I’m going to be watching some Star Trek: The Original Series in a few minutes. Until then, I’m looking at Reddit stuff.
Somebody was wondering about dodge actions; “what are people’s thoughts/experiences of using these?”
Instead of having a dodge action, I allow every character to “take a hit” for anybody else nearby. That is, they interpose themselves, and don’t automatically take a hit – the bandit tries to hit the magic user and the armored dwarf interposes himself so the bandit has to try and hit AC 2 instead of AC 9. If a second bandit also targets the magic user, then the armored dwarf doesn’t get to interpose himself again. One hopes the magic user brought more bodyguards along… So basically, the magic user is taking cover behind bodyguards but isn’t “dodging” per se – they can still cast a spell, for example.
Before rolling the d20 to hit, I ask: “is anybody going to protect the target?” If so, then the attack hits them instead. I like how this reduces the entire battle map minutia to a single strategic question: will you protect your friend right now, right here?
2011-03-25 Protecting Party Members In Combat
☯ Somebody else was wondering how to pull of a Shadow of the Colossus style game: “I want each of the 14 bosses to be a spectacle in and of itself … and a big part of tackling them … being appropriately prepared”
As a player, I suspect it’ll be tricky to figure out when we’re going to go hunt for which monster in particular. Like, you say we go hunt Grimr the frost giant in his ice palace, but what about Fir the fire giant in his lava fortress, isn’t he going to be first? Can we pick and choose? And what if we don’t feel ready, can we do something else or is there time pressure? Will there be allies to join us? I think it’s a super interesting idea but it needs some thought. Personally, I’d love to know at the beginning of the campaign that there are 14 of these bosses, and I’d love it if there was an in-game smart way to beat them all. Another difficulty is that at the beginning of the campaign it’s hard to imagine how a bunch of low level player characters will go to war against a giant. After all, these 14 legendary bosses are not going to be a simple ogre, right? Perhaps would be good to frame this all as a kind of puzzle. As first level party, go and steal an egg of the roc without fighting the roc, to give to goblins; as second level party enlist the goblins with the help of the egg to draw the black dragon into the ent forest, where it’ll get killed; as third level party bathe in the blood of the black dragon to get immunity from poison and go slay the basilisk, the king of snakes; as fourth level party use the poisonous basilisk tooth to poison the … and so on. I’d say a roc, a dragon or two, a basilisk, a giant or two, and so on, with the possibility of preparing a special trick to beat one particular monster way above the party’s level at first, that would be super great.
#RPG