After reading PF, 5e, and 3.5e I gotta ask this. Is there any point in rolled saving throws? I thought this was one of the single things 4e did right. Even people I met who hated 4e thought it was also better.
For the same reason you roll for attacks. Also having a 5% chance to fail any save is kind of nice, since you can never fully ignore even weak attacks.
Saves as static defense values is yet another of the great ideas 4e had that 3.PF fans shat all over because it was new and different.
It's legacy reasons only. Sacred cows.
>>43826841
You still have the 5% in 4e - it's the attacker's chance to crit.
>>43826864
Yeah but rolling for your own saves gives that feeling of agency. When a single save could mean the difference between life and death most players would prefer to roll it themselves.
Why are saves as static defenses better?
>>43826917
>Yeah but rolling for your own saves gives that feeling of agency.
Eh. Both ides have merit. I think that in most cases it's more intuitive to have the party who is actually doing something (casting a spell, breathing fire) do the roll - the same feeling of agency when you have to roll a die to see how well you cast that fireball etc.
I can also concede that there were some cases where this resulted in inelegant things (see THE SUN ATTACKS YOU in Dark Sun). All in all it's not a big deal either way.
>>43826955
Because it unifies a mechanic. Static defenses means that whoever DOES a harmful thing rolls the dice, and this allows to consolidate a couple of effects and is generally more intuitive.
It also opens up a little more design space - quick attacks that go vs. agility, fear effects vs. willpower etc.
>>43827007
>It also opens up a little more design space - quick attacks that go vs. agility, fear effects vs. willpower etc.
How? I thought Reflex was for physical attacks that ignore armor, other editions split that into Touch AC for directed and Reflex for area. Don't roll-for-save editions already use Fort for poison/petrification/etc and Will for fear/illusion/etc?
And wouldn't it only make sense to roll a against static Fort/Ref/Will if you were targeting a single creature? For area effects I'd think it would make more sense for all potentially affected to roll against the effect, not the caster making a single roll against multiple static save values.
>>43827201
>How? I thought Reflex was for physical attacks that ignore armor, other editions split that into Touch AC for directed and Reflex for area. Don't roll-for-save editions already use Fort for poison/petrification/etc and Will for fear/illusion/etc?
That is the norm, yes. But as I said you get a tiny bit of design space that justifies the occasional mixing up of things.
Also I don't really see your point about groups - if the agent of the effect is only one, he is the one who makes the roll. Note that at least in 4e the attacks are rolled singularly but the damage is the same for all targets.
>>43826917
and rolling against the monster's saves gives you agency. There's no agency gained either way so it's a moot point.
>>43826757
Static defences are mostly just a side effect of one of the othermanythings 4e did right - making every offensive ability work by the same rules and need an attack roll.
This kind of standardization seems to be what put some people off 4e, but it made power design a lot more straightforward and meant you could easily compare abilities across classes. And it took the traditional saves into the realm of things fighters could play with, with abilities like the armor-defeating strike that targets reflex and the shove that targets fort and so on.
>>43826987
>not wanting the environment itself to actively try to kill you
Do you even dark sun?
>>43827201
For area attacks rhe caster rolls against each target seperately; it's effectively the same thing
>>43829833
> it's effectively the same thing
> 1 roll against 5 targets is equivalent to 5 attack rolls
Stupid.
>>43828192
Now I'm really wanting a combination of 5e's stats as saves and 4e's static defenses.
>>43830483
All you really have to do to implement static defenses is just take the saving throw value, add 10 to it, and then make it so the caster has to roll 1d20 + their bonus to the DC. Of course, 5e saves are a bit lower, being 8 + mods, so you might need to adjust it accordingly.
>>43827755
Roll your own saves keeps the players more engaged in the game when it's not their turn since they get to do something.
>>43830483
>Now I'm really wanting a combination of 5e's stats as saves and 4e's static defenses.
5e 'saves' are a blight. The game can't effectually use all 6 saves, and it already shows in number of saves in the game being heavily weighted to only 2 or 3 saves spending on where you put the cut-off at and lack of advancement for your off-stat saves means you've basically at the mercy of anything that can target your 3-4 weak saves.
>>43831073
Maybe it'd work better if you took a page from 4e and let certain stats sub in for other ones? Like instead of a Con save, you could use a Strength save instead.
Might be a bit odd in some places, but it does mean that getting 3 strong saves can cover your bases more easily.
>>43830483
anything to reduce the number of discrete stats on a character sheet.
>>43831073
>>43831217
It's time to bite the bullet and reduce the number of Abilities in D&D. Brawn, agility, wits and guts/spirit/chutzpah cover all your needs for defenses, skill bonuses, attack styles and characterization without unintuitive edge cases.
>>43831073
Yeah, there are three important saves and three less important saves. Each class has one important and one less important save. With the game's math putting much heavier weight on dice rolls, having a bad save is still not the end of the world. The game just has a high degree of variability.
>>43831349
No, D&D should add two stats to a roll. Like how RuneQuest balances the static probability of the d100 and rolled ability scores with tying almost everything to two ability scores.
