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RAW, Action Points can only be used once per encounter, and you usually earn one whenever you finish two encounters in a row without taking an Extended Rest. If you are handing them out more often than that for engaging in behavior that you like and want to see more of, then it's probably prudent to lift the once-per-encounter limit, or else they'll stock them up faster than they can spend them. I would still limit them to once per round.
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May 23, 2018 14:30
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Action Points are a super powerful ressource, though. I probably wouldn't lift the once-per-encounter limit and just give out something else as temporary rewards. Non-stacking +2 bonuses, along those lines.
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May 23, 2018 15:07
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karmicknight posted:I'm not expecting to give out an Action Point to every player every turn, but I want to encourage dynamic, mobile combat in a group where I'm usually the only one moving with any complexity (as a player). Just my 2 cents, but I've never really found a need to give more incentive to be dynamic/mobile in 4e combat. Classes/powers tend to provide that incentive themselves already. More AP availability/usage tilts the game toward team PC more than it already is, which might not be a big problem in Heroic tier but can get messier in Paragon when people start getting features that proc on AP use. Is your experience being the only "dynamic" player with 4e, or other editions/games? Because I've definitely noticed a natural difference in behavior when the optimal routine is "Move to target -> trade hits -> repeat." That routine can arise in 4e, but usually, between forced movement and shifts and so on, people are still going to have to run around at least a little.
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May 23, 2018 15:18
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The best incentive is encounter design. If the only way to do what they want is to be reckless...
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May 23, 2018 15:23
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What are some of the more interesting defenders? I was thinking maybe a paladin but I'm open to pmuch anything.
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May 23, 2018 15:23
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Nalesh posted:What are some of the more interesting defenders? I was thinking maybe a paladin but I'm open to pmuch anything. Swordmage and Battlemind are very mobile (the latter really wants Lightning Rush at level 7). Fighter|Paladin is neat since your Combat Challenge will trigger off your Paladin mark.
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May 23, 2018 15:32
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Nalesh posted:What are some of the more interesting defenders? I was thinking maybe a paladin but I'm open to pmuch anything.
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May 23, 2018 15:36
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Generic Octopus posted:Is your experience being the only "dynamic" player with 4e, or other editions/games? Because I've definitely noticed a natural difference in behavior when the optimal routine is "Move to target -> trade hits -> repeat." That routine can arise in 4e, but usually, between forced movement and shifts and so on, people are still going to have to run around at least a little. You are right in that it is usually in other systems where everything else devolves into trading attacks across the battlefield while I am trying to actually use movement and tactics to intercept/hold back/down an enemy. It's been a while since anyone in my group has played 4e (and some haven't at all), but we started as the founding membership of my university's D&D 4e club, so I'm expecting weird/bad habits from everyone (especially me). I'm probably overthinking how much I need to encourage tactics and risk taking, but I would really like to make combat interesting and dynamic and mobile and a certain level of cinematic et cetera and I feel that the players are also a big part of that (alongside encounter design, obviously.) My Lovely Horse posted:Action Points are a super powerful ressource, though. I probably wouldn't lift the once-per-encounter limit and just give out something else as temporary rewards. Non-stacking +2 bonuses, along those lines. To the action itself or as a floating spendable bonus? Because I'm explicitly thinking of a situation where a player goes and has a weird hard handshake/threaten session with the Crown Prince of Bumblefuck when the party is introduced at court of the King of Bumblefuck and being able to go "Alright, that was super ballsy, take a 'resource.'" Or, "Alright, you've collapsed the waveform, you have a villain, take a 'resource.'"
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May 23, 2018 15:42
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ImpactVector posted:Never not suplex dragons. See how many different wrestling moves you can emulate with different combinations of powers and action points. Now this is the kind of poo poo I want.
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May 23, 2018 15:42
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Nalesh posted:Now this is the kind of poo poo I want. Dual Strike: Kevin Sorbo-as-Hercules smashing two dudes' heads together. Knockdown Assault -> AP -> Seize and Stab: Not actually usable on a charge AFAIK since a charge technically ends your turn, but some kind of diving tackle or spinning suplex. LordDuskBlade's Beowulf build and the fighter handbook were created before the Monk MC was added, and the brawler handbook that included it seems to have poofed, but this should at least give you some ideas for the build: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?469293-Legends-of-the-Ring-Brawlers-in-4th-Edition
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May 23, 2018 16:35
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karmicknight posted:To the action itself or as a floating spendable bonus? Because I'm explicitly thinking of a situation where a player goes and has a weird hard handshake/threaten session with the Crown Prince of Bumblefuck when the party is introduced at court of the King of Bumblefuck and being able to go "Alright, that was super ballsy, take a 'resource.'" Or, "Alright, you've collapsed the waveform, you have a villain, take a 'resource.'"
