BSR's Gauntlet

[BowStreetRunner]

BowStreetRunner's Gauntlet
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This is a project I've been contemplating for some time. The Gauntlet is designed to be a gauge of how well a particular character is prepared to handle the different types of challenges they may encounter. It's construction is simple. There is a list of challenges and for each one the character receives a score of 0-5 depending on how well prepared they are to overcome that challenge. The more effective the character is in overcoming the challenge, the higher the score. Having to expend higher than usual quantities of limited resources like spell slots and potions causes the score to go down*. The points are awarded as follows:


5 - No problem, the character remains fully effective without any expenditure of resources.
4 - Minor problem, the character remains at least 75% effective without expending more than a 25% of their resources.
3 - Moderate problem, the character remains at least 50% effective without expending more than half of their resources.
2 - Major problem, the character remains at least 25% effective without expending more than 75% of their resources.
1 - Overwhelming problem, the character is only marginally effective and must expend most of their resources.
0 - Insurmountable problem, the character is not effective at all and no expenditure of resources will help.

(*Resource expenditure that is considered is the amount beyond what is normal for an encounter. A spell-caster casts spells and an archer expends arrows - that is part of the character's design. This only includes the extra resources that must be expended to overcome the additional challenge.)

The list of challenges included in the Gauntlet is indented to describe abilities that an enemy might possess which would make them more challenging than an ordinary opponent. Some are defensive abilities that the character would need to bypass in order to defeat the enemy while others are offensive abilities the character would need to defend against. It also includes other encounter-related challenges such as unusual terrain or the presence of traps. The rating system is only concerned with whether the character can overcome the challenge, not the particular means of doing so. It does not matter whether the character uses magic effects to control their opponents or melee attacks to damage their opponents, only whether they are able to overcome the challenge in some way.

Here is the list so far:


Ability damage/drain
Antimagic
Burrow speed/Underground terrain
Climb speed/Vertical terrain
Damage reduction
Death effects
Death of ally/party member (Raise/Resurrect/etc.)
Disease
Energy drain/Negative levels/Level loss
Energy resistance/Immunity
Ethereal/Incorporeal/Gaseous form
Fear
Fly speed/Aerial terrain
Grapple/Improved grab/Constrict
Information Gathering (including divination)
Invisibility
Locks/Traps
Mind-affecting effects (Charms, Compulsions, Phantasms, Patterns, and Morale effects)
Paralysis
Poison
Regeneration
Sleep effects
Social Encounters
Spell resistance/Immunity
Stun effects
Swim Speed/Aquatic terrain
Teleportation/Planar travel


The concept of the Gauntlet is similar in some respects to the Tier system. Low Tier characters might score a few 4s and 5s, but would not have a high score overall. High Tier characters on the other hand would have a high overall score with many 4s and 5s.

I would appreciate feedback from the Playground, in particular with regard to the list of challenges to be included in the Gauntlet. That is the part I have struggled with the most in terms of defining what challenges should make the list.

[Brova]

I think you should probably add a level scaling element. Basically nothing is hitting you with energy drain at level one, and few things drop ability damage early. Also, a few of those can be removed because having one party member deal with them solves them for the whole party. For example, traps don't really threaten you if there's a Rogue in your party, regardless of how weak you nominally are to them.

As far as specific things go, it's worth noting that ability damage tends to be very all or nothing. If your weak stat is big enough that you can't get dropped in a single ray of idiocy/flensing/shivering touch, you're probably going to be able to kill the problem. Maybe separate entries for multiple weak ability damage effects (i.e swarm of Shadows) and the various nukes that casters get?

You should also have an entry for IP proofing and/or save or die spam. At 20th level you could plausibly encounter any number of Mind Flayers, Succubi, or Medusa. All those things are throwing down save or dies which you fail on a 1. Players need a way to deal with that, probably broad spectrum immunity abilities.

