anyone have better rules for tactics?

[arkangel111]

Title says it. tactics mean almost nothing in dnd. Anyone have some better rules, houserules or otherwise that do tactics batter? I know there is going to be some argument but lets face it a CR appropriate encounter where the heroes are in an endscene of 300 type scenario, the only tactic that might matter is how many archers there are, not the high ground, or the fact that they are surrounded (by the rules you can't flank at ranged anyway outside specific builds).

[loky1109]

Tactics? Did you mean mass fights?

[Logalmier]

I define tactical combat as “having a pool of viable options to choose from in a given scenario, with the best option not being immediately obvious.” There are three main things that kill tactics: alpha strikes, overspecialization, and limited mobility. D&D encourages all three.

Alpha strikes are options that are so potent, they essentially end the combat before it begins. This can be literally 1-shotting your enemy, or laying down crowd control so crippling that the enemy is effectively neutered. In any game where alpha strikes are possible, they become optimal, as nothing will beat an alpha strike besides another alpha strike, delivered first. If you want to have tactical combat with a range of viable options besides “nuke it,” you need to make alpha strikes not possible. This can be done by capping damage expectations, reducing the effectiveness of crowd control, and enhancing defensive and recovery options.

Overspecialization is often a result of damage alpha strikes being possible. In a system in which there is no limit on how much you can push the efficacy of a single option, that option becomes optimal in all scenarios, thus limiting the viability of other options, both in character creation and in combat. Martial character builds in D&D and Pathfinder tend to select 1 combat “strategy,” and then focus all their build resources around that strategy, growing vertically in terms of power, but not laterally in terms of options available. If you want characters to be making tactical decisions, they need to have different potential actions competing for their resource economy every turn, and thus, they need to be encouraged to choose those those available options during character creation.

Finally, full-attacking is really bad for tactics, because it limits mobility. Martials want to pump out damage, necessitating full attacks, which unless you’re pouncing limit mobility. Giving martials competitive standard action attacks (that maybe emphasize utility over raw damage) and toning down the ceiling on full attack damage can help make the decision between standard and full attack a viable one, as opposed to just having standard attacks be a consolation prize. Tome of Battle is very helpful in this regard

Basically, D&D characters use their build resources to number-hunt their way to victory, overwhelming everything thrown at them with brute power of a single option they’ve cultivated, obviating many tactical considerations in the process. There are ways to get around this, but they require a lot of tweaking, the outright banning of certain options, draconian limits on damage expectations, and the provision of more interesting, effective and varied options that compete for action resources.

[pabelfly]

Title says it. tactics mean almost nothing in dnd. Anyone have some better rules, houserules or otherwise that do tactics batter? I know there is going to be some argument but lets face it a CR appropriate encounter where the heroes are in an endscene of 300 type scenario, the only tactic that might matter is how many archers there are, not the high ground, or the fact that they are surrounded (by the rules you can't flank at ranged anyway outside specific builds).

I've run a few combats where 3-4 players face around 30-50 enemies. Is that suitable for what you have in mind, or do you need a larger horde of enemies pitted against your player?

[arkangel111]

I think logalmier is getting around to the crux of the problem, though no real solutions were given. I'm not necessarily looking to make a mass fight encounter, though that's not off the table. I am more looking for solutions to the "I stand and hit things" problem. Even when someone does a specific build like tripping or a spellcaster with BFC, they are only minorly tweaking the fight for their one specific purpose, and unless the whole team leans into it, their effort can be mostly wasted.
My group pretty much only cares for combat, but things are getting quite stale. I have varied the terrain, added traps, and given enemies some BFC. Despite this, combat usually quickly goes back to the status quo. Melee gets in range and beats the crap out of the baddie, while ranged sit back and plink things. Even when I give some options to affect the battlefield meaningfully, say a sudden pit that can be triggered, it only usually has the immediate effect but hardly changes the course of the battle, merely eating up a turn.
Using my original example. in 300, the status quo was fighting in the pass, round after round, they likely could have won the battle if nothing changed. A flanking maneuver later and the entire course of the battle WAS changed. During the movie, leonidas knows he has to protect his flank or it would be over. That scenario is not naturally in the rules...

[pabelfly]

Mass combat means that everyone gets to face multiple enemies in melee, so that's a possible option.

You could also make a two-stage battle, where the second lot of enemies come in from behind and ambush the ranged combatants.

Lastly you could add your own ranged characters to smipe their ranged characters or attack their melee while your melee enemies hold theirs off.

[Quertus]

Title says it. tactics mean almost nothing in dnd. Anyone have some better rules, houserules or otherwise that do tactics batter? I know there is going to be some argument but lets face it a CR appropriate encounter where the heroes are in an endscene of 300 type scenario, the only tactic that might matter is how many archers there are, not the high ground, or the fact that they are surrounded (by the rules you can't flank at ranged anyway outside specific builds).

This being the 3e forum, I guess I shouldn’t bother explaining the specifics of how the extent to which that is or isn’t true isn’t uniform across “D&D”, but varies by edition. I guess I should just expect that you meant that tactics mean almost nothing in 3e D&D.

And… even then, I think that you’re wrong - or, rather, that that statement says more about you than it does about 3e.

So, suppose you’re playing an Elvish Rogue in a cookie cutter party with a Fighter, Wizard, and Cleric. Say y’all are… around level 12. As you’re checking for traps in the Dungeon of Doom, suddenly, the lights go out. With your dark vision, you see a Beholder, 6 Shadows, and a Tiefling all float down through what must be an illusory ceiling up ahead. Are you really going to try to tell me that no actions you could take, no wands or scrolls you have prepared, nothing you could do would be likely to have more impact on the battle than everyone just spamming the same “I charge the closest thing” / “I cast the highest level spell I have remaining” buttons?

