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Rockphed
2007-10-22, 10:14 PM
Many class abilities are given a certain number of times per day based on a character's class level. Other abilities are given at a level and always are available a number of times per day equal to a number plus one of the character's ability bonuses. In the first category fall both rage and bardic music. In the second falls turning undead.

Why two methods for determining how often something can be done? As far as I can tell, the second method is better. If the ability comes at first level, a first level party can better ration that ability, rather than having to either use it up or save it and hope that it isn't needed.

....
2007-10-22, 10:18 PM
Many class abilities are given a certain number of times per day based on a character's class level. Other abilities are given at a level and always are available a number of times per day equal to a number plus one of the character's ability bonuses. In the first category fall both rage and bardic music. In the second falls turning undead.

Why two methods for determining how often something can be done? As far as I can tell, the second method is better. If the ability comes at first level, a first level party can better ration that ability, rather than having to either use it up or save it and hope that it isn't needed.

Balance.

textextext

Accountant
2007-10-22, 10:19 PM
Many class abilities are given a certain number of times per day based on a character's class level. Other abilities are given at a level and always are available a number of times per day equal to a number plus one of the character's ability bonuses. In the first category fall both rage and bardic music. In the second falls turning undead.

Why two methods for determining how often something can be done? As far as I can tell, the second method is better. If the ability comes at first level, a first level party can better ration that ability, rather than having to either use it up or save it and hope that it isn't needed.

I agree.

textextext

Jack Mann
2007-10-22, 10:59 PM
Ah, for the time when we're no longer in the yoke of per-day's tyranny.

Rockphed
2007-10-22, 11:23 PM
Okay, why can't Rage be rewritten so that it isn't unbalanced to rage 7 times a day at first level? Now rage would probably look less spiffy, but being able to actually use the Barbarian's most prominent ability in most encounters would be much more fun.

MaxMahem
2007-10-22, 11:57 PM
I agree with the general hate against uses/day. However, my hate is reserved especially for those use/day powers like say "smite evil" which are really only good for one attack. Really a power like that which has a chance of missing and is only usable a handful of times at best (often these powers are only 1/day or 3/day) is hardly worth having in my opinion. They should be changed to x/encounter instead. It always sucks for a paladin or something to have saved his smite evil usage up for the BBEG, and then miss the few times he uses it. Very anti-climatic. In reality the Paladin is better of using those smite evil attempts against some minion he is much more likely to hit. He might end combat a little earlier and have more HP available for the BBEG.

On the other hand, some powerful abilities, such as rage, should be limited to uses/day in my opinion. Rage has no chance of failure, and so is rarely wasted in an encounter it is used in. It could be unbalancing at low levels to allow abilities like this to be used in every encounter, and since there is no chance of failure, it can be effectively held up for climatic encounters. However, once the number of usages/day climbs past 4 or so, the character is likely to have more uses of this power then encounters he is likely to face in a day (especially challenging ones). So it might be okay to change powers like these to 1 use/encounter past level 10 or so.

Duke of URL
2007-10-23, 07:07 AM
Okay, why can't Rage be rewritten so that it isn't unbalanced to rage 7 times a day at first level?

No reason, really. It would just need to be reduced in power, with a more gradual "sliding scale" of rage improvements.

Say, for example, Lesser Rage at level 1 (+2 STR, +2 CON, +1 Will, -2 AC) upgraded to the "normal" Rage at level 6 and Greater Rage at level 11.

Kompera
2007-10-23, 08:20 AM
I agree with the general hate against uses/day. However, my hate is reserved especially for those use/day powers like say "smite evil" which are really only good for one attack. Really a power like that which has a chance of missing and is only usable a handful of times at best (often these powers are only 1/day or 3/day) is hardly worth having in my opinion. They should be changed to x/encounter instead. It always sucks for a paladin or something to have saved his smite evil usage up for the BBEG, and then miss the few times he uses it. Very anti-climatic. In reality the Paladin is better of using those smite evil attempts against some minion he is much more likely to hit. He might end combat a little earlier and have more HP available for the BBEG.

On the other hand, some powerful abilities, such as rage, should be limited to uses/day in my opinion. Rage has no chance of failure, and so is rarely wasted in an encounter it is used in. It could be unbalancing at low levels to allow abilities like this to be used in every encounter, and since there is no chance of failure, it can be effectively held up for climatic encounters. However, once the number of usages/day climbs past 4 or so, the character is likely to have more uses of this power then encounters he is likely to face in a day (especially challenging ones). So it might be okay to change powers like these to 1 use/encounter past level 10 or so.

