How do these ideas fix Power Attack?

[JohnSnow]

Mighty Swing from Star Wars Saga is pretty much what I think PA should be.

It's interesting to note that Saga has both Mighty Swing AND Power Attack.

But that may have been a result of a reluctance to make a major change like this pre-4e.

 

[Ahglock]

Most players aren't going to "abuse" power attack. This is why most of you haven't seen players in your games doing it. The players who do it are those power gamers who do push the limits of the game that test how well the system holds up. They are the ones that do this with it. The original feat either is underperforming (making you hit less but do more damage, working out to the same average damage per round) or broken depending on how it is used in conjunction with other game effects.

Once a power gamer figures out a broken combo and it spreads into peoples games, it hurts the integrity of the game system, people's trust in it and for organized or tournament style play where house rules aren't used to fix those problems.

If the fix for "power gamers" diminishes the options of the "most players" the fix isn't worth it.

 

[Ahglock]

In another thread we are discussing Johnathan Tweet's commentary on Power Attack, essentially how it slows down game play through metagaming. Here are my ideas on how to solve power attack with the following interests in mind:

1) Keep true to its spirit.
2) Find a way to give player's a way to increase damage.
3) remove the metagaming element (i.e. breaking the supension of belief and encouraging min/maxing of the math).
4) Keep in working fast and scaling well.
5) It should toggle on/ off, and be "used" as an action of some sort. Using power attack should be a choice.

I hate to see a feat like Power Attack go. The following two results are my ideas to solve the problem. I like commentary on mine (both pros and cons) and I would like to see other poster's ideas too. Try to follow the guidelines above.


Power Attack (pre: Str 13+)

You may choose to use power attack as a full-round action. Make a single melee attack. If the attack hits your foe, add a damage bonus to your attack equal to the amount your attack roll is greater than your foe's armor class. If your attack misses, your opponent may make an attack of opportunity against you.

You may only use this feat once per round.


Or you can do this:

You may choose to use power attack as a full-round action. Make a single melee attack. If your attack hits your foe, you automatically cause a critical hit. If your attack misses, your opponent may make an attack of opportunity against you.

You may only use this feat once per round.



So how do these two ideas help the problem? What issues do they have? Are they balance? Please comment and share your own ideas.

I actually like the idea of provoking an AoO on a miss for something like this. I think I prefer the second option. Though without any game play of them who knows which is more balanced.

Still don't have a problem with power attack as is since I think the sliding scale was a positive feature not a flaw. So while I like the AoO I'd still want a sliding scale feat. People don't have to use them if they don't like them but its nice to have the option in the game.

 

[Najo]

If the fix for "power gamers" diminishes the options of the "most players" the fix isn't worth it.

Nearly every potentially good game that has ever failed horribly has been from a point where the rules got pushed by a power gamer. Alot of gamers don't see this, but it is the point where a game collaspes in on itself, from an exploit that was missed. I would bet you name a game with potential and good presentation that failed, and I can show you where its rules were flawed.

Games like D&D and Magic are hard to see these problems because there is so many rules and they are not compiled for bugs like with a computer program, i.e. the game doesn't seize up from bad code. The other factor with hobby games is at any given time a group of players is only seeing a limited section of the rules and then keeping them in short term memory, or long term if they have played long enough. These two factors makes seeing these game hindering mechanics as the dangers as they are hard to do.

Regardless, things like Power Attack (as it is), Bull Rush, Grappling, Polymorph (old version), etc. make the player who is using them stop the flow of the game play, which is bad. These rules are either counter intuitive rules or they require metagaming to get the best effect from them. Rules like these souldn't exist, they hurt the game.

Ironically, most people who are saying they like the feat as is then go on to say that they just power attack for full or that they don't really number crunch the feat. Well, those people are not using the feat to its fullest. They would be happy with a feat that just applied a fixed number as a bonus to damage and a penalty to hit as they would one that gives the perception of choice.

Good games get test driven by explotive players. They are like the test pilot and drivers of the game industry and their work is often under appreciated as the changes made to remove the abuse they find make the rules clearer, intuitive, and more fun.

 

[Jin_Kataki]

As I stated in the other thread on this subject I think it should be a random thing based on a roll. Your swing is sacrificing accuracy for power. Roll a die to determine what gets subtracted from your attack and thus added to your damage.

 

[Stalker0]

If classes are getting manuevers in 4e I don't see the need for power attack anyway. I can just go my mighty swing maneuver and get a big bonus to damage or something equivalent.

 

[Khaalis]

My bet is that Power Attack will turn into a Talent Tree style power rather than a basic feat. Most likely along the lines of the Mountain Strike / Stone Dragon's Fury type powers from Tome of Battle.

 

[Particle_Man]

1) Keep true to its spirit.
2) Find a way to give player's a way to increase damage.
3) remove the metagaming element (i.e. breaking the supension of belief and encouraging min/maxing of the math).
4) Keep in working fast and scaling well.
5) It should toggle on/ off, and be "used" as an action of some sort. Using power attack should be a choice.

I would quibble with the last criterion here. Why not make "Power Attack" a feat that can be taken multiple times, and simply adds to one's damage each time it is taken? If there is also a feat "Precise Attack" that can be taken multiple times and adds to one's to hit roll (perhaps they could be in separate feat trees, with Power attack 2 requiring power attack 1, etc.), then you have two sorts of character, the finesse style precision fighter, and the all-out power attacker.

I think if one is going to like power attacking, it could be taken as an "always on" class feature. By making it cost a feat (or whatever currency they use in 4e), it has to be paid for, so there is a cost.

 

[Storm Raven]

How about introducing some randomness into the bonus and penalty?

Something like: You may subtract 1d4 damage from your attack roll to add that same amount to your damage roll. You must choose whether to use this ability before you roll your attack roll. You may choose to add an additional 1d4 to both the attack roll penalty and the damage bonus for every five points of BAB you have (rounded down). This benefit does not apply to light weapons. If you use a two-handed weapon, you may add double the amount of the attack roll penalty to your damage roll.

That should make it a lot harder to optimize using it, and gives some "wildness" to wildly swinging.

 

[Telsar]

Power Attack (pre: Str 13+)

You may choose to use power attack as a full-round action. Make a single melee attack. If the attack hits your foe, add a damage bonus to your attack equal to the amount your attack roll is greater than your foe's armor class. If your attack misses, your opponent may make an attack of opportunity against you.

You may only use this feat once per round.

I like this. Right now, my problem isn't with players taking time do the math for PA. It's when they say they do a full PA, roll a 10 or less, announce they hit, and then _I_ (as GM) have to do the math to make sure they didn't screw it up. And a significant fraction of the time, they have. So I like this, where your chance to hit doesn't change, just the effect when you do hit. I like the AOO too, gives the sense of the attacker potentially leaving himself open with his wild swing.