About charging?

[Sipex]

Good question Gilliric, but consider a few things:

1) Bullrush is still inconvenient to use. You need to be able to charge your target to do it after all.

2) Bullrush does exactly 0 damage, whereas most powers which push will also include damage.

3) Bullrush isn't affected by magic bonuses. Powers are.

4) Bullrush is a standard action, meaning that's all you're doing.

[Gillric]

I dont disagree with any of those statements. I still think you can't reliably assume that something that is big should get to push something that is small purely based upon that fact. If you do wish to go down this road which ultimately is entirely the DMs decision. I just think you open up a can of worms which will upset certain players. If you don't have any of them in your group (I have several, lol) then do what feels right for your game.

[Kurald Galain]

Ok, say I build an Enchanter, my awesome push power pushes x squares. I then take a standard fighter and can potentially push more than the Enchanter? Why would I play an Enchanter?

Beeeecause the enchanter power is an area effect that targets will and has a longer range than melee, and because enchanters have better thing to do than using at-wills most of the time anyway (just like how fighters have better things to do than use bull rush).

[Gillric]

lol, there are lots of enchanter powers that apply large doses of forced movement other than beguiling strands (albiet at low level that power is awesome for large clusters of enemies)

[TopCheese]

Hmm I like the idea of bull rushing pushes the creature 1 square beyond the creatures natural reach.

This way when I throw some bigger things at my current party I can really push them around ;)

[Tegu8788]

Dwarves...

If you want to do that, then just slap a power onto the monster that gives them that ability. Do the underlying mechanics need to be changed?

[Ashdate]

Hmm I like the idea of bull rushing pushes the creature 1 square beyond the creatures natural reach.

This way when I throw some bigger things at my current party I can really push them around ;)

As has been mentioned earlier, the best way to implement this inside of 4e isn't by changing the "bull rush" rules, but instead by giving specific creatures a power that mimics the "bull rush effect" you want (and can even add damage, much like some PC powers).

After all, changing them to affect "natural reach" will punish your players more than it will help them, given that (except with certain builds) players don't often have comparable reach to monsters.

(I just can't recommend a house rule that is so lop-sided against players.)

[theNater]

1) Bullrush is still inconvenient to use. You need to be able to charge your target to do it after all.

Where does it say that? Bull Rush can be used at the end of the charge, but I can't find anything that says it can only be used then.

[Alejandro]

I'd be cautious of such a broad rule, especially because it just randomly throws a disadvantage on small PCs. It also makes horses able to push halflings 3 squares, and I'm having a hard time seeing how that would work.

I know the thread has moved on, but: From personal experience, and as a Human, I can assure you that a horse can knock you multiple squares if it is upset or at speed. :)

[theNater]

I know the thread has moved on, but: From personal experience, and as a Human, I can assure you that a horse can knock you multiple squares if it is upset or at speed. :)

I'm still having a hard time seeing it; what does the horse physically do that sends people 10-15 feet? Is it a kick? Throwing a rider? That lifting action with the nose? A high-speed chest bump?

In particular, is the maneuver in question going to behave differently when applied against a smaller person, like a halfling? A horse has an easy time reaching an adult human's chest and shoulders, but that's above the top of a halfling's head. If the horse can't connect solidly with the halfling, they may not be able to knock it any farther(we can say the weaker hit and the lower weight cancel out, meaning the horse pushes everybody the same distance, for convenience).

[Alejandro]

I fully admit that a horse will mostly likely run over a halfling, instead of knock it forward (unless it kicks the halfling.)

I have seen a pissed, studding horse barrel into an adult human, however, and easily knock them ten feet.

[Dimers]

It's pretty clear, based on which powers include pushing and the fact that few of them also knock prone, that a push effect is often intended to be represented by stumbling and staggering rather than flying through the air or skidding along the ground.

[theNater]

I fully admit that a horse will mostly likely run over a halfling, instead of knock it forward (unless it kicks the halfling.)

Exactly. If we're going to increase verisimilitude of bull rush, it's not as simple as making bigger size differences equal longer pushes. By the time we get it detailed enough to actually make sense in all cases, it's no longer practical for use in play.

I have seen a pissed, studding horse barrel into an adult human, however, and easily knock them ten feet.

Yeah, I can see that.

