Healing surges and other such fail.

[RandomCasualty2]

RC2: The problem with that is that you're still assigning essentially a random penalty, because the amount of woundage you receive is random. Even if you give players action points or momentum points or whatever for pressing on, the penalty you take in the first or second act is random and the reward is not. So you still have the same essential problem, only lessened.

But isn't this a problem with any RPG combat system? Even if you look at it as a single battle, a single bad save can take a PC out of combat entirely. At this point, a random penalty that you take from a prior battle really doesn't seem that bad.

You're just not going to be able to take random factors out of an RPG, and I don't even think you should. Most people feel like fighting mooks shouldn't be deadly, but should be more about conserving your resources and playing smart for the final battle. And if you want that to matter, you need to grant some penalty or some reward for fighting those mooks effectively.

[ckafrica]

Kaelik, we all know that you hate Elennsar because he...I dunno, slept with your wife, or ran over your dog, or something. But if you want him to go away, why aren't you ignoring him?

Also, I guess you didn't notice my posts...or RC's posts...or virgilso's posts...or P_R's post...etc.

Actually I'm pretty sure quite a lot of people here would rather see him go away. The way be debates is offensive, many of his ideas are offensive, his jacking of nearly every thread he participates in is offensive (the dude's posted over a thousand times in under 2 months; virulent spammmers are not so active!), and I imagine if we were able to vote him off the island, you'd find one of the most popular polls in the history of the board (can we btw?). The fact he has been asked not to participate in discussions from the get go should indicate Kaelik and I are not alone.

There are people here disagree with each other, those of whom have low opinions of each other, but he has been unique in my time here as someone who has made this place an unpleasant place to visit.

I want to give a shout-out to Saga Frontier, which gives all characters "hit points" and "life points." Damage is subtracted from your HP. If your HP reaches zero, you become disabled until it becomes positive again, and you immediately lose one LP (and another LP every time you're damaged if your HP is already zero). If you run out of LP, then your HP are set to zero and they cannot be restored by any means whatsoever until you get some LP back.

HP automatically fully recover at the end of every combat, but LP only recover between dungeons or when you expend extremely limited resources. Healing abilities allow you to recover HP during fights, which makes them useful but not usually critical (they're also generally pretty weak compared to other CRPGs).

In random fights, you usually don't lose any LP, but if you do particularly badly or get particularly unlucky, someone's HP will hit zero, and you lose a LP, so they can wear you down over time. But they'll be back for the next battle, and as long as you've got a couple LP going into the boss fight, you usually don't care whether you're at full--running out of HP disables you no matter how many LP you have left, so unless you're capable of doing a lot of in-combat healing (during a boss fight, while part of your party is disabled), you'll usually lose the fight before anyone's lost more than a couple LP anyway.

I like this idea. It gets rid of the nonsense of healing after every encounter, while still allowing for some wear and tear on the characters.

[Elennsar]

I have to point out that what a player does is not heroic, no matter the rules and odds. Player characters do heroic stuff within their imaginary setting.

Which is not true when they are better off fighting with a broken arm than without it. (though it may be still true "more often than not" if they're risking problems when running into a burning building).

Ckafrica: If there is any halfway legitimate point in there, it is buried under "the fact he doesn't act like I like is offensive" whining.

[Username17]

Lago is basically correct. If your rules are set up to discourage "heroic" activities there is no reason to believe that characters will engage in them. People don't take risks because risks are "awesome" - they take risks because there is a reason to take risks.

Probably the worst thing about the D&D assumptions is the assumption that you will fight all the monsters. That being the case, there's no incentive to avoid fighting the monsters because you fucking can't. The question then comes down to how many monsters you fight between recharging your spell slots, and the "best" answer is "as few as possible."

Th reason that people charge ahead with blood streaming down their thigh in Shadowrun is not because it's more or less heroic to do that than any other particular thing - but because the default assumption of the game is that the vast majority of the potential guards will not ever be fought by your team. Taking additional time gives you a chance to reload, but it also gives enemies a chance to reinforce and they have deeper pockets than you do. If taking additional time gives the BBEG more time to call guards into his hallway, then taking time is something that will be discouraged.