IME, in 3e, tactics only fail to matter if the GM provides tactically-boring encounters, the players fail to give their PCs more than a single button to push, and the GM fails to give the PCs more than a single monster at a time to push said button at (and Heaven forbid that there be anything other than monsters, like interactive terrain features, horses running off into the sunset, or wagons threatening to topple over cliffs).

So… your experiences do not match mine. 3e is full of tactical decisions - in the right game.

So, the trick is, having different enemies with different threat potentials and different threat vectors. Make it a choice what you engage - and make that choice potentially change with the flow of the fight. If the Beholder charms someone, or the shadows make strength get dangerously low, that can affect targeting property. And what can that Tiefling do? Do we go with the Devil we know, or the Devil we don’t?

(Never mind the obvious “how / why are these creatures together / not killing one another?!”)

[arkangel111]

I am referring to 3e specifically but I I think it applies almost universally to at least the more modern versions. and while yes that rogue might have a specific tactic he could use on the surprise round to help impact the fight, but most likely by round 2 everyone is moving into typical beatstick configuration. other than the surprise round, what advantage is there mechanically for an ambush? Spot checks for everyone, and then initiative. even should none but the rogue make his check he get a single action before combat devolves into i run-in and hit. there aren't morale checks built in, or outside of specific builds, a fear check.

My point isn't that there isn't ANY tactics involved, just that the tactics are almost universally either build specific, OR has little to no impact on the outcome of a fight. Other than perhaps grabbing a flanking bonus against a single target, your typical barbarian is unlikely to vie for a better position. The archer, could move to high ground but unless it's impossible to hit the enemy that +2 is worth far less than an extra attack by staying put. The wizard could use his action to get to high ground, or perhaps even fly or go invisible, but 9/10 he's better off casting a more offensive spell to eliminate an enemy rather than give them a -1 or -2 to hit or AC, or wasting a round getting into a good position that wil ultimately not impact the fight, unless he is specifically in danger.

Yes you can build a BFC wizard, but then your just choosing which tactic you will use regardless of the fight, the specific spell might change, but your action ultimately won't. Tripper fighter same thing, he has chosen to trip instead of killing and will almost universally use that specific talent. This is where my question really comes in; Are there any rules, homebrew or other system, that people use to help liven up their combat and make things a little more dynamic?

Almost every DM has had that elaborate trap room with the super villain be completely obliterated with an initiative roll and a lucky crit on round 1. The system really seems to only favor one tactic and that is going first. I'd like to find a way to get a little more out of the fight than just being, Oh yea that was an illusion, or secretly give him 2-3 times the HP so you can let your epic ending be more than meh...

My player's aren't complaining about my combats, but I have done a lot of weird things and made rules up on the spot in order to stretch out the fights, and make them feel less like a beat-em-up. It's a lot of work, I am just wondering what resources I might not be tapping into to make things a little easier behind the screen.

[pabelfly]

Other than perhaps grabbing a flanking bonus against a single target, your typical barbarian is unlikely to vie for a better position.

But is stuff like that an actual problem? If I'm playing a Barbarian I want to smash people's faces in with brute strength.

[Logalmier]

I didn’t give solutions, because while I do think that D&D can be turned into a tactical game, it requires such a massive overhaul that it ends up being more than just houserules. Also, you can look to 3rd party stuff to fix a lot of problems, but I didn’t know your stance on that. I focused on diagnosing the problems, because I think each table that’s genuinely interested in solving this issue will have to come up with their own solutions that fit their tastes. I can give you what I came up with as an example.

My game is:

E6, with most level prerequisites for feats and stuff removed. Scaling effects are tweaked to provide bonuses at 3/4/6 BAB/Caster Level.

Spheres of Might/Power - Vancian spellcasting is only available through time consuming and costly Rituals, precluding its use in combat

Characters start with 10 talents and 5 feats. Every level they gain a new feat. Every quarter of a level up, they receive a new talent (essentially 4 staggered talents per level, for a total of 30 talents and 10 feats at level 6)

Characters start with 3 x Max HP at level one, and gain Max HP on all level ups.

No number boosting magic items

Number boosting spells or talents or feats are very limited, and almost never stack.

Attack Bonus is capped at +20. Most characters will never hit this cap (+17 is the most realistic without flanking or assist other)

AC is capped at 30. Most characters will never hit this. (27 is the most realistic without assist other)

The cap for CMB is +30, CMD 40

Skill bonuses are capped at +30.

Base Damage is weapon dice + strength + power attack + class abilities (+3 at most, with a few exceptions such as Inquisitor Bane). Pretty much all other ways to stack Base Damage are banned. Deadly Aim is banned, and ranged damage is kept purposefully below melee damage.

Full Attacks are always 3 attacks for everyone with iterative -5 penalties, regardless of class or BAB. These attacks do Base Damage. There are no ways to gain extra attacks on a Full Attack. No Pounce, ever.

Standard Attacks are Sphere of Might’s “Special Attack Actions,” which do Base Damage, plus add utility effects and a bit of extra damage. Special Attack AoO chains are banned. If you are Special Attacking, you are attacking once and only once - at least, only once against a single target. Stacking multiple talents worth of effects on a single “Attack Action” is banned via turning most “Attack Actions” into “Special Attack actions” (an important distinction in SOM - basically I don’t want Special Attacks to gain too many rider effects and become Alpha Strikes).

Combat maneuvers can be performed as move actions. It is not possible to directly turn combat maneuvers into damage (via things like Vicious Stomp or Smash).

Dual wielding does not provide extra attacks, but instead is used for the utility of having 2 weapons out at once. (SOM introduces many such utility options).

Personal buff spells may be cast as a move action. Potions may be drank as a move action

The action cost of drawing items such as wands and potions is folded into the action cost of using them.

Characters are given many abilities which function out of turn. These abilities consume AoOs and Immediate actions. In particular, immediate actions are very valuable, providing powerful defensive options that can only be used once per round, and which consume next turn’s swift action (swift actions are also very valuable in Spheres games).

