Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 bossemeyer Jun 06, 2010 5:24:49	I loved action points in 3.5 Eberron and i must say i like the new ones for 4E, but i felt it took away a bit from the setting now that a player couldn't chose to add a little bit extra to a d20 to change his luck... so i started out using both the old and the new action points in my games but it got confusing for some of my players and others would neglect to use the old or the new depending on when they started playing... so i am going to introduce a new kind of action point for me game... its going to work like a power and the players with get a limited amount at the start of each day, after milestones they get 1 more to use. The points would reset after an extended rest. here is the concept for the power as of right now... Let me know what you think, i am want to make this fun. At Will: Add +1d6 to a single d20 roll before the DM announces the success or failure of the roll. At Level 11 Roll 2d6 and pick the highest. At Level 21 Roll 3d6 and pick the highest Encounter: You may preform one extra Standard Action during your turn. You may preform this action even after a Charge. You may not use this if you can't normally take any actions. Daily: Record the result of a d20 you just made. Re-roll the d20 and use the new results. You may use the recorded result in place a single d20 roll you make later.  You much choose to use the recorded result before you roll. This power may only be used during a skill challenge or encounter. Special: Using an Action Point is a Free action; only one action point can be spend each round.
#2 weenog42 Jun 07, 2010 16:01:23	Take a look at the Deva racial power,  Memory of a Thousand Lifetimes.  That's basically what you're adding to every PC character, at the cost of an action point rather than as an encounter power. I would advise against scaling this to 2d6 or 3d6 at each tier - bonuses already scale with 1/2 level and magic items, so there's no reason to make the ability more powerful as they level. If your PCs think it's fun, I would say go for it.  Just be aware that it will result in slightly more powerful PCs, since they have another option for how to spend their APs.
#3 bossemeyer Jun 07, 2010 22:27:17	well that is what the original Eberron action points did and the point of doing this was to keep the original ability and the new while adding a daily function for fun and interesting meta game play... i want my players to feel they are special players in the draconic prophecy able to control a little of their own Fate or luck...  the reason it scales is so that the use of the basic at will feature will stay interesting compared to magic items and other things. it won't make it any more powerful in my opinion just increase the luck of a better number... i play table top war games and more d6 doesn't mean better...
#4 candi Jun 08, 2010 20:04:32	Hrm, very interesting.  Of course it will change the face of the Action Point economy, and one also has to wonder - do Paragon Path "on Action Point" benefits kick off when you use the at-will or daily ability or just when using them in the standard way? A note about changing the AP economy, I'm not opposed to that.  I play a lot of savage worlds which has Bennies (kind of akin to APs) and I like the freedom having rerolls affords players so I give Bennies away like candy.  With your system I would recommend more frequent APs to encourage  them to use them in this manner.  As for more d6's, more d6's is better.  Statistical fact :P But not a bad idea, I think it's a good bit of encouragement to use APs in different ways.  As an addendum I'd probably also toss up a new feat to go with it all, something like: Determined Surge Benefit: As a free action, once per day, you lose 1 Healing Surge and gain 1 Action Point which you must spend right away.  This action point must be spent on the at-will power.  You may choose to lose an additional surge to spend this Action Point as per Encounter APs.  You may choose to lose a third surge to spend it in the Daily manner.  You must have at least as many surges as you are required to spend in order to use this ability.
#5 weenog42 Jun 08, 2010 22:14:10	By all means, play it how you want.  But be aware of the math behind it.  DCs and bonuses scale together (ideally, some of the early books are wonkier).  So in general, a +2 bonus (such as Combat Advantage) retains the same value at any level.  3d6 on any d20 roll - that's an average bonus of 10.5, which is pretty huge.  Deva have a feat to make their power go from d6 to d8, so if you want it scale so that it feels more significant, I would recommend going d6, d8, d10.
