D&D 4E Disarming in 4e

[Garthanos]

It occured to me that the limits you are placing on this disarm could be incorporated in to the game as a generic re-use on encounter powers for instance... and let the reuse limitations be a sort of extension of page 42... ie you can do improvise any of the powers that could be skinned as disarming... but improvised they are limited.

1 You must have combat advantage.(but gain no benefit from it).
2. You suffer a -4 penalty on performance.
3 If the power normally does damage reduce the damage by [W] or d8 or halve it whichever is worse.
4 a minor action can undo any condition applied....

that kind of thing.

I would err on the side of caution

 

[Cwheeler]

I'd rather just have a quick and easy ruleset that everyone can use .

Personal preference though!

 

[Garthanos]

I think Intimidate provides the only model extant for a at-will disarm... switching off to Athletics might be the only real change it requires...

What made me think of it was well intimidate is the Warlord disarm... people usually give up or flee when disarmed. Then use the weakened if they chose not to for monsters and npcs.

If weakend doesnt seem good enough you can intensify it without more than a shrug.

I think that tethering magic. The same stuff in the D&D world which says that thrown magic weapons return to there users hand implies something similar would normally prevent disarms against those with magic weapons... and pcs would have to face something able to overcome that to have to ever worry about npcs disarming them.

So a disarm at-will if enemy bloodied .... that required you to have combat advantage cuts the defense bonus back from 10 to 8. (this is a skill not a normal weapon use so proficiency (being trained is worth 2 or 3 more than weapon proficiency and skill focus gives you +3 right away but weapon expertise gradually boosts)... so if we want to use an attack we could justifiably reduce the difficulty by 3 just because being trained is much better so based on an attack it would be versus defense +5 (and no benefit other than requiring CA)
this disarm might indeed be a takes your enemies weapon result like that of the 17th level fighter because we have a certain amount of... if you succeed on the intimidate check it works...

the enemy not understanding your language isnt an issue but they need to be using a weapon... lets call that equivalent if you want to wound a wolf or dragons mouth in some way so that its attacks against you are weakened that would be an analog and would up the enemies opposed defense (by 5).

If you attempted an intimidate during an encounter you cant try again against that target this encounter... ah so it is an encounter per target limited ability(But I would say you can still do the old finishing stroke disarm at zero hit points).

 

[LostSoul]

I like pretty much like everything that's been suggested here.

One thought: if a guy has a loop on his weapon, instead of being on the ground in his square, it's dangling from his hand. I think I'll use that for my disarm. Professional soldiers only; goblins and bandits might not use that, but hobgoblins would. And elites.

 

[Garthanos]

Discussing it here is the right place I think... rules are as hide bound or not as you want them to be... here most of the suggestions will be more liberal... and sometimes dangerous. ;-). Mr wheelers sunder weapon feat makes the disarmed state permanent without additional effort on the users part ... combat advantage is way less of a limit than for instance the limit on intimidate requiring the enemy be bloodied. (that is the defining limit on intimidate other limits like the +10 hostile enemy limit is fairly overcome-able in a front-loaded way sadly enough).

Ranger Wickets idea is cool because it is simple but takes two actions... but they are definitely the unarmed variety disarm (and you really should provoke an opportunity attack when grabbing somebodies weapon arm - though nothing says you do). Also he really under estimates the difficulty wrestling a weapon away from a trained enemy... its not going to be a raw fort or reflex defense .. at best give them something kin to a proficiency bonus with the weapon at minimum (+2 to +3) and an extra +1 to per 5 levels of the enemy to represent subtle magics which bind weapons and implements to their wielders (these woud seem likely in as magical a world as D&D presumes even if the weapon isnt magical).

The impact on elites and solos really needs dealt with in any of these rules... there are some cool possibilities which have me fascinated but .. need handled with care.

 

[Garthanos]

I seem to have a bit of an obcession with this.. hellpppp!!!!!
There are clues that a battle field intimidate might be intended to be skinnable as a disarm --> a Wandering duelist background gives a +3 on intimidate ? how and why ? if he succeeded on his intimidate roll a partof that roll was doing a disarm... and it wasnt important that he disarmed them it was important they gave up or ran away after he did it. Charisma is not just charming or regal impressiveness its also a inspired trickiness attribute and a real life disarm is as much trickiness as strength or agility... and doing it after you have got them tired (bloodied) makes all the difference.

 

[Alex319]

I like pretty much like everything that's been suggested here.

One thought: if a guy has a loop on his weapon, instead of being on the ground in his square, it's dangling from his hand. I think I'll use that for my disarm. Professional soldiers only; goblins and bandits might not use that, but hobgoblins would. And elites.

Interesting idea. Of course it seems there would be no reason not to use a loop if that were the case, unless there were some other kind of penalty.

Also, this brings up an interesting consideration for those who claim that the game is "unrealistic" or "unsimulationist" without a disarm maneuver. I've heard it claimed in previous threads that disarming isn't really that powerful because players can put a loop on their weapon to prevent it from being lost during a disarm. Did real-life medieval soldiers use such "weapon loops"? (That's an honest question: I don't know the answer.) It seems like if disarming were an effective combat tactic IRL, and "weapon loops" were an effective countermeasure, then such loops would have been commonplace. If not, then this seems like a blow to the "realism" argument.

(Note: For those who don't know what we're talking about, a "weapon loop" is a cord that goes around the user's wrist and attaches to the handle, thus preventing it from dropping. The Wii controller has one of these.)

 

[Garthanos]

nope didnt use loops twasn't necessary ... because it was and is very difficult to disarm somebody who knows what they are doing, sufficiently so that they its easier to cut your enemies arm badly (probably killing them). Its also not easy to knock somebody unconcious without risking seriously harming them... or similar tricks. And both occur in movies which is the inspiration for more than a little of people's thinking not realism.

D&D 4e has what I call tethering magic being very common... which returns weapons back to there users hands (see thrown weapon) and sword mages which epitomize it... but a how much cheap is a ritual that would draw on the natural bond between a warrior and his blade and cause it to cling.