Can a swarm be grabbed?

[eamon]

Obviously it doesn't make sense to use the same technique on a swarm of bees as it does... say... a terrasque. But let's reduce that logic to its bare components:

I am using technique A to describe when I use effect B on creature C.
Technique A works to describe effect B on creature C.
There exists a creature D that Technique A does not work on, therefore

therefore

Technique A does not make sense as a description of effect B.

That is your logic, broken down into its components. Now... let's use the same argument form and other valid premises:

Your abstraction doesn't clarify things - quite the contrary. If you believe the argument I made - namely that your claim to be able to grab a swarm by means of moving the swarm back into its square when it attempts to leave implies that you can force it to move with what is a single target (melee) attack - doesn't make sense, feel free to address the argument, not some made-up combination of A's and B's which serves no purpose other than to obscure common sense behind meaningless abstraction.

In doing so, you seem to have missed the key element of my complaint entirely, being that abstractions risk dissociation from the underlying fluff, and doing so while explicitly ignoring the fluff in favor of the rule undermines the essence of D&D which is (to me) it's story and fluff.

You do see the irony of trying to convince me that the abstraction is appropriate by means of another abstraction that's even further dissociated from the in-game world?

The point is... the moment you're dealing with a swarm, the most basic effects, such as a normal melee basic attack, require some form of comprimise in order for them to work in terms of the fiction of the game. If you can't accept that you can grab a swarm, then you can't attack a swarm either with non-area/close effects by the same logic.

Details matter; a melee strike through a swarm might conceivably hit many creatures, more than the handful a grab might hold - and even were the quantity the same, it then makes sense that hitting a few creatures reduces the swarm's size (thus damaging it) whereas holding and perhaps crushing creatures in a grab doesn't immobilize the rest of the swarm, but rather (at best) merely damages the swarm to the extent that missing those members matters. Admittedly, I find melee attacks vs. swarms tricky - which is why I'm happy to note that there is a compromise in that aspect; swarms take half-damage from melee attacks. As far as I'm concerned, a reasonable compromise would be if swarms were immune to all non-damaging effects from melee and ranged attacks.

Your 'this doesn't make sense' is a legitimate concern, but how you apply it is arbitrary at best. It has nothing to do with what makes sense, it has to do with a stubborn refusal to acknowledge that swarms require allowances at its most basic level. Grabs are no exception to that... and if you can make allowances for stabbing to mean something different for a swarm, then you have no reason not to give the same consideration for grabbing.

There's no question about it: how I apply "what makes sense" is arbitrary in the sense that it's not some quantifiable optimum. It's a judgement call that is a required part of game-design. Such arbitrary judgement calls are evidently present in 4e - such as the fact that swarms are immune to forced movement by melee and ranged attacks.

I'm saying that the judgement the current rules represent is ill-chosen, and that the motivation to "explain away" the inconsistencies caused by such poor choices by selectively applying in-game logic causes the in-game consistency to suffer and is thus the wrong solution. The right solution is to actually fix the problem as best as you can, rather than to unintentionally undermine the game by introducing yet more inconsistencies.

 

[DracoSuave]

Your abstraction doesn't clarify things - quite the contrary. If you believe the argument I made - namely that your claim to be able to grab a swarm by means of moving the swarm back into its square when it attempts to leave implies that you can force it to move with what is a single target (melee) attack - doesn't make sense, feel free to address the argument, not some made-up combination of A's and B's which serves no purpose other than to obscure common sense behind meaningless abstraction.

wut

No. No. No.

My point was that the argument 'Grabbing simply doesn't make sense on a swarm' is as equally as valid as 'single target attacks don't make sense on a swarm.' That it actually makes no sense to say that one game construct requiring accomodation (the ability to make single target attacks on a swarm) makes sense while another equal game construct (the ability to grab a swarm) is senseless, when both taken literally make the same amount of sense.

The argument form used is called 'disproof by contradiction' where you take the exact same argument form they have, replace the details, and show that the argument form itself is flawed.

In doing so, you seem to have missed the key element of my complaint entirely, being that abstractions risk dissociation from the underlying fluff, and doing so while explicitly ignoring the fluff in favor of the rule undermines the essence of D&D which is (to me) it's story and fluff.

