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4 months ago ::
Jan 30, 2013 - 2:19AM
#21
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Date Joined:
Jun 21, 2012
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My suggestion: first, they should make MDD refresh once per round, at the beginning of your turn, again. That brings back the basic resource-management aspect of them.
Yes. Even if they don't do this, I will. I'd actually like it to go one step further and make the dice refresh on a short rest
Second, they should scale them back for every class that's not a fighter. That way, a fighter going "all-out offense" does more damage than any other class does by walking up to people and stabbing them in the face - but at the same time, a fighter saving a die or two for Parry or Protect still does damage on par with other martial classes, ASSUMING those classes aren't Sneak Attacking or spending Ki points or raging or whatever. Now, this step may require some thinking. My personal preference would be just getting rid of MDD for non-fighter classes altogether, and instead just doing what 4e did and making ALL weapon attacks do 2W or 3W damage at a certain level if the math requires it. That way, non-fighters don't have to keep track of a halfass pile of damage dice that they can't even use for maneuvers. Fighter MDD would be on top of that. But even if they just give other classes a slower progression like they did clerics, that'd be an improvement.
I think they've got their eye on multiclassing here, but I'm actually against "fixing" the math in an inconsistent way. If the fix is for them to all have dice then give them all dice.
Third, give those other classes their own ways to do more damage. Make it worth a rogue's while to scramble for advantage so they can get in a Sneak Attack (or whatever Sneak Attack alternatives they may have chosen). If we're going to have the entire basis of the Barbarian class be the "rage" ability (not my favorite idea), then give them a bonus to friggin' damage instead of a bonus to accuracy. Give monks enough Ki points to make them worth paying attention to, and let them use it for more powerful attacks. This way, those classes feel different in combat and have stronger incentives to make use of their own class-specific advantages.
I'd like to see the classes all have their own unique resource that layers onto the core resource and interacts with dice in such a way that they all perfrom in equivalent ways but not equally. As far as rage giving a bonus to accuracy... yeah conceptually it's weak but I think what we're really looking at is the damage is still far too high across the board.
We've all ready established that lotsa damage is dull in the last packet, they've scaled that back but that means the abilities that conceptually should give more damage at the expense of accuracy actually make your character less effective because damage is too high across the board. The trimming back they've done doesn't even approach what they need to do, which is maybe even take it back by another half without the use of special abilities and the amount folks do without doing anything special currently needs to be the conditional target for when you've got things in your favour and you're using special abilities.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 31, 2013 - 1:27PM
#22
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I'd like to see the classes all have their own unique resource that layers onto the core resource and interacts with dice in such a way that they all perfrom in equivalent ways but not equally. As far as rage giving a bonus to accuracy... yeah conceptually it's weak but I think what we're really looking at is the damage is still far too high across the board.
We've all ready established that lotsa damage is dull in the last packet, they've scaled that back but that means the abilities that conceptually should give more damage at the expense of accuracy actually make your character less effective because damage is too high across the board. The trimming back they've done doesn't even approach what they need to do, which is maybe even take it back by another half without the use of special abilities and the amount folks do without doing anything special currently needs to be the conditional target for when you've got things in your favour and you're using special abilities.
Yeah, this is why I'm saying that everyone other than fighters should get a big cut to damage dice. That way their "base" damage is low enough that they can get bonus damage from Sneak Attack or Rage or whatever without screwing up the system. The reason I'm saying that fighters should have more damage dice is that they're supposed to be the only class that can trade those dice in for maneuvers. (It sounds like they're taking away monk maneuvers next time around, maybe to focus more on ki abilities?) And if dice recharge per round like we both prefer, they'll need some more dice to keep their damage balanced while still making use of defensive maneuvers.
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4 months ago ::
Jan 31, 2013 - 1:42PM
#23
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I'd actually like it to go one step further and make the dice refresh on a short rest.
I, too, plan to make the dice refresh on a short rest, rather than on a per-round basis; at the very worst, I'd have it recharge ala-Warblade (make a basic attack to recover martial damage / weapon dice). It makes monsters last longer, lowers the complexity of the class significantly -- instead of having to make 10+ decisions per turn, it'd be 10+ decisions per encounter -- and makes the player not spam stuff like crazy, and instead have him think: will I use this now, or later in the fight?
Parry might be the only exception for now, but I'm not really warm to the maneuver-turned-class-feature anyway.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 3:19AM
#24
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Listening to Mearls' google hangout thingy, it sounds like it's going to work like this:
- Martial-type classes will get weapon dice. Can be spread or stacked across maneuvers.
- Fighters only get maneuvers. Maneuvers will work by basically giving you an attack that has an effect in addition to normal damage (so that the baseline maneuver doesn't actually cost damage), and you can choose to have that effect be bigger by giving up a die/dice in damage.
That sounds doable. There's still the question of when the weapon dice refresh; personally, I prefer at the end of one's turn, since that way you don't waste anything on your turn but are still making tactical decisions about spending defensive dice on your off-turn versus saving them for offensive uses on your turn. However, I don't think it resolves all of the problems, including one which the OP hasn't really dealt with:
- The maneuvers aren't that good (yet). Yes, there's the issue that executing a maneuver (the thing that Fighters are built around) costs you damage, but that might not be a bad thing if the maneuvers had important or powerful or interesting enough effects that giving up a [w] is such a bad thing. In fact, shifting from a flat d6 to [w] actually potentially makes this worse, since even sword and board fighters are now giving up more damage per maneuver.
