G&G: Conditions

[Just to Browse]

The problem there is that we get back into the territory of a single spell being crippling...

Your current alternative is...

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Of course, if you just have spells apply penalties, they're not actually "crippling". A -6 to your will save that doesn't apply any actual conditions isn't crippling at all, and if you had a choice between just being shaken (penalty to your attack rolls) or just having a save debuff, you'll pick the latter almost every time.

Grinding down someone's defenses allows the next attack to hit harder, which means that if you're spending effort on debuffs, the effects of hitting someone with that debuff need to be a bigger deal, because you're giving up an entire action that you could spend killing fools.

[Eldan]

The dfiference, though, is this: the debuff, at least, gives a -2 to something. The enemy is that much weaker. Damage, in D&D, does basically nothing, until you hit 0.

Should we introduce some kind of bloodied condition like 4E?

[Yitzi]

Grinding down someone's defenses allows the next attack to hit harder, which means that if you're spending effort on debuffs, the effects of hitting someone with that debuff need to be a bigger deal, because you're giving up an entire action that you could spend killing fools.

No, you're giving up an entire action that you could spend doing some damage. You're right that this completely breaks down when damaging attacks can kill someone in one round...but this is designed to work with a damage system where you usually can't one-shot a level-appropriate enemy.

The goal should be that a mix of different types of condition effects (and for this purpose, damage counts as a condition effect, albeit an unusual one) should be more effective than focusing on only one or two types.

[Just to Browse]

No, you're giving up an entire action that you could spend doing some damage. You're right that this completely breaks down when damaging attacks can kill someone in one round...but this is designed to work with a damage system where you usually can't one-shot a level-appropriate enemy.

Wat? I never even brought up damage, I'm talking specifically about hitting someone with riders. If the two tactical choices are:

• cast scare, then your friend casts scare
• cast leech morale, then your friend casts scare

Then the success rate of your friend's scare in the second case needs to be wayyy higher. Damage is a beast all of its down, and I'm just talking about status effects.

I really do support the bloodied idea, and I also thought it would be cool to have a few rudimentary damage tracks and associated conditions. So say if you get hit by a fire attack that brings you below 1/2 HP, you are on fire. If you get hit by a blunt attack that brings down below 3xlevel HP, you are knocked back out to short range (etc.) Having a standard set of 3-5 of those (blunt, slashing, burn-y, cold-y?) would be a few things to memorize, and then every other condition wouldn't follow a specific damage track.

Actually, now that I wrote that down, it sounds worse... I feel like I get so close to the ideal thought, and then it runs away from me.

[Deepbluediver]

Should we introduce some kind of bloodied condition like 4E?

I really do support the bloodied idea, and I also thought it would be cool to have a few rudimentary damage tracks and associated conditions. *snip*
Actually, now that I wrote that down, it sounds worse... I feel like I get so close to the ideal thought, and then it runs away from me.

I would certainly support a set of penalties for falling below a certain level of HP, but I think we should be just let damage be damage. I'm not one to argue for major changes based on simplicity, but there are already enough things to track without having to keep a running tally of HOW or WHAT KIND of damage you took. HP bounces around like a yo-yo enough as it is.

It opens the game up to all kinds of shenanigans, like the Barbarian cleaving some one with his axe dropping them to 51% health, then that target getting whacked with with a torch and suddenly bursting into flame like they're covered in gasoline (which I think is a hilarious visual but many players like a more serious approach ).
I would rather leave individual effects up to the description of a spell or weapon enchantment.

If we want to keep the "Bloodied" condition like the others described here, we can basically set it at two levels, I think. Either at 66%-33% (two-thirds/one-third) or 50%-25%.
Personally, I favor the second option, because it allows the players to spend more time shrugging off hits that would drop an ox and fireballs to the face (i.e. feel more heroic) but the first one is probably more equitable and would make the effects of damage come into play sooner.

