D&D 4E List of Potential New Martial Practices

The martial power source needs to evoke the awesome and heroic ie not the everyday or mundane, to this end many of the practices presented here draw inspiration from characters from ancient Celtic, Greek and Norse myth as well as figures from Arthurian legend and still others from epic literary sources. These are intended to provide rich martial artistry which goes beyond the actual field of battle as well as opening up different flavors within the fight itself (see martial techniques).

Current Incarnation in more elaborate form
https://www.dyasdesigns.com/practices.xml

New Practices

1. *Acupressure (Martial Artist) -- Healing, Thieving ---> Delay Affliction (Physical Injuries only)
2. Acupuncture -- thieving --> may use Thieving to acquire and perform healing practices.
3. Ambush Preparations -- nature --> Traveler's Camouflage (camouflage and sound muffling tricks )
4. *Animal Tongues (ranger, monk) -- Nature / insight → Comprehend Languages (animal specific to use of normally language dependent skills without penalty such as Diplomacy / Insight / Intimidation / Bluff - many animals will also react more positively to someone who can talk the talk)
5. *Aura Manipulation (Martial Artist) -- Insight / Healing---> (Type of Deception/Minor Stealth)
6. *Aura Reading (Martial Artist) -- Insight → (sense levels)
7. *Awaken Magic Device → Expend healing surge to force item to repeat daily
8. *Battle Speech -- Insight → improved aid attack and defense at a range
9. Beast Bond -- Athletics/Nature → (accelerated familial bond creation)
10. *Blood Bond (blood-rite) -- Diplomacy → Comrades Succor
11. *Blood Demand / Blood Oath (blood-rite) -- Intimidate → Mark of Justice (extended influence via created mental affliction)
12. *Breaching Ram / Splitting the Mountain -- Dungeoneering or Athletics or Endurance--> Passwall
13. *Bringing In The Herd:Mounts --Nature → Phantom Steed
14. Bringing In The Herd:Swarm --Nature → (Obscuring or Harassing Swarm)
15. Bringing In The Herd:Stampede --Nature → (Creates Dangerous Terrain)
16. Cooking: Condensed Rations (Lembas) -- ?? → (mostly minor effects)
17. Cold Reading / Hidden Interrogation --Insight → surreptitiously gather information from someone without them knowing it.
18. Consuming the Blood of the Mighty -- history (endurance) → gain legendary boon
19. Death Trance/Sleep of Kings -- as per feign death → Feign Death ++ ( also delays afflictions and at higher levels suspend aging )
20. Deep Sea Swimmer (Beowulf) -- endurance/athletics → underwater long distance running like effect also includes not breathing even while active for an abominably long time.
21. *Double Back (Scout or Ranger or Warlord) -- Perception(Nature|Streetwise) → gain surprise on those trailing
22. Environmental Trap -- Dungeoneering (Engineering) or Create a temporary exploitable environmental hazard which you can trigger on an enemy at a later time. These eventually tend to either collapse on their own or become unreliably sticky if left for beyond a certain duration without use. Effects: Damage - Hazardous Terrain - Obscuring
23. Finding the Perfect Price -- insight -->(efficient but indirect bribery/large purchases, but man it takes time)
24. *Fourth Dimensional Packing -- Thieving, Dungeoneering ---> Tensers Disk (improved distributed carrying capacity)
25. *Heroic Exertion perq Martial Mastery -- Endurance → Use an extertion to repeat a GMT daily.
26. Heritage Claim (blood-rite) -- intimidate → (binds object to individual user / their family or other heritage group.)
27. Heroes Shout -- Athletics/Endurance → (1 per month triggers social empowerments within martial culture see hospitality and influence practices - athletics can now be used for activities associated with those practices )
28. Hone Weapon -- ??? → (enhance next use akin to alchemical constructs)
