D&D 5E Q&A 10/17/13 - Crits, Damage on Miss, Wildshape

[Warbringer]

No, reflex is a reflex save. It represents the ability to respond quickly and reflexively to immediate dangers. Exactly what that reflex might be depends on the circumstances and the capabilities of the character. It could be just pulling up the hood of your holocaust cloak and turning away from the fireball. I admit that it is something of a shame that there aren't standard 'oh crap' immediate actions for evading things that provoke reflex saves but I fear they'd become mechanically complex and difficult to balance. Reflex is already the weakest of the three saves.

SRD: Reflex: These saves test your ability to dodge area attacks. Apply your Dexterity modifier to your Reflex saving throws.

Again, I love the narrative of throwing you holocaust cloak over your head

I played around with Immediate descriptive action, but as you pointed out it weakens, arguably, the weakest save (unless you're a Rogue w Evasion), unless its a free action (then it turns into a free move).

On optic, I don't have a problem of damage on a miss, as I don't see all hit points as meat, nor a round of combat as a single attempt each round.

 

[Tovec]

You felt the need to repeat it three times? OK, I got it, it was called Evasion and not Uncanny Dodge. Fine.

It was twice. Unless you were counting the amount of times I said the word itself then it comes to four times.. twice per description. But yes it is an important distinction. I got told over and over how it wasn't healing surges that I had an issue with (though it was) it was the second wind mechanic (I dislike that too). Specificity is important in cases like this - especially when you are wrong in your terminology - as evasion did a thing and uncanny dodge did another.

So, you evaded a fireball with nothing to evade behind, and nobody else except the character with the Evasion special ability could do that. Even if they had a much higher dexterity bonus than the guy with the special Evasion ability. Even if you were stuck in a pit with nothing at all to provide any vague cover to evade with, and the wizard fires a fireball on your head from above.

Everyone was hit for half damage or full damage, except the guy with the special ability Evasion who could reduce it to zero because "Evasion".

There is a problem with evasion, absolutely. It could be changed to make it more realistic and to make sense. The problem however isn't with how it interacts with HP or the attack. And the solution to fix it - to make it make sense - involves giving the rogue a free move which opens up a whole other nest of problems. It is a mechanic that makes sense and is needed, as long as the guy with evasion is supposed to be able to not fall for traps and fireballs from wizards.

Why is that more believable to you than this mechanic, where everyone either hits or misses with a melee attack, but the one guy with the special ability can do half damage on a miss?

This however is the opposite thing.

Let me give you a similar analogy.

I have a problem with a car that goes 300mph and also are able to somehow fly because they are going soo fast, even though I think that doesn't make any sense (and is impossible). Further, I say I dislike you trying to make it that ALL cars should go 300mph and be designed to fly. Your reply is that submarines can submerge even though that doesn't make any sense as air is lighter than water and should keep the sub afloat.

I guess the answer to your question goes something like...
Specific fighter can use this ability to deal damage on a miss, which no one else can do.
All rogues can use evasion, which no other class can do. Except, other classes CAN do things that replicate evasion, and it isn't restricted to a single class - and the evasion ability MAKES SENSE. You use an ability to bypass the damage. It should require you to be hiding behind a wall or cover, but it doesn't. To require it to do this causes more problems.
The fighter can use his ability to deal damage on a miss. No one else can. Even if they did there is no good reason why ONLY the fighter/DOAM'r can, nor why they get to break the hit/miss economy. Allowing them to do this doesn't make sense, as everything they are described as doing is already PART of what they do in the existing attacks vs. AC structure and hit/miss. Also, removing has no problems, KEEPING it opens up a can of worms that do not make sense.

As I would define it in the fiction...a "hit" that doesn't kill me is one where I should, by all rights, be dead. That otherwise decapitating blow was stopped by my gorget, my helm stopped the curshed skull, or maybe I took a wound, a cut, or a bruise, or a minor broken bone, that could have been fatal.

Meanwhile the "damage on a miss" is more like, I've done everything right, I held my sword just so, I moved my shield to block off that avenue of attack, or I somersaulted at just the right moment to evade the blade, but the fury of my opponents attack still managed to take some wind out of me.

Rage. Damage Reduction. Poison. Power Attack. Full round attacks.
I've just named five existing structures that are all affected by what you just say here to try and justify this new mechanic. Rage or otherwise hitting them with "fury".. except people with rage (Barbarians) don't get this ability do they? Block the attack, yet still deals damage? Yeah that works against DR which requires some form of reducing the damage of the attack. Poison should also go through if you are still hitting them. Power attack should surely grant this, on a miss. Because of the fury thing. And if it is justified as "I tried to hit, it got deflected and then I used my elbow" or whatever... that is an iterative attack (first attack sword (misses), second attack unarmed strike (hits?-automatically??)).

On optic, I don't have a problem of damage on a miss, as I don't see all hit points as meat, nor a round of combat as a single attempt each round.

That's nice for you. I DO have a problem with that, I do see HP as meat, I do see combat as (usually more than) a single attempt each round. And?

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

I am not confusing anything, and that's probably not a wise way to phrase it. It's either fixed DC vs variable saving roll, or variable attack roll versus fixed AC. Both are one variable d20 roll vs. one fixed armor/difficulty class number. The only difference is who is rolling the 20 sided die and whose bonuses you apply to the 20 sided die, not the math. So no, no confusion there.

