Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Xeviat-DM 12-08-07, 04:26 AM	As discussed on the 4E boards, Johnathan Tweet discussed his issues with Power Attack in his blog. He does state that this isn't particularly a 4th Edition issue. The blog post can be found HERE (http://www.gleemax.com/Comms/Pages/Communities/BlogPost.aspx?blogpostid=23612&pagemode=2&blogid=2076) for those wishing to read it fully. To make a long post short, the main issue is that Power Attack can cause players to stop and "do the math", trying to maximize the output of it. Higher strength characters get less rewards out of it, too; PA reduces your percentage chance to hit, and the more damage your individual hit does, the more you have to make up for it with the PA bonus damage. It's too calculated for a "wild swing". I side with Mr. Tweet; the mechanics for PA would work better as a "Called Shot" type attack, aiming for a weak spot, tied to the Combat Expertise tree. That way, the calculation inherent in the mechanic would be fine. Star Wars Saga Edition took a step towards this; they still have Power Attack, but they also have Mighty Swing; make a single attack as a Full-Round action (remember, they don't have full attacks), and deal +1 dice of damage (based on the damage die your weapon uses). This better represents a powerful swing, because it takes time to set up. There are possibly other setups as well; make an attack that provokes an AoO, an attack that reduces your AC, or something. But penalty to hit for bonus damage, especially when you can change the bonus/penalty, hurts the feel in the end. What do you think?
runestar 12-08-07, 06:23 AM	For 2, the CO boards have come up with a PA calculator which should do most of the work for you. Plus, I feel the alternative would be far worse. The way PA works now, it at least can still reward the informed (ie: those with experience on how to use PA effectively). Now imagine a hypothetical scenario where PA gave a fixed predetermined penalty/damage boost (like NWN2) instead. Those unaccustomed to the intricacies of PA still get it wrong (no different from the 1st case, since they won't know the correct amount to PA for anyways), but the experienced players also get screwed over now, since they are forced to PA for an inaccurate amount or not PA at all, despite being aware of just how much they should PA for. I feel that in this case, PA should be left as is, but DMs or players could simply houserule and decide on a predetermined PA amount beforehand and stick to it to speed up gameplay. For example, at the start of my gaming session, I would decide that PA would give -3 to-hit and add +3 damage. Another player, who is in an undead-centric campaign may decide that he can afford to PA for more (since undead are notorious for crap ACs). And so on and so forth. They might be allowed to change this amount once in a while (again subject to DM's discretion), but again, I find this sort of thing will tend to vary from game to game, and I don't think it advisable to subject it to a 1-size-fits-all rule. Seems like the problem for 3 (its nature being the opposite of its "feel") could simply be resolved by changing the name "power attack" to something else with a called shot feel to it, like "called shot", while leaving it mechanically the same as before. If that is the case, then it really isn't a problem, IMO.:P For 4, the ability to PA is a choice, not an obligation, so I am not sure what the problem is. If you don't get it right the first time, then practice more until you get the feel of it. What you get out of PA depends on how much effort you put into "mastering" it. Nothing wrong with that, IMO. From what I gather, the author of blog (and no offense if you are reading my post, but I know of no other way to put my point across, so please excuse my crudeness) seems to be saying "I don't want to put as much effort into using PA, but I don't want those who do to get more benefit compared to me, so lets dumb down PA and screw everyone in the process, so that I am not the only 1 disadvantaged now.":confused: Comments?
Johnny_Angel 12-08-07, 03:30 PM	I can honestly say that I've never found Power Attack to be a problem. Now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever seen Power Attack slow down a game. The math is pretty simple; you mostly add and subtract, and the amount you can add and subtract is limited by your base attack bonus (which is 20 at the most before Epic Levels.) Certain weapons and feats allow you to get more of a benefit, but even then it's really not very math intensive. On a side note: The group I play with usually places a reasonable time limit on a player's turn. In game time it's a 6 second round, so if you're taking 20 minutes real time to decide whether or not to Power Attack we usually perceive that as meaning your character couldn't figure out what to do and go to the next person. I know that sounds harsh to some people, but it does speed things up. We make exceptions though -like if we come across a rule that we're unsure of, that's cause for us to extend the time limit, but most of the more common things like using Power Attack, taking a move action, and/or rolling for initiative shouldn't slow down game play. Even without the time limit I don't see how Power Attack is that much of a problem though.
