How to include Dominate/Hold Person/etc and have balance?

Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp · Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:04 am

Conceptually I like the idea of letting players have spells that turn the enemy to stone, disintegrate them to dust, paralyze them completely, etc. or in other words, spells which just kill people and end the battle; I like not relegating these powers merely to books or movies and not simply using them as plot devices.

However, I also like the idea of wearing down your opponent until they're finished which in turn makes spells or powers that heal meaningful. So I'm trying to reconcile these two desires.

Let's say from a game design, 4 hits kills an opponent, but on average it takes 6 attacks to kill that opponent. In such a case, we'd want our Flesh to Stone spell to have an overall 1/6 or 16.66667 % chance of working. Or maybe we decide that we want insta-kill powers inherently worse and we make the % chance worse such as say 10 % ?

I welcome you all's thoughts.

Gelare · Post by **Gelare** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:17 am

This touches on an issue that I've always been concerned about regarding Beguilers. Everything that the entire class does ever is save or die. Indeed, it's actually worse (in the sense of more troublesome) than save or die because after they fail their save, you get a cool new minion for several weeks. On this matter, I've thought of a couple things:

1) Mob of Mooks. If combat involves a bunch of mooks, and each mook takes two or three hits to bring down, a Beguiler can hit with her spells well over 50% of the time and still not be doing a disproportionate amount of effectiveness relative to the rest of the party.

2) Give SoDs effects even on a miss. Yes, this is 4E-style stuff, and it's not a bad idea. We can justify Finger of Death having a smaller chance to actually kill the target if it deals some damage anyway, bringing the target more within range of the guys with swords. Go teamwork.

3) Make SoDs harder to resist as the target is weakened. If you try to Dominate the BBEG when he's at full health, he'll shake of off with a smug grin. But once your comrades have wailed on him enough and his eyes are too clouded by his own blood to pay attention to your magic, that's when you can make it stick. Again, teamwork.

I'll maybe come up with some more later. Hope that helps.

Anguirus · Post by **Anguirus** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:28 am

The spell and the physical attack shouldn't be numerically identical unless they are functionally identical IMO. That is to say, unless you can cast your disintegrate spell as frequently as you can attack some one with a sword and can improve success rates through similar means (magic items and stat increases or what have you) then it doesn't balance. If I have a 1/6 chance of killing you with my limited use magic spell and am less able to kill things in the future as a result of the resource expenditure and I can kill you on average in 6 attacks with my weapon and be no worse off for it, why would I choose to learn magic? If I can increase the effectiveness of my weapon attacks easily and can't do the same for my magic attacks why would I choose to learn magic? I would either make the spells limitless, make the spells more effective or make the spells easier to improve so as to incentive learning spells. If I can get a +6 to attack as easily as I can get a +2 to spells then I have a reason to learn spells (because the +2 x the 6 rounds it takes to use the spell to kill something is better than the +6 for the standard attack). In 3rd ed Wizards of the Coast took this idea way to far and balanced spell effectiveness on the assumption that you would have 4 encounters per day. Don't do that.

RandomCasualty2 · Post by **RandomCasualty2** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:28 am

Balance wise, instant kill attacks only work on weak foes. When Willow throws those magic petrifying acorns at the evil witch, she just resists them. Pretty much when you're trying to kill a boss monster or major NPC, you shouldn't be able to instant kill them. In such cases, those attacks are finishing moves, not one shot death attacks.

However against nameless grunts and mooks, instant kills should be a possibility.

I like a sort of bloodied state, similar to 4E, that lets you know when it's okay to start unleashing finishing moves. Generic monsters may well start there, so they're always free game for petrification or domination.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:45 am

Why do save or dies have to be all or nothing?

Why can't it be like Mutants and Masterminds where you either have to succeed several times on the same or similar attacks generally for it to work or it just works on weaker foes instantly?

You could have some synergy with different effects or even physical damage where spells like Poison and Bio have a short effect for a while but also impose a stackable penalty/decrease health bar. When the penalty gets too large, the next attack might bring them down.

