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Post by Deleted on Feb 14, 2012 19:17:06 GMT -8
Heya Jib, So you made some comments regarding Savage Worlds Parry versus the ranged "to hit" recently. You said in your games you make their ranged "to be hit" TN their Parry modifier instead of the default 4. I am curious: Do your players utilize cover and do you enforce the darkness or range modifiers? If a player were to kneel behind a rock, or peak around a corner they could easily turn their "to hit" Target number to 5 (which is equivalent to an average parry). With darkness, some range, or better cover(all of which can stack) the TN is suddenly a 6 which is equivalent to a decent Parry. I guess I am confused with the TN 4 hate. Of course while standing in an open field...with no cover...in broad daylight you are an easy target. A bullet/arrow fly much faster then anyone could reasonably "dodge" hence the cover/range/darkness modifiers. In most of the games I have played in, these modifier rules were pretty much ignored. Yet at the same time people are upset that its sooo easy to be hit when shooting. It seems to me the balance would tip the other way if Parry were used. Suddenly my TN to be hit is 5-6 and when you add cover, light and range modifiers it could get very hard for the wildcard to get hit at range. Thoughts? Comments? I am not trying to pick a fight, I just don't follow the logic.
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Post by jazzisblues on Feb 15, 2012 12:25:20 GMT -8
Quick reply more detailed one coming (possibly not until after OrcCon though)
1. No worries, no argument and I love a lively debate. If an idea won't stand up to challenge it shouldn't be used anyway.
2. They do use cover and the cover modifiers still apply.
3. Basically it's not a question of ranged or melee it's a question of whether the target is aware they are being attacked. If they are they get to use their parry. If they do not it's a 4 regardless of combat type.
I don't hate on the TN 4 I just don't think it's balanced and gives an advantage range combatants. I think that the same is true of spells.
It's not a perfect answer and it's still (for me anyway) in a state of evaluation to see if it works. So far it has.
I will post a more thorough explanation of the rules after OrcCon.
JiB
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Post by shadrack on Feb 16, 2012 11:28:58 GMT -8
First, a question: JiB do you do this parry adjustment vs. magic attacks as well, or just ranged (arrows, bullets, etc.) or would it matter if the flavor on the bolt was something like 'shards of ice' or 'fireballs', etc.
Anyway: I'm typically in the 'TN 4 is fine' camp. It just doesn't seem like you should get the full benefit of your Parry vs. ranged weapons without some serious cost (there is an arrow-cutting edge in Iron Dynasty that gives it to you, but the list of requirements is significant)
However, for discussion purposes, it does make me think of Eclipse Phase's 'Fray'. (basically an opposing roll vs attacks you are aware of)
In order to shoot someone you must roll a 'success' on your applicable weapon skill If that is the case, and the target is unaware, => hit. if the target is aware of the attack => roll fray to avoid said attack. if the attack was a ranged attack, the 'fray' chance of success is halved.
An analogue to this in SavW would go something like this.
target is... not aware of attack => TN = 4 or parry and you have 'the drop' (analogue is you succeed w/ your weapon) aware of the melee attack => TN = parry (you get full fray) aware of the ranged attack => TN = (parry + 4) / 2 (effectively halving the benefit of going from the TN to the parry. (you get half fray)
if I did this I would be a lot more restrictive on cover, etc.
Interesting note: on the show, people sometimes comment about HUGE parry numbers, such as: "If you're fighting a minotaur with a parry of 15 or something" I looked through most of my books and haven't found a single creature with a parry of higher than 9, (Werewolf - savage worlds deluxe).
Admittedly, the problem with some things, (like a dragon) is the toughness (dragon toughness = 20). As hitting a dragon is easy (parry = 7 but it's huge so you get like a +3 to hit) It seems like if you are going after a dragon, you probably need a special quest to get a 'dragonslayer' type weapon. (you know, extra damage vs dragons, possibly no-mercy edge vs dragons)
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joegun
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Post by joegun on Feb 16, 2012 11:49:51 GMT -8
Hey all,
I'll jump in a bit as well. For starters with my group I haven't seen a big problem of balance between melee, and ranged fighters. The only true game breaker I saw was bolt, which they have mostly balanced out in SWD anyway. Now I think the reason my group hasn't seen much of the problems, is we are very aware of ranged combatants so my melee guys don't tend to fight out in the open. They stay behind/find cover when under fire. You know sorta the thing you would do if you were actually getting shot at. This probably comes from playing Palladium systems (Yeah I know!) where you had a -10 to your dodge roll to get out of the way of arrows, so you pretty much had to stay behind cover.
