Realistic Combat

[Dremmen]

... backstab you in the face with a punch.

That just doesn't seem even a little right...

..but I agree with your point that sometimes PCs need to be reminded that they are mortal. Taken down a notch or two, from time to time. For their own good. If you don't...well, an anecdote from one of the largest campaigns I've ran. This was the last session, where the two groups that were playing in my campaign albeit from different angles, had joined and now were this huge 10 PC group. A Wizard in the bunch had played smart the whole game, and thanks to meat shields and timely spells, had become pretty powerful without ever being reminded that indeed he was not godlike. The reminder came in the form of Lolth coming out of a gate ( not her avatar ) to tangle with Orcus, who the party had just revived ( unwittingly ). It was supposed to be one of those moments where the DM reads a bit of narrative and the party goes oooh and aaah until the titans move on. The Wizard decided to maximize a lightning bolt at Lolth. Despite incredulous stares from everyone at the table, he was adamant. So then I actually had to scan through Lolth's abilities - one of them being that most magic under a certain level is automatically deflected back to the caster when Lolth was the intended target.

So anyways, without Lolth even noticing, the Wizard fried himself. SO much damage - it was easily more than twice his hp. The poor player was quite speechless and got quite red faced - I'm not sure if from embarrassment or anger at losing a PC he'd gotten so powerful or what. Whatever, hopefully it was a lesson learned for him.

 

[mmadsen]

Back when I studied martial arts, my instructor gave me a similar warning about running away from a knife fight as soon as possible. He had witnessed people get lethally stabbed , but remain capable of fighting long enough to kill the person that stabbed them before finally dying.

There are stories of guys getting into a fistfight and getting punched repeatedly before realizing that something wet and sticky was running down their shirt. That's when they realized that the other guy had a knife and that they'd been stabbed.

As awful as it is to get stabbed though, it's usually not lethal. Of course, I don't want to face a 10-percent chance of death if I don't have to...

 

[deltadave]

I read someplace in the FBI website that overall survival rates for gunshot wounds are something like 70% for handguns and 30% for high powered rifles (no indication on number of shots or circumstances). IMO this leads to the idea that the range of damage for most weapons in D&D is inadequate or that the massive damage threshold is to high for 3.5e D&D. D20 Modern has a threshold of CON which works pretty well.

 

[replicant2]

I read someplace in the FBI website that overall survival rates for gunshot wounds are something like 70% for handguns and 30% for high powered rifles (no indication on number of shots or circumstances). IMO this leads to the idea that the range of damage for most weapons in D&D is inadequate or that the massive damage threshold is to high for 3.5e D&D. D20 Modern has a threshold of CON which works pretty well.

Except that D&D in no way, shape, or form models reality. It never has, has never attempted to (1E's armor vs. weapon types notwithstanding), and it never will, unless it morphs into a game like GURPS.

 

[DeeEight]

I scoff at all the talk of "realistic" combat in this thread.

Until you've wielded a styrofoam boffer like me, or stood in the cardboard shield wall and felt the impact of plastic axe blows and Nerf (R) arrows, you aren't a man.

Most of our gaming group also plays paintball together, and you see the same "I'm invincible" thinking of these players with high level characters during actual paintball games, when they go a string of games without being hit really (or hit badly anyways). I got nailed about a dozen times in one game, and hellhound had to tell me to yell "hit" because I'd totally zoned out and was just stunned that someone who shall we say, isn't typically as good a paintballer had hit me, let alone kept hitting me. Especially as I'm rolling backwards across the hayloft of the barn.

Of course in paintball, there's always a certain amount of body armor involved (much like with characters in RPGs). At the very least, there's safety masks and goggles (because you CAN lose an eye in the sport) and then people often wear other armor over areas they've had shot before. Full finger gloves, padded vests, shin/knee guards, elbow guards, etc. Take away the guns and give the guy a broadsword and wooden shield and you can go a LARPing right after paintball. Anyways, we had one player (of both RPGs and paintball) who is a BIG fellow... we're talking 6'6 and 300 pounds, and its not muscle...its blubber. The only armor he usually wore (other than the mask) was gloves and a cup. And he'd just stand there with a pump gun as everyone else is using semi or full auto guns. He'd aim, shoot, taunt you, aim, shoot... and he was a good shot, but he never feared getting shot because the balls don't have enough impact force to hurt him thru his fat. Then one day he forgot to wear the cup. And murphy's law took over and guess where the ball hit him when he did his "I'm invincible" stance during a game.

