Why have dissociated mechanics returned?

[pemerton]

But that always happens! You never, ever run in fear between hazards, or past them, you always run into them! Sometimes multiple times (if you save the first time and there's enough forced movement)!

I can see three ways to handle this issue. There are probably others I'm not thinking of.

One is to give it to the player. In which case the hazard will always be avoided, unless something else very odd is going on in the situation.

Another is to make it random. This would be the Gygaxian ideal, I think: it's player skill to avoid running in fear, but once you do the dice determine what happens to you. Sometimes you'll fall into the pit, sometimes avoid it, but there is no dramatic rhyme or reason to it.

The third is to give it to the GM. Which is what the Deathlock Wight (and 4e more generally) does. Of the three ways, I think this one maximises the likelihood of dramatic logic governing falling into the hazard. If it is getting too boring, or too deadly, the GM is always free to do something different. Or to switch to random resolution and roll the die in front of the players (I'm sure I've done this occasionally when the Chaos Sorcerer has pushed his allies on a 1 - the rule in our game is that this is a GM's push, not a player's push.)

I guess a fourth option is to give it to the Deathlock Wight, whom the GM then plays as an NPC. But that would strike me as silly - the forced movement, here, is running away, not being literally pushed by the wight.

I think that bringing out the difference between 4 and 3 drives home the metagame character of the power. Again, for me that is a virtue. Of cousre for others it's probably an objection.

Why did they rope themselves together? They knew it had a push attack.

They roped themselves together because, before they knew there was a wight, they knew there were pits. (I can't exactly remember how, now, but I think they may have seen the underside of the pits - where they dropped through to a lower level - before they found the topside on the upper level.)

Would a character genuinely fearful not slash the rope to escape?

In the fiction, I'm happy to allow that dangling over a 30' drop might restore some clarity to the mind of even the most fearful PC! And from the metagame point of view, I don't think it would help the game to try and rob the players of their little victory. Everything else being equal, I want to encourage them to engage the gameworld and the fiction, not discourage it!

Suppose it had been as you took it to be, and knowing that a scary foe is up ahead the PCs rope themselves together. At the table, this is the players taking steps to defend against forced movement. In the fiction, it's like Ulysses and the sirens: "I fear some of us might break when we confront the undead: but if we are roped together, then none can flee as long as one of us is steadfast!" So I still wouldn't see that as a problem.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

What I like about Come and Get It (pre-errata) is that it can be a feigning of weakness, or (in the case of the fighter PC in my game) deft work with a polearm, or (in a narration suggested by [MENTION=82106]AbdulAlhazred[/MENTION]) a way of breaking out of the stop-motion turn sequence. This last idea came up when I was posting about the first use of CaGI in my game: the fighter might sprinted across a room and up some stairs to a balcony, then did CaGI - which among other things pulled some of the archers who had run down a ladder at the back of the balcony back up. AbdulAlhazred suggested this is best seen as a modest retcon or interrupt: the archers were trying to run away, but never really made it because the fighter, with his Mighty Sprint, got there first and cut them all down.

For me, this narrative flexibility is not a problem. If anything, it's a strength.

That's not an objection to your analysis - I guess all I'm saying is that when you say "better way to represent it" you are applying a certain interpretation of what is better in mechanics design that is not universal.

Out of interest - does your criterion mean that [MENTION=3424]FireLance[/MENTION] is right to describe finding secret doors in classic D&D as dissociated. I mean, there's almost certainly a more elegant perception mechanic possible!

Oh, using CAGI can allow you to perform some excellent tactical moves, drawing in enemies with ranged weapons, arranging a group perfectly for an area effect and so on. Your example just doesn't work if the archers never moved away in the first place though. If they just stood at the back shooting, why the hell would they ever approach the guy with the melee weapon? With a polearm, perhaps, but there are so many more ways in which CAGI defies logic and forces you to twist your fiction to fit.

In classic D&D there are indeed better ways to represent the perception of secret doors. They obviously didn't want it to be ability-dependent and so opted for a class/race based system (same with surprise if I recall). I believe an ability-based or skill system is more associated, yes.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

They roped themselves together because, before they knew there was a wight, they knew there were pits. (I can't exactly remember how, now, but I think they may have seen the underside of the pits - where they dropped through to a lower level - before they found the topside on the upper level.)

In the fiction, I'm happy to allow that dangling over a 30' drop might restore some clarity to the mind of even the most fearful PC! And from the metagame point of view, I don't think it would help the game to try and rob the players of their little victory. Everything else being equal, I want to encourage them to engage the gameworld and the fiction, not discourage it!

Suppose it had been as you took it to be, and knowing that a scary foe is up ahead the PCs rope themselves together. At the table, this is the players taking steps to defend against forced movement. In the fiction, it's like Ulysses and the sirens: "I fear some of us might break when we confront the undead: but if we are roped together, then none can flee as long as one of us is steadfast!" So I still wouldn't see that as a problem.

See, to me that last explanation defies logic even further. A group of adventurers are going to face a frightening creature, and they know that some of them might break and flee. There are pits they might fall into. Roping the group together leads to the entire group focusing on pulling the affected out of pits and pulling them back into the fray - realistically once you've got half the group running or dangling, the others haven't the strength to pull them back.