That being said, if you have the standard party where the fighters are duking it out, dealing with Gang up, high parries, and getting plucked from far away as happy bow guys plunks down raise after raise since his TN is just a 4. It would get frustrating. (And if this is the type of game your players like, well the rules do need to be adjusted).
I personally avoid it because I think this forces some movement on the table, and really gives the players and GM an opportunity to dynamically alter the combat field. Of course this helps if you let the players add narrative. Aka if you are in town and the player says "I'm getting shot at, I'm going to dive behind the water trough", I don't think i'm ever going to tell them there isn't a water Trough there. In this case the idea of getting hit on a 4 standing out in the open is forcing the player to change his combat style, maybe he ducks into a building, maybe he tackles the guy he is swinging swords with and uses him as a human shield, whatever. Once again though it requires you as the GM to be pretty open to player ideas.
The other big thing I do to make sure the Ranged people stay in check. I'm a big enforcers of the innocent by-standard rule when firing into melee. your fighter is being shot at by the baddies, they rolled a 1, that just hit the guy the fighter was dueling with. Basically I ALWAYS make it dramatically appropriate.
And the last thing I'll bring up is the bonus for a human hitting a dragon should be +4 (pg 133 SWD) (Assuming a size 0 creature, aka human, elf, dwarf, etc) - not nit picking, just clarifying
All this being said, I do plan on trying out JiBs ideas at my table to see how it changes things.
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Post by jazzisblues on Feb 19, 2012 21:03:07 GMT -8
Bolt attacks make it more complicated but the short answer is yes I do.
I understand what you're getting at and it has real possibilities for a good compromise position.
The basic premise behind the house rule as I have implemented it is this, if you can see you are being attacked you have a reasonable chance of avoiding it. If you cannot you do not.
It's not a perfect solution, but for my purposes it has worked.
Cheers,
JiB
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Post by Deleted on Mar 6, 2012 16:20:38 GMT -8
I disagree with the premise of your argument. In hand-to-hand combat/melee, the speeds you are working with are within the realm of human perception, even in situations like fencing where to a non-fencer, the blades may be moving too fast to follow, the fencers (good ones, anyway) know where their and their opponents' blades are at all times.
But.
You are talking about missile weapons, which in SW can mean anything from a stone coming from a sling or a javelin someone has thrown, to an energy beam. Just about anyone who has been in a firefight will tell you it *does not matter* if you know where your enemy is, because bullets move fast and KILL YOU. But putting aside bullets for a second, consider the story someone told on the podcast a while back (season 4, I think) about being a 10 year old DM who had a player insisting that his character could have batted away a javelin, an argument they settled by locating a javelin-like object (the flag from one of their bikes) and the DM throwing it at the aggrieved player who tried to bat it away with a broomstick. After a couple of wide throws, the result was the defender with a javelin stuck in his face.
Being aware that something is about to come at you very fast does not mean you can defend against it with your hands or other objects. You can dive for cover, position your shield better (hence the +2 armor against missile weapons in SW) or try to make it more difficult to hit you in other ways (like running.) However, to "parry" is to physically block an attack, which only works in hand to hand combat, where you see not only the weapon, but the whole body that is driving that weapon, allowing you to predict where the pointy bit is going. At more than a few yards, it's really hard to tell exactly where a gun or bow is aiming, and even if you know, you're not going to block something coming at you as fast as an arrow or a bullet.
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HyveMynd
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Post by HyveMynd on Mar 6, 2012 19:49:52 GMT -8
I'll jump in here too even though I'm late as usual. I certainly don't mean to put words (or anything else) into JiB's mouth, but I think he's using Parry in a much broader sense than what you seem to have taken an issue with, dylanmorgan.
I'm pretty sure that JiB is using Parry much like how the Fray skill in Eclipse Phase is used as shadrack brought up. Fray represents a character's total capacity to *not* be hit by an attack regardless of the form that attack takes. Armor doesn't factor into Fray at all (since armor in Eclipse Phase is handled as damage reduction), so Fray would essentially be the Dexterity bonus to AC, if I were to put it into D&D terms.
