Diagonal wonkiness scenarios

[Kobu]

Here are a few more scenarios where 1-1-1 movement wonkiness would come into play (crossposted from a Wizard's thread).

1) Two characters are avoiding a group of wandering monsters coming up behind them by rushing south to north across a 20 square by 20 square room. One goes straight from the south center entrance to the central door on the north wall. The other takes a detour all the way to the east wall and grabs a painting off the wall, then heads to the same door. They would both reach the north door at exactly the same time despite the second character moving 40% more distance. Why not bounce from wall to wall to loot since it takes no more time to do so?

2) In a large field, a prisoner is about to executed by a band of brigands. The party can rush straight to the group but they need to go through an area of poisonous plants. Or instead they can take the safer path, but that will delay them reaching the brigands--or will it? The party wisely chooses to zig completely around the hazardous area because it takes absolutely no more time.

3) The BBGE's minions have been defeated and he is trying to escape by running to his teleportation chamber 500 feet away. Two paths lead there--a mostly straight path with one jaunt the goes off to the side for 20 feet and comes back comprised of four 90 degree turns, and a path made up of diagonals that zigs and zags back and forth all the way there. The shortest path is the straightest line between two points, right? Not in this case, Bucko.

4) The characters are in a roughly cube shaped building in the SE corner. The objective is to get to a fourth level map room in the NW corner and steal a map before the owner arrives, and he is only seconds away! Fortunately, one of the characters has a dimension door type power that will let him teleport up to 12 squares. Under normal geometry, he could chose to go 60' up onto the fourth floor, to the NE or SW corner, or up to the second or third floor and bit closer to the goal. With 1-1-1, he pops straight into the map room. Whew, I was worried for a moment that someone might actually need to make a bluff check or something!

As a player, there is no reason in the game to not take advantage of diagonals at every opportunity. A DM can get around of some of these by thinking about how players might use diagonals to great effect, but frankly I would rather not have to consider that for every map I write up.

 

[Kordeth]

Internet wonkiness = double post.

 

[Kordeth]

Here are a few more scenarios where 1-1-1 movement wonkiness would come into play (crossposted from a Wizard's thread).

1) Two characters are avoiding a group of wandering monsters coming up behind them by rushing south to north across a 20 square by 20 square room. One goes straight from the south center entrance to the central door on the north wall. The other takes a detour all the way to the east wall and grabs a painting off the wall, then heads to the same door. They would both reach the north door at exactly the same time despite the second character moving 40% more distance. Why not bounce from wall to wall to loot since it takes no more time to do so?

Fallacious argument since swiping the painting would be a standard action--an action the non-looting character could be using to move farther into the next room.

2) In a large field, a prisoner is about to executed by a band of brigands. The party can rush straight to the group but they need to go through an area of poisonous plants. Or instead they can take the safer path, but that will delay them reaching the brigands--or will it? The party wisely chooses to zig completely around the hazardous area because it takes absolutely no more time.

Easily minimized if not outright eliminated by making the area of poisonous plants a little larger or repositioning it slightly.

3) The BBGE's minions have been defeated and he is trying to escape by running to his teleportation chamber 500 feet away. Two paths lead there--a mostly straight path with one jaunt the goes off to the side for 20 feet and comes back comprised of four 90 degree turns, and a path made up of diagonals that zigs and zags back and forth all the way there. The shortest path is the straightest line between two points, right? Not in this case, Bucko.

4) The characters are in a roughly cube shaped building in the SE corner. The objective is to get to a fourth level map room in the NW corner and steal a map before the owner arrives, and he is only seconds away! Fortunately, one of the characters has a dimension door type power that will let him teleport up to 12 squares. Under normal geometry, he could chose to go 60' up onto the fourth floor, to the NE or SW corner, or up to the second or third floor and bit closer to the goal. With 1-1-1, he pops straight into the map room. Whew, I was worried for a moment that someone might actually need to make a bluff check or something!