Ice9 · Post by **Ice9** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:46 am

For mental-type attacks at least, there's a potential method I've thought about.
1) Mental attacks have an effect roll, which basically works like CAN - you're unlikely to Dominate someone on your first attack, but it wears them down and makes subsequent attempts more likely.
2) Being at low HP gives people a bonus on the mental effect roll against you - it's harder to concentrate while bleeding out.
3) Mental attacks have a secondary effect if the primary one doesn't succeed - this is generally something that makes the target more vulnerable to stabbing - being slowed, flat-footed, whatever.

The result is that mental attacks are distinct - they don't just deal HP damage, but they also don't take out most foes in one shot. Also, they're synergistic with normal attacks - being stabbed makes it easier to Dominate someone, and being hit with mental attacks makes it easier to stab them. Also, if the target is sufficiently lower level than you, the effect roll can be high enough to "one-shot" them, which is good for things like Jedi-mind-tricking bystanders.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 3:37 am

Or how about this:

Hold Person, if it works, paralyzes the foe as normal.

Anyone can, upon being subjected to an effect they don't like, such as paralysis, opt to instead take X amount of irresistible (that is, DR, damage immunity and regen don't apply, and you can't activate a class feature to get a Ref save for half and then Evasion it) damage. This should be a decent enough amount of damage - either a percentage of their maximum HP or a scaling number based on whatever handed out the effect. If the HP would reduce you to 0 or less, you may not elect to do this - you're at their mercy.

Some effects might specially mention other things (Charm Person deals nonlethal damage - unless you're immune in which case you take lethal damage - to reflect your mind getting clouded and exhausting you. Slowing effects might just translate to a Dex penalty and so on.)

So, against Thibor Wallace, he who led an army to slaughter all foes, you cast it, some muscles lock up but he grunts and shakes it off, tearing muscles and snapping bones. He takes damage, but isn't held motionless. Now, in the next round he takes an arrow to the eye, someone hamstrings him (but he decides to parry the shot to his leg muscles by blocking with his blood vessels, taking extra damage) and also gets set on fire. He is left with only a handful of HP remaining, not enough to absorb another spell OR sword strike.

You then cast Hold Person again, and he is Held.

You may even want to add some kind of tactical risk-analysis benefit by requiring them to choose "Risk the effect working or take damage automatically" before rolling a save.

Psychic Robot · Post by **Psychic Robot** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 3:50 am

Increase casting time to several rounds.

Cielingcat · Post by **Cielingcat** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 4:19 am

Spells which instant kill people, like Disintegrate, should simply do damage and possibly have a special effect upon the person's death. Like Disintegrate. There is really no reason why Finger of Death can't just be the high level negative energy blasting spell.

Spells which, say, paralyze you, should probably work on a CAN system. If you don't want to modify the game that much, you could go the easy route and make, say, Dominate also do damage, but when you die from it you don't die but instead get mind controlled. As Koumei said, Charm can deal nonlethal damage and if you get knocked unconscious you are instead Charmed.

Honestly if you want to have an hp system everything should probably attack hp.

ckafrica · Post by **ckafrica** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 4:54 am

I know there was some discussion of having multiple condition trackers so that you take mind/physical/social damage instead of just HP damage or saves or skill checks.

Though I have considered multi-round spell casting, (using a target threshold and having BAB like stat that adds up over several turns) but you have to leave it fairly flexible or it sucks when you save up for the big bang only to have the wanker rogue backstab your target.

Gelare · Post by **Gelare** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 5:37 am

One thing I forgot to mention. This:

Bill wrote:In such a case, we'd want our Flesh to Stone spell to have an overall 1/6 or 16.66667 % chance of working. Or maybe we decide that we want insta-kill powers inherently worse and we make the % chance worse such as say 10 % ?

is tremendously unacceptable. Really just godawful. If the chance of a character doing something meaningful in a given round, in a situation where that character is supposed to be able to do something meaningful, is less than (and here I am, in fact, pulling a number out of my ass) 50%, something's gone wrong. If I walk up as a beguiler and watch my spells bounce off for five straight rounds against a level-appropriate monster, at which point, let's face it, the battle's probably over, I'm calling bullshit. Not even because it's not an efficient way to dispose of enemies - it might be, better even than stabbing fools! - but simply because wasting my time like that is retarded.