If people decide to crawl into a Rope Trick and prepare spells instead of pressing on and fighting more ogres, it is not because they are a bunch of pussies. It's because the game mechanics make that a sensible option. In a role playing game, it is unreasonable to expect players to take actions that are unreasonable given the world and mechanics of the game.

If you want players to behave a certain way, you have to give them a reason. As long as you're just playing guerrilla war to the last man standing every time, there's no reason for the players to do anything other than pick their shots and gank enemies one at a time in alley ways. It may not be "cool" but that's how you win guerrilla wars, so any guerrilla war simulator is going to eventually end up like that.

If you want the action movie rubric of the PCs staggering wounded into the final confrontation with the overlord and having it out right there, your rules and world assumptions need to support that. Giving players a rage bar type effect that gives them additional advantages for pressing on is one method. Giving the world some large number of orcs that you don't ever have to fight or particularly get anything for defeating that can be bypassed by just charging in and fighting the end boss is another.

If the game benefits you for XP dancing, people will XP dance. If the game benefits you for resting after every fight, people will rest after every fight. This isn't rocket science. The things your rules rewards will become the things that players will do even if they only have the intelligence of fish. Any creature capable of discerning reward and punishment will eventually learn to press the buttons the give food and not press the buttons that give electric shocks. The goal of game design is to make it so that the buttons that give food are the ones you want pressed, and the ones that provide shocks are the ones you want avoided.

-Username17

[Elennsar]

And the problem with that is that it means people refuse to play heroic characters who are actually taking genuine, meaningful, not rewarded behavior because its the right thing to do.

If you don't want to do play that, that's your decision, but playing selfless characters because being selfless is better than selfish is absurd.

So, no, people won't take risks because "risks are awesome". People will take risks because they either A) are rewarded for doing so as you just said, or B) are playing characters who would do it because they feel they can and/or should face those risks regardless of personal danger.

You might get more people charging in if charging is less risky, but you lose it being bold and something only a very confident hero would dare.

If you don't want to take heroic and possibly suicidal risks, then while you may be a damn fine roleplayer and there's nothing wrong with you as a player, you aren't playing a character who would do such things and shouldn't claim you are.

[Username17]

And the problem with that is that it means people refuse to play heroic characters who are actually taking genuine, meaningful, not rewarded behavior because its the right thing to do.

No fucking shit?!

Look, no one takes actions that are nonrewarded. Ever. Being a hero is a reward, and people do heroic shit sometimes just for that reward.

But whatever your personal ethical calculus, the "benefit" of an action as perceived by you has got to be expected to be positive or you are not going to do it.

When you make the game, you make the calculus and the reward matrix as well. If you make them so that it doesn't encourage players to take the actions you want them to take, you're bad at game design. Full stop.

-Username17

[ckafrica]

Ckafrica: If there is any halfway legitimate point in there, it is buried under "the fact he doesn't act like I like is offensive" whining.

I thought my point was fairly obvious. It was:

Fuck you, you are a horrible person to try to have a conversation with.

And I'm not even talking about your gaming ideas. I don't agree with a lot of what many people here say but at least I can discuss with them without want to smash my monitor. It is honestly more pleasant to converse with the likes of Aubrey the Malformed and Aelryth than your sorry ass.

[Elennsar]

But whatever your personal ethical calculus, the "benefit" of an action as perceived by you has got to be expected to be positive or you are not going to do it.

Yes. The belief that there will be more good in this world, or less evil (or both) if I succeed, and that trying and failing is better than not trying at all because of some hoary saying or another.

Simple.

No damn need to reward me with a system where having a broken arm makes my PC fight harder to get that. No damn need to give special features only available to "Good-aligned characters".

CkAfrica: So, in other words, you had no legitimate point other than that you dislike me.

And here I was thinking you had an actual point to make that would be something I could address.

[Roy]

Ckafrica: If there is any halfway legitimate point in there, it is buried under "the fact he doesn't act like I like is offensive" whining.

I thought my point was fairly obvious. It was:

Fuck you, you are a horrible person to try to have a conversation with.

