Lord Lemming
2019-12-07, 05:18 PM
I'm designing a swords-and-sorcery TTRPG, and my intention is to have more nuanced martial combat than I've personally seen from 3.5 and Pathfinder. The problem is, I want to incorporate a block/parry system to martial defense that gives the defender some options and makes things more interesting, but I'm uncertain how to incorporate it. Before I get into that, though, I probably need to give a bit of basic background on the combat mechanics.
Among other things, most combatants have 'Guard', which are temporary hit points that get drained before your actual health as long as you're capable of effectively defending against the incoming attack, and is much easier to replenish than health. Think of the Poise mechanic from Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (though I was inspired by the guard mechanic in Dragon Age: Inquisition, years before I played Sekiro.) Additionally, the intention is to have the gap between high and low levels not be completely insurmountable, with leveling power being mostly front-loaded, and diminishing returns as you put more points into an ability. Also, I want to make quality of equipment less important to a character's stats, so that magical items mostly provide incomparable, unique abilities rather than straight stat boosts, and losing your gear isn't crippling, as long as you can find even basic replacements. Different weapons and shields provide different basic bonuses to hit chance, damage, block, and parry.
Every round, player get three actions, which can be spent on any combination of attacks, spells, movement, or other actions.
In melee combat, attackers get Fast Attacks, Strong Attacks, Maneuvers, and AoE versions of each.
Fast Attacks are standard melee attacks, but when used against an opponent who has no Guard, gets a significant bonus to hit chance.
Strong Attacks take a significant penalty to hit chance, but bypass active Guard if they hit. If the opponent has no Guard, Strong Attacks do double damage.
Maneuvers do no damage, but can be used to trip, move, disarm, or otherwise debilitate enemies, with more dire effects requiring higher rolls.
AoE versions off these attacks can be performed, but doing so applies a significant penalty to hit chance.
Now, here's where my question comes in: As of right now, I have two different skills that you can put points into for defending against attacks; Parry and Block. Block is pretty obvious, it works like AC in D&D, being applied against incoming attacks to determine if they hit. But I'm uncertain how to use Parry.
One of my previous versions gave players the ability to use their actions to basically lay trap cards. They could declare that they were holding an action, but had to set up what that action was. They could choose between Parry, which scaled off of the Parry skill, and if it succeeded would negate the enemy attack and allow an automatic hit on the enemy in return, and would be particularly effective against Strong Attacks. The other option would be Deflect, which could negate the enemy attack and immediately replenish Guard, and would be particularly effective against Fast Attacks. On their turn, a player could pick one of these two to hold as a trap card, and use it at any point before their next turn. I found that this system was somewhat cumbersome to play with; and even if it worked more smoothly, I'm not entirely certain that a guessing game of 'what trap card is the enemy holding' is the right approach to combat.
As of right now, I'm leaning towards a setup that would make Parrying the 'high-risk-high-reward' approach, with Blocking being more safe but less proactive. One way I could do this would be to allow defenders to call 'I parry' for any given incoming enemy attack, at the cost of one action from their next turn. If they succeed, they negate the incoming attack and get an automatic guard-bypassing hit on the enemy, but if they fail, they still lose the action and get nothing. This strikes me as being a powerful and interesting option, without being the best option in all circumstances; but it's possible that I'm missing something. What problems would arise with this option? And what other options can you think of for Parry mechanics?
Among other things, most combatants have 'Guard', which are temporary hit points that get drained before your actual health as long as you're capable of effectively defending against the incoming attack, and is much easier to replenish than health. Think of the Poise mechanic from Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (though I was inspired by the guard mechanic in Dragon Age: Inquisition, years before I played Sekiro.) Additionally, the intention is to have the gap between high and low levels not be completely insurmountable, with leveling power being mostly front-loaded, and diminishing returns as you put more points into an ability. Also, I want to make quality of equipment less important to a character's stats, so that magical items mostly provide incomparable, unique abilities rather than straight stat boosts, and losing your gear isn't crippling, as long as you can find even basic replacements. Different weapons and shields provide different basic bonuses to hit chance, damage, block, and parry.
Every round, player get three actions, which can be spent on any combination of attacks, spells, movement, or other actions.
In melee combat, attackers get Fast Attacks, Strong Attacks, Maneuvers, and AoE versions of each.
Fast Attacks are standard melee attacks, but when used against an opponent who has no Guard, gets a significant bonus to hit chance.
Strong Attacks take a significant penalty to hit chance, but bypass active Guard if they hit. If the opponent has no Guard, Strong Attacks do double damage.
Maneuvers do no damage, but can be used to trip, move, disarm, or otherwise debilitate enemies, with more dire effects requiring higher rolls.
AoE versions off these attacks can be performed, but doing so applies a significant penalty to hit chance.
Now, here's where my question comes in: As of right now, I have two different skills that you can put points into for defending against attacks; Parry and Block. Block is pretty obvious, it works like AC in D&D, being applied against incoming attacks to determine if they hit. But I'm uncertain how to use Parry.
One of my previous versions gave players the ability to use their actions to basically lay trap cards. They could declare that they were holding an action, but had to set up what that action was. They could choose between Parry, which scaled off of the Parry skill, and if it succeeded would negate the enemy attack and allow an automatic hit on the enemy in return, and would be particularly effective against Strong Attacks. The other option would be Deflect, which could negate the enemy attack and immediately replenish Guard, and would be particularly effective against Fast Attacks. On their turn, a player could pick one of these two to hold as a trap card, and use it at any point before their next turn. I found that this system was somewhat cumbersome to play with; and even if it worked more smoothly, I'm not entirely certain that a guessing game of 'what trap card is the enemy holding' is the right approach to combat.
As of right now, I'm leaning towards a setup that would make Parrying the 'high-risk-high-reward' approach, with Blocking being more safe but less proactive. One way I could do this would be to allow defenders to call 'I parry' for any given incoming enemy attack, at the cost of one action from their next turn. If they succeed, they negate the incoming attack and get an automatic guard-bypassing hit on the enemy, but if they fail, they still lose the action and get nothing. This strikes me as being a powerful and interesting option, without being the best option in all circumstances; but it's possible that I'm missing something. What problems would arise with this option? And what other options can you think of for Parry mechanics?