- Some of the best maneuvers will need to be replaced. Whirlwind Attack and Volley were some of the few maneuvers that actually felt like they were worth the loss in damage - because each dice invested possibly got you a standard attack's worth of damage. Now that Weapon Dice are fungible, these maneuvers are redundant, and need to be replaced with something equally useful and evocative.
The first one is I think the problem that the OP didn't really deal with. Quite simply, a lot of the maneuvers just aren't worth their cost in forgone damage. Just for example: Shove Away costs 1MDD to shove someone 5 feet, and 2 MDD to shove something larger than you 5 feet. Given average movement speeds, 1d6 is far more valuable than 5 feet of movement, and 1[W] is much more valuable than 5 feet of movement space. |
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 4:19AM
#25
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Date Joined:
Apr 10, 2009
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Listening to Mearls' google hangout thingy, it sounds like it's going to work like this:
- Martial-type classes will get weapon dice. Can be spread or stacked across maneuvers.
- Fighters only get maneuvers. Maneuvers will work by basically giving you an attack that has an effect in addition to normal damage (so that the baseline maneuver doesn't actually cost damage), and you can choose to have that effect be bigger by giving up a die/dice in damage.
That sounds doable. There's still the question of when the weapon dice refresh; personally, I prefer at the end of one's turn, since that way you don't waste anything on your turn but are still making tactical decisions about spending defensive dice on your off-turn versus saving them for offensive uses on your turn. However, I don't think it resolves all of the problems, including one which the OP hasn't really dealt with:
- The maneuvers aren't that good (yet). Yes, there's the issue that executing a maneuver (the thing that Fighters are built around) costs you damage, but that might not be a bad thing if the maneuvers had important or powerful or interesting enough effects that giving up a [w] is such a bad thing. In fact, shifting from a flat d6 to [w] actually potentially makes this worse, since even sword and board fighters are now giving up more damage per maneuver.
- Some of the best maneuvers will need to be replaced. Whirlwind Attack and Volley were some of the few maneuvers that actually felt like they were worth the loss in damage - because each dice invested possibly got you a standard attack's worth of damage. Now that Weapon Dice are fungible, these maneuvers are redundant, and need to be replaced with something equally useful and evocative.
The first one is I think the problem that the OP didn't really deal with. Quite simply, a lot of the maneuvers just aren't worth their cost in forgone damage. Just for example: Shove Away costs 1MDD to shove someone 5 feet, and 2 MDD to shove something larger than you 5 feet. Given average movement speeds, 1d6 is far more valuable than 5 feet of movement, and 1[W] is much more valuable than 5 feet of movement space.
Its pretty clear Mearls wants them to refresh at the beginning of each creature's turn.
Whether it remains that way probably depends on feedback.
Carl
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 8:41AM
#26
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Its pretty clear Mearls wants them to refresh at the beginning of each creature's turn.
Whether it remains that way probably depends on feedback.
Carl
Fair enough; at the end of the day, I don't think the refresh rate is the biggest problem with the class at the moment.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 10:30AM
#27
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Date Joined:
Aug 11, 2006
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I don't like the idea of having to spend damage dice for effects on a fighter. It's more math than required, and takes away the oomph of being the guy first in battle, and the last to leave.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 11:26AM
#28
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Oh, I definitely think lots of individual fighter maneuvers need a revamp, and there are some serious gaps where more could be added. But the system as a whole needs to be set first.
If things work the way VikingKingQ suggests, that's a big hit to fighter versatility - it would suggest you can only use one maneuver per action/reaction, so no more cool combos.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 11:37AM
#29
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Oh, I definitely think lots of individual fighter maneuvers need a revamp, and there are some serious gaps where more could be added. But the system as a whole needs to be set first.
If things work the way VikingKingQ suggests, that's a big hit to fighter versatility - it would suggest you can only use one maneuver per action/reaction, so no more cool combos.
Why would it suggest that? From the way I read Mearls, you essentially have a growing number of actions, as 4 Weapon Dice can be 4 attacks at 1W, or 3 (1 with 2W, 2 with 1), or 2 at 2W, or 1 at 4 W. Maneuvers would essenitally have 2 forms: a costless form with one level of effects, and an enhanced form that costs WD.
There's no reason to suggest that costless maneuvers will be limited to one per action, and I really hope they won't be.
The enhanced maneuvers do have a cost, but the key limiter on versality will be the distribution of Weapon Dice across the 20 levels. If 4WD can get gotten to fairly easily, you could pull off two enhanced maneuvers and still do 2W in damage - or you could a crazy 3-maneuver attack that doesn't do much damage but really wraps up the target in effects.
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4 months ago ::
Feb 09, 2013 - 12:36PM
#30
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Date Joined:
Dec 20, 2012
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I like the W mechanic a lot better than MDD, but I think the progression should be based on class. So the fighter would have the standard progression with, let's say, 5W at lvl 20. The barbarian would have a slightly faster progression (6W at 20) and the rogue would have a lower progression (3W at 20); so the rogue can double damage on sneak attack and not out pace the fighter at all. This would grant a distinct feel for each class. The difference in damage between die sizes will still increase as more dice are added, but that's the point. If all weapons deal equal damage, then weapon choice doesn't matter at all.
To incentive one-handed weapons, especially for the fighter, give prerequisites for maneuvers so that the most useful maneuvers can only be done with one-handers or shields. Granted, the two-hander maneuvers would likely increase damage (power attack, cleave), but the character would be very limited in choices. If the maneuvers for the smaller weapons provide extra movement, extra attacks, guile, and greater defensive capabilities; people will gravitate toward them more.
Should two-handers have an additional penalty of some kind? Disadvantage (or a -2) on initiative or an AC penalty?
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