[TopCheese]

I'm still having a hard time seeing it; what does the horse physically do that sends people 10-15 feet? Is it a kick? Throwing a rider? That lifting action with the nose? A high-speed chest bump?

In particular, is the maneuver in question going to behave differently when applied against a smaller person, like a halfling? A horse has an easy time reaching an adult human's chest and shoulders, but that's above the top of a halfling's head. If the horse can't connect solidly with the halfling, they may not be able to knock it any farther(we can say the weaker hit and the lower weight cancel out, meaning the horse pushes everybody the same distance, for convenience).

Actually 15-20 feet is how far my uncle went flying when he was kicked by his horse... I laughed sooo much... He had hoof prints on his chest for a couple years (still a faint outline)...How I miss Tennessee :D

Also I've seen kids hit by horses (I was like 12 years old and my cousin was 11 when he got kicked...something like that) it isn't pretty but they fly just as easy (or easier) as an adult. Please note the fact I'm from Kentucky, these kinda things happen every so often so it stopped being to surprising.

[Alejandro]

Exactly. If we're going to increase verisimilitude of bull rush, it's not as simple as making bigger size differences equal longer pushes. By the time we get it detailed enough to actually make sense in all cases, it's no longer practical for use in play.

Yeah, I can see that.

Cattle are more dangerous, though. I'd rather fight a horse any day.

[theNater]

Actually 15-20 feet is how far my uncle went flying when he was kicked by his horse... I laughed sooo much... He had hoof prints on his chest for a couple years (still a faint outline)...How I miss Tennessee :D

Also I've seen kids hit by horses (I was like 12 years old and my cousin was 11 when he got kicked...something like that) it isn't pretty but they fly just as easy (or easier) as an adult. Please note the fact I'm from Kentucky, these kinda things happen every so often so it stopped being to surprising.

The horse's kick is not a bull rush, and so the fact that the bull rush rules don't model it is not a problem. The horse's kick is an attack specific to horses, and so if it is absent or has insufficient push, the fix is a specific adjustment to horses, not a general adjustment of pushes and/or bull rushes.

[TopCheese]

The horse's kick is not a bull rush, and so the fact that the bull rush rules don't model it is not a problem. The horse's kick is an attack specific to horses, and so if it is absent or has insufficient push, the fix is a specific adjustment to horses, not a general adjustment of pushes and/or bull rushes.

Humanoids bullrush by standing there (or running) and then pushing with 2 appendages while the other two are being used to stand.

The horse kicking is doing the same thing mechanically just in a different way dyue to its biological differences.

Don't be a hater just cause horses can't do things the same way humanoids can.

Everything is relative after all.

So when my uncle (and cousin) went up to the horses and tried to get on them, the horse wasn't trying to kill/maim them... But push them away so it could run away.. a la bullrush (horse rush ?). Besides there is no difference between an attack and a bullrush, a bullrush IS an attack. Just in this case it does a crap ton of damage....

One of the reasons bullrushes are never used in my games is cause there are other at wills that push the target AND does damage. Those attacks bullrush as part of the attack, they just call it. "Push 1 square"(or however far).

[Tegu8788]

Humanoids bullrush by standing there (or running) and then pushing with 2 appendages while the other two are being used to stand.

The horse kicking is doing the same thing mechanically just in a different way dyue to its biological differences.

As a biologist I have to stop you right there. A person shoving you is nothing like a horse kick. A closer analogy would be doing a dropkick. A horse's legs are FAR more powerful than anything a human can do without tools. The sheer muscle tone, mass, balance, it's all completely different. The average human's arms are far weaker than our legs, and you've never seen a horse do this kick with it's front leg's I'd wager. That's a trample, not a kick.

You apply that level of force quickly above an object's balancing point and it will fall backwards. Momentum will carry it away (push), and being unbalanced is what causes the fall (prone). The actual kick has nothing to do with the landing. The right application of torque and I can knock you over with very little actual force.

A bullrush is a momentum driven attack. A linebacker charges you and literally shoves you with his body. As someone that has studied bio-physics, when you move like that you can't do anything very complex, hence restrictions to MBA and bullrushes at the end of a charge. A horse kick you list involves a stationary target stretching out and striking a foe from a stable position. That's closer to throwing a punch than shouldering someone on the run.

