Stycotl
2008-04-24, 02:39 AM
I am not much of a fan of how little use I can get out of teamwork benefits. You can only have a few of them, and they are generally of very small impact. When I imagine what a teamwork benefit should be, I see something a little more impressive. Something that has taken time and talent to put together. Something that says ‘signature move’, or something along those lines.
Without further ado,
Advanced Teamwork Benefits
Advanced teamwork benefits work in very much the same way that normal teamwork benefits operate. The team roster must include at least two creatures, and not more than eight. However, unlike normal teamwork benefits, the only limit as to the maximum number of advanced teamwork benefits is how many a team qualifies for. All advanced teamwork benefits have difficult prerequisites to meet, such as base attack bonus, feats, base saving throw bonuses, skill ranks, spells, class abilities, and lastly, every advanced teamwork benefit has at least one normal teamwork benefit as a prerequisite, narrowing the possibilities and combinations significantly, and making it difficult for even epic-level teams to operate with more than two or three at the most.
Advanced teamwork benefits vary greatly, and many are unique to one particular team. Some advanced teamwork benefits have gone down in bardic legends, bringing immortality to the names of the teams that utilized them. Parties are encouraged to come up with their own advanced teamwork benefits, supervised by the GM, of course.
No advanced teamwork benefit is attainable before 10th level, and many at even higher levels than that. An advanced teamwork benefit takes four weeks of disciplined practice in order to learn, and every team member must perform a related skill check at a set DC in order to accomplish their part of the action.
Example advanced teamwork benefit:
Breath of the Spectre
Your team has profited from your expertise with teleportation effects and the use of a hivemind strategy, allowing instant communication anywhere on the battlefield. A terrifying byproduct of such awareness is an almost instantaneous understanding of the mechanics of any battle. Your team members know exactly where the rest of the team is at all times, and through the others, gain a working knowledge of terrain features, enemy emplacements, friendly and unfriendly movement, and any other pertinent information. This allows near-perfect coordination of the team’s maneuvering and formations, which in turn gives the ability to make lightning assaults with lethal precision.
Training: Your team must practice nonverbal communication, using the power of telepathy. When your team’s interactions become instinctive, relayed in sights, smells, sounds, and other sensory information, and cease to be a language-based method of communication, you will be ready to move on to the next stage of training, that of the multitude of teleportation strategies in a combat environment. At this point, your team will begin relearning the variations of patrol formations, assault formations, enveloping, setting in, maneuvering, reaction drills, and anything else that you ever practiced together in the mundane world of linear, ground-pounding combat. But now you will do it with the benefit of instantaneous travel and choreography.
Task Leader Prerequisites: 16 HD, Intelligence 18, Wisdom 14, base Reflex save +10, Sneak Attack or Skirmish (+8d6 or +4d6/+4 AC), Improved Initiative, Rush, Smoke Strike, Spring Attack, Concentrate 19 ranks, Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) 19 ranks, Knowledge (History) 19 ranks
Team Member Prerequisites: 16 HD, Intelligence 12, base reflex save +5, Improved Initiative, Concentration 9 ranks, Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) 4 ranks, Knowledge (History) 4 ranks
Special Prerequisites: Every team member needs some form of teleportation, whether that is teleport, or dimension door, or something similar. This can be a spell, a psionic power, a spell-like or supernatural ability, or anything else. It can even be granted through a magic item. Additionally, each team member must be connected through some form of telepathic link that allows instant communication with all team members; this can be a racial ability, a spell, or anything else, as explained above. And finally, the team must know the Fireteam Rush and Patrol teamwork benefits.
Benefit: Each team member receives a +2 bonus to initiative checks and saving throws, a +2 dodge bonus to AC as long as they are telepathically connected to at least one other conscious member of the team. If one team member is aware of danger, they all are. If one team member has a visual on a location, object, or creature, they all have it. This can be good in some ways—such as qualifications for teleportation—and bad in others—such as gaze attacks. Anyone outside of the team utilizing a form of detect thoughts or anything similar on team members while communicating telepathically must make a successful Will save DC 26 against the resulting barrage of confusing and distracting thoughts, or suffer a -10 penalty to Concentration checks, and a -2 penalty to armor class and attack rolls every round that they contact or maintain contact with one of the minds of the team members.
Further, any team member that utilizes a spell or effect with the teleportation descriptor can make a DC 26 Concentration check in order to make the effect a move-equivalent action that grants him or her concealment (20% miss chance). The team leader, and anyone else that possesses the Smoke Strike feat or a similar mechanic, still retains the use of that ability as normal, augmented by the concealment. Any foe engaged in melee combat with a team member that has just teleported is considered flat-footed against all attacks until the end of the turn.
History: This tactic was created by a brilliant pair of drow elves from Menzoberranzan, one a martial wizard, and the other a psychic warrior. Both of them were marvelous combatants that perfected a number of unorthodox strategies. However, this one was one of their most potent and most feared abilities. The drow were renowned for appearing and disappearing across the battlefields on which they fought, outmaneuvering, outstrategizing, and ultimately, annihilating their opponents.
Tips: Pump ranks into Listen and Spot; with hivemind going, you cannot afford not to. You will almost never be caught unaware. Additionally, make use of the Fireteam Rush and Lethal Ambush teamwork benefits while teleporting. A completely, ridiculously mobile team of teleporting guerilla warriors can dance circles all around the mired, terrified foes caught in their ambush.