If an option is so good as to be essentially mandatory, it’s either given for free or banned (eg Power Attack and Combat/Muscular Reflexes are free. Eternal Transformation from SOP is banned, unless it’s not, in which case everyone gets it for free).

Flanking is +4 - in general, bonuses or penalties based on positioning or interacting with the environment are +4.

In general, if something has a drawback, that drawback cannot be permanently overcome through expending resources of any kind, but this is very much a case by case thing. The baseline power of certain options has been increased to accommodate this.

Weapons are divided into 3 categories: short, medium, long. Short weapons, such as daggers and unarmed strikes, have a range of 5 feet. Medium weapons, such as swords, have a range of 10. Long weapons, such as polearms, have a range of 15, but you cannot attack adjacent squares while wielding them (not even with other weapons such as unarmed strikes or spiked gauntlets).

Unarmed strikes can be easily upgraded with properties like trip, grab, or bull rush.

Medium armor gives DR 6 and reduces speed by 5, Heavy DR 10 and reduces speed by 10. This DR is halved against bludgeoning attacks.

Weapons are overhauled to create more options/parity. If a weapon doesn’t have a “niche,” it is either given a niche or eliminated. Longswords are 18-20/x2, Rapiers add +1 to-hit but lose their extended threat range, more things are made like the Swordbreaker Dagger, ect. Bludgeoning weapons in general don’t have special properties like other weapons, as their main utility is puncturing armor.

Hardness rules are overhauled, but the basic gist is “no, you cannot literally cut through the castle wall with your adamantine greatsword in 3 minutes. Also adamantine is banned”.

Making both Full Attacks (which are used for damage, if you can overcome the attack penalties) and Special Attacks (which are used for utility, such as setting up a Full Attack) viable in their own way creates interesting positioning puzzles. Combat maneuvers cannot directly lead to more damage (Vicious Stomp and all of its ilk are banned), but they are very easy to mix into combat, and are useful against enemies with high AC. In this system, AC is much more unbound by level than attack - theoretically, a level 1 character could wear full plate and a tower shield and be practically unhittable, but their low CMD would still allow them to be tripped, disarm, sundered, pushed off a cliff, ect. Everyone is given better survivability via health and defensive options, so that combats aren’t over in 1 round, and a back and forth can actually take place.

Basically, you take away the option to spend build resources on boring necessary things (which are provided for free) or unga bunga number balling (which is given a strict upper limit), so that 80% of those resources are instead spent on unlocking new, mutually exclusive options in combat, which can then be picked between and leveraged for tactical advantage.

Of course, you need to actually have a system which offers multiple viable mutually exclusive options, which is why you kind of need to add something like Spheres, Path of War, or at the very least Tome of Battle.

TLDR; I recommend e6, number caps, increasing survivability, increasing tactical and environmental numerical bonuses, limiting the extent to which specific tactics can be improved, and looking at third party stuff, particularly Spheres.

[Quertus]

I am referring to 3e specifically but I I think it applies almost universally to at least the more modern versions. and while yes that rogue might have a specific tactic he could use on the surprise round to help impact the fight, but most likely by round 2 everyone is moving into typical beatstick configuration. other than the surprise round, what advantage is there mechanically for an ambush? Spot checks for everyone, and then initiative. even should none but the rogue make his check he get a single action before combat devolves into i run-in and hit. there aren't morale checks built in, or outside of specific builds, a fear check.

My point isn't that there isn't ANY tactics involved, just that the tactics are almost universally either build specific, OR has little to no impact on the outcome of a fight. Other than perhaps grabbing a flanking bonus against a single target, your typical barbarian is unlikely to vie for a better position. The archer, could move to high ground but unless it's impossible to hit the enemy that +2 is worth far less than an extra attack by staying put. The wizard could use his action to get to high ground, or perhaps even fly or go invisible, but 9/10 he's better off casting a more offensive spell to eliminate an enemy rather than give them a -1 or -2 to hit or AC, or wasting a round getting into a good position that wil ultimately not impact the fight, unless he is specifically in danger.

Yes you can build a BFC wizard, but then your just choosing which tactic you will use regardless of the fight, the specific spell might change, but your action ultimately won't. Tripper fighter same thing, he has chosen to trip instead of killing and will almost universally use that specific talent. This is where my question really comes in; Are there any rules, homebrew or other system, that people use to help liven up their combat and make things a little more dynamic?

Almost every DM has had that elaborate trap room with the super villain be completely obliterated with an initiative roll and a lucky crit on round 1. The system really seems to only favor one tactic and that is going first. I'd like to find a way to get a little more out of the fight than just being, Oh yea that was an illusion, or secretly give him 2-3 times the HP so you can let your epic ending be more than meh...

My player's aren't complaining about my combats, but I have done a lot of weird things and made rules up on the spot in order to stretch out the fights, and make them feel less like a beat-em-up. It's a lot of work, I am just wondering what resources I might not be tapping into to make things a little easier behind the screen.

Sure, there are plenty of specific tactics that are suboptimal. If your complaint amounts to, “My characters want to live in a world where these dumb ideas are actually smart”, then Quertus, my signature tactically inept academia mage for whom this account is named, feels your pain.

But if your complaint is, “3e combat does not benefit from tactics”, that’s clearly false.

The claim “3e doesn’t benefit from tactics after the first round is trickier to evaluate. However, when that claim comes in parallel with, “other than the surprise round, what advantage is there mechanically for an ambush?”, it makes me question whether the issue is with your comprehension of what the benefit of tactics actually is. The strategic advantage of an ambush is positioning - getting all those “cover” and “higher ground” bonuses you seem so hip on, while (generally) denying them to the enemy - and action economy, getting to go while your opponents are in a surprise round.

Nothing keeps the archer Fighter from, say, shooting out the Beholder’s “Disintegrate” eye, then 5’ stepping to take cover behind the Cleric, to gain cover from the Charm eyes. There’s so many options for how to approach that fight, that I can’t imagine a party that loved tactical play being bored by that encounter.

