Taunts & Marks vs. Challenges

[FireLance]

Rogue - "Boy, I would sure like to attack that squishy wizard who is fireballing my friends, and my fighter friend even provided a flank. Sadly, NON-MAGICALLY, this other fighter is somehow subverting my high intelligence and forcing me to attack him."

Yah, that make sense. I can do without the "holding aggro" mmo-concepts.

Given the previous discussion in this very thread, it's almost as if you are daring someone to attack your post.

That is your intent, right? You're trying to demonstrate how a non-magical mark might work?

 

[GreyICE]

Rogue - "Boy, I would sure like to attack that squishy wizard who is fireballing my friends, and my fighter friend even provided a flank. Sadly, NON-MAGICALLY, this other fighter is somehow subverting my high intelligence and forcing me to attack him."

Yah, that make sense. I can do without the "holding aggro" mmo-concepts.

AoOs and fighters blocking off access to the squishy underbelly of their party is what I prefer. Animals, monsters with low int, etc will fight whoever is attacking them, in my campaign. Smarter opponents will attempt to act like they are smarter and will try and take out the healers and wizards.

Again, marks force nothing. That rogue can go attack the Wizard if he wants to. Of course the fighter can non-magically slice his legs out from under him, and if he hits you, well, you ain't goin nowhere.

There's nothing 'forced' about this. The rogue knows the risks. If he tries to go after the Wizard with the fighter attacking him, he runs the risk of getting his feet cut out from under him, and movement stopped, as well as it hurting a lot.

That, by the way, is one of the unique Fighter class features, known as Combat Superiority. Literally, the fighter is the superior combatant to any other class in the entire game. When you are engaged with a fighter, he controls the flow of battle. Unless he misses, you cannot shift away from him.

Again, is this magical? Well, if you call everything that is "cool" in the game magic, then yes, it is magical. If your definition of magic is "if the effect is more interesting than hitting with a sword it is magic" then fighters can do magic. That's one possible definition of magic. In my opinion that's going to leave a lot of non-magical classes as basically second-class citizens in a weird wizard show.

If you are basing it on what people in the real world can do with real weapons, it can be hella difficult to get away from an angry guy who has trained his entire life to be the ultimate combat machine and has a big sword.

P.S. Your system boils down to 'fighters are less useful against the BBEG or his lieutenants.' So basically not only does Vancian magic mean that casters have powerful daily resources to blow in the BBEG fight, it means fighters will lose one of their roles in the party in a BBEG fight. Meaning that the BBEG fight is basically a race between the BBEG and the casters to see who goes down first, with the fighter lamely swinging his sword for some damage, I guess.

Not an inspired system, to say the least.

 

[Kynn]

Rogue - "Boy, I would sure like to attack that squishy wizard who is fireballing my friends, and my fighter friend even provided a flank. Sadly, NON-MAGICALLY, this other fighter is somehow subverting my high intelligence and forcing me to attack him."

Yah, that make sense. I can do without the "holding aggro" mmo-concepts.

Are you trolling now, or have you just not been paying attention to this thread at all?

 

[FireLance]

Are you trolling now, or have you just not been paying attention to this thread at all?

Careful, the moderators might have you (non-magically) marked. That's the kind of post that might draw an opportunity mod comment.

 

[mkill]

Are you trolling now, or have you just not been paying attention to this thread at all?

I think he is referring to the 3.5E Knight class, because 4E Defenders don't work that way. I'm glad there is nothing that could keep him from playing 4E.

 

[nightwalker450]

I'd have to say the 4th edition marking mechanic was quite slick in it's execution. I played the knight in 3.5, and it was seemed fairly gamey but I was happy to have some way to actually be a tank. I didn't like that it was just "force the creature to attack me". There was really no thought in it, and it was pretty much the most obvious video game taunt.

Now 4th edition, made the fighter (or defender of your choice) actually get in the creature's way. Then the GM (not the computer..) got to consider whether you were a meaningful enough threat, or if you were worth ignoring. As a GM I've played encounters in multiple ways when dealing with Marks.

- Solo Dragons, feel that defenders are insignificant and will ignore the mark, taking the hits (they have the HP to soak them).
- Low Int creatures, will go after whatever is causing them the most pain, and try to make them stop
- Undead will swing at whatever is in front of them, defender or not.
- Tactical, Self-Preservation conscious creatures will figure out how to deal with the defender, or team up to bypass or overwhelm them.

But the key here is as a GM I'm determining how the creature is reacting to the mark, the player isn't mind-controlling the creature, the creature just has to weigh the penalties/effects of the mark. And simply put, if I attack the fighter, that was their purpose, to draw my attention. But if I don't attack them, the fighter is at least having an effect (-2 penalty) on my actions, and possibly more (damage/OA).

 

[BobTheNob]

I have a really easy solution for this...I just dont want the concept of the tank, or the controller, or the striker. Hell, I just dont want roles.

Again, its opinion. But I get amused reading thread like this. May you who want roles find a method that works for you, and may the designers of 5e be aware that not everyone wants combat roles and 5e needs to work both with and without them. Then we can all be happy.

 

[Sunseeker]

I have a really easy solution for this...I just dont want the concept of the tank, or the controller, or the striker. Hell, I just dont want roles.

Again, its opinion. But I get amused reading thread like this. May you who want roles find a method that works for you, and may the designers of 5e be aware that not everyone wants combat roles and 5e needs to work both with and without them. Then we can all be happy.

Are you sure you're playing D&D? I'm not accusing you of doing it wrong, but perhaps you've missing the Fighter whit their generally higher armor who often took the brunt of the battle. Perhaps you didn't notice the wizard with the high-damage Fireball. Or could you simply have overlooked those Cure Wounds the Cleric tosses out?

If you want "not roles", no concepts of certain battlefield positions, then I'm going to wager you're a little late to the party, roles have been around since the beginning, whether they were codified with certain features or not.

 

[Kynn]

Are you sure you're playing D&D? I'm not accusing you of doing it wrong, but perhaps you've missing the Fighter whit their generally higher armor who often took the brunt of the battle. Perhaps you didn't notice the wizard with the high-damage Fireball. Or could you simply have overlooked those Cure Wounds the Cleric tosses out?

If you want "not roles", no concepts of certain battlefield positions, then I'm going to wager you're a little late to the party, roles have been around since the beginning, whether they were codified with certain features or not.

I'm thinking maybe they want "not having to think about roles" especially when it comes to considering party composition -- rather than "not having roles."

If you don't have to consider your combat role while making a character, you may feel subjectively more free to "make whatever you want" -- even if, eventually, the character will end up playing some kind of useful and/or useless role in the party during combat.

 

[Sunseeker]

I'm thinking maybe they want "not having to think about roles" especially when it comes to considering party composition -- rather than "not having roles."

If you don't have to consider your combat role while making a character, you may feel subjectively more free to "make whatever you want" -- even if, eventually, the character will end up playing some kind of useful and/or useless role in the party during combat.

I suppose that's one way of looking at it. But to be honest, I don't think I've ever made a character without consideration to how it'll fit in the party. But then I know I'm a pretty party-centric player.