And I'm not even talking about your gaming ideas. I don't agree with a lot of what many people here say but at least I can discuss with them without want to smash my monitor. It is honestly more pleasant to converse with the likes of Aubrey the Malformed and Aelryth than your sorry ass.

Ouch. Dude, that's harsh. Justified, but harsh.

[MartinHarper]

If you want the action movie rubric of the PCs staggering wounded into the final confrontation with the overlord and having it out right there, your rules and world assumptions need to support that.

I liked Manxome's proposal on how to do this: "You don't heal all your wounds before the final fight because you can't. There's a time limit, or the king will only order his priests to cast the necessary spells if you win, or there's just a mechanic that says that those wounds cannot be healed by any means prior to the end of the adventure. No shortage of options there."

I have to point out that what a player does is not heroic, no matter the rules and odds. Player characters do heroic stuff within their imaginary setting.

Precisely. The characters do not know whether their actions are mechanically optimal, so there is no contradiction in making heroism mechanically optimal.

[Kaelik]

Precisely. The characters do not know whether their actions are mechanically optimal, so there is no contradiction in making heroism mechanically optimal.

Actually, characters do know what's mechanically optimal, because it has visible effects in the world.

People who cast fireball (and survive) realize it doesn't work. And people who try to fight with a broken leg and survive realize it's a lot harder.

So yeah, characters know what's mechanically optimal.

[Elennsar]

Other than the fact that they can damn well tell whether or not being hurt is slowing them down or not.

Let's say when you drop below 75% of maximum hit points you get -4 to hit. Normally you have +8.

I'm pretty sure that's noticable. Similarly, I'm pretty sure that it is noticable if you get +4.

Probably the same with -2 or +2. Maybe +/-1.

And if you can't...then what the heck is the mechanic representing for the characters? That somehow they'd be better off stabbing themselves a couple times before taking on the dragon?

Yes, this is deliberately absurd. The point is, if you reward an action and players do it because the action is rewarded, it being absurd will come up unless something else gets in the way.

As for the mechanics, if "you can't (heal to full)" is the case, then how do you deal with people like Lago who say "fuck this adventure"? Assuming that pleasing them without making any encounters prior to any given encounter meaningless is possible.

[Psychic Robot]

So let me get this straight...Elennsar's a horrible person because he has differing game ideas? I mean, I know he thew a shitstorm about the whole health care thing, but that's a little harsh.

[Roy]

So let me get this straight...Elennsar's a horrible person because he has differing game ideas? I mean, I know he thew a shitstorm about the whole health care thing, but that's a little harsh.

It's more like he pisses off everyone, even the most patient of people with his circular arguments and derailing every fucking thread to talk about the same damn thing. He did it to BG, he's doing it to TGD. As a result, either he gets ignored outright as irrelevant, or told to fuck off. Repeatedly. And he doesn't get a clue.

Just watch his response to this and you'll see.

[Elennsar]

The response of at this thread being derailed by people bitching about me, particularly when they're claiming I do nothing but derail and disrupt threads?

Or the response of less humorously thinking that this should go back on topic and deal with what we were most recently talking about on topic?

[MartinHarper]

Actually, characters do know what's mechanically optimal, because it has visible effects in the world.

It depends. In the game of Cancer and Cigarettes, smoking makes you immune to cancer. Smoking is thus mechanically optimal. However, none of the characters realise this, because evidence-based medicine hasn't been invented yet, and cancer-immunity has no immediate visible effects.

If the character is badly hurt and therefore is at -4 to hit, the character certainly knows that. If the player has three action points built up, and can spend those action points to have lucky things happen for the character, the character doesn't know that. Because the character doesn't know about action points, the character can fail to realise that pressing on is mechanically optimal.

As for the mechanics, if "you can't (heal to full)" is the case, then how do you deal with people like Lago who say "fuck this adventure"?

You "heal to full" between adventures. Either you heal to full because you kill the King of Fists, and the Princess of Tears kisses your problems away, or you heal to full because you fail to save the princess, and spend the next three months licking your wounds.

[Lago PARANOIA]

You "heal to full" between adventures. Either you heal to full because you kill the King of Fists, and the Princess of Tears kisses your problems away, or you heal to full because you fail to save the princess, and spend the next three months licking your wounds.