Bullrushes are meant to be rare, because it's a weak attack. I doubt you see your casters dropping to the ground after every single attack they make, despite it given them an effective boost to their defenses. 4E is not the best game for exact realism. Every example for a boosted bullrush has made more sense as a monster power than a mechanical change. And I'm sure there are plenty of monsters with similar powers.

Trying to boost such a weak power so that it's used more often is like telling your Wizard he get's a +2 do damage rolls on MBAs. If you are the DM and want to do this, that's your call, but it's pretty obvious that from the playground's perspective, it's a poor decision.

I may not have grown up around hoovestock, I've worked and ridden enough to know what they can do. A horse charging will at most, knock you down. As you fall out of the way, you will fall out of the way, but in this case the "push" has nothing to do with the "attack," just a side effect of the "proning." I've had to stop a running cow, and got the wind knocked out of me for my effort. I was brushed aside, then knocked off balance, so I fell down.

At best mechanically, you would charge through a target to knock it prone in a square adjacent to where it was that is not in your path. That's an awful complicated move, when your players will surely have better and more powerful things do to with a standard action. Bullrushes are best for very situational use, unless you regularly play with level 0 characters.

[Mandrake]

I like where this discussion has gone, especially with theNater and Tegu, they talk sense (in my opinion).

One of the reasons bullrushes are never used in my games is cause there are other at wills that push the target AND does damage. Those attacks bullrush as part of the attack, they just call it. "Push 1 square"(or however far).

Yes, but those powers also require stuff from you - they might provoke a scary opportunity attack, you need a shield to use them, they attack the wizard's will, they do damage where you don't want them etc.

OR
Your first level weeny character doesn't really know how to push 1 square yet, since he has no such powers. And it's imaginable that a character progresses through levels without any pushing powers, since, frankly, there are often better options to pick.

ALSO
When you think about it, your epic hero probably won't be pushing stuff around like a man pushes furniture - he will most certainly have learned some special means, much better than an ordinary man's to make stuff bounce. And if he does, that's a heroic way (not in tier sense) to "give it all he has" and, without any other resource, put even his old fashioned push to save the day. Remember, it's in the game, and the DnD cosmos is always set around up to, what, 10 people most. That one guy that can't push uses bull rush for an epic climactic effect, once in the campaign, but that's worth it, because DnD is consisted of such events; this is not an MMO, we don't care about "what could have happened to others and all". It's an epic. (not that I have anything against MMOs)

Cheers to all!

[theNater]

Humanoids bullrush by standing there (or running) and then pushing with 2 appendages while the other two are being used to stand.

The horse kicking is doing the same thing mechanically just in a different way dyue to its biological differences.

Don't be a hater just cause horses can't do things the same way humanoids can.

Everything is relative after all.

So when my uncle (and cousin) went up to the horses and tried to get on them, the horse wasn't trying to kill/maim them... But push them away so it could run away.. a la bullrush (horse rush ?). Besides there is no difference between an attack and a bullrush, a bullrush IS an attack. Just in this case it does a crap ton of damage....

Horses have a number of maneuvers they can do which should be modeled by the bull rush rules: pushing with the shoulder, running into the target(as in Alejandro's example), rearing and flailing with the forelegs to force the target back, and even a firm and steady pushing with their nose. The bull rush rules are great for relatively uncomplicated pushes which do no damage. As a horse's kick does "a crap ton" of damage, the bull rush rules are not appropriate for it. Instead, we give the horse a separate attack, called "kick" or some other appropriate thing, which does the damage and includes a push.

We don't want to use the bull rush rules to model a horse's kick because every creature can bull rush. Changing bull rush to include the kick means every large creature-ogres, bears, gelatinous cubes-can kick like a horse.

One of the reasons bullrushes are never used in my games is cause there are other at wills that push the target AND does damage. Those attacks bullrush as part of the attack, they just call it. "Push 1 square"(or however far).

I don't see this as a problem, and am therefore confused by apparent desire some people have to "fix" it. Bull rush is not supposed to be a primary attack for anybody. Bull rush is an unceremonious shove for those moments when you really need to push someone, but don't have a special maneuver for doing so ready to go. It fills the same role as a 3.5 bull rush unassisted by feats: a thing you'll only actually want to do on extremely rare occasion, but one which pretty much everyone should technically be capable of most of the time.

[neonchameleon]

The Bull Rush is meant to model a basic untrained and unspecialised attempt. For this it does well. For seeing someone whose back is to a pit trap and pushing them in.

