AC and other mechanics that don't make sense

[Arcacius]

There are many mechanics in games that are worded strangely or ones that feel counter to the tone of the game.

And then there are ones that make you want to pull your hair out screaming "that's not how the world works!"

For me that is AC. The actual function of it is fine. The thing that gets to me is how counter it works to reasonablility. The primary factor to it is what armour you are wearing, naturally. The issue comes when a person wants to counter it. Instead of armour reducing the blow by absorbing the shock, it either negates or counters. If you normally have a longsword and there is a guy in huge armour, switching to a warhammer, weapon designed to combat armour, does nothing! Attacks should either have to be made stronger to break through or hit its weak points.

And a level fifteen something fighter is just as good at parrying blows or dodging as they were at level one. Except for 4th surprisingly.

Are there any other mechanics you see that make you want to shake their designers until they get a concussion?

[RazorChain]

If this bothers you a lot, I suggest moving to another system. D&D does a lot of abstraction that makes no sense when you apply realistic expectations.

I'm not going to say how realistic different systems are because none are "realistic" in the sense that they can simulate reality. With that being said you can find systems that will cater to your realistic expectations. Like using a warhammer or a pick on heavy armor, or expecting that somebody gets badly hurts if you hit them in the head with a warhammer and they aren't using a helmet.


We all know that armor doesn't protect you from getting hit, it can deflect blows and absorbs impact and therefore protects you from getting hurt. This is why you get such a wonky results from D&D as it explains you are harder to hurt and getting hit when wearing armor. This doesn't stand to reason when you take something that delivers overwhelming damage like a Giant Frigging Death Ray that disintegrates everything in it's path. Now you aim it at a guy in plate armor and a guy without plate armor. The result will be that the guy in plate armor will be hit less, therefore D&D introduced touch AC which was just like slapping a duct tape on a bursting dam.

So if you are looking for realistic expectations from D&D it will not serve your purpose, it doesn't help trying to pick D&D a part because it just doesn't work in that way.

[Arbane]

There are many mechanics in games that are worded strangely or ones that feel counter to the tone of the game.

And then there are ones that make you want to pull your hair out screaming "that's not how the world works!"

(SNIP)
Are there any other mechanics you see that make you want to shake their designers until they get a concussion?

In D&D? Most of them. AC, Classes, Hit points, the entire borked economy, alignments.... I can go on at great and tedious length.

[veti]

In D&D? Most of them. AC, Classes, Hit points, the entire borked economy, alignments.... I can go on at great and tedious length.

I agree. D&D is designed for many criteria - playability, creativity, balance, fun, the need to cram in every conceivable trope, the even more pressing need to publish an unlimited number of expansions - but I don't think realism is anywhere on the list. Certainly not on the first page.

Of all the games I've played, system-wise I'd say D&D has one of the very worst approaches to realism. Heck, Toon is more plausible, once you accept its basic conceit.

[FabulousFizban]

You could always use THACO >:]

[Anonymouswizard]

With regards to AC, it kind of makes sense. While in reality armour is not an all or nothing affair (kinetic energy would still be transmitted, of course), it could be highly effective, and the primary way to fight against someone in armour is to attack an unarmoured area if possible (this is also why somebody in full plate armour probably didn't carry a shield). Of course, we should give some sort of bonus to weapons that are good at hitting unarmoured sections or sending force through the armour, ideally a whole 'weapons versus armour' table, although that gets complex.

As a side note, the best system I've seen for Armour is GURPS 3e. Armour has two values, Damage Reduction (which works the same as in D&D, but might vary in value based on the attack) and Passive Defence. PD was essentially a value that you could always use for a defence roll, and added to any other defence roll you made, due to how GURPS worked somebody in plate armour actively defending could easily be flat out ignoring 50% of attacks that 'hit', while only ignoring 10% of attacks with only one of the two, and so 4e dropped it.

To make AC work without resorting to a DR mechanic, if we switched to a bell curve roll (2d10 or 3d6, for instance) then we could say that every die that rolls it's maximum value on the attack roll means that an extra point or two of damage is dealt, even if the attack misses (if you want to reward characters strong enough to just bludgeon through armour, this damage is based on Strength). Armour Piercing weapons increase the range on which this damage is gained. We should also probably add to AC as we're gaining levels, probably related to scaling attack bonuses (I like increasing the two at the same rate for characters, although I've also enjoyed games where attack scales twice as fast).


For mechanics that really don't make sense, hit points. Are they meat? If so, why so many? Are they luck? If so why does standing out in the open when a fireball goes off reduce my luck without harming me? Or why does a Cure Wounds spell increase my luck?

If we move out of D&D for a moment, hp representing your ability to have wounds be nondeliberating starts to make a lot more sense. A lot of systems have hp begin at a higher level than in D&D and not increase as much, and then start inflicting penalties as it goes down (the ever popular 'penalties at half hp' model). There's also generally a lot fewer 20 ft diameter explosions going off, which makes the 'dodge the fireball' problem go away. Some systems go all in on the 'hp as luck/skill' model, having actual harmful wounds come from running out of hp, while others go all in on 'hp is meat', having the loss of hp inflict penalties and start a Death Spiral. Others do mix them in a much better way, having your hp being chipped off 5% at a time leads to just dropping when you hit zero, but if you take a quarter of your maximum/remaining [delete as appropriate] in one hit then you get a persistent bad wound. Or you could do something like Legends of the Wulin, where minor wounds and near misses (a.k.a. Ripples) build up and cause more problematic wounds as time goes on, although that also has the consequence that insulting somebody makes them more vulnerable to sword strikes.

[gkathellar]

D&D doesn't really do weapons with any level of realism, or even anything that looks like realism. This is probably okay, given that it rapidly becomes a game about superheroes and kaiju.

What bugs me, personally, is that AC, Fortitude saves, Reflex saves, and HP never seem to be able to make up their minds about what they're actually supposed to be. HP loss, for instance, is typically described as constituting bruises, exhaustion, and scrapes ... except when you take rend damage, are swallowed whole, get hit by a damaging knockback effect, etc. It's a pretty pithy complaint, but there it is.

[Tinkerer]

What bugs me, personally, is that AC, Fortitude saves, Reflex saves, and HP never seem to be able to make up their minds about what they're actually supposed to be. HP loss, for instance, is typically described as constituting bruises, exhaustion, and scrapes ... except when you take rend damage, are swallowed whole, get hit by a damaging knockback effect, etc. It's a pretty pithy complaint, but there it is.

Believe me, compared to the old "save vs." this system is crystal clear as to what's supposed to be going on there.

[Goaty14]

Instead of armour reducing the blow by absorbing the shock, it either negates or counters.
Armor-as-DR variant rule


And a level fifteen something fighter is just as good at parrying blows or dodging as they were at level one. Except for 4th surprisingly.

Two words: Magic Armor/Items

[tomandtish]

Of course, we should give some sort of bonus to weapons that are good at hitting unarmoured sections or sending force through the armour, ideally a whole 'weapons versus armour' table, although that gets complex.

This actually used to exist back in AD&D (1E) days. Not sure anybody actually used it....

[Anonymouswizard]

This actually used to exist back in AD&D (1E) days. Not sure anybody actually used it....

Which is the point for saying it might be too complex. Every system I've seen has billed down to at minimum 'what damage type it's your weapon? I have Armour 6 versus impaling damage, but only Armour 2 against Bashing damage'. Which is why the easy solution is to just now some weapons tend to be armour piercing and give them a bonus.

[Max_Killjoy]

In D&D? Most of them. AC, Classes, Hit points, the entire borked economy, alignments.... I can go on at great and tedious length.

Which is why I vary between laughing and pulling my hair out when someone tries to claim D&D is "simulationist".

[dagfari]

Two words: Magic Armor/Items

That's three (or possibly four) words.

[CharonsHelper]

Which is the point for saying it might be too complex. Every system I've seen has billed down to at minimum 'what damage type it's your weapon? I have Armour 6 versus impaling damage, but only Armour 2 against Bashing damage'. Which is why the easy solution is to just now some weapons tend to be armour piercing and give them a bonus.

Weapons varying vs armor can work with Armor=DR systems. Not that each damage 'type' should vary (I agree - that's one of those things which can work in video games where calculations are done 'behind the curtain', but not in TTRPGs.) but systems where some weapons have Armor Piercing for punching through DR can work with minimal extra work.

@OP - if you think of HP as parrying/dodging it might make you feel better.

[Pleh]

Best rendering I've seen of D&D AC is:

Roll attack. If attack is less than 10+Dex bonus+dodge bonus (including negative values), you just miss completely.

