What breaks if you make saves the static number?

[Kyutaru]

Players accept the differences between AC and DC despite one scaling relative to the defender while the other scales according to the attacker. It may be sensible to distinguish them this way to get around the different styles and allow for more DM behind the scenes manipulation but what if they were made effectively the same?

Ability scores improve the attack roll to reach a static defense total the enemy has. This is the norm for melee, ranged, and some spells. d20+score+mods vs flat AC+mods

Saves work effectively the same but swapping the roll requirement. You're still scaling according to ability score but it's your DC that remains flat while the enemy rolls to beat it. flat+score+mods vs d20+mods

I propose making saving throws a flat value and instead the caster rolls to attack the saving throw. What this means for players is more rolling on offense when casting spells while on defense the DM is rolling to determine if the effect takes place. Where it matters it allows for the same level of fudging just on offense instead of the player rolling poorly on their saves and being out of luck for it. Monsters would have known flat values to beat and casters would pray for their lucky rolls, maybe even applying Advantage of their own to beat the monster defenses. Advantage on saves ceases to be a thing and merely becomes a higher base save defense.

What potential flaws might crop up from this approach?

[Amechra]

Eh, it should be fine. One of the real benefits is that it speeds up AoEs that call for saves - just roll your "save attack" once, and compare it to all of the static values.

The real question is how you'll determine the static number of each save "defense". Some quick napkin math says that if you want monsters to save with the same frequency as they currently do, those static values are going to be really high. Like, 14-plus-the-current-save-bonus high.

(Random example: I cast a spell that calls for a DC 15 Con save on an Ogre. That Ogre has a +3 save bonus, so it succeeds on a 12+, which means that I 'succeed' in effecting the Ogre 55% of the time. If I convert my save DC into an "attack", I'm rolling a +7 against whatever static value the Ogre uses. Since I want that 55% chance of success, I should succeed on a 10+. That gives me a DC of 17, or 14 + the Ogre's Constitution modifier.)

[J-H]

This was an optional rule in 3.5. The problem in play with this is that enemy saves are typically much more obscure to the party than enemy AC. Knowing what an enemy's saving throw is removes some of the guesswork from spell targeting.

As a DM, it's faster for me to just roll and glance at a sheet and go "yes" or "no" than for wait to a player to do the same, tell me the number, and then get an answer back.

[Squark]

This is the approach Star Wars Saga Edition and 4th edition D&D took, and it works fine for the most part- Instead of Fortitude, Reflex, and Will saves, you attacked (or made a skill/ability check against, in the case of some Saga edition stuff) the Fortitude/Reflex/Will defense*. It gets a little murkier in 5e because as Amechra points out, the way proficiency bonuses works changes the math some. So to summarize, it can work, and it might speed up a few things like AoEs, but because the system isn't built from the ground up for this, you end up doing an awful lot of prep work to convert everything beforehand.

*Saga edition actually folded AC into Reflex defense, since armor that protects against blasters and vibroswords probably works against frag grenades too. Doesn't work in D&D, since Chainmail is not nearly as effective against Dragonfire.

[Amechra]

It has the same problem as if extra attack was replaced with "extra damage - when you hit with an attack, deal the damage again". It makes combat much swinger which increases both TPK and boringly easy combats.

I'm not sure where you're getting this from. Changing who rolls the dice doesn't necessarily change the likelihood that effects will succeed.

[OldTrees1]

It can change how traps filled dungeons feel. Often traps are attack roll for damage or save vs lose. So you feel more in control rolling to defend against that death trap. So account for that if you use this for Tomb of Horrors (for example).

[Willie the Duck]

What potential flaws might crop up from this approach?

Like most things, it probably works better if the system had been built from the ground up with this expectation. Various random things will have to be addressed (if Bless granted you +1d4 to your saving throw, does it grant +1d4 to your Saving Class (or whatever we call it)? What about being Blessed and being the caster (of an offensive spell), does that add to your spell to-hit-like quality for getting past your enemies defenses? Little niggling details that would have to be worked out.

Other than that, not so much. Switching who rolls won't change much, unless you have an ability that only applies to rolls you make (both Lucky feat and Portent diviner ability specifically do allow modification of either a roll you make or a roll made against you, but it'd take an exhaustive search to see if there are others out there).

[JNAProductions]

One of the real benefits is that it speeds up AoEs that call for saves - just roll your "save attack" once, and compare it to all of the static values.

On this point, that's actually something I would NOT do.

