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From the WotC Boards: Mearls on 'Aggro'
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<blockquote data-quote="TwinBahamut" data-source="post: 3882712" data-attributes="member: 32536"><p>Err, that is what I just said. The ones who get picked on are the vunerable ones, but not necessarily the dangerous ones. Thieves are not very threatening to monsters in Disgaea, at the very least. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> </p><p></p><p>This isn't exactly true... In FFX, Auron's Guard and Sentinel abilities are active abilities which lets Auron protect all allies that turn reliably. In FFVI, Celes's Runic ability is an active defense which protects the aprty from magic. In FFIV, Cecil's Cover ability can be directed, and <em>always</em> works on critically wounded allies. As such, I do say that they are important tactical elements in those games, at least.</p><p></p><p>In addition, the Defender and Blocker abilities from the Wild ARMS series are similar, and are quite useful, so it isn't limited to the Final Fantasy series. Wild ARMs 4 and 5 even integrate those abilities with a limited tactical movement system.</p><p></p><p>Considering that I just mentioned Runic, and the Wild ARMs Magic Defender and Magic Blocker abilities, I wonder if this whole conversation could be turned towards the concept of defending against magical abilities not limited to physical positioning, in addition to just physical attacks and the like. Certainly, that was a great problem for older editions of D&D, where you have very few options for defending yourself against a mage attacking from a distance.</p><p></p><p>One classic element of the Final Fnatasy games that you are forgetting is the implied party formation system of back and front rows. The Suikoden series elaborates greatly on this concept, even though more recent FF games have de-emphasized it. The characters on the front row have greater attack options for at the cost of greater risk of injury, while characters in back rows are protected, but have fewer options for attack. There isn't explicit tanking in this set-up, but still accomplishes the purpose of having tough characters protect weaker characters.</p><p></p><p>I agree for the most part. I just dislike the idea of "making defenders impossible to ignore", and prefer the concept of "making it <em>physically</em> impossible to bypass the defender".</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="TwinBahamut, post: 3882712, member: 32536"] Err, that is what I just said. The ones who get picked on are the vunerable ones, but not necessarily the dangerous ones. Thieves are not very threatening to monsters in Disgaea, at the very least. :) This isn't exactly true... In FFX, Auron's Guard and Sentinel abilities are active abilities which lets Auron protect all allies that turn reliably. In FFVI, Celes's Runic ability is an active defense which protects the aprty from magic. In FFIV, Cecil's Cover ability can be directed, and [i]always[/i] works on critically wounded allies. As such, I do say that they are important tactical elements in those games, at least. In addition, the Defender and Blocker abilities from the Wild ARMS series are similar, and are quite useful, so it isn't limited to the Final Fantasy series. Wild ARMs 4 and 5 even integrate those abilities with a limited tactical movement system. Considering that I just mentioned Runic, and the Wild ARMs Magic Defender and Magic Blocker abilities, I wonder if this whole conversation could be turned towards the concept of defending against magical abilities not limited to physical positioning, in addition to just physical attacks and the like. Certainly, that was a great problem for older editions of D&D, where you have very few options for defending yourself against a mage attacking from a distance. One classic element of the Final Fnatasy games that you are forgetting is the implied party formation system of back and front rows. The Suikoden series elaborates greatly on this concept, even though more recent FF games have de-emphasized it. The characters on the front row have greater attack options for at the cost of greater risk of injury, while characters in back rows are protected, but have fewer options for attack. There isn't explicit tanking in this set-up, but still accomplishes the purpose of having tough characters protect weaker characters. I agree for the most part. I just dislike the idea of "making defenders impossible to ignore", and prefer the concept of "making it [i]physically[/i] impossible to bypass the defender". [/QUOTE]
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