If you want to see specialised, look at the Ogre Juggernaut in (IIRC) Monster Vault. There are plenty of monsters with specialist attacks that force people backwards, and these are represented by powers special to that creature. A Cave Ogre on the other hand doesn't specialise in this sort of approach so they use normal Bull Rush rules. If you think that Bull Rushing is something a monster is likely to do, and it's likely to be good at it write them a power to do this. If it's not part of the monster's SOP, don't sweat the small stuff.

[Kurald Galain]

The Bull Rush is meant to model a basic untrained and unspecialised attempt. For this it does well.

It doesn't do well; it's clearly inferior to basically anything else a character or monster could be doing. That means, in almost all cases, if you don't have a particular power that allows you to push well, don't bother bullrushing either.

[neonchameleon]

It doesn't do well; it's clearly inferior to basically anything else a character or monster could be doing. That means, in almost all cases, if you don't have a particular power that allows you to push well, don't bother bullrushing either.

And that's why it does it well - the Bag of Sand principle from GURPS (if sand in the eyes always worked people would give up on swords and instead carry round bags of sand all the time).

[Yakk]

Also remember page 42. A huge creature tossing a smaller opponent looks like a good use of page 42, especially if you make it situational: barring the local situation (like a pit to throw enemies down), a built-in power should be a better option. The local situation can and should allow a page 42 style ruling to match or exceed the performance of a built-in power.

This avoids the bag of sand problem. The bag of sand style attack is only good if the local situation makes it good, while the sword is a better tool in general. Which is one of the reasons why rich terrain is a good idea in 4e, with lots of things to interact (for both PCs and monsters) with, and to reward said interaction.

[Kurald Galain]

And that's why it does it well - the Bag of Sand principle from GURPS (if sand in the eyes always worked people would give up on swords and instead carry round bags of sand all the time).

There is, of course, a large area of design space between making an option always superior (which is what GURPS's sand bag talks about) and making an option always inferior (e.g. bull rush). Neither extreme is good game design.

[Yakk]

If you have zero push powers, yet your bull rush is reasonably accurate, and there is an undamaged enemy next to a fall far enough to kill the target, and you aren't so optimized that you can kill the target really quickly otherwise, bull rush is quite viable. It is a hit, followed by a save-or-die.

[Kurald Galain]

If you have zero push powers, yet your bull rush is reasonably accurate, and there is an undamaged enemy next to a fall far enough to kill the target, and you aren't so optimized that you can kill the target really quickly otherwise,

That's so many unlikely "ifs" that this basically means "never".

[theNater]

There is, of course, a large area of design space between making an option always superior (which is what GURPS's sand bag talks about) and making an option always inferior (e.g. bull rush). Neither extreme is good game design.

I am of the opinion that an option that is in some way more expensive should almost always be superior to an option that is less expensive. That is, a sword should almost always be superior to a bag of sand because the sword costs more money.

In the case of 4e powers, expense comes in the form of prerequisites. Every creature can bull rush; there's no expenditure there at all. On the other hand, even the level 1 at-will powers at least require that you be the correct class, and so should almost always be better than bull rush.

Out of curiosity, do you feel that grab and the ranged and melee basic attacks are also poorly designed, on the same basis?

[Kurald Galain]

I am of the opinion that an option that is in some way more expensive should almost always be superior to an option that is less expensive.

I agree with the theory. However, in practice, that doesn't work. To bull rush effectively, you need to have a class with a primary (or maybe secondary) in strength, and you need to get specific items or feats to keep the BR relevant, because its attack bonus doesn't scale. So it actually has more complex prereqs than merely picking a pushing at-will power.

Out of curiosity, do you feel that grab and the ranged and melee basic attacks are also poorly designed, on the same basis?

Grab is badly designed because of how weak it is (it's too easy to escape, was errata'ed to become even easier, and doesn't really hinder its victim). There is pretty much no reason, ever, to use the grab attack. Ranged and melee basic work mostly fine, because there are common situations where you can only use a basic attack and not an at-will (e.g. opportunity attacks and warlord granted attacks).

[neonchameleon]

That's so many unlikely "ifs" that this basically means "never".

And yet there are times my PCs have bull rushed because the terrain is interesting and they built themselves without forced movement powers. Not many times - but it isn't never.