Or you can take as an example, the player who stood inside a crevice among some stacked haybales, with only his gun and head sticking out. PC's will do this in gaming adventures also... reasoning is the same, see what I'm shooting at, very small target to shoot back at, and I've got armor there (a mask, or your helm of protection or whatever). Doesn't mean the guys attacking you might find the weak point in your armor though. In the paintball game it was putting a ball DIRECTLY over the part of the mask covering his mouth. The armor did what it was supposed to, it stopped the ball... unfortunetly stopping the ball means breaking it, and the paint and ball fragments are still doing 250fps as they pass thru the small vents in the mask you need to breath thru.... right over the lips. And of course, murphy's law and players not learning the first time, during the next game he hid in the same place, and wouldn't you know it, got shot in the SAME spot again. After that he stopped hiding in places/ways that the only thing we could shoot at was his face.

 

[Celebrim]

Well, here you say that "a high level character shouldn't be threatened by a low level one with a knife", followed by " a knife is serious business".

Note that I used them in contrast, in that they are either/or. Either a high level character shouldn't be threatened by a low level one with a knife, or else a knife is serious business. There is no both. If the high level character has only a 1:256 chance of dying when he goes to punch the low level one out and take his knife away, he's still a fool to risk it. In D&D the odds against the low level one winning the fight are in the millions.

Both statements I agree with quote]

You can't agree with both. They are mutually exclusive.

Call them what you might, a character with 68 hp never has to worry about being held up by a brigand with a loaded crossbow. He can confidently step up and snatch it away secure in the knowledge that it is impossible that he might receive any serious injury.

Well, within limits, correct.

It is this impossibility that troubles me. I like my heroes to still be human, and it is in their lack of god-like invincibility that their deeds are heroic. It isn't so much about what a high level character DOES or DOESN'T let himself do, it is what players do with their characters when they have enough hp to be cocky and reckless. They don't have to dance about avoiding anything, because they are safe and secure in their hp blanket.

And yet you just said, "So the low level bad guy should not be a challenge for a high level PC" You can't have this both ways. Either its a challenge, or it isn't. If it isn't a challenge, the PC will manage to defeat the guy with the crossbow/knife/shotgun/sword to the neck/gun to the back of the head, even though the bad guy got the drop on him, or else if it is a challenge the PC will find a different way to resolve the situation or die. Hense, in a system in which brigands with crossbows are a threat to high level characters, the DM is best advised not to spring brigands with crossbows on his PC's very often or they will die.

And here I just plain disagree. I don't think that a 10th level rogue should have to take a bunch of feats to be lethal with a dagger.

Then you are wrong. Any character has to take a bunch of feats to be lethal against an experienced opponent with any weapon. That's the nature of the system.

Just the fact that he is 10th level should be merit enough to be dangerous with a dagger.

First, he is dangerous. He will probably win the fight against the thug anyway, and he's certainly a match for a dozen or more 1st level warriors. What he doesn't merit is being especially lethal with a dagger 'just because'. The game requires you to expend resources to be especially good at anything. Secondly, not he isn't. He's a 10th level rogue for crying out loud, not a 10th level fighter. If he wanted to be especially good at fighting he should be a fighter and not a rogue. A 10th level rogue without feats that enhance his combat ability is probably no better of a combatant than a 6th level fighter or so, and your thug is not far from that. It should be a fairly even fight, and cinematically even fights should not be over quickly. Anyone knows that if you want a rogue to be a match for a near level equivalent fighter in combat you have to take advantage of the one combat thing rogues do better than fighters - 'sneak attack'. So you ruling out sneak attacks was an attempt to coerse your example into a really bad one. I merely pointed out to you that with just 2 feats, not even really min/maxing, the game lets you do exactly what you said it doesn't do.

