Community

Dec 12, 2012 -- 7:22PM, ChrisCarlson wrote:

More evidence you know not of which you speak. You really should try to get a basic grasp of bounded accuracy before coming into a discussion like this. As it is, you just seem woefully unarmed.

There will not be oodles of attack bonus options to fluff up your character with. That's the whole point of bounded accuracy.

I know. I know. Its over your head at the moment. I understand. Come back when you got some time to bone up on the core concepts.

I get the impression you haven't the slightest conception of bounded accuracy.
Let me see what I can find from the original article.

The basic premise behind the bounded accuracy system is simple: we make no assumptions on the DM's side of the game that the player's attack and spell accuracy, or their defenses, increase as a result of gaining levels.
...
Now, note that I said that we make no assumptions on the DM's side of the game about increased accuracy and defenses. This does not mean that the players do not gain bonuses to accuracy and defenses. It does mean, however, that we do not need to make sure that characters advance on a set schedule, and we can let each class advance at its own appropriate pace.
...
Getting better at something means actually getting better at something. Since target numbers (DCs for checks, AC, and so on) and monster accuracy don't scale with level, gaining a +1 bonus means you are actually 5% better at succeeding at that task, not simply hitting some basic competence level. When a fighter gets a +1 increase to his or her attack bonus, it means he or she hits monsters across the board 5% more often. This means that characters, as they gain levels, see a tangible increase in their competence, not just in being able to accomplish more amazing things, but also in how often they succeed at tasks they perform regularly.
...

    
The point is they are moving accuracy increases to a substantial degree out of the realm of level-based boosts where they are safe and help the game more than harm it, and purely into the realm of options, which is where they have the opportunity to create game breaking problems.

Let's use DDN numbers, so you can't dismiss them as past edition.

Right now, we have only up to level 10, so we'll use that. We'll compare a melee fighter vs melee cleric.
We'll say that the cleric is primarily a cleric, only secondarily concerned with hitting. So he has optimized wisdom, with strength as his second best. Both will be human for this exercise. 
1st, the fighter has +5 attack vs +3 because he chose the "fighter" option. +2 on Fighter side.
2nd,  Strength. We give Fighter a 15 base strength, cleric a 14 (his second best) from the standard array. The fighter has another +2 from race, +1 from class. The cleric has +1 from race. Both have +2 from advancement. Fighter = Str 20 (+5), Cleric = Str 17(+3). Another +2 on Fighter side.
3rd, Manuevers. For now, the options are limited, but the Fighter can at least have Composed Attack to offset Disadvantage. Not a straight bonus or easy to calculate, but another bonus for the Fighter's accuracy.
4th,  Feats. For now the options are limited. We'll give the Fighter Ambush Specialty, which gives him Advantage on occassion. Another boon for the Fighter's accuracy, if admittedly limited.
5th,  Spells. Obviously, the cleric comes out ahead here. Divine Power can give him +4 attack/damage, catching up to the Fighter as long as he concentrates.
6th, Magic items. This is largely under DM control, but not necessarily in terms of who gets the magic item. Suppose the party has a +1 att item and a +3 att item among them (I count 4 such weapons in the playtest packet, not counting the oathbow or arrow of dragon slaying). Obviously the Fighter who is swinging every turn gets the +3, not the cleric who sometimes casts and sometimes swings. Another +2 for the Fighter. 

Right now it's looking fairly balanced if the Cleric is burning 4th level spells to boost his attack. Since he's primarily a caster, not primarily a fighter, he might instead be using Bless to boost everyone including the fighter. At that point he's 6 behind the Fighter, and lacks the Advantage the Fighter can get from his feats and the offsetting of Disadvantage he can get from his manuever. 
On the other hand, if the Cleric -was- build primarily for hitting stuff, he could have the same 20 str as the Fighter, be only 4 behind in general and catch up when using Divine Power (or even get ahead if he had a +3 att/dam weapon as well).

This is the level of optional attack spread in a BA game going only up to level 10 which is only in playtest phase and thus has less options than the game will have at release. A 6 points spread between people who are supposed to be attacking the same target number (AC) is not necessarily going to break the game down, but it is pretty substantial.

The biggest saving grace may be that AC simply becomes trivial at high levels.
The fighter here is swinging at +13 vs AC, the Cleric at +7. (not counting spells.) 
The beastiary has ACs up to 18. For the 18, the Cleric hits 50% of the time, the Fighter 80%. (And those might be the fights the Cleric busts out Divine Power to close the gap). Here the Fighter gets 60% more hits in.
For a lower AC, say,  an AC 14 Troll, the Cleric hits 70% of the time and the Fighter hits 95%. That's only about 35% more hits. At this point the Cleric hardly misses anyways, and won't really notice the difference between his performance and the Fighter's. (Aside from damage per hit, but that's fine. The Fighter can do his thing.
If, on the other hand, you introduce something nasty like an AC 25 horrorterror, now the Cleric is hitting 15% and the Fighter is hitting 45%, so the Fighter hits 3 times as often. Higher AC monsters make it more valuable to maximize attack.

In practice, we're practically guaranteed there will be new options for increase accuracy as the edition evolves. There will be new spells. There will be new manuevers. There will be new magic items. There will be new feats. They won't necessarily break the game further, if they are designed to avoid stacking. For example, another +3 attack magic weapon isn't really going to mess anything up any more than it already is. A feat that gives +2 to attack rolls, however, will. Add to that, say, a spell like Divine Power but able to target the Fighter instead of self-only, and you could have a 12 point spread instead of only 6.

They could limit the maximum spread with some simple rules for themselves:
1) no untyped bonuses. Ever.
2) For every type, predesign a specific absolute maximum it can be. As a rule, don't let it get that high in a long term, always-on, option. (So that you can have the maximum only achievable under more limited conditions.)
3) No making up new types, or applying old types to new, unplanned areas. For example, if PHB1 doesn't have feat bonuses to attacks, no going back and putting in bonus to attack feats.

Or, as I said, they can keep AC permanently low, and make people who stack up too many to-hit bonuses simply get clipped by the 1s always miss rule, while their companions usually hit anyways.