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11 months ago ::
Aug 12, 2012 - 9:58AM
#11
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Date Joined:
May 14, 2010
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I would definitely give him chances.
Acrobatics check(escape artist)
Burst check(high dc)
Heal check(mechanics lol)
Some kind of attack roll with a penalty for moving while netted and a Damage roll vs object hardness and hp.
To be fair though, not allowing the attack roll is perfectly fine. next time you see him, remind him that it gives the restrained status. Which means the guy pulled it tight, and not just let it drape over you. It's very hard to cut a net with a dagger when you can't move your arms. Ask them not to look at movies so much. They don't reflect nets correctly at all.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 12, 2012 - 12:41PM
#12
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Date Joined:
Aug 30, 2007
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I would have treated the dagger like a normal escape attempt (it really should have been an escape ends instead of a save ends effect). Like someone else said, one guy wriggles out, and another guy cuts his way out.
I would not have allowed a Heal check to work. Although by the rules it does provide a saving throw, this clearly is not keeping within the general flavor and spirit of the game. The campaign has to be more than a mere collection of game rules, it has to make sense and immerse the players.
In this specific instance, I would have modified the effect on the fly to work as an escape rather than a saving throw. However, if you wanted to keep it as a save ends effect, you would be within your rights to decide that a character couldn't cut himself out (or rather he could, but that is already represented by him attempting a saving throw). You could also decide that due to the unusual circumstances, Heal cannot be used to grant an extra saving throw, but that someone spending an action to untangle or cut their ally out could grant one. Mechanically it is all very similar, but fluff-wise it will be more palatable to your players.
Owner and Proprietor of the House of Trolls.
God of ownership and possession.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 12, 2012 - 7:11PM
#13
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If someone's willing to spend a standard action to make a skill check to get free of a restrained (save ends) effect, I'd allow it. It's either a skill check or an improvised action of some sort. If it makes sense and is interesting in the fiction, I'd tell them it might be a matter of relative success depending on how they roll. Then let them make a roll and see what happens. If they hit a high DC, they get what they want. Moderate to high, they get what they want but it costs them something right now (player can choose). If they roll low, they fail to achieve what they want.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 12:44AM
#14
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Date Joined:
Aug 23, 2010
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You're playing too close to the "rules". Allow the PC who wanted to cut himself free with his knife either an attack roll, making a basic melee attack vs the rope's break DC of 26, OR allow PCs to wiggle free from the ropes with a skill check equal to their level using Athletics; Acrobatics, Endurance; Arcana or Thievery.
Just because the Heal skill allows another save versus an effect, doesn't mean you have to use it for things that don't make sence, Heal is used for HEALING after all, not cutting ropes. If using the Heal skill doesn't seem right, use another skill. I gave you examples of skills you can use, I can also give examples of how to use thoes skills to get out of bindings.
With your example of knocking a Gellatinous Cube prone, you're absolutely right that it makes no logical sence, the cube is already on the ground and can't possibly "fall" any further. Either dissalow this sort of thing when it comes up, or providing a good way that makes sence and is fair of how the Cube is now granting Prone benefits is a good way to go.
The rules in D&D have always and forever will be only guidelines, and all good DMs know this. You can choose to play so close to the books like this and have instances that just won't make sence, or you can use the print in the books as a guide and have common sence dictate what can happen. Either way will lead to an awesome game. Using the rules as guide lines make that game all the more easy to comprehend or deal with when innconsitancies like this pop up.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 9:50AM
#15
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Date Joined:
Jul 21, 2004
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Edit: I was wrong about "restrained." Just because the Heal skill allows another save versus an effect, doesn't mean you have to use it for things that don't make sence, Heal is used for HEALING after all, not cutting ropes.
I look at it the other way: if the Heal skill can be used to help escape the net, then there must be something special about the net. Barbs, adhesives, elastics, a special constricting design, something.
Either dissalow this sort of thing when it comes up, or providing a good way that makes sence and is fair of how the Cube is now granting Prone benefits is a good way to go.