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May 23, 2018 17:20
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One thing that was neat in WHFRP3 (and probably some other games) was that the coolness points accumulated on a party sheet, and when the points equaled the number of players, each player got one. This lets you be fast and loose with the points, and still encourages people to do cool things, without worrying about favoring people or people being left out. Just another idea for the pile.
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May 23, 2018 17:30
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The best way to make 4e combat fun and dynamic is to make the battlefield fun and dynamic. Give the players secondary objectives, things the enemies are trying to do that they can stop, things they're trying to do that the enemies can stop, and terrain that they can use or that can be used against them, and battle will be chaotic enough.
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May 23, 2018 17:34
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I also always like the idea that players can choose to play to their characters' flaws to gain a bonus ressource. Obviously not "is a traitorous psychotic murderer" or anything that breaks up the party, just story complications. "You enter the underground casino. Steve, you've told us Gorbak enjoys gambling a little too much - you get an action point if he gets carried away and gambles away his ancestral axe while you're in here." The key bit is that the player can say "nah, not feeling that right now" and receive no penalty.
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May 23, 2018 17:45
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Definitely don't give out action points, they are an encounter resource for balance reasons, and limited to 1 per 2 fights for the same reason. If you wanna give out bennies (and bennies are a great thing to give out) tokens that give +1 on a roll after the fact would be fine. Then there's a strong incentive to get plenty of them, and spend them. DOubly so if they work on natural 1s. E: also, Pixie will never not be the best Brawler race. Don't just suplex dragons, suplex dragons 5000000 loving times your size. Grab them by the eyelids and headbutt their loving noses in. NAE KING NAE QUIN NAE LAIRD NAE MASTER. WE WILLNA BE FOOLED AGIN!! thespaceinvader fucked around with this message at 22:30 on May 23, 2018 |
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May 23, 2018 22:28
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I legit was tempted to go pixie wrassler before I remembered that dnd pixies are actually tiny, and not shadowrun kid sized
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May 23, 2018 23:26
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To be honest, I would kill to have stackable, post roll +1s
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May 24, 2018 00:08
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 Guessing this is about the best I could hope for with a pixie wrassler, I feel like for pixie defenders something like a chaladin or a swordmage is probably better, but being the wrestling equivalent of having a wasp stuck in your hair is just too funny.
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May 24, 2018 00:19
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Wouldn't brawlere benefit more from higher dex then that balanced con/dex/wis distribution you've got?
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May 24, 2018 00:32
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Here are basically the two arrays you want for 99% of characters in 4E: 16 16 13 11 10 8 ...Good for hybrids, characters that want to qualify for unusual feats later (heavy shields and plate mail on a character not typically kitted for those, dual implement casting), and especially characters that have +2s in both of the 16s. 18 14 11 10 10 8 ...Good for a character who wants to hit as often as possible and is generally going to look like a standard member of their class. In 4E you are generally going to want to max out your attack score and throw the rest into the ability score(s) that your class and build key off of for secondary effects, which is at most two other scores, generally. You should not attempt to cover every "base" as a character, because the game is not designed for that and you will fail. Most well-built 4E characters in actuality use three ability scores. (This is one of many of 4E's major break points with earlier D&D design, which according to some generally wrong and misguided people held that your ability scores were instructive on who you are as a character. In 4E, they aren't). Your ability score setup is often an isosceles triangle, with the points being: - STR or CON - DEX or INT - WIS or CHA Because in each case, the highest of the two scores covers one defense, and most characters will prioritize two defenses well and have not much left to spend on the third. This is OK, this is the intent of the design. You need other characters to cover your bases, it's a game about teamwork and not superstar casters. "Now," you say, "What if I want to build a character whose attack is STR and secondary is CON?" Well, it's kind of tough poo poo, because characters who need to double up on two scores that share a defense have a rougher time and are simply not that good (especially if they are intended to be in melee, where their weakness will be exposed), but you can compensate by taking that first array up there and placing your 13 wisely. TL;DR: That shitload of 12s has got to fucken go
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May 24, 2018 05:05
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How do people here handle defenders with heavily optimised armour classes? The fighter in my party has gone super hardcore on raising his defences to the point where a lot of enemies need to roll something like a 17 to hit, and then he just reduces the damage or heals himself in the next turn as a response. It feels like in this case most enemies would give up trying and instead just ignore any mark and go attack someone else, but this sort of feels like it's penalising the fighter for having a high AC. Even with the penalty for attacking another target when marked the enemies still have a better chance of hitting someone else than the super-tanky fighter, not helped by the fact that his damage is feeble due to only optimising for AC so his punishments for ignoring the mark don't feel very threatening. Is the correct response here just to ignore the mark and leave it up to the fighter to make the enemies actually want to attack him? Generally in the past I've tried to respect marks more often than not, but it feels like if the tank isn't actually very threatening then the enemies should just ignore him.