But the fluff isn't being ignored. The fluff of D&D 4th edition, at its heart, is heroes doing greater and greater deeds until they join the immortals. That fluff informs everything from the levelling process, to how powers work, to page 42, to the general suggestion that DMs give allowances to players attempting to do heroic deeds.

My argument is that saying, arbitrarily, that you cannot grab a swarm not only makes no logical sense, but also makes no sense from the basic fluff roots of the game, that doing so needlessly and arbitrarily castrates certain character concepts simply due to their power source.

You do see the irony of trying to convince me that the abstraction is appropriate by means of another abstraction that's even further dissociated from the in-game world?

The problem here is you've got a cognitive dissonance. You're allowing the game rules to use the swarm as a singular creature, but you're disallowing interactions that treat it as a singular creature... and then complain that it's abstraction of those interactions that are faulty.

The reality is, the swarm itself is the offending abstraction. You've already, once you've allowed the swarm to become that abstraction, gone over the limit, and now you have to explain everything that happens in terms of post-attack fluff. Even Ranged Basic Attack breaks down in this manner.

So thusly, the burden of proof is on you to explain why abstracting Ranged Basic Attack, Reaping Strike, Furious Smash, Magic Missile, Oath of Emnity, Combat Challenge, and all these other abilities is OKAY, but suddenly grab offends your sensibilities because, in your words, "abstractions risk dissociation from the underlying fluff."

Why does abstracting a ranger shooting a swarm with an arrow to something appropriate for a swarm make sense... but abstracting a grab does not?

The onus is on you to prove that one, because if you cannot, you have an invalid (and almost hypocritical) argument.

Details matter; a melee strike through a swarm might conceivably hit many creatures, more than the handful a grab might hold - and even were the quantity the same, it then makes sense that hitting a few creatures reduces the swarm's size (thus damaging it) whereas holding and perhaps crushing creatures in a grab doesn't immobilize the rest of the swarm, but rather (at best) merely damages the swarm to the extent that missing those members matters. Admittedly, I find melee attacks vs. swarms tricky - which is why I'm happy to note that there is a compromise in that aspect; swarms take half-damage from melee attacks. As far as I'm concerned, a reasonable compromise would be if swarms were immune to all non-damaging effects from melee and ranged attacks.

Immunity is a tricky word tho... it means 'This is now impossible.' However, D&D's central fluff is growing to accomplish the impossible. Such a comprimise would damage and strike at the heart of the game itself.

Plus, conditions on swarms are completely possible. Grabbing the alphas in a swarm might cause the betas to remain... using a herd instinct to your advantage on a swarm is -very- plausible. Hey, look, grabbing in a way that affects a swarm! Using mundane methodology!

Here is a picture of a woman using control of a central figure, or alpha, of a literal swarm of bees, to literally control them and keep them in one place.

REALITY allows for this to happen, so the LEAST imaginative explanation for grabbing/controlling a swarm "I grab/control the swarms alphas" is not only plausible, there are people who do this for a fun and interesting if somewhat scary hobby.

So, something that is plausible, and doable, at the University of Minnesota, by the act of putting a bee in a box... is somehow implausible and breaks your sense of the fantastic if it's done on a floating continent threatening to drop and destroy Waterdeep by people who can move in bursts of 27 kms per hour (little over 16miles per hour) while wearing heavy armor.

I just think you lack imagination.

There's no question about it: how I apply "what makes sense" is arbitrary in the sense that it's not some quantifiable optimum. It's a judgement call that is a required part of game-design. Such arbitrary judgement calls are evidently present in 4e - such as the fact that swarms are immune to forced movement by melee and ranged attacks.

Yes, but that's a matter of scale. Keeping something from escaping an area is not the same thing as removing it from that area. The same swarm is not immune to immobilizes, or even slows from melee and ranged attacks. Grabs are closer to an immobilize than they are to forced movement... the comparison itself is arbitrary.

I'm saying that the judgement the current rules represent is ill-chosen, and that the motivation to "explain away" the inconsistencies caused by such poor choices by selectively applying in-game logic causes the in-game consistency to suffer and is thus the wrong solution. The right solution is to actually fix the problem as best as you can, rather than to unintentionally undermine the game by introducing yet more inconsistencies.

Except there IS no problem.

The burden on you to prove is this:

That a hero on his way to immortality cannot grab a swarm. That such things are impossible in the milieu of heroic legend and high fantasy.

If you can do that, then you can actually start to introduce the premise 'It does not fit the fluff.'