Also… in what system does an archer get a +2 to hit for higher ground? Because, unless I’ve missed something, and been playing it wrong for years, that’s not 3e.

[Logalmier]

Sure, there are plenty of specific tactics that are suboptimal. If your complaint amounts to, “My characters want to live in a world where these dumb ideas are actually smart”, then Quertus, my signature tactically inept academia mage for whom this account is named, feels your pain.

The rules of the game determine which tactics are and are not suboptimal - a game can either provide a wealth of viable tactical options, or it can do what 3.5 does, and limit many options. There are many actions in default 3e that aren't worth it, not for narrative or strategic reasons, but rather because the way the game was set up punishes deviating from tactics which you have heavily invested in beforehand.

[Quertus]

The rules of the game determine which tactics are and are not suboptimal - a game can either provide a wealth of viable tactical options, or it can do what 3.5 does, and limit many options. There are many actions in default 3e that aren't worth it, not for narrative or strategic reasons, but rather because the way the game was set up punishes deviating from tactics which you have heavily invested in beforehand.

Which means that, for those who care about characters and encounters having tactical depth, it is important to not be heavily invested in one particular tactic, no?

[Logalmier]

Which means that, for those who care about characters and encounters having tactical depth, it is important to not be heavily invested in one particular tactic, no?

They will then be unable to keep up with party members who have chosen to invest in a single tactic, as that is the more effective meta-strategy in 3e. Better to have the system set the standard, rather than a gentleman's agreement among players.

[Quertus]

They will then be unable to keep up with party members who have chosen to invest in a single tactic, as that is the more effective meta-strategy in 3e. Better to have the system set the standard, rather than a gentleman's agreement among players.

… I mean, the BDF with an axe to grind into someone’s face really can’t keep up with the rest of the party at range… or against fliers… or when talking… or fighting incorporeal creatures… or in wilderness survival… or…

If you haven’t given yourself options in 3e, you’ve generally failed already anyway, IME.

Sure, on those rare occasions when Timmy gets to hit, he’ll hit big, but Spike is more effective far more often.

And I disagree that having the system set the standard is better than having a gentleman’s agreement among players. Imagine if the developers had been pulled from one of the tables that only considered “damage dealt” to equate to contribution, and considered BFC to be UP non-contributing. Imagine what the system they built to be “balanced” would look like. No, better for each table to define their own balance, around their own individual priorities.

Would a less Timmy-focused system be better? Probably? But I’m not a Timmy, so we’d have to find and poll them to be sure before we go changing things blind and cluelessly, like your stereotypical “low wealth 3e” GMs. I’ll just say, as a Jonny (sp?), I’m game.

[Elkad]

Of course things like flanking matter. It's just hard for them to matter with the "traditional" 4 PC party, as they don't really have the numbers for grand tactics. But you can still get there.

I DM and play at big tables. 6-8 players is the norm, and it's been over a dozen at times. Set the fight up in a chokepoint where half of them can't get in the fight, and circling around to the other door into the room suddenly becomes an option they consider on their own. Not because it's "smart", but because they want in on the action. You let them do it a few times and it starts to become habit. Then you change it up and have them stumble onto reinforcements instead - giving you two fights in adjacent rooms.

Even in a 4 PC group, you can hit the group with enemies from both sides. Do they fight equally, or try to kill/disable one group quickly, and then turn on the other?

Reinforcements. Having more bad guys run into the room mid-fight just adds more enemies to the problem. Useful as a DM to adjust an encounter, but not particularly tricky. But what if it's overwhelming, but you offer a method of delay. Like a door in the room barred from the inside, with a giant trying to get through it to join the fight. In-room enemies might scramble to unbar the door and need to be stopped by players. Or the giant could be battering it down over several rounds, and a Make Whole spell from the Cleric (a single action) could reset the process, delaying him several more rounds. He probably doesn't have it memorized, but you conveniently put a scroll with that on it in the treasure 2 rooms back. Will he remember?

Escaping to warn or bring reinforcements. If one enemy is running away to get help, someone had best go after him instead of just concentrating on killing the targets directly to their front.

Flat unwinnable fights. Make your party flee for their life as something they don't have a chance of beating chases them. CR12 dragon vs a L8 party or something. Give them terrain and obstacles to work with, but keep them running. Then you can increase difficulty by sticking a soft blocking force in their way as they flee. They could beat it in 3-4 rounds easily, but they don't have that long, so they'd best overspend on resources to get it over with FAST. Like by fireballing the enemies and the party both.

Target selection. Use a good mix of creatures in your encounters. Stick some melee in there to blunt charges, but put a couple archers in a balcony, a low-level caster or two in the rear, and something with an unusual special attack, low damage, and way too many hitpoints (getting swallowed whole generally isn't particularly dangerous, but you can't help if the rest of the party is still fighting). Then let your party make choices about who to go after first.

Split the party with a trap (falling portcullis is one example). Attack one side only. How does the other half of the party aid them? Shoot through the bars? Try to lift the portcullis?

Throw a monster basically immune to melee at the front of the party. Throw one basically immune to magic at the back at the same time. Make the sorc and paladin swap places to be effective.

And Morale is always a thing. It's just not codified. If the party blenders 30 goblins the first round, the other 20 should make a rational decision and run for their lives in every direction. If they just Web 30 goblins, their friends might stay and try to save them.

[Seward]

D&D tactics are far more about action economy and teamwork than anything an individual does on its own.

Some characters have a large menu of options (prep casters, or spont casters with decent list of spells known, both with consumables to fill gaps). Others are so damn good at what they do that they are enabled by other characters to do their thing.