If you take a strict definition of the word "parry", meaning the target is attempting to deflect the bullet after it's been fired, then yes, I totally agree with you dylanmorgan. People shouldn't realistically be able to deflect a bullet or other projectile with their hands or a weapon; the projectiles are simply traveling too fast. If you have a gun pointed at someone who is standing absolutely stock still and then tell the target to dodge or block the bullet the instant you pull the trigger, game over. No one will ever be able to do that. But if you tell the target to dodge the instant you start to move the gun up to a firing position or when you start to turn to face them, the target will have a (slightly) better chance of at least getting out of the way. That's the idea behind Fray in Eclipse Phase, and why your Fray score is halved when you use it as a reaction against a ranged attack. It's easier to avoid a melee attack you know is coming than a ranged attack, and trying to avoid a ranged attack you know is coming makes you harder to hit than just standing still.
He can correct me if I am wrong, but that seems to be how JiB is using Parry in his Savage Worlds games. Not in a strict "use a weapon to block or deflect an incoming attack" sense, but in a broader "this is your total capacity to not be hit" sense. In all RPGs there is some level of abstraction. There has to be, as no game system can completely replicate reality. So I personally have no problem with the idea of ranged attackers using their target's Parry score as their TN. I really like shadrack's Eclipse Phase inspired solution of using 1/2 the target's Parry for missile attack TNs, so long as the target is aware of the attack.
I will say that I don't like how Parry, your sole capacity to not be hit in combat in Savage Worlds is derived entirely from your Fighting ability. When making a character for a (now dead) fantasy game, I wanted to make an acrobatic thief with a high Agility score and lots of appropriate Edges but with a low Fighting skill. I was disappointed to find my Parry score would be pretty abysmal, making her a veritable weapon magnet unless I was willing to dump points into Fighting. It didn't seem right to me that a character with an Agility of d10 had the same Parry score as a character with an Agility of d4.
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Post by jazzisblues on Mar 7, 2012 7:43:17 GMT -8
HyveMind is exactly correct in his understanding. There is no "Dodge" feature in Savage Worlds so we kind of have to make some broad assumptions.
I agree completely that once the hammer has fallen nobody is dodging or parrying a bullet. There have been anecdotal stories about people blocking bullets but I've never heard of an actually documented case. I have seen a demonstration of a martial artist catching arrows in flight out of the air. However, in the demonstration the archer was shooting at the target right beside the martial artist and the martial artist was completely focused on doing that one thing and I think he went 2 for 3 so I don't really count that as a reliable ability.
The point though is that we're not talking about a controlled circumstance.
The house rule as I have implemented it works under a pretty simple premise. If you are aware that you are about to be attacked (important phrasing there) in the split second between when the shooter has committed to pulling the trigger and the hammer actually falling you have a chance to MOVE or take some kind of cover.
What it comes down to is that in my estimation always having a TN of 4 for shooting is non-representational and gives too much favor to the shooty guy.
The net effect in game play is that we have more shots missing and combat tends to take a little longer, but it does seem to me that the shooty guy and the hitty guy are more balanced this way.
This is still very much in play test and may evolve as time goes on. I may even throw it out and decide I don't like it. I want to run a bunch more games of varying kinds with it and see how it plays out. A couple of VERY valid points have been raised.
1. The relative amount of damage that can be expected from a melee attack vs a ranged attack. This really needs some empirical testing and I would like some help with that. I think that setting up and modeling combats of different kinds with different weapons would help show the truth of this question.
2. Do we really want to make combats take longer? This is a tough question and one I don't have a clear answer to. My usual answer is no, I want combats to get resolved as quickly as possible.
3. Does this effectively make all combatants less capable and make magic even more of a trump card than it is right now? Very possibly. I want to include magic in the modeling in #1 to see how it works out.
I'm not saying it's a perfect idea, it's just an idea that I had to correct what seems to me to be a problem (for me) with the rules. I would LOVE to sit down and have a chat with Shane Hensley about it. (Shane if you happen to read this and we run into each other at a con sometime I'll buy the beer.)
Cheers,
JiB
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Post by Stu Venable on Mar 7, 2012 9:14:18 GMT -8
Is ranged and melee combat balanced? Should it be?
Thinking of long bows and the battle at Agincourt, I'm thinking maybe they shouldn't?
