Jonathan Tweet denounces Power Attack

[Cadfan]

*shrug*

The fact that finding the proper amount to power attack requires creating an equation for expected damage giving constant average damage without power attack, constant target AC, variable power attack to hit modifier and variable damage, then taking its derivative, setting it equal to zero, and solving the question, IS a problem, even if no one does all that work during an actual game.

Power attack accomplishes three things.

1) It gives fighting characters something to do with excess BAB. If you're charging an enemy, you only get one attack per round anyways, and you hit on a -4 or above, you might as well power attack a bit.
2) It lets people simulate wild, crazed swings of an axe, lowering their chance to hit in exchange for a gamble for huge damage.
3) It lets people optimize their damage by power attacking for one or two here or there as the situation merits.

My thoughts on these:

1) Power attack accomplishes the first pretty well.

Personally, I'd rather accomplish the same thing with a rule like this- Feat: Crush. Effect: For every two full points by which you beat a target's armor class, deal one extra point of damage. This bonus applies to all attacks automatically unless you choose otherwise.

2) Power attack is not so great at the second. Frankly, the damage isn't big enough to justify the risk. If I'm going to reduce my chance of hitting by a half, I want to see around a 100% increase in damage. I'd be in favor of a feat that lets a player lower his chance of hitting in exchange for a bonus to damage, but it had better be a BIG bonus. I want it to be a momentous decision that has everyone on the edge of their seat as the player rolls, not a small decision that everyone kind of ignores.

I'd rather see a feat like this: Feat: Demolish. Effect: You may choose to subtract 10 from an attack roll. If the attack hits, you deal triple damage, and the target you strike suffers a Fortitude Stun Attack with bonus equal to your character level plus your strength. Normal rules for multipliers apply. You must choose before you roll the attack.

With a feat like this, everyone knows that your risking a serious chance of missing your attack. But if you hit, its going to be awesome.

3) And while power attack is awesome at the third if you do the calculus, I don't think the third is a good idea. I'd rather that tactical decisions revolve around in game effects, rather than number juggling. I say this as someone who is pretty good at number juggling.

 

[Guild Goodknife]

Well, it's official: Wizards' target market for 4e is complete idiots. I guess it's a smart move, since there are an awful lot of those, but for the majority of existing players, this means that the new, dumbed-down, D&D will feel like going from university to "special class".

I guess that this is what you get when you let people who wrote a "...for Dummies" book or two design a game: They just assume that everyone's a dummy and treat them as that.

Just one question: Why are you still here? You've been trolling the boards since 4th edition was announced. Your insulting comments got old real quick.

 

[mmadsen]

You can come far short of optimizing PA and still gain a solid advantage from it.

It is really easy to gauge what you need to roll to hit a particular target and adjust over the course of a few rounds. I am certain that they dish out substantially more damage than they would if they never used PA at all. And they don't spend any significant time dwelling on it.

But the evidence suggests that power attack, applied blindly, hurts as much as it helps, especially for attackers already doing decent damage.

 

[Najo]

1) Ok, to reply to the comment on WOTC as a big, evil corporation. WOTC may answer to public stock holders (ala through Hasbro), but the people working in WOTC and on D&D are huge D&D fans and love the game.

2) Power Attack has been proven to be open to abuse and cause confusion for new players. Regardless if your players don't do this, the possiblity for it to occur is there. Mathematically power attack is proven to not do much, even though the idea of it is neat. Again, if you don't see this, then you are not doing the math on it. Good game rules do not behave like this. The end result, power attack needs to be fixed in a way that keeps the feel of it, but removes the issues it can cause.

3) D&D is a wonderful game that is now competing for time and money from some other very well-done games, namely World of Warcraft. These other games have fewer barriers to entry, thus making it easy for a new player (and a potential D&D player at that) to play that game, learn it, and then stay their once they gain mastery.

Because of this, D&D has to look at its marketing, its barriers to entry and how well the game players over time. They need to look at all levels of play, and the ability for the game to draw in new blood and keep it playing. They need to remove and change the things that were counter intuitive, turned off new players or made running or playing the game not fun for veteran players.


That is the streamlining that D&D is going through right now. They are not dumbing it down. Adding in versitle talent trees is going to allow for much more character flexibility than anything the current game has. Having abilities you can use per encounter, per day and per round is going to give tactical choices. Environmental rules, monster tactics, team dynamics and roles, all of these things allow for new players to pick up and run easier, while giving old players more to chew on than ANY previous version of the game did.

D&D is making the basic rules easier to learn and get rolling. But in turn, they are giving you more options than ever before. This is the sign of a great game, simple to learn and difficult to master.

Absolutly nothing they have said about the changes or the sneak peaks we have been given suggest that they are dumbing it down. That is just gamers worst fears getting the better of them. Have faith in the guys who love the game that work at WOTC. Yeah, their bosses are saying sell books and make money, but they know if they kill the cow and lose all of their customers that noone is happy and I am willing to bet if they were having to do that they wouldn't want to work on this project anyways. The designers know what they are doing.

