Should I Ban Tanglefoot Bags?

[bestone]

If a player likes to cheese out, or do something reaaaaly munchkin while playing a game i run, sometimes, just sometimes i make them taste thier own medicine. Pc's like to abuse tanglefoot bags? well 10 mad gnomes attack with tanglefoot bags...STEAM OPERATED TANGLE FOOT BAGS WITH BUILT IN FORKS!

obviously im kidding, but no, if they wanna twink or be abusive of the rules, they can try, but they cant abuse the rules as good as the dm can, and they need to remember that.

 

[Greg K]

I ban it. It does not fit the style of games that I like to run.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Is it just me, or are tanglefoot bags really annoying? I've had them used against me as a player and now that I'm a GM, I'm having them used against my bad guys. If they don't have a slashing weapon, a monster strength score, or some alcohol, they are just dead in the water (or very slow - if they make their Reflex saves). A tanglefoot bag literally killed one of my Bosses because the boss was an elderly cleric who wielded a club, had no Strength score, and a crappy Reflex save. (The PCs just stood 10 feet away and shot him full of arrows while he was helplessly stuck to the ground.)

I'm seriously thinking about just banning them in my game. Has anyone else done the same? Does anyone think banning them would be a cruel injustice the likes of which the world has never seen?

Sound off!

First off, how does your "boss" fail to have either a slashing weapon of any kind or a monster strength score? Failing this, what about spell-casting? He was a cleric, right? Even clerics of Kord get spells! Concentration 15 is fairly easy to make. I suppose the party probably just readied attacks to shoot him, in which case, good for them! As you yourself described him, he got exactly what he deserved for facing the entire party head-on without more numbers. There's nothing horribly broken about Tanglefoot bags. At low levels, they're pricy,twice as much as a first level spell scroll! At higher levels, it's just not worth the action in combat to use one. I suppose for a while, levels ~ 4 - 8, they may be pretty sweet. So what?

Sorry to go on a rant here, but it's still somewhat related to your banning question. Why are so many people accepting of magic being able to do literally anything, yet balk in disgust when more mundane things are allowed to be cool? In this case, it's alchemy, something that never even (successfully) existed in real life! By the flaws you described, wouldn't a casting of ray of enfeeblement (clerics have the touch AC of a barn!) bring him down even more easily, as he had "no strength score"? How about a handy fireball for a save he'd have no hope of making? If that insta-killed him, is it ok because it's magic?

 

[Drowbane]

....

<snip>

...If that insta-killed him, is it ok because it's magic?

Absolutely.

 

[Darklone]

Friend of mine used tanglefoot bags and called them NETS.

 

[Infiniti2000]

I love tanglefoot bags, but they are pretty strong. I'd up the cost. But frankly I wish more alchemical items did stuff like this, the way it goes by 2nd or 3rd level if it isn't magic its crap, and that's no good imo.

I actually DO think that's good. I don't like the idea of "high-tech" tanglefoot bags and what complications it brings to the world I create. I also ban a number of other mundane "high-tech" items like that. That way, the world is medieval + magic. If the item, whatever it is, doesn't fit within the tech-level of a medieval environment then it must be magical.

 

[RigaMortus2]

A tanglefoot bag literally killed one of my Bosses because the boss was an elderly cleric who wielded a club, had no Strength score, and a crappy Reflex save.

Sounds to me like having no Str score and a crappy Reflex save are what killed your BBECleric.

 

[RigaMortus2]

I've very rarely seen Tanglefoot bags used in any campaign I have ever been involved in, going back to 3E. Sure, it's come up once or twice in the past (how many years since 3E came out?). And of those couple of times, it wasn't that big of a deal. I find Tree feather tokens more troublesome (at least in 3E, not sure if they were changed in 3.5 (price maybe?), haven't used them since 3E).

 

[Menexenus]

I do wonder how the cleric wasn't casting any spells. Were the players smart enough to take turns readying an arrow for him when he cast?

Since a couple folks have asked about this, I'll answer it.

This was the end of a bigger fight. (The Erythnul temple underneath the Dourstone mine in the second AoW module.) The PCs had already chopped their way through the grimlock cleric's minions, and the cleric had already cast all of his good range spells by that time. So at the end of the fight, when it was just the PCs vs. him, he didn't have much in the way of spell power left.

Other posters have seemed incredulous that a cleric would not have a slashing weapon. That incredulousness seems odd, since clerics aren't proficient with many of them. But that point aside, I run the bad guys as they are statted out. (In my view, it's no fair to the PCs to change the bad guys in the middle of the fight.) According to the bad guy's stat block, his only weapon was a morningstar - which is non-slashing.

Anyway, I hope that satisfies your curiosity.

 

[javcs]

Clerics are proficient with daggers. <soapbox> Every character should have a dagger </soapbox> Seriously though, only a commoner could be non-proficient with a dagger.

You say he was out of good range spells, that he'd cast most of his spells already, that's what killed him, not the tanglefoot bag.

Tanglefoot bags, IMO, are cool and good, but they get used far less often than not used.