For example, once Dimension Door is an option it is almost always better to D-door your heaviest hitters next to the most dangerous enemy than take any other option if the battle has gone from routine to potentially lethal. Unless your party has none of those full-attack-restricted melee that reliably hit and do massive damage with a full attack. Then you have to start restricting your menu of options and resources around producing enough offense to win the expected X encounters a day plus enough left over to survive a night ambush or whatever. My flexible casters had entirely different tactical approaches when teamed with heavy hitters vs teamed with mostly support-type characters.

You look at your party, and that gives you your tactial options as a team. Some parties scry and fry, others "sneak until spotted then charge" others find ways around/through the obstacle without engaging it, others blunder around and are so damn tough that "recon by fire" is how they locate enemies (allow an ambush and just kill the ambushres anyway).

In organized play, a party on an investigative mission without much talent in that direction would often just be very obvious about investigating until the bad guy gets nervous and sends somebody to take them out. Capture a few ambushers alive and you have a trail you can follow. (if you lack the skills/magic to interrogate, find a friendly npc temple or mage or diplomat etc to help).

In a home campaign, characters get more options as they level and GM will usually change up the challenges to prevent a single tactic spammed to dominate the campaign. If fights are boring in D&D the problem tends to lie more in adventure being a bad fit for the PC party. D&D is a large toolbox, and even if you tend toward published adventures you can usually tweak things to make it work better. At minimum any party who has great success with a tactic will start to get noticed, and their foes who have encountered them before, or did their homework, will try to evolve tactics and strategies within thier resources to make a given tactic less effective. (eg, anticipate teleport, dim lock, readied action to mess up dim-door character, waste resources on meaningless fights so it is not there for the important battle etc etc to avoid those deadly multiple-full attack tactical teleports)



My point isn't that there isn't ANY tactics involved, just that the tactics are almost universally either build specific, OR has little to no impact on the outcome of a fight. Other than perhaps grabbing a flanking bonus against a single target, your typical barbarian is unlikely to vie for a better position. The archer, could move to high ground but unless it's impossible to hit the enemy that +2 is worth far less than an extra attack by staying put. The wizard could use his action to get to high ground, or perhaps even fly or go invisible, but 9/10 he's better off casting a more offensive spell to eliminate an enemy rather than give them a -1 or -2 to hit or AC, or wasting a round getting into a good position that wil ultimately not impact the fight, unless he is specifically in danger.

Counterexamples from real play.

Arcane archer has high perception skills, as does his familiar. Surprising him is very rare but his surprise round actions are low opportunity cost compared to later actions (where his role is to just kill **** with steady reliable damage). I had all kinds of tactics before the fight began to maximize my odds of getting said full attack actions later which resulted in my guy outperforming higher level archers (or archers who could have higher to-hit+damage rolls in a nova but just did not seem to full attack as often).

1. routinely carried benign transposition. In surprise round could position myself in spot with best signtlines and often out of melee or short range spellcasting via flying my bat to such position with his action and swapping places.

2. invested in boots of speed early to allow myself to trail the party by 30' or so. This put me out of fireball-ambush range and usually out of range of dangerous will-save type spells, rays and similar effects even if I was surprised (and between transposition or up to 60' land speed I could separate myself from the party getting range+cover mods if not surprised).

3. had several swift action spells prepped which help ensure full attacks. Griffen killed under me? Feather fall keeps me shooting all the way down. Enemy grabs concealment+improved cover? Guided shot eliminates all that noise, plus helps with the falling situation if I fell from 100 feet.

4. invested in quickdraw and had backup bows. Disarming me only marginally reduced my damage, and not having weapon out did not waste a round.

Mainly I was thoughtful. I would full attack when blinded if I knew where to shoot (and had a feat to help with that). I would full attack if a spider was pulling me up a tree by the leg (not prone, not yet being eaten, being upside down and moving does not stop you from full attacking....although if i did not have a quiver of Ehlonna my arrows might have fallen out).

On a more mundane level my warmage would routinely go prone and behind cover, because doing so did not reduce his offence at all, and would only not do such actions if doing so would put himself at risk of melee or some other hazard where mobility is better. My sorceress got away with a 12 ac for about 11 levels by just staying the hell away from threats (with swift action spells that helped and enough hitpoint investment to suck up an aoo to avoid a full attack).

Basically though, my biggest tactical achievements in d&d came when playing support characters in organized play (where parties are random and not all the same level, and both gm and other players are often strangers). Finding just that perfect std, swift and move action to rescue and/or enable fellow party members to shine provided many memorable moments.

[Logalmier]

Â… I mean, the BDF with an axe to grind into someoneÂ’s face really canÂ’t keep up with the rest of the party at rangeÂ… or against fliersÂ… or when talkingÂ… or fighting incorporeal creaturesÂ… or in wilderness survivalÂ… orÂ…

If you havenÂ’t given yourself options in 3e, youÂ’ve generally failed already anyway, IME.

Sure, on those rare occasions when Timmy gets to hit, heÂ’ll hit big, but Spike is more effective far more often.

Part of investing in your single tactic is spending build resources to negate things that counter that tactic. For example, if you're an archer, you take Precise Shot and its Improved variant so that shooting into melee, cover or concealment are no longer problems. For the price of three feats, you can now no longer worry yourself about tactical considerations when shooting. Rest assured, every full attack will be exactly like the last.

I think that this is really really boring, and pretty bad game design - you're spending limited resources not to give yourself more options, but to make combat less varied by reducing the number of ways a scenario can demand different approaches. In a tactical game you would pick Bouncing Shot to get around cover, a sword to fight enemies already engaged in melee, and a bomb to target enemies in concealment. You can't do this in base 3e, because the effectiveness of any option depends on a level of investment that precludes dabbling. That's why I recommend limiting overinvestment, starting with eliminating options that remove tactical considerations (like Precise Shot) and replacing them with options that have a baseline level of effectiveness, but that compete for your action economy.