Rage is fairly equal to Smite. Rage does start better at 1st level, and Rage gets more uses per day on a 1/4 level scale while Smite is on a 1/5 level scale.

But, Smite scales up faster since the bonus damage is based on the Paladin class levels. Barbarian Rage doesn't scale up in ability until 11th level when Greater Rage is gained. At 10th level the Paladin is Smiting for +10 damage, while the Barbarian is still Raging for +2 damage. And Rage is a single use per encounter, no matter how long the fight lasts. And if the fight lasts longer than the Rage, there is a serious penalty to face. Smite has no negative drawback.

And Paladins have several other abilities which are very nice, and arguably superior to Barbarian class features. Illiteracy? Trap Sense? Compare to Lay on Hands, Aura of Courage, Divine Grace, and Detect Evil...

Dausuul
2007-10-23, 08:29 AM
Ah, for the time when we're no longer in the yoke of per-day's tyranny.

QFT. Per-day sucks no matter how you slice it. I prefer stuff with a higher number of uses per day, just because then the limitation doesn't come up as much; but I despise it all.

Prophaniti
2007-10-23, 08:32 AM
Rage 7 times a day at level 1? Am I going mad? I'm holding a PHB in my hands and reading: "At first level he can use his rage ability once per day."
I'm just wondering if I'm missing some hidden message or code or something...

Oh, and yeah, its for balance. Some abilities just feel right modified by level instead of stat. Wildshape, for example. Now, granted for me, rage specifically would make more sense by stat, but I deal with it.

Dausuul
2007-10-23, 08:36 AM
Rage 7 times a day at level 1? Am I going mad? I'm holding a PHB in my hands and reading: "At first level he can use his rage ability once per day."
I'm just wondering if I'm missing some hidden message or code or something...

Rockphed wasn't saying rage is currently usable 7 times a day; he was asking how rage would need to be changed so that you could make it usable 7 times a day without being unbalanced.

Prophaniti
2007-10-23, 08:52 AM
:smallredface: heh, ok. My miss-read. I got less than 2 hours sleep last night.

But anyway, I don't really understand the hate against x/per day abilities. If a Paladin could smite all the time, why wouldnt he? Undead would be a pointless enemy if the party cleric could spam Turn until he got a good roll. Uses per day are a great way to balance powerful abilities so the party has to be careful about using them. Smite misses the BBEG is too anti-climatic? No, it's just bad luck. The game would be kinda boring if everything went the players way. Like using cheatcodes in an rts- fun, but ultimatly unfulfilling.

Dausuul
2007-10-23, 09:06 AM
:smallredface: heh, ok. My miss-read. I got less than 2 hours sleep last night.

But anyway, I don't really understand the hate against x/per day abilities. If a Paladin could smite all the time, why wouldnt he? Undead would be a pointless enemy if the party cleric could spam Turn until he got a good roll. Uses per day are a great way to balance powerful abilities so the party has to be careful about using them. Smite misses the BBEG is too anti-climatic? No, it's just bad luck. The game would be kinda boring if everything went the players way. Like using cheatcodes in an rts- fun, but ultimatly unfulfilling.

It's not that people object to limits on the use of abilities; it's the specific per-day mechanic that we hate. The problems are as follows:

#1. Per-day results in the "five-minute workday." You go through your four encounters, use up your per-day abilities, and that's it. You're done for the day. Make camp and chill out for the next 23 hours and 55 minutes until your abilities refresh.
#2. Per-day depends on a fixed number of encounters per day in order to be balanced. This is particularly the case when some classes (e.g., casters) have lots of per-day abilities, while others (e.g., fighters) have virtually none. The designers have to build everything on the assumption of 4 encounters per day. If a DM likes gruelling dungeon crawls with 6 or 8 encounters a day, the casters become underpowered because they run out of useful spells. If a DM prefers a more laid-back pace with only 1 or 2 encounters a day, the casters become overpowered because they can go nova.
#3. In many cases, per-day makes no conceptual sense. Why can the paladin only smite evil once a day? Does he have some sort of celestial smiting budget, and he'll get audited if he goes over?
#4. Per-day requires more bookkeeping. It's much easier to remember whether you've used a given ability this encounter than it is to remember how many times you've used it today.

For these reasons, I want to see most or all per-day abilities replaced with per-encounter* or at-will versions.

*And before somebody starts complaining about this, by "per-encounter" I mean "refreshes with 1 minute of rest," not "usable once per ill-defined concept that 'real DMs' don't use." Per-encounter is shorthand for a short-but-not-usable-in-combat refresh time, not a literal description of the mechanic.

