D&D 4E AC exists in 4e... but do Reflex Saves?

[Syunsuke]

You can go with "player rolls all."
(Well, don't have to be ALL...)

I mean;
When PC attacks, the player rolls attack roll.
When PC is attacked, the player rolls defence roll.

 

[Nikosandros]

If armor provides a bonus to AC, then AC has to be distinct from reflex saves.

 

[Branduil]

If armor provides a bonus to AC, then AC has to be distinct from reflex saves.

But does Touch AC have to be distinct from Reflex Saves?

 

[Plane Sailing]

If armor provides a bonus to AC, then AC has to be distinct from reflex saves.

In Saga, armour provides a bonus to Reflex defence and Fortitude defence/damage threshold (I forget exactly which).

(FWIW I think the system would be better if armour was DR in that setup... fits much more neatly to my mind, and Saga already has scaling Reflex save with character level so the necessity of armour to reduce your chance of being hit has gone anyway)

 

[Plane Sailing]

My only problem with using one roll with the caster is if your targets have similar defenses, it all or nothing: you roll high enough to get them all, or you miss them all.

Although this could be considered a bug, it also introduces some other useful features like:

a) you don't get the situation any more where clumsy bob saves and lightning mcquick fails the save (which happened distressingly option in games I've seen!)

b) the situation is mostly true for mobs of mooks, and I don't know whether it will make much difference whether the whole lot is scorched or not in many cases

 

[Daztur]

I can see the mechanical advantage, of having to roll 1 die per spell instead of 1 die per target.

But the idea of switching from

"you see a sphere of fire coming towards you at lightning speed... QUICK! roll a reflex save!!"

to

"you see a sphere of fire coming towards you at lightning speed... and miss you"

is pretty appalling :/

How is that any different from "you see a big orc swing at your with an axe...and miss you" Why have such different mechanics for dodging different things. In any case there's no reason why you have roll your AC/save defenses just do your AC -10 + d20.

My only problem with using one roll with the caster is if your targets have similar defenses, it all or nothing: you roll high enough to get them all, or you miss them all.

I think I like that better, big pain in the ass to roll individual saves for a large group.

 

[Exen Trik]

I think I like that better, big pain in the ass to roll individual saves for a large group.

Avoiding the rolls is fine, but throwing a bomb into a crowd of orcs with a low roll means the all take half damage, really whats the odds of that? Maybe if you aimed the fireball a few feet too high over their heads, but that kind of hand waving doesn't work for other kinds of spells.

How about if you had some kind of... bowling pin mechanic? If a spell is cast against a crowd of (two or more of all the same kind of target), and the result is within a certain amount of the defense, a portion of the targets are flipped the other way.

Difference/Amount flipped (rounded down)
0: One for every two targets
1: One for every every three targets
2: One for every every four targets
3+: No change

Targets flipped to failure are from the center of effect, targets flipped to success come from the furthest from the center.


...Maybe that's not the smoothest way to go about it, but it's an idea

 

[Li Shenron]

How is that any different from "you see a big orc swing at your with an axe...and miss you" Why have such different mechanics for dodging different things. In any case there's no reason why you have roll your AC/save defenses just do your AC -10 + d20.

The difference is that you're going to get hundreds of orc axe swings, all of which are very similar, and all of which usually only do damage. Not dramatic enough to be exicting to roll for AC (although some groups actually use defensive rolls vs attacks as well).

Spells, traps, poisons are more diverse and their effects is often significant enough to add some drama.

Maybe now the idea of not rolling sounds nice to you, but I'd like to see after 1-2 years of playing this way if you haven't changed your mind... I know I wouldn't resist long before being frustrated that I can do nothing against the most interesting game effects, and I can only sit and listens at the DM telling me what happened.

Weapon damage is not interesting enough in comparison. Note that in fact special attacks that do something else than damage (disarm, trip) often require a player's roll to resist.

I think I like that better, big pain in the ass to roll individual saves for a large group.

How is rolling 10d20 for ST of 10 orcs a bigger pain in the ass than rolling 10d6 of fireball damage?

But then I wouldn't mind if the rules were different for monsters, or if monsters could Take10 in ST (and by the way, you very rarely get to hit more than 7-8 foes with one spell!). Yeah, for monsters it doesn't really matter whether they get to roll or not... but for PC it definitely does matter!

I actually go farther and say that rolling saving throws is part of playing the game as a player. Removing them doesn't "speed up" the game, it cuts one PART OF IT. It's like saying, hey let's speed up the Basketball match by skipping the last minutes from 10 to 15

 

[Aage]

As has been said, it's not all that difficult to change... just lower your defence by 10 and roll a d20...

 

[Cadfan]

I liked rolling saving throws, but I hated not rolling when I attacked as a spellcaster. Honestly, combat for a spellcaster is pretty dull right now.

"I cast... FIREBALL! MUHAHAHAHA"
*player sits down and waits*
*DM rolls some dice*
"Ok, you killed two of the orcs, another one is singed, and the leader is completely unharmed."
"Oh, thanks. Uh, I'm done with my turn."