[Quertus]

Part of investing in your single tactic is spending build resources to negate things that counter that tactic. For example, if you're an archer, you take Precise Shot and its Improved variant so that shooting into melee, cover or concealment are no longer problems. For the price of three feats, you can now no longer worry yourself about tactical considerations when shooting. Rest assured, every full attack will be exactly like the last.

I think that this is really really boring, and pretty bad game design - you're spending limited resources not to give yourself more options, but to make combat less varied by reducing the number of ways a scenario can demand different approaches. In a tactical game you would pick Bouncing Shot to get around cover, a sword to fight enemies already engaged in melee, and a bomb to target enemies in concealment. You can't do this in base 3e, because the effectiveness of any option depends on a level of investment that precludes dabbling. That's why I recommend limiting overinvestment, starting with eliminating options that remove tactical considerations (like Precise Shot) and replacing them with options that have a baseline level of effectiveness, but that compete for your action economy.

Hmmm… I’m not sure if we’re talking past each other. Do you really believe that the Fighter who spent his second round disabling the beholder’s Disintegrate eye and took a 5’ step behind the Cleric for cover to reduce his vulnerability to the two Charm eyes was a full attack that was exactly like the last? Do you really believe that the arcane archer who was using Benign Transposition on their bat familiar was asleep at the table, just phoning their turns in?

What do you want out of tactical play, that these two examples don’t give? What do these words mean to you, that such examples don’t qualify?

Because, given the definitions of tactical play that I use, I continue to insist that saying “3e lacks a tactical minigame” says more about the speaker than the system.

[Mars Ultor]

You don't need rules, you need to have the players or NPC make an effort to use tactics. An archer should be the designated "caster killer," his job is to ready an action and wait for the enemy spellcaster to start casting a spell. A few rounds of disrupting the spellcaster gives the other PCs enough time to get up close.

Focusing attacks is something that players don't always do consistently. If all the PCs use their distance attacks against one foe, he can sometimes be taken out by the time he's in melee.

Trippers can knock someone down then move, the other PCs then attack the guy while he's down and standing up.

A reach weapon, Combat Reflexes, and a 5-foot-step can cause a lot of trouble if the user keeps an eye on who's fighting and where. He can also fight one guy and flank another, giving the Rogue a consistent sneak attack. The "reacher" can also position himself where he can get a few Attacks of Opportunity and affect where the enemies go.

Caltrops can direct enemies away from certain areas, so can flaming oil.

Summoned monsters are often easily killed, they should be flanking and harassing, rather than attacking someone by itself.

There's no reason the villains can't do the same things. The existing rules provide for the use of tactics, the players and DM have to use them for their benefit.

[Logalmier]

Hmmm… I’m not sure if we’re talking past each other. Do you really believe that the Fighter who spent his second round disabling the beholder’s Disintegrate eye and took a 5’ step behind the Cleric for cover to reduce his vulnerability to the two Charm eyes was a full attack that was exactly like the last? Do you really believe that the arcane archer who was using Benign Transposition on their bat familiar was asleep at the table, just phoning their turns in?

What do you want out of tactical play, that these two examples don’t give? What do these words mean to you, that such examples don’t qualify?

Because, given the definitions of tactical play that I use, I continue to insist that saying “3e lacks a tactical minigame” says more about the speaker than the system.

I mean, we can come up with scenarios where you present a set of tactics and I say that full attacking would probably be better, a la "the +4 to ac against the charm rays probably does not outweigh the extra round of eyestalk attacks the beholder gets because the fighter didn't full attack it." Moreover, that +4 becomes less and less significant as the party increases in level and Numbers Go Up. Also, genuinely asking, I wasn't aware there were mechanics for putting out a beholder's eye?

As for Benign Transposition, casters do get more tactical gameplay than martials in 3e it's true. But I kind of want to avoid the Schrodinger's Scenario of having to evaluate tactics in a nebulous, purely hypothetical situation to see if, say, the Arcane Archer could have instead gotten more value out of denying enemy actions with some form of crowd control.

In terms of what I want out of tactical play, I would like a system in which there is never a clearly superior option that is defaulted to 90% of the time. Sometimes characters do things in 3e that aren't their "best move," like stepping into cover or relocating with Benign Transposition. But because "best moves" in 3e are so potent (and mostly free), this is almost always either a mistake, or done grudgingly because the "best move" wasn't available. Optimal decision making in 3e, especially for martials, is doing your best move over and over, or attempting to get into position so that you can do the best move for the rest of the combat. In order to avoid having players constantly default to the status quo of "clearly most effective option," you have to prevent those options from existing in the first place, or prevent them from being used at-will, which requires tweaking a lot of fundamental assumptions of the system.

Tome of Battle is a really elegant solution to this problem. Obtaining a powerful maneuver is usually as simple as selecting it when you reach the appropriate level, no need to expend 80% of your build resources on obtaining a commensurate level of power. And you can't do it every round, because maneuvers expend themselves until refreshed - there's an opportunity cost to using your stuff which needs to be considered as well. Manuevers are balanced around precise numerical benchmarks which cannot be easily broken - what they give is what you get. And because manuevers are for the most part standard actions, mobility is retained, thus allowing for a dynamic battlefield, the changing circumstances of which may alter what the "best move" is every round! Such a system encourages tactical battles.

[Quertus]

I mean, we can come up with scenarios where you present a set of tactics and I say that full attacking would probably be better, a la "the +4 to ac against the charm rays probably does not outweigh the extra round of eyestalk attacks the beholder gets because the fighter didn't full attack it." Moreover, that +4 becomes less and less significant as the party increases in level and Numbers Go Up. Also, genuinely asking, I wasn't aware there were mechanics for putting out a beholder's eye?

As for Benign Transposition, casters do get more tactical gameplay than martials in 3e it's true. But I kind of want to avoid the Schrodinger's Scenario of having to evaluate tactics in a nebulous, purely hypothetical situation to see if, say, the Arcane Archer could have instead gotten more value out of denying enemy actions with some form of crowd control.