Amra · Post by **Amra** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 9:45 am

I'm with Ceilingcat and Koumei for the "nonlethal damage" option for spells that do [Other] to an opponent. In fact, most spells wouldn't even have to *do* the damage as such.

If you didn't want them to inflict nonlethal damage, they could have an amount of "damage-equivalent" associated with them, which you roll at the time the spell is cast and which could scale with level. If the damage-equivalent you roll for a spell is equal to or greater than the enemies' current hit-point-total-minus-nonlethal-damage then they're affected by the spell.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 10:17 am

I like adding it to the current total - of damage or nonlethal - because that way it actually stacks with stabbing, so you casting that actually helps (and has synergy with) your friend who is using an axe.

tic · Post by **tic** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 10:20 am

Let's say from a game design, 4 hits kills an opponent, but on average it takes 6 attacks to kill that opponent. In such a case, we'd want our Flesh to Stone spell to have an overall 1/6 or 16.66667 % chance of working. Or maybe we decide that we want insta-kill powers inherently worse and we make the % chance worse such as say 10 % ?

As an option, you could have the DC related to how damaged the enemy is. It's really hard to petrify or disintegrate someone straight up, but if you stab them in the face a few times, it's easier. Maybe they can't dodge as quickly. Maybe their willpower is lessened as a result of distraction from the mind-boggling pain they're experiencing.

I'd think that, if you can disintegrate someone, you should always be able to give it a shot. When they're still fairly hale and hearty, that's pretty damned unlikely - you shouldn't rely on it. It's like hoping for the natural 20 on a vorpal blade - awesome when it happens, not something you rely upon.

Differentiating the 'special' powers from regular stabbery might be more difficult. A hit-but-don't-disintegrate with a disintegrate shouldn't be completely useless, but probably shouldn't replace regular attacks either. If you've got a choice between X amount of damage, and X amount of damage and a chance to kill them, you'll take the latter much of the time (assuming they've got enough spell slots and all).

Perhaps less damage, though that's pretty boring. Perhaps there's an 'immunity'? After you've shaken off a dominate, you're on guard for more of it, granting a bonus to that effect? After you've had your left side partially cooked, a second blast in the same area does less.

Or perhaps the save-or-die becomes a save-or-die-don't-save-and-take-a-lesser-but-still-annoying-affect. No, you're not dominated, but you suffer a -X penalty on attacks towards the caster. No, you're not disintegrated, but your leg's not looking real pretty either. Speed penalty.

Of course, that there's a fair amount of bookkeeping.

Psychic Robot · Post by **Psychic Robot** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 10:42 am

Ugh. I hate the notion of non-lethal spells doing damage. It feels very 4e to me--"Everything does damage, even charm person!"

The enchanter can't really be balanced with the swordsman. You're either going to make the powers retarded ("Sleep now does 5d10 damage instead of putting you to sleep"), lame ("You have a 10% chance to affect the target, so start spamming petrify"), or altogether worthless ("Charm person now lasts 1 round/level, and the target gets a new save each round"). The enchanter's calling card is his ability to manipulate the minds of others. No, it's not fair that he can dominate monsters and make them his slaves, but that's just what enchanters do.

I'd rather have a system that encompasses more fantasy tropes than a perfectly-balanced system, but that's just me.

To limit the power of some spellcasters, I might suggest putting strict HD limits on spells--perhaps any SoDs can only affect monsters with HD up to the spellcaster's caster level - 3 or something.

tic · Post by **tic** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 11:18 am

Psychic Robot wrote:Ugh. I hate the notion of non-lethal spells doing damage. It feels very 4e to me--"Everything does damage, even charm person!"