You allowed them their victory, but it was a superlatively metagame idea, if only because the mechanism by which characters flee in terror has a strong chance to push them into the pit. Forced movement allows a save against this, but then you're prone - far better have the save allow them to avoid it and carry on running (they're scared, but a moment of clarity avoids the pit), or even let them try to leap across it. Basically, another way of modelling fleeing in terror wouldn't lead to the bizarre situation of entering combat all tied together. I mean, maybe every other square was a pit, or they lacked light, but it was a direct consequence of the Wight's ability to push them. In a strong wind, on a cliff face or against something that is actually a physical force pushing, that makes sense, but by modelling fleeing as pushing, the game does itself a disservice.

 

[slobo777]

In a strong wind, on a cliff face or against something that is actually a physical force pushing, that makes sense, but by modelling fleeing as pushing, the game does itself a disservice.

I think D&D, and RPGs in general, suffer problems when modelling forced affects on PC's minds, perceptions and behaviours. Some kind of compromise needs to be reached, because although these effects are fantasy story staples, they break the game contract that the DM controls the NPCs and the players their PCs.

It used to drive me nuts whenever a woolly-minded DM started throwing illusion, fear and charm powers around . . . I don't mind *what* the in-game interpretation is, or whether the DM has control of my PC or I have control of my PC, or even whether that's decided round-by-round with opposed rolls. But I expect some kind of decision or ruling on this, so I can actually play the game!

3E had written rules for this, based on sub-types of charm and illusion spells (compulsions, phantasms etc etc). So few DMs (in my games) seemed to bother or understand 3E's take on it though . . .

4E's style of using forced movement for fear is a workable compromise IMO. It's simple to understand. Control is clearly with player or DM, and generally goes for the most vicious in-game effect.

 

[pemerton]

Your example just doesn't work if the archers never moved away in the first place though.

Sure, but then you'd narrate it differently.

With a polearm, perhaps, but there are so many more ways in which CAGI defies logic and forces you to twist your fiction to fit.

I've always said (in posts going back well over a year) that a fighter using CaGI it with a dagger against oozes and magma hurlers puts more pressure on the fiction than a fighter using CaGI with a polearm against goblins and hobgoblins. But I've never got any sense of how often those "high pressure" scenarios are coming up.

I know for some players the mere possibility that they might come up, in some possible but not actual episode of play, is objectionable in itself. But I am not one of those players.

Basically, another way of modelling fleeing in terror wouldn't lead to the bizarre situation of entering combat all tied together.

Are you talking about what actually happened, or the Ulysses and the sirens hypothetical I canvassed?

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

Sure, but then you'd narrate it differently.

I've always said (in posts going back well over a year) that a fighter using CaGI it with a dagger against oozes and magma hurlers puts more pressure on the fiction than a fighter using CaGI with a polearm against goblins and hobgoblins. But I've never got any sense of how often those "high pressure" scenarios are coming up.

I know for some players the mere possibility that they might come up, in some possible but not actual episode of play, is objectionable in itself. But I am not one of those players.

Are you talking about what actually happened, or the Ulysses and the sirens hypothetical I canvassed?

Yes, you'd be forced to narrate it differently. I once had an awkward moment when a CAGI was used on some unarmed enemies as a sudden attack in the middle of parlay. Not only were they surprised, but they had no reason whatsoever to approach the armed guy. As a group we muttered, allowed it and moved on with slight dissatisfaction.

I was talking about the actual scenario with the Wight you encountered. Ulysses tied himself to a mast so that the sirens could not lure him into the ocean. He wasn't trying to kill them in combat, just survive them, it's not really the same thing at all.

 

[pemerton]

I was talking about the actual scenario with the Wight you encountered.

In that scenario the players didn't know about wights, or forced movement, when they roped themselves. They just knew their were pits, and wanted to take precautions.

 

[johnmatthews920]

Thanks for starting this topic and discussion. i could not find it elsewhere.
I completely agree with the thoughts.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

In that scenario the players didn't know about wights, or forced movement, when they roped themselves. They just knew their were pits, and wanted to take precautions.

Well that does make for an amusing situation then. Do you think they would have done the same if the forced movement rules were different? Or was it that there might be pit traps as well as pits?

 

[Neonchameleon]

But that always happens! You never, ever run in fear between hazards, or past them, you always run into them! Sometimes multiple times (if you save the first time and there's enough forced movement)!

If you get pushed into a hazard, you get a saving throw. So sometimes you do run between them because that sends you further. Sometimes the positioning is wrong - a push is much more limited than a slide. Whereas put it under the PC's conscious control and they will never run into hazards. I know which I find more interesting.

Why did they rope themselves together? They knew it had a push attack. Would a character genuinely fearful not slash the rope to escape?

They roped themselves together as I understand the story because they saw the pits and were scared of the pits. They didn't know the Wight was there. And they recoil in fear. They wouldn't have time to think about the rope, so no. If they were thinking clearly enough to cut the rope rather than just run they'd no longer be subject to the immediate forced movement.