[Grod_The_Giant]

My thought on that was fatigued at 2/3 health, then exhausted at 1/3.

[Yitzi]

I'm talking specifically about hitting someone with riders. If the two tactical choices are:

• cast scare, then your friend casts scare
• cast leech morale, then your friend casts scare

Then the success rate of your friend's scare in the second case needs to be wayyy higher.

Why way higher? It needs to be substantially higher if Leech Morale does nothing other than reduce saves, but not absurdly so, as even if Scare fails, Leech Morale is still there and will apply to the next effect that's to be applied. I'd say a 50% increase to the success chance is plenty, or even less if more party members will be able to provoke saves.

Idea: If you use a 3d6 instead of d20 system, then you can get larger changes to the success chance for a smaller bonus/penalty.

[Just to Browse]

Why way higher? It needs to be substantially higher if Leech Morale does nothing other than reduce saves, but not absurdly so, as even if Scare fails, Leech Morale is still there and will apply to the next effect that's to be applied. I'd say a 50% increase to the success chance is plenty, or even less if more party members will be able to provoke saves.

... You, sir, have a very interesting definition of "way higher". a 50% increase is a -10 to saves, which I think would be great off a pure debuff spell. My definition of "way higher" is "something above 5".

I'm against 3d6 systems, and I'm not so in favor of 2/3 or 1/3 (because dividing by 3 takes a long time in my head and I don't want to rewrite my thresholds on every level up. Also I know D&D'ers who are completely math inept). I'd rather have a threshold like 1/2 HP, and then a desperation threshold based off of level. That gives asymmetric condition responses, which is always cool. Just my 2 cp there.

Having weird conditions like lighting someone on fire by taking them from 51% to 50% HP can be weird, but it's like the evasion-vs.-fireball thing, where if you just look at the combat from a different perspective, it makes more sense.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Ok, ok. Getting back to the stacking debuffs thing: what if we cut that out altogether? If someone's Shaken, and you hit them with another fear spell, they still have to fail by 5 to move up to frightened.

[Deepbluediver]

Ok, ok. Getting back to the stacking debuffs thing: what if we cut that out altogether? If someone's Shaken, and you hit them with another fear spell, they still have to fail by 5 to move up to frightened.

I liked the way it was the first time.

Maybe I'm not understanding the arguments against stacking debuffs; are we debating that they are to strong or not strong enough?
If you eventually want to kill or subdue the target (which is the goal of 95% of D&D campaigns) then loading them down with as many penalties as possible seems like a perfectly valid strategy that would still be consuming resources (spell slots, time, the element of surprise) and you're probably going to need to actually make some attack rolls or skill checks at some point anyway.
Plus, if you are already nervous (shaken) it makes sense to me that it would be easier to push you over the edge into outright fear.

I assume that you still want people to actually USE condition causing magic, because if you make it overly difficult to apply, most people will ignore it entirely and just resort to direct damage.


On an entirely different note, the list of effects that Fatigued and Exhausted have is, I think, the best choice for representing injuries in battle (HP Damage), unless you want to come up with something else entirely.
I just don't like names for this, since they seem to imply "tiredness" and not "I've been stabbed and I'm bleeding to death". Can we come up with a few more synonyms to represent a Bloodied/something/something-else track?

[Yitzi]

Ok, ok. Getting back to the stacking debuffs thing: what if we cut that out altogether? If someone's Shaken, and you hit them with another fear spell, they still have to fail by 5 to move up to frightened.

No, as that makes it too difficult to hit the top levels. I think an in-between position (easier than reaching level 2 without level 1 first, harder than reaching level 1) is best...although something like Shaken which already provides a penalty to saves might be different.

[Grod_The_Giant]

No, as that makes it too difficult to hit the top levels. I think an in-between position (easier than reaching level 2 without level 1 first, harder than reaching level 1) is best...although something like Shaken which already provides a penalty to saves might be different.

