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*TTRPGs General
Breaking Morale
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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7758836" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>My early attempts to use the morale rules made combats far too swingy, so started ignoring them and just tried to estimate when morale would break based on the circumstance and motivation of the attacker. A predator looking for a quick meal probably is going to retreat as soon as it is clear he's going to take meaningful damage. A predator defending offspring or which is starving to death is going to behave very differently.</p><p></p><p>And that is in a nutshell the problem I have with rules governing morale. Rules that are suitably complex enough to actually model morale in a way that makes sense to me will tend to be too complex to use at the table, where as rules that are simple enough to use in play tend to produce results that are just too random to be worthwhile. </p><p></p><p>Plus, it really creates wonky balance issues in that effectively it's like casting a hard "save or suck" repeatedly on the NPCs, especially with PC's using having the same degree of fearlessness as undead. Depending on how the morale check falls, the encounter could be deadly or trivial. And again, this is realistic only for complex rules that involve gradations of effect, take into account motivation, social queues, allow forces to rally or rout, and so forth. I wouldn't mind having them for some sort of mass combat rules, but for the sort of skirmishes involved in D&D with the highly varied participants its just usually best to judge for yourself how participants would behave.</p><p></p><p>One thing I note about D&D combats, is that by the time you know you are in trouble, it's usually too late to retreat. This applies to both NPCs and PCs.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7758836, member: 4937"] My early attempts to use the morale rules made combats far too swingy, so started ignoring them and just tried to estimate when morale would break based on the circumstance and motivation of the attacker. A predator looking for a quick meal probably is going to retreat as soon as it is clear he's going to take meaningful damage. A predator defending offspring or which is starving to death is going to behave very differently. And that is in a nutshell the problem I have with rules governing morale. Rules that are suitably complex enough to actually model morale in a way that makes sense to me will tend to be too complex to use at the table, where as rules that are simple enough to use in play tend to produce results that are just too random to be worthwhile. Plus, it really creates wonky balance issues in that effectively it's like casting a hard "save or suck" repeatedly on the NPCs, especially with PC's using having the same degree of fearlessness as undead. Depending on how the morale check falls, the encounter could be deadly or trivial. And again, this is realistic only for complex rules that involve gradations of effect, take into account motivation, social queues, allow forces to rally or rout, and so forth. I wouldn't mind having them for some sort of mass combat rules, but for the sort of skirmishes involved in D&D with the highly varied participants its just usually best to judge for yourself how participants would behave. One thing I note about D&D combats, is that by the time you know you are in trouble, it's usually too late to retreat. This applies to both NPCs and PCs. [/QUOTE]
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