Let's say you're facing a dozen goblins, and you cast Burning Hands and hit seven of them. You roll a little below average, and only get 9 damage.

If each goblin made their own save, some would live (7-4=3 HP left), some would die (7-9=-2 HP left). If you roll once and compare it to their defenses, you either kill them all or fail to kill any of them.

[Amechra]

That's a fair objection.

[Dark.Revenant]

What would likely break is the fact that everyone succeeds or fails at the same time. While missing, say, a fireball against a whole group of enemies might be annoying, having a good chance of *succeeding* against every single enemy at the same time with a control spell like Hypnotic Pattern would be devastating for balance.

[KorvinStarmast]

What would likely break is the fact that everyone succeeds or fails at the same time. While missing, say, a fireball against a whole group of enemies might be annoying, having a good chance of *succeeding* against every single enemy at the same time with a control spell like Hypnotic Pattern would be devastating for balance. Yeah, there's a nice detailed discussion of that here (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/140124/22566).

This table (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/140138/22566) I think really tells the tale.

[Evaar]

Divination Wizard. Cast Hypnotic Pattern, roll to hit. If you roll low, replace it with your high Portent roll. Congrats on winning that fight.

Bane also becomes useless, because if you instead just Bless the Wizard then every target of the Wizard's save spells effectively has Bane applied. Though I guess it works now as an anti-caster spell, but depending on tactics and party size you may still just be better off Blessing your team instead.

It also raises questions of how these rolls interact with Advantage and Disadvantage. You can draw out a framework to separate the Save Rolls from the Attack Rolls to try to solve these issues, but honestly it's not going to be intuitive no matter what you do. It's much more obvious that you don't apply Advantage when you aren't the one rolling the die.

[Daphne]

Divination Wizard. Cast Hypnotic Pattern, roll to hit. If you roll low, replace it with your high Portent roll. Congrats on winning that fight.

"You can replace any attack roll, saving throw, or ability check made by you or a creature that you can see with one of these foretelling rolls. You must choose to do so before the roll, and you can replace a roll in this way only once per turn."

[JackPhoenix]

There's also the matter of effects that allow to retry the save every round. 4e "solved" it by making the saving throw flatly succeeding on 11+, but that would mean it doesn't matter if it's an apprentice wizard keeping a demon lord banished or an archmage keeping an orc ROFLing, both have the same chance to maintain the effect.

[KorvinStarmast]

There's also the matter of effects that allow to retry the save every round. I was getting around to that ... and I think 13th Age borrowed that flat 11+ or 15+ thing ... need to check that rule book.

[KorvinStarmast]

it's an apprentice wizard keeping a demon lord banished or an archmage keeping an orc ROFLing, both have the same chance to maintain the effect. There is that drawback; missing the benefit of the proficiency bonus which is a key mechanical thing in this edition.

[Evaar]

"You can replace any attack roll, saving throw, or ability check made by you or a creature that you can see with one of these foretelling rolls. You must choose to do so before the roll, and you can replace a roll in this way only once per turn."

Okay, not really the point I'm making though. Get a high roll at the start of the day? Now you know you have an encounter-shattering Hypnotic Pattern in your back pocket whenever you want. That's distinct difference from being able to guarantee one attack hits.

[Avonar]

I was getting around to that ... and I think 13th Age borrowed that flat 11+ or 15+ thing ... need to check that rule book.

Yep. Normal save is 11+, Hard is 16+, Easy is 5+.

[Damon_Tor]

This is how 4e did it. Instead of saves, everyone had non-armor defenses.

The math doesn't have to change in any way. The wizard can cast 5 different attack rolls, one against each target of a given spell.

[Evaar]

This is how 4e did it. Instead of saves, everyone had non-armor defenses.

The math doesn't have to change in any way. The wizard can cast 5 different attack rolls, one against each target of a given spell.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in 4e you still made individual attack rolls against each target when targeting, say, four targets with an Intelligence attack against Will.

Because I think you could make that work in 5e. What I don't think works is doing a single roll to establish a difficulty to beat, then compare to static save scores, because you vastly increase the value of things like Portent and other effects to bolster/guarantee accuracy of a single hit. You still run into this problem with effects like Bless, which just applies to all attack rolls.

And I still think you'll have unintended effects on things like Advantage/Disadvantage. Do you get Advantage when attacking a Blinded target with Fireball? Or do they specifically have to be Restrained to grant you advantage?