29. Hospitality -- history/diplomacy → (shelter, succor, sustenance)
30. Hunters Mind -- Nature --> (subject can see beings through partial concealment)
31. Hurl into Space -- Athletics → (temporarily sequester an object)
32. Hypnosis -- Diplomacy, Bluff → this practice allows a set of practices that are normally (self only) unless medically induced to affect others and be based on the skill you associate with this.
33. Influence of Rank -- history/diplomacy → (attendants and audience)
34. *Inspired Recuperation (Warlord) -- Diplomacy → Fantastic Recuperation
35. Library Arts (Bard) -- History, Bluff → accelerated indexing interpretation, aid other enhancement instead of +2 on history checks in the Library get +5 and enable entire party to have +1
36. *Martial Mastery/Art of the Sensei (Martial Artist) -- Insight → Forge Weapon/Armor++ (Create Inherent Weaponry/Defense Abilities only for martial classes called Martial Techniques and Martial Grandmaster Trainings
37. Makeup work -- thieving → appearance alteration
38. Marshal Troops/Oath of Fealty -- History/Diplomacy/Religion → (efficient application and acquisition of troops / followers)
39. Master of Cyphers -- history → better than linguistics you can figure out things encoded with secrecy in mind, languages too you can read any language related to one you know fluently but and with effort and time even those unrelated.
40. Messenger Birds -- Nature → Animal Messenger (more range but more limited destinations sometimes using pheromones to can be used to temporarily change destinations )
41. Method Acting -- Insight, Diplomacy (others) → (tenaciously convincingly assume a known personality)
42. Mimicry -- Perception → (sound like a person or other thing, can also enhance foraging/hunting specifically)
43. *Oath of Independence / Riddle of Steel --Athletics , Endurance → Disenchant (Destroy magic item - converts to Karma Points).
44. *Oath Binding -- Intimidation/Diplomacy/Insight → Create Grandmaster Trainings - (not limited to martial flavor)
45. *Oath of Truthfulness (blood-rite) -- Intimidate → (sub case of Blood Oath - stutter or tongue swells if they lie)
46. *Obscure Trail (Scout or Ranger) -- Nature / Streetwise / Stealth →( sense and lose follower )
47. Parkour (French Military) -- Acrobatics / Athletics → (evade difficult terrain and fast climbing.
48. Perfect Escape -- engineering or perception -- Sub function of teleport (create or discover a not easily followed escape route - bonus enemy may think you are dead)
49. Peerless Tracker (Ranger) -- Nature → (perfect safe traffic to the target)
50. *Psychiatric Treatment -- Insight → Delay (Mental) Affliction
51. Reincarnative Dream(blood-rite) -- History,Healing,Endurance → (skilled sleepwalking) karma cost from task performed
52. Skillful Guide (Mountain Guide / Forest Guide / Sea Guide) -- Insight/Diplomacy → (Enhances "aid other" making it multiple target and when pushed speeds protracted activity)
53. *Surgery (Croaker/Aesclepios) -- Healing,Thieving ---> Remove (physical) Affliction.
54. Sweat It Out -- Athletics, Endurance, Healing --> Cure Disease ( longer time, less dangerous, more reliable )
55. *Training Montage / Training From Hell -- Endurance --> Cross World Self ( Retraining and also allows converting items in to Karma and acquisition of new GMT or Martial Techniques)
56. *Trained Preparedness (Scout and Warlord) -- Insight/Streetwise---> (on the fly purchasing of basic tools)
57. *Trance / Sleeping in the Saddle (Martial Artist and Soldier) -- Endurance / Healing --> Alarm (sort of it)
58. Tree Top Runner / Brachiation /Roof Top Runner -- Acrobatics or Athletics - effects similar to flight no tracks are left and no impact of most forms of difficult or dangerous terrain and accelerated speed but only over forest and denser city areas (evades most land bound encounters)
59. *Wrestling with Death (blood-rite) -- Athletics AND Insight ---> Cure (Mortal) Disease