The fact is, you cannot do so. High fantasy is filled with rediculous stuff like that, and that high fantasy is the main inspiration informing D&D4th, with an emphasis in the rise to immortality. Grabbing a swarm fits that central concept -perfectly-. Therefore, it cannot violate the fluff.

 

[Aegeri]

The real debate though is she grabbing the bees or are they grabbing her?

I mean, this could get pretty deep here. Deep in bees that is.

UngeheuerLich[/URL]]I also believe, saying: "i grab the swarm is not sufficient..." as I believe "I use the xxx skill" is no role playing. This is pressing buttons.

Okay. I say "I grab the swarm" and you say "You're going to have to explain that".

I say "Karrok roars with fury at the swarms attempt to escape from him and begins stuffing great handfuls of bugs down his pants while sealing his trousers. Is this sufficient?"

 

[DracoSuave]

The real debate though is she grabbing the bees or are they grabbing her?

I mean, this could get pretty deep here. Deep in bees that is.



Okay. I say "I grab the swarm" and you say "You're going to have to explain that".

I say "Karrok roars with fury at the swarms attempt to escape from him and begins stuffing great handfuls of bugs down his pants while sealing his trousers. Is this sufficient?"

In an unrelated story, we actually, in a recent 3.5 game, had to take out a swarm of hellfire wasps... and we had no magic weapons. So we were screwed. We DID have a door that we could open to random other places (like a portable hole+4) so we wheeled it down there (cause yes, we put that thing on wheels) opened her up with me standing in the room going 'NOT THE BEES! AAAHHHH!' and the swarm went after me, I ran out, door shut, bees cut off in its own underground oubliette.

Then we used that as a threat against other monsters, that should they fail to negotiate, we would open up this room of bees, or toss them in it, or what have you.

Not related to the argument, but this thread reminded me of 'the Nicholas cage' as we christened it.

 

[Someone]

Personally, I find that grabbing isn't exactly the stuff of legends. All it requires is a Str check and being of the right size (now that I think of it, I find amusing in the context of this thread that humans can by the rules grab a swarm of bees but titans can't grab one single human. They could, if enough humans gathered at one point to make a single Large swarm, the titan could grab their leader, making the rest of them follow mindlessly. But I digress)

As I was saying, everyone can do it. Joe Commoner can grab bees. A dog can grab bees, unless it's a pekinese; then it's be tiny and too small to grab a Medium swarm. A piercer could, if anyone suffered a mental breakdown and converted them to 4e and it doesn't even have arms. Though perhaps they are in their way to archieve immortality.

However Bob the Godslayer, who recently made Cthulhu his bitch, when he tries to bull rush these same bees couldn't. Poor Bob bounced on them like he hit a wall of bricks: harder actually, since he can crash through brick walls like if they were made of tissue paper. The next round Bob, enraged, punched off the top of a mountain and crushed the bees under it, but unless he invokes page 42 and puts himself at the mercy of the DM, he can't push these bees, or even walk through a swarm of them.

So I find much more consistent to make swarms that can't be grabbed and let the players justify a stunt if they really want to grab or push them (which must be a staggering rare circumstance, since it's the first time it's come in these forums) than having swarms that are in principle impossible to push but that everyone can grab.

 

[DracoSuave]

Personally, I find that grabbing isn't exactly the stuff of legends. All it requires is a Str check and being of the right size (now that I think of it, I find amusing in the context of this thread that humans can by the rules grab a swarm of bees but titans can't grab one single human. They could, if enough humans gathered at one point to make a single Large swarm, the titan could grab their leader, making the rest of them follow mindlessly. But I digress)

As I was saying, everyone can do it. Joe Commoner can grab bees. A dog can grab bees, unless it's a pekinese; then it's be tiny and too small to grab a Medium swarm. A piercer could, if anyone suffered a mental breakdown and converted them to 4e and it doesn't even have arms. Though perhaps they are in their way to archieve immortality.

However Bob the Godslayer, who recently made Cthulhu his bitch, when he tries to bull rush these same bees couldn't. Poor Bob bounced on them like he hit a wall of bricks: harder actually, since he can crash through brick walls like if they were made of tissue paper. The next round Bob, enraged, punched off the top of a mountain and crushed the bees under it, but unless he invokes page 42 and puts himself at the mercy of the DM, he can't push these bees, or even walk through a swarm of them.