[Deadline]

I think you should probably add a level scaling element. Basically nothing is hitting you with energy drain at level one, and few things drop ability damage early. Also, a few of those can be removed because having one party member deal with them solves them for the whole party. For example, traps don't really threaten you if there's a Rogue in your party, regardless of how weak you nominally are to them.

I disagree. If you've got the right mix in your party, none of these are serious issues, thereby making the metric mostly useless. If you do it by class, however, you can use the metric to see class weaknesses, and it would allow you to also assemble a party whose strengths cover their weaknesses. The metric becomes a useful tool for players and parties as a whole.

[Amphetryon]

Is planar travel considered to be a subset of #10, or is it distinct enough to warrant its own listing?

[Brova]

I disagree. If you've got the right mix in your party, none of these are serious issues, thereby making the metric mostly useless. If you do it by class, however, you can use the metric to see class weaknesses, and it would allow you to also assemble a party whose strengths cover their weaknesses. The metric becomes a useful tool for players and parties as a whole.

Not really. The fact that the Wizard (or whatever) happens to be immune to ability damage because he has stone body up doesn't do anything for a Fighter's weakness to Shadows. Similarly, most of the non-conventional movement speeds are personal in nature, as are most of the immunity powers.

[Deadline]

Is planar travel considered to be a subset of #10, or is it distinct enough to warrant its own listing?

Good point, maybe a listing for: Teleportation/Planar Travel?

[Deadline]

Not really. The fact that the Wizard (or whatever) happens to be immune to ability damage because he has stone body up doesn't do anything for a Fighter's weakness to Shadows. Similarly, most of the non-conventional movement speeds are personal in nature, as are most of the immunity powers.

All of which are trivialized by having the right spellcaster in the party. Ability damage/undead are rendered mostly moot by having a cleric, movement speeds are moot with pretty much any caster, traps are moot via rogues/artificers/scouts/etc., antimagic slugfests are moot if you've got a BSF or two. It is much more valuable (IMO) to have the metric be for a single character.

[Brova]

Ability damage/undead are rendered mostly moot by having a cleric,

Sorry, which Cleric spell is giving immunity to ability damage? Particularly for the whole party.


movement speeds are moot with pretty much any caster,

Yes, because those casters have individual movement powers.


It is much more valuable (IMO) to have the metric be for a single character.

You might want two rubrics. One for stuff the party needs to be able to deal with (traps, social situations, raise dead) and one for things individual characters need to deal with (you must be this immune to ride).

[Amphetryon]

Sorry, which Cleric spell is giving immunity to ability damage? Particularly for the whole party.



Yes, because those casters have individual movement powers.



You might want two rubrics. One for stuff the party needs to be able to deal with (traps, social situations, raise dead) and one for things individual characters need to deal with (you must be this immune to ride).

Ahem:


The Gauntlet is designed to be a gauge of how well a particular character is prepared to handle the different types of challenges they may encounter
Things that a party member can provide for the entire party appear to be outside the intended scope of this gauntlet; demanding that this metric be used would therefore appear to be moving the goalposts.

[Brova]

Things that a party member can provide for the entire party appear to be outside the intended scope of this gauntlet; demanding that this metric be used would therefore appear to be moving the goalposts.

Yes, my point is that using that criteria doesn't measure things as effectively as you could. Because it creates the perception of a problem where none exists. In actual play, it does not matter if every member of your party has trapfinding or none of them do. Either way, the guy with the big numbers pokes traps til they go away. But it does matter if everyone has a solution to, say, ability damage. Because you can't just throw the Cleric or Wizard in front of the ray of stupidity that sends your Fighter into a coma. It's conflating things that are radically different.

[Extra Anchovies]

A lot of these things can't really be numerically rated, at least not from 1 to 5. "Can handle without prep time", "can handle with prep time", and "cannot handle" would work better for a lot of them, e.g. ability damage (either you're immune, or you can cure it, or you're shafted).

It's also probably worth tracking when a character becomes able to deal with a problem, and if/when they are able to help their allies do so.


