WotC says, "Baby, come back! You know I didn't mean it!"

[Anastasia]

As much as I like Dune, we have nearly diametrically opposed views on some aspects of gaming.  Plus, I'm not sure you really need hero points if you're already going gestalt. >_>;

Eh. They are mildly less useful in gestalt, though I don't think that would mitigate using them if you like them.

Yeah, I know I don't agree with most here about hero points. I'll spare you to the grognard-esque bitching about 'em.

[Carthrat]

I think the point wasn't 'breaking the game' as much as, "'I do this' guy gets 50 actions while you only get one.  Who's playing more?"  Game breaking is an afterthought to the 'well, this isn't fun,' aspect.

This is also a good point, although I really was thinking of the way multiple actions are horribly unfair (since often, effects that give you +actions do not really detract from the power of individual actions as much as they should.) Online gaming spoils us a bit since taking many actions can actually be done fairly quickly, with the real bottleneck to a turn being how fast a guy can describe things.

[Corwin]

D&D is all about combat, so it occured to me that if people wanted this, the non-combat options could easily be placed under a sort of 'social combat' umbrella, for lack of a better term. It could be entirely optional, and build up on skill challenges. I'm not sure precisely how far this should be taken, but I do know no one actually finds the social skills useful as written (diplo, bluff/feint, etc) and that always makes me wonder why they're even there. With such mechanics divorced from normal combat ones (yes, talking is a 'free action', but I buy you delivering an impassioned speech to your army in 6 seconds even less than you slashing at him 6 times in a row) they won't directly interact, and people who prefer to stab things would just interrupt it easily if they wished.

[Dracos]

I think the problem is really less Combat/Non-combat and more Cultural versus Inherent Value.

Non-combat is a place where value is still a big deal.  Diplomacy stuff, for instance.

But whereas +2 to init is something that is always inherently valuable, +2 to init, lore, listen, spot versus local goblin tribe is not and gives tremendous RP flavor as well.   Yes, it's a slight gain in a very specific area, but even if it comes up, its not a big deal, and most the time it won't come up.  +2 to diplomacy with <Wealth-level> <race>  is another example.  Knowledge: Farming +2 is another example.

These things show up every so often but usually have to compete with real value adds and so are both specific and Strong in their specific, rather than weak or are totally overwhelmed, so you either are: Twinking or choosing between having things that represent your background and being effective.  How many young nobleman fighters really take knowledge nobility with their handful of skillpoints?  They know it'll never be rolled and when they're running low on their 3 skillpoints...

[Anastasia]

D&D is all about combat, so it occured to me that if people wanted this, the non-combat options could easily be placed under a sort of 'social combat' umbrella, for lack of a better term. It could be entirely optional, and build up on skill challenges. I'm not sure precisely how far this should be taken, but I do know no one actually finds the social skills useful as written (diplo, bluff/feint, etc) and that always makes me wonder why they're even there. With such mechanics divorced from normal combat ones (yes, talking is a 'free action', but I buy you delivering an impassioned speech to your army in 6 seconds even less than you slashing at him 6 times in a row) they won't directly interact, and people who prefer to stab things would just interrupt it easily if they wished.

I gotta ask one thing. How is feint a social skill? That's for tricking your enemy so you can strike them flatfooted, last time I checked.

You're right about the implication that six second rounds are dumb, though. I'm more and more tempted to houserule that for my D&D games, no matter how much rebalancing it requires.

[Brian]

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I see the significance?  Combat takes place in arbitrary time-units called 'rounds,' not anything approaching real time anyway.  Unless--  I, I see.  I think you're arguing speech duration, but I'm almost actually positive that the ruleset for 3.x doesn't say, "You can talk as much as you want," even though talking is a free action.  I'm pretty sure there was some text in there about how you could really only say fairly brief things in a round (like barking commands), which is perfectly reasonable.