[DwarfFighter]

The game assumes that rules with save DCs (poison, spells, etc.) do not trigger critical hits and do not apply advantage/disadvantage due to conditions affecting the active source of the rule.

It seems weird to convert rules with save DCs into attacks, and then either skew the game balance by subjecting them to the same modifiers that apply to regular attack rolls, or distort the game mechanics by a placing arbitrary exceptions on them to retain legacy game balance.

Example: A wizard has an enemy within 5 ft. and whats to cast a fireball at a distant group of enemies. Why should he not have disadvantage on his rolls to attack those targets? But how does the presence of that enemy make it harder for the fireball to affect its targets? Failed attacks would presumable mean half damage, but if the wizard rolls a 20 for his attacks against any of the targets, is that a critical hit? If it is a critical hit, then that skews the average damage of the fireball upwards, which could be considered "broken". If not, then it is an exception to the normal attack mechanics, which is also "broken".

-DF

[Kyutaru]

The game assumes that rules with save DCs (poison, spells, etc.) do not trigger critical hits and do not apply advantage/disadvantage due to conditions affecting the active source of the rule.

It seems weird to convert rules with save DCs into attacks, and then either skew the game balance by subjecting them to the same modifiers that apply to regular attack rolls, or distort the game mechanics by a placing arbitrary exceptions on them to retain legacy game balance.

Example: A wizard has an enemy within 5 ft. and whats to cast a fireball at a distant group of enemies. Why should he not have disadvantage on his rolls to attack those targets? But how does the presence of that enemy make it harder for the fireball to affect its targets? Failed attacks would presumable mean half damage, but if the wizard rolls a 20 for his attacks against any of the targets, is that a critical hit? If it is a critical hit, then that skews the average damage of the fireball upwards, which could be considered "broken". If not, then it is an exception to the normal attack mechanics, which is also "broken".

-DF
Thank you, easily the most compelling argument alongside the round by round saving.

My thoughts on spell crits are that they offer an alternative way to handle condition severity. Much of the magic system is currently Pass or Fail and saving throws represent the struggle. If one were to make them attacks then Pass and Fail are not the only types one might have. You can critically succeed on your spell and result in a more potent effect or critically fail resulting in something less than nothing. This sort of thing might warrant the 3rd edition or Pathfinder 2.0 critical systems however rather than 10% of all spells operating weirdly. A system like this would reward powerful wizards dealing with weak minions by upgrading their effects naturally while making strong bosses more immune to these effects without depending on poor rolling to result in a binary state victory condition. Partial effect spells seem more rewarding with potent conditions applied to lesser beings and mere debuffed stat inconveniences applied to stronger ones.

Likewise round by round saving may simply be that the strength of the spell diminishes at a certain rate each turn and when its power falls below your saving threshold it no longer effects you. Spells that last briefly may lose 5+ potency per turn while spells that hold a long duration by caster level may lose 1 or 2 potency each turn. So if you rolled a 32 on your attack and you enemy's save was 24 then a strong control effect may last four rounds on him before he breaks out 32-> 30-> 28-> 26-> 24. This eliminates one of the things I disliked about magic being the inconsistency as every round a wizard is unsure if he can still hold the enemy or not. A system like this would tell them definitively how long they can expect to control a bear for depending on how strong their hold on them happens to be.

[Amechra]

It seems weird to convert rules with save DCs into attacks, and then either skew the game balance by subjecting them to the same modifiers that apply to regular attack rolls, or distort the game mechanics by a placing arbitrary exceptions on them to retain legacy game balance.

While those are valid concerns, this wouldn't necessarily happen. There's no need to change stuff from being a "saving throw" to an "attack roll" just because someone else is rolling the die - just call it a "save check" or whatever. Kinda like how Grapples and Shoves call for opposed ability checks instead of an attack roll.

(At this time, I would like to voice my annoyance with the fact that we refer to the act of rolling a d20 + modifiers vs. a DC as a "roll", "check", or "throw", depending on what we're doing. Now that's a sacred cow I could do without.)

[Mellack]

You would have to figure out how advantage/disadvantage will work on these. What if you are casting at a gnome who gets advantage against the spell?

[Teaguethebean]

I'm not sure where you're getting this from. Changing who rolls the dice doesn't necessarily change the likelihood that effects will succeed.

I think they mean when it is 1 roll for a hypnotic pattern instead of 7.

