D&D General What does the mundane high level fighter look like? [+]

[Crimson Longinus]

That's certainly been my take-away: that if I want a Conan-esque FRPG, I should look elsewhere than D&D. What happened to the much-vaunted Appendix N?

As it has been told you many times, having Conan-esque character in D&D 5e doing similarish thing he does in the stories works just fine. You are just nitpicking the the specific passage of book doesn't exactly match the flow of the game's combat engine under your arbitrary insistence that these monsters from the book must map to specific monster from D&D that doe even have same name and demonstrably have different characteristics. (D&D werewolves are immune to normal damage, Conan's foes were not.)

But yeah, a high level fighter or barbarian (and surely Conan is a barbarian?) can indeed defeat a big pile of pretty fearsome foes alone in D&D 5e.

 

[Gammadoodler]

There’s a huge difference between freely dashing in more or less in straight line and maintaining that kind of speed when changing direction to cover more or less of a circle, especially when being opposed by persons intent on stopping you from doing whatever it is you intend.

Sticking with the football analogy in your post, take the fastest defensive lineman you want and see how long it takes him to cover the 10 yards to a quarterback when actually opposed by only 2 offensive linemen. It will take them almost as much time to cover 30 or so FEET as it does for them to dash 40 yards.

Here’s J.J. Watt beating a double-team to get a sack. It takes him about 4 seconds to reach the QB.

HIGHLIGHT: Watt Beats The Double Team For Second Sack

Now imagine him trying to get past 5 opposing people. Now 10.

IOW, a human warrior covering an area 315sq ft (10’ radius circle) in melee probably takes more time than 6 seconds, and over 700sq ft (15’ radius) would require breaking some laws of physics.

JJ Watt is also battling foes who are roughly his peers is speed, size, strength and toughness. He battles these foes using his bare hands operating under a set of rules meant (at least partially) to keep players safe.

And even with all that, your ask doesn't seem superhuman to me. In extremely limited googling, I've already found several sack times between 2 and 4 seconds. The fastest I've seen so far is less than 2 seconds.

In D&D, none of those parameters would be consistent with a scenario where a fighter would want to use an AoE weapon attack though. The creatures would not typically be on the same level in terms of physical characteristics. The fighter would be using a weapon crafted for the purpose of smashing, cleaving, and/or piercing other creatures.

And the sole concern for their foes' safety that the fighter would need to consider would be how best to deprive them of it.

To make it more comparable for this D&D scenario.

1. Give JJ Watt a greataxe
2. Sub out all the offensive linemen for kickers, punters, coaches, trainers, and the front office staff.
3. Give those foes some kinds of weapons and armor.
4. Spread them out in a space roughly approximate to 10 grocery store parking spaces.
5. Forbid those foes from running away (turn-based combat and all)
6. Tell JJ that if he can get to everyone in 6 seconds, he can redo his career with a relevant football team (or whatever else would sufficiently motivate him).

I like JJs chances in that scenario.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

You’re saying two things here. That “it’s not informed by the fictional reality” and “the rules do not represent the fiction in a consistent manner”. I don’t think these two things are the same. I don’t think the first is true at all. The second is true.

Whether or not that means the GM is constrained by the fiction… I don’t see how it affects GM constraint. That seems a separate issue.

GM is constrained in a sense that they are required to stat the fiction in consistent manner. It is more WYSIWYG and predictable to the players.

Imagine you don’t care about this idea of monster stats always being consistent, always being the same.

The problem goes away.

I don't think it entirely goes away. The GM still has to decide every time what version of the monster to use. And it will lead to situations like @Oofta described, high level characters helping low level town guards to fight medium power monsters that should be minions to the characters but normal to the guards. I think this is genuinely more convoluted that just having objective stats and being able to throw them into whatever combination and not having to decide to whom the relative stats should be scaled.

So all your ogres always have the same number of hit points? None of them are ever tougher than the others? Better to hit bonuses or maybe a slam attack that can knock people prone?

No, they don't all have same stats. I modify monster stats often to represent different individuals. But these differences are diegetic. Everyone would agree that the pit-fighting champion Mord is a particularly tough ogre that can punch unusually hard and fast with his meaty fists.

Minion rules are no less diegetic than HP or most other representative game mechanics.

No, no they are not. Like I said earlier, I doubt the purpose of minion ogre is to represent a particularly sickly ogre that is hovering at death's door. In fiction it is supposed to be just a normal ogre and them being easy to kill is a narrative conceit. That's not diegetic.

But you don’t need the stat to do that. You can just describe the person. Also, wouldn’t your description of the “big” guy depend on who you were describing him to?

I don't need stats for that, but when there is a clear rules-fiction connection it is easy to assign fiction to the rules or rules to the fiction. If creature can have whatever rules then this ceases to be the case.

There’s no reason for any of this to be unknown to the players.