If attack is less than AC, but more than 10+dex+dodge, you connect, but connected against the armor's plate and the damage was mitigated. This would be a great place to hybridize the Armor as DR rules.

Then you meet or beat AC and you deal damage as normal. The weapon found a weak point in the armor.

[Telok]

D&D hp and ac aren't too bad as long as there is a spread of 15 points in ac, a weapon vs. ac table, and max hit points stay under 25 times the base weapon damage. It works ok then.

And a better falling damage system. The d6 per 10' cap at 20d may be easy to remember but it's also really weak.

[RazorChain]

Best rendering I've seen of D&D AC is:

Roll attack. If attack is less than 10+Dex bonus+dodge bonus (including negative values), you just miss completely.

If attack is less than AC, but more than 10+dex+dodge, you connect, but connected against the armor's plate and the damage was mitigated. This would be a great place to hybridize the Armor as DR rules.

Then you meet or beat AC and you deal damage as normal. The weapon found a weak point in the armor.

So what if I fire at them with a Giant Friggin Death Ray that destroys anything in it's path? Did the plate armor mitigate the damage from Giant Friggin Death Ray that destroys anything in it's path?

Or a 30' titan grabs a giant boulder at the size of a small truck and throws at you and it connects against the armor's plate and the damage was...mitigated?

Often the best way to see if mechanics work is to put them under the strain of extreme circumstances.

[Lord Torath]

@OP - if you think of HP as parrying/dodging it might make you feel better.Works great until you get to the rules for Natural Healing. :smallamused:

Depending on Edition, of course.

[Knaight]

Putting aside weirdness like combat skill not actually mattering for AC, it works okay in its original contexts - representations of actual variation in armor quality on naval vessels, and human scale combat. In both of those hits to the armor where it's good generally don't do anything significant, and one good hit where the armor is weak/missing can have catastrophic effects. Having both quality of armor and ability to get out of the way of attacks to where it isn't as factors in AC makes sense.

Taking that model and sticking it in a very different context full of oversized attacks that aren't likely to care about armor? That's not so great, and D&D did that early.


Works great until you get to the rules for Natural Healing. :smallamused:

Depending on Edition, of course.

Or magical healing. HP is an excellent example of a variable in a lot of simulationist mechanics all awkwardly jammed together, and while it can make sense for any one individually it makes no sense for all of them simultaneously.

[CharonsHelper]

Works great until you get to the rules for Natural Healing. :smallamused:

Depending on Edition, of course.

Yeah - that was one thing I liked about 4e

[Pleh]

So what if I fire at them with a Giant Friggin Death Ray that destroys anything in it's path? Did the plate armor mitigate the damage from Giant Friggin Death Ray that destroys anything in it's path?

Or a 30' titan grabs a giant boulder at the size of a small truck and throws at you and it connects against the armor's plate and the damage was...mitigated?

Often the best way to see if mechanics work is to put them under the strain of extreme circumstances.

You mean hyperbole is justified then?

Death Ray sounds like it targets Touch AC. Touch AC either hits 10+dex+dodge or it just misses. Saying AC doesn't work when AC should be substituted with Touch AC seems like an insubstantial criticism.

Titan boulder: yeah, he barely missed, so you were clipped by the boulder's edge and the plate from your armor took the glancing hit. Apply DR if you like.

Those scenarios almost make the system fall apart more when the attack manages to hit, not when it barely misses. How does HP loss explain surviving being hit by a death ray or a giant boulder?

[RazorChain]

You mean hyperbole is justified then?

Death Ray sounds like it targets Touch AC. Touch AC either hits 10+dex+dodge or it just misses. Saying AC doesn't work when AC should be substituted with Touch AC seems like an insubstantial criticism.

Titan boulder: yeah, he barely missed, so you were clipped by the boulder's edge and the plate from your armor took the glancing hit. Apply DR if you like.

Those scenarios almost make the system fall apart more when the attack manages to hit, not when it barely misses. How does HP loss explain surviving being hit by a death ray or a giant boulder?

You could apply enough damage to the attack. It was first in 3rd edition that Touch AC was introduced and had all kinds of problems because I can assure you that If I'm holding a sword in front of me and you want to touch me then you're the one who has problems. It also says how hard you are to hit not how hard you are to hurt. With that established we are going to have problems with excessive force. When I'm talking about excessive force I'm talking about attacks that do so much damage that your armor is irrelevant.

Your armor isn't going to help you when you get hit by a bus and neither is it against the boulder. Touch AC has established that any AC that isnt the base of 10+Dex+dodge is your armor protecting you from harm. You know that you might jump away or dodge the bus and the boulder but that bus isn't going to glance off your armor. This tells us that the AC system is only good for certain circumstances, mostly to simulate man to man combat, not where large monsters are involved.

[Lord Torath]

My understanding of Touch AC is that it ignores armor entirely (except perhaps the magical bonuses from magical armor), not that it's the AC verses someone literally putting a finger on you. For the big boulder/death ray, you just need to hit the person's silhouette. Dodging protects against that, as do magical protections.

Of course, all I learned of 3.P and later editions is what I've gleaned from this forum, so my knowledge may be inexact.

[Enixon]

My understanding of Touch AC is that it ignores armor entirely (except perhaps the magical bonuses from magical armor), not that it's the AC verses someone literally putting a finger on you. For the big boulder/death ray, you just need to hit the person's silhouette. Dodging protects against that, as do magical protections.

Of course, all I learned of 3.P and later editions is what I've gleaned from this forum, so my knowledge may be inexact.

It's kinda both, depending on if it's a ranged or melee touch attack. Ranged, yeah it's just "drawing a bead on you" or however you want to phrase it, but then stuff like the Shocking Grasp spell or a Rust Monster's well... rust.... at least implies that you have to actualy touch the target

[2D8HP]

"Armor Class" and "Hit Points" were previously used in Dave Arneson's Civil War Naval Combat game Ironclads


http://pc.gamespy.com/articles/540/540395p3.html


https://archive.org/stream/gamespy-dave_arneson_interview/gamespy-dave_arneson_interview_djvu.txt


https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/114105/Dungeons__Dragons_Arneson_The_Lost_Interview.php


and the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Naval combat game

Don't Give Up The Ship (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/7791/dont-give-ship)

Here's early TSR employee Tim Kask on

.
What we really meant—Pt. 1--AC (http://kaskoid.blogspot.com/2015/10/what-we-really-meantpt-1-ac.html?m=1)

More combat "realism" was wanted, and in my area, in the late 1970's, we used the "Peering Conventions", from "All the World's Monster's" (a third-party "Monster Manual" published before the Monster Manual.

Perrin Conventions/Chaosium #1 (https://www.kirith.com/random-wizard/articles/steve-perrin-interview.html)


Perrin Conventions/Chaosium #2 (https://books.google.com/books?id=GqBnDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA326&lpg=PA326&dq=perrin+conventions&source=bl&ots=zFmNnpJfjX&sig=T9iWNw0874BQ7nawtMfkoFL7MU4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiNr5fe8qfVAhWhrVQKHdrTAZA4ChDoAQgfMAI)


Perrin Conventions/Chaosium #3 (https://www.acaeum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=10785)


All the Worlds Monsters/Perrin Conventions/Chaosium #4 (http://expeditiousadvance.ebongryphon.com/2016/05/toward-history-of-rpg-mechanics-part-11.html?m=1)


All the World's Monster's/Perrin Conventions/Chaosium #5 (https://crypticarchivist.blogspot.com/2014/12/12a-old-rpg-you-still-read-california.html?m=1)


Perrin Conventions/Chaosium #6 (https://dorkland.blogspot.com/2013/06/the-perrin-conventions.html?m=1)

The "Perrin Conventions" led to the RuneQuest game, which seemed more realistic than D&D, but the desire for even more "realism" continued and for a time my DM used

Arms Law (https://rpggeek.com/rpgitem/46804/arms-law-1st-edition)

which became the RoleMaster game.

I was less involved with RPG's after the 1980's, so someone else has to tell the tale.

[Pleh]

You could apply enough damage to the attack. It was first in 3rd edition that Touch AC was introduced and had all kinds of problems because I can assure you that If I'm holding a sword in front of me and you want to touch me then you're the one who has problems. It also says how hard you are to hit not how hard you are to hurt.

Fair enough, I've played 3e for 10 years, but never played earlier editions.

