Action Advantage

[Person_Man]

So over the years I've played many roleplaying, miniature, and card games. Back when I started playing Magic the Gathering (I started collecting it shortly after Arabian Nights came out - but sadly made the mistake of selling all of my cards when I left home for college to help pay for my first semester - a sad and horrible tradeoff. Now I play MtG rarely) I realized that a dominant strategy in almost any strategic game was to look for an action advantage. This is most apparent in cards/abilities that let you take an additional turn/action, draw additional cards/resources, reduce the resources necessary to take an action, or prevent an enemy from normal movement and/or actions (commonly referred to as battlefield control). So whenever I read a new set of rules, it's one of the first things I look for.

This is apparent in 3.X D&D through Pounce and Free Actions, Quickened actions, metamagic abuse, Attacks of Opportunity, Summoning, Animal Companions/Mounts/etc, and various other means.

When WotC took 80% of action advantage out of D&D when they made 4E, I was very happy. But once I played 4E, I realized that D&D had lost a ton of fun tactical options, and found the game to be bland, and now mostly stick to 3.X. (I know, I can't be pleased. I'm a nerd and I've accepted it).

So my questions to the community is are these:

• Is action advantage a good or a bad element to include in game design?
• Does it automatically "break" a game, in that players who choose not to use action advantage are so much weaker then those who do that they become mostly pointless?
• Are there ways to use the fun tactical options (particularly summoning, companions, and battlefield control) in a way that doesn't greatly imbalance the game against players who choose not to use those options?

Discuss.

[Eloel]

Summoning is balanced when you have to keep concentrating. Something akin to the Warlock's Summon Swarm invocation in 3.5 - you can have a summon, but you can't do something else while you have the summon.

[Chrono22]

Action advantage is a good element- to a degree. When a single players turn takes too long, it can mess with the continuity of combat, immersion, and party interest in the fight -> See full attack action.
Does action advantage break the game? Yes, but only if the system doesn't apply checks against it. In real life (yeah I know, drawing inspiration from how things actually work, I must be crazy), doing many actions at once means you lose focus and are less capable of succeeding at any of them.

In star wars d6, you could commit many actions if you wanted to- but each additional action reduced your total chance of success by reducing your dice.

If you gave each character a base number of actions (1) and allowed them to tack on additional effects or actions by incurring penalties, then it would be balanced. But it really depends on the system. The RPG I'm working on can get away with this more easily than DnD, since it is skill based and lacks the numerous subsystems of 3.5 and 4e.

[Tehnar]

I think this is the part of DnD that breaks the game. It especially evident when one character has the ability to use extra actions on a semi-regular basis while the others don't. To answer your points.

- I think action advantage is a bad element to include if some characters can do it, while others can't

- I wouldn't say that players that can't use extra actions per turn are automatically pointless, but weakened yes. I tend to view actions as a currency; if you have more it is as if you have more money. Now if you can take a extra move action per round then the other guy, it wont make him worthless, it will just make you more powerful.

- I think there is a way extra actions can be included in the game without breaking it. I think the basic example is summoning. Summoning creatures takes time (when you can interrupt the summoner), they can be easily thwarted (dispel, magic circle vs X) and they don't last a long time. In my opinion this makes summons a valid ability, as they have weaknesses, thus are easily countered. When you can eliminate the weaknesses then it becomes unbalanced.

I think this is the underlying reason the stuff that breaks the game is broken. Things that give you a action advantage without any (or a very small) cost should not be allowed.

[RelentlessImp]

Please keep in note the following is opinion, and not subject to the min-maxer that lives in my soul:

Action advantage is a good tactical resource in any game involving combat, and is an integral part of any battle system. When was the last time you played a turn-based (or ATB) RPG without a Haste spell, for instance?

The base Action Advantage in D&D comes from outnumbering your opponent, so calling up summons, having undead minions, etc - anything to give your "side" more turns than the other "side" is a clear advantage. This is a good thing - it's a tactical option that puts you on even (or better) footing than your opponent(s).

Having an advantage in actions doesn't inherently break the game, but when one person breaks it into tiny pieces, that's when you start having problems. Celerity in 3.5 plus daze immunity, Ruby Knight Vindicator burning Turns and stacking nightsticks - when you're taking 20+ actions in comparison to your allies taking 1-2, and your enemies maybe not taking any at all, that's when the action advantage breaks the game.

Those who choose not to use these advantages may not have access to them (no spellcasting) or choose not to (banning Celerity, Ruby Knight Windicators, Polymorph) aren't at much of a disadvantage. They've got a more powerful ally on their side who still needs their actions - for instance, blocking access to the physically frail caster who is the one throwing out the Quickened Maximized Empowered Split Enervation and following it up with Maximized Empowered Split Twin Enervation. That's an example of not breaking the action economy, while still making the rest of the team useful.