In fact, I thought the 'in combat penalty to diplomacy' rule was to represent the difficulty of trying to get your statement to fit in a single round of combat, anyway.  The fact that players/GMs might let this go further is kind of on them more than the ruleset, unless I'm missing something (which is entirely possible).  If I'm wrong, then--  Yes, that's incredibly stupid and it should be fixed/houseruled.


I think (IIRC), feint is based off bluff -- but this does touch on one difficulty of the idea of trying to separate things into combat/non-combat feats.  What about feats that govern things in both domains?  Skill focus: Bluff, in this instance.

I'm not positive, but I'm thinking that combat feats are fine if they also provide non-combat aspects, but the inverse is not true -- or else minmaxers will only ever choose 'non-combat' feats that provide combat bonuses anyway.  Or will the game be damaged by trying to prevent that from happening?

Would the alternative to be to create a tier system for feats, so they had multiple levels/types?  You get a 'lesser feat' every <quantity> levels, (+2 to a skill, a minor background element, something like a penalty reduction to something that doesn't apply to combat), a 'greater feat' every <less often> levels (combat effects or major non-combat skill bonuses, maybe things that let typically non-combat skills have in-combat effects)?

Hmmm....  Strikes me as interesting, but a huge pain to balance/do _well_.

[Grahf]

I played a bit of 3rd, and read but never played 4th. The fact that 5th seems to be coming out so quickly does strike me as an admission that 4th has not done as well as they'd have liked it to.

I honestly liked some of the ideas behind 4th, which stemmed from the Star Wars Saga Edition iirc, that had classes that actually built on themselves in logical ways and filled the roles a little better, it's just that from what I saw D&D still seemed to suffer from Linear Fighters / Quadratic Wizards to a degree.

I could be way off the mark, but the largest issue has always been party balance, since it's ultimately a game that aims to entertain a group of people that have diverse tastes when it comes to what they like to play. If 5th can achieve a balance between classes to a further degree than any other edition then I'm all for it (although truth be told I'm more of a White Wolf fan anyways... cough)

[Anastasia]

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I see the significance?  Combat takes place in arbitrary time-units called 'rounds,' not anything approaching real time anyway.  Unless--  I, I see.  I think you're arguing speech duration, but I'm almost actually positive that the ruleset for 3.x doesn't say, "You can talk as much as you want," even though talking is a free action.  I'm pretty sure there was some text in there about how you could really only say fairly brief things in a round (like barking commands), which is perfectly reasonable.

Nah, all I'm saying is that I dislike the six second round. It's too fast for my tastes; I preferred 2nd edition's one minute per round. For a round to happen in six seconds, everything is on insane amounts of speed. I've never really messed with it before, since buffs are keyed to round durations, so this makes changing it a tricky proposition.

[Merc]

For a round to happen in six seconds, everything is on insane amounts of speed.

And it gets even faster with haste and combat reflexes!

[Dracos]

"So you hit him how much?  Well, six times with my left sword and seven with my right.  In six seconds.  So roughly..."

I agree with thinking of it as arbitrary time personally. 

Not that a minute is bad with the statistical life of combat being 5 rounds.  5 minute fights.

[Brian]

Potential derail; we may want to threadsplit (unsure).

Nah, all I'm saying is that I dislike the six second round. It's too fast for my tastes; I preferred 2nd edition's one minute per round. For a round to happen in six seconds, everything is on insane amounts of speed. I've never really messed with it before, since buffs are keyed to round durations, so this makes changing it a tricky proposition.

Okay -- I totally misunderstood.

I seem to recall (this is way back when for me, now) an explanation that while players/monsters are in melee range, they're assumed to constantly be exchanging blows, but parrying/armor/shield blocking, etc.  You only roll for significant attacks.  I believe that was actually in 2nd edition, too, which would match up with the 1 minute rounds.

OTOH, looking at (say) the Lord of the Rings movie000000000000, a typical example of the epic fantasy adventure -- Aragorn and Legolas are dispatching Orcs left and right.  I suppose from a technical standpoint, you could argue that they're mooks and it's actually just the special effect for cleave, but there, dispatching foes goes pretty quickly.

