Gaming W/Jemal: Planar Quest! (Closed)

[Scott DeWar]

Meep, my bad. Thanks!

too much snow up there?

 

[Jemal]

You mean somewhat like, say, the Daze cantrip at low levels? Confusion/charm/slow spells? Trip attemps *are* fairly nice when they work (that being, you know, the point), but contrarely to most things, they are resisted *twice* (once from the touch, once from the Str), allow the defender an opportunity to turn the tables if the trip attack should fail and, in the non-Feated version, even give out an AoO for your trouble(!), all of which balances things some I would think...

It depends on how you look at it. Trip is something anybody can attempt. If you're looking at it from the viewpoint of someone who hasn't invested any resources into it, tripping is much more effective than ANY spell, because there's no such thing as a spell anybody can cast without previously investing something in it. Someone who invests half as much into tripping as one would into casting those types of 'control' spells can be extremely effective, without having to worry about how many 'times per day' they can do it.
Lets look at the most minimal of investment For Tripping, it's one feat: Improved trip, and good bab/str. For a spell, that would be the equivalent of one spell chosen(lets say Hold Monster) and good caster level/stat. Looking at your specific stats, someone who invested the same casting stat as you use for your tripping stat, the DC to resist their charm would be 10+5(spell level) +7(stat) = 22 Will DC. You require a touch attack, he requires a spell resistance check (given average rarities and numbers of spell resistance vs touch AC's, I'd put those at about the same difficulty). You can be tripped if you fail, they have limited spells per day.

Would it be better accepted if the target did not suffer from the Prone disadvantages when under an AoO Trip? (For no RL reason that I can see, but much better to loose a hard won advantage than not being able to use it at all, right?). What say yee?

I presume you're trying to convince me to change my ruling by offering this as an alternative, but I'm afraid I still have to stick to the original rule.
The advantage is not hard-won, it only seems like that because you're trying to trip a character with a high touch ac and a high trip check himself. Outside of truly epic and gargantuan monsters, Wade's about the hardest thing to trip you'll come across in this campaign (and I'd imagine most others)... And you got him on what the second try?
Against most average challenges, Ur will be a wrecking machine capable of knocking 90+% of his opponents flat with little effort. Ur's chance of tripping not only usually significantly better than his chance of hitting, it afterwards IMPROVES said chance (As well as that of all your allies).

Lets compare to Tutek, for example. I think he's a good example of a "Powerful Fighter"
If UR were to just full round Tutek: 26/26/26/21/15 VS AC 32.
Chances of hitting: 75, 75, 75, 50, 25. That's statistically 3 hits.

If he were to try Trip vs Tutek: 26/26/26/21/15 vs touch ac 13. +21 on the opposed str check vs Tutek's +13.
you need a 1 to not hit, and he has to roll 8 higher than you to beat you. That's a VERY good chance that you'll win. If you roll above 12 you've already won.. that's a MINIMUM 45% chance of beating him before he even gets a roll.
With the +4 for attacking prone, your chances of hitting for damage are then 95/95/95/70/45. So if you DO trip on the first attack, you get a statistical 4 hits. If you DONT trip on the first, but get him the second time, you get statistically 3.05 hits.
So even if you get extremely unlucky on the trip check and he manages to stay standing for the first hit, your average damage is still the same(Insignificantly better, actually), AND your opponent is prone, causing him to either expend an action to stand(Granting you yet another free hit), use some sort of resource, attempt a skill check, or take the continued penalties for remaining prone.

Now you may say "But Tutek's a Brute-fighter, not the average monster type we'll be facing". Well, first off I'd say to you that I prefer using characters to monsters, and second Off I say OK, lets pick a fairly standard CR 20 monster: The Balor. he's bigger, harder to hit, and stronger than Tutek. Better vs Trip in EVERY way.
Balor has AC 35, Touch 16, and opposes your trip with a +16. SO..
If UR were to just full round IT: 26/26/26/21/15 VS AC 35.
Chances of hitting: 60, 60, 60, 35, 10. That's statistically 2.25 hits.

If he were to try Trip vs Balor: 26/26/26/21/15 vs touch ac 16. +21 on the opposed str check vs Balor's +16.
you still need a 1 to miss, and it has to roll 5 higher than you to beat you. Still damn good odds for you. You need a 16 to guarantee sucess(25% chance that he doesn't even get a roll).
With the +4 for attacking prone, your chances of hitting for damage are then 80/80/80/55/30. So if you DO trip on the first attack, you get a statistical 3.25 hits. If you DONT trip on the first, but get him the second time, you get statistically 2.45 hits.
Again, even if you get unlucky and he beats you on the first trip, odds of him beating you the second time are exceptionally slim, and you STILL increase your hit Rate, PLUS the above 'negatives of being prone'.

Does it still seem so useless?


*EDIT: Just for giggles, lets do the above Hold Monster caster vs tutek and Balor.
Remember this Caster has as much invested in Hold Monster as UR does in Trip.

Tutek 0 SR, Will save +14 vs DC 22 = 35% chance of being held.
Chance of failing intial save AND not breaking out on his round: 12%

BALOR: SR 28 vs CL20, Will save +19 vs DC 22 = 65% chance of beating SR, 10% chance of failign save = 6.5%
Chance of failing initial save AND not breaking out on its round: 0.65%
/edit*

(While on the subject, I don't generally consider Ur to be a "trip character". He's far from optimized to be one anyways. I think of him more as a General Support character. He's much more polyvalent than, say, Tutek, and, if he ever manages to lay his hands on a Divine Might item he can use, he might even manage to be at least competitive in the straight damage-dealing arena as well.)

Ur can out-trip most average brute/fighter types of his level, in my mind if you're significantly better at something than the average, that means that you're good at it, hence UR is good at tripping. I never said he was the best.

 

[Jemal]

For any who are interested, I have posted Wade's sheet to the Rogue's Gallery.
Any mistakes you may notice in the build are not bugs, they are features intended to make the encounter more fun.. yeah, that's it...

 

[Scott DeWar]

What's with the "classified" stuff? huh?

 

[Shayuri]

Hm. I'm fairly sure Ascetic Mage doesn't work with Warlocks. I think you actually need to be a spellcaster. Invocations wouldn't count. Not that I'm complaining.

 

[Jemal]

True, technically it doesn't work with warlock b/c it requires to cast 2nd lvl spells, but I'm using a bit of a variant. I used 2nd lvl spell like abilities to qualify and he can't gain the offensive bonuses through spell slot sacrifice - all he gets from it is the Cha to AC instead of Wisdom, b/c he's supposed to be a bit crazy, and so a high wisdom didn't make as much sense to me.
I could have easily pumped his wis to match instead, just preferred this way.


Scott - I didn't actually DO any skills for him, so I left it 'classified' so I can get around to it whenever. As for the other.. well, aren't you just glad I didnt use any of the dark invocations on you guys?

 

[Scott DeWar]

uh-huh. I see. Note to self. Keep a really close eye on the titan forged construct.

 

[Binder Fred]

So are we waiting for something in particular Jemal? Wade seems unusually tongue-tied.

 

[Jemal]

Had a busy week, my manager's out on Medical leave so lots to take care of at work, and my baby girl's teething. I been posting OOC stuff to threads but haven't had enough time to do a game update, they usually take a while.
I get some days off now, so I'll try to do some updates.

 

[Scott DeWar]

Please take note, I will be AFK pretty much all day tomorrow as I will be in surgery. Thank you.

Scott DeWar