Ranged Strikers - more "aggro" mechanics?

[Lord Sessadore]

And as the players crunch the umbers I wondering if this wee mechanic has the potential to bring gameplay to the speed of molasses in mid winter in Alaska

Only if you give your players the time to crunch the numbers that long
Small-scale combat is an instinctual thing, you shouldn't have 5 minutes to ponder what you do in the course of 6 seconds. That said, I'm a terrible DM for letting things slow down, haha.

 

[small pumpkin man]

And as the players crunch the umbers I wondering if this wee mechanic has the potential to bring gameplay to the speed of molasses in mid winter in Alaska

No, see, this is what "put the complexity where is deserves to be" goes. there is no number crunching. This is not like power attack, I can't use math to figure out exactly what the character should be doing, I have to make a conceptual decision about what to do. It could be just attack the front guy, I could get over it and attack the back guy, I could delay untill after the wizard so they can move the front guy out of the way, I could dart in, mark the squishie then attempt to get to safety, I could attempt to get higher ground and attack from there.

But all of these are concepts not numbers, and all of these are things that can be described in character terms, and often involves interacting with the world, with the terrain and surrounding, (and often trying to bull**** the GM into allowing something) instead of the game of the numbers.

Yes, people will dither, people always dither, but that's very different from a character attempting to figure out all their bonuses to attack, or attempting to find the right power attack.

 

[hong]

Actually, I think it opens up some interesting tactical options.

"Do I keep pounding on the dudes up front, or do I position myself so that I can mark the pain-in-the-ass controller back there, and potentially take him out more quickly?"

The other way opens up interesting tactical options too. "Do I go it alone by shooting the annoying mage at the back, or do I join my buddies in killing the brute who's beating up our fighter?"

 

[tomtill]

marking independent?

There seems to be some ambiguity with the wording on hunter's quarry and warlock's curse.

They are listed as +dX damage, rather than dX damage. This suggests that it is additional damage. Thus, the assumption that a standard attack is necessary.

But, there is no mention of such an attack. There is no "hit" or "miss" condition. Each round, you do +dX damage.

Isn't it possible that hunter's quarry and warlock's curse (both minor actions) are independent of any standard action attacks.

Might the ranger and warlock can get automatic damage on their marked foe (representing the ability to strike their marked foe with only a minor action), and choose to attack another opponent with their standard action?

 

[Lord Sessadore]

No, see, this is what "put the complexity where is deserves to be" goes. there is no number crunching. This is not like power attack, I can't use math to figure out exactly what the character should be doing, I have to make a conceptual decision about what to do. It could be just attack the front guy, I could get over it and attack the back guy, I could delay untill after the wizard so they can move the front guy out of the way, I could dart in, mark the squishie then attempt to get to safety, I could attempt to get higher ground and attack from there.

But all of these are concepts not numbers, and all of these are things that can be described in character terms, and often involves interacting with the world, with the terrain and surrounding, (and often trying to bull**** the GM into allowing something) instead of the game of the numbers.

Yes, people will dither, people always dither, but that's very different from a character attempting to figure out all their bonuses to attack, or attempting to find the right power attack.

Ok, that's what I wanted to say. Thanks, small pumpkin man.

And really, your players only have as much time as you give them. Since there really is no number crunching to do with this (how hard is it to pick up an extra d8 to roll damage?), it all comes down to which of those options the character wants to go with, which is something you can limit player decision time on more easily. Denying them their action because of indecision (letting player indecision result in character indecision) is a lot better than denying them their action because they're not good with math and are having trouble figuring out how exactly 4 points of power attack and a flank on a prone enemy who is on lower ground all adds up.

 

[Lord Sessadore]

There seems to be some ambiguity with the wording on hunter's quarry and warlock's curse.

They are listed as +dX damage, rather than dX damage. This suggests that it is additional damage. Thus, the assumption that a standard attack is necessary.

But, there is no mention of such an attack. There is no "hit" or "miss" condition. Each round, you do +dX damage.

Isn't it possible that hunter's quarry and warlock's curse (both minor actions) are independent of any standard action attacks.

Might the ranger and warlock can get automatic damage on their marked foe (representing the ability to strike their marked foe with only a minor action), and choose to attack another opponent with their standard action?

I would interpret that the other way around. +dX needs something to be added on to, whereas just a plain dX is by itself. You don't see basic attack or power descriptions saying "+XdY+Z damage", right? That implies that without the + at the front is the normal, when-you-use-this-successfully-you-do-this-much-damage clause, whereas +dX is a bonus to whatever you do that does damage to people.

 

[Lackhand]

There seems to be some ambiguity with the wording on hunter's quarry and warlock's curse.

They are listed as +dX damage, rather than dX damage. This suggests that it is additional damage. Thus, the assumption that a standard attack is necessary.

But, there is no mention of such an attack. There is no "hit" or "miss" condition. Each round, you do +dX damage.

Isn't it possible that hunter's quarry and warlock's curse (both minor actions) are independent of any standard action attacks.

Might the ranger and warlock can get automatic damage on their marked foe (representing the ability to strike their marked foe with only a minor action), and choose to attack another opponent with their standard action?

They might, but I don't think it very likely.

They really really really look like additional damage on attacks to me.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

To put it in military history terms, the Ranger would be a circle-around-behind 'em Skirmisher, not a stand-in-a-line-of-more-of-us Archer.

And in all the games I've played so far, the ranger is perhaps TOO good at killing the back row-squishies, not the other way around.

I don't quite understand the OP's idea that the tactics are somehow different than either older D&D games, OR reality. Could you elaborate?

Fitz

 

[Lord Sessadore]

To put it in military history terms, the Ranger would be a circle-around-behind 'em Skirmisher, not a stand-in-a-line-of-more-of-us Archer.

Haha, I like your extremely technical military history terms.

 

[drjones]

I don't think of it as an 'every round have to do thing' and more of a 'nice bonus when you can' thing. You can still feather the controller in the back row with your hunter mark on the tank up close you just lose some of the alpha strike umph. In a tough fight it might make some difference but those are the fights where you carefully consider your movement to get a chance to mark someone off the front line.

It means you won't be doing your 100% best damage every moment of every fight but I think that makes the tactics more interesting because there is no always right answer. I mean if you can mark anyone then when would you not go after the artillery?

So yeah I like it, although the 'full LOS' rule sounds good too I will have to see how it plays out in more robust playtesting situations than the 1st level stuff we have now.

I should say also I played the burst 'range' on the marks as being to maintain it as well so you don't have to keep your quarry closest to you but you do have to stay relatively nearby. Seems best to avoid silly gaming of the marks although I would guess the final rules will be more strict than what we have now.