Preferences regarding "save to resist" vs. "roll to hit" mechanics?

I'm pondering different game systems, and wondering what people's feelings are about how you resolve whether something affects a character.

In 3rd and 5th edition (and Pathfinder 1st edition):

• if I attack you with a weapon, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with a beam of energy, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with an area of energy, you roll to resist.
• if rocks fall toward you, you roll to resist.
• if I attack your mind with a compulsion, you roll to resist.
• if I attack your lungs with poison gas, you roll to resist.

In 4th edition:

• if I attack you with a weapon, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with a beam of energy, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with an area of energy, I roll against your defense.
• if rocks fall toward you, the rocks roll against your defense.
• if I attack your mind with a compulsion, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack your lungs with poison gas, I roll against your defense.

And to shake off a negative effect, in 3rd/5th/PF, if I paralyze you with magic, each round thereafter you roll to resist against a specific DC, which can be easy or hard depending on how powerful I am relative to you.

In 4e, if you're paralyzed, each round you might get a roll to resist, but my power matters almost not at all. It's as easy for a dragon to break free as a squirrel.

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How do you feel about the difference? Do you prefer the mechanical consistency of 'the thing that might cause harm rolls to see if it harms the victim' (i.e., 4e), or do you like the idea that whoever is most active is the one who rolls? Like, in 3rd/5th/PF, you vaguely aim your fireball, but you can't use something like true strike to help it hurt someone. In 4e you can.

Any preferences? Does it change the feel of the game? Is it weird to have boulders 'attacking' you?

RangerWickett said:

Any preferences? Does it change the feel of the game? Is it weird to have boulders 'attacking' you?

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For me, it just seems more intuitive that the do-er of a thing is the one who rolls for its success.

I generally prefer mechanical consistency, typically player-facing consistency where the players are the ones who roll everything. (Excluding GM charts and tables.) Something risks harm for the players? They roll to avoid it.

This is nice for a number of reasons. (1) Players are getting the chance to roll more. (2) Players don't blame the GM for attack rolls against them. If they were hit, then the fault shifts to their own rolls. (3) The GM gets to focus on running story, encounter generation/design, etc. instead of rolling.

My favorite is neither of the above, but roll vs roll. It's swingier, but keeps both sides engaged in the process and opens up other possibilities for defenders - like in HackMaster crit defense can result in a riposte.

RangerWickett said:

I'm pondering different game systems, and wondering what people's feelings are about how you resolve whether something affects a character.

In 3rd and 5th edition (and Pathfinder 1st edition):

• if I attack you with a weapon, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with a beam of energy, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with an area of energy, you roll to resist.
• if rocks fall toward you, you roll to resist.
• if I attack your mind with a compulsion, you roll to resist.
• if I attack your lungs with poison gas, you roll to resist.

In 4th edition:

• if I attack you with a weapon, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with a beam of energy, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack you with an area of energy, I roll against your defense.
• if rocks fall toward you, the rocks roll against your defense.
• if I attack your mind with a compulsion, I roll against your defense.
• if I attack your lungs with poison gas, I roll against your defense.

And to shake off a negative effect, in 3rd/5th/PF, if I paralyze you with magic, each round thereafter you roll to resist against a specific DC, which can be easy or hard depending on how powerful I am relative to you.

In 4e, if you're paralyzed, each round you might get a roll to resist, but my power matters almost not at all. It's as easy for a dragon to break free as a squirrel.

---

How do you feel about the difference? Do you prefer the mechanical consistency of 'the thing that might cause harm rolls to see if it harms the victim' (i.e., 4e), or do you like the idea that whoever is most active is the one who rolls? Like, in 3rd/5th/PF, you vaguely aim your fireball, but you can't use something like true strike to help it hurt someone. In 4e you can.

Any preferences? Does it change the feel of the game? Is it weird to have boulders 'attacking' you?

Click to expand...

I use PAR Players Always Roll.

If the NPC orc throws a spear at your PC you roll d20 +AC. Success indicates not successful. Failure is a hit.
If your PCs throw Hold Person on the NPC orc, you roll d20+DC to see if the orc is held or not. Success is held, failure is not. (DC is your character's spell save DC.)

