Once, Twice, Three times a Daily

[Oni]

I prefer that daily abilities have a good justification for being daily.

 

[mkill]

Daily abilities have the huge issue that playtime at the table != time in campaign.

In a 4-hour session, you usually have at least one fight, because players are itching to roll some attacks. However, that fight could be a giant set-piece battle with a huge setup and dozens of enemies, or a quick skirmish to let off steam, or a succession of smaller fights, or a series of encounters of increasing difficulty, leading up to a big boss.

It really depends on what the current campaign events are:

Overland exploration: days, even weeks can go by, with an occasional random encounter on one day

Investigation: Playing hide- and seek with one powerful enemy. Leads up to one climactic battle

Classic dungeon: Series of rooms at one fight each. Can have up to a dozen fights per session, without much rest in between. Fights are pushovers with the occasional lucky monster hit.

Mini-Dungeon: Unlike the classic one, this one has a maximum of 4 or 5 encounters, with a big boss at the end. PCs are expect to clear it in 1-2 sessions and move on

War campaign: Huge ongoing battle, in which the PCs are engaged in a series of smaller skirmishes. Even on a big battlefield, the PCs usually only engage a part of the enemies

Horror: The PCs are chased by something much more powerful than them. The goal is rather to avoid the fight until they find a way to beat the monster

And these are just 5 of many options. The "daily power" model works for the mini-dungeon, but gets in the way for all the others.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

Daily uses of immaterial stuff are the same level of abstraction as, say, hit points, for me. I know it's not realistic, but it offers me an easy way to quantisize power.

In my 4e game I use the "opportunity presents itself" explanation for limited uses of powers, but I can see others having problems swallowing that. It took me some convincing to get my players to my side, but now they really enjoy their ability to select their moment to shine, which this solution also provides.

 

[delericho]

IMO, there should be five different categories of powers:

At Will: we know what this is from 4e.

Encounter: you can use once, and then you have to catch your breath before you can use it again. And, yeah, we know what this is from 4e.

Daily: you can use once, and then have to have a good night's sleep before you can use it again. We know what this is from 4e.

Always On: You activate this power, and it stays on until you turn it off. If you want, you can turn it on or off many times per day/encounter/whatever. (Probably need a rule that you can only have one always-on power at a time, but that you can switch them as a free action on your turn.) A good example would be the 3e Paladin's holy aura power.

Conditional: This power has some trigger condition. Whenever you meet the condition, you can use the power. (Again, you probably need a rule that if you have multiple powers with the same trigger condition, you can only activate one at a time.) A good example would be the Rogue's sneak attack.

I think that covers everything, although I do know 4e did have a couple of "use twice in the encounter" powers. I wasn't a fan. (Also, note that under this model a "class feature" is just a power that you don't get to choose.)

Anyway, having established the five types of powers, the designers should then build the various classes to each use the most appropriate setup. So, perhaps the Wizard looks like the 4e version, with At-Wills, Encounters and Dailies; while the Mage is much more Vancian and so only has Dailies.

Meanwhile, the Fighter uses mostly At Will powers for his attacks, but has the option of taking Always On "stances", and probably wants to pick up a bunch of Conditional powers for those tricks he knows but can only use when he sees an opening. (And there could well be a Wuxia-inspired class that has the 4e AED setup as well, of course.)

I agree with the OP in that I don't think one size can fit all as far as types of powers is concerned - I felt that forcing the 4e Fighter into that AED model was a mistake (and one that Essentials corrected). Still, it will be interesting to see what they come up with.

 

[Hassassin]

I, too, would like to get rid of most dailies (except for Vancian magic), as well as per encounter abilities.

Some more examples for how abilities could be restricted instead:

• Only usable if an ally has gone down during the past round.
  
• You become fatigued from using the ability, and cannot use it while fatigued. Lasts until a night's sleep.
  
• You can use the ability when you roll a critical hit by sacrificing your next action.
  
• You get a cumulative -2 penalty when using it against the same opponent.
  
• Only usable if you've hit the target three times in a row.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

I'd just like to see a little more simulationism (yes, in a game with magic, I know).

Magical effects can be at will, per encounter or daily, because magic can make whatever sense it wants to. In particular for Arcance powers, maybe some are trivial to use, some require you to prepare ingredients from your pack (not something you can do in the heat of battle) and maybe some are limited by the very nature of magic itself and only daily.

I've just had a (potentially) awesome idea for Divine powers along these lines. Could there be a set of deity-specific powers (since we all love speciality priests) which only recharge when you do something that your deity appreciates? I remember you used to get double XP for spells cast in this manner in 2nd Edition, and it created some interesting roleplay scenarios (no, I won't heal the party fighter because a civilian got hit by that fireball..). So every day you pray, get your initial daily spells, but might get them back if you use them correctly. Balance gods of war/battle/stealing treasure by providing them with more stringent conditions (you must down the most powerful threat, or accept surrender as a point of honour etc).

Back to the point I wanted to make, simulationism - really I just want to see no more daily powers for fighter-types. I struggle to make it work in my head. Encounter yes, there's some element of stamina involved, but I can't grok dailies without magical involvement.

