D&D 5E "Damage on a miss" poll.

[billd91]

How would you address people who have drifted the game into Simulationism without any actual mechanical backup? We've all agreed that the rules don't actually simulate anything. Heck, even Bill91 agrees with me on this - it doesn't matter, right? So long as the table agrees to the narration. So, why how should we address players who have never actually played the game the way it was written and instead substituted their own rules for what's in the books?

??

I'm not saying it doesn't simulate anything - rather it just does it at a fairly abstract level with a lot of specific leeway. What it does simulate is that there are attacks that are effective to varying degrees (hit and randomly determined damage) and ones that aren't effective because of some defense that was more effective than the attack (miss).

 

[ForeverSlayer]

Before I answer, you answer first - how many would I have to name before it's a meaningful thing to you, and can we agree the question is "Name spells that require an attack roll, and which also do damage on a miss"? If you're not willing to answer that with a firm and reasonable number, I don't see the point as you'll just continue to make this position a moving target.

Oh, and you missed one in the PHB by the way.

Which one is it then?

 

[Hussar]

A question then.

Since it is acceptable for attacks to deal damage on a miss, so long as they create some sort of explosion or area effect, (we've established that, I think - the whole Alchemists fire thing, plus numerous spells), what is the issue with expanding that to large weapons?

Is it simply that the attack cannot miss? Is that the major stumbling block here? I think it is, but, I'm willing to be corrected.

Now, if that's true, how do you narrate a graceful dodger, to use Imaro's example? Excluding magic (since we're talking about the character, and not his or her items), about the highest AC you can achieve with light armor (a pre-req for a graceful dodger - it would be strange for the graceful dodger to be in full plate) is about 25. You can't get any higher than that in 3e, without resorting to magic.

So, our 10th level fighter has a 25 AC and 100 HP. The problem is, by 10th level, CR 10 creatures generally have about a +15 attack bonus (give or take), meaning our graceful dodger gets tagged 50% of the time, more or less. Now, according to Ahn and others, a hit MUST be contact. You cannot take damage without the attack physically impacting you. So, again, our Graceful Dodger is getting beaten like a pinata. He's taking hits virtually every round (since most creatures have more than one attack per round).

But, he's not going down. He's getting hit time and again, taking physical damage, but, he's standing up. How does this fit with the Graceful Dodger? After all, the goal here is to have the mechanics fit the narrative right? But, there's a complete mismatch here. A character in full plate with a 25 AC and 100 HP gets exactly the same results. There's no difference between the two characters. Because the mechanics make no distinction here.

However, if we assume, as it explicitly stated in virtually every D&D DMG, that HP are not just meat, then we have no real problems narrating the graceful dodger differently than the armored fighter. Sure the graceful dodger is losing HP, but, at no point does that actually mean he's getting physically hit, whereas the heavy armor fighter can get whacked about in the narrative and that makes sense too.

So, for those of you who want miss to always include a clean miss, how do you justify the fact that your interpretation of the mechanics doesn't actually fit what's going on in the game world? How do you justify the disconnect between the fact that you are narrating actual hits every time, with a character that's supposed to be dodging around like Spider Man?

This is what I'm talking about when I say that people have internalized the mechanics unquestioningly and then respond so strongly when that interpretation is questioned. It shows just how far off the mark the interpretations are and reveals the gaping holes in some people's playstyles that have simply gone unquestioned in the past. Unquestioned because the mechanics as they stood let people fairly safely ignore the gaping disjunction between the narrative and the mechanics. All damage was going to be healed by magic anyway, so, why worry about it. After all, so long as the table agreed, it doesn't matter right?

 

[Mistwell]

Which one is it then?

Before I answer, you answer first - how many would I have to name before it's a meaningful thing to you, and can we agree the question is "Name spells that require an attack roll, and which also do damage on a miss"? If you're not willing to answer that with a firm and reasonable number, I don't see the point as you'll just continue to make this position a moving target.

 

[Hussar]

??

