Goodman Games

There was an interesting discussion started over at EN World about the *cough* imbalance of power between the pre-4th Edition DnD fighter and the magic-user/wizard:

How is the Wizard vs Warrior Balance Problem Handled in Fantasy Literature?
A lot of people agree that D&D has historically heavily favored spellcasters after about a third of the way thru leveling and the classes we drastically unbalanced at the endgame. I'm trying to brainstorm an approach to correcting this inbalance in a way that maybe makes more sense than the 4e "make everyone a Vancian caster" approach. So, I'm thinking of look at fantasy source material: the novels and epic tales that inspired fantasy roleplaying games in the first place.

So, since I don't have the time to read all the great fantasy literature in one setting, I thought I'd ask everyone here:

How have you seen warior characters in fantasy books overcome spellcasters?

I recently read a Conan story where Conan's encounter with a wizard was a bit anticlimatic - he just threw a dagger at him and killed him in one shot while the wizard was trying to cast a spell. So, in that case, spellcasting probably took more than the typical "Standard Action" and the wizard had *very* low Hit Points and no protective magic in place (even though he was anticipating the encounter).


How applicable do you think the fiction Goodman is drawing upon for the DCC rpg can ultimately "balance" the two classes (who, of course, are constantly fighting each other instead of, I don't know, the frakkin' monsters!)

I think that Appendix N books tend to take one of a couple of approaches (and I'm sure someone will correct me if I miss any....)

1. Heroes are fighters, wizards are the NPCs.
When I read Conan, he dislikes magic and wizards in general and with good reason since they seem to be drunk with power all of the time. Fafhrd and Mouser encounter great wizards who aren't evil, but certainly they are manipulative. Gandalf can do all kinds of pretty magic but is hesitant to do so because its use might attract the attention of Sauron and/or other bad guys. (Which is, by the way, my favorite way to limit magic use. Fear! ) In pretty much all of those kinds of cases, the wizards are the NPCs and not the characters.

2. Heroes can use magic, but it is unpredictable.
Mouser can sometimes do little spells, but not always to the desired effect. Cudgel the Clever does magic and the effects are also more random than he would have hoped. Same with Harold Shea. Elric can control his better, but has health issues that cripple his power at inopportune times and much of his strength comes from Stormbringer anyway. In most of these cases magic can be strong at times, but its use isn't totally under the control of the character for various reasons.

The DCC RPG is more aligned with option #2. You can use magic but its effects are unpredictable sometimes and it can have some ugly side-effects that we'd all rather avoid. I think this provides the intended balance in the RPG.

A lot of the balance issues are mitigated by using E6. DCC stopping at Level 5 should solve most of the balance concerns between Fighters and Spellcasters. IME, Fighters only seriously start getting left behind past 8th level or so.

Once Clerics are able to kill things by touching them and once Wizards get enough mojo to fly pretty much whenever they want and drop Fireballs like a B-52 bomber, I think the Fighter's role as mookslayer is relegated to "that guy who hangs out with the Wizards".

I don't think DCC will have this problem. If anything, the problem with Fighters will be that they are less fun to play. Because they don't have a booklet of charts to use every game. But I don't think that will have any reflection on whether or not they're balanced.

I agree. I just hope that there are some "high level wizard NPC" rules so that our heroes can fight big baddies.

joela wrote: the wizard had *very* low Hit Points

Or Conan got a good critical hit. In DCC RPG terms, it might have been that the two were pretty evenly matched, but Conan got lucky. Part of the "balance by randomness" philosophy.

I find the basis of the argument spurious. Heck, the books in Appendix N are made up. The author has total control of how powerful warriors are in comparison to the wizards and he doesn't have the fragile egos of players to placate when he makes one or the other stronger or weaker in comparison.

Besides, I've played 1e/2e games where we started at 12th level and the fighters weren't just sitting on their asses. They had magic items so they could put out 30-50 points of damage per hit. As long as you weren't stingy with class appropriate magic items, fighters never really lost their ooompf. Sure, the mage was having the fun teleporting the group and stuff. But once you got into combat with a cabal of old dragons or some demon horde, the mage was not winning the fight unless the fighter was hacking the critter down.

I can't be the only person who had fun with high level AD&D.

That cough is very well placed.

D&D doesn't have a problem with balance at all. Some DMs on the other hand...

I think this is true about most games. If players or GMs want to bend a rule or work outside the best region of any game it breaks. Players and GMs need to be aware of the power range that a game is designed to work with and try to stay within in.

For example, I kind of like the CODA Lord of the Rings RPG by Decipher, but its 2d6 mechanic means that actions difficult for Frodo are absurdly easy for Aragorn. Aragorn and Frodo simply don't have the same power level and the game tends to "break" for one or the other.

mythfish wrote:

joela wrote: the wizard had *very* low Hit Points

Or Conan got a good critical hit. In DCC RPG terms, it might have been that the two were pretty evenly matched, but Conan got lucky. Part of the "balance by randomness" philosophy.

Or remember that one critical hit in "Iron Shadows in the Moon" in which a pirate slings a single stone, hits Conan in the head, and Conan is knocked cold?

And there is a critical "fumble" in "The Hour of the Dragon" in which Conan rushes forward to attack...

...only to trip and fall on some drapes.

Later editions of D&D completely removed the balancing factors that keep wizards from dominating the world.

The D4 hit die, making saving throws scale with the caster, ridiculously high int scores, easy access to scrolls and magic items, and exponentially increasing the spells per day a wizard can cast, all contribute to making magic users into gods. But the single biggest mistake the D20 designers made was changing the initiative system. It's almost impossible to interrupt a spell in D20. Any wizard worth his salt will have his concentration skill maxed out, and will laugh at just about any caster level check. In AD&D a wizard cannot move, cannot even use his dex bonus to ac or he loses his spell. If he takes the merest scratch, he loses the spell. And, since initiative isn't cyclical, he's not guaranteed to get his spell off. Spells aren't instantaneous, so there's ample chance to interrupt the wizard. This, above all else balances casters with other classes. The wizard can fry the entire room, hell, the entire TOWN, if he manages to get that spell with a casting time of 9 off. That's a big if. WOTC removed the checks and balances. Restore those and the problem disappears.

Geoffrey wrote:Or remember that one critical hit in "Iron Shadows in the Moon" in which a pirate slings a single stone, hits Conan in the head, and Conan is knocked cold?

I'm going to sound like a broken record. People are probably used to it by now...

But does anyone else read the above and think DCC has got to have a way for PCs to "lose" a combat and not be dead?

It's like the 800 lb. Gorilla in a red cape. Yet I seem to be the only person pinging on it.

smathis wrote:

Geoffrey wrote:Or remember that one critical hit in "Iron Shadows in the Moon" in which a pirate slings a single stone, hits Conan in the head, and Conan is knocked cold?

I'm going to sound like a broken record. People are probably used to it by now...

But does anyone else read the above and think DCC has got to have a way for PCs to "lose" a combat and not be dead?

It's like the 800 lb. Gorilla in a red cape. Yet I seem to be the only person pinging on it.

We've had a lot of conversations around that. Not to derail the thread, but here are a couple ideas that have been playtested and/or discussed...

* The "bleed out" rule: When reduced to 0 hp, you have [class level] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 hp of stamina. I've used this in play and I like the fact that it sets a "clock" for reaction time - the party suddenly gets VERY focused on the fact that they only have 1 round to save the level 1 character. But you absolutely need a cleric on hand. In the games where the cleric dies, it's useless.

* The "Luck" rule: When reduced to 0 hp, any ally can make it to you and roll your body over to see if you're really dead. Once your body is rolled over - and not before! - you make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just knocked out or critically injured. This one is fun because it adds an air of mystery to the process. But the downside is the Luck check - it sucks to fail it.

* The "prophecy of Luck" rule: I've toyed with this one but not actually played it yet. Sounds cool but I'm not sure how it will work out in play. Every DCC RPG character has a Luck score. What if every PC also had a "Luck prophecy" (bad term but read on for the idea) that modified their mode of death? For example, "You will be killed by your father" or "You can only be slain by a witch" or "You will die at the hands of one you trust." Then, the PC can only truly die under those circumstances. And of course this becomes an awesome plot tool for the DM, when he introduces a father / witch / "one you trust" into the game! In all other circumstances, "death" means something very severe -- like a week of unconsciousness followed by permanent loss of Stamina and/or hp, and perhaps some critical injury (broken leg = 1/2 movement, etc.) -- but not a true permanent death. Provided the "Luck prophecies" were carefully chosen, I think this could be really cool, but it may be hard to actually put into a published work (this is the kind of rule that requires a good DM to use it right).

I definitely don't want to do negative hit points...that unbalances low-level games (effectively gives the PCs an extra 10 hp).

Why not combine the first two:

The "lucky bleeder" rule:

When reduced to 0 hp, you have [class level] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 point of stamina.

If the other party members are unable/unwilling to do magic healing but an ally can make it to you [in class level rounds, as above] and roll your body over to see if you're dead, make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just knocked out and injured (permanently lose 1 stamina and out of action for 1d4 more rounds).

I like this type of rule as it involves choices [tactical and character-based] on the part of the party, not just the individual being a superhero-who-cannot-die.

geordie racer wrote:Why not combine the first two:

The "lucky bleeder" rule:

When reduced to 0 hp, you have [class level] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 point of stamina.

If the other party members are unable/unwilling to do magic healing but an ally can make it to you [in class level rounds, as above] and roll your body over to see if you're dead, make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just knocked out and injured (permanently lose 1 stamina and out of action for 1d4 more rounds).

I like this type of rule as it involves choices [tactical and character-based] on the part of the party, not just the individual being a superhero-who-cannot-die.

I like this combination better than the first two Joseph listed.

I also like the "no negative hit points" Joseph was talking about. I know I'm a heretic but I'm not a fan of negative hit points unless they're tied to the minus 1d4-1 per round sort of bleeding out mechanic Andy brought up.

The "death by prophecy" rule is interesting. But I agree it would be hard to get it right in a publication. And it would be weird for every character in a party to have something like that.

As far as "losing combat without dying", I was also wondering if there would be any critical hit effects that went "roll save versus DC XX or fall unconscious". That's another unobtrusive way to do something along these lines.

Interesting that getting dropped drops Stamina by one permanently. Youch. But it gives 0hp some teeth for sure.

Has a "Getting Dropped" chart been considered? Just wondering. I've been toying with the notion of a "getting dropped" chart where each roll on the chart lowers the dice rolled. So a character might start rolling 2d10 on a chart. Then the next roll they make will be 2d8. Then 2d6. Then 2d4... which would pretty much mean death or something bad.

smathis wrote:

geordie racer wrote:Why not combine the first two:

The "lucky bleeder" rule:

When reduced to 0 hp, you have [class level] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 point of stamina.

If the other party members are unable/unwilling to do magic healing but an ally can make it to you [in class level rounds, as above] and roll your body over to see if you're dead, make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just knocked out and injured (permanently lose 1 stamina and out of action for 1d4 more rounds).

I like this type of rule as it involves choices [tactical and character-based] on the part of the party, not just the individual being a superhero-who-cannot-die.

I like this combination better than the first two Joseph listed.

I also like the "no negative hit points" Joseph was talking about. I know I'm a heretic but I'm not a fan of negative hit points unless they're tied to the minus 1d4-1 per round sort of bleeding out mechanic Andy brought up.

The "death by prophecy" rule is interesting. But I agree it would be hard to get it right in a publication. And it would be weird for every character in a party to have something like that.

As far as "losing combat without dying", I was also wondering if there would be any critical hit effects that went "roll save versus DC XX or fall unconscious". That's another unobtrusive way to do something along these lines.

Interesting that getting dropped drops Stamina by one permanently. Youch. But it gives 0hp some teeth for sure.

Has a "Getting Dropped" chart been considered? Just wondering. I've been toying with the notion of a "getting dropped" chart where each roll on the chart lowers the dice rolled. So a character might start rolling 2d10 on a chart. Then the next roll they make will be 2d8. Then 2d6. Then 2d4... which would pretty much mean death or something bad.

I like the "Lucky Bleeder" rule with one change. Make it [Stamina level] rounds, not [class level] rounds. It seems to me that physical toughness should determine how quickly someone bleeds out.

I also like the idea of getting rid of negative hit points. So, +1 to getting rid of them.

As far as losing a point of Stamina permanently after going to zero hit points, I would rather see some sort of table with four or six options for consequences that can be rolled on when the PC is saved. Or perhaps the PC loses 1 point of Stamina for 2d6 games months.

dkeester wrote:I like the "Lucky Bleeder" rule with one change. Make it [Stamina level] rounds, not [class level] rounds. It seems to me that physical toughness should determine how quickly someone bleeds out.

Yes, I like that, but how about 1d4 plus Stamina bonus rounds (with a minimum of 1) so there's a range of 1 to 7 rounds ? This makes it vital the party act quickly to save you, whatever the character's level. Imagine a party stuck in a room filling with zombies and the only cleric's lying out of action on the other side of the room....

dkeester wrote:As far as losing a point of Stamina permanently after going to zero hit points, I would rather see some sort of table with four or six options for consequences that can be rolled on when the PC is saved. Or perhaps the PC loses 1 point of Stamina for 2d6 games months.