 

[Andor]

IMO, there should be five different categories of powers:

At Will: we know what this is from 4e.

Encounter: you can use once, and then you have to catch your breath before you can use it again. And, yeah, we know what this is from 4e.

Daily: you can use once, and then have to have a good night's sleep before you can use it again. We know what this is from 4e.

Always On: You activate this power, and it stays on until you turn it off. If you want, you can turn it on or off many times per day/encounter/whatever. (Probably need a rule that you can only have one always-on power at a time, but that you can switch them as a free action on your turn.) A good example would be the 3e Paladin's holy aura power.

Conditional: This power has some trigger condition. Whenever you meet the condition, you can use the power. (Again, you probably need a rule that if you have multiple powers with the same trigger condition, you can only activate one at a time.) A good example would be the Rogue's sneak attack.

I think that covers everything, although I do know 4e did have a couple of "use twice in the encounter" powers. I wasn't a fan. (Also, note that under this model a "class feature" is just a power that you don't get to choose.)

Nah, there are plenty more way to manage resources that are perfectly useable in play and don't hurt your brain the way fighter dailies do.

My favorite 3e example is focus. It was implemented a few times, once as a psionic thing and (IIRC) in PHB II with a set of connected feats.

Anyway the idea was that you attain the proper mental state based on a skill or ritual and then have a small benefit while in that focused state but can also expend it to use a 'big gun' type power. If you want to regain enlightenment in combat it means spending an attack just for the chance. In practice this usually works out to being an encounter power.

But it has several virtues. 1, the static bonus means even if you never use it you don't feel you have wasted the skills/feats/powers that let you buy in to the mechanic. 2, there is a clear and understandable fluff reason for why it works this way. 3, you can try and use this more than once a combat if you want which adds verisimilitude and gives players more options.

Another way is like in Mike Merles Iron Heros. In that system martial characters gain tokens as they fight based on their actions (and sometimes the enemies) these tokens represent the fighter using his martial skill to manipulate the fight by maneuvering his foes into poor positions, or a berserkers growing rage, etc. You can then expend tokens to accomplish powerful effects.

There are other ways too. For example what if rolling a nat 20, instead of being a critical hit, grants you an "Advantage" token for that fight which might be expended to cause double damage on an attack, or somesuch effect. And could additionally feed into class features/feats/skills etc.

These are all 3e style examples, and I get the feeling 5e is going for a simpler feel than the sometimes compex mechanisms of 3e. I think something as simple as a 'focus' state which can then feed a variety of other mechanics is not an excessive convolution however.

I can tell you that I, personally, would much rather use an Iron Heroes style token system than a "Your fighter can use 'strike of the sleepy eel' once a day" system.

Re: The thread title, this is what happens to me when I need sleep. Glad you liked it.

 

[tlantl]

What is the general opinion?

I have to agree.

My issue with this kind of thinking is in regard to magic items. Some being limited to a couple of uses a day isn't that big a deal, but when nearly every item you read has either a use limit or is basically useless, it gets frustrating.

 

[delericho]

Another way is like in Mike Merles Iron Heros. In that system martial characters gain tokens as they fight based on their actions (and sometimes the enemies) these tokens represent the fighter using his martial skill to manipulate the fight by maneuvering his foes into poor positions, or a berserkers growing rage, etc. You can then expend tokens to accomplish powerful effects.

In principle, I liked Iron Heroes' tokens system. However, in practice it proved way too much hassle for my tastes, especially when we got to a point of tracking multiple different types of token.

My favorite 3e example is focus. It was implemented a few times, once as a psionic thing and (IIRC) in PHB II with a set of connected feats.

Certainly, the psionic focus rules are quite neat. I like those.

There are other ways too. For example what if rolling a nat 20, instead of being a critical hit, grants you an "Advantage" token for that fight which might be expended to cause double damage on an attack, or somesuch effect. And could additionally feed into class features/feats/skills etc.

That's essentially just the same as my "Conditional" powers; the key difference being that I would require the Fighter to cash in his advantage immediately, where giving a token would instead allow him to use it later (and indeed save it for multi-token powers down the line).

I can tell you that I, personally, would much rather use an Iron Heroes style token system than a "Your fighter can use 'strike of the sleepy eel' once a day" system.

Definitely agree with this. As I said, I have no problem with a Wuxia-inspired class having the 4e AED arrangement of powers, but it's definitely not something I would want for the baseline Fighter.

 

[Minigiant]

I have no problem with one time use abilities as long as they have the proper recharge mechanism.

For example in my homebrew, a rogue can craft X poisons a day assuming he has the Y hours free to gather materials and mix the poison. The ranger can do the same in the wild.

So if the party is in a medium sized city, he can spend 2 hours shopping and mixing poisons to get 2 strong doses or 6 weak ones before bed. If he chooses strong, he knows these two doses are the only ones he has unless he gets 2 more hours of free time.

But in a large city and after making friends with a local apothecary, the time is reduce to 5 minutes plus the time to walk there. So if the group is bothered by a gang of hoods, the rogue can go all out with poison. Because after the fight, he can walk to the drugstore, mix up a brew and the antitoxin, and be back in 15 minutes.