PnP Fan
2007-10-23, 09:17 AM
Pro,
I think what folks are wanting to move towards is a per encounter limit, with fewer uses per encounter (1, or 2 or a defined number of slots that have to be alotted towards special abilities per encounter), much the way the Tome of Battle works. Not that this changes the "I miss my smite attack" much, but it allows characters to be useful in every encounter, and avoids the "narcoleptic caster" problem (which is annoying in game play). In this game mechanic, there are still limits, which still forces players to use good judgement in resource management, but it tends to reduce the magnitude of errors (i.e. "I used and missed my smite this combat, and this fight was tougher than it might have been, but I can still use my smite again next fight, maybe it'll work better.")
I've played with Tome of Battle, and it's nice to be able to customize your mellee combatant for each fight.
In short, it's not that the paladin "smites all the time", or "smites 3x/day", instead he "smites at the pace of encounters", which means that he gets to do something cool and fun at least once per encounter.

Kompera
2007-10-23, 07:22 PM
It's not that people object to limits on the use of abilities; it's the specific per-day mechanic that we hate. The problems are as follows:

#1. Per-day results in the "five-minute workday." You go through your four encounters, use up your per-day abilities, and that's it. You're done for the day. Make camp and chill out for the next 23 hours and 55 minutes until your abilities refresh.
#2. Per-day depends on a fixed number of encounters per day in order to be balanced. This is particularly the case when some classes (e.g., casters) have lots of per-day abilities, while others (e.g., fighters) have virtually none. The designers have to build everything on the assumption of 4 encounters per day. If a DM likes gruelling dungeon crawls with 6 or 8 encounters a day, the casters become underpowered because they run out of useful spells. If a DM prefers a more laid-back pace with only 1 or 2 encounters a day, the casters become overpowered because they can go nova.
#3. In many cases, per-day makes no conceptual sense. Why can the paladin only smite evil once a day? Does he have some sort of celestial smiting budget, and he'll get audited if he goes over?
#4. Per-day requires more bookkeeping. It's much easier to remember whether you've used a given ability this encounter than it is to remember how many times you've used it today.
Meh, most of your objections are fairly inaccurate.

#1. I must be misunderstanding this, because it makes such little sense that I don't think you could possibly really believe what it says. There's no possible way to go through 4 encounters in either 5 minutes of real-time or game-time.

#2. The argument that a sword has no charges is only accurate up until the point that the melee type has no more HP. Then the sword run out of charges. Fighters don't suddenly become "ZOMG Overpowered!" just because the GM plans 6 encounters instead of 4. The Wizard still outlives the Fighter, because he is in the back throwing darts while the Fighter is taking damage which can't be healed.

#3. This is a game of imagination. If you can't come up with the conceptual sense due to a lack of imagination, that doesn't mean that it's not there. Did the 1st level Cleric use up his celestial Raise Dead budget? Or even his celestial Cure Light Wounds budget? It's the exact same mechanic, and it is a core part of the game rules. Go up levels, get to use more abilities more often. The Paladin gets more Smites and more powerful Smites as he advances levels. There is no lack of conceptual sense here at all.

#4. Again, tracking use per day abilities is not foreign to the game design. All spell casters face this exact book keeping requirement, and have faced it since the game was released. If melee types suddenly chafe at their per day ability book keeping requirements because they have only been around since 3.0 , they should play a Wizard and see how easy they have it.

Jack Mann
2007-10-23, 07:33 PM
Meh, most of your objections are fairly inaccurate.

#1. I must be misunderstanding this, because it makes such little sense that I don't think you could possibly really believe what it says. There's no possible way to go through 4 encounters in either 5 minutes of real-time or game-time.

Five minutes is an exaggerration. On the other hand, it's easy to go through four or five encounters in, say, two hours in-game, and now have no spells, rages, or smites left, and be left without enough hit points to continue. Now the group has to strike camp much earlier than they might otherwise. This becomes a bit less of a problem at higher levels, but it's still a problem.

Kurald Galain
2007-10-23, 07:50 PM
The problem with per-encounter abilities is that it encourages the player to use them in every single encounter, effectively going nova each time. This reduces strategic thinking, because resource management can now be ignored.

Note that "per day" often isn't really "per day" either, but "refreshable with eight hours of rest". Sometimes, for plot reasons, the DM can disallow this amount of rest. This means that psychologically, the party can be weakened; this is not feasible with per-encounter mechanics.

Per-day makes as much or as little conceptual sense as everything else in D&D, including such things as hit points, BAB, and skill ranks.

Finally, I find the bookkeeping argument nonsensical. D&D is a complex game (just count the number of rulebooks) and this is a simple checkmark that you erase each morning. People who can play D&D can also place a checkmark. What's next, ignoring hit points because it's too much bookkeeping?

TimeWizard
2007-10-23, 10:41 PM
"Hey Morthos, is that you?"
"Yeah"
"You can warlock it up, like, all day right?"
"yeah..."
"Ok, just checking. Oh, do you have the Initiators number? I need to call them too."

'Locks and 'sub-Limeys. Not taking per-day crap since 1192. D.n.D.C.E.

Dausuul
2007-10-24, 08:22 AM
#1. I must be misunderstanding this, because it makes such little sense that I don't think you could possibly really believe what it says. There's no possible way to go through 4 encounters in either 5 minutes of real-time or game-time.

"5-minute workday" is what the folks at WotC call it. I'd have said 20, myself. The point is that the party starts the day with a bunch of resources, blows through them very quickly, and then is useless until the next day.

(And technically, you could very easily go through 4 combat encounters in 5 minutes. A typical fight lasts about 5-7 rounds. 5 minutes is 50 rounds. Of course, in practice there's usually some time walking from one fight to the next and collecting loot.)


#2. The argument that a sword has no charges is only accurate up until the point that the melee type has no more HP. Then the sword run out of charges. Fighters don't suddenly become "ZOMG Overpowered!" just because the GM plans 6 encounters instead of 4. The Wizard still outlives the Fighter, because he is in the back throwing darts while the Fighter is taking damage which can't be healed.

I'll concede this point to some extent. Still, if the cleric is being a healbot as many clerics do, then the fighter won't start running out of hit points until the casters are already out of spells.


#3. This is a game of imagination. If you can't come up with the conceptual sense due to a lack of imagination, that doesn't mean that it's not there. Did the 1st level Cleric use up his celestial Raise Dead budget? Or even his celestial Cure Light Wounds budget? It's the exact same mechanic, and it is a core part of the game rules.

And it makes no sense for them either. Providing more examples of where something doesn't work does not equal demonstrating that it does work. And saying that something is a core part of the game rules doesn't make it any less nonsensical.


#4. Again, tracking use per day abilities is not foreign to the game design. All spell casters face this exact book keeping requirement, and have faced it since the game was released. If melee types suddenly chafe at their per day ability book keeping requirements because they have only been around since 3.0 , they should play a Wizard and see how easy they have it.

See response to #3. I love arcane casters, but I've pretty much quit playing wizards because the bookkeeping involved in prepared casting drives me up the wall. The fact that the problem is even worse for wizards does not somehow make the problem better.

I don't care if something is "foreign to the game design." I care if it sucks. Per-day sucks. If it's a core element of the game design, then the game design needs to be fixed.

Hario
2007-10-24, 10:37 AM
The only good thing about turn undead all day long, the writers who contrived divine metamagic would have easily realised that their feat would be beyond epic (it really should be an epic feat) and it would be clerics in the playground or any spellcasting build would end with 1 level of cleric (or sacred excorsist) 'for flavor' and divine metamagic

Yakk
2007-10-24, 11:03 AM
Out of combat healing is amazingly cheap.

Not at first level, but by even a medium level...

A 1st level wand of CLW produces 5.5 hp per charge and costs 750 gp for 50 charges.

That's 15 gp per charge, or about 3 gp per HP healed.

There is another spell that reduces this cost to about 1.5 gp per HP healed.

At 4th level, each encounter earns each player 400 gp. A tank with 50 hp can heal up from 0 hp for a grand total of 75 gp -- a small share of the reward from the encounter. As levels increase, the percent share required to heal up shrinks.

Each single wand of CLW has about 275 HP in it, so you don't end up having a ridiculous amount of wands to pull this off either.

Roderick_BR
2007-10-24, 11:14 AM
Yeah, balance. Rage gives several bonuses and lasts for several rounds, as does some of the bard's abilities.
Turn undead is instantaneous, and the creatures affected (mostly low-level undead) are not numerous enough to make this ability overpowered (against rage, for example, that can be used in battles with any creature).
The paladin's smite evil ability is also limited (evil enemies, an optimistic view of 1/6 to 1/3 of encounters), and gives you a direct bonus (Cha bonus to attack, level bonus to damage), so it's limited too.
There are some options you could adopt.
Barbarians: Trade the barbarian's rage by the berzerker ability from the Player's Handbook 2.
Alternatively, make it that you can rage once every encounter, and that as you progress in levels, your rage lasts longer. It may look overpowered, but the penalties the barbarian suffers when not rested is enough to keep it controlled. Ah, yes, a fatigued barbarian can't rage. When he gets Tireless Rage, he doesn't get the penalties, but still needs time between a battle and another.
Paladins: An option I'm giving to one of my players. Allow your paladin to smite once per encounter (with extra uses as he levels up), but the damage is only half the paladin's level (rounded up), so it doesn't get too powerful at higher levels (like giving +20 damage 5 times/encounter all day long).