So I find much more consistent to make swarms that can't be grabbed and let the players justify a stunt if they really want to grab or push them (which must be a staggering rare circumstance, since it's the first time it's come in these forums) than having swarms that are in principle impossible to push but that everyone can grab.

It's not that you can't push bees, individually, and I think that's the mistake people are making.

You can push the individual bees, but that's not the same as pushing a swarm, in the same sense that throwing a rock is not the same thing as throwing a pile of rocks. A bullrush would obviously involve the individual running -into- the bees, rather than causing the bees to move. That make sense. But a complete lack of ability to control the swarm of bees is not so plausible, given the evidence posted above of a girl controlling a swarm of bees.

 

[Someone]

It's not that you can't push bees, individually, and I think that's the mistake people are making.

You can push the individual bees, but that's not the same as pushing a swarm, in the same sense that throwing a rock is not the same thing as throwing a pile of rocks. A bullrush would obviously involve the individual running -into- the bees, rather than causing the bees to move. That make sense. But a complete lack of ability to control the swarm of bees is not so plausible, given the evidence posted above of a girl controlling a swarm of bees.

So you find dogs (not pekinese, though) grabbing swarms plausible in the context of super high fantasy, but can't wrap your mind around the concept of Bob the Godslayer forcing a piddly swarm of bees to move 5 feet?

Also, he doesn't move through the swarm of bees when he tries to bull rush them. You can't pass through your enemie's squares. Bob is literally stopped on his tracks.

 

[DracoSuave]

So you find dogs (not pekinese, though) grabbing swarms plausible in the context of super high fantasy, but can't wrap your mind around the concept of Bob the Godslayer forcing a piddly swarm of bees to move 5 feet?

Also, he doesn't move through the swarm of bees when he tries to bull rush them. You can't pass through your enemie's squares. Bob is literally stopped on his tracks.

Actually, you can pass through a swarm. They are not impenetrable barriers:

A swarm can enter or move through an enemy’s space; this movement does not provoke opportunity attacks. An enemy can enter a space occupied by a swarm, but the space occupied by the swarm is considered difficult terrain, and doing so provokes an opportunity attack.

And swarms are not immune to bullrushes... the bull rush just doesn't do very much. The swarm is immune to the push, but the shifting into the square the swarm is in part of the bull rush is perfectly legal. So... pretty much as described. The rules, as written, have this guy charge them, push into the swarm, the swarm goes no where, and now he's in swarm.

One thing to note tho, you can grab a swarm... but you can't use the Move a Grabbed Creature action with it. The extent of what you can do is immobilize the swarm.

 

[Someone]

Ah, sorry, I missed the verses on moving through them. It doesn't change the crux of the matter, though, which is that the rules forbid Bob the Godslayer to force the bees to move 5 feet but allow Fido the dog to grab these same bees and not allow them to move. Think on it; Bob was attacked yesterday by the tarrasque and found it mildly amusing, but he's helpless when he faces the simple task of moving a mere swarm of bees 5 feet, unless his DM says it's OK with him. Fido the dog is entitled by the rules to do a perfectly simple Str check to keep the bees in place. There's no reason, based on the pro-grabbing arguments repeated about three hundred times in this thread, to keep Bob from moving the bees.

To make this abundantly clear, if it was allowed in the rules, when asked how he bull rushes the swarm Bob's player could say simply "I move them back... with my awesomeness!" and really, it'd not be more ludicrous than coming from he dead once per day. However, right now, if he wants to bees to move he has to invoke page 42, explain how he does that, and his DM could say anything from "No, that's stupid" to "Make so and so check, totally unlike a regular bull rush" or "ok". I just ask why. Why is so important to keep most people from bull rushing swarms, but allowing everyone to grab them? It doesn't make sense from the character balance side: it makes characters with reliable area attacks overpowered when dealing with them, and people who use melee or ranged attacks and forced movement near useless. It doesn't make sense from the heroic fluff perspective that Bob, who makes gods nervously check with their lawyers about "armed assault", can't move the bees if his DM is in a particularly sour mood. What makes sense is, perhaps, that the writer didn't though about anyone wanting to grab a swarm: after all the Enworld comunity seems to not have though on it for 2 years.