Ah, but there's the problem, isn't it? Giving a bonus encourages you to stack conditions. No bonus, and it becomes really hard to hit the high-level conditions.

[Yitzi]

Ah, but there's the problem, isn't it? Giving a bonus encourages you to stack conditions. No bonus, and it becomes really hard to hit the high-level conditions.

And a smaller bonus should hit in the middle, where it's balanced.

When the difference between "too powerful" and "not powerful enough" is numerical in nature, there's usually going to be a numerical value in between that's just right.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Mmm... how about each level of condition inflicting a -2 penalty to future saves against that same condition? So if you're, oh, Dazzled you have a -2 to more saves against Blinding effects (meaning that you effectively only need to fail by a 3 or more for a 2nd degree and 8 or more for 3rd), and a -4 if you're Partially Blinded (so you effectively need to fail by 6 or more for the 3rd degree).

[Deepbluediver]

Ah, but there's the problem, isn't it? Giving a bonus encourages you to stack conditions. No bonus, and it becomes really hard to hit the high-level conditions.

I still don't understand why stacking conditions is something that people seem to want to avoid. If you spend 5 turns wailing on something to reduce it's HP to 0, or 3 turns debuffing and then 2 turns wailing on it, what's the difference in the end?

I would think the best balancing factor would be that anything the player's throw at the monster, the DM can throw back at them.

[Yitzi]

I still don't understand why stacking conditions is something that people seem to want to avoid. If you spend 5 turns wailing on something to reduce it's HP to 0, or 3 turns debuffing and then 2 turns wailing on it, what's the difference in the end?

Because in one there are 5 turns where it can do you harm at full effectiveness, whereas in the other there's 1 turn in which it can do you harm at full effectiveness, 1 turn in which it can do you harm at a penalty, 1 turn in which it's close to harmless, and 2 turns in which it's completely harmless and you're just attacking it to finish it off.
It's the same number of turns, but not the same amount of risk.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Because in one there are 5 turns where it can do you harm at full effectiveness, whereas in the other there's 1 turn in which it can do you harm at full effectiveness, 1 turn in which it can do you harm at a penalty, 1 turn in which it's close to harmless, and 2 turns in which it's completely harmless and you're just attacking it to finish it off.
It's the same number of turns, but not the same amount of risk.

Which is still considerably better than one round to cripple it completely, mind you.

[Yitzi]

Which is still considerably better than one round to cripple it completely, mind you.

Definitely.

[Just to Browse]

A non-zero bonus for applying stacking conditions will always encourage everyone doing the same thing. There is no medium in between, and getting higher conditions needs to be dealt with another way, or you need to contend with the fact that everyone will want to stack similar effects.

I recommend not putting things on condition tracks, since that seems to be adding complexity anyways. You could have some conditions that are on tracks, but are useless against a good chunk of monsters (like fear effects fail against plants, vermin, undead, dragons, golems, and prometheans) so that party members can shine by spamming one spell over and over against very specific targets. Other than that, condition tracks just should be somewhat weighted against each other, that way you know how to balance special abilities, but tracks aren't a good idea.

[Grod_The_Giant]

A non-zero bonus for applying stacking conditions will always encourage everyone doing the same thing. There is no medium in between, and getting higher conditions needs to be dealt with another way, or you need to contend with the fact that everyone will want to stack similar effects.

I recommend not putting things on condition tracks, since that seems to be adding complexity anyways. You could have some conditions that are on tracks, but are useless against a good chunk of monsters (like fear effects fail against plants, vermin, undead, dragons, golems, and prometheans) so that party members can shine by spamming one spell over and over against very specific targets. Other than that, condition tracks just should be somewhat weighted against each other, that way you know how to balance special abilities, but tracks aren't a good idea.

Well then, since you disagree with my entire thesis here, perhaps you would care to suggest a different way to attempt to balance binary condition-inflicting spells and abilities against non-binary HP damage?