Fixed Practices

1. Alter Ego (split into Makeup / Method Acting and Mimicry)
2. Feign Death ( split into Death Trance)
3. Forge Weapon
4. Forge Armor
5. Speech without words

Notations

-- skills associated
---> Analog Ritual (description of new effect or detail which is different than the analog ritual)
* Cbloader .part file exists (not final form)

Martial Practices Design and Usage Notes

• In keeping with DMG2 guidelines even scaling practices will generally have a difficult skill check which if successful you do not expend the healing surge this time. MP that do not scale beyond when acquired have a skill check based on their associated level. The healing surge costs may occasionally be optional costs kicking in only when benefit occurs ... some rituals will have similar changes.
• An MP (or ritual) used appropriately in a skill challenge scenario should be considered worth a auto success if not two.
• A Healing surge is a cost that discourages use in combat to a degree that sometimes the time cost like you see in rituals is less necessary. (A healing surge for example in parkour is a rushed performance cost).

Related New Rules and Rules Elements

• Karma Points.(necessary for martial practices to achieve ongoing permanent effects - also a useful abstraction in a campaign where actual money and wealth are conceptually not in your face)
• Ways to gain or induce Physical Afflictions (various wounds) and Mental Afflictions(ptsd and similar)
• Martial Art a grouping of Martial Techniques and possibly Grandmaster Trainings can be purchased as a martial practice.
• Martial Techniques (analogs to weapons, armor and shield)
• Rehearsed Practices/Preparations - may involve karma point costs instead of a healing surge cost if you wish to maintain them beyond the day of rehearsal.These operate analogous to a scroll or potion and for some bring time to perform down to a standard action.
• Persistant Practictioner Feat - Pick several practices number to be determined perhaps based on an attribute associated with each and if you spend X minutes longer or perhaps 2x You can use endurance as the Normal skill for reducing the Healing Surge Cost on that use.

Usage Price for Practices

It has been pointed out DMs really can just enable the effects of martial practices even allowing the healing surge cost. The DMG2 has a guideline that defines the relative value and the use space for both practices and rituals establishing a suggested improvisation effectiveness. A martial Practice or Ritual according to the DMG2 each when used in an appropriate challenge give an auto success, but so will spending 1/10 the price of a magic item or spending a Healing surge in appropriate effort. Rituals use cost ranges from 1/4 to 1/2 (aka 1/40 to 1/20th of a magic item price) . This greater efficiency is rather the point of learning the ritual no such benefit by the default rules occurs for Practices.

These rules fill that discrepancy improving the efficiency of practices to be analogous to rituals making them worthwhile even if the DM allows improvisation (as many DMs may)

Most easily expressed a skill check can be used to allow a practice to forgo the healing surge cost. This feature allows the cost of practices to act more like rituals for instance while low level rituals are often still useful at higher levels their cost effectively fades out.

We also have contexts for use of Karma Points for practices (such as those being rehearsed into something akin to a scroll).

Costs in Karma or the DC to reduce/remove the HS cost of a Practice.

Karma Costs [full], ¼, ⅓, ½ and DCs

1. [36] → 9 or 12 or 18 (DC 15)
2. [52] → 13 or 17 or 26
3. [68] → 15 or 23 or 34 (DC 16)
4. [84] → 21 or 28 or 42
5. [100] → 25 or 33 or 50 (DC 17)
6. [180] → 45 or 60 or 90
7. [260] → 65 or 87 or 130 (DC 18)
8. [340] → 85 or 113 or 170
9. [420] → 105 or 140 or 210 (DC 19)
10. [500] → 125 or 153 or 250
11. [900] → 225 or 300 or 450 (DC 20)
12. [1300] → 325 or 433 or 650
13. [1700] → 425 or 533 or 850 (DC 21)
14. [2100] → 525 or 700 or 1050
15. [2500] → 625 or 833 or 1250 (DC 22)
16. [4500] → 1125 or 1500 or 2250
17. [6500] → 1525 or 2166 or 3250 (DC 23)
18. [8500] → 2125
19. [10500] → 2625 (DC 24)
20. [12500] → 3125
21. [22500] → 5625 (DC 25)
22. [32500] → 8125
23. [42500] → 10625 (DC 26)
24. [52500] → 13125
25. [62500] → 15625 (DC 27)
26. [112500] → 28125
27. [162500] → 40625 (DC 28)
28. [212500] → 53125
29. [312500] → 78125 (DC 29)
30. [562500] → 140625

