Our Warglblasters Are Different

[K]

Just tell us what you're trying to do. Give us concrete examples. If nothing else, to get Frank to stop rage posting so you two can have makeup sex or whatever it is you two do after futilely butting heads over nebulous mechanics.

Here is the short version:

The design goal is: make sure people don't lose at chargen by making racial abilities equally useful to all classes. This means altering a bunch of core assumptions about how several simple abilities and conditions need to work so that they aren't completely unbalanced when used. The two we've discussed are ranged attacks and low-light vision vs. darkness, both variations of the Flying Archer problem.

Every time I give a concrete example, I get handed a counter example based on existing mechanics and not mechanics that could be easily written. For example, Frank says that Pyromancers should be removing darkness and Shadowcasters should be creating more darkness, so creating a balanced form of low-light vision is impossible.

My response is that you can balance low-light vision by writing rules for those popular archetypes so they don't do the offending behavior in his example. We do that because our goal is to clean up a Flying Archer problem and because we want these two archetypes to be balanced with others.

Now, Frank doesn't really want to use the Pyromancer archetype because its not known for creating light, but creating fire. He also doesn't want to use the Shadowcaster because they are mostly illusionists and not darkness creators and creating rules that avoid the Flying Archer problem while keeping within their flavor is really easy.

He's stuck with them because there is no rational argument for why you can't write rules to make low-light vision not contribute to the Flying Archer problem, so he's going for a flavor argument instead and those are the two most popular archetypes that might be examples where low-light vision can't be balanced.

This is why I said that he wants a Lightbringer and not a Pyromancer. He needs a better flavor argument because its not difficult to write up a Pyromancer that doesn't create a meaningful amount of light or a Shadowcaster that makes illusions not affected by low-light vision and still keep both within the flavor of the popular archetypes that you'd want in any kitchensink fantasy.

This whole thing boils down to the fact that Frank doesn't think you can meaningfully make progress on writing the Flying Archer problem out of a game, and I disagree because I can offer mechanics that work to every example he offers.

It's very tiring.

[Username17]

At the point where you are contorting your example so that characters cannot make light or darkness with their class abilities in order to balance out low light fucking vision, you've lost all sense. Light is totally a thing, people can make it. Like, in the real world even. Darkness isn't a real thing, but in a game with magic it should certainly be available. You're going to tell me that between weather control, shadowcasters, and necromancers, noone can blot out the sun or douse open flames? Fuck you.

This is basic shit, and it's literally the first example. If we have to chop the balls off of open fires lighting up rooms in order to accommodate the first example, how much neutering are you going to demand by the time we get to the 25th? This is not a workable strategy, and the immense amount of doublethink required for even one fucking example is more than enough evidence to demonstrate that fact.

For fuck's sake: low light vision synergizes better with people who have to carry two physical things, because it's harder for them to use a torch. You want to tell me how you're going to ban people from using a sword and shield or a dagger in each hand so that everyone has equal torch access?

-Username17

[Avoraciopoctules]

Here is the short version:

The design goal is: make sure people don't lose at chargen by making racial abilities equally useful to all classes. This means altering a bunch of core assumptions about how several simple abilities and conditions need to work so that they aren't completely unbalanced when used. The two we've discussed are ranged attacks and low-light vision vs. darkness, both variations of the Flying Archer problem.

Okay, let's see if we can do something with this. Because I'm infatuated with the idea of houseruling it right now and it doesn't have hyperdetailed combat, let's go with OSH ( http://www.oldschoolhack.net/ ) as a basic system to work off of.

Basically, the attributes have little bearing inside of combat except for use as "saving throws" and determining whether you can carry heavy weapons and armor. Classes give you one thing by default, and you can pick one thing of the list of secondary abilities per level.

Races:

Midgardian:
- Can go twice as long without food. You skip every other check for starvation penalties.
- You skip every other check for fatiguing out from a chase.
- For Daring, roll 3d10, keep 2 highest.

Jotunese:
- Don't take discomfort penalties in cold environments, and your blood can't be frozen. You can sleep in open snow without dying of exposure.
- You can turn into a wolf. This uses stat-block replacement, so how powerful you are personally doesn't really figure in. If the wolf dies, you appear, knocked out but unharmed.
- For Brawn, roll 3d10, keep 2 highest.