In my opinion, the only time when breaking the action economy over your knee is a bad thing is when you're denying your fellow players a chance to participate, as well. It's a group game, and your all-powerful spellcaster would die a lonely death if the rest of the players and DM wasn't there to interact with him. But that doesn't mean it's time to showboat and do everything yourself.

tl;dr version: It doesn't ruin the game unless the other people at the table don't get to play, it's good to have tactical options that involve it such as summoning/necromancy/quickened spells/other things, and it's a good thing to operate on an action economy to layer strategy.

[Epinephrine]

So my questions to the community is are these:

• Is action advantage a good or a bad element to include in game design?
• Does it automatically "break" a game, in that players who choose not to use action advantage are so much weaker then those who do that they become mostly pointless?
• Are there ways to use the fun tactical options (particularly summoning, companions, and battlefield control) in a way that doesn't greatly imbalance the game against players who choose not to use those options?

Discuss.

I think action advantage is a bad element to include in a game design, unless it is controlled in a way to be balanced. In the board game Pandemic, there are roles that provide various types of action advantage - each has their niche, and they work together to fight disease.

It's an interesting game, in that it is impossible to say that the Dispatcher was "better" than the Medic - both played a role, and their differing abilities synergised to win the game. It would be akin to asking whether the heat or the ingredients was more important in baking a loaf of bread - they're both necessary, and baking bread simply can't work without both.

So action advantage can be part of a game and function, but it's a tough line to walk. If action advantage can be gained by one type of character, who then also has the same options as another type of character, that creates problems. If one character can grant action advantages to another type, that creates synergies that can be fun for all.

I suspect that battlefield control and summoning could be balanced against other means, but it might require tweaking. For example, if your choice to use a control spell to limit each of 5 foes to a single attack were matched by the warrior simply killing 3 of the 5 foes with his action, I'd say that you might be close to hitting a balance. I'd like to see an RPG stick closer to the Pandemic model - different roles working together toward a goal. I think they were right in some ways with 4E, in trying to hit that style of play. It can be accomplished in 3.5 (or Pathfinder) as well; the group I DM is very tactical, and work as a team - it would be hard to say that a given player was "better" or did more in a fight - the casters enable the fighters, the fighters control and defend for the casters. Another D&D group I play in is more like a collection of individuals all striving to shine. They buff themselves, magic items are purchased for personal benefit, and the teamwork is pretty lousy. Guess which group regularly takes out foes above their CR?

[Darrin]

So my questions to the community is are these:

• Is action advantage a good or a bad element to include in game design?

There's an article by James Ernest in the first Captain Herman pack, "Keeping It Simple", where he talks a little about designing Spree! So yes, he had "Extra Turns BAD" hammered into him via MtG, which steered him into all sorts of wrongness with Spree!, but in that particular case, extra actions made the game better. I'm not sure if there are any other examples.

• Does it automatically "break" a game, in that players who choose not to use action advantage are so much weaker then those who do that they become mostly pointless?

Depends somewhat on the goals of the game. If everybody is having fun and gets a chance to enjoy the spotlight, then the action economy is already at some kind of equilibrium point or is largely meaningless.

I guess the biggest danger is if the extra actions are only available to the hardcore optimizers that spend hours/days/weeks trying to exploit loopholes or min/max structural choices, which allows them to dominate what's going on and overshadow the other players.

• Are there ways to use the fun tactical options (particularly summoning, companions, and battlefield control) in a way that doesn't greatly imbalance the game against players who choose not to use those options?

Well, first you can show less... shall we say enthusiastic?... players some of the more effective mechanics via advice, examples, or sometimes the blunt force trauma approach: "I will absolutely not allow you to write 'Athletic' on your character sheet. Here, let me map out your next 9 feats... just hand over your pencil and no one gets hurt."

Another strategy would be to break the game, but break it for the benefit of someone else. Using White Raven Tactics to give another player something interesting to do. Bringing in a cohort spellcaster/crafter to create better magic items for the other party members. Yes, this can be self-nerfing and you may fail the "Would this be optimal?" test if you follow up that question with the "Would it make a good story?" test.

If you boil all that down... I don't know, does "Don't be a d-bag" count as an optimal strategy? Or does "sacrifice some of your own fun to make sure someone else is having fun" lead to bigger rewards or bigger risks?

[Douglas]

[*]Does it automatically "break" a game, in that players who choose not to use action advantage are so much weaker then those who do that they become mostly pointless?

Not necessarily. I once played through a level 50 gestalt arena fight with very few house rules (mainly capping epic spell mitigation to half the DC and the final DC to level+10, plus banning a very short list of truly broken things) against an opponent who got six times as many actions as me (not counting Time Stop and similar), had quite a few very powerful attacks, and beat my initiative. I won.