[Deepbluediver]

A non-zero bonus for applying stacking conditions will always encourage everyone doing the same thing. There is no medium in between, and getting higher conditions needs to be dealt with another way, or you need to contend with the fact that everyone will want to stack similar effects.

Not every class has easy access to every debuff, so what they want and what they can actually accomplish are very different things. The majority of D&D players are NOT min-maxers (although I admit the percentage of readers of this forum who are is probably above average). Anything short of completely crippling a target will still allow it the chance to endanger you, so at some point you are going to need to attack it anyway, and as we discussed damage will probably also inflict some conditional penalty.

Also, since this is part of a larger rewrite, I suspect that the classes that do get every single debuff-spell (like wizard) will be getting a few nerfs. Not every combat will play out the same way because you will run into different types of enemies with different strengths and weaknesses, who might be immune or resistant to different effects.
The difference is, instead of a straight up SoD spell, at worst most of these are Save-or-Suck, which still allows the target a chance to counterattack. I certainly don't see it being any more monotoness within a given party then combat is currently. And that's basically my standard for fixes: not perfect, but better than RAW? I vote "Yes".

[Dienekes]

A non-zero bonus for applying stacking conditions will always encourage everyone doing the same thing. There is no medium in between, and getting higher conditions needs to be dealt with another way, or you need to contend with the fact that everyone will want to stack similar effects.

I recommend not putting things on condition tracks, since that seems to be adding complexity anyways. You could have some conditions that are on tracks, but are useless against a good chunk of monsters (like fear effects fail against plants, vermin, undead, dragons, golems, and prometheans) so that party members can shine by spamming one spell over and over against very specific targets. Other than that, condition tracks just should be somewhat weighted against each other, that way you know how to balance special abilities, but tracks aren't a good idea.

Actually there is a method of forcing differentiation but instead of being a problem of just the Condition Tracks it has to do with class and spell design. If the classes themselves are designed to successfully counter different types of enemies better or worse than other classes then all the players being, let's say mind control focusing wizards, would actually be unoptimized in party make-up as it would be weak against enemies that cannot be mind-controlled.

Of course this is under the assumption that it even would be optimized ever for 3+ players to waste their time upping the spell effects against 1 opponent

Or you can use the M&M method that powers do not stack unless you pay for them (or in this case higher levels spells). So everyone being one thing is actually pretty weak unless you're willing to waste higher spells just to do your trick.

Of course this would mean getting rid of casters that can do everything (good riddance to bad rubbish I say).

Also is under the assumption that players will even want to play one thing. I have never seen that happen, ever. Hell even in 3.5 now it's far more optimized for everyone to play only Tier 1, if that hasn't forced everyone to homogenize their class choice then I doubt strictly weakening their effectiveness will.

[Yitzi]

A non-zero bonus for applying stacking conditions will always encourage everyone doing the same thing.

Says who? With a small but significant bonus, doing the same thing again means that you've got a significant* chance of accomplishing absolutely nothing whatsoever.

*Assuming that the rewrite also makes it reasonably easy to make saves.

I recommend not putting things on condition tracks, since that seems to be adding complexity anyways.

So then what should be the rules for save-or-die effects? Just make it completely impossible to apply them unless he rolls extremely low on his save?

[Just to Browse]

Not every class has easy access to every debuff, so what they want and what they can actually accomplish are very different things. The majority of D&D players are NOT min-maxers (although I admit the percentage of readers of this forum who are is probably above average). Anything short of completely crippling a target will still allow it the chance to endanger you, so at some point you are going to need to attack it anyway, and as we discussed damage will probably also inflict some conditional penalty.

A majority of D&D players are not min-maxers, so it's also fine to have overpowered wizards and weak fighters! Right?

Also, since this is part of a larger rewrite, I suspect that the classes that do get every single debuff-spell (like wizard) will be getting a few nerfs. Not every combat will play out the same way because you will run into different types of enemies with different strengths and weaknesses, who might be immune or resistant to different effects.

But you're encouraging everyone to be the same class. If only the rogue and wizard can do impairment, then you are encouraging a party of pure rogues and wizards.

The difference is, instead of a straight up SoD spell, at worst most of these are Save-or-Suck, which still allows the target a chance to counterattack. I certainly don't see it being any more monotoness within a given party then combat is currently. And that's basically my standard for fixes: not perfect, but better than RAW? I vote "Yes".

There are options here. One is "mediocre system, potentially better than old one." The other is "better system, potentially better than old one." Voting for the former is not a good thing in any way, and I don't see why you would do it, especially if you're rewriting the game to make it better.

Actually there is a method of forcing differentiation but instead of being a problem of just the Condition Tracks it has to do with class and spell design. If the classes themselves are designed to successfully counter different types of enemies better or worse than other classes then all the players being, let's say mind control focusing wizards, would actually be unoptimized in party make-up as it would be weak against enemies that cannot be mind-controlled.

I am very much in agreement there. I think building classes to have weak points will certainly encourage non-homogenous (heterogenous?) parties, but if that's the aim then there's no reason to have ability tracks anywho.

Says who? With a small but significant bonus, doing the same thing again means that you've got a significant* chance of accomplishing absolutely nothing whatsoever.

If you get +1 DC (smallest bonus) to tier 2 fear effects on a target that is already shaken, now every tier 2 fear spell on that target will be 5% more likely to work than any other tier 2 spell, so everyone will want to do it. You can have your bonus, and have it encourage spamming, or you can have no bonus. There is no ground in between.

Well then, since you disagree with my entire thesis here, perhaps you would care to suggest a different way to attempt to balance binary condition-inflicting spells and abilities against non-binary HP damage?

Damage thresholds. Bloodied, Fatigued, Exhausted, etc. You even brought up your 1/3 and 2/3 recommendations. Heck, the whole problem with save-or-dies is that they kill people. Just don't let debuffs kill people--have "kill" effects deal a lot of damage, and make the rest of it action or movement denial.

[Dienekes]

I am very much in agreement there. I think building classes to have weak points will certainly encourage non-homogenous (heterogenous?) parties, but if that's the aim then there's no reason to have ability tracks anywho.

Actually there still is. It allows spells to be effective without being overpowered in use against opponents. The potential for really interesting effects is still present, and in certain situations going straight up the track could be the optimal solution but it is not the only one. The tiered solution also allows through saves a nice means of changing how spells effectiveness is used. The question on should you go for the big opponent who you might only get a Tier 1 effect on, or take on a mook to get a pretty certain Tier 2 or 3 effect becomes a valid tactical choice. As is the idea of having 3 players try to push down one opponent and risk potentially being mobbed by the others.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Classes should ideally all wind up with a decent amount of variety, both in and out of combat. The question is not "are condition tracks more balanced than binary conditions--" By definition, it is. I don't think anyone is arguing that. The two questions are "is the system too complicated to use in play?" and "is condition stacking a real-life or theoretical concern?"

The first could be addressed in several ways. The first would be to reduce the number of tracks. Or at least the number of commonly used tracks-- Blinding and Wind are pretty rare, Dying (hopefully) isn't common either, and Madness is really only a very few spells and abilities. More efforts at homogeneity in the remaining tracks is also a possibility, though I did my best to include as much as possible.

The second probably can't be answered without a wide poll of playing groups. I, personally, feel that the 'danger' isn't as great as it may appear-- after all, "optimal" 3.5 means everyone playing casters and volleying SoD/SoS spells, and how many groups do you know who do that? Even if you do, it takes three successful hits to push you from 1st to 3rd degree-- maybe 4 or 5 actions, if the target has decent saves. Move, if they're a boss-type and have good saves. How many opponents can stand 4 or 5 actions worth of focused fire from an intelligent party?