Alfar:
- See in the dark as though you had a torch.
- Adapt to new environments so after 1 day, you don't take discomfort penalties. Don't keep old adaptions, you have to re-acclimatize.
- For Cunning, roll 3d10, keep 2 highest.


Classes:
- Red
Basic: You may evoke fire. This comes in the form of a ball about the size of what you'd see on the end of a torch. The ball dissipates if you let go of it, but you can chuck it like you were an imp from Doom. Counts as a weapon, and you can burn or warm stuff.
Secondary 1: Boost someone's fighting abilities. If they go more than a few rounds without getting re-boosted, it wears off.
Secondary 2: Make a super-flaming attack that deals extra damage. Needs to recharge by moving to a new combat zone.
Secondary 3: Once per day, unleash chaotic fire magic that sets the whole arena on fire.

- Blue
Basic: Force a reroll on someone's attack, but you need to recharge to reuse.
Secondary 1: Evoke blasts of wind strong enough to move unattended objects like keys and such. You get a wind-based knockdown attack that needs to recharge.
Secondary 2: Evoke blasts of water that work like the last ability, but have different MTP applications and give you another special knockdown attack before you need to recharge.
Secondary 3: Once per day, gain magical flight, but it starts dealing unblockable damage to you if you hold it for more than a couple minutes. The flight comes from obvious glowy energy wings.

- Green
Basic: Negate a bit of damage from an attack. Need to recharge.
Secondary 1: Once per day, heal someone a significant amount.
Secondary 2: Once per day, make an arena full of entangling plants
Secondary 3: Fire venom bolts that deal damage over time. Need to recharge.

[DSMatticus]

Whether or not you want to call it a pyromancer is completely sidestepping the point. If your game contains a fire DoT, whether mundane or magical, then being able to see in the dark is less synergistic with that strategy than it is with any strategy which does not sem them on fire. Your options from there are either have a game where people are inflammable (lol wat?) or people on fire do not emit light (lol wat?).

Your goal is to create a list of racial abilities who synergize equally with every strategy. That is nearly flat-out possible for any set of racial abilities that do anything at all. If you have a character who can create darkness, seeing in the dark is more important to them than anyone else. You can either make seeing in the dark meaningless (everyone can do it somehow), remove it entirely, or remove darkness. Then we find every other possible synergy, and we repeat this process. As this process runs to completion, all strategies start to look the same or all races start to look the same (mechanically). Because for every iteration of the process you are cutting something out of the game that was different about them from everyone else that gave them the synergestic advantage.

[K]

Whether or not you want to call it a pyromancer is completely sidestepping the point. If your game contains a fire DoT, whether mundane or magical, then being able to see in the dark is less synergistic with that strategy than it is with any strategy which does not sem them on fire. Your options from there are either have a game where people are inflammable (lol wat?) or people on fire do not emit light (lol wat?).

You first have to decide if creating light/darkness by magic or mundane methods is the same, and if those things are affected by low-light vision. Right now, your assumption that it's "see in the dark perfectly."

I think the easiest thing to do is to write up low-light vision like this:

Low Light vision: When you make an Alertness check, you can visually identify features, forms and objects who are in darkness at the range of normal sight. This vision is grainy and lacks detail and color, and so cannot be used to identify anything more than crude shapes. It is not good enough to determine things like colors, fine features like facial features of specific individuals, writing, or anything else that you'd expect to see if there was not complete darkness. You still take the normal penalties for fighting, spellcasting, and Indirect Firing* in poor light and darkness conditions as noted in the Lighting Conditions section because fast-moving objects tend to smear and wobble in your field of vision.

You also can Run in poor light and darkness conditions without risking collisions.

-------------------

At that point, you then write up the Fire rules and how easy it is to set things on fire and how much light they produce (not much compared to daylight). You'll notice that making light by any means doesn't interact with our low-light rules, so there is no advantage that Low-light guys have over torch-carriers.

Our Alertness rules let us make non-visual IDs of things, and low-light vision just augments that a bit.