Really, houseruling that on the fly doesn't look so bad. IMO is not that bad to see that Fido can bite swarms of bees in place, but Bob can't move them and declare that Fido after all can't grab those bees unless he comes up with a good excuse, the same I'd allow Bob to swat the bees 5 feet with his shield.

(On a side note, now that I'm on it and checked the grab rules I'll allow creatures to grab enemies much smaller then them:

 

[DracoSuave]

Ah, sorry, I missed the verses on moving through them. It doesn't change the crux of the matter, though, which is that the rules forbid Bob the Godslayer to force the bees to move 5 feet but allow Fido the dog to grab these same bees and not allow them to move. Think on it; Bob was attacked yesterday by the tarrasque and found it mildly amusing, but he's helpless when he faces the simple task of moving a mere swarm of bees 5 feet, unless his DM says it's OK with him. Fido the dog is entitled by the rules to do a perfectly simple Str check to keep the bees in place. There's no reason, based on the pro-grabbing arguments repeated about three hundred times in this thread, to keep Bob from moving the bees.

Who cares about Fido the dog? Fido the dog is not a character at your game table. All this talk about Fido the dog is clouding the issue.

What you SHOULD be looking at is whether Bob the Godslayer can grab those same bees that he cannot bullrush. The fact is... he can. Easily.

Bob is not helpless at all before these bees.

He can still, say, Vorpal Tornado, or Come and Get It, or Shift the Battlefield.

Fighters do have close attacks, and many of those close attacks do have the ability to force things to move.

Bob is not helpless at all.

To make this abundantly clear, if it was allowed in the rules, when asked how he bull rushes the swarm Bob's player could say simply "I move them back... with my awesomeness!" and really, it'd not be more ludicrous than coming from he dead once per day. However, right now, if he wants to bees to move he has to invoke page 42, explain how he does that, and his DM could say anything from "No, that's stupid" to "Make so and so check, totally unlike a regular bull rush" or "ok".

Invoking page 42 is quite acceptable. Describe a way to use the environment or handy tools that it qualifies as an area or close attack, and the push is quite doable. That's -exactly- what page 42 is for. There's a reason why page 42 is getting expanded in scope in Essentials.

I just ask why. Why is so important to keep most people from bull rushing swarms, but allowing everyone to grab them? It doesn't make sense from the character balance side: it makes characters with reliable area attacks overpowered when dealing with them, and people who use melee or ranged attacks and forced movement near useless.

I wouldn't call 5 extra points of damage and the ability to use forced movement overpowered. And the answer to fix that is 'you can't use grabs either'?

Explain that... area and close effects are 'overpowered' against swarms, so therefore you cannot grab swarms.

My brain exploded from that one.

It doesn't make sense from the heroic fluff perspective that Bob, who makes gods nervously check with their lawyers about "armed assault", can't move the bees if his DM is in a particularly sour mood.

I can't disagree. The restriction against forced movement is somewhat odd... but it does make sense in a way. Regardless, it's irrelevant to the central point.

What makes sense is, perhaps, that the writer didn't though about anyone wanting to grab a swarm: after all the Enworld comunity seems to not have though on it for 2 years.

And perhaps they did. Perhaps someone, generally a player, went... 'Hey, it dsoesn't say I can't grab a swarm of bees. Can I grab the swarm of bees?' And the guy running the game, one of the designers of the game went... 'AWESOME!' and thus it was allowed.

Cause... fourth edition IS the most playtested roleplaying game ever made.

Really, houseruling that on the fly doesn't look so bad. IMO is not that bad to see that Fido can bite swarms of bees in place, but Bob can't move them and declare that Fido after all can't grab those bees unless he comes up with a good excuse, the same I'd allow Bob to swat the bees 5 feet with his shield.

Except holding a swarm of bees in place is no more like swatting them 5 feet than using vines to restrain them with a druid spell is changing them into a newt. Unrelated things are unrelated.

That's the problem with this stretch of logic... the dots do not connect.

More over... who the hell is Fido? Bob can grab those bees. Who gives a crap about some dog?

(On a side note, now that I'm on it and checked the grab rules I'll allow creatures to grab enemies much smaller then them:

Well, yes, that's allowed in the rules, explicitly.

Regardless, your argument points out something completely irrelevant, and uses it as an appeal to emotion so that we go 'Well this other guy can't do this other unrelated thing, therefore NO GRABS FOR ANYONE.' It's a very weak argument. Contrast with this: