is that using the OP's suggestion makes combat completely unnecessary. You already know how often you hit, exactly the amount of damage you deal, and thus how many rounds it takes to kill something. There is no need for the rolls in the first place. The DM could literally just tell you how combat went.

That's not true.


Assume the following: All hits of 16 or higher inflict damage in the following ways:

16 - 0 damage
17 - 1 damage
18 - 2 damage
19 - 3 damage
20 - 4 damage

Vs. HP totals of 10, 20, 30

16 - infinate rounds
17 - 10 rounds 20 rounds 30 rounds
18 - 5 rounds 10 rounds 15 rounds
19 - 3.3 rounds 6.6 rounds 10 rounds
20 - 2.5 rounds 5 rounds 7.5 rounds

Find the minimum hit roll needed to inflict damage based on STR/DEX weapon damage. It tells you the number of rounds.

Same formula for Spell damage, except you add in all damage or no damage if you "hit".

Figure combat for minimum damage = rounds of combat and there is no need to actually play it out. The DM can tell you what happens.

This is literally no different than normal D&D. There's even the same amount of randomness, because the variability of the roll still influences damage as a variable. It's potentially possible for a d20 roll to hit 30, 40, 50 even under the right circumstances, and if the enemy AC is 30 that's still anywhere from 0 to 20 damage.

[Myzz]

I'm not saying that "my rolls don't represent the average" overall. They probably don't, for the simple reason that most polyhedral dice are weighted poorly (you've work in a casino, you know exactly what I mean regarding the standards to which they are manufactured). I'm saying that in the course of an individual encounter, there are few enough dice rolled that it's still chaotic. If you roll 100,000d20 with perfect dice, then you'd expect extremely close to 5,000 of each result. In a single combat, you might roll closer to 10d20. That's few enough that the odds of getting a fair number of higher rolls are still significant.

I'd actually suggest that they approach average with only a 100 rolls. And within average by an acceptable margin by 50 rolls. Although you correct about the dice standards. I've even known players to use shaved dice for DnD.

My point about cheating is thusly: If you know your die rolls 18, 8 times out of 10... well your not lucky your dice are bogus. And if I observed that as a DM, I'd probably ask you to use a different dice next session.

I had a player roll 20, ten times out of 15 rolls... he obliterated stuff. We used the roll 20 three times and its dead rule... well he wasnt allowed to use that d20 anymore, he had to retire it. I explained to him that it was in the dice's best interest to retire as a champion of the universe than to be relegated to trying to live up to the hype...

[Knaight]

I'd actually suggest that they approach average with only a 100 rolls. And within average by an acceptable margin by 50 rolls. Although you correct about the dice standards. I've even known players to use shaved dice for DnD.

Sure, but 100 rolls is a huge chunk for a combat, and even if there are that many you get into the question of how the rolls are distributed. A standard enemy soldier getting a lucky roll against you is one thing. That same roll coming for the leader of their entourage, The Black Knight (TM) is a different matter entirely. Plus, while 100 rolls is more than enough for the 10.5 average to be close, it's not nearly enough for the number of times each side has come up to necessarily be a super tight distribution.


That doesn't change the fact that this change to the system takes out a majority of the random factor. You don't have superior hits (20) that only deal a fraction of their potential damage (1+1+STR). Or innocuous hits (any non-crit) that deal spectacular damage (12+STR). All the damage is predictable. Every hit deals a predictable amount of damage. Because of this, all combat (a series of 10 rolls over 20 combats as an example) you can just say "The fight lasted for 8 rounds, you all take X damage". Based on nothing more than minimum damage inflicted per hit, and HP totals of targets.

The idea that the bulk of the randomness is being taken out is deceptive, it's that the number of different micro-states of die rolls that represent the change vary.

Lets use a simple example here - say you need a 15+ to hit, and deal 1d6 damage. By default, there are 6 numbers you hit on, each of which can have 6 damage options. From a statistical perspective, there's a 6/20 chance of damaging at all, and a 1/20 chance of each result. Now say you roll 1 die, and a 15 does 1 damage, a 16 2, etc. Again, there's a 6/20 chance of damaging at all, and a 1/20 chance of each damage result. No randomness has been lost, just the illusion of randomness created by multiple dice. There are also 6 different die combinations that have the same result: 14-1, 15-1, 16-1, 17-1, 18-1, 19-1, and 20-1 all do 1 damage, and that set is just as likely as just rolling 14 when there is no second die.