>>43831217
Actually, what you need to take from 4e is 1/2 level to everything instead of Proficiency. That way you don't have things balaced against a +11 save when the PCs could easily have a -1.
>>43831438
Bounded Accuracy sounded like such a good idea before they revealed it was actually code for lol, some things scale and some things don't just like in the old days when everything was broken.
>>43831384
Hmm. That would be acceptable, if you could then get rid of extraneous values like attack bonuses and skill ratings.
>>43831438
A better way might be to balance things around the assumption of a +6 save. No reason why the absolute maximum should be considered the baseline. A good save and a good score should combine into something above average, as opposed to just one or the other or none at all.
>>43826757
In PF at least you can do the same thing. You add 11 to the save bonus and that's your new defense. You take the bonuses to DC's for spells, spell like abiilities, supernatural abilities, and the like, and add that number to a D20 roll to determine the attack of an ability. Monsters add 1/2 their HD as well as the stat bonus to their abilities (like any supernatural ability) to determine their full bonus.
This also makes for interestign facts such as diseases and unknown attacks taking effect without the player's knowledge - all you need is a list of their Fort, Ref, and Will defenses.
>>43831520
The issue there is that most classes give proficiency in stats that will want to increase to maximum already.
>>43826917
>gives that feeling of agency
>that feeling
This. No amount of efficiency, optimization, or change can ever measure up to a true gamer's gut feeling.
>>43831438
The 1/2 to skills per level exists so that high level characters have better chances doing the same shit than low level characters even if they haven't trained the skill or augmented it anyway.
Level 1 wizard jumps over a 2 square pit with running start
-1 to Athletics with DC 10 == 45% chance of succeeding.
Level 10 wizard jumps over a 2 square pit with a running start
+4 to athletics with DC 10 == 70% chance of succeeding
Level 20 wizard jumps over a 2 square pit with a running start
+9 to Athletics, DC 10 == 95% chance of succeeding
The point is that while many skill checks issued by non-combat encounters scale straight with your level making the 1/2 bonus null, there are some checks with static DCs. It is kinda neat that a high level character has a better chance of succeeding in those skills checks even without using feats to train those or have any items augmenting them.
>>43831601
I don't see a problem with a Rogue having an effective +5 over the baseline assumption in Dex saves. That just makes them even better at dodging fireballs.
Same with Sorcerers and Charisma saves or Fighters with Strength. Why not let the classes with good saves that line up with their good stats benefit more?
This way the system still works if you swap around your stats to be a Dex based Fighter, since your Strength, Dex, and Con saves will all be at the baseline, rather than being at an effective -5.
>>43831647
Amen.
>>43831663
It's a matter of taste really. Some people might like it that their Wizard has gotten better at general adventuring skills over his career. Others might find it jarring that their old sage is now better at a long jump than most of the town guard.
>>43831705
>Why not let the classes with good saves that line up with their good stats benefit more?
Because that's every class. If everyone is above the baseline, then you've set the baseline wrong.
>>43831663
That's great, but we're talking about saves, not skills.
>>43826757
Rolled save throws in my experience, imprve a players immersion.
However, I've allowed players to take other saves instead of the default (ie a paladin taking a Fortitude save instead of a Reflex vs a fireball after the player said that he Raised his Shield and braced for impact)
>>43831779
There are pretty much 3 levels of competency with saves in 5e.
High competency, which is the +11 you get from a maxed stat and full proficiency bonus
Mid competency, which is the +5 you get from a high stat or the +6 you get from a save you're proficient in but don't really use
Low competency, which is not having a stat proficient or high.
A typical Character will probably have 1 High competency save, 1 or 2 Mid competency saves, and the remaining 3 or 4 will be low competency.
If you balance around the assumption that a +10 is the standard, that means characters will pretty much only succeed on their High competency saves. Anyone with Mid competency is at a -5, and anyone with Low Competency can basically forget it.
If the standard DC is 20, someone with a +0 only succeeds 5% of the time, someone with a +5 succeeds 25% of the time, and someone with a +10 succeeds 50% of the time.
Instead of that, why not balance it at the mid point, making High competency +5 above the baseline, and Low competency -5 below it. That makes having multiple decent saves more worthwhile, since the bonus is more likely to mean something without having to be maxed out.
>>43831779
>If everyone is above the baseline, then you've set the baseline wrong.
Everyone is above the baseline AT THEIR THING, not in general.
That's what being a specialist is about. If you balance everything around "a specialist is doing this," then the people who aren't specialists are going to struggle (like basically everyone with random chargen), and the weakpoint of a specialist may as well not even bother, they just auto-lose.
>>43831663
>Cont.
Even the 1/2 to Attacks and Defenses isn't that stupid. Yet again there are monsters and NPCs who have their attack and defenses statistics staying static through the game which means that a goblin who had a 50% chance of landing a hit against a non-melee character at level 1 only has 25% chance of landing a hit against the same character at level 11.