Xeviat-DM 12-08-07, 04:47 PM	Runestar, the author of the blog is Johnathan Tweet, credited as the lead designer of the PHB (at least that's what my 3.5 PHB says). The fact that there is a calculator shows without a doubt that it's too complex for a meat head feat. A barbarian should never have to calculate their attack ... "*puts on monacle* well old chaps, do you believe I should use power attack against this monster? I believe I'll power attack just a little ..." Johnny, my issue isn't that it slows my game down (no one sits at the table with the calculator), but that it doesn't feel right to me. In Star Wars Saga, where there is both Power Attack and Mighty Swing, Mighty Swing feels more like Power Attack than Power Attack. In other games, such as True20, finessers have an option to reduce their AB by an amount equal to their opponent's Armor (which uses a Toughness save) in order to bypass the armor; which is the exact same mechanic as reducing your AB to boost damage; the system still has Power Attack, and it seems really odd.
apesamongus 12-08-07, 05:55 PM	The fact that there is a calculator shows without a doubt that it's too complex for a meat head feat. A barbarian should never have to calculate their attack Player =/= Character
1hitparry 12-08-07, 06:28 PM	I agree with the argument that PA can slow down the game. I've never had it happen to me, but I can imagine it happening. I do not agree that characters that take power attack are neccesarily "meat heads." Granted a fighter is unlikely to be as smart as a wizard or even a rogue, but there's a good chance a fighter will be as smart or smarter than the average D&D denizen.
Enigmis 12-08-07, 06:39 PM	Player =/= Character Seriously... Removing power attack because players have to do math is a really horrible explanation. They might as well remove remove sneak attack because there is a lot of numbers to add together or items because it makes barbarians keep track of the weight they carry.
InkBlot 12-08-07, 07:26 PM	Tweet isn't saying Power Attack should be removed! Read the blog we're discussing, for goodness's sake. Power Attack doesn't do a good job of represent a reckless wild swing. It should stay, but it should be renamed and reflavored. Precise Attack would be a better name, to go along with the flavor of a warrior carefully guaging his opponent's defenses in order to deliver his attack directly to a weak spot. This is what Tweet, and the OP, are actually saying.
NecroBobb 12-08-07, 07:48 PM	Honestly, I feel Power attack is both aptly named and perfectly implemented. If its name were Precise strike, it would be counter-intuitive, as it actually makes your attack less precise. Also, I never felt that power attack was a wild swing as much as simply a harder swing. Additionally, I feel even the "meatiest" characters would be able to mentally calculate how hard they could swing by pure virtue of their experience and training, even if the entire process was subconscious. As for the speed of the game, I've never personally seen it slow down the game, but I can see how it might if a player started to take the time to calculate every opponents AC and the optimum PA value.
FrostWolf 12-08-07, 07:54 PM	What the heck is so hard about calculating power attack? You turn one BAB into 1 damage. You sack accuracy for damage, the wild hard hitting attack so to speak. Your using a two hander, you get a two for one deal. If you can't do the math fast enough, don't take the feat, that simple.
Suspect_Unusual 12-08-07, 08:10 PM	Runestar, the author of the blog is Johnathan Tweet, credited as the lead designer of the PHB (at least that's what my 3.5 PHB says). The fact that there is a calculator shows without a doubt that it's too complex for a meat head feat. A barbarian should never have to calculate their attack ... "*puts on monacle* well old chaps, do you believe I should use power attack against this monster? I believe I'll power attack just a little ..." A character isn't going to know he has an attack bonus of +14, but he will know he can hit commoners in chain shirts almost every single swing he uses. A character isn't going to know he can sacrifice up to 8 bab to add up to 16 damage when Power Attacking with a greatsword, but he will know that the recklessness of his swing is limited by the quality and quantity of his training, and that the swings he makes are both less accurate and more damaging. A character isn't going to know that his opponent has an "Armor Class" of 20, but he will know, after a few swings, both the quality of his attack, and the ability for his attacks (of known quality) to penetrate a foe's defenses. A character, then, will not know to sacrifice X bab for Y damage when he has attack bonus A and an average damage of B. A character will probably know, after dozens of combats of actual battle experience and countless hours training, that there are "sweet spots" concerning HOW reckless a swing will still have a good enough chance to penetrate his foe's defenses, and thus will regulate how reckless he swings his sword in order to come out ahead in battle. A warrior that enhances his combat with intellect will do this intellectually, but I see no reason whatsoever that a raging barbarian couldn't do this purely on instincts honed in countless battles and during mock-battles he fought training with his fellow tribesmen. My 2 cents, anyway.