This does affect the skew of distributions and similar, and if a mechanic like this is in use it would have to be carefully considered - just plopping it into 5e is a bad idea. With that said, the idea that randomness is actually lost is dubious. This is before getting into things like the implication of advantage, bonuses that shift damage through shifting attack, etc. Removing the damage roll and tying damage dealt into attack is perfectly viable, doesn't reduce randomness, and certainly doesn't imply that you could just have the GM narrate results because it's so predictable.

[JNAProductions]

Quick question-what if you have a d10 damage die? Or 2d6? Or some other mismatch between accuracy and damage rolls?

[Myzz]

level 5 Fighter with TWF.

R1: 2 Attacks + Action surge + Bonus action +Reaction (AoO maybe) =5 rolls
R2: 2 attacks +AS + B + R = 4
R3: 2 Attks +AS + B +R = 4

so in a normal 3 round combat its likely 13 rolls just for the fighter... sure thats not 100 yet... but if the combat goes substantially longer: 21 Rolls in a 5 round combat, of which it will only take 5 of to get to the 100 mark. Assuming the 2-3 encounters per short rest and 2-3 short per Long, you will reach that each and every day. Double the rolls if attacks are with advantage and/or disadvantage. Reaching the 100 roll mark isnt too terribly hard. And as I said I pretty sure they will fall in line around 50 rolls, which is only 2 maybe 3 encounters. If your going to average in dmg, why not like Fiffwo said, average the whole thing out...

(except that its not nearly as fun)... AND if rolling Dice is fun, why would you want to minimize it?

[Knaight]

Quick question-what if you have a d10 damage die? Or 2d6? Or some other mismatch between accuracy and damage rolls?

Also, something that never got addressed:

This gets into why you don't just directly transfer things, like I said I was using one simplified instance because the math was easy. It is worth noting that the system as is can create things like a d7 or d9 damage die situationally; both approaches have things the other doesn't model. Crits in particular stand out here, as that gets handled easily enough as part of the continuum for attack bonus going to damage.

As for dealing with mismatches between accuracy and damage rolls, as well as introducing variable attributes to it (or just variable weaponry or whatever), there are a lot of ways to do it. For instance, you could have an attack be dexterity based, then have strength act as either a constant bonus to the damage or a multiplier. You could have a location based system, where damage dealt is going to be strength based, but dexterity lets you influence where damage gets dealt to some extent - Burning Wheel does something like this, where your opponent chooses where you hit, but you can move it a certain amount based on how well you roll. Again, it's the sort of thing that works best outside of an existing game using different mechanics, where it is instead part of the game from the start.

Still, lets say we were transferring 5e over. Based on bounded accuracy and similar, there are a few points that stand out:
A) You generally start hitting in the low to mid teens somewhere for most monsters.
B) Damage dice are generally restricted from 1-12, with only a subset of that range actually being used. Changes to higher damage weapons generally leave in the low end. Cantrips explicitly break this, as do bonus damage dice.
C) Attributes are just flatly added.
D) Critical hits do maximum damage.
E) Defenses are effectively static, or offenses are effectively static. Opposed rolls are comparatively uncommon for damage dealing.

Given those things, we can expect a range from about 5-9 that actually hits most of the time. The flat addition of damage attributes could probably just be kept. Weapons could be used as multipliers for the degree of success. Mapping as below:
1d6 (or worse): x0.5
1d8-1d10: x1.0
1d12, 2d6: x1.5

Bonus damage would also be handled in a multiplicative fashion. So, say you have a fighter with a +3 strength bonus wielding a great sword. They attack an AC 14 creature, and get 19. That's a difference of 5, multiplication takes it to 7, the bonus takes it to 10. Now say they get a 22. That's a difference of 8, multiplication takes it to 12, the bonus takes it to 15. It also roughly corresponds to a critical, so that 15 is fine

This is obviously clunky in a few ways, which gets back to my previous point of how it works so much better when you bake this sort of thing into the system. For instance, if opposed rolls were standard, you'd get some nicer curving, along with it suddenly becoming much easier to use a system of break points which correspond to existing damage values (similar to Burning Wheel, which has three different types of strikes based on how well you do, which essentially work out to a minor hit, a solid hit, and a crit). It's also the sort of thing that works much, much better when there are ways to affect numbers added to hitting, which outright goes against 5e design. It frequently works better with a DR system in place for armor, which isn't what is in use. So on and so forth.


If your going to average in dmg, why not like Fiffwo said, average the whole thing out...

(except that its not nearly as fun)... AND if rolling Dice is fun, why would you want to minimize it?
Nobody is saying to use average damage, they're saying that the damage still varies, but it's tied directly to the attack roll instead of a second roll.

