Trip is an Encounter Power now

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

To me the entire argument seems to be a conflict between two play styles, one power based and one narrative based. 4th ed seems to be slipping into a more narrative based mode of play.

Previously, if something was listed as a power used only 3 times a day, it was because it was ONLY possible to use it three times a day. Since it was a hard limit, this applies mostly to magic effects where you can easilly explain away stuff like magical charges and the like. For the same reason, since you couldnt 'realistically' apply a hard limit to how often a particular skill based maneuver could be attempted, more skill based abilities just allowed you to try it whenever, usually with some sort of penalty to keep you from 'spamming it'.

In 4th, they look to be switching to a more narrative based system. If a power can only be used 3 times a day, it's not because of any hard limit. Now, it's because the events that allow said power to be used only show up roughly 3 times a day. The person controlling the narrative is allowed to decide when that chance may be.

In a way, it reminds me of the arguments between people who like to describe what they're doing and have the DM give bonuses/penalties based on the description, and people who want to roll first and them RP based around the result.

EDIT: ...Which is exactly what SteveC said above me, for the most part. *sigh* Stupid slow connection.

it can also be put in another way, if we ignore "simulationsim, narrativismn and gamismn" terms for a moment.

3.x models the difficulty of maneuvers in additional risks and penalties.
4E models them by making them "per encounter".

3.x has the problem that this means that the maneuver is rarely useful. Unless you can get abilities to negate the risks or penalties, but this means a maneuver that is supposed to happen seldom becomes a common event. On the plus side, you can always try.
4E has the problem of giving you a hard limit. Once per combat. That's it. If you don't even have the power, you need to negotiate with your DM - there might be tools for it in the DMG, but it still means it is not something you can rely on. On the plus side, when you use the ability, you can probably count on it.

The 4E design team obviously things that the "net sum" of drawbacks/plus sides of 3.x was lower then their approach. This "calculation" isn't true for everyone, different people have different priorities...

 

[Li Shenron]

Why I dislike this rule:

I play a lot of games with people who are new to the system or to gaming in general.

Usually, rather than teach them the whole system before we start I just help them make a character and we start playing, with me teaching them the rules as we go. There's nothing I hate more than the player saying something like,

"I run up to the orc and try and knock it to the ground."

and me trying to explain why something that seems possible isn't allowed by the system.

I totally agree.

The kind of verisimilitude/believability I enjoy from a RPG is this.

It's not about "simulating" minor differences in weapons (I was against 3.5 weapon size rules! where are all those people who said they were "needed"? ) or slight variations of circumstances (God bless the guy who wrote that simply beautiful 3ed rule of just apply +2/-2 circumstance mod when you don't know what to do).

It's about being able to first think what you want to do, and then find a rule that lets you do it, and not first look at the rules and then rule out what you cannot do it.

Because if the rules work this way, then both kind of people can enjoy the game, the one who wants to reason this way, and the one who has fun in first reading the rules and then studying the opportunities: the fact that rules are "believable" doesn't make it unfun to play in the second way. But if the rules don't care at all for believability, then the first type of gamer is going to have a much harder time enjoying the game...

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Except that you didn't put a "better/worse" quality judgement on the difference.

As an aside, does anybody know what the pressing reasons were for the design team to slap the "provokes AoO" label on the Standing up from Prone action in 3.5? Maybe got a link, or a quote, or something else enlightening.

I wonder about that too. I think that this one of the most important change for making trip too useful. (Aside from the fact that people that need to spend a move action to stand up lose their full attack. Which can be big in 3.0 and 3.5)

 

[SteveC]

Except that you didn't put a "better/worse" quality judgement on the difference.

As an aside, does anybody know what the pressing reasons were for the design team to slap the "provokes AoO" label on the Standing up from Prone action in 3.5? Maybe got a link, or a quote, or something else enlightening.

In my defense, I try to make sure all of my posts come off as "in my opinion" rather than "this is a statement of objective truth!"

To answer your question: I think this was done for the worst of all possible reasons for a game like D&D: it struck them as the realistic thing to do.

Either that or they felt that the trip option was not powerful enough at that point (which I find hard to believe).

--Steve

 

[Wolfwood2]

To answer your question: I think this was done for the worst of all possible reasons for a game like D&D: it struck them as the realistic thing to do.

Either that or they felt that the trip option was not powerful enough at that point (which I find hard to believe).