While I do get your distaste for the matter, it could be done without being silly. 4e pretty much requires this because it has only lethal damage. That's just daft, and leads to daftness (although they seem to have variable effects, rather than damage for a fair chunk of such powers. Sleep, for example, slows them, and then might send them to sleep.).

With nonlethal damage, however, it's viable to have it make sense. No, you can't charm someone to death. You can wear down their mind. Beating someone wears down their body, why shouldn't performing acts that basically amount to holding someone in a mental chokehold wear down down their mind? Might even warrant a third pool of hp, but that's getting a bit much.

The enchanter can't really be balanced with the swordsman. You're either going to make the powers retarded ("Sleep now does 5d10 damage instead of putting you to sleep"), lame ("You have a 10% chance to affect the target, so start spamming petrify"), or altogether worthless ("Charm person now lasts 1 round/level, and the target gets a new save each round"). The enchanter's calling card is his ability to manipulate the minds of others. No, it's not fair that he can dominate monsters and make them his slaves, but that's just what enchanters do.

Even if you can't balance them perfectly, you can balance them to an extent. The enchanter needn't be the bloke that sometimes gets lucky and wins the encounter, but otherwise relies on the fighter to kill everyone because his weapon is useless.

Think about it: assuming the fighter hits, he does something. He may do little damage, he may crit and do stupid amounts. It's variable. Why no so for the enchanter? Why not have Sleep have variable effects - yes, the enemy falling asleep is the aim. Maybe you can 'crit' and knock them into a comatose state, harder to wake up. Maybe you can fail to render them unconscious, but make them fatigued.

I'd rather have a system that encompasses more fantasy tropes than a perfectly-balanced system, but that's just me.

Depending on how much imbalance we're talking about, I agree with you. But, just the same, everyone needs to be able to do something. I mean, sometimes the dice gods just hate you, but no one should be utterly useless a lot of the time.

To limit the power of some spellcasters, I might suggest putting strict HD limits on spells--perhaps any SoDs can only affect monsters with HD up to the spellcaster's caster level - 3 or something.

Works, if the casters have something else to fall back on. You've stated your dislike for enchantments and the like dealing damage, but if the enchanter can't SoD the baddie, he's relegated to clearing out the fodder and mooks, or throwing crossbow bolts or something.

If you limit enchanter/illusionist/whatever damage like this, there needs to be some sort of (viable, at least somewhat effective) alternative for them - no one should be sitting around while everyone else wails away at the lich. Don't let them outshine the damage dealers at dealing damage, but don't make them useless.

Amra · Post by **Amra** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 11:27 am

Koumei wrote:I like adding it to the current total - of damage or nonlethal - because that way it actually stacks with stabbing, so you casting that actually helps (and has synergy with) your friend who is using an axe.

I prefer it too, but it's not necessary for the spells in question to actually do non-lethal damage per se if you'd rather nerf SoD/SoS spells further. not that I think they're particularly in need of nerfing most of the time.

My main issue with thie approach is the flavour of the thing. If you want to charm some dude into "lending" you the key to the strongroom, you should be able to do that without kicking him repeatedly in the nuts first. The nice thing about the enchantment-type spells is that you *don't* bring the Watch running.

Imagine the following scene...

Obi-Wan: "This is not the droid you're looking for."
Stormtrooper: "What are you on about? It totally fucking is!"
Obi-Wan: *sighs and draws light-sabre*

[Five minutes later there is scene of utter devastation: bits of Stormtrooper are littering the landscape, the Cantina is a smoking ruin and a Star Destroyer crammed with Empire riot-police loaded for bear has been dispatched from the nearest outpost. Obi-Wan approaches the last remaining Stormtrooper, who has taken his helmet off to vomit copiously into a smouldering crater, blood obscuring his features.]

Obi-Wan: "This is not the droid you're looking for."
Stormtrooper: "This is not the droid we're looking for." *collapses*
Luke: "What... the... FUCK?!"