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Post by jazzisblues on Mar 7, 2012 11:34:27 GMT -8
Is ranged and melee combat balanced? Should it be? Thinking of long bows and the battle at Agincourt, I'm thinking maybe they shouldn't? Very valid point and a question that might vary from situation to situation. For example in a game we might want longbows to be much more impactive than in another game. I've thought for years that bows were under powered in relation to other weapons in d20, but in point of fact most weapons are underpowered in d20. (IMO anyway) More food for the mill in terms of modeling and testing. Cheers, JiB
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2012 5:09:20 GMT -8
In response to Hyvemynd's comments, the fact that your parry increases when your fighting skill does implies to me that Parry in SW does refer to the literal definition of "parry" as opposed to a total defense. I would argue that initiative allows for the active defense JiB is looking for-if you act before the shooty guy, and you have a realistic kind of battlefield laid out, you should have the ability to dive for cover. If anything, I would say that a better way of adding the option of active defense would be to adopt the "dive for cover" rule for area-effect attacks when dealing with certain ranged attacks. Also keep in mind the -2 penalty for multi-actions when you have to ready a weapon and attack in the same round, making the TN 6. Add in some rain during a twilight battle, and suddenly your shooty guys are dealing with a TN of 8 or 10 on their first attack (if they draw and attack, and don't have the quick-draw edge) which equalizes a lot of the imbalance you are concerned about. Also keep in mind range modifiers and terrain. If the terrain does not allow LoS at close range until in melee range, you again have a very different battle than a flat, well-lit field with your guys at one end and the enemies at the other.
Just some thoughts.
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HyveMynd
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Post by HyveMynd on Mar 8, 2012 5:54:23 GMT -8
Is ranged and melee combat balanced? Should it be? Well, that depends. I used my history class during high school as a daily nap period, so I'm not even going to pretend that I understand the real world historical aspects of weapon effectiveness and combat tactics. So I'll use anecdotal evidence from some of the miniature wargames I've played over the years, most notably Warhammer 40K. Every few years, Games Workshop comes out with a new edition of their Warhammer 40K game. Their main goal in doing this is to suck more money out of your pocket, but there is also a bit of rules clean up and some faction rule tweaking that happens with each new edition. Sometimes one or more of the factions will get a complete and radical rules overhaul. Why? Because someone always finds a way to "break" the rules or abuse the army lists and things need to be "re-balanced" again. Some player out there with way too much time and money finds some army list or unit combination that wins more often than it should due to some rules loophole or ambiguity. Other people start to catch on, leading players down one of three paths. Either they a) join the bandwagon and start running that particular faction or army list; b) they run the one faction or army list that has the best chance of beating the other "top tier" list; or c) they continue to play what they think is "fun" and get absolutely crushed by the "optimized" lists. The result is that the overall health of the game suffers, since the majority of people will start playing one of the "top tier" army lists and ignore most of the other options the game has available because "they aren't competitive". You also see this happen in Magic: the Gathering all the time. There is a small handful of "top tier" decks and their variants, and you will see these decks in the Top 10 slots of tournaments again and again and again. The only way to be competitive is to run one of those decks or the deck that is specifically designed to beat it. Instead of a cornucopia of variety, players get stuck with two or three "best" choices. Bringing this back to RPGs, I feel that there shouldn't be one option that is perceived as being better than the other choices the game or setting provides. The whole reason this thread got started was because someone felt that ranged combat was superior to melee combat due to their different TNs in Savage Worlds. If one option/feat/type of weapon/whatever is seen as being superior to the other choices available, the players who choose to *not* do that "best thing" are kind of getting punished. I'm of the opinion that everything in an RPG should be of around the same level of effectiveness. The only time things should be "unbalanced" in a game system is when the GM or setting is actively trying to encourage or discourage a specific style of play. Call of Cthulhu is a great example of this. It's been said on the podcast many times that Firearms is the most useless skill in CoC because so many of the Things That Go Bump in the Night won't even flinch if you manage to pass your Sanity check and shoot them. I would argue that is because CoC is an investigative game and the creators are intentionally making Firearms a useless skill to force players to peruse other avenues to victory (such as it is in CoC). In a "standard" fantasy game though, it's generally assumed that the archer and the swordsman are going to be equally effective given the right situations. Is this historically accurate? I have no idea. Maybe it is, or maybe the longbow should be the Medieval equivalent of a GURPS sniper rifle and wreck absolutely everything. If that 's the case though, most players are going to drop their swords and pick up ranged weapons completely changing the playstyle for the game. If everyone's cool with that, then that's fine. I guess I could have summed up Stu's question with a simple answer of "It depends on what playstyle your group wants to have."