I think the 3E designers had a shiny new mechanic called "attack of opportunity", and when you have a hammer everything looks like a nail. They probably went over a lot of different things and made quick decisions about whether it would draw an AoO without thinking much about how often those situations would occur or what the greater game effect would be.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

In my defense, I try to make sure all of my posts come off as "in my opinion" rather than "this is a statement of objective truth!"

To answer your question: I think this was done for the worst of all possible reasons for a game like D&D: it struck them as the realistic thing to do.

Either that or they felt that the trip option was not powerful enough at that point (which I find hard to believe).

--Steve

No worries, I wasn't trying to discard or attack your opinion, I appreciate it as much as I appreciate D.Shaffer trying to be objective about it. Neither of you was abrasive or offensive, and that's what counts. After all, I have my opinions, too.

As for your answer, it was the only thing that occurred to me as well as "most probable"...they might have looked at the list of actions that do provoke AoOs in 3.0, and said "if THIS and THIS provokes, how can standing up from Prone NOT provoke an AoO? We have to change this to be more consistent." It would make sense, too...but the net effect is that suddenly the "trip monkey" combo is a devastating thing in 3.5 Maybe something is commented in the Rules Compendium. Anyway, was just curious, because from my 3.0 position, tripping is neither overpowered nor underpowered nor unnecessarily complicated, which makes this switch to "per encounter" a bit weird in the taste.

 

[Imp]

If you have a character who is based on grappling and throwing targets around, one presumes that you're trying to grapple and throw your targets all the time. The time when you trigger the trip power is when this actually works for you, and this is something you get to choose.

Actually I think the 4e fighter class is, among other things, explicitly not designed to accommodate the concept of a hero who is great at grappling, and that stuff is coming in some subsequent book, tied to a future monk class or possibly something else. This is part of that "stronger class definition" business they're trying to play up for this edition.

 

[pemerton]

I think that a lot of the problems with this new system is that people are thinking of the at will/encounter/daily powers from a character perspective rather than a narrative one.

<snip>

Think of 4E in the same light: every time you attack someone you're trying one of your special moves, you just get to pick the cases when they actually work.

To me the entire argument seems to be a conflict between two play styles, one power based and one narrative based. 4th ed seems to be slipping into a more narrative based mode of play.

Agreed. Nearly every mechanics-oriented thread I look at on the 4e forum is really a debate between simulationists (who don't like the 4e changes because they subordinate the modelling of ingame causation to the empowerment of the players)) and narrativists or gamists (who like the changes for the same reason).

What is interesting to me about the new direction for D&D is that the 4e designers apparently agree with Ron Edwards that the best way to attract new players is to abandon simulationism and appeal to other metagame priorities.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

As an aside, does anybody know what the pressing reasons were for the design team to slap the "provokes AoO" label on the Standing up from Prone action in 3.5? Maybe got a link, or a quote, or something else enlightening.

I can only assume it has to do with the definition of what provokes in 3.5. That is "Whenever a creature takes an action which distracts him from protecting himself."

I believe the logic is that when you are in the midst of getting up, your hands are pushing yourself off the ground and you are off-balance, which is a perfect time to strike and, in theory, you aren't ready to defend against it.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

Because if the rules work this way, then both kind of people can enjoy the game, the one who wants to reason this way, and the one who has fun in first reading the rules and then studying the opportunities: the fact that rules are "believable" doesn't make it unfun to play in the second way. But if the rules don't care at all for believability, then the first type of gamer is going to have a much harder time enjoying the game...

But that's not true. If the rules are all written from the point of view of "believable" then you get an unwieldy set of options written up in the book.

To players who like studying the books in order to know all their choices, you have created a barrier to entry(reading a large amount of information). Plus, these sort of people like to USE all the options available to them. They want to trip, disarm, etc. They want to consider all their options each time they act, which slows down decision making during each round of combat. It confuses some of them when they have too many options, especially if you don't limit their options and say "Whatever you want to do."

It doesn't provide that barrier to people on the other side of the fence since they are thinking in terms of "I want to get the enemy to the ground, how does that work?" They might never consider disarming, sundering, or bull rushing and never need to understand those options, so the number of options doesn't matter for them. It still matters for their DM, however, who needs to understand it all in case someone tries it.

It really is a matter of choosing one to satisfy over the other. 4e is taking a route of building complexity. Keep the number of options everyone has low, then give each player their own small number of options to build on the basic ones.