Character roles, at a higher granularity

[Bigode]

Well, we all know the 4E role list's heavily blurred. Besides, making just 4 roles, even if they were wholly distinct, would suck IMO because a higher number would allow a higher number of classes which were role combinations, which's in turn better to me than separating classes by fluff, as being currently made. So, I dragged a ridiculously old post of mine from here, in a role discussion at the time. Please discuss/poke holes/whatever (of useful, I mean). Do note, however, that parts of this are rather heavily keyed to D&D (for example, teleportation as a normal travel method). Also, I do know everything in combat ultimately boils down to just 5 tasks, but, as per above, there's good reason to want a wider list, and it's not that hard to chop the big 5 into smaller pieces that play differently (for example, both impairing and healing are essentially action cancelation, but the fact that one is done proactively and the other reactively does make a fair bit of difference).

OK, we'd have to start by listing what are the tasks people need to get done, in and out of combat. Here is my initial attempt at doing so. Also, I'm typing this off-the-cuff and fully expect to have missed things.

In combat:

- quick removal of threats (namely, dealing hefty damage or using instant-kill effects);
- mob sweeping (usually accomplished by having area attacks, but I think having great personal defenses is an acceptable susbstitute whenever time isn't a critical issue);
- opponent stalling (either by paralyzation or mind control);
- party support (and weakening opponents is pretty much the same - either way, you're making your partners' job easier);
- healing (although it may be in truth a subset of support);
- freedom of movement (not because it's a personal defense, but because it sometimes allows people to accomplish things before a combat's end).

Out of combat:

- party support applies here too (namely, pre-fight buffing and foreknowledge of threats);
- stealth (and social craftiness is pretty much another kind of it, as are attacks so long-ranged that no one can do much against them);
- finding goals (anything from tracking to divination);
- avoiding surprise attacks (goes from trapfinding to aura projection);
- reliable travel (and, in time-sensitive situations, this is quite likely to mean "teleportation";
- supply making (from magic item manufacture to many kinds of summoning).

[Username17]

Combat actions take one of six forms:

1. 
   
2. Defeating enemies.
   
3. Buffing friends.
   
4. Debuffing enemies.
   
5. Enemy Action Prevention (Battlefield Control)
   
6. Enemy Action (Healing)
   
7. Advancing Arbitrary Win Conditions (some games don't have this).

Now the thing is that you can have versions of this which are topologically equivalent but which feel distinct rather easily. The obvious one is buffing. If you give out bonuses which make your team hit harder or more often that feels different from giving out buffs that make your team last longer. The net result is much the same, but the feel of the combat is unrecognizable. One shortens combat, the other lengthens it.

And of course there are hybrid actions. An attack where you steal hit points from an opponent is a 1/5 hybrid action. An attack where you break te turn order and try to retroactively interupt an attack of your opponent's by hitting them with a time saber is also a 1/5 hybrid action. Doesn't really feel that similar.

Defeating enemies can likewise be broken up into attacks which are good against groups and attacks which are good against individuals. You could break it down into attacks which are good against Red or Blue opponents even. Subdivisions are infinitely regressable.

Very reasonable assuptions would be to give everyone a "defeating enemies" action or hybrid action. Also, giving combat a secondary win condition seems like a bad plan in a general sort of way, although I could definitely see someone getting a time cap for fights where they build up to casting Dragonslave or something.

Common tropes:

• Lifestealing (1/5)
  
• Summoning (1/4)
  
• Mind Control (1/2/4)
  
• Luck Stealing (2/3)
  
• Slow/Fatigue (3/4
  
• Attacks with Side Effects (1/3)

Now one thing which has certainly occurred to me is to replace buffs which make players hit harder with debuffs that make opponents take more damage. Replace buffs that protect with debuffs that limit attacks. And so on.

A problem of course is that much of battlefield control is conceptually usable before combat begins in earnest or even at all. So you might be better off just trying to come up with a world mechanic where you don't care that much.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

When you move onto a tactical map another point of interest comes up, namely how someone accomplishes their role. This tends to further define a counter system.

There are for instance a lot of units in Starcraft who have the role of eliminating enemies, but how they do it makes them varied and different. It means that in some situations you'd rather have 6 zealots instead of 6 dragoons or 4 siege tanks. All those units just deal damage, but the way they do it makes their role widely varied.

[JonSetanta]

For 'transportation', I was thinking in somewhat abstract definitions of what a character can accomplish alone or allowing the possibility of aid.

As a 3.x example, while most warrior-archetypes can't outright cast Greater Teleport or Planeshift, they CAN take Leadership and grab a cohort that DOES.
They can also strike an off-the-record deal (read: RP) with deities or powerful entities to gain teleportation, or simply have something like a demon or celestial "on call" to pop them about.