Moving back to minute rounds, getting six attacks means one ('effective') attack every 10 seconds, which seems fairly slow.  OTOH, giving a full minute to diplomancy/bluff/combat instructions seems like an awful lot.  I guess I just don't have a problem with D&D's six-second rounds -- it's probably that number just for the convenience of ten rounds in a minute.

I guess I just don't have a problem with actions being as fast as they are; this is fantasy, and the typical adventurer is assumed (I thought) to have better than average stats compared to the mortals who make up the vast majority of the population.  A level ten fighter should be really rare compared to a level one figther, and he gets three times the attacks -- for being an order of magnitude more experienced.  Haste magnifies that, but that's magic, which (IMO) gets a pass. 

Combat reflexes are attacks of opportunity -- and unless you've got a pretty good dex, you won't really be getting an ungodly number of them until higher level anyway (when you can argue super-man level heroic abilities (what are 'feats' otherwise?) and magic bonuses).  Strikes me as reasonable.

Really, I'd :\ more at 1 minute rounds.  You can only move 30 feet a minute as a level one human in medium or light armor?  (Though, it's possible that movement distance may be unreasonably high for six seconds -- I'd argue for 10 second rounds, personally.)

[Anastasia]

I seem to recall (this is way back when for me, now) an explanation that while players/monsters are in melee range, they're assumed to constantly be exchanging blows, but parrying/armor/shield blocking, etc.  You only roll for significant attacks.  I believe that was actually in 2nd edition, too, which would match up with the 1 minute rounds.

That's correct as far as I recall.

Moving back to minute rounds, getting six attacks means one ('effective') attack every 10 seconds, which seems fairly slow.  OTOH, giving a full minute to diplomancy/bluff/combat instructions seems like an awful lot.  I guess I just don't have a problem with D&D's six-second rounds -- it's probably that number just for the convenience of ten rounds in a minute.

I guess I just don't have a problem with actions being as fast as they are; this is fantasy, and the typical adventurer is assumed (I thought) to have better than average stats compared to the mortals who make up the vast majority of the population.  A level ten fighter should be really rare compared to a level one figther, and he gets three times the attacks -- for being an order of magnitude more experienced.  Haste magnifies that, but that's magic, which (IMO) gets a pass. 

Combat reflexes are attacks of opportunity -- and unless you've got a pretty good dex, you won't really be getting an ungodly number of them until higher level anyway (when you can argue super-man level heroic abilities (what are 'feats' otherwise?) and magic bonuses).  Strikes me as reasonable.

Really, I'd :\ more at 1 minute rounds.  You can only move 30 feet a minute as a level one human in medium or light armor?  (Though, it's possible that movement distance may be unreasonably high for six seconds -- I'd argue for 10 second rounds, personally.)

I do agree with that too. I'm not quite saying to go back to 1 minute rounds. The way 3.x is structured, it leads to the problems you noted. I've toyed with 12 second rounds and 18 second rounds; I feel they make more sense and allow more flexibility to what happens within a combat round. On the other hand, it really does screw with some of the basic underpinnings of durations. A spell measured in rounds has its duration doubled or tripled, while a spell that is measured in minutes per level has its effective battle time duration reduced. 3.x is keyed to the six second round from the ground up, lots of little things need adjusting if you change that.

[VySaika]

I use 10 second round. It doesn't really make much mechanical difference besides for 1 minute duration abilities like Devotions and such. Which I'm fine with only lasting 6 rounds instead of 10.

[Anastasia]

I use 10 second round. It doesn't really make much mechanical difference besides for 1 minute duration abilities like Devotions and such. Which I'm fine with only lasting 6 rounds instead of 10.

Yeah, Devotion feats are good enough to where a soft nerf doesn't seriously impact their usefulness.

[Dracos]

Well, that and most combats aren't more than 5 rounds anyway.