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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 3:08AM
#1
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A few arguments I've seen around this board about CC and Tanking:
"The game is built to be playable without a grid! How can you CC or Tank without a grid?"
Answer: Immobilize effects, taunt effects, and any other effect that doesn't actually use distance traveled.
"It's modular, so tanking isn't in the core rules"
Response: I understand that the rules are incomplete as of now. I'm not going to argue that. I'm just pointing out that if the game is truly going to be modular, protecting the squishy needs to be a core mechanic.
As a final note I'd like to make it clear that tanking and CC are just two sides of the same coin.
To tank is reactive. You are defending yourself or another from incoming damage or effects (In a gridless game this would usually be done by standing adjacent to your squishy and intercepting attacks.
To crowd control is proactive. You are preventing the enemy from getting into a favorable position. This usually comes in the form of debuffs (disadvantage, immobilization, blindness, etc).
Note that none of this requires a grid.
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 7:27AM
#2
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Date Joined:
May 24, 2012
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Please stop using MMO terms for a tabletop game. Tank. Crowd Control. Debuffs. Those terms gained usage because of MMOs. They should stay there. This is NOT a computer game and it shouldn't be designed or thought of as one. A living, thinking, breathing human DM controls the monsters (or would you prefer Mobs?) and how they react, not a pre-programmed AI. Any DM worth his salt knows how to make adjustments to combat encounters without NEEDING an artificial game mechanic to tell him what to do.
"Death smiles at us all. All a man can do is smile back."
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 7:31AM
#3
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Date Joined:
Jul 18, 2007
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Fighters shouldn't be "tanks" - fighters should be the guys who kill stuff in melee the best while wearing heavy armor and have the highest hitpoints to keep themselves alive.
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 7:33AM
#4
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Date Joined:
Aug 27, 2002
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Please stop using MMO terms for a tabletop game. Tank. Crowd Control. Debuffs. Those terms gained usage because of MMOs. They should stay there. This is NOT a computer game and it shouldn't be designed or thought of as one. A living, thinking, breathing human DM controls the monsters (or would you prefer Mobs?) and how they react, not a pre-programmed AI. Any DM worth his salt knows how to make adjustments to combat encounters without NEEDING an artificial game mechanic to tell him what to do.
Translation; DMs should use dummy tactics.
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 7:33AM
#5
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Date Joined:
Oct 26, 2004
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You've obviously not paid attention in language class.
People steal terminology from other places all the time. English is pretty much the result of people stealing words and concepts from other languages whole hog.
Furthermore crowd control is older than the bloody internet, and actually applies to controlling crowds, suppresion fire, and anti-personell weapons among other things.
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 7:38AM
#6
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Date Joined:
May 24, 2012
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Please stop using MMO terms for a tabletop game. Tank. Crowd Control. Debuffs. Those terms gained usage because of MMOs. They should stay there. This is NOT a computer game and it shouldn't be designed or thought of as one. A living, thinking, breathing human DM controls the monsters (or would you prefer Mobs?) and how they react, not a pre-programmed AI. Any DM worth his salt knows how to make adjustments to combat encounters without NEEDING an artificial game mechanic to tell him what to do.
Translation; DMs should use dummy tactics.
If you want to run your game like an MMO (which is pretty narrowly focused, as it's programmed that way), go for it, but a tabletop game doesn't need to be clogged up with a lot of artificial rules forcing monsters to act in a pre-determined way.
"Death smiles at us all. All a man can do is smile back."
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 7:46AM
#7
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Date Joined:
Aug 27, 2002
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Please stop using MMO terms for a tabletop game. Tank. Crowd Control. Debuffs. Those terms gained usage because of MMOs. They should stay there. This is NOT a computer game and it shouldn't be designed or thought of as one. A living, thinking, breathing human DM controls the monsters (or would you prefer Mobs?) and how they react, not a pre-programmed AI. Any DM worth his salt knows how to make adjustments to combat encounters without NEEDING an artificial game mechanic to tell him what to do.
Translation; DMs should use dummy tactics.
If you want to run your game like an MMO (which is pretty narrowly focused, as it's programmed that way), go for it, but a tabletop game doesn't need to be clogged up with a lot of artificial rules forcing monsters to act in a pre-determined way.
Opinion.
As a player I prefer to have the ability to defend any player in my group who is weaker than the rest.
Taunting/tanking/CC are simple and recognizable tools that allow the players this kind of 'control' on the battlefield.
Also, my group was using the terms taunting and tanking before we ever played an MMO way back in the 90's...
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 8:06AM
#8
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Like it or not, the appropriation of language (MMO or otherwise) from outside the D&D sphere is not only going to happen, it's been happening since the beginning. Just to name a few, terms like armor class and "to-hit" were originally appropriated from the tabletop gaming crowd. Terms like "stacking" can be seen in the core rules now. And I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure I've seen "buff" and/or "debuff" in at least one core rulebook.
At my tabletop, there are only two of us old farts who've been playing since 1st edition. For the rest of our table, they've never played anything but 4e. But they've played plenty of WoW, LoTRO, CoH, Diablo, the list goes on.
And quite frankly, descriptive archetypes such as tank, controller, defender, etc...they make sense. I'd actually be surprised if it was the MMO world that coined these phrases. My money's on these terms being older than even Everquest.
The meta-game evolves, and we'd be kidding ourselves that external influences don't have a place in our games. If my 16 year-old nephew wants his "toon" to be a tank or a controller in my tabletop RPG, the last thing I'm going to do is berate him for something as silly as language. Heck, D&D is what gave me my love of reading and language. In the end, it's still a game, and having fun is what it's all about. Nothing breaks fun like somebody sitting on their high horse demanding that proper terminology and ettiquette be obeyed.
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 8:07AM
#9
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One of the clerics has a theme that grants them decent reactive "Tanking" style abilities. They are not necessarily 'proactive', so they do not fit your second criteria above, but they do fulfill basically everything else up there. Using immobilization and disadvantage and everything!
Personally, I was quite pleased with this implementation, though I think in a tactical rules module it could be expanded greatly.
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13 months ago ::
May 26, 2012 - 8:08AM
#10
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Date Joined:
Jul 18, 2007
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And quite frankly, descriptive archetypes such as tank, controller, defender, etc...they make sense. I'd actually be surprised if it was the MMO world that coined these phrases. My money's on these terms being older than even Everquest.
You are correct. I was a MUDder from 1994-2008 ( I think - may have been 09), and those terms (especially tank) were all in use when I started.
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