how often do you forget stuff in combat?

[King of Nowhere]

ever since our group hit mid levels, with all the large stuff of boosts and abilities and immunities available, it seems that it never happened that we could manage a fight without afterwards saying "oh wait, we forgot about X".

Notable examples include:
- a pc dead to a failed save against distruction. we forgot both that he had a reflecting shield, so he could have avoided having to make a save, and a +2 racial bonus to saves against spells, that would have made him pass anyway
- a main villain prepared for a fight against the party. the druid was fond of shapechange into beholder and use the antimagic eye to neutralize spellcasters, so the villain prepared a crossbow with poisoned bolts. forgot that shapechanged druid retains poison immunity. the players did remind me that, though. so I had to change the plan and had the villain cast destruction, from which the druid saved. because we forgot to make him lose some item buffs when he shapechanged and equipment melded with him.
- a villain had an item that prevented teleportation too close to him, to avoid the party teleporting in melee and unleashing a full attack. forgot about that item uuntil the end of the fight.
- a tripped golem made attacks and we forgot the -4 because it was prone (it was a homebrewed advanced golem with a +5 gatling gun firing adamantine incendiary rounds with 10 attacks per round, and it was instrumental to felling a great wyrm)

that's just what comes to mind immediately, but it applies to most fights. afterwards we realize that something we forgot would have made a huge impact.
mind you, probably not story changing. there would have been a few more pc resurrection perhaps - except the dwarf case. and a villain or two may have escaped, but most of them were liches and came back anyway.
things are also made more difficult because most of the party still doesn't have much grasp on the mechannics, and those who do have to remember things for them too.

I would like to know if it's normal experience for a high level table. if it's not, how do they manage it.

[Segev]

It happens. Experience with the same tactics and buffs over and over helps a lot. Making yourself a cheat-sheet helps, but isn't a guarantee, given all the situational things you have to keep track of.

[RNightstalker]

Nobody runs a perfect game. I try to have notes ready and round by round tactics prepared for what I'm doing. I also started doing my character sheets in Excel to better keep track of stuff once we hit mid levels and started having multiple bonuses to the same thing. It was pretty thorough and took some time but I stopped missing stuff. If I had special resistances, I would list those under AC. Temporary hit points were listed by regular hit points of course, keeping track of luck rerolls, etc.

[daremetoidareyo]

Everyfight every time. It's unavoidable with how fiddly this game is.

You know what 90% of all words a bard player words utters are?

"Did you remember my inspire courage?"

Best uttered right after you wrap up your turn but while you still remember what your rolls were.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

Oh yeah, all the time. Not even at mid level; my group is at level 4-5 and still forgets stuff consistently. Can't complain too much there, though, since my remembering a rule the DM had forgotten quite literally saved my life in a surprise round, when it turned out the enemies couldn't both open a door and attack (reduced the number of attacks I got hit by from "I am now a fine mist" to "almost dead, almost dead, need healing!").

4e is a lot easier to keep track of all this stuff, since the rules for each power are very self-contained, not referencing other rules throughout various sourcebooks. Print out/write on index cards your powers, throw in a couple of visual aids (my group used colored rubber bands to represent marks on enemies), and you should be pretty much golden.

[Oberron]

from a long time of trial and error I have found the following useful.
1. If it is a self buff that doesn't last all day or a situational buff wright it out in the margin near where the buff goes or write under where the stat is adjusted if possible (mostly do this for all the different AC bonuses)
2. If group buff have a note card with what the spell/ability does and leave it on the table where the minis are where everyone can see it. Remove it when its no longer needed/time expires.
2a. If playing online with online programs that the dm/players can interact with with tokens or such make a color token that is easy to see and if able to be labeled but buff as an overlay and if it has any detail spots but the name of the buff and the info for it, if not just put the name of buff and player it is from. If using PBP put any group or special buff either at the start or end of your post in a different color with timer/range beside it like so:
Inspire courage:+1 vs charm and fear and a +1 attack/damage:4/rounds left


But even with all of that there is still a lot of bookkeeping that simple is just missed/over sighted/forgotten about. Even the veteran in the group who has played for 20+ years forgets things or misremembers them (he has a lot more editions and table top games he has played then almost anyone else). I had to correct him on how exp is done to people who are lower level than the rest of the party.

