"Nearest enemy"?

[DEFCON 1]

You're arguing that this is possible as though you need to justify to us that it should be allowed.

But we aren't the ones who need to agree to it. Your DM is. So there's no point in trying to justify the point here.

 

[DreamChaser]

You change the assumption by being specific in your description of how your character acts. Characters are assumed to stand on two legs, but you can specify you character is hopping.

not as described in the rules and not without suffering negative effects....however even if you did choose this action and you DM okayed, you are voluntarily blinding yourself (with all attached) to every other direction. if you decided you wanted to hop, you would suffer a penalty to movement.

DC

 

[Rafe]

you are voluntarily blinding yourself (with all attached) to every other direction.

...and should grant CA to every foe who isn't in the direction you're facing, I would say. If you want to go for cheese, punish'ed be thy name.

 

[DreamChaser]

...and should grant CA to every foe who isn't in the direction you're facing, I would say. If you want to go for cheese, punish'ed be thy name.

right..CA is part of blinded. I figured it was implied...

DC

 

[Doctor Proctor]

Bino's wouldn't really work for one simple reason. When you go to fire your bow, you can't hold the bino's up. Heck, you can't even hold them while trying to use a one-handed weapon for the most part, since you can't really see how you're aiming when looking through the bino's. So at some point, you have to take them off, and then you can see the other enemies.

The "blinders" would work I suppose, but as was stated above it would have a LOT of nasty side effects to make the user pay for using them.

 

[CapnZapp]

My real issue, of course, is that this makes these classes with "ranged marks" so very dependent on terrain. But not in a good way.

I'm not sure I find it fun to see a Ranger maneuver behind walls and rocks for such an overwhelmingly meta-game issue. It makes these marks look-n-feel extremely videogamish. How on earth could you explain why the Ranger moves backwards to the right just to do extra damage on the furtherest Orc in the rear to the left?!?

It would seem much easier - assuming that "you can mark whomever you want" isn't desirable balance-wise - to just make a roll of some sorts to see whether you can mark someone who isn't closest. Or DM fiat. Or something - anything but having to slow down the game just because the Ranger player needs to test each square for all possible line of sights, just to see if he can Quarry just the right enemy...

This would also make it possible to use the Quarry/Curse ability in a game that doesn't use minis or track terrain meticulously ...

 

[DreamChaser]

I'm not even sure what you're asking here...

Terrain isn't metagame...in combat of any era, terrain factors massively into tactics...your ability to see or not see someone (and conversely have them see / not see you) has a huge impact.

Now, on that note, if you're concerned about the technicality that a ranger could have a situation where he has 2 bad guys...one is 3 away the other six but he wants to quarry the further one...so he moves behind a column to give the one 3 away total concealment so that he cannot "see" the nearer one and thus the one six away is the closest he can "see", this raises the question of whether this is concealment or cover...and does awareness count as seeing? And is taking that time to move to gain cover worth it? and do we care if the ranger is able to switch out his quarry like that?

DC

 

[Doctor Proctor]

Now, on that note, if you're concerned about the technicality that a ranger could have a situation where he has 2 bad guys...one is 3 away the other six but he wants to quarry the further one...so he moves behind a column to give the one 3 away total concealment so that he cannot "see" the nearer one and thus the one six away is the closest he can "see", this raises the question of whether this is concealment or cover...and does awareness count as seeing? And is taking that time to move to gain cover worth it? and do we care if the ranger is able to switch out his quarry like that?

DC

Yeah, this isn't an issue of the power, it's an issue of players trying to game the system. It doesn't mean we need to change how Quarry works though, because a lot of players don't do this (our Ranger, for one, does not). If you're a DM and you have a player that's doing this, then deal with it. Have that guy that's now out of sight sneak up on the Ranger and give him a good whallop. There's a reason why in most battlefield situations you're trying to expand your line of sight on targets. This is why high ground is favorable, is because then you can see all the enemy forces around you.

 

[Saeviomagy]

No, you -can- see around you. Absolutely nothing is stopping you from using the ancient art of turning your head. Line of sight is not disrupted by equipment you hold in front of your face, when said equipment can be moved almost as easily as your head.

So we need to add a neck brace?

I don't really think that nit-picking over the meaning of 'can' is the way to go about this. Just tell the prospective blinker wearer to get lost, it's silly.

Mind you, that sillyness is being provoked by the profoundly silly "nearest target that you can see" rule, whos purpose is purely to give the warlock and ranger some reason to move.

Personally I'd rather that prime shot was more powerful rather than such bizarreness. If prime shot and curse/quarry were linked, for instance, you'd see the same level of focus on movement without any of this blinker nonsense.

 

[CapnZapp]

I'm not even sure what you're asking here...

From how you continue your post, I think you are...

Terrain isn't metagame...in combat of any era, terrain factors massively into tactics...your ability to see or not see someone (and conversely have them see / not see you) has a huge impact.

True. But a 4E Ranger is encouraged to move in ways completely contradictory to common sense, having some bizarre supernatural ability to hurt some people but only if he can't see other, closer, people; even if he knows they're there!

It's completely jarring. And from how you phrase yourself, it seems you agree.

Now, on that note, if you're concerned about the technicality that a ranger could have a situation where he has 2 bad guys...one is 3 away the other six but he wants to quarry the further one...so he moves behind a column to give the one 3 away total concealment so that he cannot "see" the nearer one and thus the one six away is the closest he can "see", this raises the question of whether this is concealment or cover...and does awareness count as seeing? And is taking that time to move to gain cover worth it? and do we care if the ranger is able to switch out his quarry like that?

Involving cover and concealment would only make a big headache grow into a monumental pain in the ass.

One easy change is from "that you can see" to "that you're aware of". In much the same way Invisibility have always dispelled itself on the intent of its caster (i.e. it isn't the nature of the action that's important, it's whether the caster himself views it as offensive/hostile or not).

Whether moving around to exploit this "feature" of Quarry is worth it or not is not the issue. Whether the DM can stand having a player who even occasionally would spend time on optimizing such a silly parameter is.

You're right in that the easiest change, of course, is to simply drop this requirement. But I guess the dev's realized this would make it too easy just to stand back shooting down things.


So what do you think of the "that you can see" to "that you're aware of" change? (Or should I open a new thread in Houserules for that?)