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<blockquote data-quote="Sunseeker" data-source="post: 5901861">One of the things that video games have as a default assumption is that attacking causes &quot;threat&quot;, the more damage you do, the more attacks you do, the more &quot;threat&quot; you generate.&nbsp; To continue the dominance of the &quot;Holy Trinity&quot;, the &quot;tanks&quot; gained a taunt in order to artificially buff their threat when other classes pulled off of them.&nbsp; This idea was added in 4e with the addition of various Defender &quot;marks&quot;, which basically made the target suck/hurt at doing anything other than attacking the Defender.In D&amp;Ds, aggro is handled by the DM, and it often has no rhyme or reason.&nbsp; Sometimes enemies will mindlessly attack the Fighter because he's closest, sometimes they'll always go after the wizard blasters or the healer clerics, sometimes they'll go after whoever makes the worst puns.&nbsp; Whatever the case, there is no mechanic determining who the enemies attack other than the will of god.Sometimes this works out well, some enemies attack the fighter in their face while a few others run off and attack the back-row casters.&nbsp; Sometimes it doesn't work so well and enemies mindlessly swarm a single target.&nbsp; Certainly this also depends on enemy intelligence, zombies are more likely to swarm, human platoons are more likely to be tactical...but ALWAYS and ONLY if the DM decides to run them that way.&nbsp; The DM's will be done, some zombies will fight like they just got out of high-level tactics training, and some of the best fighting forces in the land won't move out of fire.4e's addition of marking attempted to rectify this, though providing mechanics that punish enemies for not engaging the &quot;tank&quot;.&nbsp; So even if the DM's will was that the zombies always go after the cleric, the fighter engaging those zombies would punish them above and beyond normal attacks for doing so.When talking about possible drawbacks to spell casting, people often talk about damage interrupting a spell, but the problem is still that without a non-DM aggro mechanic, there's no guarantee that this drawback will ever occur.&nbsp; We'd have to take more power away from the DM, by giving all spells a way of generating &quot;threat&quot;, ie: if your spell is 5th level, casting it causes +5 threat, and at 10 threat, the nearest enemy will engage you over their current target.&nbsp; After being engaged, your threat drops to zero.D&amp;D has always leaned towards a loose &quot;holy trinity&quot; design, but without aggro mechanics, this design can never become very solid.&nbsp; So what I'm curious for your opinions on, is how should &quot;threat&quot; be handled in the next edition of D&amp;D?&nbsp; Should the DM be the only thing that determines what an enemy attacks?&nbsp; Should players have abilities that make it more or less effective to engage them/their allies?&nbsp; Should the game as a whole codify mechanics further towards players generating threat?&nbsp; In short, how should &quot;aggro&quot; be handled in D&amp;D?I see advantages and disadvantages to both sides.&nbsp; ALSO: please don't make this into a TTRPG vs VG thread.&nbsp; Aggro and threat are simply terms representing ideas.&nbsp; They're not limited to video games.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Sunseeker, post: 5901861"] One of the things that video games have as a default assumption is that attacking causes "threat", the more damage you do, the more attacks you do, the more "threat" you generate. To continue the dominance of the "Holy Trinity", the "tanks" gained a taunt in order to artificially buff their threat when other classes pulled off of them. This idea was added in 4e with the addition of various Defender "marks", which basically made the target suck/hurt at doing anything other than attacking the Defender. In D&Ds, aggro is handled by the DM, and it often has no rhyme or reason. Sometimes enemies will mindlessly attack the Fighter because he's closest, sometimes they'll always go after the wizard blasters or the healer clerics, sometimes they'll go after whoever makes the worst puns. Whatever the case, there is no mechanic determining who the enemies attack other than the will of god. Sometimes this works out well, some enemies attack the fighter in their face while a few others run off and attack the back-row casters. Sometimes it doesn't work so well and enemies mindlessly swarm a single target. Certainly this also depends on enemy intelligence, zombies are more likely to swarm, human platoons are more likely to be tactical...but ALWAYS and ONLY if the DM decides to run them that way. The DM's will be done, some zombies will fight like they just got out of high-level tactics training, and some of the best fighting forces in the land won't move out of fire. 4e's addition of marking attempted to rectify this, though providing mechanics that punish enemies for not engaging the "tank". So even if the DM's will was that the zombies always go after the cleric, the fighter engaging those zombies would punish them above and beyond normal attacks for doing so. When talking about possible drawbacks to spell casting, people often talk about damage interrupting a spell, but the problem is still that without a non-DM aggro mechanic, there's no guarantee that this drawback will ever occur. We'd have to take more power [I]away[/I] from the DM, by giving all spells a way of generating "threat", ie: if your spell is 5th level, casting it causes +5 threat, and at 10 threat, the nearest enemy will engage you over their current target. After being engaged, your threat drops to zero. D&D has always leaned towards a loose "holy trinity" design, but without aggro mechanics, this design can never become very solid. So what I'm curious for your opinions on, is how should "threat" be handled in the next edition of D&D? Should the DM be the only thing that determines what an enemy attacks? Should players have abilities that make it more or less effective to engage them/their allies? Should the game as a whole codify mechanics further towards players generating threat? In short, how should "aggro" be handled in D&D? I see advantages and disadvantages to both sides. ALSO: please don't make this into a TTRPG vs VG thread. Aggro and threat are simply terms representing ideas. They're not limited to video games. [/QUOTE]

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