Charm/beguilment effects pretty much need to have a good chance of working right from the off, or there's no point having them in the first place. Admittedly, if you're going to completely take over someone's will and play them like a puppet à la Dominate Person then kicking the living shit out of them to soften them up is entirely in keeping. If all you want to do is make someone look the other way for a minute or so whilst you and your mates take weapons past the security check-point, requiring the party to bitch-slap the guards into submission first makes the magic more than a little redundant.

Maybe a non-lethal-damage system is the right way to go, but something additional like being able to do maximum damage against a surprised target (i.e. 'one who wasn't expecting a spell' rather than 'one who didn't know you were there') with an enchantment spell should probably go in too. A decent Bluff check should let you catch a grunt with his mental pants down, but tougher opponents should be hard to break.

Here's a thought. What if mental spells could be maintained round-on-round for cumulative non-lethal damage, with the target having the option of taking an action of some sort to shrug off that round's effects? It could lead to ongoing battles of wills of the sort you find in Conan novels and the like. The mighty hero battles desperately with the guards, frantically trying to reach his true enemy; his vision slowly clouding as the insidious magic of the evil enchanter gradually erodes his will...

The approach we're talking about would have to be dealt with carefully: any spell that inflicts "damage" is subject to all sorts of metamagic feats and other jiggery-pokery. That doesn't mean it isn't a good idea, just that it needs thinking about for abuses that could make it worse than the current situation.

Psychic Robot · Post by **Psychic Robot** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 11:35 am

Mayhaps the target of your spell gets a +4 bonus on his save. If he's hostile to you and aware of your presence, he gets a +8 bonus on his save. If he's not hostile toward you or unaware of your presence, he gets no bonus on his save.

Amra · Post by **Amra** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 12:58 pm

tic wrote:With nonlethal damage, however, it's viable to have it make sense. No, you can't charm someone to death. You can wear down their mind. Beating someone wears down their body, why shouldn't performing acts that basically amount to holding someone in a mental chokehold wear down down their mind? Might even warrant a third pool of hp, but that's getting a bit much.

I don't see why, particularly. In many ways it would simplify the mechanics by making a clear separation between one form of damage and another. You could relate them if you wanted to by saying your "Psyche Points" were dropped by [x] for every [n]% of total hit points lost (and/or vice-versa) or nonlethal damage accumulated. 3.x and 4E both support two hit-point pools already... Hmmm.

violence in the media · Wed Apr 08, 2009 1:14 pm

I like the ideas mentioned of having a separate mental HP pool and having save-or-die spells persist round to round.

Mental HP
Even though PR doesn't like the idea, what if we decided to go whole hog with this and give everyone mental HP totals? Then spells like Dominate Person and Hold Person do mental damage, though perhaps they also carry an immediate effect as well. Hold Person, for example, could stun someone for a round when it's cast in addition to inflicting 3d6 mental damage (numbers pulled from ass). Maybe you get a save to resist the immediate stun. However, if the 3d6 mental damage reduces their mental HP to 0, that's where you get the long-term, you're-fucked paralysis. You probably wouldn't get a save at this point.

Multi-round spells
Why do all spells, especially save-or-die, have to be fire-and-forget affairs? Along the lines of mental HP, why not have Hold Person be something that persists with concentration? The spellcaster has the choice of continuing to wear down a target's MHP, but can abandon the task if they need to whip out another spell to deal with another situation. We'd probably need to introduce more decision-making into such a thing, but it kinda makes sense to have Enchanters and Illusionists manuvering on the battlefield of the mind rather than the physical one. Doing this might even create your "spellcaster vulnerability" by leaving them mostly physically defenseless without reducing them to ineffectual uselessness if they decide to forego the magic and just do some swording.

tic · Post by **tic** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 1:23 pm

violence in the media wrote:I like the ideas mentioned of having a separate mental HP pool and having save-or-die spells persist round to round.

