Frequency of Opportunity Attacks

[blargney the second]

We see opportunity attacks in our games *all the time*. The two rogues deliberately provoke OAs to trigger the fighter and paladin marks because they get hefty bonuses to AC vs OAs. Heck, almost everybody takes OAs when there's a target they really want to go after, especially if the monster's marked and/or its basic attack sucks. That's all in our control.

To a lesser extent we do get to make some OAs of our own. The DM likes to have monsters walk away from the paladin because his melee basic sucks. My fighter's the only one with a truly good MB, and I rarely make OAs. Which makes me artificially even stickier, so it's a win-win for us.
-blarg

 

[Victim]

We don't see too many. Monsters will sometimes provoke from our wizard and cleric (well, the wizard is gone now) to get into position to pound them more. They'll rarely provoke from our rogue and barbarian - generally only when a ranged guy is pinned down.

We provoke against marked enemies when defender punishment is online. Often, the monster doesn't even take the OA. Otherwise, it doesn't happen often.

 

[Akaiku]

This is also very much the case. Enemies shouldn't know what you're capable of until they've either seen it or experienced it for themselves.

Sadly, my gm plays with the "Critters know what happens cause of effects on them." interpretation that lets them know more or less exactly what the downside of violating a mark or walking past a person is. Makes sorcerous blade channeling never get used for AoO's too...

 

[exnusquam123]

I DM our game. I hope I'm correct in saying that OA's happen based completely on non-metagaming reasons from my side. I provide OA's to players in probably almost every battle, due to the fact that they position themselves well and my creatures are mostly attacking and not defending. On the flip side, the players generally avoid providing me with OA's, but will certainly go for it when they want a better position, etc. It helps that they have excellent healing, though - they are never afraid of taking a MBA. Our averages are likely 3 player OA's per battle and 1-2 DM OA's per battle.

Ex

 

[Nifft]

Sadly, my gm plays with the "Critters know what happens cause of effects on them." interpretation that lets them know more or less exactly what the downside of violating a mark or walking past a person is.

That is the standard interpretation, isn't it? For both sides of the screen: PCs and critters alike, yes?

It is good to be rid of "HA HA GOTCHA" effects.

That said, it's nicer to play with people who are not afraid to risk effects that they know about, and that too goes for PCs and critters alike. Especially Elite critters: if someone with the HP to eat OAs like candy doesn't have the balls to risk getting hit, it's going to be a long, slow grind.

Intelligent risk-taking makes the game more fun.

Cheers, -- N

 

[KarinsDad]

We see opportunity attacks in our games *all the time*. The two rogues deliberately provoke OAs to trigger the fighter and paladin marks because they get hefty bonuses to AC vs OAs. Heck, almost everybody takes OAs when there's a target they really want to go after, especially if the monster's marked and/or its basic attack sucks. That's all in our control.

Does the DM ever have the monsters take advantage of this?

For example, if the Rogue provokes and the Fighter takes his Combat Challenge, then all of the marked foes around the Fighter can shift away and spread out and attack (possibly charging, negating 1 of the 2 mark penalty) other PCs. Thus, forcing the Fighter to chase off in one direction or another.

By purposely triggering the OAs, the Rogues are in reality triggering Combat Challenge and Divine Challenge/Sanction and hence, making the Defenders less sticky.

 

[blargney the second]

Does the DM ever have the monsters take advantage of this?

For example, if the Rogue provokes and the Fighter takes his Combat Challenge, then all of the marked foes around the Fighter can shift away and spread out and attack (possibly charging, negating 1 of the 2 mark penalty) other PCs. Thus, forcing the Fighter to chase off in one direction or another.

By purposely triggering the OAs, the Rogues are in reality triggering Combat Challenge and Divine Challenge/Sanction and hence, making the Defenders less sticky.

Yep, absolutely. It's a trade-off that we're happy to make.

With my whopping huge melee basics, we're killing them that much faster. Once I've used my Combat Challenge for the round, we usually try to get the paladin to mark so we get double defender damage for even faster fasterness.

Incidentally... we have yet to see this "grind" stuff that people are always going on about.

The neat thing is that by sacrificing stickiness for one round early on (on our own terms, with guaranteed payoff for us), monsters see how much they're going to get punished if they misbehave. This actually significantly increases my stickiness in later rounds.
-blarg

 

[Benlo]

We had a guest DM come in one evening, who set up an apparently deserted village with a central building (church).

We came into the village and every time the clock in the church would ring, the DM had one of our party roll a d6. Whatever they rolled was the amount of Zombies that appeared. We had 27 at one time. That sounds really OP - but he played them like mindless "nom nom" machines. When they locked on to a target, they wouldn't release until either the target or they were dead. It was hairy for our party until we realized that. Our ranger, with a speed of 7, aggro'ed about 10 of them, then led them past a couple of our party who then OA'd them to death, turn after turn. I dropped a couple of glowstones in their path to help. I personally led 4 or 5 into a single lane alley where they could only come at me one at a time and wailed on them. Our AOE people nailed the groups as they trailed us.

It was really pretty fun - like playing a "Night of the Living Dead" movie.

I like this DM's style. I do this sort of thing myself, such as if my players were facing undisciplined troops, or they've killed commanders, so the chain of command is collapsing and chaos is unfolding.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

seconded.

Great encounter and a great story.

 

[Benlo]

seconded.

Great encounter and a great story.

Helps keep up variety, too.

Sometimes you want an epic battle of wits with a brilliant opponent. Sometimes you want to blast away battle fodder as they oafishly stumble into you.