But with Touch AC, I always took Shocking Grasp as the best example of how touch attacks work: You brandish your sword at me to keep my hands away, then I bat the flat of your sword with my palm, discharge the shock through the blade and send it straight to your heart without putting myself in more danger than a regular attack. Touch Attacks get special consideration because they absolutely do not care how or why they connect. Once they do, they apply their effect.

If one of my players wanted to use their sword to prevent being hit by touch I would ask them to Ready an Action on their turn. D&D combat is turn based, but represents simultaneous action, wanting to use your sword for offense and defense simultaneously is not easy, nor is it totally standard skill for most martial classes. Maybe the Duelist or Swashbuckler has something?


With that established we are going to have problems with excessive force. When I'm talking about excessive force I'm talking about attacks that do so much damage that your armor is irrelevant.

Your armor isn't going to help you when you get hit by a bus and neither is it against the boulder. Touch AC has established that any AC that isnt the base of 10+Dex+dodge is your armor protecting you from harm. You know that you might jump away or dodge the bus and the boulder but that bus isn't going to glance off your armor. This tells us that the AC system is only good for certain circumstances, mostly to simulate man to man combat, not where large monsters are involved.

A thrown boulder can still miss its mark. A medium creature has a 5ft space to occupy. If a 30ft boulder misses, but only just barely, then 2ft of its mass passed through the occupied square, the tip brushed the armor plate, the rest kept on its way.

Heck, even on a total hit, if it didn't kill the hero, it probably pinballed them off to the side. You mentioned a titan was throwing this boulder? That's a CR 21, so yeah, most adventurers should be paste. If epic heroes are being targeted, I do kind of expect the Marvel Cinematic Universe interpretation where they just push the boulder off and make a quippy one liner about how they might need to start taking this fight more seriously.

And I think that's part of what you're struggling with. The more fantastic monsters are meant to scale with these fantastic heroes. At some point, it's not trying for verisimilitude or simulationism. If you want that, you're better off in E6. It's about as close as 3.5 gets.

[Max_Killjoy]

What about the leather glove that's maybe insulating the hand of the guy with the sword?

[Pelle]

It was first in 3rd edition that Touch AC was introduced and had all kinds of problems because I can assure you that If I'm holding a sword in front of me and you want to touch me then you're the one who has problems.

Isn't that what Attacks of Opportunity are for?

[Lord Torath]

What about the leather glove that's maybe insulating the hand of the guy with the sword?What about the rubber tires insulating the car?

Truth is, if you've got enough voltage, insulation doesn't matter. A lightning bolt that's traveled through 5 miles of open air is not going to be stopped by 6 inches of rubber. If Shocking Grasp just needs to hit your Touch AC, assume it's got enough voltage to go right through any insulation you may be carrying.

[Pleh]

Isn't that what Attacks of Opportunity are for?

Not exactly. Touch Attacks with Spells are considered Armed Attacks and do not provoke. Casting in Combat, however, typically DOES provoke AoO. So Fighter W/ Sword VS Sorcerer W/ Shocking Grasp gets AoO when the Sorcerer chooses to cast the spell, not when they make the Touch Attack.

Unarmed Touch Attacks (such as Starting A Grapple without the Improved Grapple feat), DO provoke Attacks of Opportunity.


What about the rubber tires insulating the car?

Truth is, if you've got enough voltage, insulation doesn't matter. A lightning bolt that's traveled through 5 miles of open air is not going to be stopped by 6 inches of rubber. If Shocking Grasp just needs to hit your Touch AC, assume it's got enough voltage to go right through any insulation you may be carrying.

This. If the player had an Item described as a Glove that gave some special protection against Shocking Grasp or Shock Damage, all that would matter.

But otherwise, this isn't just an arbitrarily high voltage necessary to reduce this whole scenario to a simple Touch Attack, this is also a Magical Spell attack. The Spell could be interpreted as hard science fiction that once you release the electricity, normal physics takes over, but there's really no need to do so. The spell could say you only need to touch the target, then magic bombards them with an electrical surge from no particular source. It's an Evocation spell, the electricity can be coming from a plane of Electrons. No reason Physics even needs to come into play here. The spell used targets any creature Touched, which is defined as not caring about armor, so why would it care if you touched an object held any more than an object worn? You're still targeting the creature, you effectively touched them and the magic was conducted to its intended target.

[Max_Killjoy]

What about the rubber tires insulating the car?

Truth is, if you've got enough voltage, insulation doesn't matter. A lightning bolt that's traveled through 5 miles of open air is not going to be stopped by 6 inches of rubber. If Shocking Grasp just needs to hit your Touch AC, assume it's got enough voltage to go right through any insulation you may be carrying.


First, what's the voltage on a Shocking Grasp? It's a touch spell, so don't assume anything about the voltage being that high.

Second, lightning hitting a car doesn't force its way through the tires, it travels through the metal body and frame, then arcs off the car and bypasses the tires entirely, through the air, to the ground, in the same way it traveled through the 5 miles of open air.

[Cluedrew]

No reason Physics even needs to come into play here.None at all I assure you.

Sorry this line just sort of hopped out at me. And I suppose it does depend on what sort of magic you are dealing with. The magic of otherworldly forces, the science of a world that is not our own or hand wave special abilities certainly doesn't. In a more "urban fantasy" setting maybe physics should be taken into account, but that is a setting thing.

[Pleh]

First, what's the voltage on a Shocking Grasp? It's a touch spell, so don't assume anything about the voltage being that high.

Second, lightning hitting a car doesn't force its way through the tires, it travels through the metal body and frame, then arcs off the car and bypasses the tires entirely, through the air, to the ground, in the same way it traveled through the 5 miles of open air.

It does. not. matter.

The spell is magic and does not inform that an insulating glove would provide any defense against a magically applied voltage of ANY magnitude. Unless the player were wearing a glove that gave a specific mechanical benefit of being resistant to Shocking Grasp or any category of effects under which Shocking Grasp would be considered to be part of, the glove may as well not be there. It does. not. matter. Regardless how much you might think it should matter.

To me, that seems like a problem solved by developing more detailed statistics for mundane equipment: Leather Gloves, comes standard with any full body armor and provides 1 Energy Resistance against Shock damage plus 20% concealment against attacks that deal Shock damage (but if the attack misses from this concealment, only the shock damage itself is negated).

Either way, you're just houseruling, at which point you can houserule whatever you want to begin with, so go crazy.

It is my firm belief that the description of the spell was careful to only be specific about exactly how it is supposed to work within the game structure and intentionally vague about how so that each table can come up with their own unique flavor in explaining exactly how it happened. You can devise literally ANY justification you like about why you only need to touch a person or whatever they're holding for the spell to work, but your answer still needs to justify the spell or else you have to houserule why the spell isn't working according to RAW in this instance.

I mean, think of the poor Catgirls.

[Max_Killjoy]

This. If the player had an Item described as a Glove that gave some special protection against Shocking Grasp or Shock Damage, all that would matter.

But otherwise, this isn't just an arbitrarily high voltage necessary to reduce this whole scenario to a simple Touch Attack, this is also a Magical Spell attack. The Spell could be interpreted as hard science fiction that once you release the electricity, normal physics takes over, but there's really no need to do so. The spell could say you only need to touch the target, then magic bombards them with an electrical surge from no particular source. It's an Evocation spell, the electricity can be coming from a plane of Electrons. No reason Physics even needs to come into play here. The spell used targets any creature Touched, which is defined as not caring about armor, so why would it care if you touched an object held any more than an object worn? You're still targeting the creature, you effectively touched them and the magic was conducted to its intended target.


Isn't it "physics coming into play" when you assert that the spell should travel down the metal blade of the sword?

[Pleh]

Isn't it "physics coming into play" when you assert that the spell should travel down the metal blade of the sword?

Sure, physics CAN be used to explain things, but if that isn't working, physics isn't the ONLY WAY to explain how it works.

RAW says it does though, so we find a way to explain RAW or start houseruling.

[Max_Killjoy]

Sure, physics CAN be used to explain things, but if that isn't working, physics isn't the ONLY WAY to explain how it works.

RAW says it does though, so we find a way to explain RAW or start houseruling.

Thing is, I didn't think it was me who opened the door and let "physics" into the room.

If going by the RAW, couldn't one just as easily say that because target needs to be touched, a held object would be the touched target (instead of the person holding it) if you touched the sword, and that the spell would thus effect the sword?

As soon as one starts talking about the electricity traveling down the blade to affect the person holding it -- "then I bat the flat of your sword with my palm, discharge the shock through the blade and send it straight to your heart without putting myself in more danger than a regular attack" -- isn't that getting into the physics of electricity and the biology of electrocution?