Write up the Shadowcaster rules and make magical darkness an illusion that doesn't interact with normal light conditions or Alertness rules.

When you write up the Pyromancer, you make sure that he doesn't get some huge ability to create light since that brings back the Flying Archer problem, though he can set things on fire to create small amounts of light like normal secondary fires from explosions (and how small secondary fires don't affect Alertness check results).

Your Light section will show light sources of various sizes and what penalties they reduce, meaning that generally it is always in your favor to have light. It will also have movement penalties for moving in poor light and rules for leading people through darkness.


*Indirect Firing is the rule you use for ranged firing with spells or weapons outside of your battle zone. It doesn't require sight. It basically replicates long-range bow or spear firing on things very far away and can be done by sound or just estimation. It also sucks since it's free attacks and needs to be priced as sucking.

-----------------------

And there, the darkness version of the Flying Archer problem is solved. You'll notice that I had to concept out many subsystems just to make that one ability, but that's how designing according to a goal actually works when you don't have any subsystems already made.

I'd have to actually write out all the complete rules for those subsystems to show an actual proof that it works with the rest of the system, but I think this is enough as a proof of concept.

[DSMatticus]

Low Light vision: When you make an Alertness check, you can visually identify features, forms and objects who are in darkness at the range of normal sight. This vision is grainy and lacks detail and color, and so cannot be used to identify anything more than crude shapes. It is not good enough to determine things like colors, fine features like facial features of specific individuals, writing, or anything else that you'd expect to see if there was not complete darkness. You still take the normal penalties for fighting, spellcasting, and Indirect Firing* in poor light and darkness conditions as noted in the Lighting Conditions section because fast-moving objects tend to smear and wobble in your field of vision.

Someone with low-light vision targets enemies as well as someone who literally cannot see anything at all. It is, at this point, almost a non-ability. It does nothing for the character except:
1) Give them a chance to detect the presence (but not assist in targeting) creatures in the dark, and
2) Let them move freely.

so there is no advantage that Low-light guys have over torch-carriers.

Low-light guys do not produce light. Torch-carriers produce light. One is obvious to others. The other is not. The torch-carrier is a poor sneaker.

Your Light section will show light sources of various sizes and what penalties they reduce, meaning that generally it is always in your favor to have light.

This is only true when the situation is symmetric. If any penalty exists which applies solely to those without low-light vision, then not having light around is an asymmetric gain to those with low-light vision.

And where we're going with all of this: rogues/scouts/sneak types in your game like low-light vision. It lets them move freely and make alertness checks in the dark without carrying a torch, which emits light and makes them (presumably) easier to perceive; you could set up your stealth subsystem such that carrying a torch does not make you any less sneaky, but that would be weird. Or you could set up your stealth subsystem such that it's just as easy to detect someone when you can't see them as when you can. Which is, again, weird as all hell.

And what have you sacrificed to get to this point?
1) Low-light vision characters fight as well as people who are effectively blind.
2) Requires the removal of any ability which extinguishes or suppresses traditional light sources (darkness has to circumvent by being a magic illusion; what about gusts of winds? Blasts of water?).
3) Removal of any ability which itself creates a traditional lightsource. Frank has already pointed out that this even goes so far as to be problematic with torches, because torches occupy an arm so anyone who likes to use both arms in combat (sword and board, dual-wield, giant sword).

And low-light vision is still more desirable to some characters than others. What's the next proposed fix to make rogues not care about being able to see in the dark?

[Dean]

Alternative Racial Traits

You can exchange one or several of your character’s normal racial Traits, but of course you cannot exchange the same racial trait more than once.

It's fair cop. What I was attempting to express primarily was the stat plusses and minuses are still there and that those are the things that make the real racial power differences. Something which the alternate racial benefits don't touch. But still, fair call.

[K]

And where we're going with all of this: rogues/scouts/sneak types in your game like low-light vision. It lets them move freely and make alertness checks in the dark without carrying a torch, which emits light and makes them (presumably) easier to perceive; you could set up your stealth subsystem such that carrying a torch does not make you any less sneaky, but that would be weird. Or you could set up your stealth subsystem such that it's just as easy to detect someone when you can't see them as when you can. Which is, again, weird as all hell.

