David Noonan on D&D Complexity

[Particle_Man]

The trick here is simply one of application: You don't try to go through and find all the cascading effects and modify them. You simply make a note of the penalty or bonus off to one side and then, whenever you're attempting to do something, ask yourself: "Is this affected by this Strength penalty or bonus?"

Now we are back to the "flowchart problem" which is a part of the processor problem that stops the game dead for me.

"Is this affected by this str penalty or bonus? y/n"
"Is this affected by this dex penalty or bonus? y/n"
etc. Add 4 steps for the other 4 ability scores, a step for negative levels, possible steps for size changes, etc. Do this for every action you do and for every action that is done to you. Not exactly Fast, Furious or Fun.

Plus, the "joy" of cascades is that they can be multiple step processes, where (say) one's armor class is not direclty affected by a penalty to strength, but is indirectly affected because of a sudden shift in encumbrance load, itself an effect of a suddenly reduced strength, itself a result of becoming fatigued. Thus one may not remember that one's AC is affected by a str. penalty unless one also remembers the intermediate step mediated by the encumbrance rules.

 

[Gentlegamer]

With the 3e setup though, if powerful dragons don't have access to powerful magics, they are going to get quickly destroyed in the magical arms race that D&D can turn into - if they can't scry, buff, teleport, Heal and do other fancy stuff.

And here we run into the real problem.

 

[Justin Bacon]

1) Definitely reduce the durations on buffs to those that last for one encounter/part of one encounter and long duration buffs that last all day. I see no reson why the duration of beneficial spells should be measured by caster level. (I actually suggested a system for this only a few weeks ago). Also definitely put a limit on the number of beneficial effects that can be on one person at a time.

Yeah. Although I, personally, don't like any ability which has a duration of "an encounter". (I don't think you're actually proposing that upon re-reading what your wrote, but I thought I'd comment on it.) That includes the barbarian's rage-induced fatigue, which should be changed.

2) Drastically reduce the number of conditions. Do we really need shaken and sickenend (which are almost the same). Stunned, nauseated, dazed and paralyzed? Frightenend and paniced? Dazzled? Fatigued and exhausted?

I think having the difference of degree distinctions (frightened/panicked, fatigued/exhausted, dazzled/blinded) is useful. Shaken and sickened may be mechanically similar in their effect, but I can see a mechanical usefulness in having a flag which says "this guy is sick". But combining sickened and nauseated into a single effect is probably a no-brainer. Cowering should just be rolled into stun and be done with it.

Plus, there's lots of stuff in the conditiosn section that don't need to be there: All the wind-related effects. Grappling, pinned, prone. Probably disabled an dying. If confused is going to be on that page, its effect shouldn't be defined in a way which only makes it apply if you've cast the spell -- if that's the case, then the whole description can be left under the spell description and left off this page entirely.

Removing all of those would make that section a lot easier to reference.

3)Reduce the amount of named boni. The nothing with the same name stacks rule is pure genious. Until you've got 10+ types of boni on every stat. Different flavor shouldn't authomatically mean it's a different bonus.

And then they start making up new bonus types in the supplements so that you can stack even more stuff on top. Either it all needs to stack (easy to stack) or the number of types of bonuses should be kept small.

6) The combat maneuvers definitely need streamlining. But I haven't spend enough thought on that issue yet.

I like have different options in combat. That gives tactical crunch to the game. But those maneuvers need to be based on mechanically consistent and intuitive principles: If a rule makes sense (like Charge), its easy to remember. If it's just a bunch of arbitrary numbers (hit chances in bull rush), then it's difficult to remember and will end up being looked up every time it's used (which means it probably won't be used as often as it should/could).

 

[Justin Bacon]

"Is this affected by this str penalty or bonus? y/n"
"Is this affected by this dex penalty or bonus? y/n"
etc. Add 4 steps for the other 4 ability scores, a step for negative levels, possible steps for size changes, etc. Do this for every action you do and for every action that is done to you. Not exactly Fast, Furious or Fun.

Sure. But outside of your standard buff packages (which, as I mentioned, should be pre-prepped), how many bonuses and penalties are you really suffering from at any given time? I, personally, don't see a lot of penalties and bonuses stacking up in the middle of combat. As a DM, I'm usually looking at checking one or two bonuses/penalties for any given NPC at most.

After combat, if there are lingering penalties that can't be gottten rid of, you should have enough time to go through and figure out the whole cascade of effects without any game-slowing side-effects.

Plus, the "joy" of cascades is that they can be multiple step processes, where (say) one's armor class is not direclty affected by a penalty to strength, but is indirectly affected because of a sudden shift in encumbrance load, itself an effect of a suddenly reduced strength, itself a result of becoming fatigued. Thus one may not remember that one's AC is affected by a str. penalty unless one also remembers the intermediate step mediated by the encumbrance rules.

I find encumbrace to be a pain to calculate in the middle of a session even when I'm not dealing with Strength penalties. It's just one of those book-keeping chores that's annoying, and no one has ever found an easier way to handle it.