Individually, non-casters can't do shit about it. For this consideration I include UMD owners with teleportation items as "casters" too.
The only way warrior-archetypes can keep up individually is to either expand the definition of the archetype, or scoop out a theme-supported 'maneuver' that moves the individual vast distances in a brief amount of time.

My vote: trash the archetype. A role closer to 'Swordmage', Eldritch Knight, or various gish buiilds would replace warriors, but more competent... which means they get all the combat buffs that allow mages and clerics to steal their role.

Glad you made this thread.. Since Frank's review of the Bright Blade I've been trying to sum up a rough sketch aone of tasks players need to be able accomplish in order to have competent characters, but there's so much stuff out there it gets me confused or bogged down.
Am I off track with these statements?

[Bigode]

Frank: without going into an arbitrary distinction such as Red vs. Blue (as opposed to a concrete distinction such as "multiple weaker opponents vs. one stronger opponent" or "glass cannon vs. tank"), which do you think are the distinctions that play mechanically different (for your example of healing vs. paralyzing, they play exactly the same, despite not looking similarly, if both are immediate actions, and don't if one isn't)?

Sigma: I don't know whether, much less when, I'd get around to it, or whether I'll get support (if you understand what I say), but I have indeed thought about scavenging through the 3.5 effect lists, looking which ones really are different from each other, and having each and every character be akin to a spellcaster (I can supply some extra detail if anybody shows interest).

[Username17]

Arbitrary distinctions don't have to feel arbitrary. For example, consider a game in which many characters were vampires or werewolves. Weapons made of magic or silver would cause such creatures to catch fire and not regenerate. While they would be no more effective than iron weapons against anything else. Maybe even less effective. So you could in that case have a perfectly servicable role of "supernatural hunter" who specialized in using magic weaponry. And he'd be suboptimal when fighting mundane badasses or hordes of mooks. But he'd be good at killing vampires. And in the proper set up, that would be a point in his favor.

-Username17

[Bigode]

That seems a bit of each talking past each other. That certainly doesn't feel as stupid as fighting the tendridiculous, or figuring out why 3.x dragons are color-coded, certainly, but what I meant is: there are some distinctions that only exist because they were included artificially (i.e., racial vulnerabilities mechanically unrelated to anything else about the race, such as the essentially arbitrary examples you gave), despite the fact that they can be made to feel natural story-wise; others come naturally from a scenario or matchup (number of enemies for example - each tactic works optimally against a different one). So, what are the roles that feel different considering just the second kind of distinction?

[JonSetanta]

I understand you plenty, am interested, and will be willing to help re-sort the spell lists/effects into new combinations.

[Username17]

There really isn't a distinction. There are distinctions which are built into the game and the story, and ones which are not. The reason that it feels completely arbitrary that you use blunt weapons against a tendridiculous is because that's stupid. It's not how "plant monsters" in D&D work.

Which is the point. If in your setting silver hurts the infected, and rock salt hurts incorporeal, then that's what happens. Those attacks naturally are good against those kinds of targets. And if you establish that those kinds of enemies make up a substantial portion of the opposition, and you establish that those weapons are useful against those enemies, they have value.

Cloud weaponry is no more or less naturally effective against large groups of weak opponents than weapons made of salt or prayer are naturally effective against demons and ghosts. In a supernatural horror game it makes sense to fill squirt guns full of holy water. And it makes sense for those attacks to be at best an annoyance to non-vampiric opposition.

The number of non-arbitrary delineations between combat roles of the "slayer" type is itself arbitrary.

Consider, you expect to go up against:


Now, can you imagine that someone might come armed with an elephant rifle, some garlic and holy water, incendiaries, and silver bullets? Would that make sense to you? Would that be "not arbitrary?"

-Username17

[JonSetanta]

Frank, with that most recent image, I would assume a player would need (in order from right to left) silver, fire, fire, silver, and a Japanese fisherman.

[Bigode]

Sigma: good to know, though, as said, I wasn't even sure if I'll actually do it - if yes, I'll certainly start asking for help here (aside from my MSN contact list). And LOL @ you - I wish the LOL road sign was here ...

Frank: are you really telling me that "single-target attacks can't obliterate a group at once" and "highly reliable defense is more important against opposition able to kill with a single blow than against other kinds" are as arbitrary as "werewolves can only be killed by silver"? Moreover, if I get correctly that by "cloud weaponry" you mean something able to create a cloud as an attack form, we get that, for that amount of effort, some of it will necessarily be wasted if there's just one foe inside it, unless of course if there was a rule to pile all the damage into them, but that's the rule for scorching ray (a multi-effect attack), not fireball (a spread) - the fact that I'm using D&D 3.x terminology notwithstading, these are different kinds of attack, good and bad in different situations, not better against some unique enemy because mythology or fiction said so.