I think he meant the classical definition of confuse. You are fusing saving throws and attack rolls into the same mechanic, which they are not. Similar, yes. But not the same.

Attacks can miss. Most spells can't. Their effects can be mitigated through a saving throw, but they never miss.

The difference is more apparent when a spell requires an attack roll, or when an attack has an extra effect like poison which grants a saving throw.

So, while the mechanics are similar, you are rolling for entirely different actions.

Now, in 4E all of this was, in fact, rolled into a single mechanic that used the terms hit and miss, but those terms rarely actually meant hit and miss like they did in previous editions.

 

[Jester David]

Amusingly, a fighter with 16 Str and wielding a 2-handed weapon will never NOT kill a goblin. Because they always do at least 3 damage and goblins (and kobolds and giant centipedes and many others) have 3 or fewer hp. And once the fighter gets 18 Strength they can kill any human commoner with zero effort. Disadvantage? Natural 1? Doesn't matter, auto-damage for their total hp.

A first level human fighter can walk into any town and kill almost anyone, with their eyes closed.

 

[Warbringer]

That's nice for you. I DO have a problem with that, I do see HP as meat, I do see combat as (usually more than) a single attempt each round. And?

So if you see combat as more than usually one attack per round we are on the same page; if you see HP as meat only, then apart from that never having been the case in the rules, then you have all the other arguments and contortions to explain damage on a miss, or, just ignore it.

 

[Celebrim]

On optic, I don't have a problem of damage on a miss, as I don't see all hit points as meat, nor a round of combat as a single attempt each round.

I do see all damage as meat because under the constraints of the game, nothing else makes sense. That isn't to say however that all hit points are meat. Hit points also represent luck, destiny, and skill. But while those things are also depleted when you take damage, all those things serve to mitigate the meat damage: they never completely eliminate it.

I do not see a round of combat as a single attempt per round, but a six to a dozen (or more) furious moves - only one of which has a real chance of breaching the opponents defenses (unless you are very skilled). I don't think that the single attempt per round model works with rounds unless the rounds are a second or so in duration. Second by second modeling of combat is very interesting, but it's also very complex and requires a very long time to resolve combats that are more than duels between single foes.

 

[Warbringer]

Amusingly, a fighter with 16 Str and wielding a 2-handed weapon will never NOT kill a goblin. Because they always do at least 3 damage and goblins (and kobolds and giant centipedes and many others) have 3 or fewer hp. And once the fighter gets 18 Strength they can kill any human commoner with zero effort. Disadvantage? Natural 1? Doesn't matter, auto-damage for their total hp.

A first level human fighter can walk into any town and kill almost anyone, with their eyes closed.

Which is why villagers are terrified or strangers with weapons... even blind ones

 

[Warbringer]

I do see all damage as meat because under the constraints of the game, nothing else makes sense. That isn't to say however that all hit points are meat. Hit points also represent luck, destiny, and skill. But while those things are also depleted when you take damage, all those things serve to mitigate the meat damage: they never completely eliminate it.

I do not see a round of combat as a single attempt per round, but a six to a dozen (or more) furious moves - only one of which has a real chance of breaching the opponents defenses (unless you are very skilled). I don't think that the single attempt per round model works with rounds unless the rounds are a second or so in duration. Second by second modeling of combat is very interesting, but it's also very complex and requires a very long time to resolve combats that are more than duels between single foes.

We are pretty damn close to saying the same thing, and I agree with you at some point a miss is still a miss (less than touch)

I personally use a threshold mechanic that leads to "wounds" (similar to [MENTION=336]D'karr[/MENTION]) that don't bounce back after a short rest that represent the meat under the HP, but that's a pure house rule.

 

[Kobold Stew]

I'm a bit surprised at the vehemence of feeling being exhibited in this thread. We're talking only about fighters who choose to specialize in heavy weapons (1 out of 5, on average; plus paladins and rangers at second-level) being able to do a point or three of damage.

* Is this really the point that stains credulity for you above everything else (in a game with magic...)?
* Has it been a proved to be a problem in play tests? The fighter in my game didn't think this was an attractive option.
* Was this even a concern that you voiced (or that you saw others voicing) before it became part of the Q&A?

The answer for me, on all three, is no.

 

[D'karr]

We are pretty damn close to saying the same thing, and I agree with you at some point a miss is still a miss (less than touch)

I personally use a threshold mechanic that leads to "wounds" (similar to [MENTION=336]D'karr[/MENTION]) that don't bounce back after a short rest that represent the meat under the HP, but that's a pure house rule.

I don't mind damage on a "miss", at all. It can serve to illustrate the normal "fatigue" incurred during combat and actually opens up the narrative space to describe hits that don't penetrate the armor but still "tire you out". Half damage on a failed save has always done something similar anyway.

HP have always been such an abstraction in the game that defining them as "meat only" always felt like the most absurd way to do so for my games. It has always caused more problems than describing them abstractly. The wounds and injuries subsystem I devised simply gives more options for the DM when he wants to do something else in addition to the regular rules. I'm glad it has inspired others to do something similar, or use the same system. D&D has always had a very strange way of dealing with short term & long term injuries after all. So the wounds and injuries subsystem let's the DM use the existing rules to give that sense of long term loss without having to do all kinds of weird gyrations with HP description.