It doesn't have to be about physics, it can operate on magically just-so rules in D&D's special black-box way of treating each spell as its own little isolated section of the rules, I suppose.

But it just seems odd to me to discuss the spell as if the electrical discharge acts like electricity for purposes of affecting the intended victim, but then stops acting like electricity when it presents a complication for that intent.

[Pelle]

Not exactly. Touch Attacks with Spells are considered Armed Attacks and do not provoke. Casting in Combat, however, typically DOES provoke AoO. So Fighter W/ Sword VS Sorcerer W/ Shocking Grasp gets AoO when the Sorcerer chooses to cast the spell, not when they make the Touch Attack.

Unarmed Touch Attacks (such as Starting A Grapple without the Improved Grapple feat), DO provoke Attacks of Opportunity.

Yeah, I've seen that. But it's not really the Touch AC mechanic's fault. If wanting an armed sword to dissuade being attacked with touch spells, house rule that touch spells grants AoO. If wanting armour not protecting against big thrown boulders, make them ranged touch attacks (or Reflex saves) instead of normal attacks...

[Zombimode]

Thing is, I didn't think it was me who opened the door and let "physics" into the room.

Don't think so. You can replace "sword" and "metal" in that sentence with "Club" and "Wood" without changing its meaning. The Point is that it is a touch attack and touch attacks don't really care where the attacker touches the target and definitely do not require the attacker to touch the target's skin.

[wumpus]

This actually used to exist back in AD&D (1E) days. Not sure anybody actually used it....

It looked good on paper. The *huge* catch was that there was never a good way to determine which AC "type" (and bonus) you would use for any monster's AC (they simply had the AC for the "to hit" table listed in the monster manual, no "AC type").

If you were fighting foes in well typed armor (preferably non-magical armor so AC=AC type) it shouldn't be a problem and was even included in Dragon Magazine's 1e "combat computer" (a circular slide-rule type thing that made THACO* calculations trivial) and showed the bonus for each weapon while doing the calculation.

It might even work if you changed to just a few "armor types"

weak hide [unarmored]
strong hide [leather]
chain [gets its own type, strong with holes seems pretty unique]
steel [plate]

Sword and board was also historically popular and presumably much more effective than most RPG styles. You could have a few bonuses specific to shields if you wanted this to be important. The big catch is dealing with monsters. I remember a product called "claw law" (part of the rolemaster system) that asked "ever see a wolf use a crossbow?". Unless you want to use strictly anthromorporphic monsters, expect to be ready to house rule which claw/bite type each monster has.

AC as a system (never mind what it is trying to model) becomes a huge issue in 3.x. As your character progresses from 1-4 or so, they may upgrade to the best possible armor (a lot depends on if your setting allows full plate). After that they may managed to add up to a +5 to their AC. After that, progress pretty much grinds to a halt. On the other hand the monsters gain roughly a +1 BAB every level, meaning that armor becomes pretty pointless. DDO not only had too much powercreep to push to too far along, they also allowed robes and outfits to have a second magic effect (instead of the +n AC bonus). This lead to years of fighters and clerics running around in "pajamas" and only ended when DDO abandoned the d20 system and replaced it with a system that favored armor-wearing characters.

* I think THACO was somebody at TSR's pet name and not used in the rules before 2e. I think it came up in the premade "player character sheets" or possibly "DM's screen" of the early 1e era.

[Max_Killjoy]

Don't think so. You can replace "sword" and "metal" in that sentence with "Club" and "Wood" without changing its meaning. The Point is that it is a touch attack and touch attacks don't really care where the attacker touches the target and definitely do not require the attacker to touch the target's skin.


One could still argue over whether held objects count as "part of the target", distinct from worn objects.

And the specific description used seemed to rely on the spell discharging electricity that would then act like electricity.

[Pleh]

Thing is, I didn't think it was me who opened the door and let "physics" into the room.

If going by the RAW, couldn't one just as easily say that because target needs to be touched, a held object would be the touched target (instead of the person holding it) if you touched the sword, and that the spell would thus effect the sword?

As soon as one starts talking about the electricity traveling down the blade to affect the person holding it -- "then I bat the flat of your sword with my palm, discharge the shock through the blade and send it straight to your heart without putting myself in more danger than a regular attack" -- isn't that getting into the physics of electricity and the biology of electrocution?

It doesn't have to be about physics, it can operate on magically just-so rules in D&D's special black-box way of treating each spell as its own little isolated section of the rules, I suppose.

But it just seems odd to me to discuss the spell as if the electrical discharge acts like electricity for purposes of affecting the intended victim, but then stops acting like electricity when it presents a complication for that intent.

I am arguing for the flexibility of AC in D&D. The fact is that *some* physics can plausibly satisfy some gaming groups and tables means that bringing *some* physics in is an acceptable answer (even if only some of the time, that still means it qualifies as acceptable). Proof need not be rigorous, only sufficiently convincing and useful in direct application within particular degrees of tolerance (which will vary based on who is playing the game).

I'm only aiming for "plausible." The fact that counter arguments are equally plausible are irrelevant.

The ability to use a little bit of physics doesn't mean I have to therefore explain EVERYTHING IN THE ENTIRE GAME through physics. Some tables (most assuredly yours) would require an all-or-nothing inclusion of physics in TTRPGs, but not every table would.

I don't have to convince every table, just the one in front of me. Therefore, I due to the flexibility of 3.5's AC system, I could explain to some groups a physical answer to how Touch AC works with Shocking Grasp. If confronted with an insistence to make ALL THE PHYSICS work, I'll just abandon that one and go back to, "well, then, I guess it's magic, so that's how it works." Because I should never have needed more of an explanation than that to begin with.

Sure, some tables will play Toon and accept anything at all and this is no evidence of AC being a good mechanic or system because they definitively accept even bad systems. But 3.5 is a pretty widely successful system in general while this forum is pretty much exclusively a fringe case from the fan base of 3.5 at large. In general, AC is accepted as a useful and fun mechanic as is.

As it is, 3.5 mechanics can be explained through hard science, pseudo science, or pure inexplicable fantasy. Hard science is just a lot more work, but no less valid.

If we were playing a Hard Science 3.5 game and I tried to use Shocking Grasp to hit you through your sword and you said, "leather gloves," I'd demand to see it written on your sheet and paid for by WBL. Then I'd have to check to see what the actual electrical resistance of leather gloves has been measured to be (since even electricians who wear professional insulated gloves still cut power to their wires rather than trusting the gloves to protect them). Pedantry swings both ways, but isn't always actually any fun to wade through.

But I went to a Science school, so my group likes adding science to the game. We all understand that you can always break that toy by asking for too much scientific validity, but since we all like science in our games, we usually like whatever little bits we can add without murdering the local Catgirl population.

Science in my D&D games is like salt. It adds some great flavor when used in moderation, but too much just ruins the meal.

---

On the subject of "targeting the sword," I'd say that since Touch AC ignores Armor, even if there are literally no openings through which you could touch the person without instead touching their armor and its still not considered to be targeting the armor instead of the person, the magic must be "smart enough" to translate through items worn. If it's smart enough to know what the caster is targeting, why is it limited to items worn vs items held? Sure, magic can be defined any way to Sunday, but I don't see a reason the spell couldn't be used to target either the sword or the swordsman by touching the blade itself. All methods should work the same.

[Tinkerer]

But it just seems odd to me to discuss the spell as if the electrical discharge acts like electricity for purposes of affecting the intended victim, but then stops acting like electricity when it presents a complication for that intent.

This ties into the question of how a fireball interacts with a lake which came up a little way back. Also if you want to write 1001 niggling little rules for exactly how spells interact. Does a parka provide any protection against a cone of cold? Can a flying creature be affected by shocking grasp? Hence why it's usually assumed that the spell works as intended unless otherwise indicated by the rules. A fireball will only heat the surface of the water, a parka provides no protection, and a flying creature is affected by shocking grasp even though they really shouldn't be. If we attempt to codify the result then you run into a research segment mid game session and nobody wants that.

My magic system has a little more finesse in that the reason that the electricity runs down the blade but wouldn't run down a connecting piece of metal such as a railing is that the blade is within the outermost area of the defendants aura but that is a topic for another day.

[Max_Killjoy]

It just seemed a bit arbitrary to me, to talk about electricity discharging down the sword and into the person holding it and straight to their heart (which seemed a "physics based" argument) and then object to equally applying the physics of the metal being separated from the person by heavy clothing.

As an aside, correctly worn full plate armor should actually make the person less likely to be electrocuted, as the metal armor should have no contact with their skin, and should form the path of least resistance to the ground -- in much the same way a car can channel a lightning strike around those sitting inside it.