[Username17]

In the real world, attacks in general are pretty lethal. The idea of having people who are sufficiently tough that they require special single target blaster attacks to get rid of is absurd. And it's fantasy. It's a genre consideration.

In the real world, anti-tank weaponry is explosives. Anti group weaponry is... explosives. You use knives and pistols because those are available and they work at all, not because they in any meaningful way better at killing individual enemies than rocket launchers are.

The idea that there are powerful opponents and powerful opponent killing attacks is silly. But we establish it at the beginning and that makes it part of the story.

-Username17

[Bigode]

According to this, one-shotting (if that was important in real combat, I'm not saying it is) a human inside a flak jacket does require "special single target blaster attacks"*. Anyway, for the case of this example being shown to be shaky, I may think about something else in the meantime.

Anyway, since attacks in RPGs frequently feature matter/energy created spontaneously, the relevant question is: if it was possible to create a certain amount of [insert harmful substance here], but you could deploy it either over an area or dumped over a single point (a smaller area technically, but whatever), does that need to be overly specific about the story being told?

*: without counting sneak ... er, headshots.

[CatharzGodfoot]

1200194325[/unixtime]]According to this, one-shotting (if that was important in real combat, I'm not saying it is) a human inside a flak jacket does require "special single target blaster attacks"*. Anyway, for the case of this example being shown to be shaky, I may think about something else in the meantime.

In no way does that example show that a human inside a flak jacket requires a special targeted attack to take out. He only ever tried using targeted attacks, some of which worked. The vest never stepped on a claymore mine, got hit by a LAW rocket, or had a smart bomb dropped on it.

[Bigode]

Sorry if I wasn't clear; I should've been specific in comparing it against a hand grenade, which is certainly enough to kill an unarmored human.

[Username17]

"What do you do when you step on a mine?"
"The traditional response is to throw yourself 200 feet in the air and scatter yourself over a large area."
-Black Adder

Yes, in the case of the supernaturals coming out to fight, it would be entirely reasonable for you to go get fire and silver for them specifically. Although in the case of gill man, he's probably just really touch and you want big normal weapons.

In Final Fantasy XI, the larger area explosions do more damage and the smaller ones do less. However, your castings take time and cost mana, with Firaga costing more mana and taking more time relative to the amount of extra damage it does. So while a Firaga hits harder, given a longer time frame you can hit a boss with Fire more times and that makes it a better "long term" strategy against single targets in a lot of instances. Also good for sniping off lone weak monsters - kills a rock worm just as dead but you use less of your resources.

But it's important to note that the guy who has that choice is the Black Mage. His attacks are resource limited and he can choose to use more or less of his resources to hit variously hard and big. Kind of a pain in the ass for table top game, though 4e D&D is doing their damndest to emulate the concept with giving characters separate at-will, per encounter, and per day abilities.

---

But yeah. The fundamental truth at the end of the rainbow is the fact that Slaadi DR/Law feels insulting is not because it is any more or less arbitrary to attack Giant Frog with weapons of order than it is to attack werewolves with silver, ghosts with salt, or Frankenstein's Monster with fire - it is insulting because D&D never bothered to establish weapons of order as being something that people should have or which were particularly helpful against classes of monsters. It's basically just Slaad. And even then you only know about it by reading their actual stats. It's not in the D&D fiction anywhere that you need weapons of order to banish the foul frog monsters.

But if it was established early on and consistently, then you could have people dumping Order's Wrath on things be a viable and distinct feeling combat role.

-Username17

[JonSetanta]

1200218528[/unixtime]]
But it's important to note that the guy who has that choice is the Black Mage. His attacks are resource limited and he can choose to use more or less of his resources to hit variously hard and big. Kind of a pain in the ass for table top game, though 4e D&D is doing their damndest to emulate the concept with giving characters separate at-will, per encounter, and per day abilities.

Yep, I've been worrying about this dilemna with an Eberron campaign I've joined...
After a bit of negotiating I got a custom Feytouched/Faun/Elf/Tiefling combo kinda race in but Fire Mage was OK from the start.
The DM had "no problems at all, it's good to go", and now I'm concerned.
As I mentioned earlier, it's limited in scope. Like, really limited. I can't even Sleep/Color Spray and Scythe the helpless.
Just blasting... every level.... all the time.
I'll be kept from using the good 'spell trigger' stuff like wands or most staves, kept from polymorphing, buffing my girlfriend's tanker Tome Knight, flying, and all the cool tricks even Sorcerers can manage.
It's like a Warmage, but better in some ways (unlimited damage) and worse in others (sorta boring after a while)

As far as I see, there's a few options:

1 Swap out certain level abilities for others. Thematic or not, they would be utility in nature. Negotiating them may or may not be possible, since my request of "can I get UMD or at least the ability to activate Evocation items?" was shot down with a "no, I like that as it is, using Fire items." Youch.