Without further ado,
Advanced Teamwork Benefits
Advanced teamwork benefits work in very much the same way that normal teamwork benefits operate. The team roster must include at least two creatures, and not more than eight. However, unlike normal teamwork benefits, the only limit as to the maximum number of advanced teamwork benefits is how many a team qualifies for. All advanced teamwork benefits have difficult prerequisites to meet, such as base attack bonus, feats, base saving throw bonuses, skill ranks, spells, class abilities, and lastly, every advanced teamwork benefit has at least one normal teamwork benefit as a prerequisite, narrowing the possibilities and combinations significantly, and making it difficult for even epic-level teams to operate with more than two or three at the most.
Advanced teamwork benefits vary greatly, and many are unique to one particular team. Some advanced teamwork benefits have gone down in bardic legends, bringing immortality to the names of the teams that utilized them. Parties are encouraged to come up with their own advanced teamwork benefits, supervised by the GM, of course.
No advanced teamwork benefit is attainable before 10th level, and many at even higher levels than that. An advanced teamwork benefit takes four weeks of disciplined practice in order to learn, and every team member must perform a related skill check at a set DC in order to accomplish their part of the action.
Example advanced teamwork benefit:
Breath of the Spectre
Your team has profited from your expertise with teleportation effects and the use of a hivemind strategy, allowing instant communication anywhere on the battlefield. A terrifying byproduct of such awareness is an almost instantaneous understanding of the mechanics of any battle. Your team members know exactly where the rest of the team is at all times, and through the others, gain a working knowledge of terrain features, enemy emplacements, friendly and unfriendly movement, and any other pertinent information. This allows near-perfect coordination of the team’s maneuvering and formations, which in turn gives the ability to make lightning assaults with lethal precision.
Training: Your team must practice nonverbal communication, using the power of telepathy. When your team’s interactions become instinctive, relayed in sights, smells, sounds, and other sensory information, and cease to be a language-based method of communication, you will be ready to move on to the next stage of training, that of the multitude of teleportation strategies in a combat environment. At this point, your team will begin relearning the variations of patrol formations, assault formations, enveloping, setting in, maneuvering, reaction drills, and anything else that you ever practiced together in the mundane world of linear, ground-pounding combat. But now you will do it with the benefit of instantaneous travel and choreography.
Task Leader Prerequisites: 16 HD, Intelligence 18, Wisdom 14, base Reflex save +10, Sneak Attack or Skirmish (+8d6 or +4d6/+4 AC), Improved Initiative, Rush, Smoke Strike, Spring Attack, Concentrate 19 ranks, Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) 19 ranks, Knowledge (History) 19 ranks
Team Member Prerequisites: 16 HD, Intelligence 12, base reflex save +5, Improved Initiative, Concentration 9 ranks, Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) 4 ranks, Knowledge (History) 4 ranks
Special Prerequisites: Every team member needs some form of teleportation, whether that is teleport, or dimension door, or something similar. This can be a spell, a psionic power, a spell-like or supernatural ability, or anything else. It can even be granted through a magic item. Additionally, each team member must be connected through some form of telepathic link that allows instant communication with all team members; this can be a racial ability, a spell, or anything else, as explained above. And finally, the team must know the Fireteam Rush and Patrol teamwork benefits.
Benefit: Each team member receives a +2 bonus to initiative checks and saving throws, a +2 dodge bonus to AC as long as they are telepathically connected to at least one other conscious member of the team. If one team member is aware of danger, they all are. If one team member has a visual on a location, object, or creature, they all have it. This can be good in some ways—such as qualifications for teleportation—and bad in others—such as gaze attacks. Anyone outside of the team utilizing a form of detect thoughts or anything similar on team members while communicating telepathically must make a successful Will save DC 26 against the resulting barrage of confusing and distracting thoughts, or suffer a -10 penalty to Concentration checks, and a -2 penalty to armor class and attack rolls every round that they contact or maintain contact with one of the minds of the team members.
Further, any team member that utilizes a spell or effect with the teleportation descriptor can make a DC 26 Concentration check in order to make the effect a move-equivalent action that grants him or her concealment (20% miss chance). The team leader, and anyone else that possesses the Smoke Strike feat or a similar mechanic, still retains the use of that ability as normal, augmented by the concealment. Any foe engaged in melee combat with a team member that has just teleported is considered flat-footed against all attacks until the end of the turn.
History: This tactic was created by a brilliant pair of drow elves from Menzoberranzan, one a martial wizard, and the other a psychic warrior. Both of them were marvelous combatants that perfected a number of unorthodox strategies. However, this one was one of their most potent and most feared abilities. The drow were renowned for appearing and disappearing across the battlefields on which they fought, outmaneuvering, outstrategizing, and ultimately, annihilating their opponents.
Tips: Pump ranks into Listen and Spot; with hivemind going, you cannot afford not to. You will almost never be caught unaware. Additionally, make use of the Fireteam Rush and Lethal Ambush teamwork benefits while teleporting. A completely, ridiculously mobile team of teleporting guerilla warriors can dance circles all around the mired, terrified foes caught in their ambush.