blogger on 5e: no-roll-to-hit-rationale

[xechnao]

I found this from a thread posted on rpg.net
Eleven Foot Pole: No Roll To Hit: Rationale
Although I am not a fan of the powers structure of 4e, the mindset behind this article highly agrees with my own.

So, what are your reactions to this post?

 

[Minicol]

So, what are your reactions to this post?

At which point is it a game any longer ?

My reaction is : I would not want to play that on tabletop. Maybe in a bad videogame, that might work. Or not.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

It is a interesting idea, and I think could be pulled off. One thing I would like to see with such a system, is that if certain amounts of "hit", like the 33% less on a hit he talked about would bring about certain effects. A %100 hit does such a keyword, 50%-75% does such a keyword, etc. This could be built into individual Powers or be a overall for all Powers (with perhaps Feats altering them). Sort of like one of his ideas with weapons.

 

[Nifft]

Thought about it. To get the variety of attacks we have in 4e, you'd basically need four weapon damage types, and armor would provide a different DR vs. each of those four weapon damage types.

Magic could be problematic (as it was in 3.x), or it could fall into those four types.

The end result would be just as much "defense probing" as we have in 4e, because that's part of the fun of the game IMHO.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Kwalish Kid]

If you are interested in this mechanic at work, check out My Life With Master by Paul Czege.

 

[resistor]

At which point is it a game any longer ?

Non-determinism (randomness) is not required for a game.

Chess, go, and checkers are all completely deterministic, and are still games.

 

[Minicol]

Non-determinism (randomness) is not required for a game.

Chess, go, and checkers are all completely deterministic, and are still games.

Are they really ?

I know them, and played them some, but they seem more to me like "skill contests". Because you have on cold strategy facing an another one, and the brightest guy of the moment wins.

And are they really such fun, honestly ? While I appreciate the mental challenge now and then, I would not fight to play these.

Now, this could turn into a narrative game with predetermined result, somewhat like the AMBER Diceless RPG, but I fail to see how fun this is.

It just seems a really rotten idea to me, but hey, you don't have to agree.

 

[Minicol]

I'll add something else : I have the suspicion to have played several video games looking like this, but video games have other assets, like cool graphics, background music, and then some ...

And in a Video game, non-randomness can be camouflaged. Not so in face to face tabletop

 

[TheWyrd]

I find it interesting that White Wolf is already doing this with the nWoD and in the process of creating their new system they were accused of becoming more D20-like.

For a while I was playing with the idea of a system that involved a level based dice pool and a number of associated manuevers. The player would roll their dice pool BEFORE they acted and then could spend their successes on different actions. It gets you an automatic hit but a random level of success each turn.

I think the system might work fine. I think it would take some work for a system like that to still feel like D&D however.

 

[xechnao]

And in a Video game, non-randomness can be camouflaged. Not so in face to face tabletop

My tastes match yours, here. But the article does not suggest elimination of randomness. It suggests reducing as much as possible all the steps 4e, or D&D in general, uses to offer this randomness effect to the most direct and simple way necessary so to not lose time and focus on fundamnental aspects of the gameplay -due to interface complications.
It does not suggest that whatever option you choose things will have to go smooth. It rather says that team tactics or interactions will become more the focus of the game in practice.