How about rolling 1d6 to see which stat is affected, they lose 1 point from the stat. The point can be regained when (if) they reach the next XP Level. Critical injuries can affect a person mentally as well as physically.

so making it:

The revised "lucky bleeder" rule:

When reduced to 0 hp, you have [1d4 + STA bonus] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 point of stamina.

If the other party members are unable/unwilling to do magic healing but an ally can make it to you [in 1d4 + STA bonus rounds, as above] and roll your body over to see if you're dead, make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just critically injured and knocked out for 1d4 rounds. If critically injured you roll 1d6 to see which stat is affected and lose 1 point from the stat, which can only be regained when you reach the next XP Level.

geordie racer wrote:

dkeester wrote:I like the "Lucky Bleeder" rule with one change. Make it [Stamina level] rounds, not [class level] rounds. It seems to me that physical toughness should determine how quickly someone bleeds out.

Yes, I like that, but how about 1d4 plus Stamina bonus rounds (with a minimum of 1) so there's a range of 1 to 7 rounds ? This makes it vital the party act quickly to save you, whatever the character's level. Imagine a party stuck in a room filling with zombies and the only cleric's lying out of action on the other side of the room....

dkeester wrote:As far as losing a point of Stamina permanently after going to zero hit points, I would rather see some sort of table with four or six options for consequences that can be rolled on when the PC is saved. Or perhaps the PC loses 1 point of Stamina for 2d6 games months.

How about rolling 1d6 to see which stat is affected, they lose 1 point from the stat. The point can be regained when (if) they reach the next XP Level. Critical injuries can affect a person mentally as well as physically.

so making it:

The revised "lucky bleeder" rule:

When reduced to 0 hp, you have [1d4 + STA bonus] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 point of stamina.

If the other party members are unable/unwilling to do magic healing but an ally can make it to you [in 1d4 + STA bonus rounds, as above] and roll your body over to see if you're dead, make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just critically injured and knocked out for 1d4 rounds. If critically injured you roll 1d6 to see which stat is affected and lose 1 point from the stat, which can only be regained when you reach the next XP Level.

I like it.

I know that my recollection of DnD has for a very long time had negative HP's... so I know my opinions are very much colored by them.

But I would like to vote for keeping the negative HP's.

They provide a very solid mechanic to the game. I know Joseph is not in favor of them as it provides a large number of additional HP's at first level to survive with, but I do not count that as a bad thing for the first few levels in DCC.

While character death is important, allowing negative HP's is also important to allowing a character to survive for the first few levels.

Even with -10 hp, you can immediately die. If you are at one HP and you get hit for 11 HP... DEAD. BAM.

Most of the time, characters will end up in the low negative numbers. If there is some sort of bleed out, they will dies in a few rounds anyway (there are multiple bleed out ideas on the forum to review).

By abstracting things too much, someone could take massive damage at one HP (normally be at -15) or just barely get to -1. In an abstracted system, they both would take the same number of rounds to die. I prefer a system where how much damage you take determines your survival time.

What about your level in negative hp...? Not too gross, gives a bit on an edge. Maybe double your level in negative hp (10 max fits in with the purported 5 level cap, too).

goodmangames wrote: * The "bleed out" rule: When reduced to 0 hp, you have [class level] rounds to "bleed out." If magically healed during that time, you can survive, but you permanently lose 1 hp of stamina. I've used this in play and I like the fact that it sets a "clock" for reaction time - the party suddenly gets VERY focused on the fact that they only have 1 round to save the level 1 character. But you absolutely need a cleric on hand. In the games where the cleric dies, it's useless.

I would so with this as long as you can have either a Cleric heal, someone roll to apply a bandage to the character (see explanation below), or pour a rare healing potion on the wounds, etc...

Bandage: (this idea works with negative HP). You roll a skill check of 10+number of negative HP. If you succeed on the check, you stop further bleeding. If you fail, you can try again next turn. If you roll a 1, you do d4 damage to the character. This promotes a situation where it is not likely that someone will succeed on the first roll, so they would be tied up for one or more 'combat' rounds to stop the bleeding. Magic is best, but you do what you have to do.

goodmangames wrote: * The "Luck" rule: When reduced to 0 hp, any ally can make it to you and roll your body over to see if you're really dead. Once your body is rolled over - and not before! - you make a Luck check to determine if you're really dead or just knocked out or critically injured. This one is fun because it adds an air of mystery to the process. But the downside is the Luck check - it sucks to fail it.