Frosty
2007-10-24, 11:16 AM
My group just bought a wand of Infinite CLWs and was done with it. 2000 gold infintie healing for the win.

Kompera
2007-10-24, 11:42 AM
[#3. In many cases, per-day makes no conceptual sense
Re: Casters have many per-day spells and so has even more record keeping to do than a melee type with a small number of per-use abilities each day]

And it makes no sense for them either. Providing more examples of where something doesn't work does not equal demonstrating that it does work. And saying that something is a core part of the game rules doesn't make it any less nonsensical.But I didn't provide more examples of where something doesn't work. I provided examples of where they worked. This mechanic works just fine, for both Wizards and their ilk with a dozen or so spells per day, and melee types with a small handful of per-day abilities. Also, your objection was one of conceptual sense. I think I provided a very workable conceptual sense, which works well within the game system of advancing levels providing more and more powerful abilities.


I love arcane casters, but I've pretty much quit playing wizards because the bookkeeping involved in prepared casting drives me up the wall. The fact that the problem is even worse for wizards does not somehow make the problem better.

I don't care if something is "foreign to the game design." I care if it sucks. Per-day sucks. If it's a core element of the game design, then the game design needs to be fixed.

Really, if you have such serious issues with such core elements of the game, you should think about finding yourself another game to play.

There are several with different systems which don't equate specifically to a per-day mechanic, even if there are other limitations in place which may make them work this way in the end. The various "mana points recovered over time" systems are one example of these alternatives. It's not per-day at all. Unless you consider that you'll recover only a certain amount of mana over the course of a day, and thus the per-day uses can be easily calculated by dividing the points cost of a spell into the maximum mana recovered in a day.

And as for record keeping? Try asking the GM to notify you every time 15 minutes passes so you can add 1 to your spell power pool, or mana, or whatever it's called. Then tell me which is easier:

Cast a spell and make a tic mark on your spell sheet
-or-
Cast a spell, subtract the mana/spell power/juju/whatever expended, and then track it's return over time. In a game which sometimes has hours pass within a single sentence, "You pass through the mountains and enter the Plains of Doom", and sometimes tracks time in 6 second increments, "It's your combat turn, what do you do?".

I'll take the tic mark, please.

Yes, there are even other systems which use even other mechanics. But I'm not aware of any one which is worth playing which uses a spell casting system which requires no element of record keeping.

Overlard
2007-10-24, 12:50 PM
Yes, there are even other systems which use even other mechanics. But I'm not aware of any one which is worth playing which uses a spell casting system which requires no element of record keeping.
HERO

I'm looking forward to seeing where 4th ed goes with this. Per day stuff looks like it'll only be 20% of caster's power, so the problems it holds should be less of an issue.

Dausuul
2007-10-24, 02:53 PM
But I didn't provide more examples of where something doesn't work. I provided examples of where they worked. This mechanic works just fine, for both Wizards and their ilk with a dozen or so spells per day, and melee types with a small handful of per-day abilities. Also, your objection was one of conceptual sense. I think I provided a very workable conceptual sense, which works well within the game system of advancing levels providing more and more powerful abilities.

You provided no conceptual sense, you just gave some mechanical examples. To clarify: What I mean by conceptual is, why, in fluff/game world terms, does this limitation exist? Why does the paladin have a daily smiting budget? Why does the cleric have a daily healing budget?


Really, if you have such serious issues with such core elements of the game, you should think about finding yourself another game to play.

*shrug* You may consider this a core element, inextricably entwined with D&D. I don't. And given that I see 4E moving away from a heavy reliance on per-day mechanics, I'm inclined to stick with the old warhorse at least long enough to see where it goes.


And as for record keeping? Try asking the GM to notify you every time 15 minutes passes so you can add 1 to your spell power pool, or mana, or whatever it's called. Then tell me which is easier:

As you say, that's a per-day mechanic by a different name. How about we look at, say, the warlock's class mechanic?