I do the latter, and I don't see why anyone wouldn't.
The rules in D&D have always and forever will be only guidelines, and all good DMs know this.
Fluff is even more of a guideline and the rules, and is much easier and safer to change.
You can choose to play so close to the books like this and have instances that just won't make sence, or you can use the print in the books as a guide and have common sence dictate what can happen.
"Common sense" is fine, but it doesn't take much extra effort to think of another plausible approach (especially in a fantasy game) that still "makes sense" with the rules.
[N]o difference is less easily overcome than the difference of opinion about semi-abstract questions. - L. Tolstoy
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 9:53AM
#16
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"Restrained" specifically states that the character can't attack, so it's not very appropriate to allow the character to make an attack, unless the save is reflavored as an attack.
I don't think that's the case - restrained only imparts immobilized, -2 to attack, and CA if I remember correctly. Unless I misunderstand your meaning.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 9:55AM
#17
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Date Joined:
Jul 21, 2004
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"Restrained" specifically states that the character can't attack, so it's not very appropriate to allow the character to make an attack, unless the save is reflavored as an attack.
I don't think that's the case - restrained only imparts immobilized, -2 to attack, and CA if I remember correctly. Unless I misunderstand your meaning.
You're right. I must be thinking of "helpless."
Edit: Nope, that doesn't seem to be it, either. I could swear there was a condition like immobilized that specifically prevented a character from attacking.
[N]o difference is less easily overcome than the difference of opinion about semi-abstract questions. - L. Tolstoy
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 10:00AM
#18
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I look at it the other way: if the Heal skill can be used to help escape the net, then there must be something special about the net. Barbs, adhesives, elastics, a special constricting design, something.
I like this, especially after reading the Heal entry again. It talks about "using first aid" to grant that save. If it's used in this way, it definitely suggests something nasty is going on with that net such as barbs, as you say. (Do you know how to remove a fishing hook in someone's thumb? You gotta snip it off and push it through rather than pull it out. Ouch.) I like the fiction generation aspect of its use in this case. Arguably, they could even make the check on themselves though I think the rules are against me on that point.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 10:02AM
#19
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Edit: Nope, that doesn't seem to be it, either. I could swear there was a condition like immobilized that specifically prevented a character from attacking.
I'm not aware of any standard conditions that prevent the victim from attacking, aside from Unconscious. Any individual power might have a 'can't attack' clause on it, though.
Another day, another three or four entries to my Ignore List.
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11 months ago ::
Aug 13, 2012 - 10:22AM
#20
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Date Joined:
Jul 21, 2004
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I look at it the other way: if the Heal skill can be used to help escape the net, then there must be something special about the net. Barbs, adhesives, elastics, a special constricting design, something.
I like this, especially after reading the Heal entry again. It talks about "using first aid" to grant that save. If it's used in this way, it definitely suggests something nasty is going on with that net such as barbs, as you say. I like the fiction generation aspect of its use in this case. Arguably, they could even make the check on themselves though I think the rules are against me on that point.
It's like that spot on your back that you just can't scratch.
Because of complaints from people who could only take the term "prone" literally, later versions of the gelatinous cube were made immune to being knocked prone. Fine, that works too, it's just a tad overly simulationist for me.
If the xivort net caster was as iconic as the gelatinous cube, I imagine its power would have been scrutinized more closely and changed to "escape ends." But "save ends" does make sense, without too much additional thought. Really, it's just a matter of wanting it to make sense, and being willing to think of it in another way. "Net" can mean more than one thing.
Edit: Nope, that doesn't seem to be it, either. I could swear there was a condition like immobilized that specifically prevented a character from attacking.
I'm not aware of any standard conditions that prevent the victim from attacking, aside from Unconscious. Any individual power might have a 'can't attack' clause on it, though.
Well, the memory I have of it is from the first time I sat down with the PHB and looked at the conditions, so it's very likely faulty.
[N]o difference is less easily overcome than the difference of opinion about semi-abstract questions. - L. Tolstoy
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