[hawklost]

Myzz
Because people like exciting combat not mediocer combat that is based fully on knowing your enemies stats.

You also ruin multiple builds that are designed around Critting (Champion, Assassin, Half-Orc to name a few)

Your and Fiffwo's combat is like playing an RPG with auto-attack on. All you decide is what to attack and then you wait for the results. Most people do not find that fun for a roleplaying game because you negate most of the actual tactics then. (Movement, Terrain, Focus fire vs not, lots of caster spells, ect...).

I personally am not interested in having a dm tell me how and what I attack because it is fun to sometimes 'be the hero' and jump out in front or to flee behind when injured.

Finally, your changes make Armor the King. Who cares if I cannot hit the guy much, if I stand in front and have 25+ AC, noone is going to harm me at all. So a wizard would want full plate and a fighter would want full plate and even a rogue would want that and a shield. Saves most damage against you so that you win every battle (even if it takes 200+ combat rounds since you only do 1 damage to the enemy a round)

Knaight

If I was going to play that way, I would prefer not to use a D20 die as it is far more wild than most other methods. The WhiteWholf way of rolling D10s and taking 8+ as success or the ShadowRun way of using D6s works better.

Of course, you need to completely recalculate things then.,,,, possibly use D20s but give you more than one to roll and each success equals so much damage based on the weapon type, but at that point you are getting as complicated as just rolling the hit and damage dice seperately.

[Knaight]

Knaight
If I was going to play that way, I would prefer not to use a D20 die as it is far more wild than most other methods. The WhiteWholf way of rolling D10s and taking 8+ as success or the ShadowRun way of using D6s works better.

Of course, you need to completely recalculate things then.,,,, possibly use D20s but give you more than one to roll and each success equals so much damage based on the weapon type, but at that point you are getting as complicated as just rolling the hit and damage dice seperately.

I absolutely agree. Like I've been saying, you want this sort of thing built into the system from the beginning, and if you're planning on using degrees of success as a major mechanic using some sort of multiple die system is probably a good start. You listed dice pools (which do work well), though I'd also add that something like Fudge's core mechanic (effectively 4d3-8), or even a 3d6 roll and add system would work well.

The point is though, consolidating to one roll can work just fine, and it certainly isn't more deterministic. It could even be made to work with a d20, though if I were doing something like that from scratch I'd use opposed rolls, and then just use some sort of break point where you get something for every 4 or 5 or whatever you beat the opponent by, possibly with secondary weapon effects tied to getting a certain number of successes.

[Fwiffo86]

Myzz
Because people like exciting combat not mediocer combat that is based fully on knowing your enemies stats.

You also ruin multiple builds that are designed around Critting (Champion, Assassin, Half-Orc to name a few)

Your and Fiffwo's combat is like playing an RPG with auto-attack on. All you decide is what to attack and then you wait for the results. Most people do not find that fun for a roleplaying game because you negate most of the actual tactics then. (Movement, Terrain, Focus fire vs not, lots of caster spells, ect...).

I personally am not interested in having a dm tell me how and what I attack because it is fun to sometimes 'be the hero' and jump out in front or to flee behind when injured.

Finally, your changes make Armor the King. Who cares if I cannot hit the guy much, if I stand in front and have 25+ AC, noone is going to harm me at all. So a wizard would want full plate and a fighter would want full plate and even a rogue would want that and a shield. Saves most damage against you so that you win every battle (even if it takes 200+ combat rounds since you only do 1 damage to the enemy a round)

Knaight

If I was going to play that way, I would prefer not to use a D20 die as it is far more wild than most other methods. The WhiteWholf way of rolling D10s and taking 8+ as success or the ShadowRun way of using D6s works better.

Of course, you need to completely recalculate things then.,,,, possibly use D20s but give you more than one to roll and each success equals so much damage based on the weapon type, but at that point you are getting as complicated as just rolling the hit and damage dice seperately.

Again.... not my idea. Please stop thinking it is.

Additionally, the fact that it is boring is part of why I brought it up in the first place. Thank you for bringing further attention to it though.

At no point have I voiced an opinion about this modification one way or the other. To be honest, its not a system I would ever use. My players like rolling dice. The more they have to roll, the more excited they become.

[Doug Lampert]

Again.... not my idea. Please stop thinking it is.

You are literally the ONLY ONE in this conversation to recommend removing rolls/luck altogether.

That is ENTIRELY your idea, solely and only.