The way I envisioned sneaking is that everyone does it at roughly equal proficiency. It's a core part of "adventuring" so everyone is equally penalized by using or not using torches and sneakng around in the dark is something people without low-light vision do.

You can also lead people in the dark, so only one person needs low-light to move the party faster.

Also, the Alertness rules would let everyone make checks to notice enemies in the dark. Low-light wouldn't help at all aside from giving extra information like "it's a four-legged animal with horns running low to the ground and coming toward you" as opposed to normal check results of "you hear a big animal with many legs running toward you."

As for putting out light sources.... who cares? Enough wind or water to knock out the party's lights would be enough to knock down the person or whole party. They have bigger problems than some light if they get hit that hard.

Basically, this is the kind of thing you have to do to fix the Flying Archer problem. It's not as simple as just writing "you can see in the dark," but it is an actually playable and fair system.

Your other option is just to let people who see in the dark to win your game at will. I don't see that as better.

Simple and bad or complicated and good.

[Ice9]

The thing is, most of these solutions to the flying archer "problem" seem far worse than the problem itself. A game where you can't shoot farther than melee range, can't make actual light or darkness, can't conjure minions unless you're there making attack rolls, and can't in any way attack from an asymmetrical position sounds fucking terrible. That makes 4E look exciting and interactive.

[DSMatticus]

The thing is, most of these solutions to the flying archer "problem" seem far worse than the problem itself.

The flying archer problem isn't even a racial ability problem. Reasons you would want to avoid racial synergization with a class are because it narrows the space of playable characters, like the case that elf fighter is strictly inferior to dwarf/orc fighter because of the racial synergization

The flying archer usually has nothing to do with race, but just a combination of class features or magic items. Applying this methodology to solve the flying archer problem and variants is about removing synergistic abilities in general, from everywhere in the game. And yes, taken to its ultimate conclusion it does lead to a homogenous bowl of shit because any meaningful difference must lead to different results in some circumstance. That is what makes it meaningful. And once you have different results, those differences can be leveraged for advantages. And once you have an advantage, this idea sets it on fire.

[K]

The thing is, most of these solutions to the flying archer "problem" seem far worse than the problem itself. A game where you can't shoot farther than melee range, can't make actual light or darkness, can't conjure minions unless you're there making attack rolls, and can't in any way attack from an asymmetrical position sounds fucking terrible. That makes 4E look exciting and interactive.

Yeh, people want to be able to attack asymetrically and have their abilities always work, but not have enemies attack them asymetrically and have those enemys' abilities always fail.

The goal would be to create rigorous rules for creating asymmetry through your actions and not just passive use of auto-win abilities.

I mean, Flying Archers is boring as shit because it's just you turning on your flight power and then winning the encounter, but setting an ambush on a cliff and raining fire down on your enemies is cool. Hopefully, people would enjoy the system for that.

[Username17]

The ability to see farther isn't even a flying archer problem. The actual distance a sword thrust goes is unchanged if it's dark or not. A restriction that you can only see X distance only matters for your ability to attack if your attacks normally go farther than X. If you increase X (by having keener vision or whatever), that doesn't make the swordsmen any worse, it removes a relative penalty from you as an archer.

Let's say the conditions are that there is an archer and a swordsman and no darkness. The archer can shoot at the swordsman, and the swordsman can attack the archer when he gets into melee range. Now, we add Darkness: the swordsman can still attack the archer when he gets into melee range, but now the archer is severely constrained until the swordsman comes into view. If the archer has low light vision, that is a relative advantage only over the way conditions would be in the dark without it - it doesn't inherently give the archer any ability he wouldn't have in the no darkness scenario.

Which is why this conversation is so surreal. K is ranting about flying archers and shit, and that's not even on the table. He's flipping out because low light vision alleviates a penalty that hurts archers more than swordsmen, and is therefore by definition better for archers than swordsmen. All that crap about flying archers and shit is 100% irrelevant to this conversation, because no one is suggesting some sort of magic darkness where the inability to see people farther away somehow neuters people whose attacks only go as far as their arms.