 

[Najo]

*shrug*

The fact that finding the proper amount to power attack requires creating an equation for expected damage giving constant average damage without power attack, constant target AC, variable power attack to hit modifier and variable damage, then taking its derivative, setting it equal to zero, and solving the question, IS a problem, even if no one does all that work during an actual game.

Power attack accomplishes three things.

1) It gives fighting characters something to do with excess BAB. If you're charging an enemy, you only get one attack per round anyways, and you hit on a -4 or above, you might as well power attack a bit.
2) It lets people simulate wild, crazed swings of an axe, lowering their chance to hit in exchange for a gamble for huge damage.
3) It lets people optimize their damage by power attacking for one or two here or there as the situation merits.

Criteria
1) Power attack should feel like a wild swing that leaves you open but hits harder or is harder to hit with.
2) Power attack should increase the damage of the attack.
3) Power attack should toggle on and off and possibly be restricted in use per round.


My suggestion:

Power Attack (Pre: Strength 13+)
Benefit: You can use power attack as a standard action. To use power attack, make a single melee attack. If your attack hits, then it causes double damage. If you miss, your opponent may make an attack of opportunity against you. You may only make one power attack per round.

 

[frankthedm]

Just one question: Why are you still here? You've been trolling the boards since 4th edition was announced. Your insulting comments got old real quick.

On Enworld, if you think someone is trolling, you click the 'report post' button and let a Moderator about it. It looks like this>

That said, I like 4E, but that doesn't mean I disagree with Kae'Yoss on thet wotc seems to be simplifying the game for more mass market appeal. The bulk of humanity is not called "the ignorant masses" without reason. Hasborg wants the cash of the fools who are soon parted from thier money. Wotc want to keep thier jobs and has to get as much money as possible for thier megacorp owner.

 

[Quartz]

I love Power Attack and Combat Expertise: a fighter-type can allocate a couple of pips of BAB to each and hit hard while being harder to hit.

 

[Najo]

Here is some basic math that simply presents the Power Attack issues:

Lets assume we have a character with a to hit roll modifier of +15 (all bonuses included)

Lets say our monster has an AC of 26 (giving our hero a 50% chance to hit)

Our hero has power attack and deals 1d8+3 damage. The average damage is 7.5.

Because the hero has a 50% chance to hit, they will deal 3.75 damage per attack.

Here is the effect that power attack has:

+hit %hit av. damage
15 50% 3.75
14 45% 3.825
13 40% 3.8
12 35% 3.675
11 30% 3.45
10 25% 3.125
9 20% 2.7
8 15% 2.175
7 10% 1.65
6 5% 0.875

This shows you exactly how power attack works. As the hero takes greater penalties to hit, and thus adds to damage, they actually do less damage over time. This at the cost of a feat. Power attack only benefits you if you have excessive BAB or within a small amount used +1 or +2. Even then, the effect is negligible.

If you look at power attack with monsters with a much lower AC (say 17), and thus higher chance to hit, it looks like this as you use it:

+hit %hit av. damage
15 95% 7.125
14 90% 7.65
13 85% 8.075
12 80% 8.4
11 75% 8.625
10 70% 8.75
9 65% 8.775
8 60% 8.7
7 55% 9.075
6 50% 8.75

Ironically, power attack fluctuates up and down as you go down the chart. But overall, when you have a high base attack bonus, it gives you about +1 damage extra, all for a feat.

The ONLY exception is when your to BAB is far higher then needed. So much so that you can take all of the excessive, still hit on anything but a 1 and then add that difference to your damage. That is the ONLY place power attack really does anything at all.

Now, here is where all the arguments come in. But for a starting feat, that a 1st level character can have and doesn't get ANY benefit from at all. That it takes using with tables like these to understand and I won't really break it until high level and then once I do it can add gross amounts of damage to monsters that are already easy to hit.

Power attack doesn't work like it advertises. It confuses new players and lies to veteran players. It is pure luck if you get it to work for you, and your missing more than you realize, likely only remembering when it is lucky. Power attack needs an overhaul, badly.

 

[helium3]

Here is some basic math that simply presents the Power Attack issues:

So here's a tangentially related question for you. If power attack is so obviously broken in that it doesn't even do what it claims to do, how did that get by the designers of 3E?

 

[frankthedm]

So here's a tangentially related question for you. If power attack is so obviously broken in that it doesn't even do what it claims to do, how did that get by the designers of 3E?

One side says "lets make power attatck deal a little extra damage, 50% more, with a two handed weapon".

Someone else, "that might confuse some folks, lets just make it x2".

1st side, "well we better playtest that..."

Hasborg rumbles... "PRRRROFITS OR PIIIINKSLIPS!"

1st side, "Fine fine, x2 it is"