I don't understand what you mean here.

Yes, and you also describe others’ preference as convoluted and messy and a kludge. I don’t agree, so I’m pointing out why.

Right. I think I have explained in some detail why I think this method is more complicated. I stand by that assessment.

I haven’t yet stated that your method is restrictive and needlessly limited. That it’s a case of the tail wagging the dog. But I imagine you’d have something to say about that.

It indeed is somewhat restrictive, which I consider in this case to be a feature, not a bug. It lends rigour to the mechanical description of the world and keeps rules and the fictional reality aligned. So it is not the tail wagging the dog, it is the tail being attached to the dog in the first place.

But there are different types of stats for creatures of the same type. Different orcs, different types of giants, different drow, and so on. There already is variety.

Yes. And these represent diegetic differences.

I don’t see what’s being “taken away”. Except one more tool at the GM’s disposal.

Consistent portrayal of fictional reality by mechanics. But like I said earlier, if you don't care, and do think minions would improve your 5e experience, then just do it. It is even RAW in a sense that the GM certainly has permission to give whatever stats they want to the monsters.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Bounded accuracy might play a part, but I expect the bigger factor is that there just aren't that many levers to pull to increase damage on a per attack basis, and once the enemy hp reach that threshold, there's not really any going back.

PF2e handles this with scaling weapon damage and attack bonuses that lead to more frequent and damaging crits. It's not bounded accuracy, but there might be some tactics in the approach that D&D could steal.

Edit: that and some functional AoE options

I think scaling weapon damage and some AOE options like in Pathfinder 2 would be doable in 5e. It just is that you cannot have scaling damage and be able to use extra attacks at the same time, like some people seem to want. Issue really isn't that martials don't do enough damage, they do, and bumping their DPS that much would warp the entire game.

But I get why they went with just the extra attacks. It was easier to design and balance, and it can approximate either (fairly limited) AOE by dividing your attacks against several foes or one powerful attack by piling them all against the same foe. But this doesn't mean more complicated arrangement couldn't work without fundamentally altering the basics of the system, and I think contemplating how this might look could be worthwhile.

 

[Gammadoodler]

I think scaling weapon damage and some AOE options like in Pathfinder 2 would be doable in 5e. It just is that you cannot have scaling damage and be able to use extra attacks at the same time, like some people seem to want. Issue really isn't that martials don't do enough damage, they do, and bumping their DPS that much would warp the entire game.

But I get why they went with just the extra attacks. It was easier to design and balance, and it can approximate either (fairly limited) AOE by dividing your attacks against several foes or one powerful attack by piling them all against the same foe. But this doesn't mean more complicated arrangement couldn't work without fundamentally altering the basics of the system, and I think contemplating how this might look could be worthwhile.

Certainly there is a multiplicative effect when you combine scaling damage per hit with additional attacks.

But ultimately I think the question you need to get an answer for generally is how much time (i.e. how many actions) a higher level fighter "should" spend on enemies from lower level ranges and then build mechanics to suit.

 

[Horwath]

Certainly there is a multiplicative effect when you combine scaling damage per hit with additional attacks.

But ultimately I think the question you need to get an answer for generally is how much time (i.e. how many actions) a higher level fighter "should" spend on enemies from lower level ranges and then build mechanics to suit.

What should be core mechanic:

Whirlwind attack: Exchange 2 attacks from your Attack action to make melee attack vs all targets in reach of your melee weapon.
This halves your single target damage but helps clear mooks when it's needed.

 

[pemerton]

Minions had issues

When it comes to minions, the mixed-level party was probably the biggest issue.

If a core design of a system doesn't work for you, I suggest you are not playing the right game.

So was there really an issue, or were you just not playing the right game?

 

[Gammadoodler]

What should be core mechanic:

Whirlwind attack: Exchange 2 attacks from your Attack action to make melee attack vs all targets in reach of your melee weapon.
This halves your single target damage but helps clear mooks when it's needed.

I'd be inclined to agree that some kind of AoE should be more available. The trouble we currently have is that, with the current per attack damage outputs available, the population of enemy mooks for whom this would be an effective tool for 'clearing' would still be restricted to CR 2 and below.

I'm not sure what the right CR would be for a 'threshable mook' should be, but I expect it should get beyond CR 2.

Maybe character level divided by 2 or minus 5 or something.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

What should be core mechanic:

Whirlwind attack: Exchange 2 attacks from your Attack action to make melee attack vs all targets in reach of your melee weapon.
This halves your single target damage but helps clear mooks when it's needed.

I believe this would probably make reach weapons too good both absolutely and relatively. But with just reach of five it would probably be fine.

 

[Horwath]

I believe this would probably make reach weapons too good both absolutely and relatively. But with just reach of five it would probably be fine.

maybe reach weapons need disadvantage on attacks in 5ft radius to begin with.