InkBlot 12-09-07, 01:02 AM	Here's a better feat for representing the powerful, wild, and reckless fighting style that Power Attack is supposed to represent. It's from the System Reference Document, and the XPH. RECKLESS OFFENSE [GENERAL] You can shift your focus from defense to offense. Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +1. Benefit: When you use the attack action or full attack action in melee, you can take a penalty of -4 to your Armor Class and add a +2 bonus on your melee attack roll. The bonus on attack rolls and penalty to Armor Class last until the beginning of your next turn.
navar100 12-09-07, 03:00 AM	If something is not broken, don't fix it. Power Attack is not broken. If an individual DM wants to tweak something for his game, fine, but why should he impose it on everyone else? It was because of that reason why monks and paladins can't multiclass freely. It's a stupid rule that had nothing to do with the game but rather a designer's own biased flavor text. By obviousness a game designer will "impose" his ideas when creating the game, but there's a fine line between a rule to make the game work and a rule just because you feel like it. Have a side bar offering the different way if you must.
Johnny_Angel 12-09-07, 05:14 PM	You sacrifice accuracy for power; that seems to fit the description of a Power Attack to me. I still don't see the problem, but I'm not one of the designers, so my opinion really doesn't matter in that regard. If they feel it needs changed, they'll change it regardless of what I think. If it doesn't fit in other systems, that's a different discussion because we're not talking about True 20 or other systems; we're talking about D&D. If it doesn't fit for those systems (I don't know because I haven't played them) then change it. I personally don't see a problem with the feat as written for D&D though. I can't stop people from number crunching; that's their style of playing the game -which is no more right or wrong than my style of playing the game. I don't feel that a rule should be changed simply because some players use the rule in a way that doesn't suit the tastes of one of the designers. There are just as many players who don't use a Power Attack calculator, so -to those players; myself included- the changing of how Power Attack works would seem as though it's a change just for the sake of change. You sacrifice accuracy for power; that seems to fit the description of a Power Attack to me. I still don't see the problem, but I'm not one of the designers, so my opinion really doesn't matter in that regard. If they feel it needs changed, they'll change it regardless of what I think.
Enigmis 12-09-07, 05:27 PM	Here's a better feat for representing the powerful, wild, and reckless fighting style that Power Attack is supposed to represent. It's from the System Reference Document, and the XPH. That is more of a reckless strike where you are putting yourself in more danger in order to do more damage. Power attack trades accuracy for damage which fits perfectly.
Kyuketsukiouji 12-09-07, 07:56 PM	Power Attack is broken because people metagame it. They go "Ah, I've got a bab of +6, the kobold has AC 17, so I need to PA for..." Where the heck is that AC number people calculate stuff coming from? What characters should be doing is guessing at PA, and adjusting from there, not the players with their nose buried in the MM or the DM's notes. Your raging barbarian could start the fight "Puny creatures, I'll wipe you out!" (PA for 5). Then after a few rounds of missing too much ("Small people quick!"), he might descide that, well, maybe going all out isn't quite such a good idea, since he's been giving his best shots (rolling high), but none of them have scoring real hits (lots of misses) and roll the PA back to 3. Or maybe he's just that frothing mad that he'll keep trying to PA for 5, just so when he hits, it'll tear large bloody chunk out of enemies. Meanwhile your gnome swashbuckler might decide that he'll start the fight at PA 1, and if next round he's had clearly no problems at that level (lots of hits without having rolled particularily high), he'll commit to a more agressive stance, raising his PA by one or two points, checking the results and then readjusting again. That's how you play PA, not with a chart, a calculator and the magical ability to know your enemy's AC. That's the real weakness with PA. That it's possibl for the players to play with it without their character's intervention.
