D&D 5E How much should 5e aim at balance?

Lokiare · Aug 15, 2012

Ratskinner said:
a) There are plenty of people around here that would argue that every single hit ever contains some element of physical damage. I don't share this view, but openly stating the opposite would cause some to abandon any such game as "not D&D". (I would presume, given comments that I've read here and elsewhere.)

b) I don't think you (quite) got what I was saying. I'm suggesting that maybe Sleep should do 3d6 Drowsiness damage, with the caveat that it can only drop targets unconscious. Charm Person should do 1d6/level charm damage, and if that drops the target, it switches to your side, otherwise it just saps its will to fight you. Weapon attacks and spells that do "normal" damage, would function similarly to each other, perhaps causing more substantial wounds if they "drop" you. If HP are really only "plot-token" staying power, then use them as such.

To be clear, I'm only musing on the idea. For all the reasons @the _Choice mentioned and a few more.

Strangely enough that's similar to how Aetherianica (the game I'm making right now) works.

You have three different hit point pools: Trauma, Stress, and Endurance.

If your Trauma hits 0 you are 'dying', if your Stress hits 0 you are 'having a mental breakdown' and if Endurance hits 0 'you are exhausted'. Each type of attack deals one of those kinds of damage. For instance a charm spell might deal Stress damage and when you reach 0 you are then under the control of the person that dropped you to 0. Endurance can be sapped by slamming on the shield and armor without dealing physical damage, eventually you are so battered and tired that you drag yourself across the battlefield barely able to swing your weapon.

You'd be surprised how flexible it really is.

pemerton · Aug 15, 2012

Emerikol said:
I caveated my one reference on here to board games inside out. I did not say 4e was a board game. I said the people approached the playing of the game in the same manner where they are moving pieces instead of being a character.

Which people are you referring to when you say "the people"?

I have given an actual play example - the paladin/polymorph example - where the presence of the metagame duration mechanic (which is "dissociated" by Justin Alexander's criteria) enhanced rather than udnercut the player's playing of his PC.

I could give other examples, too, if you want.

You seem to be assuming that no one who plays 4e, or uses metagame mechanics, can be playing characters or inhabiting their PCs or doing anything that you recognise as roleplaying. Which is frankly bizarre - even if you've never come across non-shallow 4e play, what do you think goes on in the typical game of Burning Wheel, The Riddle of Steel or HeroQuest revised?

pemerton · Aug 15, 2012

Ratskinner said:
I'm suggesting that maybe Sleep should do 3d6 Drowsiness damage, with the caveat that it can only drop targets unconscious. Charm Person should do 1d6/level charm damage, and if that drops the target, it switches to your side, otherwise it just saps its will to fight you. Weapon attacks and spells that do "normal" damage, would function similarly to each other, perhaps causing more substantial wounds if they "drop" you. If HP are really only "plot-token" staying power, then use them as such.

4e comes within the same neighbourhood as this - psychic damage, for instance, and some monster powers that cause specific non-death conditions upon the PC being reduced to zero hp - but doesn't enter this particular ballpark. It keeps a whole suite of hit-point independent conditions.

I think the "everything does damage" approach would be elegant. I personally like the "hit points plus conditions" approach only because the conditions game is more tactically interesting. Which is to say, I prefer [MENTION=90669]The Choice[/MENTION]'s option of non-casters also getting condtion-infliction.

But the "all hp, all the time" appraoch certainly strikes me as viable in principle, and would be more consistent and generate fewer corner cases than the 4e approach (eg in 4e, when you are knocked unconsscious by a sleep spell, how does that compare to falling unconscious because you got reduced to zero hp?).

Lanefan · Aug 16, 2012

pemerton said:
(eg in 4e, when you are knocked unconsscious by a sleep spell, how does that compare to falling unconscious because you got reduced to zero hp?).

It compares in that the latter option usually hurts a whole lot more when you wake up.

Otherwise, the condition "unconscious" is what it is, regardless how it was arrived at; but some people in the "unconscious" condition also have that annoying "dying" condition tacked on.

Lanefan

Mustrum_Ridcully · Aug 16, 2012

pemerton said:
4e comes within the same neighbourhood as this - psychic damage, for instance, and some monster powers that cause specific non-death conditions upon the PC being reduced to zero hp - but doesn't enter this particular ballpark. It keeps a whole suite of hit-point independent conditions.

I think the "everything does damage" approach would be elegant. I personally like the "hit points plus conditions" approach only because the conditions game is more tactically interesting. Which is to say, I prefer [MENTION=90669]The Choice[/MENTION]'s option of non-casters also getting condtion-infliction.

But the "all hp, all the time" appraoch certainly strikes me as viable in principle, and would be more consistent and generate fewer corner cases than the 4e approach (eg in 4e, when you are knocked unconsscious by a sleep spell, how does that compare to falling unconscious because you got reduced to zero hp?).