I'm not saying it doesn't simulate anything - rather it just does it at a fairly abstract level with a lot of specific leeway. What it does simulate is that there are attacks that are effective to varying degrees (hit and randomly determined damage) and ones that aren't effective because of some defense that was more effective than the attack (miss).

Isn't the point of simulation to answer basic questions of "How did this happen"? Correct me if I'm wrong here, but, that's why we have sim rules, isn't it?

Nothing is actually being simulated in a D&D combat attack. The mechanics don't simulate anything. A hit could be contact, or it might not be - after HP aren't just meat, unless you think that my 10th level fighter with 100 HP can somehow withstand more physical punishment than a polar bear and that somehow, gaining levels, makes my character physically more resistant to damage, IOW, gaining a level actually has significant physical changes - like being 10 TIMES tougher.

The combat rules are, and always have been, 100% gamist. Nothing is simulated. You make an "attack", which can mean virtually anything, against a nebulous ball of hit points, which don't represent anything in the game world - it's completely unmeasurable in any meaningful way since it includes things like luck and whatnot and then narrate the results in a fashion that has nothing to do with anything really, it's pretty much entirely free-form, so long as the table agrees to it.

In what way are the rules for D&D combat a simulation of anything? You cannot use these mechanics to answer basic questions, that any simulationist rules must be able to answer - "How did I miss?" is a basic sim question that, if it isn't answered, means that these rules are a complete failure for simulation.

 

[urLordy]

Nothing is actually being simulated in a D&D combat attack. The mechanics don't simulate anything.
<snip>
The combat rules are, and always have been, 100% gamist. Nothing is simulated. You make an "attack", which can mean virtually anything, against a nebulous ball of hit points, which don't represent anything in the game world - it's completely unmeasurable in any meaningful way

One should never ever argue with an absolutist. It will never amount to anything. Life is 100% black and white. Always has been.

 

[Hussar]

One should never ever argue with an absolutist. It will never amount to anything. Life is 100% black and white. Always has been.

Ok, I'm overstating the case. Show me where the combat rules satisfy simulationist demands. I'm willing to be proven wrong here, but, I've asked this same question over and over again over the years, and no one seems to be able to come up with an answer. "Well, it's simulating a successful or unsuccessful attack". What does that actually mean?

I know I've asked it at least twice in this thread alone. I need a 15 to hit the target. I, after modifiers, get an 8. What happened in the game world?

Prove it using D&D mechanics.

In a simulationist system, this is an easy question to answer. Every sim system out there worth the name can answer this very simple question. Yet, D&D cannot. Doesn't that mean that D&D isn't really a sim system and those who argue that it is are doing so from a very questionable position? And if D&D isn't a sim system, then most of the issues regarding DoaM go away since the criticisms are actually not pertinent to the system in question.

Funny isn't it. Forever Slayer posts an absolute (no spell with an attack roll ever does damage on a miss) and gets shown to be wrong by Mistwell, yet you don't seem to have an issue with that. I post a question, admitted strongly worded (mostly out of frustration for not getting an actual answer) and you jump on me with snark. According to Ahn, it's my side of the fence that's guilty of the ad hominem attacks and dodging the questions.

 

[Aenghus]

I'm not going to look up spells because I'm not particularly interested in most older editions any more. In any case, the request for spells that damage on a missed attack roll is, IMO, a red herring. Most spells in older editions didn't require any attack roll, and as attack rolls weren't the forte of caster classes in any case, the attack roll spells for specialised use or sub-standard. Auto damage and save for half spells are more effective damage producers, typically. Save or suck spells can be better in tough fights, but fireball type spells remain best for horde-clearing.

Given the restrictions insisted on by the anti-DoaM camp, to have a character with somewhat reliable abilities I would need to play a spellcaster with auto-damage spells, and a reasonable knowledge of enemy properties so as to effectively target those spells. In 3rd ed a Wand of Magic Missiles was easy enough to craft, and provided a source of autodamage against most targets.

But I don't agree to the restriction that only magic attacks can auto-damage necessarily. I would like non-spellcasters to have the option to be more reliable in their actions, in a non-broken way.