Neither of these "proves" anything we don't all already know--1:1 diagonals are marginally less realistic than 1:2 diagonals. Nobody has ever argued anything differently--but both of these scenaqrios can easily be mitigated simply by the DM designing dungeons with the 4E movement rules in mind and adjusting differences accordingly.

As a player, there is no reason in the game to not take advantage of diagonals at every opportunity. A DM can get around of some of these by thinking about how players might use diagonals to great effect, but frankly I would rather not have to consider that for every map I write up.

I think you're drasticvally overestimating the effect of 1:1 diagonal movement, and that's speaking as someone who has many, many years experience playing variou editions of D&D using both 11 and 1:1 rules for diagonals. A typical character gets about 2 extra squares per move action--hardly game-breaking.

 

[frankthedm]

Yeah, this is a problem to some folks, like myself. All you really can do is inform your players you are changing it or someone else is running.

 

[hong]

I like ketchup.

4) The characters are in a roughly cube shaped building in the SE corner. The objective is to get to a fourth level map room in the NW corner and steal a map before the owner arrives, and he is only seconds away! Fortunately, one of the characters has a dimension door type power that will let him teleport up to 12 squares. Under normal geometry, he could chose to go 60' up onto the fourth floor, to the NE or SW corner, or up to the second or third floor and bit closer to the goal. With 1-1-1, he pops straight into the map room. Whew, I was worried for a moment that someone might actually need to make a bluff check or something!

Wait, what? You have 3-dimensional battlemats now?

As a player, there is no reason in the game to not take advantage of diagonals at every opportunity. A DM can get around of some of these by thinking about how players might use diagonals to great effect, but frankly I would rather not have to consider that for every map I write up.

Personally, I spend far too much of my time thinking about whether dragonborn females have breasts to worry about this kind of thing.

 

[im_robertb]

Wait, what? You have 3-dimensional battlemats now?

He's onto us. Get everything into the time machine.

 

[themilkman]

Not having to recount long or complicated movements is well worth the minor impact on realism, which I forgot about almost immediately anyway.

If you really miss 1-2-1 diagonals, you can show solidarity by making sure that every other diagonal move you make is around a hard corner.

 

[D_E]

The second one does seem like something that would bite the DM from time to time. He'd always have to check to make sure that hazards were shaped such that avoiding them had a cost. Not something that'll come up every day, to be sure, but something that would be annoying when it does happen.

Fallacious argument since swiping the painting would be a standard action--an action the non-looting character could be using to move farther into the next room.

I believe all turns now have one move action and one Standard action, so for his zig to grab the tapestry, the player only loses one attack (move to wall, standard to grab tapestry, move to door, standard action to do whatever he wanted to do with the tapestry. This compares to: move to cover half the room, standard to attack, move to reach door, standard to attack).

 

[Kordeth]

I believe all turns now have one move action and one Standard action, so for his zig to grab the tapestry, the player only loses one attack (move to wall, standard to grab tapestry, move to door, standard action to do whatever he wanted to do with the tapestry. This compares to: move to cover half the room, standard to attack, move to reach door, standard to attack).

Yes, but you can always "trade down," sacrificing a standard action for a move or a minor, so the guy who didn't stop to loot is always at least one action ahead, assuming they both have to get past the same obstacles to get out the door.

 

[Blue]

My personal wonkiness is movement and cover on diagonals, because unlike the other places they treat diagonals differently.

Picture a wall running N to S. Two minis adjacent to each other next to the wall. No cover. One could move into the other's square (if that was allowed) for 1 square of movement.

Turn the picture 45 degrees. The wall is now a diagonal running NE to SW. (Or NW to SE, doesn't matter.) The impassible squares of the wall now grant cover (according to the DDM rule book). And you can't move directly to them you need to go "around the corner" so it's 2 squares of movement. (Also according to the DDM rulebook.) The DDM rulebook even has an illustration of just this case (the diagonal wall).

So my problem is that diagonals are not treated consistently.

Mind you, I'm still sold on 4e. Somehow I'll cope.

Cheers,
=Blue(23)