[RNightstalker]

Can't complain too much there, though, since my remembering a rule the DM had forgotten quite literally saved my life in a surprise round, when it turned out the enemies couldn't both open a door and attack (reduced the number of attacks I got hit by from "I am now a fine mist" to "almost dead, almost dead, need healing!").

I had player A bail out player B when player B got slammed with a Meteor Swarm...player A reminded player B he was blinking before it was too late, two of them missed.

[Asmotherion]

in high OP? i'm more probable to forget one of the 20+ Spells i persisted than not.

We use a rule that "if you don't mention it it doesn't function that round (fluffed as "magic is unstable when not focused on it")". Helps the DM not being your baby sitter wile trying to obliterate you at the same time.

Most often than not i forget to apply DR/Elemental Resistance to a hit. Sometimes i re-cast an active spell.

Because the DM declares things in the Affirmative sometimes i don't double chec and just apply what he declared even though i'd normally be imune to it/have a way to counterspell it.

[Zaq]

In 4e, I like playing leaders, especially leaders with a ton of numerical bonuses for my allies. I keep a small dry-erase board within reach and document all of the individual bonuses and penalties I’m dishing out for individual PCs and individual monsters.

It STILL doesn’t help. If I’m not constantly watching everything, my friends still can’t keep track of this stuff.

I’m far from perfect myself, but since I’ve got a lot of experience being the one to keep everyone else aware of their totals and their options, I flatter myself that I forget less than average in this arena. But make no mistake: that’s ONLY because of a hell of a lot of extremely specific practice. I’m not special. I just have a lot of history of playing finicky characters.

[RNightstalker]

I just have a lot of history of playing finicky characters.

Finicky characters are the best though.

[Biggus]

I won't say I forget things every session, but definitely most sessions, especially at high levels. I write out custom character sheets so I have space to note down all the relevant bonuses where they'll be most helpful (eg underneath my AC scores I write the bonuses or penalties for all my short-term/conditional spells/items/class features, and also miss chances and anything else which affects my chances of avoiding being hit).

[Quertus]

Some groups of happens; others, it doesn't.

I (and my groups, when I can convince them) use custom sheets, where known situational modifiers are located right next to the number(s) that they modify. Have a 5 Fort save, with a +2 vs monthly issues? It's listed as "5+2” or "5/7”, with corresponding explanatory text.

Get a temporary bonus/penalty? That's what a note card or handy scratch paper are for. Same as for tracking HP damage. Check the "current" temporary sheet first, followed by the character sheet.

With the right tools, groups can go whole campaigns with doing the math right, not forgetting their immunities, etc.

Without those tools? Yeah, I'll mess things up multiple times per combat, just by myself. Which is why, as GM, my custom monster sheets have room for me to fix stats based on temporary modifiers.

[daremetoidareyo]

Some groups of happens; others, it doesn't.

I (and my groups, when I can convince them) use custom sheets, where known situational modifiers are located right next to the number(s) that they modify. Have a 5 Fort save, with a +2 vs monthly issues? It's listed as "5+2” or "5/7”, with corresponding explanatory text.

Get a temporary bonus/penalty? That's what a note card or handy scratch paper are for. Same as for tracking HP damage. Check the "current" temporary sheet first, followed by the character sheet.

With the right tools, groups can go whole campaigns with doing the math right, not forgetting their immunities, etc.

Without those tools? Yeah, I'll mess things up multiple times per combat, just by myself. Which is why, as GM, my custom monster sheets have room for me to fix stats based on temporary modifiers.