Suspect_Unusual 12-09-07, 08:14 PM	Power Attack is broken because people metagame it. They go "Ah, I've got a bab of +6, the kobold has AC 17, so I need to PA for..." Where the heck is that AC number people calculate stuff coming from? What characters should be doing is guessing at PA, and adjusting from there, not the players with their nose buried in the MM or the DM's notes. Your raging barbarian could start the fight "Puny creatures, I'll wipe you out!" (PA for 5). Then after a few rounds of missing too much ("Small people quick!"), he might descide that, well, maybe going all out isn't quite such a good idea, since he's been giving his best shots (rolling high), but none of them have scoring real hits (lots of misses) and roll the PA back to 3. Or maybe he's just that frothing mad that he'll keep trying to PA for 5, just so when he hits, it'll tear large bloody chunk out of enemies. Meanwhile your gnome swashbuckler might decide that he'll start the fight at PA 1, and if next round he's had clearly no problems at that level (lots of hits without having rolled particularily high), he'll commit to a more agressive stance, raising his PA by one or two points, checking the results and then readjusting again. That's how you play PA, not with a chart, a calculator and the magical ability to know your enemy's AC. That's the real weakness with PA. That it's possibl for the players to play with it without their character's intervention. Gee, that sounds familiar. It's almost like another poster already addressed those points. Huh. Deja vu, eh?
Kyuketsukiouji 12-09-07, 08:28 PM	No, actually, you gave the exact opposite of my argument. You just handwaived the math with "but they'd know instinctively how to do it". My argument is the opposite: Don't do it. Don't bother trying to optimise your use of Power Attack in response to values you shouldn't even be knowing in the first place.
Suspect_Unusual 12-09-07, 08:36 PM	Since when does your character not know "how difficult it is to hit a foe"? Since when is your character so unknowledgable in his own techniques (which he should not only have had combat experience with, but have trained for days or months in between actual combats to learn) that he has to guess not based on his experience with power attacking or his self-knowledge of his attacking skill (attack rolls aren't made secretly - your chracter should know how well you attacked, even if you're raging at the time), but as if each and every combat is an entirely new experience on a tabula rasa from which one should establish tactics for the rest of the encounter, to be ignored for the rest of one's combat career? I repeat: Your character doesn't know his opponent has an AC of 20, but he will know (if he has an attack bonus of +14), if he misses on a 5 and hits on a 6, that only his blows of sloppy/crappy technique are going to miss, while even a mostly below-average strike will still land. With enough combat experience and/or training, the amount of accuracy one should sacrifice for efficacy for a given AC (translated in character, of course, as relative difficulty in landing one's blows) is going to become instinctual. There's also a very distinct difference between what a player DOES and how a character ACTS - that the player uses mathematics to determine what his character should already be quite aware of, instinctually, from his combat experience, isn't metagaming, it's playing an effective combatant as effective in what he's learned to do. Edit: No, actually, you gave the exact opposite of my argument. You just handwaived the math with "but they'd know instinctively how to do it". For the record, when I said "another poster had already addressed these points", i was referring to YOUR points (y'know, the ones i was quoting) about metagaming, which i disagreed with and explained in my earlier post, and hopefully argued more clearly in THIS post. I handwaved the math because, since AC and attack bonus and damage are already abstract concepts, even a 100 int fighter with power attack isn't going to be doing the math any more than a 3 int fighter, since there's NO SUCH THING AS "AC" IN IN-CHARACTER GAMING. Do you see my point?
Suspect_Unusual 12-09-07, 08:48 PM	I'm not saying, by the way, that Power Attack computing CAN'T be metagamed - if another character, of attack bonus +12, rolled a 7 and missed but rolled an 8 and hit, instinct wouldn't allow the +14 attack bonus Power Attack fighter from utilizing THAT knowledge to maximize his efficacy without some very precise communication from the +12 bonus character to the +14 bonus character, and that communication (because of the abstract nature of the difference between rolling an 8 and a 7 in terms of descriptive purposes and it's personal nature) would be difficult to convey perfectly accurately. That's a different animal, however, from "Using mathematics to calculate the best Power Attack damage is metagaming, and you shouldn't do it EVAH".
Grod_The_Giant 12-09-07, 09:44 PM	um...what's the problem with power attack? I think it works well and doesn't slow things down at all.
Etarnon 12-10-07, 10:58 AM	Power Attack is broken because people metagame it. That could be said of all games, any time or place. Metagaming, and optimization of all the numbers are the problem, to me. But if you think it's broken, change it in your own game.
RobbyPants 12-10-07, 02:17 PM	Player =/= Character That's what I was going to say. The entire concept of the feat (and the math behind it) is purely metagaming. All of the calculation is done based on player knowledge (or guesses), not character knowledge. Concepts like BAB, AC, 5% incrementes of chance to hit, HP, and circumstance bonuses are all metagame knowledge. It's not like the barbarian is thinking, "well, I'm charging and ranging, so I can afford to take a -4 to hit and still have my same BAB." That's what the player is thinking. The only way I could think to help "fix" this problem is to give the player a very short amount of time to decide how much they want to power attack for, if at all. Although, even still, they can always do the math during the rest of the turn. I don't see a real problem with it. We're playing a game based heavily on rules and math. People are naturally going to look for the highest yield at the lowest cost.