 

[ruleslawyer]

And here we run into the real problem.

Uh, yeah. And it was the same problem afflicting dragons in previous editions... except that in previous eds, dragons weren't the top of the heap the way they are in 3e. If anything, the 3e take on dragons is a direct outgrowth of the constant complaints about the weakness of dragons that were found in 1e and 2e. The increases in natural attacks, spellcasting ability, durability, etc. are reflections of the contant drive to upgrade dragon power.

 

[Hussar]

This is relatively simple if you can remember (and can condition your players to remember) to write down not just "+4 strength" but "inherent +4 strength" or "enhancement +4 strength".

QFT.

Organization is absolutely key to running higher level games. This is what I was talking about earlier when I said that the players should be taking responsibility for tracking stacking and the like.

Realistically, your character sheet should look like the new stat block. Take a look at your current character sheet. If it's anything like a usual one, the largest block on the first page is taken up by your six stats. Why? That should be in one small line somewhere near the bottom. You don't need to know your exact stats in the middle of combat very often, you just need the bonuses.

I've taken to using the new stat block for character sheets in play and then have a standard sheet for downtime. Works absolute wonders. Everything is right there and you can change, fold, spindle and maul so much easier.

 

[Justin Bacon]

Realistically, your character sheet should look like the new stat block. Take a look at your current character sheet. If it's anything like a usual one, the largest block on the first page is taken up by your six stats. Why? That should be in one small line somewhere near the bottom. You don't need to know your exact stats in the middle of combat very often, you just need the bonuses.

My turn: QFT.

The character sheet design for 3rd Edition is just god-awful. Key information is absolutely buried in a morass of tiny print and numbers.

To take one example, look at the Skills section: Even Rogues are unlikely to have ranks or bonuses in more than a dozen skills. So there is never a need to have every single skill listed on the character sheet. It would be better to shrink that section down and leave large spaces for players to write up to a dozen or so skills in.

(A complete list of skills and their key attributes would be useful on a separate cheat sheet.)

The 3.5 sheet represents an improvement over the 3.0 sheet, but it's still severely lacking. Just glancing at the first sheet for Barbarians, for example, reveals some odd oversights (given the half dozen pages of information the new Deluxe Sheets have): They include a section for "Carrying Capacity While Raging" and another small section for listing your Rage modifiers on a completely different page. What you should have is a half page dedicate to "rage stats": Modified AC, attack bonuses, bonus HP, saves... The whole nine yards. You're going into a rage? Flip to that page and you're good to go.

EDIT: Another great place to look for streamlining changes to the rules is anywhere where an extraneous decision point is added to the rules. One I almost immediately houseruled was the Dodge feat: Deciding who to apply that +1 dodge bonus to AC against is an extra decision point and extra bookkeeping. It also disrupts the DM's ability to roll multiple attacks from identically-statted creatures all at once (because now, suddenly, one of the creatures has a different AC to hit). Replacing that with a flat +1 dodge bonus to AC completely elminates all of that hassle: The bonus is added to your AC in prep and never (or rarely) thought of again.

Coming back to Trip, again, I'd look real long and hard at the defender's ability to "retaliate" against a failed trip by tripping in return. What are you really modelling here? Is there a need for that opportunity for retaliation in order to keep the rule balanced (remember, you're already provoking an AoO by attempting to trip them in the first place)? Can you just eliminate this unusual "out of turn" action without really suffering any meaningful side-effects?

 

[delericho]

Sure. But outside of your standard buff packages (which, as I mentioned, should be pre-prepped), how many bonuses and penalties are you really suffering from at any given time? I, personally, don't see a lot of penalties and bonuses stacking up in the middle of combat. As a DM, I'm usually looking at checking one or two bonuses/penalties for any given NPC at most.

The one that really caused me grief while running "Shackled City" was the Ray of Enfeeblement spell.

As I've mentioned earlier in the thread, there is a sliding scale of complexity. Personal-range buff spells are the easiest to handle, because I can work out the effects in advance, and just apply them as necessary.

The next easiest are non-personal buffs. I can't generally work these out in advance, since I don't know to whom they'll be applied (and while I could work through all the options, that's more effort than I'm really willing to go to). Still, the additions tend not to have too many consequences: a bonus to Strength applies to attack rolls, damage rolls, and a few skill rolls (see below for encumberance knock-on effects). And so on.

The next most complex are the penalties. It's easier to apply a Bless effect than a Bane effect, despite the two being mechanically equivalent, because I can rely on my PCs to remember the one but not the other.

The worst are the debuffs - Dispel Magic can really ruin my day. Especially where it takes down some but not all of the buffs.

Oh, there's one more class that's even worse still: the polymorph type spells. The mere existence of so much errata for these spells is a major source of complexity (such that I have decided to just ignore errata IMC... we use the PHB RAW). But, beyond that, these spells simply have to be prepared extensively in advance. If you aren't ready with your modified stats when you cast the spell, you can't cast the spell. (I think one consequence of that is that no-one has ever used one of these spells or effects in one of my campaigns.)