2 Swap the Fire Mage 2 for Sorcerer 2. Maybe Battle Sorcerer, since I'm considering Swiftblade (yes, seriously. it's a mostly warrior party, I'm not trying to 'nova' here, just have fun). Abuse shapeshifting, Save or Sucks, and blasting as normal.
Level 3 feat could be Firey Burst (reserve) as backup

3 Something that will never happen: get specific Evocations as at-will or even per-encounter spells.
Also, beg for an unlimitedly expandable Sorcerer spell list (as by Wizard) that can be swapped out as needed every morning.
This will be possible in 4e, but we're playing 3.5 with few house rules and little to no allowance for wacky experiments.

In short, the slots-per-day of Sorcerer always seems like a sucktastic penalty for the ability to cast spontaneously (yes, I refuse to play Vancian.) and mostly why I'm doing Fire Mage.
Warlock is too thematic, and invocations lame, FYI why I didn't pursue that instead.
20 Charisma and so many options...


And agreed, DR/alignment is bad.
Like firing-squad-the-designers bad.

[NoDot]

1200220478[/unixtime]]And agreed, DR/alignment is bad.
Like firing-squad-the-designers bad.

To clarify, as I'm missing something, do you mean "as it is now" or "at all?"

[JonSetanta]

At all.

[Endovior]

What? And lose the 'smite evil with holy sword' goodness?

Because I really don't have a problem with that so much as I have a problem with DR/(Law or Chaos), and that's mostly just a result of the poor definitions of Law and Chaos.

[Username17]

Heck, nothing wrong with wanting to use Elder Signs to smash servants of the Outer Gods. That's aligned DR right there, it just happens to be in a setting where the alignments are Cthonic, Archaic, and Normal. Once that's established and consistently applied it can be pretty cool.

The problem with DR/Law is not that it exists. The problem is that Tanar'ri don't have it. When the majority of Chaos Demons you fight honestly don't care if your weapons are aligned to Order, it becomes a genre foul when a different Chaos Demon has that as his only weakness.

-Username17

[NoDot]

So, if your Chaos Plane power provide DR, it should be DR/Law, with anyone who doesn't being the exception.

Is that it?

[Username17]

1200303640[/unixtime]]So, if your Chaos Plane power provide DR, it should be DR/Law, with anyone who doesn't being the exception.

Is that it?

It's a variation of Chekhov's Gun. If you establish that monsters in your story are fought in a particular way, it becomes a genre violation for them to require different combat techniques to overcome.

If you establish Lawful Weapons and DR/Law for Chaos Monsters, it becomes a genre violation for them to not have it. If you establish that Chaos Monsters are ambivalent to whether you have Lawful Weapons, it becomes a genre violation for them to have DR/Law at a later date.

The fact that a Death Slaad has DR/Law and a Marilith does not is a genre violation no less severe than the crashed space ship in the X-Series.

-Username17

[Bigode]

Certainly the genre of a story can can spawn new character roles.

But, to try to get a better example than the earlier one (which did discount rocket launchers, for example): something characters expect to fight in a level-based game is unbalanced enough towards damage dealing that it can kill same-level PCs by a large margin with a single hit. DR is an useless ability. Extra dodge is highly valuable, despite them having a normally true mathematical correlation. Do I need, before deeming those 2 methods of "preventing damage" that play out differently, to consider any genre?

[RandomCasualty]

1200304612[/unixtime]]
If you establish Lawful Weapons and DR/Law for Chaos Monsters, it becomes a genre violation for them to not have it. If you establish that Chaos Monsters are ambivalent to whether you have Lawful Weapons, it becomes a genre violation for them to have DR/Law at a later date.

Well, I don't really have a problem with bringing that stuff up between editions. When you make a new edition, you can feel free to change some of the things in the old edition and just pretend that's the way it was all the time.

I don't feel like you have to be stuck in the traditional way things were just because the prior edition did it that way. I mean there are like tons of different myths about killing vampires and any literary vampire has to choose what happens with these different vampire slaying tools.

Stake through the heart, silver, fire, crosses, holy water, running water, etc.

What works? What doesn't? In blade, silver is the way to go. With Buffy, you want the stake.

I don't really see a problem with that.