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May 24, 2018 05:31
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Don't pull your punches, the whole point of marks as a system is that they enforce themselves. Be generous with respecs if this makes his character ineffective, though.
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May 24, 2018 05:41
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if you want to actually hit the Fighter, shoot them with Fort/Ref/Will attacks. save your AC attacks for people with low AC if the Fighter wants to prevent you from using your AC attacks against players with low AC, then they've got to use their Defendery tools, which they have available to them
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May 24, 2018 06:20
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Lemniscate Blue posted:I cannot even begin to express how insane Grappling Strike as an MBA would have made my Brawler. It's already usable as an OA but to be able to grab on an immediate interrupt as mark enforcement as well? Yowza. The Zeitgeist AP is great for this because there's a Polyhistor paragon path all about letting you spend points to boost your basic attacks so you can do stuff like boost your AC or make an attack as an immediate, but the most interesting option is the ability to spend a point to grab a dude except it doesn't cost a point if you have a free hand like a Brawler with the monk MC. And this is a full sustainable grab, not an End of Next Turn one like Grappling Strike. Grab on your immediates, grab on your leader-granted attacks, grab on your charges. And if you hit a grabbed dude with an MBA you can instead spend your points to inflict status conditions like blind, dazed, or weakened (or slowed or immobilized which are a bit redundant, or prone if you didn't have World Serpent's Grasp for some weird reason) and just wreck a dude with your combat challenge or granted attack. Nalesh posted:Now this is the kind of poo poo I want. Brawlers are kind of feat-intensive, but they're pretty fun. There's a really fun combination of feats you can use. Grabbed is a specialized version of immobilized, which means whoever you grab can't move anywhere unless one of the following happens. 1) They make a check to escape, which is normally either an Acrobatics check vs. your Reflex or an Athletics check vs. your Fortitude defense 2) You two are physically separated either by forced movement moving them away from you or you away from them, or they teleport out of your grasp 3) You are rendered unable to take actions (stunned or knocked unconscious, dominated, maybe dazed) 4) You let them go for some reason Anyways, there's a fun feat called World Serpent's Grasp that means that whenever you hit an opponent who is slowed or immobilized, you can knock them prone for free. This means that as soon as you're grabbing someone, your next hit against them can knock them to the floor, but it also means that if one of your allies can slow or immobilize enemies then you can hit them with a grab attack and clothesline them to the floor. Fighters also have a feat called Pin Down- if you're grabbing a prone opponent then they cannot stand up until the grab is ended (they escape/incapacitate you/knock you away, etc). This really shuts down mobility since even if they manage to escape by rolling a check as a move action, they probably don't have the move action to stand back up so you can grab and pin them again. Alternatively, if they manage to break your grab with an attack that stuns you or knocks you away, they can stand as a move action but probably can't move anywhere either, so you can roll back up and grab them again. Brawler fighters also have a feat called Inescapable Hold, which means that any check your opponent makes to escape (either Athletics or Acrobatics) must be made against your Fortitude defense, instead of possibly being able to target your Reflex defense. Fighters are Strength-based (which means they have a good Fortitude), get a class bonus to Fortitude, and Brawler fighters get another Fortitude bonus on top of that, so wriggling out of your grasp gets increasingly difficult as you level. If you're a fighter whose Strength and Dexterity are equal then you can put it off for several levels, but if Strength is your strength then you will want to get it sooner. Brawler fighters have a bunch of powers that involve punching people. Normally your unarmed attack is the weakest weapon in the game since it has the lowest damage die and no proficiency bonus, but brawlers get their own inherent enhancement bonus to unarmed attacks, which improves the accuracy if not the damage, but those powers frequently have some nice effects like Vicious Uppercut (a power that involves hitting a foe with one hand and then stunning them with a punch). There's the feat Master of the Fist, which is a multiclass feat that makes you count as a monk and gives you the monk's Unarmed Combatant feature, which means your fists are as good as dual wielding longswords (and can get even better with the right feat and paragon path investment, but while the paragon path is great the feat is more of a fun gimmick than anything else), which means you not only have great fighter punching powers but you also have two free hands for the purpose of all your brawler powers that involve having a free hand for grabbing dudes or blocking shots with their bodies or whatever. And since the brawler enhancement bonus