Yes, my point is that using that criteria doesn't measure things as effectively as you could. Because it creates the perception of a problem where none exists. In actual play, it does not matter if every member of your party has trapfinding or none of them do. Either way, the guy with the big numbers pokes traps til they go away. But it does matter if everyone has a solution to, say, ability damage. Because you can't just throw the Cleric or Wizard in front of the ray of stupidity that sends your Fighter into a coma. It's conflating things that are radically different.

You have a point. But I don't see anything on that list other than locks/traps that only one party member will need to deal with when the party comes across it, so I don't think the rating system needs to be changed (it's just that characters with trapfinding will be the only ones who score well on locks/traps).

[Brova]

You have a point. But I don't see anything on that list other than locks/traps that only one party member will need to deal with when the party comes across it, so I don't think the rating system needs to be changed (it's just that characters with trapfinding will be the only ones who score well on locks/traps).

Well, there are some things that need to be added. Social situations, plane shift or equivalents, teleport or equivalents, magic to raise the dead. All of those are things you need, but they are also things that one person provides for the party. There are also characters that can provide some of these options for the whole party, notably the War Weaver.

[Deadline]

Sorry, which Cleric spell is giving immunity to ability damage? Particularly for the whole party.

Aside from several spells that can cure it, like the Restoration line? Death Ward jumps to mind as being pretty effective against most sources of it. And most clerics have access to a spell that can render you immune or heal it from every other source, I think (i.e. none of the spells are alignment locked to my knowledge). I'm not sure if there's one that grants blanket immunity, but then I don't have a photographic memory of every spell in every splatbook.

And unless a spell is Range:Personal, then it can be cast on other party members. And spellcasters tend to have more than one spell they can cast per day.

That's why I don't think the party metric is useful, because it doesn't tell you anything useful aside from "this party will have trouble with this type of challenge" without telling you how to fix it. The individual metric does both.

You brought up a good point that social situations are a thing that should be added to the list (since mind control is already addressed, this would be for things like extraordinary effects). Oh! Information Gathering/Divination! That can be a huge factor in encounters (and not just the old chestnut of scry 'n' die).

Edit - To add to what Extra Anchovies was saying about prep time being a useful measurement, it may also be useful to break down the "expenditure of resources" into Encounter resources (maneuvers, Inspiration points), Daily resources (HP, spells), and permanent WBL resources (charged wands, potions, scrolls, etc). That may be getting to granular to be useful for your purposes though.

[Brova]

Aside from several spells that can cure it, like the Restoration line?

Every single form of ability damage renders you helpless. Constitution drain kills you flat out. Considering that you can coup de grace helpless people and restoration takes three rounds to go off, that's not going to cut it.


Death Ward jumps to mind as being pretty effective against most sources of it.

Except all the spells that do it. Like ray of stupidity. A couple of third level Wizards dropping that on even a 15th+ level martial is probably going to drop him.


That's why I don't think the party metric is useful, because it doesn't tell you anything useful aside from "this party will have trouble with this type of challenge" without telling you how to fix it. The individual metric does both.

I think you may be confused. What I'm saying is that there are certain challenges (traps, long distance travel) that one person solves for the party. Those should be evaluated separately. So you'd have one list that said "Rogues are good at deal with Antimagic, DR and Spell Resistance, but bad at dealing with Death Effects and Stun" and then another list that talked about how Rogues were able to provide the Trapfinding needs of the party, but not the resurrection or travel needs.

[Deadline]

Every single form of ability damage renders you helpless. Constitution drain kills you flat out. Considering that you can coup de grace helpless people and restoration takes three rounds to go off, that's not going to cut it.

Are you assuming any application of ability damage sets a score to zero? Or are you assuming that help cannot be applied before numerous applications set it to zero? Because I don't think either is correct. Sure, if you've got a dex of 4, then you'll probably go down when hit with DEX damage, but if not then you've got time for something to be done about it (neutralize or delay poison, death ward, etc). That's assuming you go into the situation blind to the danger of whatever source of ability damage you'll face.