[Luccan]

Could someone explain the math here? Because to me it looks like this change favors the spellcaster/attacker, particularly against low save opponents

Either way, it certainly feels weaker, which I don't think should be ignored. Presentation is important

[Valmark]

Could someone explain the math here? Because to me it looks like this change favors the spellcaster/attacker, particularly against low save opponents

Either way, it certainly feels weaker, which I don't think should be ignored. Presentation is important
Like Amechra explained:


The real question is how you'll determine the static number of each save "defense". Some quick napkin math says that if you want monsters to save with the same frequency as they currently do, those static values are going to be really high. Like, 14-plus-the-current-save-bonus high.

(Random example: I cast a spell that calls for a DC 15 Con save on an Ogre. That Ogre has a +3 save bonus, so it succeeds on a 12+, which means that I 'succeed' in effecting the Ogre 55% of the time. If I convert my save DC into an "attack", I'm rolling a +7 against whatever static value the Ogre uses. Since I want that 55% chance of success, I should succeed on a 10+. That gives me a DC of 17, or 14 + the Ogre's Constitution modifier.)
Just need to boost the save AC before modifiers from 10 to 14.

On another note, advantage on a save would become disadvantage to the spellcaster's roll (and viceversa for disadvantage).

A problem is that stuff like Bless/Bane and Bardic Inspiration become slower- you first need them to roll the die to see how much the save AC changes, then you roll your save attack instead of rolling the dice together. It's a small change, but on the long run I expect the effects to become more noticeable.

Also, I think making the caster roll the dice themselves to make save attacks makes the game slower too. Not sure, but I get that feeling.

[heavyfuel]

There is the "problem" that some saves aren't triggered by enemies.

If you stumble on a trap that requires a Dex save, who is the one rolling? The trap itself? The same goes for stuff like diseases and poisons.

Another thing that might be problematic is rerolls.

If I have something that allows me to reroll (eg; the Lucky feat), it's nice to know the result of the dice before choosing to reroll.

[Valmark]

There is the "problem" that some saves aren't triggered by enemies.

If you stumble on a trap that requires a Dex save, who is the one rolling? The trap itself? The same goes for stuff like diseases and poisons.

Another thing that might be problematic is rerolls.

If I have something that allows me to reroll (eg; the Lucky feat), it's nice to know the result of the dice before choosing to reroll.

Why wouldn't the trap roll? Or diseases and poisons?

For the reroll you'd only need the DM to tell you what they got. It would be very awkward though, I think.

[heavyfuel]

Why wouldn't the trap roll? Or diseases and poisons?

They would, but I can see some people being averse to this idea. That's all I was saying.

[Teaguethebean]

They would, but I can see some people being averse to this idea. That's all I was saying.

there are dart traps that make attack rolls in published adventures.

[OldTrees1]

there are dart traps that make attack rolls in published adventures.

True, however as I described earlier:


It can change how traps filled dungeons feel. Often traps are attack roll for damage or save vs lose. So you feel more in control rolling to defend against that death trap. So account for that if you use this for Tomb of Horrors (for example).

Traps that currently roll against you are ones that tend to be damaging but not save or lose.
Traps that the PC current saves against are ones that tend to be save or lose.

So moving the dice from the PC to the Trap in the case of save or lose might change how those traps feel.


PS: I guess this also applies to combat now that I think about it.

[Kyutaru]

Positive change in my opinion. If the DM rolls behind the screen and says you got hit by a trap and here's the damage and effect then it really feels like a sucker punch. Like a trap just got sprung.

There's fundamentally no difference between a dart trap attacking you and a regular pit trap making you roll a reflex. They might even do the same amount of damage. One is just rolling for you.

[ThatoneGuy84]

My only aversion to using this, is How DC is calculated vs how you would calculate the save.
DC is 8+prof+Mod
If save was 10+prof+mod it feels alittle strange to me.
Just on paper
Rolling saves is really just 1 roll per player effected, I dont really see an issue. It also takes the gas out of things like Indomitable, which let's you reroll a save. If i take my static and reroll to take my static. I'm still boned, so that's pretty bad.
Does advantage give blanked +5 to static? Cause Yanti just became so much more powerful (cause magic resist wasnt powerful enough)

In comes the yanti, monk that never fails a save. Aoe never deals damage because of evasion.

As for when I DM, I always ask my players that are casting the AOE spell.
Do you want the enemies to have 1 roll or roll individually. I let them choose if they want a blanket roll that could potentially succeed and have the potential to kill all/all succeed and all be standing.
That way if it's a group save the players makes the decision, and wont groan about it.
If they all fail, then the player feels great they just nuked a huge chunk of an encounter.

