Static Save Defense instead of dynamic saving throws.

[Gentlegamer]

Thats the problem, lets say it IS as easy to stack a wizards magic attack bonus as a warriors meele attack bonus. We've all seen fighters out there who can hit just about anything 80% of the time or higher. Do you really want a mage whose spells always hit and have thier full effect? Good god, were talking the difference between a single sword blow and an AOE attack spell.

I'm thinking the effects of a "failed save" may not be as bad as we are used to.

 

[Branduil]

In Saga all of your defenses receive a bonus equal to your level. In 4e it should be more like you have one "good" defense that saves you most of the time and two "average" ones where you save about half of the time, as opposed to 3.x where you have one decent save and two that you always fail at.

 

[Celebrim]

This is IMO a very small net change. So small that I'm not sure I understand why they bothered. It just moves 'the action' from the province of the defender, to the province of the attacker.

The only positive I can see is that it makes the whole system a bit more elegant, in that everything has the same mechanic. Spells work the same as melee attacks. Ok, fine.

The only negative I can see is that spells tend to have grosser effects than melee attacks in any case but a critical. So, I'd rather put the dice in the hands of the player when he's the defender, than put it in the hands of the player when he's the attacker because I'd rather he not feel in total control when he's attacking a monster than feel he has no control when he's being attacked. But that's a really small thing, because the player already has to deal with that when he's being subjected to ordinary attacks.

A slight worry is that area of effect attacks will only have a single 'saving throw' now, which will make them swingier (ei all the monsters fail or save, or the entire party fails or saves at the same time). I don't know what the mechanics are though, and in any event this is easily handled by DM judgment/house rule (ei, if its a bunch of mooks, resolve with a single attack roll. If the target is something important, let everyone be subject to a separate attack.)

 

[Nine Hands]

In Saga all of your defenses receive a bonus equal to your level. In 4e it should be more like you have one "good" defense that saves you most of the time and two "average" ones where you save about half of the time, as opposed to 3.x where you have one decent save and two that you always fail at.

I hope they use the save mechanics right out of SW. Its super easy to figure out what your saves are and its really hard to munchkin out the defense values since you only get the best bonus from each class.

Plus it does not penalize multiclassing at all.

 

[breschau]

Besides, the only real difference is who gets to roll.

If you want to keep rolling your own defense scores go ahead. It's simple to arrange.

Static defenses are just dynamic saves +10. With Defenses the attacker's roll has to beat: your level + bonuses + 10. With Saves the defender has to beat the attacker's roll with: bonuses + d20. Just drop the +10 bit from Defenses and let the other person roll the dice. It's all the same bonuses.

It's just Taking 10 for your Saves and calling it Defense.

 

[drothgery]

I hope they use the save mechanics right out of SW. Its super easy to figure out what your saves are and its really hard to munchkin out the defense values since you only get the best bonus from each class.

I think in D&D I'd go with class bonus + ability bonus + equipment bonus + 1/2 level rather than + level (as per SWSE), mostly because with the SWSE progression Skill vs. Defense becomes pretty much an autofail at high levels. And that's a more serious concern given 30 levels to work with than 20, and that due to a goal of emulating the movies, skill vs. defenses was supposed to fail a lot vs high level characters (and succeed a lot vs. low level characters). And also because getting armor to stack with defenses will undoubtedly be more common and easier in D&D than it is in SWSE (because in D&D, most heroics wear armor; only pure arcane casters, monks, and people who eschew armor for style reasons do not).

 

[Branduil]

Well the problem has always been that due to the way things like BAB and saves scale, the disparity at higher levels between good BAB and saves and bad BAB and saves becomes so great that you often either autofail or autosucceed. Now, if they make BAB and other attacks work more like the skills and saves in Saga, you could minimize this problem. They could give every character a set BAB progression that applies to all characters, then certain classes get bonuses at first level, like with saves. The only problem is you couldn't use the same multi-classing as Saga, since a bonus to BAB is far more valuable than a bonus to a single defense. Maybe something like you only get the bonuses from the class you have the most levels in. That would discourage Rogues dipping into a single level of Fighter for the attack bonus.

 

[breschau]

Well the problem has always been that due to the way things like BAB and saves scale, the disparity at higher levels between good BAB and saves and bad BAB and saves becomes so great that you often either autofail or autosucceed. Now, if they make BAB and other attacks work more like the skills and saves in Saga, you could minimize this problem. They could give every character a set BAB progression that applies to all characters, then certain classes get bonuses at first level, like with saves. The only problem is you couldn't use the same multi-classing as Saga, since a bonus to BAB is far more valuable than a bonus to a single defense. Maybe something like you only get the bonuses from the class you have the most levels in. That would discourage Rogues dipping into a single level of Fighter for the attack bonus.

It's more likely they'll keep the different BABs, and scale Saves/Defenses as in Saga, +1 per level for everyone, with small bonuses for each depending on class. So even a fighter's BAB versus a wizard's Defense, the +1/level from each cancels out, leaving other bonuses as the determinant.

 

[Geoff Watson]

The problem I see is that it's one roll for all targets, so it's likely that everyone "fails the save" or everyone "makes the save" with only a small change for some targets to save and some to fail.
Either the spell "wins the battle" or has very little effect.

This isn't that much of a problem for damaging spells (except on a critical) but for "save or lose" spells it's a big problem (IMO).

Geoff.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

1) The "thrill" is gone from the defender's hands. IE. No longer is there the exultation of rolling a 20 or the dread of possibly rolling a 1.

Are you also complaining about the lack of thrill involved with static AC?

2) STACKING EFFECTS: This is the big one. In any system its easier to modify a single source than multiple ones. Now that Wizards get an attack roll, it seems to me that it would be much easier for that single mage to find ways to stack up a really high magic attack roll, compared to how the defenders can increase thier STATIC defense score.

It would be a shame if this turned out to be the case, but I don't see any reason to predict it as such.