Suspect_Unusual 12-10-07, 02:26 PM	I still find it somewhat unconvincing that, because a feat provides an abstract benefit that a player wouldn't know that interact with other abstract values that the character doesn't, a character wouldn't be able to understand from ingame experience what combinations of abstract values are best - If my target is about THAT hard to hit, and i sacrifice THIS amount of accuracy to put more strength behind my blows, my foes generally fall faster. There's nothing that instinct couldn't account for, as far as I can tell, unless there is specific metagaming like i described a few posts back, where another player's attack rolls are used to calculate the Power Attacking player's damage, since in-game communication is incredibly difficult. Character's don't know AC, Attack Bonus, and Damage, but they do know Relative Difficulty to Hit, Accuracy in Combat, and Resulting Pwnage (OK, OK, Resulting Devastation), and I haven't heard a cogent argument besides "nuh-uh, nuh-uh" stating why a character that does know those last three wouldn't be able to establish, through experience and training, what sort of loss of accuracy makes him a more efficient killing machine - y'know, those whatchamacallits, Adventurers. Is metagaming Power Attack possible? Sure, just like just about ANY MECHANIC IN THE GAME. Is it necessary, EVEN WHEN USING POWER ATTACK CALCULATORS? I don't think that's been shown yet, only asserted without much argumentation to back it up.
ZiggZagg 12-10-07, 03:17 PM	Power Attack is a perfect wild swing. How do you think it isn't. You just swing your weapon really hard, but at the expense of accuracy. How much wilder do you want it to be? If you want it to penalize AC, take Shock Trooper.
Einvaldurinn_mikli 12-10-07, 03:22 PM	What the heck is so hard about calculating power attack? You turn one BAB into 1 damage. You sack accuracy for damage, the wild hard hitting attack so to speak. Your using a two hander, you get a two for one deal. If you can't do the math fast enough, don't take the feat, that simple. Dude, you are missing the point. People are calculating the optimal power attack penalty to maximize damage. As in, if the opponent has AC 23, my attack bonus is +16 and my average damage is 3d6+12)22.5 on my twohander then I should PA for 1 to get an average of 15.925 points of damage as opposed to PAing for 2 and getting 15.9. Get it?
InkBlot 12-10-07, 03:44 PM	It's not about metagaming. It's not about difficulty. It's about feeling like "you can make exceptionally powerful melee attacks," versus feeling like you can make carefully measured attacks to take advantage of opponents who let their guard down. One feels like what a raging barbarian should be doing, and the other doesn't. That's what's wrong with Power Attack. It's all about making the player at the table feel like a raging barbarian. Power Attack doesn't help that. What's so hard to understand? Power Attack doesn't need to be changed at all. It just needs to be renamed, or reflavored.
ZiggZagg 12-10-07, 04:14 PM	Ok, so if you want to have that feeling of "I don't know how much to take off let's check", then tell the DM not to tell you the Ac of the thing you are trying to hit
Tordak 12-10-07, 04:22 PM	Anyone who has done sport in his life knows exactly how power attack feels. If you play baseball, you can try to hit the ball with accuracy, with the result that you have better chances of getting a hit, or try to hit really hard and get it over the fence, but chances are good that you'll also get a sucky hit or miss altogether; but if the pitcher makes a mistake and throw a curve ball that doesn't curve, it's out of here. Same thing in hockey, you can use a wrist shot, which is usually more precise, or a slap shot, more powerful; shot from the same spot, a well placed slap shot is much harder to stop, but in the heat of the game you'll often miss. Better example yet, boxing : most of the time, boxer will jab, whether with there strong hand or not, because it's more accurate and doesn't involve opening that much, but when they see an opponent unbalanced or not as good to defend himself (both could have a lower AC in D&D term), they'll throw in a hook, which involve more rotation af the hips, weight transfer and power. This is much like power attack, where at the expense of accuracy (a hook would be easier for a prepare and trained opponent to avoid for example), you try to hit real hard. There's really nothing wrong behind the ingame mechanic of power attack, and I don't think it compares to called shot and such, who relied on even more accuracy (you aim for an even harder to hit spot and score additional damage because of its vulnerability). As for calculation, fighter in D&D are much like professional athlete (they are much more than common man or novice). In a fight, you're are constantly scrying your surronding, aware of what is going on around you (else you'd be sneak attack all the time). Even if your attention in mainly on the one opponent in front of you, you have to know what is going on around. If a fighter sees a team mate swinging at an enemy, and doing an