[Sigreid]

Really there's 3 things. 1 is it's a different feel to overcome the spell either initially or on succeeding rounds than to have the spell miss. 2. When you're having a bad dice rolling night, sometimes it's satisfying to know you can make the other guy roll instead. 3. As was pointed out earlier, for any AoE spell you either have the caster roll a lot of dice and have to keep track of individual targets, or you have a situation where one single roll is an all or nothing for the full effect.

[Amechra]

My only aversion to using this, is How DC is calculated vs how you would calculate the save.
DC is 8+prof+Mod
If save was 10+prof+mod it feels alittle strange to me.
Just on paper
Rolling saves is really just 1 roll per player effected, I dont really see an issue. It also takes the gas out of things like Indomitable, which let's you reroll a save. If i take my static and reroll to take my static. I'm still boned, so that's pretty bad.
Does advantage give blanked +5 to static? Cause Yanti just became so much more powerful (cause magic resist wasnt powerful enough)

It would be 14 + Proficiency + Mod if you didn't want saves to suddenly be way more effective. And advantage on saving throws would probably just become disadvantage on the check - something similar would happen with Indomitable and the like.

...

I have to apologize, everyone - I missed the fairly obvious issue with just rolling the save once for the full group of enemies. And forcing the player to roll 10+ checks for all of the Goblins they hit... well, at that point, what's really the point?

I was reminded, however, of an optional rule from 3.5 where players roll all the dice. So monsters just have a bunch of static scores, while players have a bunch of check bonuses. If you attack an enemy, you make an attack roll - if you get attacked, you make an AC check against their Attack DC. Stuff like that.

And then you have the opposite, where the DM rolls all the dice. I've heard that that's actually really effective for PbP games. Normally, actions in a PbP work in one of the following ways:

1. The DM describes the scene.
2. A player says that they want to do something that requires a check.
3. The DM asks for that check.
4. The player posts their result and asks if they succeed.
5. The DM tells them what happens.

If the DM rolls all of the dice (and keeps a copy of the character sheets on their computer), they can skip steps #3 and #4, which makes the whole thing way faster.

[ahyangyi]

That was how it worked in 4e, and to be honest, I don’t think it was much different flavor-wise. Mathematically they are all equivalent.

... until mechanisms that allow you to double roll / reroll saves come into play. They will have to be translated to “the attacker roll twice and use the worse / the attacker rolls and the defender can choose to force reroll”. In this case, the flavor does get flipped.

What was usually worded as fortune becomes misfortune. Well, technically one man’s fortune is another man’s fortune, but they do feel different.

[Dr. Cliché]

My experience from playing 4th is that it creates a strong feeling that your character lacks agency/control.

Even if the odds are the same, I think it makes a difference to have the player roll to save against an effect, rather than having the DM roll and just tell him whether or not he's been affected.

Incidentally, it also added to 4e's issues with spells and weapon attacks being basically indistinguishable from one another.

[Kyutaru]

Incidentally, it also added to 4e's issues with spells and weapon attacks being basically indistinguishable from one another.
Shouldn't this be one of the positives? Weapon attacks and skill checks operating way different from spells is part of the martial/caster divide. Martials are rolling to try to affect their targets at all while casters sit back with predetermined spell strength that they can reliably sling around and just affect things even partially. It lends to the spells are OP idea when they operate under their own special rules that ignore how the rest of the rules work. Magic should be a rulebreaker in a sense but mages are playing a different game system in the same space as skill or weapon classes.

[Dr. Cliché]

Shouldn't this be one of the positives? Weapon attacks and skill checks operating way different from spells is part of the martial/caster divide. Martials are rolling to try to affect their targets at all while casters sit back with predetermined spell strength that they can reliably sling around and just affect things even partially. It lends to the spells are OP idea when they operate under their own special rules that ignore how the rest of the rules work. Magic should be a rulebreaker in a sense but mages are playing a different game system in the same space as skill or weapon classes.

All I'll say is that I've certainly never seen it in those terms myself. :smalltongue:

[Tanarii]

I was reminded, however, of an optional rule from 3.5 where players roll all the dice. So monsters just have a bunch of static scores, while players have a bunch of check bonuses. If you attack an enemy, you make an attack roll - if you get attacked, you make an AC check against their Attack DC. Stuff like that.
Isn't that the route PF2 went? It's definitely the PbtA method. All dice are rolled by the players, not the GM.