For the player it's the same numbers shown on their sheets already.

So, the "static target DC" is on the NPC side always.

Works great - for years and years - in many different systems. All that is required is like 3m of math when I decide to use it for a game and then I just writes that blocks listing the NPC with "AR 25" say instead of "+3 attack bonus" etc.

When they roll a natural 1 on their "armor check" and take a crit, then roll their own damage - it's something.

In no small part I think this helps them see it as NPCs vs them, not me vs them, because I am not actively rolling the attack or damage against them. It puts more spotlight on them - as the center for resolution. It's more action movie like John McC dodging bullet swarms and blocking or taking punches instead of focusing on the villain shooter.

In D&D which doesn't have "active defenses", I prefer the creature taking the action rolls in all situations. So I like 4e Fort/Reflex/Will defenses over saves.

Where I'm a bit hazy is for ongoing issues. If I cast a spell that affects you with freezing cold that does ongoing damage and slows you, should the caster make an attack every round - which may not be on their turn, they might be dead, or they might have gotten buffed/debuffed since which changes their attack numbers. Or does the person under the effect need to roll, which brings us back to saves but only in a limited selection of cases.

In a game system set up for it, I like the idea of players do all the rolling.

Probably not helpful but: neither. I prefer to roll to Parry or Dodge instead of taking it up the chin if the GM's attack roll succeeds. In the case of mind attack, a Willpower resistance roll instead, possibly as Opposed Roll against the power of the magic.

Any preferences? Does it change the feel of the game? Is it weird to have boulders 'attacking' you?

Click to expand...

As GM I have players roll as much as necessary, even rolling for NPC's if I can get them to. So a lot of this, the "to hit" is fine, if they are rolling it. For me as a player, the consistency of doing it the "to hit" way is fine too.

RangerWickett said:

Any preferences? Does it change the feel of the game? Is it weird to have boulders 'attacking' you?

Click to expand...

It is weird to have boulders attack, because they're inanimate objects which lack agency. The die roll is supposed to represent how well they succeed at what they're trying to do, and boulders don't want anything; they care equally little, whether they hit a person or the ground. A better mechanic would be for the GM to roll randomly, in order to determine whether the boulder falls on the character in the first place; but that leads to the unfortunate situation where they roll behind a screen and inform you that you have died. A saving throw is a good middle ground there, since you presumably want to avoid getting hit, and the die roll measures how well you do that.

When making an attack roll, the enemy wants to hit you, and you want to avoid getting hit. In theory, you should both roll. However, rolling two dice has the unfortunate side-effect of normalizing the distribution, making unlikely events even less-likely than they should be. Whether the attacker or the defender rolls is not important, but consistency is important, so you might as well let the attackers roll. (Or always let the player roll, if the system math is reversible like that.)

When casting a fireball, you don't really have control over the individual flames, or how the ball expands. The caster really only has control over forming the spell in the first place, and setting the point of impact. In that case, an enemy dodging the explosion is a lot like someone dodging a boulder, since the fire doesn't have a goal or agency. Moreover, since fireballs often hit multiple targets, it makes sense from a practical standpoint for each player to roll the one die for their own character, rather than having one person roll multiple times for different characters that all have different bonuses. (In cases where a PC is the one casting fireball, the enemies often have the same bonus, and it's easier for the GM to decide which roll goes for which enemy since they don't really care.)

I prefer 4e/SWSE's NADs (Non Armor Defenses) to other DnD editions' saving throws, but I prefer 5e's spell DC system for ongoing effects.

In my own game, all characters (anything that can take actions is a character) have 2 Quick Actions per round, which can be used during your turn, or in some cases, outside of your turn. If you're targeted by something, you can use a Quick Action to make an Active Defense Check, using an appropriate skill. If you don't have an appropriate skill, you can spend 1 Attribute Point (your stats are resource pools, so strong characters have more Strength Points to spend) from an appropriate Attribute to roll dice equal to that Attribute instead. IF you don't do that, it simply targets one of your Attributes, which means the DC is 10+targeted Attribute+any bonuses.

The actor always rolls, and the acted upon only rolls if they choose to take the risk/reward gamble of active defense.