This is a cool mechanic, but I would prefer this mechanic to be related to massive damage. If a character takes damage > half of their starting HP AND it drops them negative, then that would be a roll to see if they survived the massive damage. Not totally sold on this one, but it is possible.

goodmangames wrote: * The "prophecy of Luck" rule: I've toyed with this one but not actually played it yet. Sounds cool but I'm not sure how it will work out in play. Every DCC RPG character has a Luck score. What if every PC also had a "Luck prophecy" (bad term but read on for the idea) that modified their mode of death? For example, "You will be killed by your father" or "You can only be slain by a witch" or "You will die at the hands of one you trust." Then, the PC can only truly die under those circumstances. And of course this becomes an awesome plot tool for the DM, when he introduces a father / witch / "one you trust" into the game! In all other circumstances, "death" means something very severe -- like a week of unconsciousness followed by permanent loss of Stamina and/or hp, and perhaps some critical injury (broken leg = 1/2 movement, etc.) -- but not a true permanent death. Provided the "Luck prophecies" were carefully chosen, I think this could be really cool, but it may be hard to actually put into a published work (this is the kind of rule that requires a good DM to use it right).

While that is a great plot tool, I do not think it really should be in the core rules. It should be something that the DM chooses to add to their campaign.

goodmangames wrote:I definitely don't want to do negative hit points...that unbalances low-level games (effectively gives the PCs an extra 10 hp).

See, I do not see that as big of an issue. I think negative HP's gives a solid chance for characters to survive accidents at first level. I know DCC is about a great deal of randomness, but in a long term campaign too much randomness may be too much for players to handle.

If DCC provides a mechanic where low level characters have a chance to survive a funky die roll, that would be fine with me. I would even be willing to go this distance.

Max Negative HP = 1/2 STA score + 1 per level. That means a first level character will have on average a maximum on -6 HP. It would scale up to an average of -15 by 10th level. That is not as big of a number as it looks, because attacks do more damage at that level. (note a 18 STA = -10 hp at level 1 and a max of -19 at level 10) - I will not even show what a really low STA score would be as their survivability rate is horribly low to begin with.

I also like the mechanic of variable bleed out. Where you lose d6-2 HP per turn. Note: Yes, you can gain a hp, keep the same, or lose 1-4 hp each round. The variable time keeps the party on their toes. A first level character could go from -2 to -6 (average max) in one roll. Or stick around for 5 rounds.

If I had to use negative HP, I'd want it to be more random by rolling a dice [Wizards get d3, Thieves/Clerics d4, Warriors d5] then adding a bonus** if that bonus is positive. Then reroll every level, so there's a chance of it decreasing due to old wounds, trauma etc.

**Maybe Warriors use their Stamina bonus, Wizards/Clerics use the bonus for whatever covers Willpower, maybe Thieves use their Luck bonus.

I know I keep advocating stuff to be more 'random' but I'm really not into every aspect of a character automatically rising in a linear progression with level.

Hamakto wrote:I also like the mechanic of variable bleed out. Where you lose d6-2 HP per turn. Note: Yes, you can gain a hp, keep the same, or lose 1-4 hp each round. The variable time keeps the party on their toes. A first level character could go from -2 to -6 (average max) in one roll. Or stick around for 5 rounds.

I've always liked this. But I thought one of the variants was 1d4-1 instead of straight 1d4.

smathis wrote:

Hamakto wrote:I also like the mechanic of variable bleed out. Where you lose d6-2 HP per turn. Note: Yes, you can gain a hp, keep the same, or lose 1-4 hp each round. The variable time keeps the party on their toes. A first level character could go from -2 to -6 (average max) in one roll. Or stick around for 5 rounds.

I've always liked this. But I thought one of the variants was 1d4-1 instead of straight 1d4.

I had two versions...

But the one I like the best was d6-2.

1. It allowed you to gain a HP (i.e. recover if you are lucky) (1-2 = -1 which is gaining one hp)
2. Stay the same (zero result)
3-6. Take 1-4 hp's of damage during the bleed out

I do not think anyone has mentioned the fact that the longer one casts arcane magic in DCC, the greater the chances of having to make corruption rolls. High level arcane magic users are powerful, but also quite possibly disfigured, cursed, etc.

That does not necessarily happen to fighters.

Coleston the Cavalier wrote:...High level arcane magic users are powerful, but also quite possibly disfigured, cursed, etc.

That does not necessarily happen to fighters.

...have you seen me play fighters...?