The Gaming Den

Hat tip to Imban for this.

To get the least funny news out of the way-

- Cone effects are gone (Not sure about this)
- HP is no longer rolled (Yay!)

Now for the funny news (to me)
- Moving diagonally is a square only, not 1.5

Now, while this is meant to make movement on a grid easier, it's still funny. I for one, welcome WotC back to the denying geometry fold.

That is so fvcked up. It's like strafe running in an FPS, but stupider cause it takes the same amount of time to run to the corner of a square room than either of the sidesl. Fvcked up.

I can deal with the removal of the 1.5 diagonal move. I always though it was pointless anyway and counting the 1.5s got real annoying. The Saga 2x rule was the worst though. I think I can live with 1. Thats easy to work with and in the sense of a game doesnt make much difference Another nice thing is that it means airborne targets just add the elevation to the range, which is much easier than trying to calculate the distance for someone shooting a bow at a flying dragon.

RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1202598356[/unixtime]]Another nice thing is that it means airborne targets just add the elevation to the range, which is much easier than trying to calculate the distance for someone shooting a bow at a flying dragon.

It means absolutely nothing for hitting airborne targets.


Squares are just plain dumb. If you aren't using a board, they don't exist in any meaningful way. If you are using a board, you can just measure the distance yourself.

The 1.5 was just annoying, honestly. It was a bad move to retain maps on grids when you could just move to hexes if you want that granularity.

The hypotenuse of a right triangle with sides on the right being equal to one isn't one point five. (It's 1.41)

Besides, it just gets annoying counting the halvesies when you're going around obstacles.

-Crissa

Hexes are better than squares for diagonal movement only in certain directions. If you're not moving in directions that hexes find efficent, you may as well be using squares. Catharz is right, if you want to use minis, use measuring tape to decide move distance.

-Desdan

Just like 3.5 Power Attack. They gave 2x for two handers instead of 1.5, and no PA for light weaopns instead of .5. They changed it so its easier, but also less balanced. At least this is just as easy to houserule like 3.5 Power Attack was.

Crissa at [unixtime wrote:1202599446[/unixtime]]The 1.5 was just annoying, honestly. It was a bad move to retain maps on grids when you could just move to hexes if you want that granularity.

The hypotenuse of a right triangle with sides on the right being equal to one isn't one point five. (It's 1.41)

Besides, it just gets annoying counting the halvesies when you're going around obstacles.

-Crissa

Yeh, I've always been a hex fan myself.

I've always been a Makai Kingdom fan, without grids of any variety. People threaten a 5' radius circle around them, for instance.

Of course, I also rarely bother with minis or anything and just use the rule of "Whatever".

Considering me (or Imban) run our D&D games online, it'll only be relevant if we use MapTool or such a like tool.

... but still, I'm just amused.

Big fat squares for the win. (or anything resembling them).

Or at the very least free vector based movement and ranges.

How hard is it to use a fricking measure? Its standard fare in table top miniatures games...

I'm cool with squares being 1 movement, as thats how I play it at the moment. I'm not looking for simulationist efficiency from the game. If I cared, I'd get a hex grid and a bit of handwaving.

Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I don't see how declaring movement 'changed' has actually changed anything.
Most player's I've met, and I've met a lot, never use grids, and the grognards that do will probably ignore that new rule.

Rolling HP is for idiots. Some insist on doing so only because they feel lucky, that they can get an edge over their fellows, but then bitch and moan when "1" and "2" come up for more than half their levels.
What's even worse is when a DM won't even let a player take average HP for each level; it's a sign of an inexperienced DM chock full of assumptions and you're better off joining a different group or not playing at all.

And cones have always sucked, I hate calculating who gets hit nearest the point of origin. Rather just write "area attack" and it could be an orb, a cone, a spiral, a bunch of squares, anything.. it hits more than one target and that's whats important. Fancy shapes mean bullshit in a dynamic abstract environment.

When I play an RPG, I don't want an algebra session to triangulate trajectories (or was that trigonometry? I barely passed it all anyway)
In fact, I might begin an attempt to redesign how distance is measured in an RPG in a 'fuzzy math' sense, one of relative distances rather than absolute.
For instance, a Close range is worse than a Medium is worse than a Long, and no numbers would be assigned. Encounter distance would be determined within those parameters.
And I know about the Big Squares idea but the concept should be taken to the fullest extent.

Because grids/hexes are easier than measuring. Honestly. It's really a matter of simplicity.

Normally, I've never actually used a mat at all, until gaming here in the bay. Measured ranged are best for when you're not using minis, but once you are... You need to choose a tolerance of level in the beginning, else you have what is within this mm or no?