Hit Points all the time may be boring, though, because you first only whittle down hit points until something meaningful happens.

I like to have a mix. One way I could see it work is if you get people over certain hit point threshold (like Bloodied), you already get an effect. Say, you may have 4 thresholds:
3/4 hit points, 1/2 hit points, 1/4 hit points, no hit points.
An effect that can inflict a condition can state that it inflicts that specific condition if you bring the target down to that condition level (either with that attack, or simply because you hit it and is at that condition level after the attack, regardless of why it was there before. Needs tweaking.)

It could basically also substitute for a wound system. Everytime you take 1/4 of your hit points in damage, you take a "wound" - except some effects do not create physical wounds but special conditions, like charmed or disintegrated or whatever. Wounds take time to heal off, and some conditions may likewise require some extra effort to fix.

Neonchameleon · Aug 16, 2012

Ratskinner said:
Y'know. This kind of thing is making me think more and more about "Save or Suffer" and the mechanics that underlie it. I'm starting to think that if dodging, resisting, avoiding, covering, blocking, etc. are all rolled into HP, then any attack, spell or not, should do HP damage. Actual wounds would only be "triggered" on the last hp. It'd be a big change, and maybe not a good one. Especially since it would indicate that "damage" would explicitly not be wounding (except for that last hp.)

The part I've never understood is how trying to turn someone to stone somehow gets to ignore someone's explicitely at least partly magical protection and luck, but trying to stick a foot of solid steel straight through their skull doesn't.

pemerton · Aug 16, 2012

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
Hit Points all the time may be boring, though, because you first only whittle down hit points until something meaningful happens.

Agreed. For me, that was a good part of the reason for leaving AD&D for Rolemaster. 4e brought me back to D&D, in part because of its condition-heavy combat resolution.

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
One way I could see it work is if you get people over certain hit point threshold (like Bloodied), you already get an effect.

<snip>

It could basically also substitute for a wound system.

<snip>

except some effects do not create physical wounds but special conditions, like charmed or disintegrated or whatever. Wounds take time to heal off, and some conditions may likewise require some extra effort to fix.

That looks like it could work, too.

Ratskinner · Aug 16, 2012

Neonchameleon said:
The part I've never understood is how trying to turn someone to stone somehow gets to ignore someone's explicitely at least partly magical protection and luck, but trying to stick a foot of solid steel straight through their skull doesn't.

Exactly. A petrification spell would do some amount of "petrifying" damage. If that damage reduced the target past 0 hp, they would turn to stone. Otherwise, they lose the hp. Narratively, they might feel stiff and turn grey momentarily.

Emerikol · Aug 16, 2012

Tony Vargas said:
....stuff....

Tony when you have a system at launch that has daily powers for every single class then there is no fixing the dissociation problem. Daily martial powers are hopelessly dissociative. I can't just choose to explain them in some particular way and then it's not dissociative. There are other things that can be explained in different ways. Hit points for example could be explained in a certain way to become dissociative. I've never done that with hit points so it's never occurred to me. But if I can go either way then that is fine. I think that 1e,2e,3e all had things that could be used in a way that would be dissociative for some people but no one was required to play that way.

To me a dissociative mechanic is by definition something that cannot be played any other way. If it has a way where it can be played which is not dissociative then I consider the entire mechanic as non-dissociative. Even if in theory some people could use it dissociatively.

Tony Vargas · Aug 16, 2012

Emerikol said:
Tony when you have a system at launch that has daily powers for every single class then there is no fixing the dissociation problem. Daily martial powers are hopelessly dissociative. I can't just choose to explain them in some particular way and then it's not dissociative.

Maybe you can't, but others /can/. That suggests to me the issue is too subjective to be of much value. But, for the sake of argument, say that we grant that dailies for all classes is impossible for the core system, for the reason that /some/ may find the the offense to their anti-dissociativistic sensibilities insuperable.

Similarly, the giving of /some/ classes, but not others, significant daily resources produces an unavoidable balance issue that, likewise, makes such a core approach impossible.

Ergo: the only practical way to present core is /without any daily powers whatsoever/.

From there, modules introducing daily mechanics could be presented. Those wishing to evoke a certain feel could selectively add those mechanics only to those classes they feel are deserving of them, while those concerned with balance could either decline to use them entirely or introduce them to all classes. Even those wishing for both could tailor a campaign to allow it, by keeping to a very strict formula for challenges presented in an average adventuring day, in order to hover near whatever balance point is dictated by their particular mix of disparate class abilities.

D&D 5E How much should 5e aim at balance?

Lokiare

Banned

pemerton

Legend

pemerton

Legend

Lanefan

Victoria Rules

Mustrum_Ridcully

Hero

Neonchameleon

Legend

pemerton

Legend

Ratskinner

Adventurer

Emerikol

Adventurer

Tony Vargas

Legend

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