Non-spellcasters dependent on attack rolls suffer from the occasional cold streak, missing every round for a number of round, and players vary in how frustrating they find this. I don't think our shrinking hobby can afford to say players can't have their (non-broken) pc concept for philosophical reasons (e.g. DoaM) without some questioning of that philosophy.

The most complex RPG rules available are still a rough-and-ready simplification of what's being simulated as there's almost always a trade-off between accuracy and speed. A damage on a miss mechanic is an approximation to provide a minimum effectiveness to those who have it. A positive or neutral narration of how the damage occurs is required to sustain versimilitude.

 

[urLordy]

Show me where the combat rules satisfy simulationist demands. I'm willing to be proven wrong here, but, I've asked this same question over and over again over the years, and no one seems to be able to come up with an answer.

Well there you go. If you've asked the same question over and over again for years, then it's pretty clear: there is no answer for you. Pragmatism is so easy

 

[Ahnehnois]

Is it simply that the attack cannot miss? Is that the major stumbling block here? I think it is, but, I'm willing to be corrected.

No, it's not that simple.

For example, if you instead had an ability that said something like "every time you attack an opponent, any creature within that 5 ft square takes damage equal to your strength modifier in addition to any damage the weapon might deal", you wouldn't have the same questions of logic that DoaM raises. You probably wouldn't have a viable or balanced ability either, and some might argue that a condition or saving throw should be applied to this damage, but you could at least describe it as area damage within a 5 ft square. It might not meet everyone's scrutiny, but it would radically change the conversation and plausibility and internal logic probably wouldn't be the focal points.

As it is, regardless of how one conceptualizes damage on a miss, whether it involves physical contact or exhaustion or indirect wear and tear, the distinctive aspect that violates the d20 paradigm is not that it occurs on a miss, but that it somehow does not occur on a hit. The character has apparently acquired the ability to "relentlessly" deal damage only when his normal attack fails. Somehow he realizes that his attack is going to miss and his relentlessness kicks in. That makes no sense.

If you had an ability that said "instead of making his normal attack(s), the fighter selects three consecutive 5 ft squares; every creature within those squares takes damage equal to his weapon die plus his strength modifier, Dexterity save for half", it doesn't raise plausibility questions. It actually makes me think of the opening to Gladiator. Again, there's room to debate over balance; where this ability lies in the character's advancement scheme, how many squares, how much damage. But I think the basic approach holds alright and doesn't raise the same plausibility questions (though one might still debate that it takes a lot longer for an axe stroke to happen than an explosion).

***

Similarly, an ability that granted a (presumably qualified or limited in some way) ability to take 10 on attacks does not raise the same plausibility concerns. Of course, such a character would still miss sometimes over the course of his career, but situations would arise where the character could not fail; only if the task was relatively easy, and the character was skilled enough to declare the attack trivial. This is perfectly fine, and even desirable, rather than rolling every attack in mopping up an easy battle. It's also consistent with other implementations of the take 10 mechanic and its use during stressful, high-leverage situations. I've implemented it as a high-level martial ability and no one raised an eyebrow. It's the sort of approach I'd like to see expanded as it provides a way to represent skill without further inflating spine numbers (which is supposedly a goal of 5e).

In this case, replacing the die roll with guaranteed mediocrity duplicates the DoaM function of automatically dispensing with weak opponents without worrying about a 5% chance of a fumble, while avoiding the DoaM corner cases where a DoaM character of overall modest skill is somehow able to damage extremely well-defended opponents. It's also worth noting that as currently constituted, 5e characters/monsters still has relatively low ACs relative to PC attack bonuses, and a lot of them would be hittable in this scenario. I find that players often enjoy narrating their high-level fighters rampaging through weak opponents without having to roll attacks; in my mind, it's no more implausible than a high level rogue using Skill Mastery to sneak by the guards every time. However, the rogue can't sneak by everyone so easily, and the fighter can't kill anything so easily.

***

Which to my mind is why all of this "fighters can't have nice things" is BS. There are many nicer things than damage on a miss as it's being discussed here, which can not only duplicate relevant aspects of the DoaM functionality, but do a lot more as well.