The Big Squares is a good idea, but works best with diagonals being equal to 1.

-Crissa

If you are going to use squares at all, you should allow people to go from one square to another at a cost of 1 square. It's better geometry.

There isn't any such thing as half a square of movement. There seriously isn't. You move from one square to another and it either costs you one square of movement or it costs you two squares of movement. It can't cost you some fractional square of movement because you don't keep track of fractional squares.

If you count a diagonal as one square then the distance between you and your target is the largest of the distance along the X axis and the distance along the Y axis. If you count a diagonal as two squares then the distance between you and your target is the distance along the X axis plus the distance along the Y axis. In "reality" the distance between you and another point is the square root of the summed squares of the X distance and the Y axis distance. And you know what? That's closer to the first option than the second!.

If the X axis distance is 3 and the Y axis distance is 4, the true distance is five. And if you add the X and Y axis together you get 7 (2 off) and if you just use the larger axal difference you get 4 (1 off).

And if you alternate 1 and 2 for a diagonal, then some characters will end up paying the lower distance and some will end up paying a higher price, and that's even more unbalanced and retarded than the other options.

-Username17

Taking your example, someone accepting the yoke of Euclidean geometry for their game will get exactly 5 "squares" - what gives?

Bigode at [unixtime wrote:1202650236[/unixtime]]Taking your example, someone accepting the yoke of Euclidean geometry for their game will get exactly 5 "squares" - what gives?

What, the yoke of actual Euclidean Geometry? The one where such a distance is genuinely calculated as 5? Sure. Bust out the measuring tape and take direct point to point distances. I've played enough war games to be down with that.

But the 3.5 bullshit with its half square notation counts differently depending on how you get there. Two 5' steps followed by a charge and it's 4 squares. A single double move and it eats up 5. And that's not OK. It's weird for the game to consistently report distances as high or low, but inconsistently reporting distances is flat unacceptable.

In 3.5 you can stand outside the threat range of a hill giant, and then take a 5' step in and be adjacent to him - but only if you move in "diagonally." WTF?!

And lest you think that the 1.5 diagonal is somehow "more accurate" - consider the example of an opponent who is 24 squares down the table and 7 squares to your left or right. The absolute true distance is 25.

-Username17

RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1202598356[/unixtime]]I can deal with the removal of the 1.5 diagonal move. I always though it was pointless anyway and counting the 1.5s got real annoying. The Saga 2x rule was the worst though. I think I can live with 1. Thats easy to work with and in the sense of a game doesnt make much difference Another nice thing is that it means airborne targets just add the elevation to the range, which is much easier than trying to calculate the distance for someone shooting a bow at a flying dragon.

Actually, since going diagonally is just '1 square' the distance to an object in 3-D will be the greater of the distances in the X, Y and Z directions.

We use hexes because they make more sense for everything. The 5' step thing across diagonals has always been retarded, even more so in games such as Fire Emblem when moving in a straight line (diagonally) costs you more movement than moving in straight, blocky lines.

How do hex-grids deal with 3-D?

Fwib at [unixtime wrote:1202658073[/unixtime]]How do hex-grids deal with 3-D?

Same way that square grids do.

Ain't nothing you can do about it, up is 90 degrees from whatever forward you choose.

-Username17

I'm not busting out tape. Combat takes long enough already even though its lasts 3-6 rounds. Doubling that time by making people measure is not a solution in any situation.

What are you talking about? It takes the same amount of time to measure out your movement distance than it does to count squares. Hell, less, since you just have to move the ruler a little to try a different path, but you have to count the squares again if you want to with squares.

-Desdan

Desdan_Mervolam at [unixtime wrote:1202676527[/unixtime]]What are you talking about? It takes the same amount of time to measure out your movement distance than it does to count squares. Hell, less, since you just have to move the ruler a little to try a different path, but you have to count the squares again if you want to with squares.

-Desdan

Apparently our experiences differ. Every time I've seen someone try to measure a path with a ruler the game stops while they obscure the board with their ruler and try several paths on top of trying several paths for AoEs.

I just count squares and try paths in my head on someone else's turn. It takes no real time at all.

I like how 95% of the time, this rule change makes no difference to anyone whatsoever. Let's see what has to happen in order for these rules to have an effect on tactical combat:

1. The players have to be using a square battle map instead of hexes, ruler and string, or some variant of Big Squares Method or the Vague Whiteboard Method.

2. A character wants to move diagonally for a distance that is exactly at the edge case of his maximum movement rate.

3. The orientation of the battle grid cannot be rotated to accommodate linear movement.

At this point, I think an insult for WotC would be redundant, so I'll hold my tongue.