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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 11:47AM
#1
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I keep seeing a reference by some people on the forum -- a reference which seems somewhat counter-intuitive to me.
Martial damage dice refresh every turn. If I were to read that phrase in the context of, well, every other game I have ever played, that says that they refresh every time YOUR turn goes around the table. These would be a pool of dice which you could utilize as you see fit -- as extra damage, to power up maneuvers, or to *hold in reserve* to utilize your reaction maneuvers, etc.
However ...
Some individuals on the board are suggesting that they refresh every SINGLE turn (i.e. your turn, another player's turn, a monster's turn, etc.). Effectively this turns them from a resource pool into a static set of dice which can be constantly utilized. Apparently Mike Mearls tweeted something or other (I do not have a link to this tweet, and cannot find it), to clarify the ruling in this direction. This doesn't change things too much, I guess -- it effectively means that you have your pool on your turn to power your action, but you also have your ENTIRE pool to power your reaction. This spooks me a bit, as it is of course a more powerful option.
I can see the concept here, in that it minimizes record-keeping. You wouldn't ever have to hold any dice in reserve. But to me, that takes some of the tension and fun out of it. Perhaps I'm simply too conservative, but I *like* the idea of unspent resources and hedging one's bets. And frankly, it also strikes me as a pathetically small bit of record-keeping (akin to keeping track of how many hit-dice you have left after healing, book-keeping until the next refresh) and if we're worried about that level of record-keeping, perhaps we're jumping at shadows?
So before I go all-in one way or another, can I get a confirmation on this? If somebody has an official ruling, or a link to the 'tweet', or what have you?
I just want to make sure I'm not messing my playtest game up, here.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 12:40PM
#2
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Date Joined:
May 24, 2012
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The intention was that it refreshed on the player's turn. Some people interpreted it as 'every turn,' and Mike said that while that may be hyper-technicality correct, it was not the intention. I'd run it as the intention and not as the wording-abuse.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 12:59PM
#3
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Date Joined:
Feb 26, 2010
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Here's the link to the tweet: twitter.com/mikemearls/status/2847537704...To Nevrus: Do you have a link to a source for Mike's statement on that? I'm not intending to be combative - I really want to know if he said that so I can be sure to do things correctly. I'm a stickler for rules, and I prefer to do things right, especially with the seemingly minimal editing done with these playtest packets. =) I like the idea of MDD being a once per round resource that refreshes at the start of battle and the end of a player's turn. That's just my preference, though, so take that for what it's worth. You could even limit it to 1d6 MDD at the start of battle and you get your full MDD at the end of your turn.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 20, 2013 - 2:33PM
#4
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Well, Mike's tweet is pretty straightforward, isn't it --- "You get them all on your reaction".
No resource management, then.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 21, 2013 - 11:22AM
#5
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Date Joined:
Apr 10, 2009
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Unless Nevruss has some personal communcation with Mike outside of the Twitter feed and his other statements (for example, I didn't see the last Google+ hangout) - I think he is in error.
Mike's tweet (and Trevor's subsequent comment on the tweet) make it pretty clear that it refreshes each turn (i.e. each player's turn) not each round (as it was in prior packets).
I'm still on the fence about this - remember that there is still only one reaction per round, so that means two uses (one on your turn, one as a reaction) not unlimited uses for the dice.
I think that is fine as it stands - I just think that there are too many dice in general (or that the dice are too large; maybe we should go for d4s or even d3s.)
I suspect that - keeping in mind that this is a playtest - the intent is that we TEST recharging on each player's turn and give feedback into whether or not that works. Not reject it out of hand as too powerful and assume they meant something other than what they put in the rules and confirmed in the Tweets.
Carl
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4 months ago ::
Jan 31, 2013 - 5:36PM
#6
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Date Joined:
Dec 20, 2012
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What about opportunity attacks? Those are not reactions. He responded to the question, but did not state that they can only be used on your main attack and reaction.
From a strict reading of the rules, I interpret it in the same way as the OP. They renew on each and every turn which is far too much. It seems as though they can be added to every attack.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 31, 2013 - 6:34PM
#7
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Date Joined:
Feb 26, 2010
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Actually, Opportunity Attacks are a reaction. How to Play, page 12, Movement in Combat, Opportunity Attacks.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 01, 2013 - 2:13AM
#8
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Date Joined:
Jan 14, 2013
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Yep, opportunity attacks and parry are both reactions and both will allow you to use the full extent of the MDD. This is useful in both cases to allow proper scaling of the abilities with the level. That is ot allows parry to scale up every time you gain an MDD, and allows you to deal proper full damage when attacking on opportunity attacks.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 01, 2013 - 7:06AM
#9
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Date Joined:
Dec 20, 2012
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Ah, I obviously did not notice that before.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 01, 2013 - 7:14AM
#10
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Date Joined:
Aug 24, 2012
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My players are up to level 3 and I have been incorrectly only recharging their MDD on the start of their turn. They have yet to save their dice for Parry, probably because if they don't get hit, they will have lost an opportunity to use this resource. This reluctance may be reasoning behind the designed recharging of MDDs for reactions. During our next session, I will correct this and I expect to see a lot more Parrying. The next question will be whether this imbalances the encounters.
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