Have I mentioned lately how retarded the assumption that you will spend every fight fighting to the death?

In a low-level 4E game I have just played, the DM miscalculated the climax encounter. Key members were out or early out of healing surges and there were two fairly powerful monsters that targetted NADs. After two rounds it was ascertained that it was pretty much hopeless for us to win so we started a retreat.

Only, the party cleric thought that she should fight to the very end. She went over to the prisoners and tried to free them but got shot down. A couple of other party members decided to go down fighting, and go down they did. I and a couple of others managed to flee the scene.

And yes, the prisoners and those three party members got sacrificed.


Now, under that proposal for healing, in which you can't until you pick up some moronic event flags, running for our lives would've not been an option at all. We would've faced continual wound penalties that would've pretty much crippled our ability to adventure until we have gone by and 'somehow' squeezed out a victory and avenged our fallen comrades like they do in the movies. Which anyone could've told you was impossible.

Are you seriously trying to tell me that the game should be set up in such a way where we had to have our characters meaninglessly fight to the death?

Dungeons and Dragons is not a fucking video game. There are some fights that you can't win and fighting to the death like some brain-damaged berserker is not a mark of heroism--it's a mark of insanity and stupidity!

Except for boring Mary Sue heroes like Steven Seagal, any adventurer with enough battles worth their salt have retreated at some point when the battle was hopeless or they had better things to do, even when the consequences for not winning were extremely fucking severe.

Characters lose battles and sometimes realize that the battle they're about to get into is hopeless. I don't care how heroic or noble your character is, it will eventually happen. And a game mechanic that forces characters to commit suicide because 'win every adventure no matter what or die' is an assumption of what characters do needs to be thrown in the garbage.

[Fuchs]

Let me be more precise:

You, as the player, are not a hero, nor are you doing anything heroically when you direct your character, no matter what the odds and rules are. Whether you risk your character's deth, or play it safe is meaningless - you won't be a hero.

Your character may be a hero in his or her world. But whether that is the case or not depends on a great many things.

[virgil]

Frank brings up a good point. If you can at least give some kind of method to minimize/off-set the penalties for fighting while wounded (such as the rage bar), I'm fine with that; you still have wounds that are present, and thus at least the illusion is maintained.

Though I still want retreat to be an option. That's gotten on my nerves many a time, when the party decides they need to fight to the death ALL THE TIME, as if retreat was worse.

[name_here]

It's actually quite possibly worse if we have rules that don't invite kiting, as faster monsters can run them down repeatedly, forcing non-melee characters to start in hand-to-hand when they begin their turn.

which, as you might imagine, is a bad thing. Also, it could somtimes be sort of a show of solidarity, because if the opposition is overpowering to the entire party any member slower than the opposition is toast if you retreat.

[MartinHarper]

Though I still want retreat to be an option.

Me too. I don't think there's anything in having longer term wounds, or in not healing to full after every combat, that prevents retreat being an option, whether that be retreat from a fight, or retreat from an adventure.

We would've faced continual wound penalties that would've pretty much crippled our ability to adventure.

Longer-term penalties that cripple a character aren't fun. Any decent system which attempts to support the illusion of attrition would need to avoid that. This can be done with a simple cap on number and severity, for example.

Re-reading your posts, I gather that a system that supports the illusion of attrition would need to ensure that:
1) Your character is never crippled by long-term injuries (except death or equivalent conditions).
2) You can get rid of long-term injuries at the end of an adventure, even if you lose the adventure.
3) Encounters need to be weighted to take into account that at the end of an adventure, characters will have picked up some loot and xp and allies, but will also have picked up some long-term injuries.

[Elennsar]

You "heal to full" between adventures. Either you heal to full because you kill the King of Fists, and the Princess of Tears kisses your problems away, or you heal to full because you fail to save the princess, and spend the next three months licking your wounds.

Yeah, its the "between parts of the adventure" part that you may or may not get that option.

Characters lose battles and sometimes realize that the battle they're about to get into is hopeless. I don't care how heroic or noble your character is, it will eventually happen. And a game mechanic that forces characters to commit suicide because 'win every adventure no matter what or die' is an assumption of what characters do needs to be thrown in the garbage.