Except all the spells that do it. Like ray of stupidity. A couple of third level Wizards dropping that on even a 15th+ level martial is probably going to drop him.

Are we going to play the "find a spell, find a counter to that specific spell" game? Because if so, I've already stated that I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of every spell, and quite frankly I don't think that such a course of discussion would be all that useful. Once we go back and forth and cover all the edge cases for any spells that don't fall under one of the spells that provides various immunities, are we then going to have to do it for creature abilities? Poisons?


I think you may be confused. What I'm saying is that there are certain challenges (traps, long distance travel) that one person solves for the party. Those should be evaluated separately. So you'd have one list that said "Rogues are good at deal with Antimagic, DR and Spell Resistance, but bad at dealing with Death Effects and Stun" and then another list that talked about how Rogues were able to provide the Trapfinding needs of the party, but not the resurrection or travel needs.

No, I understood you just fine, and I think all of that is well covered using the existing character based metric. And there are trap challenges that cannot be solved by the rogue alone (at least not before it affects the party). Take a look at encounter traps in Dungeonscape (pg. 120).

[Brova]

Are you assuming any application of ability damage sets a score to zero? Or are you assuming that help cannot be applied before numerous applications set it to zero? Because I don't think either is correct. Sure, if you've got a dex of 4, then you'll probably go down when hit with DEX damage, but if not then you've got time for something to be done about it (neutralize or delay poison, death ward, etc). That's assuming you go into the situation blind to the danger of whatever source of ability damage you'll face.

Assume that people put an 8 into their dump stat, whatever it happens to be. That doesn't really go up as you level (unless you use wishes for across the board +5), so it doesn't actually take a big hit to incap someone. Four 3rd level Wizards will, assuming they all hit, knock a Fighter of essentially any level into helplessness. And that includes the 12th level Fighter who is not supposed to be meaningfully threatened by any number of 3rd level Wizards.


No, I understood you just fine, and I think all of that is well covered using the existing character based metric. And there are trap challenges that cannot be solved by the rogue alone (at least not before it affects the party). Take a look at encounter traps in Dungeonscape (pg. 120).

Looking over the rules for those, they appear to be just like traps, but more complicated. I don't really see what stops a Rogue from disarming them for the whole party.

[Deadline]

Assume that people put an 8 into their dump stat, whatever it happens to be. That doesn't really go up as you level (unless you use wishes for across the board +5), so it doesn't actually take a big hit to incap someone. Four 3rd level Wizards will, assuming they all hit, knock a Fighter of essentially any level into helplessness. And that includes the 12th level Fighter who is not supposed to be meaningfully threatened by any number of 3rd level Wizards.

Right, and according to the metric in the OP, a fighter would not score well against ability damage (regardless of whether it comes from multiple sources, or a single optimized source). With a Cleric in the party to provide immunity or healing (or any caster providing counterspelling), it trivializes what would otherwise be a problem for the fighter.

And, of course, it's a moot point for say, a fighter with the Undead or Construct type.

The point being, knowing the specific strengths and weaknesses of a given class provides valuable information on how to mitigate those weaknesses where possible and assemble a well rounded team that has ways of covering the various weaknesses of the party. The thing you are suggesting (a metric that measures the party as a whole) is covered already by the OP's proposed metric when used for that purpose. However the reverse isn't true. If you have no metric or tools to measure the strengths and weaknesses of a particular class, your metric will only point out where a party is weak, without any information about what class or options can be used to correct said weakness (it relies on the system mastery of the players to 'figure it out').


Looking over the rules for those, they appear to be just like traps, but more complicated. I don't really see what stops a Rogue from disarming them for the whole party.