Did you remember my inspire courage?

[AnimeTheCat]

I used to, until I started making tokens and cards to hand out to players (or the DM if I was a player) that had the buff, debuff, or modifier identified on it. For Inspire Courage, I had a card (small card, about the size of a sticky note) with a musical note and the bonus written on it. For Mage Armor, it was a blue set of armor with the bonus on it (and the duration). Fear, an image of a guy scared and the penalties written on it. Everything is small enough that they're easy to keep track of but not forgotten about. The rest of my group has ended up following the example and ended up making attack cards and similar where the baseline attack and damage is written out, and then modified by the other cards. It turned the table in to something of a trading card game, but it did make combat go faster and it did help everyone remember modifiers in combat.

Spell cards help spellcasters, maneuver cards helps initiators, soulmeld cards help meldshapers, etc. Turning abilities in to physical reminders really helps fix these issues.

Other things I've seen/heard groups using are color coded "chips" with numbers on them, or quantities of the chips for different bonuses or penalties. Black for fear, yellow for luck, red for morale, etc. 2 chips equals +/-2 or a +2 or -2 on the chip shows what the bonus or penalty is.

It takes a little more effort, but it's fun and can help bring more flavor to your character, especially if you want to showcase specifically what your spells or effects look like.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

All the stupid fiddly conditional +2s that pop up everywhere. This is just one of the reasons why I hate the space wasted on all those conditional +2 feats in Pathfinder. Why do they insist on even printing the things? First of all, they're piss-poor benefits anyways, and they're just not worth taking even when one remembers to use them, which is doubly bad since hardly anyone even remembers they have them when it does matter (which is incredibly rare anyway).

So,

1.) It's burning a feat for a tiny bonus that rarely matters even when it's used.
2.) It's usually a conditional bonus, meaning even if you remember you have it, it doesn't come up much, if at all.
3.) 99% of the time, you don't even remember you have it, so it's like you burned a feat for no gain at all.

Anyone who reads this who crafts feats for Pathfinder, stop it with the stupid piddly conditional +2 feats. They're worthless and a complete waste of time.

Hell, I have a build with several hundred thousand feats (just to see how many I could get). I'm running out of feats to take, and I still don't bother with those. They're that worthless.

[Faily]

When I played a buffing-focused Cleric back in 3.5 at high levels, I had a spreadsheet with all the spells I would cast and what they did (working out what sort of bonuses they give to see which ones stacked and such). At the end of the sheet, I had worked out the total adjustments to Attack, Damage, Saves, and AC and just told those to the other players. That way they didn't have to think about how many spells they had going and such.

Nowadays, in tabletop I just write up the current total bonus to attack/damage/saves/AC when it's not my turn so that I remember everything. Which has been very useful on my Paladin in that group since there's a lot of modifiers to take into consideration (Smite, Power Attack, Haste from the Sorcerer, and Blessing of Fervor from the Cleric). I think it's time well-spent out of turn to just go over what active effects you have going. In Roll20, I keep a notepad open to write down on-going effects, and I just add them into the temporary modifier fields.

I do like Oberron's trick of putting cards with the modifiers on the battlemap though! I might steal that for the future since not all my fellow players are equally good at remembering their bonuses. :smallbiggrin:

[Verappo]

You know what 90% of all words a bard player words utters are?

"Did you remember my inspire courage?"


This is a struggle, especially since it doesn't apply just to your turn, but to the whole thing, so you have to catch it in time. my bard also had other buffs he cast on everyone else, so I had to micromanage everything

[Quertus]

Perhaps a prerequisite to playing 3e should be playing Battletech, where you grow accustomed to the litany of "medium range is 6, two woods is 8, I ran is 10, your movement is 13, clan is 12, pulse is 10, targeting computer is 9 - I need 9s", where everyone can follow along with your math, and point out any modifiers you missed.


Did you remember my inspire courage?