Then you retreat, fail the quest, see and/or suffer the consequences, lick your wounds, and...do whatever it is you intend to do about the fact that the Princess of Tears is dead and that was something you intended to prevent. Maybe you vow to avenge her death.

"Quest failed." and "game over" should never be the same result, and it should never be assumed that failing a quest ends the story, because unless its "you died (and can't be brought back)" in some form, there's almost always something to do after failure.

So the story needs to support "if the heroes do fail, what then?", but that's not a mechanical concern other than how the "event flags" work.

[Talisman]

Frank brings up a good point. If you can at least give some kind of method to minimize/off-set the penalties for fighting while wounded (such as the rage bar), I'm fine with that; you still have wounds that are present, and thus at least the illusion is maintained.

Though I still want retreat to be an option. That's gotten on my nerves many a time, when the party decides they need to fight to the death ALL THE TIME, as if retreat was worse.

I agree 100% with this. There needs to be a mechanica stimulus to keep going in addition to the RP one (as always, mechanics and flavor should support each other). Also, retreat should be an option most of the time...not every scenario is a time-crunch fight to the death.

I just was to play a game that supports heroics.

[Elennsar]

Okay, you don't -get- the Second Wind if you take the easy way out.

Its there as a "You wipe the blood out of your eyes and press on." method of ensuring you do have a chance if you press on, but it should never be mechanically superior to "go against the 'odds'", because then you're not fighting the odds.

As stated, Achilles is a big damn butcher. Plot armor is antithetical to "Damn the torpedos.", because it means ramming a mine is safer than running away.

Still, if you do go for Damn the Torpedos, you ought to be able to be strong enough to face them. Whether you are lucky enough for them to not explode...depends on how much luck has to do with it all to begin with. Swashbuckling favors the idea that Fortune's favor makes a big dent in things. Not necessarily Arthurian Knights.

[Talisman]

I shall now take the time to respond to this.

Have I mentioned lately how retarded the assumption that you will spend every fight fighting to the death?

I agree. Only some fights should be assumed to be to the death.

Some random bandits? Screw 'em; we'll withdraw and come back next week.
The princess gets sacrificed at midnight, thus opening a portal to the Realm of Badness? Fuck, we better get going! No matter what, we've got to stop this ritual!

Are you seriously trying to tell me that the game should be set up in such a way where we had to have our characters meaninglessly fight to the death?

No.
I am telling you that the game should be set up in such a way as to encourage heroics. According to the back of the book, it's "a world of heroic fantasy." In my opinion, "heroes" don't say "screw the quest" and retreat when they get a little banged up; they press on and fight.
I'm not talking about situations where time is not a factor. I'm not talking about unwinnable fights. I'm not saying that every fight has to be "underdog heroes miraculously snatch victory from the jaws of defeat."

I'm saying that the game is currently not designed to encourage this specific brand of heroism, and I think that's a shame. It's the 5-minute adventuring day writ large. PCs stop to rest - or retreat - because their level-appropriate powers are diminshed, and it often kills the drama.

Dungeons and Dragons is not a fucking video game. There are some fights that you can't win and fighting to the death like some brain-damaged berserker is not a mark of heroism--it's a mark of insanity and stupidity!

I agree completely. We have no disagreement here. Some fights cannot be won, and retreat should - usually - be a valid option.

On the other hand, fighting to the death is sometimes a mark of heroism, if whatever you're fighting for is worth more than your life.

Characters lose battles and sometimes realize that the battle they're about to get into is hopeless. I don't care how heroic or noble your character is, it will eventually happen. And a game mechanic that forces characters to commit suicide because 'win every adventure no matter what or die' is an assumption of what characters do needs to be thrown in the garbage.

Agreed. See my previous statement.
A setup where every battle was a grit-your-teeth-and-fight-through-the-pain, skin-of-the-teeth potential victory would be just as unpleasant as one where every battle - no matter how minor - ended with the PCs resting for 8 full hours, no matter the power of the enemy or the context of the situation. Both are ludicrous extremes.

Edit: Spelling.