They require numerous disable checks (or attack rolls, or specific spells, or specific actions), and I didn't see a single example of one that the Rogue could take his time and deactivate before the trap affected him or his party. By design, they are a trap that is an encounter for the entire party (and that the entire party can participate in the disabling of), not something the rogue finds and disables before it is a problem. And if it's something that is going to at least partially affect the party, then you run into the same problem you are arguing against with ability damage.

[BowStreetRunner]

This is definitely aimed at the individual character and not the party. To use this to evaluate a party you might put the scores side by side and like Deadline states see where the weaknesses overlap. I really came at this as a response to the Tier system. It's pretty subjective for one person to call a class Tier 3 and someone else to argue it's only Tier 4 - particularly if the ranking doesn't even take into account individual builds. A more objective approach is to build a hypothetical gauntlet of challenges and rate how well the character can overcome each one. It also helps when building a character to look at a decent list of challenges and think of how you would handle each one. You can see how reliant you are on other party members and how well you can handle certain situations on your own.

As Brova points out, some challenges are themselves level-dependent. Since I'm not sure if there is a good source out there that shows how prevalent various abilities are at each level I think that this would be something that the user would just have to keep in mind. Obviously, a character is not going to score as well at 1st level as at 20th level.

As pointed out by Extra Anchovies, there is a big difference between things a character can handle with advanced warning and prep time versus without any warning or prep time. As this is a tool that is intended to be used for a single character at a time, I think that it might be worth having two columns for the score. It might also be useful when figuring out the character's default spell load or such to look and see where their score goes up or down for each decision point.

Ultimately there shouldn't be many characters that score a 5 in every category (except Pun Pun maybe?), so deciding where its critical to have a high score and where it's okay to have a low one and leave it to another party member is going to be up to the individual. They just need to remember to keep that other party member around and well protected. ;)

[Brova]

Right, and according to the metric in the OP, a fighter would not score well against ability damage (regardless of whether it comes from multiple sources, or a single optimized source). With a Cleric in the party to provide immunity or healing (or any caster providing counterspelling), it trivializes what would otherwise be a problem for the fighter.

No, it doesn't. Because those spells take three rounds to go off and aren't generally prepared. Consider the encounter for a 12th level party of a Dragon and a bunch of Sorcerer minions. The Sorcerers drop the Fighter to helplessness, and the Dragon coup de grace's him to death. What exactly is the Cleric doing to prevent the ability damage there?


(a metric that measures the party as a whole)

Uh, that's not what I'm suggesting. I'm saying that some threats (i.e. traps, travel, social encounters) are not threats to individual characters and should not be evaluated as such.


As Brova points out, some challenges are themselves level-dependent. Since I'm not sure if there is a good source out there that shows how prevalent various abilities are at each level I think that this would be something that the user would just have to keep in mind. Obviously, a character is not going to score as well at 1st level as at 20th level.

The Same Game Test has some stuff in this direction, though it's not perfect.

[The Insanity]

You say "character", not "class". I assume this is to evaluate builds then, not classes?
Is this gauntlet supposed to be used by yourself (you make a character and then run it throught the gauntlet to evaluate it), or are you thinking about evaluating the characters of others (like a forum thing where you're the Evaluator)?
Listing all the possible chellenges is okay, I guess, so that someone building a character has a reference on what to aim for if he wants his character to be well rounded and score high, but I wouldn't reveal the details of the actual scenarios/encounters, because that allows someone to build specifically for the encounters, which could skew the results. Casters (Wizards in particular) are the strongest when they know what to expect, after all.

[Deadline]

No, it doesn't. Because those spells take three rounds to go off and aren't generally prepared. Consider the encounter for a 12th level party of a Dragon and a bunch of Sorcerer minions. The Sorcerers drop the Fighter to helplessness, and the Dragon coup de grace's him to death. What exactly is the Cleric doing to prevent the ability damage there?