horrible swing (the player rolled a 2), almost tripping in the attempt, but still manage to hit, he'll know the enemy is easy to hit. Same if they fight the same enemy. A fighter as heard stories from his previews master (espacially if he trained to power attack, or if he's a natural at it) of how you can get rid of a skeleton in one blow if you hit hard enough because they're easy(easier) to hit. A fighter will remember his previous enemies, see similitude in combat techniques, see patern in defenses, and will figure, whether from looking at someone else fight or doing it himself, that some enemies are easier to hit than other. Even in a fight experienced fighter will communicate, yell to each other things to do and quick pointers. Much like athletes do when they are doing what they are best at. Of course a player will catch on his friend rolling a low '2' but still hitting, and will know his friend has +17 AB, but so will the character he is playing : he know his allie is a good, strong fighter, and he knows that one hit was not the best he could, yet the hit connected and he knows he can capitalise on that. By fighter I mean anyone who fights, but this is espacially true of true fighter. Fighting is what they do, and they should be good at it. This is hardly metagaming, just clever (and justifiable) use of abilities. Just go watch any professional or amateur sport with someone who has practiced the sport before; he will tell you every mistake the athlete makes, every opportunities not taken, what should have been done, etc. Edit : also, any player who power attacks often will be well advised to make some calculation ahead of time, especially if he's slow at calculating.
RobbyPants 12-10-07, 04:34 PM	Ok, so if you want to have that feeling of "I don't know how much to take off let's check", then tell the DM not to tell you the Ac of the thing you are trying to hit The DM doesn't have to tell you for you to figure it out. If you roll a d20 and add in a bunch of modifiers, you're going to roll a particular AC. Either you hit or you don't. Every time you swing, you have the posibility of narrowing down the AC. If you're in an advnture where you keep running into the same type of creature, once you've figured out the AC, you know it for all of them. Even without swinging, you can have a good idea when fighthing humanoid creatures. Is it a single humanoid encountered at mid/high levels? It probably has class levels and/or magical gear. Are there quite a few of them? They're probably 1st level warriors with relatively avreage stats and gear. Is it wearing scale mail with no shield? It has an armor bonus of +4 and a max dex of +3. So, basically, the DM doesn't ever have to do anything more than desribe the monsters and tell you when you hit or miss for you to determine the creature's AC.
Scion of Coldshard 12-10-07, 04:37 PM	I generally like the mechanic of power attack, although I think the numbers of it should be redone (0.5/1/1.5 or 1/1.5/2 vs 0/1/2). I also think that there should be a general mechanic for things like power attack, fighting defensively, and the like. The feats should improve the basic option already there rather than create a whole seperate extra option.
ZiggZagg 12-10-07, 04:39 PM	Is it a single humanoid encountered at mid/high levels? It probably has class levels and/or magical gear. Are there quite a few of them? They're probably 1st level warriors with relatively avreage stats and gear. Is it wearing scale mail with no shield? It has an armor bonus of +4 and a max dex of +3. Easy way to get around that...don't metagame. How do you know they are 1st lvl warriors? If you see a bunch of enemies and immediately think "hey lotsa enemies all mean low cr and easy to hit" then you are metagaming. Stop it.Does your fighter have a high int? No? Then let me see an intellignce check to see if you remember exactly how and where to swing against that monster. And when you are adventuring, I am pretty sure you don't hear anyone utter the words "Heads up guys. They can't have that high of an ac. Scale male only has a +4 normal armor bonus and they only can add +3 of their dex"
RobbyPants 12-10-07, 04:47 PM	Easy way to get around that...don't metagame. How do you know they are 1st lvl warriors? If you see a bunch of enemies and immediately think "hey lotsa enemies all mean low cr and easy to hit" then you are metagaming. Stop it.Does your fighter have a high int? No? Then let me see an intellignce check to see if you remember exactly how and where to swing against that monster. And when you are adventuring, I am pretty sure you don't hear anyone utter the words "Heads up guys. They can't have that high of an ac. Scale male only has a +4 normal armor bonus and they only can add +3 of their dex" That's fine. I was merely pointing out that a DM doesn't have to tell the players the enemies AC to tell them the AC. It's pretty hard not to metagame to some extent. When 97% of orcs you run into have scale mail and falchions, the one in shiny full plate with the dull black great sword is going to stand out. Metagaming or not, you know that something is different.