[Myrmex]

I don't like homogeneous encounters, so allowing action advantage (as long as everyone in the party is about equal) is fine.

[valadil]

Economy of actions is something that must be considered in any RPG. 3.5 threw them out there without much thought and that was problematic. 4e does a better job of controlling what actions are available, but there are still ways to take advantage of it. A fighter who marks his enemies intelligently will be taking lots of free attacks. Free actions and immediate interrupts let you act outside of your turn. These effects are usually weaker than what you do on your own turn, but that's how it should be IMO.

[Fax Celestis]

One of the biggest problems with 3.5 is that spellcasters can use swift actions to do stuff (Quicken spell), whereas non-spellcasters generally have to stick with standards and more often than not either give up their swift entirely or use it on something other than "attacking an opponent."

Where a wizard can cast two spells (essentially getting two standard actions) in a round, albeit at a reduced level of power for the second spell, a non-spellcaster cannot spend a swift action to take another swing.

This is something I'm actually considering putting into d20r: you can spend a swift action to make a melee or ranged attack as long as your BAB is +6 or better (which is about the time a spellcaster can start using quicken).

[Indon]

Action advantage is balancable, but only in a vacuum.

Any game which features power creep - which is every game which gains usable options with time - will cause action advantage to increase in value corresponding to the power creep, aggrivating any corresponding problems.

Now, if you have a game which doesn't care about balance, like Exalted (I fire over nine thousand lasers!) or Mutants and Masterminds (in which you can probably also fire nine thousand lasers if you try), then it can work out just fine - both those games have tons of extra action features (Exalted doesn't even try to balance them, really), and both are fun games... of course, neither are balanced.

In the 4E game I'm playing, the party's most powerful characters are those with potential action advantages - our controller who can summon something that takes minor actions to attack, and me, the warden, who can potentially mark multiple targets as a free action (also, extra saving throws, which is a power related to action advantage).

[Tengu_temp]

When was the last time you played a turn-based (or ATB) RPG without a Haste spell, for instance?

Yesterday. Persona 3.

Anyway. I think action advantage can be balanced, but it requires giving all characters some ability to take extra actions. It also helps to give a penalty for taking more actions, and/or give every character many extra actions - it's less balanced when character X can perform 2 actions while character Y can perform 1, then when character X can perform 4 actions while character Y can 3. Last but not least, action advantage considerably slows the game down.

[RelentlessImp]

Yesterday. Persona 3.

And here I thought I might be the only person on GiantITP who enjoyed Atlus's RPGs.

[Frosty]

One of the biggest problems with 3.5 is that spellcasters can use swift actions to do stuff (Quicken spell), whereas non-spellcasters generally have to stick with standards and more often than not either give up their swift entirely or use it on something other than "attacking an opponent."

Where a wizard can cast two spells (essentially getting two standard actions) in a round, albeit at a reduced level of power for the second spell, a non-spellcaster cannot spend a swift action to take another swing.

This is something I'm actually considering putting into d20r: you can spend a swift action to make a melee or ranged attack as long as your BAB is +6 or better (which is about the time a spellcaster can start using quicken).

Non-spellcasters should at least be able to use swift actions to perform other interesting actions or to beef up their next melee attack(s) this round. We can name those things Boosts.

[Kurald Galain]

When WotC took 80% of action advantage out of D&D when they made 4E, I was very happy. But once I played 4E, I realized that D&D had lost a ton of fun tactical options, and found the game to be bland, and now mostly stick to 3.X. (I know, I can't be pleased. I'm a nerd and I've accepted it).

Nevertheless, action advantage is still an (important) element of 4E gameplay. This is evident when e.g. a solo monster battles five player characters, or when an enemy can be immobilized out of melee range.

Is action advantage a good or a bad element to include in game design?

A neutral one: good if done well, bad if done poorly. It is clearly possible to build a good game without action advantage (e.g. Go) and also to make a good game with it.

Does it automatically "break" a game, in that players who choose not to use action advantage are so much weaker then those who do that they become mostly pointless?

Not automatically, but it is certainly one of the easiest ways in which a game can be broken.

Are there ways to use the fun tactical options (particularly summoning, companions, and battlefield control) in a way that doesn't greatly imbalance the game against players who choose not to use those options?

The first question is, why is game balance important to you? I'm not saying it should or shouldn't be, but your goals here are important.

Second, yes, it is possible to have several tactical options where none of them obviously trumps the others (except in specialized situations). The easy way of doing this is making all options mechanically the same (or mostly the same), which arguably isn't very tactical. The hard way of doing this requires extensive balancing. Witness e.g. the game Starcraft, where each of the three races is fundamentally different, but none of the three is obviously superior.

Third, if you ask if a player using options A,B,C and D would be unbalanced against a player using only option A, then yes, it would be, unless options B,C and D are tactically meaningless.