Look, I listed numerous spells (and if I had to go digging through the books I'm sure there are plenty more). And there are even more if you are fixated on the damage coming from spells, because there is also a multitude of ways you can protect yourself from spells, let alone ability damage. You seem to have decided that because one of those spells I listed by name takes 3 rounds to take effect, everything else I listed must also be pointless. That is clearly not the case (seriously go look any other spell I mentioned aside from the Restoration line), and I know you have solid reading comprehension, so I'm not sure why you are still beating this particular drum (it smacks of not arguing in good faith). But it frankly doesn't matter. I'm sorry if I didn't make it clear in my previous post, but let me do so know. I have no interest in engaging in the edge case game where we go round and round posting spells and counters to those spells. I don't think it's useful, and I'm not going to be doing it. Take that however you want to.


Uh, that's not what I'm suggesting. I'm saying that some threats (i.e. traps, travel, social encounters) are not threats to individual characters and should not be evaluated as such.

There are several kinds of traps that are a threat to individual characters. There are also many base classes that have resources to deal with them (barbarians, rogues, spellthieves, artificers, clerics, wizards, scouts, etc). I'm not sure why you insist on declaring a difference between traps and, say, ability damage. So I'll just go with, "I disagree with the opinion that traps should be removed from the metric", for the reasons I've already stated in thread.

*tips hat* Good day, sir.

Edit - I did want to mention something to the OP that The Insanity reminded me of:


Listing all the possible chellenges is okay, I guess, so that someone building a character has a reference on what to aim for if he wants his character to be well rounded and score high, but I wouldn't reveal the details of the actual scenarios/encounters, because that allows someone to build specifically for the encounters, which could skew the results. Casters (Wizards in particular) are the strongest when they know what to expect, after all.

(Emphasis mine). This caused me to think of Ernir's list of necessary magic items (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?187851-3-5-Lists-of-Necessary-Magic-Items). That could be a valuable tool for the OP to see if any challenges are missing and also to potentially evaluate when certain counters are available (by cross-referencing cost of the item with the WBL chart).

[BowStreetRunner]

You say "character", not "class". I assume this is to evaluate builds then, not classes?
Is this gauntlet supposed to be used by yourself (you make a character and then run it throught the gauntlet to evaluate it), or are you thinking about evaluating the characters of others (like a forum thing where you're the Evaluator)?
Listing all the possible chellenges is okay, I guess, so that someone building a character has a reference on what to aim for if he wants his character to be well rounded and score high, but I wouldn't reveal the details of the actual scenarios/encounters, because that allows someone to build specifically for the encounters, which could skew the results. Casters (Wizards in particular) are the strongest when they know what to expect, after all.

The gauntlet concept was one we used often when I used to play Magic: The Gathering. Within the current meta-game there were certain deck archetypes we expected to face in a tournament so we would build fairly optimized copies of each of these - that was our gauntlet. Then any deck we wanted to try out was played against each of the gauntlet decks to see how it fared and whether it had answers to each of them. A deck that ran the gauntlet well would be one we would take to the tournament. One that had major hangups trying to run the gauntlet was only used when we were fairly certain we wouldn't be facing decks that gave it trouble.

My goal is mostly as a reference when building characters. There are not going to be any specific scenarios, although I'm sure a little imagination could fill in details like "you got separated from the party and a locked adamantite door stands in your way of getting back to them, do you have a way to deal with this?" I'm sure someone could use it in the forums to rank different builds, but I would probably not be the one doing the scoring. That's not really my thing.

[Flickerdart]

My goal is mostly as a reference when building characters. There are not going to be any specific scenarios, although I'm sure a little imagination could fill in details like "you got separated from the party and a locked adamantite door stands in your way of getting back to them, do you have a way to deal with this?" I'm sure someone could use it in the forums to rank different builds, but I would probably not be the one doing the scoring. That's not really my thing.
It should be noted that specific scenarios will all have more than one problem involved (either as an OR, or as an AND). An adamantine door can be punched through, or teleported through, or picked - but if there's also a monster trying to eat you, some of these options fall away because you have to deal with the door and the monster at once. In a vacuum, "locks/traps" doesn't really mean very much.