I have never known a rogue to take Power Attack...

Oh, brother. Like I said, your lack of familiarity with the game doesn't enhance your examples.

A skilled rogue doesn't make vicious thrusts into the throat - he should be able to make two or three well placed cuts that aim vitals AS HE FIGHTS (read: not sneak attack) because he's been there and knows where to cut. Slash the wrist, under the arm, behind the knee, etc - not dealing 1d4 each time like some tavern keeper NPC. So comes in the system where a high bonus to hit (skilled) translates into added damage proportional to how well the blow landed.

It sounds like you want to play a fighter.

I could keep up this conversation, but its pretty clear to me that you don't understand the implications on the design of a game if you implement it the way you say that you want to implement it. The fact is, D&D deals with the ability to generate alot of damage by the mechanisms of feats and iterative attacks. If you must, consider an iterative attack against a single foe to be a single swing doing as much damage as the total of all attacks. Feats are skill. Gaining iterative attacks are skill. Pure skill certainly does count. Having a character with both weapon finesse and power attack is an example of skil, and its in my experience really really common.

Think Lan from the Wheel of Time - its not wild Power Attacks that kill his opponents...

Oh bloody heck. How do you know? Lan doesn't have ANY stats. He's a character in a book. We have to come up with a game system for him before we know what a character like Lan has. Secondly, power attacks aren't wild attacks (or at least not necessarily). They are committed risky attacks. They are attacks in which the player chooses not to take advantage of some easy opening in favor of a much trickier - but much more rewarding - opening in his foes defences. Combat systems are abstract. All of them. You have to accept the abstractions if you want the combat to be resolved any time soon.

 

[Dremmen]

Oh, brother. Like I said, your lack of familiarity with the game doesn't enhance your examples..

So that's the second jab you took at my gaming experience. I have had games with rogues in them, as well as played rogues myself. The BAB on the Rogue is decent, but usually not enough to sacrifice for Power Attack unless you play in really high level games and then the damage from Sneak Attack overshadows whatever you can add from Power Attack anyways. The AC on most NPCs will only decrease by a point, maybe two, when you take away their Dex when you catch them by surprise. A 5th level Rogue, with a BAB of +3, and say another +2 from Weapon Finesse, has only a +5 to hit say a guardsman with Chainmail AC 15. That's 50/50 that you hit him even flat footed, and you are planning on diverting that to Power Attack for a point or two more damage? So really, I'm not making it up. Rogues in my experience don't take Power Attack, they take Quick Draw, Improved Init, Point Blank Shot and Wpn Finesse. Not saying that you sohuldn't take Power Attack as a Rogue, you take whatever floats your boat, but players that I've run games for don't spend their few feats on Power Attack. The trend is ranged sneak attacks using Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot in the last couple of games actually, very annoying if my thugs can't Spot them. Me personally I like to multiclass Rogue with a Cleric to deliver stabs with touch spells to the back of victims using some feat a friend picked up out of one of the sourcebooks.

Now, if you could so kindly quit attacking my experience at gaming, which is not in question in this particular thread, I'd appreciate.

Combat systems are abstract. All of them. You have to accept the abstractions if you want the combat to be resolved any time soon.

True, but there are some abstractions DMs are not comfortable with. That's why personally I play with the Game of Thrones D20 rules, which are more like Grim and Gritty, making the PCs using Buy the Points, using Elements of Magic for my magic system, and a couple of house rules for armor piercing effects of missile weapons at close range, the above mentioned skill based damage bonus, and the Torn Asunder Critical Hits rules. Granted, I adopted them over time, but so far it is what I'm happy with for my abstraction.

Getting back to the original idea of a skill-based in crease in damage, it adds to game speed by allowing high level characters to mow down low level thugs so no heroics lost there, while if the PC is unarmored and facing that crossbow, even from a low level character, because the damage added comes from the discrepancy between the To Hit roll and the AC, it is possible for that bolt to really hurt. And the PC would be forced to get crafty, instead of cocky. And that's all that I am looking for - a sense of vulnerability, even at high levels. I will grant that a high level PC, in armor, in front of said low level PC with a crossbow CAN be cocky, because there is about no chance any additional damage would be delivered then, but if the system was perfect then I wouldn't be blurbing it out in the forum, I'd be marketing it. It helps, it doesn't fix.