is +2 per tier it means that your accuracy scales up faster than inherent bonuses or stuff like ki focuses (though you're still probably going to want one of those options for the damage boost eventually). It also opens up some fun monk feat options at higher levels like Fluid Motion (big speed boost for dragging dudes very far away from their friends) and maybe some more esoteric stuff like Dragon's Grasp (boosts generic grabs, giving you an interesting option) or maybe Driving Rain (really big Bull Rush trick, pretty niche though). Monk multiclass also opens up Ki focuses, which gives you some interesting options. -Ghost Strike: Lets you ignore the insubstantial property and punch ghosts -Blazing Arc: Lets you punch poo poo with fire -Rain of Hammers: Lets you damage dudes whenever you KO someone, which is good for mulching minions. Also has a power that lets you make an at-will attack as a minor action, great for knocking down dudes once you've grabbed them -Abduction: Lets your MBAs slide people one square, so you can punch dudes away from your allies. Also has a power that lets you teleport yourself and your target somewhere else so you can settle this outside -Body of Fire: Like blazing arc, but all your damage is now fire (not just melee), and you can set yourself on fire to damage anyone grabbing you or that you're grabbing (though this does make you vulnerable to cold) -Forked Lightning: Let you punch poo poo with lightning -Steadfast Stone: Ignores up to a certain amount of resistance, which includes resist all and means you can punch stone and metal -Thunderfist: Lets you punch poo poo with thunder -Iron Body: Expensive, but gives you resistance to your target's attacks whenever you hit someone, which means you're tankier when you're brawling with someone Brawlers may not be the total masters of area denial like some other fighter builds, but they are extremely good at bullying the hell out of some nerd who just wants to sneak by you and attack your back line. Punching dudes is probably the most simple, effective and stylish route, but there's also a few other brawler gimmick builds involving things like swords or flails for either extra damage when smacking an enemy or making it easier to prone your foe.
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May 24, 2018 06:30
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zedar posted:How do people here handle defenders with heavily optimised armour classes? The fighter in my party has gone super hardcore on raising his defences to the point where a lot of enemies need to roll something like a 17 to hit, and then he just reduces the damage or heals himself in the next turn as a response. It feels like in this case most enemies would give up trying and instead just ignore any mark and go attack someone else, but this sort of feels like it's penalising the fighter for having a high AC. Even with the penalty for attacking another target when marked the enemies still have a better chance of hitting someone else than the super-tanky fighter, not helped by the fact that his damage is feeble due to only optimising for AC so his punishments for ignoring the mark don't feel very threatening. That's an option. Other good options are creating instances where he'll take damage if that's all he does (Zones for example.) If all else fails, just make one dude spend his time wailing on the defender while the others split off. You can probably countermark him (grab a solider type creature to mark him and keep him off marking other opponents.) If you can wrangle it, make it so that, in order to enforce his mark, he has to take damage/use actions. If he's spending time healing or reducing damage, give him more things to do, so he has to choose between reducing damage or effectively protecting something.
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May 24, 2018 06:31
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Torchlighter posted:That's an option. Other good options are creating instances where he'll take damage if that's all he does (Zones for example.) If all else fails, just make one dude spend his time wailing on the defender while the others split off. You can probably countermark him (grab a solider type creature to mark him and keep him off marking other opponents.) If you can wrangle it, make it so that, in order to enforce his mark, he has to take damage/use actions. If he's spending time healing or reducing damage, give him more things to do, so he has to choose between reducing damage or effectively protecting something. Yeah I suspect the real solution is I need to up my game in providing interesting tactical fights so that the players can't just stand around walloping the enemy over and over again.
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May 24, 2018 06:42
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Fighters' whole thing is giving the enemy a choice between wasting an attack on the fighter's massive defenses or attacking another PC but eating the fighter's decent damage. If your fighter only has massive defenses, he's only doing half of his job. A smart enemy can very well realize that it's a more worthwhile use of his time to go after someone else. And then the fighter gets to use his Combat Challenge and Combat Superiority features, which is fun. As for encounter setups, try one with two brutes. The fighter can lock one down and feel like a tough badass. The rest of the party still has to handle a brute.