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Post by jazzisblues on Mar 8, 2012 7:36:23 GMT -8
In response to Hyvemynd's comments, the fact that your parry increases when your fighting skill does implies to me that Parry in SW does refer to the literal definition of "parry" as opposed to a total defense. I would argue that initiative allows for the active defense JiB is looking for-if you act before the shooty guy, and you have a realistic kind of battlefield laid out, you should have the ability to dive for cover. If anything, I would say that a better way of adding the option of active defense would be to adopt the "dive for cover" rule for area-effect attacks when dealing with certain ranged attacks. Also keep in mind the -2 penalty for multi-actions when you have to ready a weapon and attack in the same round, making the TN 6. Add in some rain during a twilight battle, and suddenly your shooty guys are dealing with a TN of 8 or 10 on their first attack (if they draw and attack, and don't have the quick-draw edge) which equalizes a lot of the imbalance you are concerned about. Also keep in mind range modifiers and terrain. If the terrain does not allow LoS at close range until in melee range, you again have a very different battle than a flat, well-lit field with your guys at one end and the enemies at the other. Just some thoughts. Interesting thoughts they are too. I will factor them into the model and see how that affects the numbers. Thank you for your insights and constructive criticism of the idea. I more than welcome the dialog and may very well change my thinking on this as this works through. Thanks, JiB
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HyveMynd
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Post by HyveMynd on Mar 8, 2012 16:52:48 GMT -8
I must have been typing up that long-ass rant while you posted your response, dylanmorgan. Sorry. I usually take a long time to write my posts since I'm so damn anal about them. In response to Hyvemynd's comments, the fact that your parry increases when your fighting skill does implies to me that Parry in SW does refer to the literal definition of "parry" as opposed to a total defense. That is a totally fair assumption and if you go by that, then yes. I would argue that using a target's Parry for a ranged attacker's TN makes no sense and that the TN of 4 should stand. Unless you have some kind of crazy kung-fu Matrix Force ability where you could potentially deflect bullets with your sword maybe. I would argue that initiative allows for the active defense JiB is looking for-if you act before the shooty guy, and you have a realistic kind of battlefield laid out, you should have the ability to dive for cover. Again, this is a totally fair and realistic assumption. In real life if the guy with the gun pulls the trigger before you attempt to get out of the way, you're in big trouble. I think perhaps the reason some people don't like this though, is that it doesn't feel heroic. I usually like realistic, gritty games but I understand the appeal of playing a heroic bad ass now and again. If your character takes a sucking chest wound simply because he acted a bit slower than the gunman (i.e. lost the initiative roll), well, that doesn't feel so heroic. Neither does it feel that heroic to have your character constantly diving for cover, scrambling to keep something between him and the gunman as you try to get close to him. You don't feel like a bad ass when you're on your belly in the dirt waiting for the bullets to stop so you can sprint to the next spot of cover. That feels gritty and realistic and would be totally appropriate for some games, but not for others. Also keep in mind the -2 penalty for multi-actions when you have to ready a weapon and attack in the same round, making the TN 6. Add in some rain during a twilight battle, and suddenly your shooty guys are dealing with a TN of 8 or 10 on their first attack (if they draw and attack, and don't have the quick-draw edge) which equalizes a lot of the imbalance you are concerned about. That certainly does balance the TNs for melee vs. ranged attacks, and again it's totally realistic. My issue with that, is that the GM had to add in two separate elements to the encounter specifically to deal with the ranged attack guys. You can't really do that for every encounter just to make the melee players at the table feel like they're effective again. Your ranged players will also call bullshit on you. "You know, just once I'd like to have a fight that's not in the dark and not during a friggin' rainstorm. Just once I'd like a clean shot!" So, I really don't know what the solution is. Maybe there isn't one "catch all" fix because there are too many variables at play here. The way things should work are based on the tone of the story (heroic vs. gritty), the level of realism you want to portray in the game (cinematic vs. realistic), and whether most characters are specialized (like most fantasy games) or more general (more modern games).
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Mar 9, 2012 23:19:52 GMT -8
In general, this is one of those things I'd suggest you consider a Setting Rule for.
Is your game all "mangariffic" where everyone is jumping around everywhere and melee is king because ranged weapons are challenging? Then, definitely, apply a Setting Rule along the lines of "The Arrow Has No Hope: The Target Number to hit with Ranged Combat has a base value equal to 1/2 Agility +2. Changes to Parry do not affect this number, and changes to the Ranged to Hit number do not affect Parry." (That way Dodge and Block don't become interchangeable.)
Is your game at the cusp of the move to blackpowder pistols? Perhaps something along the lines of "Wild Power: All black powder weapons suffer a -1 attack penalty, but gain +2 AP."
I also tend to think that people in the game world learn. If every time an archer shows up, it's bad, bad news, then people will naturally and logically tend to develop means to deal with ranged weaponeers, even if it's just showing up with a bunch of their own to shoot first!
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