[Tinkerer]

It just seemed a bit arbitrary to me, to talk about electricity discharging down the sword and into the person holding it and straight to their heart (which seemed a "physics based" argument) and then object to equally applying the physics of the metal being separated from the person by heavy clothing.

As an aside, correctly worn full plate armor should actually make the person less likely to be electrocuted, as the metal armor should have no contact with their skin, and should form the path of least resistance to the ground -- in much the same way a car can channel a lightning strike around those sitting inside it.

Yep, you know what else is arbitrary? Turning someone to stone takes less effort than creating an air embolism in their bloodstream. Try and figure that one out.

[Max_Killjoy]

Does a parka provide any protection against a cone of cold?


Depends...

Does Cone of Cold unleash a spray of supercooled air / vapor?

Or does it produce a cone of effect that leaches the heat from anything caught inside that area?

[Ignimortis]

Depends...

Does Cone of Cold unleash a spray of supercooled air / vapor?

Or does it produce a cone of effect that leaches the heat from anything caught inside that area?

It produces magical cold damage. A parka, unless enchanted, is probably under "cold weather clothes", which do not protect against magical cold at all, because magic works on a non-physical level, on which the mundane parka does not exist - ghosts can be damaged by magic, and mundane objects do not harm them at all, even if it is energy damage - a lit torch does nothing to a ghost. Therefore, we're working with at least two geographically overlapping but technically distinct planes of existence, are we not?

[Pleh]

My magic system has a little more finesse in that the reason that the electricity runs down the blade but wouldn't run down a connecting piece of metal such as a railing is that the blade is within the outermost area of the defendants aura but that is a topic for another day.

I like that idea: magic targets aura and the blade is "an extension" of the swordsman

[Tinkerer]

I like that idea: magic targets aura and the blade is "an extension" of the swordsman

Exactly. It also means that the shocking grasp would have an equivalent effect if the warrior was wielding a wooden club as it does for a metal sword. The system sounds complicated, however once you wrap your brain around it you get fairly predictable effects which are quick to resolve and make sense by the laws of magic.

[kyoryu]

More combat "realism" was wanted, and in my area, in the late 1970's, we used the "Peering Conventions", from "All the World's Monster's" (a third-party "Monster Manual" published before the Monster Manual.

I'll have to tell Steve his name has been changed.

:smallbiggrin::smallamused:

[Pleh]

Exactly. It also means that the shocking grasp would have an equivalent effect if the warrior was wielding a wooden club as it does for a metal sword. The system sounds complicated, however once you wrap your brain around it you get fairly predictable effects which are quick to resolve and make sense by the laws of magic.

Which is perfect for those Roleplaying elements of Casters, so that you have something distinctly unique about how Casters see the world that is rational enough for players to use it as a framework for playing their character.

It's like Yoda saying he sees all things more by how the Force flows through and around them than by their outward appearance (my own paraphrasing this is). Size and weight are insignificant compared to the might of the Force that flows through the object. It's simple and rational enough for a player to latch onto it and play from this perspective, but different enough that another player could use the more general "mundane" mindset and operate just as rationally in the same universe.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Exactly. It also means that the shocking grasp would have an equivalent effect if the warrior was wielding a wooden club as it does for a metal sword. The system sounds complicated, however once you wrap your brain around it you get fairly predictable effects which are quick to resolve and make sense by the laws of magic.


Which is perfect for those Roleplaying elements of Casters, so that you have something distinctly unique about how Casters see the world that is rational enough for players to use it as a framework for playing their character.

It's like Yoda saying he sees all things more by how the Force flows through and around them than by their outward appearance (my own paraphrasing this is). Size and weight are insignificant compared to the might of the Force that flows through the object. It's simple and rational enough for a player to latch onto it and play from this perspective, but different enough that another player could use the more general "mundane" mindset and operate just as rationally in the same universe.

I ran with this idea for my setting--every living thing has 3 parts:

The spark: This is the self, the creativity, the part that makes the decisions.
The body: This is the spark's interface with material things, including sensation.
The aura: This is the spark's interface with the body and with other spiritual things (including spells/external magic).

So spell-casters manipulate their aura to cast spells, targeting other auras. This is how "auto-targeting" spells like magic missile work (as well as individual saving throw spells like hold person)--they target an aura and so can't miss. Other spells create little bits of energy and then those get thrown (so they have to hit and can be deflected by armor). People like barbarians or monks manipulate the connection between aura and body, juicing their bodies up with the same type of energy as a spell-caster, but having physical effects rather than magical ones. This also explains why spell-casters have less HP than brute-types--they focus on training their auras to interact with the outside magic, instead of pouring that energy into building their bodies.

[vasilidor]

on the giving combat realism and metal armor and lightning bolt, a person in full plate should be immune as it acts like a Faraday cage and directs the electricity around the wearer and into the ground. my two coppers.
that said we like to have our lightning bolts fry people like eggs thus the best way to handle arguments of armor in such situations is to pretend the armor is not there.

[PhoenixPhyre]

on the giving combat realism and metal armor and lightning bolt, a person in full plate should be immune as it acts like a Faraday cage and directs the electricity around the wearer and into the ground. my two coppers.
that said we like to have our lightning bolts fry people like eggs thus the best way to handle arguments of armor in such situations is to pretend the armor is not there.

I'm not sure how much you sweat, but the inner padding might make a pretty decent connection between you and the plate. And it's certainly going to heat up quite a bit--plate armor isn't a perfect conductor. So not immune, but certainly a bit reduced.

I tend to say that it isn't real lightning (because real lightning would short out to ground as opposed to moving horizontally)--it's charged mana that appears like lightning, but behaves like the spell. Same for other evocation spells.

[2D8HP]

I'll have to tell Steve his name has been changed.

:smallbiggrin::smallamused:.

https://i.imgflip.com/1a2s4i.jpg

[Tanarii]

Armor Class is a number to determine how likely you are to lose Hit Points, which is a number used to determine when you're dead / unable to take actions. The latter depending on edition. It's not supposed to "make sense" other than that.


It looked good on paper. The *huge* catch was that there was never a good way to determine which AC "type" (and bonus) you would use for any monster's AC (they simply had the AC for the "to hit" table listed in the monster manual, no "AC type").I thought that it explicitly wasn't supposed to be used with monster ACs, only with Armor? Like weapon speed and weapon reach, it only came into play during some very niche situations. Most of which were probably PvP if you ran a properly Gygaxian multiparty with pickup groups campaign, with some encounters with randomly rolled NPC adventuring groups. (I never ran that type of campaign until later editions. I used armor tables, weapon speed and weapon distances mostly with 1e Oriental Adventures, because most of my bad guys were humans when I ran that.)

The catch I remember was that it didn't distinguish between AC from Armor, and AC from Armor + Shield. In other words, AC 6 modifier was used for both Leather+Shield and Banded (or whatever). That never sat right with me.

Regardless 2e & 2e C&T were a huge relief in terms of simplicity and ability to run a workable game system. Even if they didn't make any 'sense' either. and 3e's touch AC and abandoning weapon speed was even more of a relief. 5e dropping touch AC and just going back to full on abstract is even better. I've yet to see a game that really 'makes sense' that isn't a pain the patootie to run.

[RazorChain]

It produces magical cold damage. A parka, unless enchanted, is probably under "cold weather clothes", which do not protect against magical cold at all, because magic works on a non-physical level, on which the mundane parka does not exist - ghosts can be damaged by magic, and mundane objects do not harm them at all, even if it is energy damage - a lit torch does nothing to a ghost. Therefore, we're working with at least two geographically overlapping but technically distinct planes of existence, are we not?

So is the cone of cold then harming your soul?

So you need magical water to put out magical fire?

If magic operates non-physical level and my character exists on the physical level then isn't it logical that he can just ignore magic?

[RazorChain]

I'm not sure how much you sweat, but the inner padding might make a pretty decent connection between you and the plate. And it's certainly going to heat up quite a bit--plate armor isn't a perfect conductor. So not immune, but certainly a bit reduced.

I tend to say that it isn't real lightning (because real lightning would short out to ground as opposed to moving horizontally)--it's charged mana that appears like lightning, but behaves like the spell. Same for other evocation spells.

This sounds all kinds of fabulous but RAW says no!

So either physics in D&D land is just plain different or I can just drop my cold/fire/electricity resistances and just get magic damage resistance instead. The system establishes that these different kind of magic attacks are indeed fire/cold/lightning not some pseudo elemental attacks.