Mental HP
Even though PR doesn't like the idea, what if we decided to go whole hog with this and give everyone mental HP totals? Then spells like Dominate Person and Hold Person do mental damage, though perhaps they also carry an immediate effect as well. Hold Person, for example, could stun someone for a round when it's cast in addition to inflicting 3d6 mental damage (numbers pulled from ass). Maybe you get a save to resist the immediate stun. However, if the 3d6 mental damage reduces their mental HP to 0, that's where you get the long-term, you're-fucked paralysis. You probably wouldn't get a save at this point.

Multi-round spells
Why do all spells, especially save-or-die, have to be fire-and-forget affairs? Along the lines of mental HP, why not have Hold Person be something that persists with concentration? The spellcaster has the choice of continuing to wear down a target's MHP, but can abandon the task if they need to whip out another spell to deal with another situation. We'd probably need to introduce more decision-making into such a thing, but it kinda makes sense to have Enchanters and Illusionists manuvering on the battlefield of the mind rather than the physical one. Doing this might even create your "spellcaster vulnerability" by leaving them mostly physically defenseless without reducing them to ineffectual uselessness if they decide to forego the magic and just do some swording.

I like that. I like that a lot. There's that image of the two mages having this intense mental battle while the rest of the party slaughters mooks.

Would mental hp be equal to regular hp? It almost seems like it should be reversed - wizards have the most, barbarians, fighters and their ilk have the least.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 1:32 pm

If you're going to have ablative defenses that defend you from things that aren't deadly, you're going to want to have the special effects of those defenses involve you not bleeding when they are expended. They can be force fields, or mystic runes of protection, or fatigue, or luck, or whatever. But they can't be "hit points" in any traditional D&D sense.

Noone casting a partially blocked charm spell on you should have their effects healed with bandages. Because that's retarded.

-Username17

angelfromanotherpin · Post by **angelfromanotherpin** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 1:43 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:If you're going to have ablative defenses that defend you from things that aren't deadly, you're going to want to have the special effects of those defenses involve you not bleeding when they are expended. They can be force fields, or mystic runes of protection, or fatigue, or luck, or whatever. But they can't be "hit points" in any traditional D&D sense.

Noone casting a partially blocked charm spell on you should have their effects healed with bandages. Because that's retarded.

-Username17

I don't know, there's a long history of psychic nosebleeds and similar. Maybe charm damage will be treated with smelling salts and cotton swabs instead of bandages, but they're all found in the same first-aid kit.

tic · Post by **tic** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 1:49 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:If you're going to have ablative defenses that defend you from things that aren't deadly, you're going to want to have the special effects of those defenses involve you not bleeding when they are expended. They can be force fields, or mystic runes of protection, or fatigue, or luck, or whatever. But they can't be "hit points" in any traditional D&D sense.

Noone casting a partially blocked charm spell on you should have their effects healed with bandages. Because that's retarded.

-Username17

A system could function exactly like hp, and have nothing to do with health or bodily integrity. Like if I said "this new fighter has 'spells' - I may not mean literal spells, its shorthand.

violence in the media · Wed Apr 08, 2009 2:34 pm

tic wrote:Would mental hp be equal to regular hp? It almost seems like it should be reversed - wizards have the most, barbarians, fighters and their ilk have the least.

I was thinking that, yeah. Give Wizards d12, Fighters d6, and Barbarians d4 or whatever.

Frank Trollman wrote:If you're going to have ablative defenses that defend you from things that aren't deadly, you're going to want to have the special effects of those defenses involve you not bleeding when they are expended. They can be force fields, or mystic runes of protection, or fatigue, or luck, or whatever. But they can't be "hit points" in any traditional D&D sense.

Noone casting a partially blocked charm spell on you should have their effects healed with bandages. Because that's retarded.

-Username17

I agree with this. I wouldn't want someone tossing out a Cure Light Wounds spell to regenerate MHP. I might be OK with the smelling salts idea that angel mentioned. Maybe MHP fully regenerate after a 10 minute breather? These are all things we can flesh out if people like the idea enough to pursue it. We can even come up with a better name to avoid HP confusion.