D&D 4E Do full attacks have no place in 4e?

[Nifft]

+2 is too much, IMO. No need to get CA by moving if you get the same bonus by not moving. +1 doesn't seem too bad. I may give that a try.

Prime Shot gives a +1, so I'd agree that's about the right value for the bonus.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Eldorian]

+2 is too much, IMO. No need to get CA by moving if you get the same bonus by not moving. +1 doesn't seem too bad. I may give that a try.

+2 is what I was going to originally suggest, but +1 seems more reasonable, I agree.

 

[On Puget Sound]

If I were to invent such an ability it would be defensive and usually inferior to moving. Something like:

FEAT: Hold the Line
You may spend a move action to gain +1 to defenses until the start of your next turn.

Or maybe
FEAT: Defensive Shot. You gain the At Will power, Defensive Shot
Defensive Shot: at will, martial, move action
The next ranged or area attack you make before the end of your turn does not trigger opportunity attacks.

 

[Leatherhead]

Here are my thoughts on the topic.

There is a feat called "Steady Shooter" that gives a +3 damage bonus damage to crossbows when you don't move. It is available at paragon tier. While using this for reference, I would hesitate to give out anything greater than a +1 damage (not attack) bonus for a move action. Even then I would say it is a bad idea, because once you start handing out bonuses for not moving, requiring players to move becomes a penalty. OA's make moving dangerous as it is, and adding a opportunity cost on top of the danger is going to cause fights to become very static.

 

[Blackbrrd]

Played 3.5 yesterday, an 4-year ongoing campaign that has reached level 16.

OMG that was slow moving stuff!

I had to recalculate my character the whole time (Rightous Might, Quickened Divine Favour, Insight of Yarus, Divine Power, Ray of Enfeeblement), and I was doing 4 or 5 attacks the whole time.

One of the characters was a two-weapon fighting rogue that has 6 bloody attacks...

And we were fighting mobs with 4 arms and 2 attacks per arm and there were 8 of them... so... eh... 64 attacks per round for the DM.

There was plenty tension in the combat - we used 4xHeal in addition to temp hp from heroes feast and divine power, and damage reduction from Righouts might. But I like the way 4e does it better. Each round is a lot quicker so even though the combat lasts for 5 rounds instead of 2 rounds it feels much more engaging.

 

[ChristopherA]

Conversely, if a move action does nothing BUT move, then the players feel compelled to move when they have one, even if it's pointless. For example, in a game I'm playing, one of the players (who, incidentally, quit) was a fey pact warlock who insisted in teleporting every time his pact was triggered, no matter how pointless it was and how much time it took to make this move.

I think a balance between the desire to move and the desire to gain a benefit by not moving should be balanced. It gives more tactical options.

If you don't like having characters spend time moving around the battlefield unless it is tactically vital to do so, then it makes sense to give them a reward for standing still, as in 3rd edition.

Personally, I like having the characters move around as much as possible. I have a fey warlock in my game, and I like it when they teleport around for no particular reason. I'd want to encourage that as much as possible, because it makes the tactical situation change all the time and reduces the repetitiveness of combat.


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[frankthedm]

I doubt i want to see "Plant your ass full attacks" in a "chose what you do when your turn comes" cycling initiative system ever again. It favors "let yourself be attacked, so you can Full Attack" stupidity, opens the door to "Power up Charging to the breaking point since you are not full attacking" abilities and then it is only a matter of time before some munchkin combines both into a "Full attack combined with uberdamage charge" abilities

 

[Mad Hamish]

Normally it should take time to weigh the advantages of each possible position that can be moved to, if it doesn't, then the move is pretty darned pointless.

If you intend to teleport around every chance you get you should have a pretty good idea of where you want to go next.

Um. The biggest reasons for moving are a) to be able to hit, b) to get a +2 to hit from flank, and c) avoid damage. This is no different than 3E.

there's a lot more movement in 4th ed because the tanks aren't stuck in 1 spot all the time, forced movement affects etc.

Yes, my wizard full attacks every chance he gets. Very few character builds wanted to full attack, it pretty much was limited to classes with sneak attack since having more attacks greatly increased damage. Other classes could get by with power attack.

Rubbish.
Full attack was the basic approach for any character who was attacking with weapons rather than spells except for maybe a completely charge optimised character.

Full attacks in 3E are what you tried to avoid letting the monster do as a higher level monster doing a full attack could often kill a lot of characters.

Really depended heavily on what the monster had by way of attacks. Mostly they didn't have the iterative attack so they didn't all get the same benefit from full attacks -> there were a lot of monsters that only had 1 attack...

 

[Regicide]

If you intend to teleport around every chance you get you should have a pretty good idea of where you want to go next.

You're making the drastic assumption that a) the player is smart enough to actually start thinking of their turn before it comes around, and b) the battlefield is static enough that they can.

Rubbish.
Full attack was the basic approach for any character who was attacking with weapons rather than spells except for maybe a completely charge optimised character.

Hardly. Full attack is completely pointless for nearly anyone below level 6 with the notable exception of the monk. So right there the majority of characters gain nothing from it.

Any BoNS melee will almost never do full attack.

The few other melee classes WILL charge optimize as it means... 1, maybe 2 feats they wouldn't already be guaranteed to take. Rhino's rush is so good for paladin they love charging assuming they're not mounted and doing spirited + ride by with a lance.

The main reason to want to do full attack is haste. If you're a pure melee and you're getting haste often, then build your character so you can stay in combat. Lord knows a spiked chain wielding fighter with permanency on an enlarge spell with improved trip is NOT lacking for chances to take full attack unless the opponent can teleport or cast walls every round or has a decent tumble. The 40 foot chunk of the battlefield that he commands is pretty effective.

Really depended heavily on what the monster had by way of attacks. Mostly they didn't have the iterative attack so they didn't all get the same benefit from full attacks -> there were a lot of monsters that only had 1 attack...

My party has not met a single one that doesn't have multiple attacks in the last 3 to 5 modules, with most of them having 5 attacks a round using multi-attack feat so they have excellent to-hits. All the party deaths have been because they've ended their turn beside a monster with 3+ attacks and the power attack feat and often the improved critical feat.

Bite, claw + free trip, claw + free trip, wing, wing, possible tail, optional quickened breath weapon VS. Bite + option quickened breath.