Unchained Action Economy and the Path of War

[DurionArcanis]

As someone who has never really looked into Unchained rules at all and never thought I would, I recently stumbled upon the Unchained Action Economy. Now as I am always open to improvements, tend to use lots of 3pp and even homebrew and 3.x in my games, and am seeking a smoother more story inclined flow... I wondered about this.

How would you rule maneuvers in general? A simple action or an advanced action? One act or two? I'm not even considering the total abuse it can suffer with taking three spells per round or something, my players generally know better than to try to abuse that privilege and I'm trying to somewhat reduce the "kill it till it's dead every time without exception" type of adventure style so I'm not too worried about how combats go as long as there's some sort of creativity in the approach.

Any thoughts on the matter though? I'm all for hearing pros and cons from any point of view, it helps me analyze how I should approach it, what to look out for, and how others will react upon seeing it in my rules.

[johnbragg]

PFSRD says "Most actions that involve an attack roll or a combat maneuver check as a standard action in the standard economy are simple actions in this system. For combat maneuvers that can’t be substituted for one attack in a full-attack action and other complicated attacks, consider making them attack actions that require further consecutive acts to complete. Look at combat maneuvers such as drag, grapple, and reposition for examples of such actions."

So maneuvers are usually simple actions.

But that probably is referring to PAthfinder maneuvers, CMB/CMD things. I've never seen Path of War, so I have no idea how PoW maneuvers would translate.

[DurionArcanis]

The Path of War is basically the Tome of Battle made by a 3pp for Pathfinder. They're (Su) abilities that essentially translate to "weaboo fitan majik" or "spells for martials". Think like old Chinese Wu-Shu movies, Xiaolin Showdown, Avatar the Last Airbender, some older animes, etc.

The thing is, there are several categories of Maneuver. You have Boosts and Counters which are often Swifts, you've got Strikes that are often Standards, and you've got Stances (which you can change with a Swift). Many maneuvers also want you to move as part of it or work as ranged or something.

[QuadraticGish]

They're (Su) abilities I don't mean to be pedantic, but IIRC PoW boosts, maneuvers, and stances are explicitly (Ex) unless specified otherwise(typically in the discipline's description).

[Dr_Dinosaur]

I don't mean to be pedantic, but IIRC PoW boosts, maneuvers, and stances are explicitly (Ex) unless specified otherwise(typically in the discipline's description).
You’re absolutely right.

As for UAE, idk about the balance of it but I’d say 1 action for Boosts and entering Stances and 2 actions for using Strikes. Alternatel, just add a rule that you can’t take attack actions in the same turn you use a Strike

[Eldariel]

The Path of War is basically the Tome of Battle made by a 3pp for Pathfinder. They're (Su) abilities that essentially translate to "weaboo fitan majik" or "spells for martials". Think like old Chinese Wu-Shu movies, Xiaolin Showdown, Avatar the Last Airbender, some older animes, etc.

Eh, like 70% of the maneuvers are something that would more fit Historical European Martial Arts than a kung fu flick; stuff like "I attack aggressively", "I deflect an attack", "I move fast" or things of that nature. Supernatural stuff makes up a tiny minority of the whole and it's really misleading to refer to it as magical or spells; the only similarity is that they are fixed chunks of effects that you can initiate and that they happen to be split into an equal number of tiers that you gain access to as your character advances. They can, however, be recovered, multiples can't be prepared at any given time, etc. They function very differently from magic in the system.

[Thealtruistorc]

Personally, I would rule that boosts, strikes, and stances would all be simple actions, but a rule would exist that only one of each type could be used per round. Full-round strikes would be advanced actions requiring 2 acts. Balancing it this way would, I feel allow martial characters to retain the overall benefits of their class features while also enabling them to take advantage of the options afforded by the unchained action economy.

[The Vagabond]

I would rule it very differently from how most folks here seem to think such an action would cost. While technically it would be classified as a Single Action, I think they would be better suited to being a complex action, taking 2 actions rather than one. This is largely because they are all balanced around being standard actions, compared to most attacks, which are balanced around being part of a full attack.
Boosts would be a simple action, as they are swift action equivalents. Switching Stances would also be a simple action.

[DurionArcanis]

Seeing some good suggestions here so far, helps me see the potential concerns as well.

Regarding Strikes, I do believe they're somewhere between Spells and Single Attack Actions, so that can easily get hard to place. I like the special rules people mentioned if I go with making them single actions with UAE, mostly because martial adepts are sort of balanced on being able to use all three Move, Swift, and Standard actions rather frequently. I do believe that I'd have to carefully watch the gameplay and perhaps change the ruling during the campaign after playtesting it a bit though.