Seeing in the dark is fundamentally more useful for people who are hurt more by darkness and fundamentally less useful for people who are less hurt by darkness. And flipping your shit and neutering the entire game until it is less interactive than 4e to get around that reality is fucking stupid. Just consider some of the people who inherently are more concerned about darkness that would then have to be removed from the game:

• Any character whose attacks or other abilities are in way limited by how far they can see.
• Any character who uses both of their hands at the same time and is thus more inconvenienced by wanting to hold a light source.
• Any character whose abilities create darkness or extinguish light sources under any circumstances.

And now let's consider the flip side, characters who are inherently less concerned about low light vision:

• Any character whose attacks or other abilities are not limited by how far they can see (such as "range: touch" or voice activated or purely psychic or straight up explosions).
• Any character with free hands who can carry a fucking torch without inconveniencing themselves.
• Any character whose abilities create light or dispel common sources of darkness under any circumstances.

Holy shitballs! K is seriously suggesting chopping the balls off the game to remove all of that just so that one character won't value low light vision more than another character. We haven't even gotten to any of the literally dozens of other abilities he is suggesting adding to the game and further castrating the system to "support".

-Username17

[Fuchs]

Seems best having races mean stuff for NPCs, but letting PCs build their characters as they want, PCs being the exception from the norm anyway.

[K]

Yes, I get it Frank. You can't even imagine a game that's not as clone of existing games, and aren't even willing to try.

I am surprised that you don't realize that archers are strictly superior to swordsman in every game right now and one of the most basic imbalances. Seems like a no-brainer.

Still, you seem to be having fun without your strawman, so at least this discussion was good for that.

[name_here]

If an attack cannot be used at range then it's not really a ranged attack, is it? If you've got a zone system, then a ranged attack would be one that allows you to attack people in adjacent zones, or alternately subzones that melee people have some sort of difficulty attacking. If your game doesn't have any attacks like that, it does not goddamn include archers.

Look, the way ranged and melee attackers get balanced is fundamentally pretty simple. The ranged attackers can shoot further but do less damage and have fewer hitpoints. The melee attackers have the capacity to get within melee range of archers unless the archers have their own melee dudes to stop them or manage to take advantage of terrain (which should usually be unavaliable) , and if they succeed they will promptly fuck the archers up.

This is something of a pain to implement, but there is no good reason to say, "Fuck it, no archers!". It is an acceptable reason to say "No flying" or "You cannot move and shoot".

[OgreBattle]

Would it be weird if being a Rogue, the class, gave you enhanced nightvision abilities?

Because you trained it and have a general sense of sneaking around in the dark.

[Username17]

I am surprised that you don't realize that archers are strictly superior to swordsman in every game right now and one of the most basic imbalances. Seems like a no-brainer.

There are lots of games in which being an archer is generally inferior to hitting things in melee. For example: Champions. Being super strong is cheaper than shooting energy blasts of comparable damage output and you don't suffer range penalties. So if you take some of the savings and spend it on being able to get across the battlefield really fast, you punch people for more damage at greater accuracy and you still have points left over.

I mean, we could go game by game and find all the ones where melee is better than archery (almost half the games, by the way), but it's not even terribly important. Even if in every game ever printed so far, shooters were better than beat sticks, it still wouldn't excuse removing "able to attack non-adjacent opponents" away from "ranged" attacks for an RPG. There are lots of dials you can fiddle with, and reducing "tactical" combat to Civilization or Warlords is not acceptable.

-Username17

[erik]

Hell, even in DnD 3e there were environments where archers got the, uh, shaft.

It was standard practice for most archer characters I met to have a two handed weapon as a backup for when you got stuck in dungeons/tunnels or anywhere else that getting a clear shot wasn't bloody likely. Maybe Living Greyhawk just had a lot of trolololol modules with cover provided for enemies or forced us into tight quarters for combats, I dunno.

[shadzar]

Would it be weird if being a Rogue, the class, gave you enhanced nightvision abilities?

Because you trained it and have a general sense of sneaking around in the dark.

can humans do it in the real world? can we train our eyes better to see at night, without losing ability to see in the day?

if a real human couldnt do it, then a class couldnt do it for those that seek verisimilitude and SoD.

the closest i could think a class could offer is the attention to detail and level of detail gained from night work more often allowing you to identify more what you see because of that training as opposed to actually seeing more.