All things considered, I suspect that the only way to really evaluate the questions is in playtesting. You should be able to drop the chart into any 3.5 or game and be OK.

[Just to Browse]

Well I gave you my opinion. I really don't want stacking tracks to be central in any game, but if you guys think it's good then roll with it.

[Grod_The_Giant]

And I thank you for your opinion. I do see where you're coming from, but... as I mentioned, I don't see any better way to handle things, and I think it will be OK in the end. It'll be pretty easy to take out the part about stacking conditions if it turns out to be a problem.

[Deepbluediver]

A majority of D&D players are not min-maxers, so it's also fine to have overpowered wizards and weak fighters! Right?

That's not what I'm saying at all. My point was that it's no more accurate to say that "every combat scenario will be the same" than it is to say "every player is a min-maxer".

But you're encouraging everyone to be the same class. If only the rogue and wizard can do impairment, then you are encouraging a party of pure rogues and wizards.

This would only occur in a situation where causing status-effects was purely better than damage, and it would still run into trouble against enemies with high saves.

The solution should be to give more classes access to a variety of condition-causing effects, and no one class should be able to do them all at once.

There are options here. One is "mediocre system, potentially better than old one." The other is "better system, potentially better than old one." Voting for the former is not a good thing in any way, and I don't see why you would do it, especially if you're rewriting the game to make it better.

I'm not sure I understand what you proposed then, because reading what you wrote above it seems very much like the RAW.

I am very much in agreement there. I think building classes to have weak points will certainly encourage non-homogenous (heterogenous?) parties, but if that's the aim then there's no reason to have ability tracks anywho.

What? I don't see the corelation between classes with different strengths and weaknesses and ability tracks for status effects.

If you get +1 DC (smallest bonus) to tier 2 fear effects on a target that is already shaken, now every tier 2 fear spell on that target will be 5% more likely to work than any other tier 2 spell, so everyone will want to do it. You can have your bonus, and have it encourage spamming, or you can have no bonus. There is no ground in between.

As far as I can tell, there are 3 only tracks that affect saves:
Fatigue - Reflex, via lower Dex score
Fear- Will, directly
Impairing- everything

If you think this makes them to powerful in comparison to the other tracks, then we should either make them harder to cause, or work on fixing them by reducing the other penalties.

[Just to Browse]

This would only occur in a situation where causing status-effects was purely better than damage, and it would still run into trouble against enemies with high saves.

There is no damage effect that makes people cower. There is no damage effect that stops people from moving. When dealing half someone's HP in damage, and dealing a tier 2 condition to them, it's still obvious that a tier 2 condition is better. So the "only" situation where debuffs beat damage is actually "every" situation.

And yes, enemies with high saves can be a problem, but that's outside the scope of this thread. General condition design policies are here, specific chances are being put off. If we start talking chances of infliction, I'd love to pitch in, but that's not right now.

The solution should be to give more classes access to a variety of condition-causing effects, and no one class should be able to do them all at once.

And if you have condition-stacking, now you have multiple classes who will all want to use the exact same condition. I don't see how this solves the problem of condition-spamming.

I'm not sure I understand what you proposed then, because reading what you wrote above it seems very much like the RAW.

My proposition is that, instead of changing the conditions in a way that encourages bad gameplay, change the relevant abilities. Don't require nauseated to stack off sickened, just write the effect of Stinking Cloud to force Fort-v-Sickened and say "if you fail by 5 or more or are bloodied, you will be Nauseated". No stacking. No tracks. No bonuses. The problem is fixed entirely outside of condition tracks.

What? I don't see the corelation between classes with different strengths and weaknesses and ability tracks for status effects.

See above. Abilities can fix this problem well, so fix the problem with abilities. Don't write up tracks of conditions.

[snip]confusion about saves[snip]

That was a post in response to Yitzi, on a topic started by Grod, about allowing bonuses for conditions in the same track. Yitzi maintained that a small enough bonus wouldn't affect spamming tactics. I disagreed.