The usage cost for some rituals are significantly lower than their level in that instance I am assuming an effect where the value of the ritual is effectively lower than its Awesomeness. This is true of practices as well. A good example of this occurs in the epic "to be renamed" hurl into space maneuver it is really somewhat less valuable than hidden pocket (as it is mayhaps location limited), but is flavor wise an epic use of athletics but which might have a DC of only 16. (so when you get the practice you may find it almost never costing appreciable exertion) .

Martial Techniques now moved to its own thread

4E - Martial Techniques

Largely just wondering if anyone else has ideas

Basically we need 10 more...

Edit* have well exceeded that.

Epic rocky-esque training montage? I kid, I kid. Maybe something related to building pain tolerance like the pain taster from pathfinder. Or something like focusing on controling involuntary functions. But something related to the fact that no matter who you are,what race you are, the fact you can alter reality with your mind does not remove the fact that punching things is extremely painful to your hands. Maybe something related to toughening the hands/bones in the hands? Preparing psionic battle wraps? Making bruce lee noises in the mirror for a half hour?

tuxedoraptor said:

Epic rocky-esque training montage? I kid, I kid. Maybe something related to building pain tolerance like the pain taster from pathfinder. Or something like focusing on controling involuntary functions. But something related to the fact that no matter who you are,what race you are, the fact you can alter reality with your mind does not remove the fact that punching things is extremely painful to your hands. Maybe something related to toughening the hands/bones in the hands? Preparing psionic battle wraps? Making bruce lee noises in the mirror for a half hour?

Click to expand...

They have been doing the Iron Fist thing as a feat wrapped up in the multiclassing monk...HOWEVER it has occurred to me that building magical/inherent bonuses in to non-weapon attacks is right up there with other things like how a martial practice enables building basic magic weapons... its in the same arena, and binding it to the toughening of hands and flesh/bone, or "The way of the iron fist" might indeed be appropriate as a martial practice -- > Iron Palm Training. In this case you do it once and keep it "honed." with practice.

Might give it the Martial Artist name "Iron Palm Training" instead of "Physical Empowerment" or "Herculean Fists'.

In fact that reminds me a Hone Weapon practice that allows one to keep a weapon well and truly sharpened (maybe bonus damage on the first attack which lands after it has been honed?)


Thank you for your thoughts

tuxedoraptor said:

Preparing psionic battle wraps?

Click to expand...

I am currently ignoring that NON-Martial martial artist

Added Parkour to the list...

This is very much a real world martial practice. (Originated with the French). Skill is generally acrobatics based. The primary technique is examine area... then navigate difficult/dangerous terrains without impairment (if you are in a rush you may spend a healing surge to do this without taking the time to examine things properly). A secondary effect would be able to use acrobatics instead of athletics for climbing.

One direction I thought to go with this is to enumerate rituals which we think CANNOT be converted directly into martial practices.

Then figure out indirect methods of approaching it.

For instance Teleport

Garthanos said:

.
Then figure out indirect methods of approaching it.

For instance Teleport

Click to expand...

Hero had tricks like using powers to represent extraordinary skill use. Teleport could be used for superhuman escape artistry or stealth ...

Tony Vargas said:

Hero had tricks like using powers to represent extraordinary skill use. Teleport could be used for superhuman escape artistry or stealth ...

Click to expand...

Extraordinary skill use is almost definitional to either a Martial Practice or a Skill Power