In terms of what I want out of tactical play, I would like a system in which there is never a clearly superior option that is defaulted to 90% of the time. Sometimes characters do things in 3e that aren't their "best move," like stepping into cover or relocating with Benign Transposition. But because "best moves" in 3e are so potent (and mostly free), this is almost always either a mistake, or done grudgingly because the "best move" wasn't available. Optimal decision making in 3e, especially for martials, is doing your best move over and over, or attempting to get into position so that you can do the best move for the rest of the combat. In order to avoid having players constantly default to the status quo of "clearly most effective option," you have to prevent those options from existing in the first place, or prevent them from being used at-will, which requires tweaking a lot of fundamental assumptions of the system.

Tome of Battle is a really elegant solution to this problem. Obtaining a powerful maneuver is usually as simple as selecting it when you reach the appropriate level, no need to expend 80% of your build resources on obtaining a commensurate level of power. And you can't do it every round, because maneuvers expend themselves until refreshed - there's an opportunity cost to using your stuff which needs to be considered as well. Manuevers are balanced around precise numerical benchmarks which cannot be easily broken - what they give is what you get. And because manuevers are for the most part standard actions, mobility is retained, thus allowing for a dynamic battlefield, the changing circumstances of which may alter what the "best move" is every round! Such a system encourages tactical battles.

Yup, we’re definitely talking past each other.

The Fighter did full attack when he took out the beholder’s Disintegrate eye, I just didn’t bother to specify what he did with the rest of his attacks.

Magic can do stuff, Magic has tactical options. Sounds like we’re in agreement there. The 5’ step for cover behind the high will save Cleric was to show a purely muggle, build- and resources-independent response (and one that’s practically free, to boot!).

Huh. It seems that, wrt attacking individual eyes, unless I’m just too tired to read, the “attack individual body parts” text is missing from both 3.5 and 3.0 MM. I must have been thinking 2e (darn senility), and must have had permissive GMs who remembered the old days and allowed it the times players used that (generally suboptimal, IMO) option. Sigh. This is what happens when people mistake house rules for the actual rules. :smallamused:

And you seem to be saying “the archer firing arrows is all the same, regardless of their tactics in choosing targets”. If the targets are all identical, I agree that’s not really a tactically meaty choice. But when the targets represent different vectors of threat, there’s actual weight to your choice of targets. (Huh. I wonder if I’d have liked 4e more if the encounters hasn’t always been samey / of generally homogenous composition?)

If you want PCs to not always spam the same move / for the same move to not always be the optimal play? “Play a caster” is, of course, solid advice as always. But for the muggles? Hmmm… encounter design can go a long way there, as I’ve seen plenty of encounters where trip / sunder / grapple was superior to “full attack for maximum damage”. And that’s before adding in terrain to manipulate, or shoving foes off cliffs / through portals / into acid or lava.

Of course, just because it’s optimal for the PCs to use sunder or grapple doesn’t guarantee that anyone will actually fall to the dark side, and commit the heretical dark arts of using the grapple rules, or the PvP sin of destroying loot.

[Seward]

But I kind of want to avoid the Schrodinger's Scenario of having to evaluate tactics in a nebulous, purely hypothetical situation to see if, say, the Arcane Archer could have instead gotten more value out of denying enemy actions with some form of crowd control.


The only crowd control I can do with my single wizard level was a scroll of obscuring mist, and given that I am an archer, that was an extremely rare contingency (although I carried one just in case I spotted a zillion rogues surrounding the party and I was the only person who could act in the surprise round). The spells in my head were all swift action spells designed to help me keep shooting in various adverse circumstances, except for benign transposition (and if I had ever found a wand of that to quickdraw, that slot would have been used for something else that I could combine with a full attack). Cantrips were usually a single dancing light spell (solid gold for an archer at night with lowlight vision, you can light up a target area in surprise round well out of darkvision range and move it around as needed to keep focus party fire on the enemy if your enemy tries to escape it) and other slots left open, filled with things like prestidigitation or mending at the end of the day if I had not needed to detect magic or whatever earlier.

But I was playing a role of "archer" which in D&D means "steady reliable damage on the most dangerous target every round" with a side of "ready to interrupt if you can't just kill it" in rare circumstances (something arcane archer tools like phase arrow and seeker arrows help with tremendously). If I was reduced to a utility caster I had been seriously taken out of my game, although there were some fights where to keep people alive I pulled scroll after scroll of benign transposition out instead of shooting.

That is what it means to be a martial character with a single spellcasting level. Sometimes you do become a weak utility caster because it is better than your other alternatives. Somebody with a bigger spellcasting commitment could do more, but that just changes their menu of options. An arcane archer built around 4 bard levels plays pretty differently from one with a single wizard level. If you are advertising yourself as an archer though, you need to be able to have a potent full attack in terms of both accuracy and damage, regardless of whatever else you bring to the table (my guy was a fair scout from high investment in alertness skills, familiar etc, high dex and minimal investment in stealth skills and tracking, a bard4 chasse might have made a decent face instead).

I once advertised a full caster wizard in Pathfinder as an archer because most rounds she blasted enemies with ray attacks. She COULD do a lot of other wizard things (eg, she had a whole suite of spells for investigating a ruin the day AFTER you killed everything in it, and had a bunch of quality of life spells for traveling because she was really bad at wilderness stuff) but she DID NOT normally have spells for anything other than "clear away impediments to my ray spells" "make me comfortable when traveling" and "give me long running buffs that improve my senses, keep me alive". She could spontaneous scorching ray so a bad choice could always be more raw damage. Building a wizard that way took all the specialization you speak of (keeping up with a well designed archer even for a few rounds a day in offense is a challenge) but her role was "remove enemies from the battlefield with direct damage" not "tie them up in battlefield control". Because she packed mobility spells she did sometimes provide significant arcane utility to the party, and she had a couple "get a spell out of the spellbook and cast it" perks to pull a rabbit out of a hat, but normally her blasting was a better combat contribution.