Tordak 12-10-07, 04:49 PM	Any good fighter will know what kind of protection you get from a scale mail, that most humanoid (because he's one or has encountered some, hopefully, in his life and training, unless he's a 3 years old) don't have very tough skin (metagaming : high natural armor bonus), and from the look at the gears that is likely not a very experienced fighter : he can than decide to act on those assumptions and try to swing hard, and then could realised it's not that easy and the guy he's facing is not a noob, or wait a bit to see how the fight goes. And even animal are able to gauge opponents (usually from the size), and can act on that instinct to try to overpower a foe; if there was need for it, PA would have an intelligence prerequisite. Animals aren't very intelligent yet they remember not to touch the same electric fence twice. Of course they might hit a wall sometimes, yet there's nothing wrong with guessing.
Suspect_Unusual 12-10-07, 05:06 PM	Easy way to get around that...don't metagame. How do you know they are 1st lvl warriors? If you see a bunch of enemies and immediately think "hey lotsa enemies all mean low cr and easy to hit" then you are metagaming. Stop it.Does your fighter have a high int? No? Then let me see an intellignce check to see if you remember exactly how and where to swing against that monster. And when you are adventuring, I am pretty sure you don't hear anyone utter the words "Heads up guys. They can't have that high of an ac. Scale male only has a +4 normal armor bonus and they only can add +3 of their dex" *facepalm* of course they aren't going to say "Scale Mail has +4 armor bonus and they can only have a +3 dex modifier to AC", because THOSE VALUES DON'T EXIST FOR THE CHARACTER, ONLY FOR THE PLAYER. That doesn't mean they won't be "a cakewalk for all but my most off-balance strike to devastate my opponent" for a character whose mechanics include a +16 bonus to hit. generally speaking, no, another character isn't going to be able to precisely determine that another has +16 to hit, except by comparison - Character A doesn't seem to hit as often as Character B, meaning Character B's precision of attack is higher... but the difference is very low, only about 1/6 to 1/5 of a difference when attacking the same target, so their difference in attack bonus is going to be relatively slim (probably +3 to +4) if this difference is noticable in enough combat, or in training. Guessing that a bunch of foes with Scale Mail, and who move well in said armor, will be about "yea" difficult, where yea is the difference between your precision in your attacks (which your character knows) and the difficulty in overcoming the protection the armor provides (which your character probably knows from experience) and the maximum mobility the armor provides to dodge attacks (which your character may know from personal experience or from fighting foes before), isn't unreasonable. If an attack of a certain quality, below average but not horrible (mechanically, for the player, that'd be a roll of let's say 7 or 8), misses when it should have clearly hit (let's say for a character with a Precision of Swing that would normally strike such a foe on any attack except a horribly-off-balance attack - player's mechanic being a roll of anything but a 1), clearly the foe has something else going for him, and is more than just the normal ability of a dextrous foe to dodge blows in non-magical scale mail. The character might GUESS it's because of a magical enhancement (+1, or Nimble, or whatever), or because of that nifty gold ring on his finger (Ring of Protection, mechanically), or because the foe's movement seems to have included special techniques to be particularly capable of dodging blows (Dodge, or Mobility, or Focused Shield, etc), or magic (Shield of Faith, Force Screen, etc)... but he wouldn't know for sure WHAT it is, just that it is more difficult to successfully land a blow than an average foe wearing average gear and who can really move (Featless foe, wearing normal Scale Mail, with a Dexterity of 16 or higher, mechanically). There's nothing stopping a fighter from Power Attacking for that optimal setting where the most foes will drop and the most devastating will be wraught while one is still consistent enough in one's ability to hit to make those devastating strikes fall. That's something a good fighter is going to know from experience, since encounters should NOT start as a Tabula Rasa in which all previous combats one has ever been in don't mean **** if you don't have an intelligence of 307. The PLAYER does the mathematical calculations on abstract values, the CHARACTER instinctually makes himself the most efficient combatant based on intuition and experience. The character NEVER makes those mathematical calculations no matter HOW intelligent he is, because those calculations are based on abstract values that are NOT accessible to ANY character. Metagaming, again, is POSSIBLE with Power Attack, if a character who has never encountered an Iron Golem (but whose player has memorized the AC thereof) Power Attacks for the optimal damage before discovering How Difficult To Hit (AC, in a players' mechanical terms) an Iron Golem is by comparing the character's Precision in Attack (Attack bonus, player mechanic) with the Quality of Attacks he makes (Attack rolls, player mechanic). One could make an argument that it could be construed as metagaming if, upon the first combat the character ever uses Power Attack, he maximizes his Power Attack efficiency, since his personal experience in actual combat using that technique (and it's abstract mechanics, which are unknowable by the character) is limited. I'd respond that it's a bit of a stretch, but that since feats should involve "off-camera" training ANYWAY to learn, that might be where the experience came. It could be an old technique taught before the character was even 1st level, while still training at Fighter U, which the character let atrophe before reteaching himself (but relying on the experiences he had learning the technique in the first place).