#6 bossemeyer Jun 09, 2010 1:33:42	@ weenog42... well the d6 is only the best of all that is rolled... hence "pick the highest"... so if you roll 3d6 and get 2, 4, 5 you would only get +5 to the roll... all i am doing is increasing the odds to get the max result of 6... If the way i wrote it confuses you let me know a better way... thats part of why i am posting it so i can improve how clear the abilities are before i add them to my game... i was tempted to make then scale as in d6, d8 and then d12 (because the extreme explore had AP in 3.5 that scaled this way, and was my favorite 3.5 PrC) @Candi... part of the reason i am doing this is to increase the usage of them so that i can reward my players with AP as instant gratification. I am hoping my players use them so much that in the middle of combat or a skill challenge a player who is out will try something silly, stupid, funny or just amazing in hopes to earn an AP to use. I want to give my players a reward that they won't get tired of using to make them RP more or think out side the box... something the current AP don't let me do since you can only use them once per encounter and will only really gain the perk of one or two...  In my style of DM'ing i don't often use a lot of combat as a means to balance my games... the party is meant to be outstanding in my view and so AP are a way to reflect this... its gives their attacks better odds to hit when it really matters, it lets them jump higher, makes their hands quicker and their words more influencing.
#7 paulos Jun 11, 2010 0:03:27	Interesting, Ive been trying to add something like this to my game.  So you'll allow as many APs to be used as they want in an encounter in the At-will manner?  I'd like to hear your thoughts about applying paragon path effects "when you spend an action point to take an extra action" clearly indicating the special benefit only when used in the regular/encounter method. I think I'm going to try using this system out, married to a modification of Aspects from the game Fate that we're already using. I need to get my players to want to use the resources I want to bribe them with. How many are you starting them out a day with: 2, 3?
#8 Hellcow Jun 11, 2010 5:55:11	On a related topic, when a PC misses a roll by a single point, I will typically offer to let them spend a healing surge to turn the miss into a hit... representing that heroic drive to do just a little bit better. It sucks to miss a big roll by that much, and helps to make healing surges a slightly more versatile commodity.
#9 bossemeyer Jun 11, 2010 19:38:22	Interesting, Ive been trying to add something like this to my game.  So you'll allow as many APs to be used as they want in an encounter in the At-will manner?  I'd like to hear your thoughts about applying paragon path effects "when you spend an action point to take an extra action" clearly indicating the special benefit only when used in the regular/encounter method. I think I'm going to try using this system out, married to a modification of Aspects from the game Fate that we're already using. I need to get my players to want to use the resources I want to bribe them with. How many are you starting them out a day with: 2, 3? The was thinking that i would start the party with 4 each day... logic behind that is basicly this currently you get 1 at the start, and 1 after to more fights... so you get 2 each day on norm. If i assume my party uses at least 1 AP for Encounter power that leaves them with 1 use of the day feature. This would be how it plays out if my players didn't use the at will... which i highly doubt they would pass on... so asume that after the first fight they use at least 1 at will, 1 encounter and maybe the daily feature. leaving them 1 AP for the next enounter to use on encounter action like normal...  and i'll give out more as it goes along... and after each mile stone... @Hellcow; i like that idea but i doubt my party has the surges to go around, we play in a group with out a tank, 2 strikers 1 control (striker'ish) and a Leader (control'ish) and well being get beat up ALOT...
#10 Elton74 Jun 12, 2010 19:34:09	here is the concept for the power as of right now... Let me know what you think, i am want to make this fun. At Will: Add +1d6 to a single d20 roll before the DM announces the success or failure of the roll. At Level 11 Roll 2d6 and pick the highest. At Level 21 Roll 3d6 and pick the highest Encounter: You may preform one extra Standard Action during your turn. You may preform this action even after a Charge. You may not use this if you can't normally take any actions. Daily: Record the result of a d20 you just made. Re-roll the d20 and use the new results. You may use the recorded result in place a single d20 roll you make later.  You much choose to use the recorded result before you roll. This power may only be used during a skill challenge or encounter. Special: Using an Action Point is a Free action; only one action point can be spend each round.