[Eldan]

For me that is AC. The actual function of it is fine. The thing that gets to me is how counter it works to reasonablility. The primary factor to it is what armour you are wearing, naturally. The issue comes when a person wants to counter it. Instead of armour reducing the blow by absorbing the shock, it either negates or counters. If you normally have a longsword and there is a guy in huge armour, switching to a warhammer, weapon designed to combat armour, does nothing! Attacks should either have to be made stronger to break through or hit its weak points.?

There were rules like that in older editions of D&D. Everyone hated them, as it meant looking up a long and detailed table on how each armor was affected by each weapon every time you tried to attack.

[FabulousFizban]

we are running a game system, not modeling real world physics. for that reason, i think simplicity and comprehension take precedent over realism. i think the combat system could be much more streamlined an still present depth and versitility.

[Ignimortis]

So is the cone of cold then harming your soul?

So you need magical water to put out magical fire?

If magic operates non-physical level and my character exists on the physical level then isn't it logical that he can just ignore magic?
Not the "soul", but probably the "lifeforce" which is similar but doesn't carry the same connotations as "soul". As in, your soul is relevant to afterlife or raising you from the dead, so it doesn't get damaged, but your body isn't physical only in D&D realms.

Magical fire usually doesn't light stuff on magical fire, and if it is, the interactions with water are either noted or not. In the latter case, I would expect that if the spell explicitly lights stuff on magical fire and not mundane fire (like, say, 3.5e Combust is probably mundane fire generated by magic, and not magical fire like a Fireball), then you cannot just put it out with mundane water, yes.

Your character exists on all relevant levels, because ghosts can still harm you, therefore there is a common plane of existence between you.

[wumpus]

There were rules like that in older editions of D&D. Everyone hated them, as it meant looking up a long and detailed table on how each armor was affected by each weapon every time you tried to attack.

Hated rules were ignored rules in AD&D. Just ask how often you rolled for contracting a disease (I've recommended that anyone asking for a RAW interpretation of rules in AD&D suddenly have any "forgotten" disease rolls all retroactively rolled at once). The whole idea of RAW didn't make any sense until at least 3.0 (when I started hearing the term, and it shocked my AD&D sensibilities).

I *think* the DM was supposed to house rule the bonus for each monster (judging by how it resembled any specific armor type), but can't be bothered to dig out my AD&D DMG. This is probably the reason it was largely forgotten.

If anybody is still playing AD&D and thinks looking this up is an issue, you need to try this: http://melkot.com/mechanics/combat-comp.html

[Knaight]

we are running a game system, not modeling real world physics. for that reason, i think simplicity and comprehension take precedent over realism. i think the combat system could be much more streamlined an still present depth and versitility.
It can be, and plenty of other systems have done so. The problem is in the fundamentals - from a simulationist perspective something like an opposed combat roll determining whether hits land (where the primary factor is combat skill) where armor comes in later tends to be both simpler and have more room for depth.


There were rules like that in older editions of D&D. Everyone hated them, as it meant looking up a long and detailed table on how each armor was affected by each weapon every time you tried to attack.
There are also rules for that in a lot of other games that don't have this problem. Early D&D is very good at presenting simple information in needlessly complicated ways. Remember attack matrices?

[Max_Killjoy]

It can be, and plenty of other systems have done so. The problem is in the fundamentals - from a simulationist perspective something like an opposed combat roll determining whether hits land (where the primary factor is combat skill) where armor comes in later tends to be both simpler and have more room for depth.


One of the reasons I don't personally care for "roll once to determine everything" (if you hit, how well you hit, how much damage, what kind of damage, etc, all in one roll) systems is that the squeeze out a lot of room for nuance or differentiation -- while also not really feeling that much like a fight.




There are also rules for that in a lot of other games that don't have this problem. Early D&D is very good at presenting simple information in needlessly complicated ways. Remember attack matrices?


And in what looks like over-correction, there have been (and are) systems that were very "good" at presenting complex information in needlessly simplified ways.

[kyoryu]

There are also rules for that in a lot of other games that don't have this problem. Early D&D is very good at presenting simple information in needlessly complicated ways. Remember attack matrices?

Attack matrices aren't perfectly linear, so they can't be codified into a formula.

THAC0 is a reasonable approximation, but it's not the same thing. Whether that slight non-linearity is important or not is a valid subject of debate.

[ross]

dnd asymmetry for rolls is weird: almost everything goes like this: initiator rolls, meets or beats target number. attacks and AC, skills and DC, loot tables, xp tables.

But spells invert it. Initiator has a save DC, target rolls to beat it. Why reverse it for this one case? Normal method would work just as well; with multiple targets you would just roll once and check against each target, so it would even be faster in that case.

[PhoenixPhyre]

dnd asymmetry for rolls is weird: almost everything goes like this: initiator rolls, meets or beats target number. attacks and AC, skills and DC, loot tables, xp tables.

But spells invert it. Initiator has a save DC, target rolls to beat it. Why reverse it for this one case? Normal method would work just as well; with multiple targets you would just roll once and check against each target, so it would even be faster in that case.

4e tried that (attacker rolled everything against static TNs). Did it work? <shrug> The edition failed for many reasons, although I liked it for what it was.

One other wrinkle is that for initiator-rolled things (AC, skills, etc), a tie is a success. On a defender-rolled thing (saving throws), a tie is a failure (for the initiator). While those are the same from the roller's perspective (a tie is good enough), it's odd from the outside.

[Tanarii]

4e tried that (attacker rolled everything against static TNs). Did it work? <shrug> The edition failed for many reasons, although I liked it for what it was.
When I really miss the 4e method is with 5e can trips. It's a (very minor) pain in the ass to have to roll a saving throw every time the cleric uses Sacred Flame, or a Sorc/Wizard uses Poison Spray or Acid Splash. Especially at lower levels, when they're doing it the majority of combat rounds. I already have to do enough rolling for enemies as is. I've suggested players rolling them for the enemy instead, but that just doesn't feel right for most of them.

I do recognize that a save in 5e has different implications for those spells, like no criticals, or no auto hit/miss, or no cover for non-Dex saves.

[PhoenixPhyre]

When I really miss the 4e method is with 5e can trips. It's a (very minor) pain in the ass to have to roll a saving throw every time the cleric uses Sacred Flame, or a Sorc/Wizard uses Poison Spray or Acid Splash. Especially at lower levels, when they're doing it the majority of combat rounds. I already have to do enough rolling for enemies as is. I've suggested players rolling them for the enemy instead, but that just doesn't feel right for most of them.

I do recognize that a save in 5e has different implications for those spells, like no criticals, or no auto hit/miss, or no cover for non-Dex saves.

Yeah. Conceptually, they're representing different things (to me at least).

Attack rolls: Things where either aiming is important or that can be substantially mitigated/deflected/absorbed by armor. For these, it's hit (result happens) or miss (nothing happens).

Saving throws: Affect the whole space (either as an AoE or as a mind-affecting/soul-targeted thing). Can't dodge these, only get partially out of the way or resist the effect.

[sengmeng]

Hitpoints being explained away as a combination of experienced heroes rolling with the hits, fighting through the pain, and just raw toughness... but then the cleric starts healing you and it takes literally 20 or more times the power to bring you back from 0 to full as it would for a peasant. That makes it clear that explanations aside, you're basically a battery for positive energy and you do have a capacity many times that of an average Joe. Plus, if you both died, the same spell would be needed to bring you back. I think healing should restore a percentage of hitpoints rather than a fixed number. But then you get another problem where the gp value of a potion wouldn't make sense as you go up in level.

[CharonsHelper]

I think healing should restore a percentage of hitpoints rather than a fixed number.

4e did that.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Hitpoints being explained away as a combination of experienced heroes rolling with the hits, fighting through the pain, and just raw toughness... but then the cleric starts healing you and it takes literally 20 or more times the power to bring you back from 0 to full as it would for a peasant. That makes it clear that explanations aside, you're basically a battery for positive energy and you do have a capacity many times that of an average Joe. Plus, if you both died, the same spell would be needed to bring you back. I think healing should restore a percentage of hitpoints rather than a fixed number. But then you get another problem where the gp value of a potion wouldn't make sense as you go up in level.

I decided that HP in my setting represent the body's ability to quickly heal itself (a literal reserve of energy). This is slow to replenish naturally (requiring sleep), but heals most injuries rapidly (so as to prevent debilitation from non-lethal injury). "Higher level" (stronger souls) can store more energy (have more hit points). Above ~50% HP, the body heals things real fast (as if you're not hurt at all). Below ~50% (bloodied), your body starts showing the effects, as it keeps energy in reserve to heal the big hurts (internal injuries, broken bones, etc). Healing is literally replenishing that reserve.