The suggestion was combining to-hit and damage into one roll. Which doesn't reduce variance one bit (as has been demonstrated). YOU and ONLY YOU insist that this is somehow the same as making battles entirely deterministic because YOU and ONLY YOU are insisting on also removing the to-hit roll.

Please stop claiming this is somehow not your idea.

[Fwiffo86]

You are literally the ONLY ONE in this conversation to recommend removing rolls/luck altogether.

That is ENTIRELY your idea, solely and only.

The suggestion was combining to-hit and damage into one roll. Which doesn't reduce variance one bit (as has been demonstrated). YOU and ONLY YOU insist that this is somehow the same as making battles entirely deterministic because YOU and ONLY YOU are insisting on also removing the to-hit roll.

Please stop claiming this is somehow not your idea.

Before someone gets all confused....

All I stated was that combining Attack roll and damage made combat predictable. The posts I directed too were responding to me as if I had made the original posted suggestion to do so. If I read that wrong, I apologize.

Now, explain to me how knowing exactly how much damage you will do on any hit is not predictable? You know exactly how the damage scales (based on higher rolls) So you can just calculate combats based on the minimum roll to inflict damage and divide it into the HP pool of the target to get your rounds of combat. How is that not predictable?

[ProphetSword]

Wouldn't it be just as easy to use the average damage rolls on a hit? Daggers would be a 2. Short Swords would be 3. Long swords would be 4, etc. At least that way your weapon selections have meaning.

You swing against the goblin. You hit with a long sword and do 4 plus whatever the appropriate modifiers are.

It's pretty easy. Why go and do something non-D&D-like and have the hit roll matter to the damage? Wouldn't that open up all sorts of hit-bonus cheese to boost the damage? (Bless spells, things that give advantage, etc).

[JNAProductions]

What if the attack roll was multiplicitive? So rolling 10 against AC 10 gives you 80% damage, rolling 14 gives you 100% damage, rolling 18 gives you 120%, etc. Numbers subject to change.

That way, great attack scores help your damage, but not to the extent where you get more damage from accuracy than actual damage. (Unless you have truly ridiculous attack bonuses.)

[Segev]

This really seems like it's overcomplicating things in the name of simplicity. Attack and damage is not that much rolling. Attack and look up umpteen charts and decide if you're multiplying etc. is going to take at least as long as the second roll. And it still loses the difference between accurate weapons and highly damaging weapons (and the combinations of low/high accuracy and low/high damage that are possible).

[Knaight]

Now, explain to me how knowing exactly how much damage you will do on any hit is not predictable? You know exactly how the damage scales (based on higher rolls) So you can just calculate combats based on the minimum roll to inflict damage and divide it into the HP pool of the target to get your rounds of combat. How is that not predictable?

You still don't know exactly how much damage you will do before you roll, damage is still variable, and the idea that you can just calculate combats involves completely ignoring everything in them that changes on the targeting end, varying bonuses, varying penalties, etc. It's no more predictable than it already is, because you can already calculate the minimum roll to inflict damage, the average damage, and the expected rounds taken in a slug fest.

I go back to my example of the 15+ hit, 1d6 weapon here. They produce the exact same probabilities, literally nothing is changed mathematically with having it be one roll. What does change is that it is a one step process to distribute the possibilities the exact same way instead of a two step process.


This really seems like it's overcomplicating things in the name of simplicity. Attack and damage is not that much rolling. Attack and look up umpteen charts and decide if you're multiplying etc. is going to take at least as long as the second roll. And it still loses the difference between accurate weapons and highly damaging weapons (and the combinations of low/high accuracy and low/high damage that are possible).
The over-complication is an artifact of trying to jam this into D&D, which isn't made for it. There's no reason to look up even one chart (other than a weapon list at the beginning, which is already done), and the difference between accurate and damaging weapons is really easy. Give a bonus to attack for a particularly accurate weapon, multiply damage by some number or add some high constant for a particular damaging one.

[7heprofessor]

This thread does a good job at showcasing that D&D's combat system is really shallow under layers of fake complexity. Indeed, doing what the OP proposes to cut down the 'do you strike home and harm your opponent' part of combat resolution would make sense. Then one could use the time you save this way to add some actual diversity.


If by shallow you mean user-friendly and easy-to-grasp, then I totally agree. That was one of the main goals of 5E was to make the game easier to absorb by new players, as well as streamlining the rulebooks and systems. This by necessity makes the game "shallow."

Also keep in mind that additional diversity and complexity can be added easily by the player describing her actions, and the DM adjudicating accordingly. No new system is needed at all.