Jonathan Tweet denounces Power Attack

[TerraDave]

Its sad to see a parent turn on a child, from his blog:

Power Attack, I disown thee! Foul deceiver! False friend! Vile tempter! You promised fun and flavor, but you brought only arithmetic and delay. You offered wild, barbaric swings, but you bogged us down with attempts to maximize average damage. Begone! Thou art no rule of mine.

Power Attack is one of my regrets. It seems innocent enough, but it puts complication where one wants excitement.

The ability to mciromanage one's attack and damage rolls has some appeal, but it runs counter to the spirit of Power Attack. Power Attack simulates a reckless, mighty swing in melee, but at the table it turns into a picky exercise in sliding numbers. It sounds like a slick feat for the mighty chopping barbarian, but it works better the less damage you normally deal. A better feat that would fit the flavor would give you a fixed attack penalty and damage bonus, so that using it becomes a simple either/or toggle rather than a sliding numeric effect. Even simpler and faster would be a feat that makes the power-attack effect always on. That way the reckless barbarian could make attack rolls just as quickly as any other character rather than having to pause and assess the odds with every swing

 

[Aloïsius]

The gamist in me strongly disagree, the rolist in me strongly agree. I'm torn apart.

 

[JDJblatherings]

oh yeah, it takes ages to subtract form one number and add to another number. :\

 

[Remathilis]

Power Attack ultimately became a game of averages. I've seen spreadsheets that did the math for how much PA to use. Monsters typically either had this on or utterly forgot it.

I'll be upset to see it go, but maybe something better will take its place...

 

[Remathilis]

oh yeah, it takes ages to subtract form one number and add to another number. :\

The math wasn't hard, it was getting the *(^*%( to declare how much that took for-bloody-ever...

 

[Scribble]

oh yeah, it takes ages to subtract form one number and add to another number. :\

Dude we already determined this between 2e and 3e.

Also... I wonder how it would work if you switched it to instead of a 1 for 1 bonus you made it a certain number of points buys you a certain die for extra damage. ie: 1 point = 1d2 2 points = 1d3 3 points = 1d4 and so on...

 

[Cadfan]

oh yeah, it takes ages to subtract form one number and add to another number. :\

I had a spreadsheet which calculated the amount by which I should power attack with a given weapon and a given damage bonus in order to gain the maximum average damage per round versus a known AC. It was... a pretty complex spreadsheet.

I didn't use it in gameplay, of course, nor did I try to recreate it with pen and paper. But I could have. The potential was there, latent, in the rule.

Here's my take on power attack:

It COULD have worked like JoT says, but no one I know who took power attack ever used it for min maxing. They just used it to wager higher damage in combats where higher damage per hit wasn't useful, and where they were reducing their overall average damage. It was a trap for enthusiastic players- Hit harder! it advertised. And then it made you miss.

I don't think power attack was a time sink for number crunchers. It was a trap for people who should have crunched some numbers, and realized what they were doing to themselves.

 

[JDJblatherings]

The math wasn't hard, it was getting the *(^*%( to declare how much that took for-bloody-ever...

that's a tabletop play-time management issue.

DM "well what does olaf do?"

PC "let's see he attacks with a +12...no wait a +4 that would mean i'd do..."

DM "well'

PC "wait let me compare atatckign at +12 to aattacking at +4 with the dmage bonus...'

DM "Next player"

 

[Daniel D. Fox]

Good riddance to an underperforming Feat!

 

[Irda Ranger]

I'm with Tweet.