After combat, if there are lingering penalties that can't be gottten rid of, you should have enough time to go through and figure out the whole cascade of effects without any game-slowing side-effects.

Agreed. I don't particularly care how complex the cascade is outside of combat. I can deal with that easily enough. What causes me grief are changes within combat, and the plethora of options that make good preparation more difficult than it should be.

I find encumbrace to be a pain to calculate in the middle of a session even when I'm not dealing with Strength penalties. It's just one of those book-keeping chores that's annoying, and no one has ever found an easier way to handle it.

In my game, we simply drop encumberance, and only have armour reduce movement rates, etc. It works fine, although doesn't so much fix the problem as ignore it.

One thing I've toyed with is dropping the numerical encumberance ratings, and instead rate items by 'grade': Negligible, Low, Medium or High encumberance. The character's strength score would indicate how many units of one type are added to make up a unit of the next type, with the highest encumberance item determining the overall encumberance category. The utility of backpacks, sacks, belt pouches, and so forth, is that they would allow more efficient adding of units.

But I'm not sure the resulting system would actually be any easier. Besides, recalculating encumberance in mid-game would still be a pain.

 

[delericho]

Yeah. Although I, personally, don't like any ability which has a duration of "an encounter". (I don't think you're actually proposing that upon re-reading what your wrote, but I thought I'd comment on it.) That includes the barbarian's rage-induced fatigue, which should be changed.

It is what I would propose. Setting a duration of 'one encounter' allows the DM to have his spellcasters bring up their buff spells without having to work out exactly the optimum order to do so (something the character absolutely would know), and also saves him from tracking six different durations for the six spells used. Multiply that by the number of spellcasters, and it can become an absolute nightmare.

That sort of duration tracking is fine for PCs - the player has only one character to worry about. For DMs, it can become too much.

Perhaps even better, though, would be some sort of ruling where the durations of the 'buff package' become tied together, such that if you cast them in consecutive rounds, the durations of the earlier spells are 'reset' when the newer spells are cast. That way, they all expire together, and instead of tracking six durations you're tracking one.

And better than that would be a mechanic allowing the spellcaster to prepare and cast the whole buff package as one. This could be a metamagic feat, but is probably better if not. When preparing spells, the caster would prepare them as a single entity, such that they can now only be cast together. Then, when cast they would automatically expire together. Plus, the dispel checks should also be tied together, such that either the whole package is dispelled, or none of it. This would make book-keeping for the buffs, and also for dispel magic, considerably easier... my fear is that it would make either buffs or dispels, or both, too powerful.

I think having the difference of degree distinctions (frightened/panicked, fatigued/exhausted, dazzled/blinded) is useful.

Agreed. Other that a need to condition cards, I have few to no problems with the conditions section. And, yes, the condition cards I can generate myself, so that's a non-issue too.

And then they start making up new bonus types in the supplements so that you can stack even more stuff on top. Either it all needs to stack (easy to stack) or the number of types of bonuses should be kept small.

Agreed. I nominate seven as the 'magic number'. And I propose they remove the exception that Dodge bonuses stack. And remove Circumstance bonuses entirely - as mentioned above there seems no reason these can't be unnamed. And no more adding new bonus types.

I like have different options in combat. That gives tactical crunch to the game.

Again, agreed. Maneuver cards help a great deal here. Nonetheless, I feel the grapple rules should be redone to get as close to the other combat mechanics as feasible. Likewise, the flying rules (although not strictly part of combat) should be looked at with a view to getting as close to the normal movement rules as feasible.

 

[Thomas Percy]

Realistically, your character sheet should look like the new stat block. Take a look at your current character sheet.

When I'm a player, I have to used such sheets.
Because I'm a DM nearly all along, I forget how to use quickly standard sheets.

The next easiest are non-personal buffs. I can't generally work these out in advance, since I don't know to whom they'll be applied (and while I could work through all the options, that's more effort than I'm really willing to go to).

The next most complex are the penalties. It's easier to apply a Bless effect than a Bane effect, despite the two being mechanically equivalent, because I can rely on my PCs to remember the one but not the other.

The worst are the debuffs - Dispel Magic can really ruin my day. Especially where it takes down some but not all of the buffs.

Maybe all basic buffs will be supernatural abilities in 4e?

And better than that would be a mechanic allowing the spellcaster to prepare and cast the whole buff package as one. This could be a metamagic feat, but is probably better if not. When preparing spells, the caster would prepare them as a single entity, such that they can now only be cast together. Then, when cast they would automatically expire together. Plus, the dispel checks should also be tied together, such that either the whole package is dispelled, or none of it. This would make book-keeping for the buffs, and also for dispel magic, considerably easier... my fear is that it would make either buffs or dispels, or both, too powerful.

It makes DMing (or even playing my PC) easier.