Well, in Battletech, you wouldn't have to ask, you'd just say, "you forgot my inspire courage". (So, "inspire courage - I need 8s"?)

[King of Nowhere]

the thing with handing out cards seems good for temporary modifiers. for permanent conditional modifiers i don't see a solution yet

[Psyren]

It's a common issue in 3.x.

We play on roll20 though (even the in-person folks) so you can just add icons for every single buff and debuff and that helps. You can also automate the really common buffs. For example, our ranger set up "full attack with favored enemy, power attack, inspire courage, haste, bane weapons, and flanking" as one click.

[Malphegor]

Every combat. I played a barbarian/war hulk once and forgot to add my strength to anything. I died. It was fun, but man did my hits seem weedy and I couldn't figure out why nothing was doing much damage at the time.

(this is why I'm better off as a wizard. I look at a sword and go 'okay so what is this arcane nonsense of hitting things with metal, this makes no sense to me')

Plus, sometimes there's too many buffs to realistically keep track of. On paper. In a hurry. While concentrating on other stuff.

[Gallowglass]

Everyfight every time. It's unavoidable with how fiddly this game is.

You know what 90% of all words a bard player words utters are?

"Did you remember my inspire courage?"

Best uttered right after you wrap up your turn but while you still remember what your rolls were.

We literally had a player put a playing card with "I'm giving you a +2" on his forehead and clear his throat every time someone said "Okay I rolled a ..." in every combat because of that.

Bard-life, man. Bard-life.

I played an inquisitor with so many stupid fiddly little bonuses and penalties that I built an excel spreadsheet with all of them listed in columns so I could mark them on or off as they came online or fell offline so that it would calculate a "add 14 to your hit roll" and "damage is currently 1d6 + 10 + 2d6(bane) + 2d6(fire)" so I would have help remembering.

[RNightstalker]

I played an inquisitor with so many stupid fiddly little bonuses and penalties that I built an excel spreadsheet with all of them listed in columns so I could mark them on or off as they came online or fell offline so that it would calculate a "add 14 to your hit roll" and "damage is currently 1d6 + 10 + 2d6(bane) + 2d6(fire)" so I would have help remembering.

Haven't played an Inquisitor yet but that's how I build all of my characters now, in Excel. That way it's easier to upkeep instead of trying to do it all at once later on.

[Biggus]

the thing with handing out cards seems good for temporary modifiers. for permanent conditional modifiers i don't see a solution yet

The AC section of the character sheet for an epic Barbarian in one of my current games looks like this:

..........Base..Touch..FF
AC........45.....34.....45
Rage....-4......-4......-4
EP........-2......-2......-2
Traps...+9.....+9.....+9 (Dodge)
PD.......+7.....+7.....+7 (Sacred)

Miss chance 20/50%
Crit fail 50%

(EP=Enlarge Person, PD= Protection Devotion (from her Cleric friend))

Always leave a line or two to add extra stuff as you level up.

I forget a lot less since I started setting character sheets out like this.

[King of Nowhere]

Haven't played an Inquisitor yet but that's how I build all of my characters now, in Excel. That way it's easier to upkeep instead of trying to do it all at once later on.

for you and others using excel: how does it work for you bringing a laptop at a session?

because for me it would be a lot of encumbrance, especially if everyone had to have one (my laptop is big). while a mobile phone would be too small to be practical.
there would also be logistical problems with carrying the thing around, and everyone haviing to plug it somewhere in the basement we use.

[Dimers]

a tripped golem made attacks and we forgot the -4 because it was prone (it was a homebrewed advanced golem with a +5 gatling gun firing adamantine incendiary rounds with 10 attacks per round, and it was instrumental to felling a great wyrm)

For that particular point, you could just rule that a gatling gun is equivalent to a crossbow for this purpose (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/conditionSummary.htm#prone). Little-known quality of the crossbow -- too bad they didn't list it in, I dunno, the weapon description, maybe?!


I would like to know if it's normal experience for a high level table. if it's not, how do they manage it.

Absofrigginlutely.


for you and others using excel: how does it work for you bringing a laptop at a session?

Pretty well. I only use Excel for tracking memorized and expended spells, but the laptop also lets me make a session log, access myth-weavers character sheets, look up rules on SRDs, all kinds of stuff. It's bulky but consistently worthwhile, and I've never had real trouble plugging in.

[RNightstalker]

for you and others using excel: how does it work for you bringing a laptop at a session?

because for me it would be a lot of encumbrance, especially if everyone had to have one (my laptop is big). while a mobile phone would be too small to be practical.
there would also be logistical problems with carrying the thing around, and everyone haviing to plug it somewhere in the basement we use.

Excel let's you actually save a lot of space. There "may" be other ways to access information through the books online, not that I would know of any:smallbiggrin:. I can pull up a book and switch between books by clicking a different window, the one time I prefer technology over books that were created from trees. You can adapt the spreadsheet to fit your needs so you're not roped into something that doesn't flow for you.

[DwarvenWarCorgi]

We used to forget a lot of stuff at my table. I and the other casters started using spreadsheets for SLAs and activated magic items. But the one that made it so easy is keeping your character sheet in a clear plastic page protector. When you have temporary effects, literally write over the base number on your sheet in a bright colored wet erase marker. Can't miss it. Wipe it away with a damp napkin when it goes away.

As far as situational stuff, just have to write it somewhere it's obvious and keep as much of it together as possible.

[daremetoidareyo]

We used to forget a lot of stuff at my table. I and the other casters started using spreadsheets for SLAs and activated magic items. But the one that made it so easy is keeping your character sheet in a clear plastic page protector. When you have temporary effects, literally write over the base number on your sheet in a bright colored wet erase marker. Can't miss it. Wipe it away with a damp napkin when it goes away.

As far as situational stuff, just have to write it somewhere it's obvious and keep as much of it together as possible.

But did you remember the inspire courage?

[Khosan]

Literally all the time. Even in PbPs.

It's especially bad if you happen to create a character with 11 attacks per round with a variety of different bonuses. I had to make a spreadsheet for that one because it was so hilariously bad.

[Malphegor]

to solve this I keep meaning to bring my tablet in and draw any situational buffs on the art application I use. I need to find an old ipad mini-compatible spreadsheet software one day tbh.

[Segev]

It won't help as much with flat bonuses, but I wonder if buffs which add dice (like 5e's Bardic Inspiration) would be more easily remembered if the player granting the buff rolled the dice for it when it mattered. That way, the player being buffed just does what he normally does, and the granting player (who is more likely to be interested in seeing his bonus used, and also might be more engaged by the need to participate in his friend's rolling) tells him how much bonus to add.

[King of Nowhere]

For that particular point, you could just rule that a gatling gun is equivalent to a crossbow for this purpose (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/conditionSummary.htm#prone). Little-known quality of the crossbow -- too bad they didn't list it in, I dunno, the weapon description, maybe?!



could be reasonable, but the guns are mounted where the golem's eyes should be, and so being prone does make it awkward to aim properly. an advanced greater stone golem isn't known for a flexible neck

[DwarvenWarCorgi]

But did you remember the inspire courage?

Idk if we've ever had a bard at my table, literally been playing since the 3.5 release event at gencon Indy. We forget the paladins area effect bonus to saves vs fear pretty frequently though.

I have a venerable halfling grandma bard/warweaver concept someone on giantitp posted a while back on my to do list though.

[Mato]

Q: How often do you forget stuff in combat?
A: "We're in combat?" :smalleek:

"Is it my turn?"^NI :smallbiggrin:

[RNightstalker]

Q: How often do you forget stuff in combat?
A: "We're in combat?" :smalleek:

"Is it my turn?"^NI :smallbiggrin:

#trypayingattention lol:sigh: