D&D General Passive Power Budget: Balancing Magic Item Attunement, Concentration and Everything Else Properly (or Die Trying)

[Zardnaar]

Here is a list of Archive.org links, since they've all been removed from the Wizards website at this point (in fairness, they kept 'em up for like 15 years, so that much I can't be too mad about.) All of the articles were written by Skip Williams in 2004-2005. And remember: Skip Williams was co-creator of 3e. He knew what he was talking about. He was behind only Tweet in terms of influence over the design of 3e. If you don't think he knows what he's talking about, then nobody does. Not even you.

Further, the designers explicitly admitted (quite late, I admit, 2007) that there really were a "Big Six" items that every character needed in order to not fall behind the system's designed dangers:

• Magic weapon
• Magic armor & shield
• Ring of protection
• Cloak of resistance
• Amulet of natural armor
• Ability-score boosters

And, again, Mr. Williams explicitly refers to several of these (particularly the amulet of natural armor and the ring of protection, no surprise there).

Anyone who knows anything about 3e knows that these were intentionally designed this way. System mastery was the intent of the 3e designers--explicitly, by Monte Cook's own admission--and one of those system-mastery things was that there were mountains of absolute trash items, and a small handful of genuinely essential items you needed in order to not fall behind the game's innate scaling math.

That's the truth. If you don't like it, that's your business, but it is, in fact, the truth. Admitted by Skip Williams and Andy Collins (another designer around since 2002, who wrote or co-wrote several books for both 3e and 3.5e.)

I remember the big 6. Thats an opinion long after the core rules came out.

Powergamers liked those items. 2007 is 4 years after the core rules came out. Game only lasted t years.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I remember the big 6. Thats an opinion long after the core rules came out.

Zardnaar.

It is how the game is designed.

You can pretend that it wasn't designed that way. It still was, in fact, designed that way. It might have been an accident...but I find that extremely, extremely unlikely. If it were an accident, it would be a major mistake on the designers' part, on par with the stupid overpowered nature of 3.x magic relative to non-magic, since the designers explicitly told us they were trying to fix magic/martial balance, not make it (by far!) the worst it's ever been.

"We TOTALLY didn't design for ANY required items!" is something designers can say in an official capacity all they like. If it isn't actually true in practice, their assertions are utterly irrelevant.

Collins was a designer from 2002 onward. He explicitly described them as "required to play". Was he lying? If he was not lying, then that statement is true and was true long before he said it!

 

[Zardnaar]

Zardnaar.

It is how the game is designed.

You can pretend that it wasn't designed that way. It still was, in fact, designed that way. It might have been an accident...but I find that extremely, extremely unlikely. If it were an accident, it would be a major mistake on the designers' part, on par with the stupid overpowered nature of 3.x magic relative to non-magic, since the designers explicitly told us they were trying to fix magic/martial balance, not make it (by far!) the worst it's ever been.

Reading article now.

Its not saying what you think it is.

Its actually talking about the best items after 4 years. Even then its not referencing a survey. Its essentially an opinion peace.

None of those items are required or baked in.

I read that article long time ago. Its how people assumed things went 4 years after DMG came out.

Thats not how it was designed its what powergamers liked.

Direct quote "ultimately we realized" from the article.


Its not saying what you think. The game wasn't designed to require those items. Those items are very powerful for their cost. They've never priced items correctly 3E to 5E. Its why magic item mart and built in bonuses are a bad idea.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Reading article now.

Its not saying what you think it is.

Its actually talking about the best items after 4 years. Even then its not referencing a survey. Its essentially an opinion peace.

None of those items are required or baked in.

I read that article long time ago. Its how people assumed things went 4 years after DMG came out.

Thats not how it was designed its what powergamers liked.

Direct quote "ultimately we realized" from the article.


Its not saying what you think. The game wasn't designed to require those items. Those items are very powerful for their cost. They've never priced items correctly 3E to 5E. Its why magic item mart and built in bonuses are a bad idea.

It is saying exactly what I think.

I literally quoted the part that says exactly what I think it says. Where Collins explicitly uses the phrase "Required to Play." In bold. In no uncertain terms.

This is how it was designed. They designed it that way. Whether it was "intentional" or not is completely irrelevant. It is, in fact, what the game actually IS.

A designer's intent and $7 will buy you a cup of coffee. If you're lucky, anyway, in this economy.

 

[Silam]

Wow. Thanks a lot for this incredibly thoughtful feedback! I’ll re-read it again later to make sure I digest everything fully, but I think I agree with everything from my first-pass look.

I agree. Not because I think everyone should be having the incredibly boring +N weapons and armor etc. But because I believe that item-acquisition is one of the critical, beating hearts of the D&D experience, and thus believe that the rules should be designed to support at least four things:

• 4e Dark Sun-style Inherent Bonuses: Your weapons do not make you strong. You make your weapons strong.

Although I haven’t played DS in 4e, I like this idea in general. That there would be a symbiotic relationship, or a two-way street if you’d like, between item and owner. Just like there should be (and there used to be in 3e) between familiar and wizard, etc.

• OSR-style Easy Come, Easy Go: Durable magic items are rare and don't get traded. Fragile ones are accessible.

Yeah… that is something I’ve considered… let everything significant have expendable charges. Many items were like that in 3e. Almost none (besides potions and scrolls) in 5e. Maybe the pendulum needs to swing back. Expendable items have less overall impact on the game, acting more like the option of a safety net rather than a passive perpetual bonus. As such, I think it would be fine to leave expendable items outside the scope of the whole "passive power budget" concept. Their cost is the action you spend to activate them, and the fact the item itself crumbles to dust.

• Monster Hunter-style Build Your Arsenal: Who said only the ancients could make wonders? Find your materials, forge your legacy.

Yep… and moreover, there could be crafted items that work only for their creators… items that work for anyone would obviously be worth more gold but should cost more to create as well. This could solve the weird quirk that NPCs and even bosses are typically naked or close to it, while PCs are decked to the nines on every body part.

• Standard 4e-style Slow Accretion: Being an adventurer, you encounter magic things. Those magic things are, generally, proportional to the risk for the job, or better, because otherwise you wouldn't take the freakin' job.

If it's meant to require all your concentration when you gain a new spell level, then I would instead say have Concentration equal to half your character level, rounded up. A spell requires concentration equal to the spell level of the slot used to cast it.

Yeah… that bit needs some careful thinking. Perhaps the way out of this conundrum is that spells work out of the box for some small period of time (e.g., 1-3 rounds or whatever). It is extending them beyond that timeframe that requires tapping into your passive power budget, and possibly making hard choices along the way…

Also, although it is not actually a problem, I will not be using the term "concentration points" because its abbreviation could be misunderstood. I will instead speak of Concentration score or tally.

Yeah, concentration is very close to the concept I’m trying to tackle, but doesn’t feel quite broad enough. I think I like "passive" better (passive power, or passive ability, something like that). Then, effectively, the action economy would be made up of: active, passive, reactive. No need for Bonus Actions anymore, since they’re a bit of a kludge anyway. BA powers can either become active powers or passive powers, and compete with other options in those buckets.

Hmmm. The problem here is that Fighting Styles are much, MUCH weaker than spells.

Indeed. Although I tend to favor homebrew ideas that are short and sweet (one or two new rules that fit in a paragraph or whatever), this is clearly not the case here! There is a lot of scope creep to make all aspects of this proposal work smoothly… it’s basically a whole new edition at this point.

Fighting Styles would either need to be much stronger, or martial characters would need to get FAR greater access. As in you choose your preferred 4 styles to start with, and either add new basic ones, or get access to more powerful ones, as you gain levels. I don't think they should ever be quite as chonky as spells though--every Fighter should be doing at least 2-3 by the time they get to high level.

Yep. FS could either get upscaled, or else have some limited stacking potential.

This is a very interesting idea though. You've taken your Concentration score concept and turned it into a general rules-tool. That's good design instinct. It'll need refinement, but I really like where this idea is coming from. It has legs.

Thanks. I’m very intrigued by the idea. It would need a lot of work to materialize, but I feel there is something there…

I would say this needs to be handled extremely carefully, because now we run into the problem of spellcasters being denied enough Concentration to both have magic items of their own, and focus on a powerful concentration spell. Consider, if something like the Robe of Eyes requires 1 Concentration, which seems reasonable because it's a powerful magic item, you now have a character that has to choose between "use the cool spell I JUST learned" or "continue to benefit from the cool item I earned". That's not a fun choice, that's a "choose what benefit you aren't allowed to draw on today", which sucks.

Yeah… I don’t have a good answer to that yet… one possibility is to make magic items a lot more active in nature, and less passive overall. This way, you need not attune to a ring of protection, a magic armor, a magic shield, etc… rather, your items eat up your action or reaction in order to activate them, and there’s a big bang and it’s done. If passive items are rare and not really required to avoid falling off the treadmill, then it might be fine?

Possible alternatives:

• Spells require concentration, they have enough spare points to also have an item or two by 5th level, but they cannot concentrate on more spells than half their proficiency bonus, rounded down.

Yeah. That could be fine, but it possibly takes us back to square 1, with items being absolutely needed to "fill your expected power curve" rather than giving you additional options on how to populate the area under the curve (if that makes any sense…).

• Spells require concentration, you have enough spare points etc. etc., but concentrating on more than one spell at a time is a high-level feature--the full-spellcaster's equivalent of high-level damage/attack features on martials. Various limitations to avoid abuse.
• Split items into three categories: generic, spellcaster, martialist. Spellcaster items are those that require attunement to a spellcaster, and their points do not count against you for the purpose of concentrating on spells. Martialist items are those that require attunement to a Fighting Style practitioner, and they do not count against you for the purpose of concentrating on styles. Generic items, unless otherwise stated, always count against both spells and styles.

All good ideas to consider…

A Dragonslayer Greatsword, for example, might have the [Augment] tag: each time it is used to slay a dragon, the maximum potential Concentration investment goes up by 1, to a maximum of N (whatever is appropriate for the system's math.)

I love that. The item itself becomes a side quest. Could be very entertaining, especially if there is a tension between the goals of various characters’ items. For example, a Life Cleric wanting to save lives and a Necromancer wanting to raise undeads. Clearly, any corpse can serve one or the other but probably not both. Which item or agenda will get fed on a given day?

Sure, but as noted above, this creates the immediate problem of "I only JUST got CME, and now I can't use my bracers of defense because CME requires all of my concentration." That's not a "choose to have full CME and a weak weapon, or partial CME and a strong weapon", it's "choose to have CME at all, or to have magic defenses at all". From your description here, it sounds like you wanted this to be more of a back-and-forth, which would be a much more enjoyable gameplay experience, rather than an either-or that comes up every single time you get a new spell level and consider taking a Concentration spell.

Yeah, I’m not sure what the right answer is. There may not be one. There is an inherent tension between: a) I can stack buffs and items alike but then I’m falling behind if the DM is stingy, the loot rolls are unlucky or simply because we found just a single legendary item and therefore 4/5 party members don’t have one; versus b) items carry a significant enough opportunity cost (either in terms of action economy or passive power budget) that there is still a rough balance between the character wielding the legendary drop versus another character of equal level who only relies on their own powers…

A mechanic which basically says "don't bother taking Concentration spells" is gonna have undesirable effects, creating perverse incentives. That isn't a criticism of you, nor of the idea--you are at the "throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks" stage. That stage is never clean or simple.

Indeed.

It's an excellent design proposal. It has a clear design goal: address the problems of excessive magic power, through items and features that must spend from a very restrictive budget. It aims at reasonable, gameplay-experience results: reward clever approaches, keep things relatively simple while still permitting depth, offer degrees of choice rather than dull non-choices or frustrating "gotcha" binaries. It leverages an existing concept in a new and clever way, that isn't much beyond what already exists. And, perhaps best of all, it opens new design space, rather than closing existing design space. That's a real noteworthy thing.

As said though, it requires refinement. I can foresee at least two key issues (ensuring martials have both flexibility and growth, beyond just magic items; and ensuring that spellcasters don't get forced into crappy, anti-fun "use your new shiny toy, OR your old shiny toy, but never both" choices) that depend enormously on the specific execution. And, as with any design proposal, it requires testing to ensure that it actually achieves the desired results. To do this, you'll have to nail down, with a degree of precision, what you want out of this mechanic. What should it feel like to use? If it were executed perfectly, what gameplay experiences would it develop? Why would this be something that should excite the player, rather than make them feel annoyed or frustrated? What would you consider a "good enough" result, even if it fell short of your intended goal? Once you can answer those questions, you'll be able to construct a testing rubric, and then actually do playtesting to determine if the approach you've settled on achieves those goals. If it doesn't, iterate and test again. If it fails to improve meaningfully after 2-3 iterations, then the core design probably needs to be reworked. If it still fails to improve meaningfully after 2-3 reworks (so 6-9 testing iterations, split across 2-3 versions), then the idea itself is probably flawed and will need to be workshopped.

At least, that's how I see it. Testing ain't easy. Believe me, I know. I tried to test some homebrew I wrote for 5e. Passed it by at least two dozen GMs. Exactly one was open to it, despite essentially all of them saying that it looked well-built, and that one ended up not actually inviting me to their campaign. So....yeah. IME, 5e GMs have their 1-2 pieces of 3PP/homebrew content, and otherwise won't even touch non-official things they didn't personally make themselves. But this is the process, if you want to do serious, meaningful playtesting, rather than the odious marketing song-and-dance that Paizo and WotC typically do.

Thanks for all the feedback. I agree that there’s a lot of work ahead to materialize this vision… I definitely don’t want to underestimate that! It’s an uphill battle to be sure.

 

[Maxperson]

Well I just read them and provided a quote from DMG. Page 135 black and white.

Theres nothing in there whatsoever about exact numbers. It assumes magic items yes. It assumes you have wealth. It specifically says they make no such assumptions about what they are right there. Also says the wealth thing is guidelines only.

They may have changed there minds later but its not there in the DMG. It says the opposite in fact.

Treadmill was a 4E thing RAW, conceptually late 3.5 perhaps. Wasn't baked in. You get money and a shopping list. Guidelines only.

 

[Zardnaar]

It is saying exactly what I think.

I literally quoted the part that says exactly what I think it says. Where Collins explicitly uses the phrase "Required to Play." In bold. In no uncertain terms.

This is how it was designed. They designed it that way. Whether it was "intentional" or not is completely irrelevant. It is, in fact, what the game actually IS.

A designer's intent and $7 will buy you a cup of coffee. If you're lucky, anyway, in this economy.

Come to realize in the article. Directly contradicted by the DMG.

Theyre talking about evolution over 7 years. Alot of those items were designed in 1997-2000. You're claiming that they were needed which is directly contradicted by the DMG.

Articles essentially talking about metagaming. And hyping up an upcoming book. . Its a meta gaming article puff piece. Essentially an ad. Those items were designed by the designers. Players came to like them.

The treadmill context is baked into the math. These items are not baked into the math nor needed. We had been playing for 7 years by the time that article dropped. Also 4E was in active development by the time that article dropped.

Necessary for metagaming/powergaming and article specifically says come to realize. Thats not baked into the math. You can play without them easily enough? (We had the big 3 or didnt power game to that extent).

Its a slice in time though process. Its not claiming wat you think and doesn't even contradict the 3.0 or 3.5 dmg. After 7 years they're some of the best items. Not required at all as somehow people played for 7 years. I doubt more than a tiny fraction of people even read it lol. Its essentially irrelevant and youre ignoring the context its written in.

 

[Silam]

Come to realize in the article. Directly contradicted by the DMG.

Theyre talking about evolution over 7 years. Alot of those items were designed in 1997-2000. You're claiming that they were needed which is directly contradicted by the DMG.

Articles essentially talking about metagaming. And hyping up an upcoming book. . Its a meta gaming article puff piece. Essentially an ad. Those items were designed by the designers. Players came to like them.

The treadmill context is baked into the math. These items are not baked into the math nor needed. We had been playing for 7 years by the time that article dropped. Also 4E was in active development by the time that article dropped.

Necessary for metagaming/powergaming and article specifically says come to realize. Thats not baked into the math. You can play without them easily enough? (We had the big 3 or didnt power game to that extent).

Its a slice in time though process. Its not claiming wat you think and doesn't even contradict the 3.0 or 3.5 dmg. After 7 years they're some of the best items. Not required at all as somehow people played for 7 years. I doubt more than a tiny fraction of people even read it lol. Its essentially irrelevant and youre ignoring the context its written in.

Zardnaar, I truly appreciate the breadth and depth of your D&D experience across the editions, but this sidebar has nothing to do with the subject of the thread, and yet it probably occupies half or more of the 8 pages of posts (disclaimer: I haven’t actually counted it, and not looking to debate it if someone else cares to compute the %!).

Your other two threads about magic items inspired me (thank you!) to fork off this third thread, also about magic items, but not about this never ending argument regarding 3e/4e designer intent.

I thought it best to fork off a new thread rather than attempt to hijack one or both of your other two threads… so perhaps you might be so kind as to do the same here? Perhaps start a 4th thread specifically about magic items treadmills and magic marts over the ages, and kindly invite your fellow forum mates to discuss it over there?

Now, if you have any comments about this passive power budget system I’ve been trying to explore, I’d love to get your take on it.

Cheers!

 

[SableWyvern]

Based on my (admittedly distant and cloudy) recollection of the 3e era, I think some posters are giving the designers a lot of undeserved credit for intentionally creating things that were never actually intended, and which were only identified after the fact by a segment of the player base heavily invested in build maximisation.

 

[MichaelSomething]

Of course magic items boost character power; so course the game has to take that into account. If they didn't, the term "monty haul" would never have been invented.