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May 24, 2018 07:05
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zedar posted:How do people here handle defenders with heavily optimised armour classes? The fighter in my party has gone super hardcore on raising his defences to the point where a lot of enemies need to roll something like a 17 to hit, and then he just reduces the damage or heals himself in the next turn as a response. It feels like in this case most enemies would give up trying and instead just ignore any mark and go attack someone else, but this sort of feels like it's penalising the fighter for having a high AC. Even with the penalty for attacking another target when marked the enemies still have a better chance of hitting someone else than the super-tanky fighter, not helped by the fact that his damage is feeble due to only optimising for AC so his punishments for ignoring the mark don't feel very threatening. Marks are not MMO agro pulling. Ignore them if it works best, tactically. Defenders have mark *punishments* for a reason.
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May 25, 2018 09:22
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thespaceinvader posted:Marks are not MMO agro pulling. Ignore them if it works best, tactically. Defenders have mark *punishments* for a reason. As a wise man once said, geek the mage first.
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May 25, 2018 11:55
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Also remember that the fighter can only use one Reaction per round. So if he's trying to lock down multiple dudes, only the first one will eat an attack on a shift. They'll still eat an Opportunity Attack on a move or ranged attack though.
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May 25, 2018 12:45
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zedar posted:How do people here handle defenders with heavily optimised armour classes? The fighter in my party has gone super hardcore on raising his defences to the point where a lot of enemies need to roll something like a 17 to hit, and then he just reduces the damage or heals himself in the next turn as a response. It feels like in this case most enemies would give up trying and instead just ignore any mark and go attack someone else, but this sort of feels like it's penalising the fighter for having a high AC. Even with the penalty for attacking another target when marked the enemies still have a better chance of hitting someone else than the super-tanky fighter, not helped by the fact that his damage is feeble due to only optimising for AC so his punishments for ignoring the mark don't feel very threatening. This is a badly designed fighter. The real solution is to have him rebuild. Everything else is just building encounters around a lovely character build, and that never works out long term.
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May 25, 2018 12:48
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ImpactVector posted:Also remember that the fighter can only use one Reaction per round. So if he's trying to lock down multiple dudes, only the first one will eat an attack on a shift. Characters have one Opportunity Action PER TURN. If a single character, on their turn, does multiple things that trigger an AOO, the Fighter can only AOO them once. But if multiple characters, on their respective turns, all trigger an AOO from the Fighter, the Fighter can AOO them all, even if that results in multiple AOOs in the same round. The distinction here is that Combat Challenge's basic attack is an Immediate Interrupt, and characters only get one Immediate Action per round.
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May 25, 2018 12:55
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Disrespecting the mark is fun for the player too as they get more attacks off which is fun.
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May 25, 2018 13:23
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Disrespecting marks sometimes is fun and interesting for the Defender. Disrespecting marks all of the time makes the defender feel pointless.
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May 25, 2018 14:57
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How are their non-AC defenses? You could mix in some attacks against those to keep them on their toes.
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May 25, 2018 15:09
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I do think it's the case that even if the DM always tries to take the "best" option for any given attack, it still wouldn't be "always ignore the mark".
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May 25, 2018 15:14
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Khizan posted:This is a badly designed fighter. The real solution is to have him rebuild. Everything else is just building encounters around a lovely character build, and that never works out long term. Yeah, this is the right next step. Lemon-Lime fucked around with this message at 23:28 on May 25, 2018 |
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May 25, 2018 16:03
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Wait, how is the ac getting that high? I've seen some cases where obscene numbers end up just being misinterpretations of some abilities.
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May 25, 2018 18:41
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Gharbad the Weak posted:Wait, how is the ac getting that high? I've seen some cases where obscene numbers end up just being misinterpretations of some abilities. Getting buff as gently caress AC wise is not difficult for Sword and Board fighters, though the highest possible non-power-boosted ACs (IIRC, it's been a LONG while) are actually both on cloth wearing classes - the Berserker and the Swordmage.
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May 25, 2018 19:41
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| # ? Jun 3, 2024 20:13 |
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Khizan posted:This is a badly designed fighter. The real solution is to have him rebuild. Everything else is just building encounters around a lovely character build, and that never works out long term. This is bullshit. 1) One of the fighter's jobs/basic build options is to not take a lot of hits 2) There have been several suggestions on how to handle this, all of which are good and not difficult 3) I can't imagine how loving lame it would be to tell a guy to rebuild because you're too lovely of a DM to handle "guy with high AC"
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May 25, 2018 21:12
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