"Normal" people have about as much healing power as a normal earth person. So things like small scrapes, cuts, bruises all heal fast, but a broken bone is already > 50% of the reserve. Yeah, these people aren't as affected by non-mortal injuries as earth people are. Diseases work differently (attacking the spirit/body connection). And yes, this makes "soul energy" a tradeable resource. One city uses hit die based currency--donate a hit die (~3.5 HP) of energy; that pays for about 2 days food.

I'm sure there are other weirdnesses, but it works fine for my purpose.

[Cluedrew]

To PhoenixPhyre: I feel like if the Tippyverse was an intended D&D setting, that could be the official explanation. Which is to say it is kind of cool, but I feel it is bit too mystical for the standard feel Dungeons & Dragons. It also might fix right in with a mystic Kung Fu setting as well. Still, it is a little more coherent than not choosing between luck, dodge & inhuman toughness.

[RazorChain]

For me pretending HP is something it isn't doesnt help.

Let's look at empirical evidence

Different classes get different HP. Why is the barbarian luckier, better to avoid/roll with the blows than fighter or monk? He's tougher is the official explanition.

Why do you get more HP the more Constitution you have? Because you are healthier/tougher

Why can a high level character survive being routenily dropped off a cliff or bathed in lava? Because he has more life than the ordinary peasant

Why does a high level character survive more burning/poison/acid than a low level one? Because he has more life.

If I put D&D characters in a lab like environment I can literally prove that HP is just ability to withstand more damage

[PhoenixPhyre]

@RazorChain, that's one of the reasons I ended up with the explanation I did for HP. I've never liked the "luck and plot armor" explanation personally. It's always seemed off to me.

One of the goals of my setting was to see if I could construct a coherent set of reasons why the mechanics of 5e D&D work the way they do in this universe. The HP answer was a natural outgrowth of some other explanations, and it also helps explain magic and fantastic creatures.

[RazorChain]

@PhoenixPhyre

Well you are moving in the opposite direction than most people do.

Most people try to reconcile the mechanichs with real life expectations which doesnt work

You are making up ingame explanation for the mechanics which moves it away from real life expectations.

I like the thought experiment like Typpiverse which tries to marry the mechanics to the setting and it will be interesting where this leads you.

[Max_Killjoy]

My experience is that the assertion that D&D-like high-scaling HP is a conglomeration of factors that overlaps with other mechanics typically comes from the "defenders" / proponents of that sort of HP.

[PhoenixPhyre]

@PhoenixPhyre

Well you are moving in the opposite direction than most people do.

Most people try to reconcile the mechanichs with real life expectations which doesnt work

You are making up ingame explanation for the mechanics which moves it away from real life expectations.

I like the thought experiment like Typpiverse which tries to marry the mechanics to the setting and it will be interesting where this leads you.

My problem with the Tippyverse is that it relies on very particular assumptions about the nature of the rules to reach its end result. It's also not nearly a playable setting.

I'm trying to treat the mechanics (not really numerical here, more qualitative) as a reasonable, game-appropriate, playable approximation/abstraction of something and figure out a something that fits but is still fun to play in. Because, for me, that's the whole point. I fear that sometimes in our desire for tight world-building we end up filling in all the spaces, leaving none for exploration or for "better" answers that come later. In a sense, I'm working backward--I know what the result should look like and am trying to figure out what conditions would lead to that result.

I'd like the surface effects to be reasonably earth-like, but am totally willing to let fantastic things be fantastic. I realized early on that to make the mechanics work, everyone would have to either do magic or be magic, or both. I've completely given up things like quantum mechanics, atoms, molecules, etc. An earth scientist who went to Quartus would not recognize anything about the fine details, although the surface level would be very similar.

So far I've found 5e to be quite amenable to this and have discovered lots of ways that the classes (for example) are both similar and different so that it makes sense to separate them. I've discovered a theory of 5e's pseudo-vancian magic that, for me, makes it quite rigorous. I've had to jettison most of the racial fluff, however, along with alignment. Good thing those aren't tightly bound into the assumptions, unlike 3e.

[RazorChain]

My problem with the Tippyverse is that it relies on very particular assumptions about the nature of the rules to reach its end result. It's also not nearly a playable setting.

I'm trying to treat the mechanics (not really numerical here, more qualitative) as a reasonable, game-appropriate, playable approximation/abstraction of something and figure out a something that fits but is still fun to play in. Because, for me, that's the whole point. I fear that sometimes in our desire for tight world-building we end up filling in all the spaces, leaving none for exploration or for "better" answers that come later. In a sense, I'm working backward--I know what the result should look like and am trying to figure out what conditions would lead to that result.

I'd like the surface effects to be reasonably earth-like, but am totally willing to let fantastic things be fantastic. I realized early on that to make the mechanics work, everyone would have to either do magic or be magic, or both. I've completely given up things like quantum mechanics, atoms, molecules, etc. An earth scientist who went to Quartus would not recognize anything about the fine details, although the surface level would be very similar.

So far I've found 5e to be quite amenable to this and have discovered lots of ways that the classes (for example) are both similar and different so that it makes sense to separate them. I've discovered a theory of 5e's pseudo-vancian magic that, for me, makes it quite rigorous. I've had to jettison most of the racial fluff, however, along with alignment. Good thing those aren't tightly bound into the assumptions, unlike 3e.


I do it the other way around. I've tried a lot of different systems so I have a very broad system knowledge and know what is good for what. So when I decide upon what I want to run, what setting and what kind of campaign then I'll chose the system that fits best. This means I know the mechanics and what they are capable of from the start and what I can expect from the mechanics.

I know that D20 is mostly atrocious in simulating anything close to realism or anything that adheres to realistic expectations. You can probalby do D&D hacks for something but mostly for me D&D can only do one thing and that's zero to superhero with a tight focus on dungeon crawling and therefore I won't use the system for anything else.

And because I have a limited time I do a very loose world building and paint it in broad strokes and go better into details as needed.

I heartily recommend that you try out different systems. Every roleplayer worth his salt should at least try out 10 systems just to have comparison.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I do it the other way around. I've tried a lot of different systems so I have a very broad system knowledge and know what is good for what. So when I decide upon what I want to run, what setting and what kind of campaign then I'll chose the system that fits best. This means I know the mechanics and what they are capable of from the start and what I can expect from the mechanics.

I know that D20 is mostly atrocious in simulating anything close to realism or anything that adheres to realistic expectations. You can probalby do D&D hacks for something but mostly for me D&D can only do one thing and that's zero to superhero with a tight focus on dungeon crawling and therefore I won't use the system for anything else.

And because I have a limited time I do a very loose world building and paint it in broad strokes and go better into details as needed.

I heartily recommend that you try out different systems. Every roleplayer worth his salt should at least try out 10 systems just to have comparison.

I'd love to try different systems, but groups are few and far between where I am for anything but 5e and PF (which I'd rather not play, too much crunch).

I'm a bit of a special case--I don't care about realism, so discarding that is easy. 99% of the time, I want larger-than-life figures doing heroic things in a fantastic environment. Political and mystery games bore me (especially as a DM), and internal angst-driven games (the stereotype of oWoD) make me want to hurl.

I run a single setting, single system because I'm running multiple games in parallel that only live a school year (being the advisor to a D&D club at a high school). Trying to keep track of multiple settings/systems would make me crazy. I also love (and they do too) that their actions have visible, persistent effects on the game world. Officially, each group runs in a parallel timeline that branches off the canon one at session 1, but I fold the notable things they do, organizations they found, places they discover, etc. back into the timeline. In a sense, we're collaborating on building the setting. My policy is that anything I say at the table is canon and nothing else is. My one adult group (colleagues) are currently doing an explicitly non-canon adventure arc (since the canon timeline presumes that their characters live and become NPCs, and this arc may or may not remove one of them from existence entirely), but I'm collecting ideas from them as they play to incorporate into the canon timeline. Heck, I let one of the first groups decide how to blow up the world. I was switching from 4e to 5e and I knew I needed a big time-skip to rearrange things, so I let them decide the parameters of the end of the world as they knew it through their actions. This sense of continuity is really attractive to players.

