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Disarm rules
- Thread starter Felon
- Start date
Puggins
Explorer
Just completed the relationships for you. The hunter borrows its concept directly from 3.5e. DAoC originally based paladin auras loosely from 3.5e paladin's aura of good. WoW expanded it. The mage is a straight wizard from every single edition of D&D. Ditto the rogue. The D&D warlock came out before WoW was even released. A superficial examination of the two will tell you that they have NOTHING to do with each other.
The Tiefling and the Draenei are more opposites than they are similar. Please read the fluff and look at the pictures.
As for disarm, well choose your poison: realism or gaming balance.
In "reality," anyone who is at all a competent fighter would never get disarmed. All the neato hollywood disarming moves are simply that- hollywood disarming moves. Historically, knights lost their weapons by breaking them against enemy armor or by planting them so far into the enemy that they couldn't pull them out. They didn't lose them by dropping them unless they weren't wearing armor protecting their hand and the opponent landed a spectacularly lucky shot- the guard foiled 99% of all hits agains the hand.
In terms of gaming balance, disarm tended to be useless or a single die roll that determined the result of the combat. Neither were enjoyable, so out it went, and good riddance.
It would be easier to just cut off the opponent's hand or sunder his weapon rather than disarming him.
wingedcoyote
First Post
Here's the #1 reason why Disarm doesn't work in 4E.
Open the MM and look at a random monster. Here, I'll do it -- Earth Titan. It has a +20 to hit with its basic attack, and it does 2d10+6 damage. It's described as using a greatclub, so presumably that's what it uses to attack.
Now, knock the club out of its hands. What does its attack look like now?
Monsters no longer follow the same rules as PCs, and they aren't built like PCs. Specifically, they aren't "born naked" and then given bonuses from gear -- the creature and the gear are all one entity, mechanically. This makes it much easier to create monsters and to keep them at an appropriate challenge level. It also makes Disarm extremely hard to adjudicate.
Open the MM and look at a random monster. Here, I'll do it -- Earth Titan. It has a +20 to hit with its basic attack, and it does 2d10+6 damage. It's described as using a greatclub, so presumably that's what it uses to attack.
Now, knock the club out of its hands. What does its attack look like now?
Monsters no longer follow the same rules as PCs, and they aren't built like PCs. Specifically, they aren't "born naked" and then given bonuses from gear -- the creature and the gear are all one entity, mechanically. This makes it much easier to create monsters and to keep them at an appropriate challenge level. It also makes Disarm extremely hard to adjudicate.
An ordinary person can also instantly kill somebody (or at least blind them)by stabbing them through the eyeball. None the less there have never been any rules for doing so....you just attack. This is the point of an abstract combat system.
It's generally assumed that people are always trying to do extremely effective things like disarm their foe or stab them through the eye when they attack. It's just that it doesn't actually work unless you burn through all their hit points or you use a power. This is one things that has remained consistent through every edition of D&D. The only difference has been what powers they gave rules for and who they gave it to. 3e Just happened to have chosen to gvie disarm to everyone.
So no I don't think the ability for a person to physically do something in has ever in any way indicated a need for it in the rules. If you don't thave a problem with a lack of rules for attacking body parts, riposting, locking weapons, or any number of other things you could never do without a power, you shouldn't have a problem with the lack of ability to disarm without a power.
I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.
See, what you just described isn't actually disarming him. Disarming someone means knocking his weapon away. Instead, what you described is defeating an opponent. That's when you beat him.
That's the benefit of disarming someone. You know, how when you knock his weapon away, he can't use it to fight until he recovers it? Makes sense, I think.
That's a failing of the system.
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keterys
First Post
Curiously, I think it's one of the system's greatest successes.
Thasmodious
First Post
No, its a feature. Putting all monsters and NPCs under the same umbrella as the, by necessity, most complex part of any RPG system, PC creation, was a great idea on paper, but a poor one in execution. It was unique to 3e, as well. 1e and 2e did not use the same framework for monsters and PCs. They tried something new in 3e, it didn't work, so they went back to what did. That's not a failing of the system, its good design.
wingedcoyote
First Post
You're pretty clearly looking for a game that puts a heavy emphasis on simulation and verisimilitude, and one that has a very strict connection between the rules and the specific events in the game world. With fourth edition, D&D has very deliberately moved away from these priorities -- the new D&D is about creating a fun game, and when that comes into conflict with simulationism the game always wins.
This isn't better or worse -- it's just a different style of play. Luckily there are lots of RPGs on the market -- you could just stick to 3.5, or perhaps something like Rolemaster would be more to your taste?
