No Pain; No Gain

[Orion Ravenclaw]

Hello everyone,

I finally registered after lurking for a while.

Sly Flourish made the following Tweet today:

"So critique this house rule for me: All characters and creatures can shake off a status effect by taking their level in damage. Discuss."

I came up with the following power for all creatures; please let me know what you think about it.

No Pain; No Gain

Encounter Utility: Minor Action

Take a healing Surge's worth of damage to end one Status Effect.

Special: This damage cannot be reduced in any way. This Power cannot end the dying, dead, or petrified status

 

[keterys]

It also can't get rid of the stunned condition, as a minor action

At any rate, part of the point of such a house rule is to make elites and solos able to extricate themselves from statuses, and making it a surge seems unnecessarily punitive in that respect.

 

[eamon]

Sounds like a reasonable rule - but as keterys points out, you may want to make it a No Action to permit usage with stun. On the other hand, do you want this to work against dominate?

I think using a surge's worth of hitpoints is generally a good idea. The difference in damage&hitpoints between monsters & PC's is a weakness, not a strength, and if you're going to make a new combat rule you should avoid using absolute numbers of hitpoints. And whereas on the one-hand a solo takes more damage from this rule than a PC, it also may have more to gain. However, particularly early solo's lack a decent way of dealing with status effects; you could institute a special ability for such solo's to take only half damage from this power and to use it several times in an encounter.

In any case, I'd grant such extra solo-only-benefits on a case-by-case basis; some solo's need em much more than others. Be careful - shaking off arbitrary status effects can be extremely powerful. You don't want to turn combat into a pure damage slugfest either...

 

[ZephyrTR]

I really enjoy this idea as a Barbarian or Fighter, or even Paladin encounter exploit, but for a Wizard? Why would he have the ability to do this? It doesn't seem to fit for most of the classes, but for some, it sounds great.

Maybe put it in as a Feat, and require Strength or Constitution to be yea high.

 

[Orion Ravenclaw]

Sounds like a reasonable rule - but as keterys points out, you may want to make it a No Action to permit usage with stun. On the other hand, do you want this to work against dominate?

I think using a surge's worth of hitpoints is generally a good idea. (snip) ...

I would consider it as a no action for Solos...interesting point.

I agree about the Surge's worth of damage. It scales well, and it makes the power "hurt." It would be a tough decision in many circumstances. Some talked about expel a surge, gain no HP, and get rid of the condition. I didn't like that. Take an action to take the damage and rid the condition, then later, that PC or another PC would need to spend another action to use/grant a Surge.

I really enjoy this idea as a Barbarian or Fighter, or even Paladin encounter exploit, but for a Wizard? Why would he have the ability to do this? It doesn't seem to fit for most of the classes, but for some, it sounds great.

Maybe put it in as a Feat, and require Strength or Constitution to be yea high.

Good idea for a feat, or maybe a Martial/Primal utility power?

I could see a Wizard using extreme mental concentration to shake off a condition but taking "mental" trauma to do it.