Alternative to marks?

[Plane Sailing]

Another possibility would be to remove 'Mark' entirely, and replace it with 'Taunt'.

Taunt
Minor action. You taunt an opponent you could reach with your weapon. [optionally: make a Cha vs Will attack and if successful], the opponent must include you in his attacks next turn.

That would give a flavourful minor action activity for the fighters, doesn't give the fighters the opportunity to pump up their damage output via extra attacks on people shifting or hitting other guys but certainly helps in the defendery role by 'attracting aggro' as it were.

Cheers

Well, I discussed this with my players last night, they liked the idea and it worked really well in play for the two fighters.

Taunt
Minor action. You taunt an opponent you could reach with your weapon. The opponent must include you in his attacks next turn.

So no penalties to hit for anyone, no free strikes against people shifting or attacking someone else, but the taunted target is forced to include the fighter who most recently taunted him in his attacks.

This worked really nicely on a mechanical level for us, and it was much more flavourful as well - the fighters enjoyed using their minor actions to taunt people and keep the bad guys attention focussed on them.

Cheers

 

[CapnZapp]

Just as a general comment, not criticism ("hey, if it works for you...", etc)

I would say Taunt is not the kind of power WotC wanted to include, precisely because of its altered flavor. In other words, it's a crude form of aggro management, replacing the DM with a rule when it comes to deciding what enemies do.

 

[Stalker0]

Just as a general comment, not criticism ("hey, if it works for you...", etc)

I would say Taunt is not the kind of power WotC wanted to include, precisely because of its altered flavor. In other words, it's a crude form of aggro management, replacing the DM with a rule when it comes to deciding what enemies do.

Yep, WOTC specifically mentioned they didn't want to go the 3.5 knight's way of being a defender. They don't want to force monsters to fight a party member, they want to discourage it from fighting any one else. Hence marks were born.

Not saying marks were the best way to do it, but I agree with their logic.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Just as a general comment, not criticism ("hey, if it works for you...", etc)

I would say Taunt is not the kind of power WotC wanted to include, precisely because of its altered flavor. In other words, it's a crude form of aggro management, replacing the DM with a rule when it comes to deciding what enemies do.

I remember them saying that, and I remember their reasoning, but so far it is working better for us in practice both mechanically and RP-ing wise this way.

It isn't actually that crude of a form of aggro management because it isn't literally replacing the DM with a rule (which PC game aggro management has to do), but it does give the PC defenders the choice about whether they wish to force attacks their way or not.

The important thing for us is that conceptually everyone can 'get' what is happening. The standard 4e 'mark' whether you hit or miss as long as you attack and decide you want to mark just seemed too nebulous and game construct-y without an obvious real world analog. The Taunt gives us a clear real-world analog again.

As you say, it won't work for everyone, but since it is working for us and the OP wanted to hear about some options, I thought I'd share

Cheers

 

[CapnZapp]

I wonder if the PCs are as happy when the monsters do that to them.

You do pit Soldier monsters (Fighter NPCs) with auto-succeed Taunt abilities against the party, right?

Not doing that would really break the real-world analog for me, that's for sure.

 

[Exen Trik]

I think a fighters marking can be simplified a little and still have the same basic effect. The idea is to be about as sticky as normal, but limit the mark to one target at a time and keep it more consistent.



COMBAT CHALLENGE
In combat, it’s dangerous to ignore a fighter. Once each round an enemy that you attack, whether the attack hits or misses, can be marked by the fighter. When marked the target suffers a -2 to any attack that does not include you as a target. A creature can be subject to only one mark at a time. A new mark supersedes a mark that was already in place.

In addition, whenever the enemy marked by you makes an attack that does not include you, you can make a melee basic attack against the enemy as an immediate interrupt.

This mark can be maintained as long as the enemy is engaged. To engage the target, you must either attack it or end your turn adjacent to it. If none of these events occur by the end of your turn or if you mark another enemy, the marked condition ends.


COMBAT SUPERIORITY
Whenever an enemy that is adjacent to you shifts away from you, you can make an opportunity attack against that enemy.

If an enemies move action provokes an opportunity attack from you, you gain a bonus to that attack equal to your Wisdom modifier. An enemy struck by this opportunity attack stops moving. If it still has actions remaining, it can use them to resume moving.



The change to Combat Challenge makes it very similar to the paladins mark. It only effects only one enemy at a time, and it can be maintained by either attacking or staying up in its face. However it requires no action to activate, and has no penalty to letting the challenge end.

The immediate interrupt now only applies to the one mark, only when it attacks and not when it shifts. To compensate, the fighters Combat Superiority lets them get an OA (not interrupt) against any adjacent shifting enemy, just as a normal character gets OAs against a move action. Against regular movement provoked OAs, they still get the Wis bonus to attack and movement interruption.


I'm not sure if this complicates anything else like mark based exploits, but it seems to work on its own.

 

[keterys]

Well, by letting the fighter flat out prevent shifting by all enemies, that's a pretty serious boost in power. Unless you meant to say that the OA for shifting didn't get the Wis bonus and move prevention, for some reason.

That said, it might be interesting to just go a different route with things:

Paladin Ward: Aura 5 enemies take a -2 penalty to attack any ally of the paladin's
Fighter: May make an OA against an adjacent enemy that makes an attack that does not include the fighter.
Swordmage: Immediate Reaction, when an ally within 5 squares is damaged, teleport adjacent to the enemy and make a basic attack.

At which point, the defenders are stacking, it's true... but it's also less critical probably. Yes, the enemy will take a -2 penalty to attacks or provoke, but they won't do 5+Con less damage and take 3+Cha damage automatically as well.

 

[Exen Trik]

Well, by letting the fighter flat out prevent shifting by all enemies, that's a pretty serious boost in power. Unless you meant to say that the OA for shifting didn't get the Wis bonus and move prevention, for some reason.

Yeah that's what I meant, they get their usual Wis bonus and interruption to normal movement provoked OAs, and also get to punish those who shift with a normal AO. The idea was to give it a little more stickiness in exchange for limiting the mark to one target.

If that's too much (and it may well be) than the mark can just have the usual immediate interrupt feature for both attacking others and shifting, and keep combat superiority normal.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I wonder if the PCs are as happy when the monsters do that to them.

You do pit Soldier monsters (Fighter NPCs) with auto-succeed Taunt abilities against the party, right?

Not doing that would really break the real-world analog for me, that's for sure.

No - not unless the monster had the Combat Superiority feature (which is what I'm really replacing).

The standard soldier 'mark' just disappears.

 

[Plane Sailing]

That said, it might be interesting to just go a different route with things:

Paladin Ward: Aura 5 enemies take a -2 penalty to attack any ally of the paladin's
Fighter: May make an OA against an adjacent enemy that makes an attack that does not include the fighter.

That is a nice, simple set of things which I could imagine working well.

I think it is good to allow the fighter to get OA against adjacent enemies (thus could attack all of them that ignore him and attack someone else), but removing his ability to smack people who shift away from him would restore some much needed mobility to the battlefield.

I agree that this wouldn't be putting foes into a double-mark problem, so you don't need to track marks at all, which would be a highly desirable situation IMO.

Cheers