Target 20 as new to-hit mechanic?

[mkill]

ANYTHING that requires me as DM to tell the player the monster's AC (as opposed to "you hit / miss") is a design fail.

Keep AC on the DM's side of the equation.

 

[delericho]

Target 20 isn't a bad system, but it has two very important constraints:

- The AC must always be positive. That's fine for OD&D, but even as early as 1st Ed it is no longer true.

- The DM must be willing to tell the players the AC of their targets, even if there is some hidden defence that by rights they should not know about.

If either of these constraints are broken, Target 20 requires either that players perform a subtraction, or that they handle negative numbers. Neither of these is inherently bad... but they negate the benefits of the system and give the win to the 3e/4e model.

Even with those constraints in place, the 3e/4e model feels more intuitively right - it makes more sense that a harder task has a higher target number, rather than that it gives you a smaller bonus on the roll.

 

[Blacky the Blackball]

I'm a big fan of the "Target 20" mechanic.

I came up with it independently when writing the second printing of my Dark Dungeons retro-clone of the BECMI/RC rules, and I use it there instead of using an attack table or THAC0.

During playtesting with 7-13 year old kids, I found that they easily understood the Target 20 mechanic but struggled with the more varied mechanics for other systems which still used a variety of dice and which sometimes used roll-under and sometimes roll-over.

That's what led me to write Darker Dungeons - which takes the same mechanics that Dark Dungeons has and changes them all (skills, saving throws, turn undead, and so forth) to use the "Target 20" mechanic while keeping the probabilities of success the same (within +/-5%).

 

[Ratskinner]

ANYTHING that requires me as DM to tell the player the monster's AC (as opposed to "you hit / miss") is a design fail.

Keep AC on the DM's side of the equation.

I dunno, my players usually figured it out after about 3 swings. I've given up worrying about it. I haven't noticed that it really changes anything but to make combat run more quickly by letting the fighter types figure out what they need to roll. I used to keep enemy hit point secret, too, but nowadays just put %ile dice next to them after they are wounded.

 

[Ratskinner]

I like the mechanic personally, and I think it works for non-combat as well. That is, DCs run from Super Easy 10 to Super Hard -10, with 0 being bog standard. While I realize that ascending AC is somewhat intuitive, using Target 20 is also intuitive so long as you envision it as a penalty on the attacker's roll, not an inherent quality of the character.

Unfortunately, I do seem to recall that 2e best AC was actually -22 or something like that, once you tacked on all possible bonuses. (At least as best as my friends and I could figure.) However, that required a bunch of buffs like Invisibility and quite unlikely stats and magic items, IIRC. So maybe the ranges should be adapted, or maybe not. I suppose that would depend on the design of the new system (stacking rules for one easy example.)

All that being said, while I would support such a rule, I'm not holding my breath for it. For whatever reason, too many people find minus signs scary.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

Target 20 isn't a bad system, but it has two very important constraints:

- The AC must always be positive. That's fine for OD&D, but even as early as 1st Ed it is no longer true.

I weep for whoever tried to teach you integer arithmetic.

 

[delericho]

I weep for whoever tried to teach you integer arithmetic.

If you had read the rest of my post, you would have seen the paragraph where I talk about what happens when those constraints don't hold - specifically that the algorithms work, but you don't get the benefits that Target 20 claims to offer.

 

[nightwalker450]

If this is serious, then I guess they're giving up on speeding up combat. Between this and opposed checks for spells, you've got a ridiculous amount of rolls/hunting for numbers that is completely unnecessary.

Or, maybe that's why we're looking so much at SoD, because if we can reduce combat to a single round of unnecessary rolls and hunting for numbers than it's quicker!

 

[WheresMyD20]

asically, it is "Roll d20 + attack bonus + AC". You always hit on a 20 or higher, or miss on a 19 or lower. (This is based on the era when lower AC was better). Attack bonus was defined as level for a fighter, 2/3 level for a cleric, 1/2 level for a wizard.

So it's
d20 + attack bonus + AC >= 20
Subtract AC from both sides and you get
d20 + attack bonus >= 20 - AC

Why not just subtract AC from 20 and record that as the number needed to hit you? For example, if your AC is 4, then you're hit on a 16 or better. Attacks simply become d20 + attack bonus vs. number needed to hit. Attack rolls are simpler and AC stays on the DM side of the equation.

 

[mkill]

So it's
d20 + attack bonus + AC >= 20
Subtract AC from both sides and you get
d20 + attack bonus >= 20 - AC

Why not just subtract AC from 20 and record that as the number needed to hit you? For example, if your AC is 4, then you're hit on a 16 or better. Attacks simply become d20 + attack bonus vs. number needed to hit. Attack rolls are simpler and AC stays on the DM side of the equation.

Because that's D20 system/3E/4E. Because obfuscating simple equations by elementary school arithmetics is old school. (*)

(*) While this is not representative for players who just like older editions, I've seriously seen someone claim that THAC0 was a watershed between people smart enough to play D&D and the hoi polloi.

Now stop stepping on everyone's lawn.

/sarcasm