Game broke down over Pinning Strike

[windman68]

I think questioning the player as to how the creature is being pinned is neccesary, especially with certain monsters, ie: Displacer Beast - large creature and pinnable, however- it also has the use of it's long tentacles. Unless the player has specified exactly how he/she has performed the pin, those tentacles could be quite effective for cancelling the power. In addition, shouldn't a strength check be required at the start of the players next turn to see if he/she is able to continue pinning the creature as well as an endurance check to see whether or not the character can withstand the strength of a monster trying to escape? If anything, a "save ends" should be attached to the power.
I've noticed a few powers in the PHB like this that seem kinda broken.

 

[Regicide]

I think questioning the player as to how the creature is being pinned is neccesary, especially with certain monsters

*groan* This is 4E, you CAN NOT ASK SENSIBLE QUESTIONS! How do you trip an ooze? How do you pin an ooze? How do you fire two arrows at the same time? How do you throw 1 dagger to hit 9 people? The powers make absolutely no sense what so ever. Just follow the rules.

 

[windman68]

*groan* This is 4E, you CAN NOT ASK SENSIBLE QUESTIONS! How do you trip an ooze? How do you pin an ooze? How do you fire two arrows at the same time? How do you throw 1 dagger to hit 9 people? The powers make absolutely no sense what so ever. Just follow the rules.

That's where you're wrong. Who decided that you can not ask sensible questions? Anything is questionable, if it raises an eyebrow - the DM and the players have the right to ask, no matter what edition it is - INCLUDING 4E! Just because you prefer not to play that way, doesn't mean that it can't be done. It doesn't say anywhere in any of the 4e books that you can't ask questions. You seem to forget one thing that was stated years ago when D&D was born: the rules are guidelines. That means they can be fudged at any time and for any reason by the DM. If I had a dime for every person who stuck to the "rules", I'd be in debt.
And by the way, keep this in mind - if you try to trip Ooze, you deserve to take damage.

 

[Regicide]

That's where you're wrong. Who decided that you can not ask sensible questions?

The writers of 4E. If you ask questions about powers then you'll need to ask questions about ALL of them and you won't be playing 4E. Singling this power out and ignore the weirdness in all the others is just plain silly.

 

[keterys]

As far as 'tripping an ooze', you're not exactly taking its leg out, but you could smash an ooze so strongly into the ground that it's less able to move and needs to spend a moment to reconstitute itself before it can move about...

Yeah, I'm fine with prone oozes.

 

[eriktheguy]

Look out, its a troll! The only way to prevent his regeneration is to not respond to his posts!

 

[windman68]

The writers of 4E. If you ask questions about powers then you'll need to ask questions about ALL of them and you won't be playing 4E. Singling this power out and ignore the weirdness in all the others is just plain silly.

So you play by verbatim, nothing wrong with that. I'm not singling out this particular power, if you read my first post, at the bottom I clearly stated "I've noticed a few powers in the PHB like this that seem kinda broken." All I'm stating is that some things are questionable with simple solutions. For you to tell me or to tell anyone that "you CAN NOT ASK SENSIBLE QUESTIONS!" is a classic example of a "my way or the highway attitude". I'm pretty sure that WoTC, or in your words - "the writers of 4e", did not specifically say that asking sensible questions in 4e isn't allowed, prove me worong and I'll appologize.
Some powers don't make sense, that's just the way it is, so fudging them to fit a campaign is a logical solution to some people, especially when there's more than one person raising an eyebrow over things. (Have you ever DM's before?)
One last thing, if you're going to quote me on something, quote the entire text instead of just taking it out of content to find a reason to complain.

 

[rainsinger]

Well, for what it's worth, I think this issue separates the two major schools of DMs... those that take gameplay over story, and those that take story over gameplay. I know I'm the latter... but there's nothing wrong with either. I know those DM's that try to go by the rules as much as possible tend to run faster games, and that can be nice.

 

[windman68]

Well, the newer edition of Star Wars was the playtest for 4e - I wonder what 5e is gonna be like. I'll probably be a very old man when that happens. I believe 4e will probably be around for quite a while.