As far as D&D, I think recent editions are a little better than you portray them. 4e handles the "fantasy superheros in tactical combat" side of things really really well (if you can get past the intentionally disassociated mechanics). 5e is much more grounded--you're never zeros, but you don't end up as superheros either. Larger-than-life, sure. But not superheros. Bounded accuracy goes a long way in restraining that, as does the limits on spell-casting, etc. It basically defaults to what I said above--larger-than-life figures doing heroic things in fantastic environments. It doesn't provide tons of guidance for intricate social maneuvering, but I'm glad for that--I'd rather mostly just talk that out and only roll when necessary to wrap things up for a particular request. Codifying things like that causes absurdities real fast in my experience.

[Pleh]

It doesn't provide tons of guidance for intricate social maneuvering, but I'm glad for that--I'd rather mostly just talk that out and only roll when necessary to wrap things up for a particular request. Codifying things like that causes absurdities real fast in my experience.

Sounds like you're referring to Diplomancy and Bluffcraft. I like that they are possible in 3.5, but not how ridiculously powerful they often become. I feel, just like magic, it balances out in E6 due to limits on how much you can put into the skill. From there, if party faces are still breaking your games, add 5 to the DC for general stuff and 10 to ridiculous stuff. Add some Reputation rules so failure at diplomacy has long lasting consequences, making the choice to use diplomacy more tactical.

[RazorChain]

Sounds like you're referring to Diplomancy and Bluffcraft. I like that they are possible in 3.5, but not how ridiculously powerful they often become. I feel, just like magic, it balances out in E6 due to limits on how much you can put into the skill. From there, if party faces are still breaking your games, add 5 to the DC for general stuff and 10 to ridiculous stuff. Add some Reputation rules so failure at diplomacy has long lasting consequences, making the choice to use diplomacy more tactical.

Now I don't remember how the difficulty levels are in 3.5 or what guidelines are used. The problem with skill that gets better and DC that stays put is that the players will have the expectations that move way beyond what's reasonable not into the fantastic but just plain silly. Like I remember a player who was dissatisfied about that the DM didn't allow his diplomancer to overcome an encounter by convincing the bad guys to kill themselves because he had such a high skill.


The problem with such DC tables that allow the PC to convince somebody in 6 seconds flat that he shouldn't kill the PC but indeed they are best buddies and he should have the PC's back are rules that don't make sense and go against realistic expectations. Especially when you can squeeze your diplomacy skill high enough and people demand that RAW is used.

[Pleh]

Now I don't remember how the difficulty levels are in 3.5 or what guidelines are used. The problem with skill that gets better and DC that stays put is that the players will have the expectations that move way beyond what's reasonable not into the fantastic but just plain silly. Like I remember a player who was dissatisfied about that the DM didn't allow his diplomancer to overcome an encounter by convincing the bad guys to kill themselves because he had such a high skill.


The problem with such DC tables that allow the PC to convince somebody in 6 seconds flat that he shouldn't kill the PC but indeed they are best buddies and he should have the PC's back are rules that don't make sense and go against realistic expectations. Especially when you can squeeze your diplomacy skill high enough and people demand that RAW is used.

See, part of the original rules for 3.5's skill systems were that some tasks were actually impossible to achieve no matter the skill check. A slight step down is things that are Epic, which are only nigh-impossible. Generally, most epic checks start around 40 IIRC.

The real problem is that, unlike the Climb or Jump skills, where check results can translate directly into tangible distance, DCs for social interaction can only really be determined by DM fiat. There are guidelines suggesting a DC increase if X or decrease if Y, but since there's not a hard set DC for every social interaction, players can easily feel the DM is being stingy if they don't have at least a chance to succeed. Then, once they have a chance, they can optimize to maximize the chance into certainty.

Social skills are definitely an aspect of the game that suffered from give an inch, take a mile. The game seems to want diplomacy to be mechanical, but then shies away from adequately defining the limits of power because it's too broad and nuanced a subject to crunch into mechanics.

Bounded accuracy serves THIS end of the game well, IMO.

[PhoenixPhyre]

3e diplomancy is to me a symptom of a deeper problem--unbounded bonuses and defined, specific DCs. Persuading a dire enemy to be your devoted servant in a single check has DC: Nope in my opinion. You might be able to do it over the course of an adventure, but it will require a bunch of actions and small checks to do smaller, specific things. 5e doesn't really have that issue, so that's not my big problem. My big problem is that when you have "social mechanics" (social combat, defined moves, etc), it makes it hard for me in two ways.

1) As a DM, it sets expectations that social conflicts should be solved in ways that "fit" with the system--through conflict. That feels really rigid and restricts my flexibility to really respond to what the characters do and say. It feels confining. I have players saying things that their opposite numbers would just agree to. No check needed. Or things that can't be changed (DC: Nope stuff).

2) As a player who isn't the most socially ept, it feels disconnected and artificial (not that most RL social interactions don't feel that way, but this is even more so). More like a board game that can be "won" rather than a conversation that I can imagine a character really having.

It also brings back bad memories of arguing with my brother (a star debater) as a teenager. Hint: I never "won" because he was real good at twisting words to make me convinced that I was really wrong all along, even if I wasn't. It wasn't pleasant. But that's a personal failing.

[Max_Killjoy]

Any game that systemizes all social interaction on a combat model is immediately suspect.

[Pleh]

I don't think the game makers intended the skill to monopolize all social interaction. I think it was an unintended side effect of trying to make it flexible enough to use in most any social interaction.

Since the rules are meant to apply in any scenario you want, they effectively apply in every scenario. It's the same problem 3.5 suffers with assuming that tables will be selective in which splats are added, rather than building them to all be actually balanced when added all together.

[RazorChain]

I don't think the game makers intended the skill to monopolize all social interaction. I think it was an unintended side effect of trying to make it flexible enough to use in most any social interaction.

Since the rules are meant to apply in any scenario you want, they effectively apply in every scenario. It's the same problem 3.5 suffers with assuming that tables will be selective in which splats are added, rather than building them to all be actually balanced when added all together.

This is a problem in most games where you add to the rules without referencing the old rules to make a complete rulesystem. D&D is particularly prone to this to sell splat books and each class has rules for itself (and monsters too)

The other problem with social skills is when there are hard rules that can be exploited or you have loose rules dependent on the GMs whim.

With social rules I prefer them loose when I have a good GM but they can be disastrous with a bad GM

[PhoenixPhyre]

With social rules I prefer them loose when I have a good GM but they can be disastrous with a bad GM

The same issue applies with most rules--even the most restrictive rule set won't help you against a bad DM. Because the rules don't really constrain the DM in the same way they do the players*. Since the DM decides what goes into the game**, if they want something to be difficult/impossible/trivial they can simply alter what they put in the players' path to make it so, even following the rules. Only solution is not to play with bad DMs.

*In D&D-like systems. Some other systems restrain the DM in other ways, but you fundamentally can't put outside restraints on the game-runner except from the players at the table-social-agreement level.
** unless you're doing full narrative/players-as-authors style games, which often don't have DMs

[RazorChain]

The same issue applies with most rules--even the most restrictive rule set won't help you against a bad DM. Because the rules don't really constrain the DM in the same way they do the players*. Since the DM decides what goes into the game**, if they want something to be difficult/impossible/trivial they can simply alter what they put in the players' path to make it so, even following the rules. Only solution is not to play with bad DMs.

*In D&D-like systems. Some other systems restrain the DM in other ways, but you fundamentally can't put outside restraints on the game-runner except from the players at the table-social-agreement level.
** unless you're doing full narrative/players-as-authors style games, which often don't have DMs

I agree, rules don't fix bad GMs but I hope they can be restrained.

There is only one bad GM I've played with recently and I've known him for 20+ years so I knew what I was signing up for.

But he ran 5e and while playing I found some rules that I hated. In fact I thought 5e was better because of the praise it had gotten.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I agree, rules don't fix bad GMs but I hope they can be restrained.

There is only one bad GM I've played with recently and I've known him for 20+ years so I knew what I was signing up for.

But he ran 5e and while playing I found some rules that I hated. In fact I thought 5e was better because of the praise it had gotten.

That's the problem. I've never seen a set of words that can restrain someone who's a consciously bad DM. You can train an inexperienced one, you can run fixed adventure paths for the ones who are better at rules than at creating engaging options, but if someone wants to be bad (or refuses to accept that they're bad), no written text can change that. Only other players refusing to play with them until they change.

In my experience, bad DMs will ignore, change, or otherwise be unaffected by rules that try to restrain them. Because they naturally have inalienable power as the one creating the situations--they can pick and choose elements to cause the effect they want.

[Pleh]

I don't think a game that literally rules out being a bad DM is one I want to play. Seems like such a system would have to be exhaustively limiting.

At that point, I'll just pick up a video game.