Aryxbez 12-10-07, 05:11 PM	Like many have said already, if you don't like something in the rules, you can get rid of it, however don't bring everyone else down by having it not be in the rules to begin with. I personally liked power attack, it was my favorite feat, now I don't really like it as much as in my opinion, I feel it has been trounced on by the people of the boards. Don't ask why or who, I won't know the answer. About 4th edition, well I'm not worried, as I'm sure the warrior types will have abilities that represent it anyway. Heck in TOB, there is already Mountain hammer, or any of the Stone dragon strikes, practically represent what power attack does. Although right now, Pow attack is not slowing my games at all. In fact one of my players is about 10 or so, and maybe only 60 sec were used in calculating the damage, although that was as he was unfamiliar with 2-handed, (only been playing the game for about a month, 1st time using it at the time). I know I don't have problems deciding how much to Pow attack, as I usually just take off any bonuses I got randomly, such as higher ground, charging etc. Usually try to ensure that I have an even number bonus to hit, same for bonus to damage I'm gaining, so it looks more whole to me I guess.
navar100 12-11-07, 01:34 AM	Players wanting their character to be efficient in fighting using Power Attack. Can't have that. :rolleyes:
Suspect_Unusual 12-11-07, 01:40 AM	Players wanting their character to be efficient in fighting using Power Attack. Can't have that. :rolleyes: Seriously, what will they think of next, utilizing Spring Attack and Attacks of Opportunity to keep from getting mauled by TWFers!?! ******* munchkins. :P
Zippis 12-11-07, 04:21 AM	PA doesn't scale well and is stupidly used against inanimated objects (walls, ...). Of course, I'm speaking about my feelings and don't force anyone to follow me :) World, where fighters can destroy average castle within one hour just with their greatswords doesn't fit "MY" vision of average fantasy world. You may say, as usually, that wizards can do the same with one or two spells. As I said, in my eyes that's what wizards do, not fighters :) (and I don't play wizards or sorcerers ;) ) You should give up something to receive something else ... but fighters above lvl 10 frequently don't need to give up anything, because their attack is high enought to hit with natural roll 2 even when they pump up PA with good portion of their BAB. Same thing against objects. In those situations you receive something for nothing which seems stupid to me. I understand that many people like to hit hard, kill many monsters with just one blow ... but it is doesn't give me feelings of "real fantasy fight" (again my vision of "real fantasy fight", others can have different visions ;) ). BUT, anyhow, everybody can finde some portion of rules he doesnt' like. Some people don't like wizards and clerics and their spells be "too powerfull" and I understand that may be PA is another part which should balance the system. Individualy I hate "mechanics" of current PA, but I have to live with that as a part fo bigger sytem. As it goes for 4thED ... well, I don't know enough to say it will fit or not, because I still can't compare it to other options/feats/spells/classes etc.
frisbeet 12-12-07, 10:56 AM	To augment the Tordak, Suspect_Unusual, etc argument: Do you really know more about fighting than your Fighter? At the gut level, the instinct level, the faster-than-a-blink-of-an-eye level? Power attack allows your Fighter to be effective on this timescale. A pretend timescale, part of the game. If figuring power attack is metagaming and the only solution is to restrict players to split seconds to decide what to do, then all combat should be resolved this way. Quick! You've got 1 second to decide what you're going to do for the next 5 seconds. Absurd. Moreover, a spreadsheet can simplify your calculations to split seconds. Print one out when you next level; a quick glance together with an estimate of your opponents AC and viola! Repeat as needed.