Action economy wins the game, as we all know. The problem with that is that Wizards get to rely on Standard Actions to do their winning, while Fighters have to rely on Full-Round Actions. Thus, the easiest way I can see to balance them is change the price of actions and how many everyone gets.
Full Action: Encompasses everything that Standard and Move Actions do combined. You can use one to move your speed, make an attack, etc.
Half Action: Encompasses everything that Swift and Immediate Actions do.
Getting Full Actions: Everyone gets 2 Full Actions and 1 Half Action a round. At every point you would normally get an Iterative Attack, you instead gain 1 Full Action. Thus, at 20th level, the Fighter has 6 Full Actions and 1 Half Action, while the Wizard has 4 Full Actions and 1 Half Action.
Getting Half Actions: It can be a class feature to gain more Half Actions, as shown by the Tome Fighter.
Spellcasting: Depending on how powerful a spell is, it costs more Full Actions to cast. Evocation, being weak, costs 1 Full Action. Win spells like Sleep and Stinking Cloud and the like, cost 2 Full Actions. We can even charge higher level spells more Full Actions, as the Wizard will have more to spend at higher levels.
Attacks: Obviously, the Fighter can now move further than lesser characters on the battlefield at the cost of his attacks. Also, since we've upgraded him to effectively two Standard Actions a round at 1st level, we have every attack after the first made at a -5 penalty.
Effects That Grant Extra Attacks: Things like Haste and Speed no longer grant extra attacks. They instead remove the -5 penalty from one extra attack per round. In return, these effects stack, so if you can get five different such effects, a 20th level Fighter can attack at full bonuses on all six attacks provided he doesn't move.
This has been pretty stream of consciousness typing, so tell me what I've missed.
Full and Half Actions
Moderator: Moderators
Full and Half Actions
Last edited by TOZ on Fri Nov 26, 2010 4:19 am, edited 1 time in total.
Unless a half action really is "0.5 full actions", in the sense that one full action can be traded for two half actions (or vice versa), that is a needlessly confusing terminology.
If they're not exchangable, give them names that reflect the fact that they are different in kind, rather than in quantity. Maybe call them "actions" and "flourishes" or something.
And as I said in the extra attacks thread, giving people more actions at higher levels is probably not a good way to fulfill most plausible design goals. It tends to give you lengthy turns at the high end and inflexible turns at the low end and create breakpoints in the middle where you undergo a gigantic power jump at a couple specific levels. I'd pretty much only recommend them if you're trying to maintain compatibility with D&D, which...it sounds like is already out the window if you'd need to manually adjust the action cost on every spell in the game to make this work.
At which point, it sounds like you're basically taking move/swift/standard and setting move = standard, which is a perfectly workable action system, and one you've probably played with in one game or another.
If they're not exchangable, give them names that reflect the fact that they are different in kind, rather than in quantity. Maybe call them "actions" and "flourishes" or something.
And as I said in the extra attacks thread, giving people more actions at higher levels is probably not a good way to fulfill most plausible design goals. It tends to give you lengthy turns at the high end and inflexible turns at the low end and create breakpoints in the middle where you undergo a gigantic power jump at a couple specific levels. I'd pretty much only recommend them if you're trying to maintain compatibility with D&D, which...it sounds like is already out the window if you'd need to manually adjust the action cost on every spell in the game to make this work.
At which point, it sounds like you're basically taking move/swift/standard and setting move = standard, which is a perfectly workable action system, and one you've probably played with in one game or another.
The original idea I got this from was allowing move actions to be used to make attacks at -5. So you get one standard and an increasing number of moves. I figured one unified action would be simpler, but I suppose using the current understanding of standard and move actions with that addition will be easier for players to grasp.
So instead of combining the actions, add the attack ability to move actions and give extra of them?
So instead of combining the actions, add the attack ability to move actions and give extra of them?
Last edited by TOZ on Fri Nov 26, 2010 5:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Full and Half Actions
Cleaned up a bit.
Standard Action: Unchanged.
Move Action: Add ability to attack at a -5 penalty.
Swift Action: Add some cool abilities for the melee types to use.
Additional Move Actions: Instead of an iterative attack, characters gain an additional move action at those levels. Thus, at 20th level, the Fighter has 1 Standard Action, 5 Move Actions, and 1 Swift Action, while the Wizard has 1 Standard Action, 3 Move Actions, and 1 Swift Action.
Spellcasting: Mostly unchanged, although spells that increase base speed should be changed to add Move Actions per round. Probably also need to disallow trading Move for Swift Actions so Wizards aren't throwing multiple Swift Action spells.
Standard Action: Unchanged.
Move Action: Add ability to attack at a -5 penalty.
Swift Action: Add some cool abilities for the melee types to use.
Additional Move Actions: Instead of an iterative attack, characters gain an additional move action at those levels. Thus, at 20th level, the Fighter has 1 Standard Action, 5 Move Actions, and 1 Swift Action, while the Wizard has 1 Standard Action, 3 Move Actions, and 1 Swift Action.
Spellcasting: Mostly unchanged, although spells that increase base speed should be changed to add Move Actions per round. Probably also need to disallow trading Move for Swift Actions so Wizards aren't throwing multiple Swift Action spells.