Just because you fill a role well doesn't mean you adhere to it blindly. Each round you gauge "do I do my thing or does the party need something else more?" A typical ratio is about 2/3 to 4/5 of rounds you do your main schtick, the rest of the time you dip into your other capabilities. Support characters can be another animal, but again if your party dynamic is static (as in a home campaign) you don't get the variety of outcomes as you do when your party changes from episode to episode (as in organized play) so it could get dull I suppose, although even in a home campaign the GM usually mixes up the threats enough to engage most of your toolkit over the campaign.



And you seem to be saying “the archer firing arrows is all the same, regardless of their tactics in choosing targets”. If the targets are all identical, I agree that’s not really a tactically meaty choice. But when the targets represent different vectors of threat, there’s actual weight to your choice of targets. (Huh. I wonder if I’d have liked 4e more if the encounters hasn’t always been samey / of generally homogenous composition?)


The essence of tactics for an archer role character is target selection. Doing the damage is assumed. Doing it to the correct target is where the decision lies, and only when no target is obviously correct vs some other action is when you do said other action. Part of this decision is recognizing which targets will take more or less damage from your best attack, and how much margin of error you need for RNG swings. You might go for a more dangerous enemy knowing you might just ding it up instead of killing it, which is a safer option if you know an ally has an action before said enemy. Or you might take out a less dangerous enemy that killing is a sure thing, just to take its distraction value off the board, and use any extra shots to whittle down the true threat.

One big advantage of a martial archer vs my wizard "archer" is that it does damage in more, smaller chunks, which reduces RNG variation and overkill. The wizard had one big attack where you have to pre-allocate rays, and a smaller quickened attack in later levels. She often had just massive overkill and wasted a lot of her damage potential when enemies were more numerous and weak (although she had area effect options if they were very weak in hitpoints for whatever reason available that he lacked). Part of her tactics was using lower level spell slots to try to match the expected damage to the target, saving her biggest punch for targets that were giant wads of hitpoints or had resistances she could not bypass.

You can say X-com is just "shooting at the aliens", but you need to be very, very good at its sort of tactics, including understanding alien behavior, not just abilities, to do those ironman impossible games. Much of defense in that game at that level is killing aliens before they can attack, in the right order, and getting them to notice you at just the right time. And also allowing for the fact that unlike some CRPGs the RNG doesn't cheat and if you have an 80% chance of a hit, you need 5 shots to get 4 shots worth of damage, and you will sometimes get a bad clump of numbers and do less than you needed, so you plan for the failure points too, and accept the damage/deaths that come when things crap out to pay for the success the rest of the time.

[Kitsuneymg]

Giving martials competitive standard action attacks (that maybe emphasize utility over raw damage) and toning down the ceiling on full attack damage can help make the decision between standard and full attack a viable one, as opposed to just having standard attacks be a consolation prize. Tome of Battle is very helpful in this regard.

Tome of Battle is pretty good.

Path of War is less helpful. The high level move plus full attack plus boost plus a stance gameplay is the equivalent of a delete button. In theory you can’t use it again. Good thing there’s another discipline that has near enough to the exact same ability in it. How many move your speed and make a full attack’s worth of attacks with paltry penalties strikes are there? How many add your level to damage boosts? What about Xd6 stances? Hell. Broken blade by itself can easily do a charge, 3 attacks at -2 with 3d6 bonus damage, 2d6 bonus damage on top and ignore DR, and then stance for 1d6 bonus. By level five.

What you want is spheres of might with tweaks. Tweaks being the removal of barrage as a sphere, and possible the nerfing of lancer and guardian/berserker builds. Or not. That sort of resilience may be a plus.

SoM emphasizes the attack action with rider abilities. It goes hard on utility over raw damage. Delete full attacks and give the vital strike line for free at appropriate level and you’ll probably get closer than first party is ever going to give you to what you seem to want.

The magic system (spheres of power) is also great. It makes casters far less flexible and pins them to a more linear power scale rather than the typical quadratic one. You can still raise an army of the dead or blast huge explosions of acid at people, just likely not both on the same character. Instead of buying every spell on a scroll and scribing it into a book, you’re stuck with a talent based progression that forces strategic (or just “it sounds fun”) decisions. With only a minor amount of flexing spheres, you really want to pay attention to your talents instead of just buying the meta spells as you level.

[Logalmier]

snip

This is all really good advice, but I do think that Full Attacks should be kept around as a reward/punishment for good/poor positioning tactics.

eg. "I Skillfull Charge and Special Attack for x1.5 damage. But now I'm standing right next to the monster, who gets to Full Attack for potentially x3 damage"

or "I use Mobile Striker to advance, Special Attack for 1.5x damage, and then retreat out of Full Attack range"

or "I charge and Special Attack, using Follow Through for a free bull rush, hopefully denying the monster Full Attack"

or "I trip the monster, forcing it to choose between Full Attacking while prone, standing up and Special Attacking, or standing up and moving out of my Full Attack range"

or "I stand next to the monster to bait out a Full Attack, but use Footwork x2 to immediate action 10 foot step away out of reach after the first swing. The monster can still move, but wasted their standard doing a normal attack for x1 as opposed to a Special Attack for x1.5 + utility"

Full Attacks also incentivize debuffing. Cumulative -5 penalties are harsh when number-balling isn't allowed, but become manageable through things like Leg Smasher, Wide Open, prone, sunder, ect. (Lancer should be gigabanned as you say). Monster full attacks can be made more dangerous through keywords like grab and trip. You do have to clamp down hard on Full Attack optimization though, because it's really easy to break it. No extra attacks, no stacking flat damage increases beyond what's whitelisted, and no Pounce or equivalents. Ideally they should be an equivalent option, sometimes correct, sometimes not. Trading mobility for damage is a legitimate design space, it's just that by default this trade-off is either too efficient, or nonexistent.