Edit: By the by, this simple house rule of skill based damage bonus also makes the high level monk character actually dangerous. Where in every game I've been a part of monks begin to lag in the ability to do serious damage in comparison to the rest of the party at around 6th level and up. They hit every time but even with bonuses and extra dice the damge they do is minimal. However their really high To Hit bonuses and multiple attacks, combined with the additional damage based on skill house rule, makes them lethal weapons.

 

[mmadsen]

Combat systems are abstract. All of them. You have to accept the abstractions if you want the combat to be resolved any time soon.

Yes, but two equally abstract systems are not necessarily equally realistic. In fact, a more abstract system could be much, much more realistic than a less abstract one.

A realistic-but-abstract system might have highly random damage effects, where a single attack might kill a hardy warrior, or a dozen wounds might not kill a frail scribe, low to-hit probability, lots of morale issues, which might contribute to the low to-hit probability, etc. -- all while conceivably being less complicated than 3.5E.

(Whether we want any of that for a D&D game is another story...)

 

[Celebrim]

So that's the second jab you took at my gaming experience...Now, if you could so kindly quit attacking my experience at gaming

Your right. I apologize. However you have said a few things which implied to me that you'd not explored the game. I probably shouldn't take them in that way, but that's how they sound to me.

For example, when you made your example about the rogue vs. the thug, you seemed to be implying that there was no way under the rules for the rogue to make a lethal attack. It seemed pretty obvious to me that in fact you could. I still maintain, whatever your level of experience, that picking a rogue as your example and then complaining when I performed a manuever that took advantage of his sneak attack ability was setting up the character to fail solely for the sake of the false example it would provide. You can't ignore the feats. They are a significant part of combat. If they weren't, a 20th level warrior would be nearly as good as a 20th level fighter.

I have had games with rogues in them, as well as played rogues myself. The BAB on the Rogue is decent, but usually not enough to sacrifice for Power Attack unless you play in really high level games and then the damage from Sneak Attack overshadows whatever you can add from Power Attack anyways.

I was responding to your suggestion that 'skill should count most' coupled with your claim that Power Attack represents 'wild attacks'. Thats suggested to me that you weren't familiar with how power attack is often used. Power attack is extremely useful for any sort of finesse 'skillful' combatant that uses a light weapon, because it lets them dump any excess to hit bonuses into thier damage. Rogues are usually a finesse combatant, although, admittedly not as much as a 'swashbuckler' type, they still can get alot of power attack. Granted a combat focused rogue will probably be powering up sneak attack, still there is alot of utility in power attack if you qualify for it, which your sample rogue with +1 STR bonus did, if only because a purely sneak attack focused rogue isn't much good against anything that doesn't take criticals.

So really, I'm not making it up. Rogues in my experience don't take Power Attack, they take Quick Draw, Improved Init, Point Blank Shot and Wpn Finesse. Not saying that you shouldn't take Power Attack as a Rogue, you take whatever floats your boat, but players that I've run games for don't spend their few feats on Power Attack. The trend is ranged sneak attacks using Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot in the last couple of games actually, very annoying if my thugs can't Spot them. Me personally I like to multiclass Rogue with a Cleric to deliver stabs with touch spells to the back of victims using some feat a friend picked up out of one of the sourcebooks.

That'll work too. Rapid shot is busted.

 

[Celebrim]

Yes, but two equally abstract systems are not necessarily equally realistic. In fact, a more abstract system could be much, much more realistic than a less abstract one.

A realistic-but-abstract system might have highly random damage effects, where a single attack might kill a hardy warrior, or a dozen wounds might not kill a frail scribe, low to-hit probability, lots of morale issues, which might contribute to the low to-hit probability, etc. -- all while conceivably being less complicated than 3.5E.

(Whether we want any of that for a D&D game is another story...)

Granted. But as I said, my underlying position is that realism is in and of itself only a secondary goal.