Fighter sees a shiny object it could be a door handle, a sword on an enemy belt, a coin on the floor, etc.

rogue sees the same shiiny object and can tel that the apparent distance and height it must be above the ground it is more likely to be a door handle glinting in the distance as it doesnt move as it sparkles, so not a word swinging on a belt, and isnt on the floor due to depth of the field of vision.

and since the rogue has to make quick escapes he needs to be able to identify these things quickly so that he can grab a window latch and slip out, not grab the nearby candle holder on the wall and THUNK onto the floor waking a whole household to his presence.

[John Magnum]

So, shad, are you saying that there shouldn't be any caster classes? Or what's even going on here?

[wotmaniac]

So, shad, are you saying that there shouldn't be any caster classes? Or what's even going on here?

I think that he's referencing mundane abilities brought about through mundane means. Casters/non-casters doesn't have anything to do with it.

[John Magnum]

if a real human couldnt do it, then a class couldnt do it for those that seek verisimilitude and SoD.

I guess he meant "a martial/mundane class, which the rogue is, couldn't do it"

[shadzar]

So, shad, are you saying that there shouldn't be any caster classes? Or what's even going on here?

magic is a concession opposed to what we have in the real world, but even those that disagree on humans as the base and foundation for races, will still argue that a class and training in it, will not physically alter the eye structure such that one can see better in certain conditions.

the training itself can lead to better information gathering and usage by a rogue in lower levels of light since that is where he usually employs the skills, but it wont really let him see more clearly as if in daylight.

so in the presence of magic, and where races can have special light sensitive eyes, how can a class present better physical abilities?

seeing isnt something you can train to be better at, but understanding WHAT you are seeing is. take that as you will from someone wearing glasses since age 3.

i just dont see a class offering some sort of better sight itself.

now if you say only rogue can use these fancy glasses that arent magical, per say, because only they understand them and through a set of night vision goggles for the era in.. then sure rogues as a class get better at seeing in the dark. for everyone else, there's Mastercard(TM) magic.

[K]

I am surprised that you don't realize that archers are strictly superior to swordsman in every game right now and one of the most basic imbalances. Seems like a no-brainer.

There are lots of games in which being an archer is generally inferior to hitting things in melee. For example: Champions. Being super strong is cheaper than shooting energy blasts of comparable damage output and you don't suffer range penalties. So if you take some of the savings and spend it on being able to get across the battlefield really fast, you punch people for more damage at greater accuracy and you still have points left over.

I mean, we could go game by game and find all the ones where melee is better than archery (almost half the games, by the way), but it's not even terribly important. Even if in every game ever printed so far, shooters were better than beat sticks, it still wouldn't excuse removing "able to attack non-adjacent opponents" away from "ranged" attacks for an RPG. There are lots of dials you can fiddle with, and reducing "tactical" combat to Civilization or Warlords is not acceptable.

-Username17

Why would you think the problem was damage?

The problem is that the archer gets to be on the other side of the room and immune to melee attacks because something is in the way. Maybe some friendly swordsman are in the way or the meleer just out of movement range, or maybe the archer is flying or on a ledge, but any situation where the archer can attack and damage his opponent and the meleer can't do jack about it means the archer is fundamentally better.

I mean, the essence of the Flying Archer problem is that it's a boring auto-win tactic that expends no resources, not that it's a faster take-down than a melee guy might do.

Ideally, I'd fix that by using an abstract zone system and just giving ranged attacks some special power inside the zone like being able to hit multiple targets for substantially less damage per opponent, but otherwise making it clear that the chaotic conditions of combat make it impossible to use the theoretical absolute range of a weapon.

That being said, people have been clear that they want asymmetry. I suggest playing GURPS or Rifts. It doesn't get more asymmetric than that crap.

[John Magnum]

Ideally, I'd fix that by using an abstract zone system and just giving ranged attacks some special power inside the zone like being able to hit multiple targets for substantially less damage per opponent

Which is to say you'd fix it by getting rid of ranged attacks? Great solution.