The 1/2 to skill checks per level coupled with with fact that even those who pump up their skill checks don't get so far ahead results in every character having at least some chance in succeeding a skill check.
>In 4.0
A level 1 wizard with -1 to Athletics and a level 1 fighter with +9 to Athletics have 10 points of difference in the Athletics skill.
A lvl 10 wizard with +4 to Athletics and a lvl 10 fighter with +15 to Athletics have 11 points of difference in Athletics skill.
A lvl 20 wizard with +9 to Athletics and a lvl 20 fighter with +21 to Athletics have 12 points of difference in Athletics skill.
>Compare to 3.5
At level 1 a wizard has -1 to Climb and a fighter has +10 to Climb
At level 10 a wizard has +1 to Climb and a fighter has +23 to Climb.
The difference in skill values between non-proficient and a proficient character grows far faster in 3.5 compared to 4.0. Once the difference is more than 20 the two different characters aren't 'bound to a same die (d20)' any longer.
>>43831349
Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Health, with HP keying off of the first, Will off of Intelligence and Perception off of the last. You could do some fancy math to derive reaction times and equipment load, and while you're at it you could streamline the dicerolling so that you don't need at least one of each polyhedral die and just grab a dozen d6's.
>>43831989
>If you balance around the assumption that a +10 is the standard, that means characters will pretty much only succeed on their High competency saves
That depends on what you think the baseline should mean. If you think the baseline should represent 50% save chance, then sure, you're right. But if you interpret it to mean 75% save chance, then we have an entirely different situation on our hands.
>>43832012
>If you balance everything around "a specialist is doing this," then the people who aren't specialists are going to struggle (like basically everyone with random chargen), and the weakpoint of a specialist may as well not even bother, they just auto-lose.
Right, but if we don't look at specialists things can get rediculous, like SWSE's characters who can one shot literally everyone who doesn't have one specific ability.
>>43832049
>Even the 1/2 to Attacks and Defenses isn't that stupid.
>Writes the example of Athletics skill
>>43832098
Well, as it stands, the maximum DC for a PC spell is 19, while the maximum Save Bonus is +11. I'm sure there are high level monsters that have higher, but it seems like the intent is that a focused approach is intended to result in 50/50 odds, which leaves those with lower saves unable to do much against the higher values.
This is mostly an issue with the DC on saves caused by monster abilities though. I think it's perfectly reasonable that against a mass Wisdom save, the party cleric should have a 75% chance to succeed, the Sorcerer could get 50% thanks to his proficiency in it, and the Barbarian that didn't invest in Wis could still get 25%.
There would be a clear benefit to investing heavily, but minimal investment wouldn't result in you automatically failing either.
>>43831018
4E doesn't have that problem because there's a ton of abilities that function off-turn. You should ask yourself why your game isn't providing the players reasons to stay invested in combat when it's not their turn.
>>43831496
>Bounded Accuracy sounded like such a good idea before they revealed it was actually code for lol, some things scale and some things don't just like in the old days when everything was broken.
Bounded Accuracy was a shitty idea to start with, since getting autistic about numbers was one of the things people liked about D&D.
>>43832204
Then we're in agreement.
>>43832049
The d20 is part of the problem with bounded accuracy desu.
When you're spending most of your adventuring career with skills in the single digits, the number you roll on the d20 is usually way more important than your actual bonus, which is pretty backwards.
>>43831496
It would be nice if they didn't decide to say "fuck it, we're scaling this up anyways" by making HP bloat faster than it does in 3E in a game where damage numbers are barely above AD&D level.
This literally ruined the game for me.
Okay, lets think from this perspective: The absolute values of numbers aren't meaningful, but the differences in the numbers between different characters are. Since all the characters use the same die to make the checks, the differences between the highest and the lowest value shouldn't ever be as high or higher than the maximum value of the die.
>>43826757
Not so much just 4E, it was also the system implemented in SW Saga.
>>43826757
What? No. It's the one thing it did wrong. Rolling dice is fun. Rolling less dice is less fun.
>>43832423
I'd argue that the amount of fun gained from the game isn't straightly tied to the absolute amount of dice rolled.
>>43832423
The Fighter rolls less dice, but gets more toys in 4e.
The Wizard rolls more dice, but gets less toys.
>>43832067
is perception really derived from Health in GURPS? Weird. Well, it's a shit system for unrelated reasons anyway.
>>43832236
My variant of numbers-autism flares up at the illusion of progress created by stats that increase uniformly across the board as you level up.
>>43832423
Uh. You realise that a shift from save-vs-static-DC to roll-attack-vs-static-defense doesn't actually result in any more or fewer dice being rolled, right?
And it's a mercy it doesn't take any more rolls. It's bad enough that you have to make separate rolls for attack and damage in D&D.
>>43832529
>I have a shit DM.
>>43832586
Huh? It's not a matter of DMing, 1/2 level bonus is a central rule.
>>43826987
in 5e at least, there is only one roll: the static is the attacker's value, which serves as a static target to beat on the rolled save.
>>43832603
I'm saying that it does not create an illusion of progress unless you have a shit DM.
