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Post by robertsconley on Sept 21, 2021 10:38:50 GMT -6
From an OD&D perspective, having an unlimited cantrip that does a d4 or d6 damage doesn't seem to unbalance much. Particularly when the MU has to roll to hit. I guess one of the problems for me is that I have always had a problem with a mage having to roll to hit with a spell. Seems to me to be an odd thing. Certainly for D&D style magic. But is not uncommon with other magic system including older ones like Runequest.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 21, 2021 11:08:32 GMT -6
But if we are going to white room this, let's white room this. What are you talking about?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 21, 2021 11:09:43 GMT -6
I guess one of the problems for me is that I have always had a problem with a mage having to roll to hit with a spell. Seems to me to be an odd thing. Certainly for D&D style magic. But is not uncommon with other magic system including older ones like Runequest. One of the attractions of taking a mage is not having to roll to hit.
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 21, 2021 11:36:26 GMT -6
But if we are going to white room this, let's white room this. What are you talking about? When doing RPG comparisons often statistics are taken in isolation without considering how they work with everything else in a campaign. A lot of folks including myself call this white room analysis. For example, just because 5e fighters start with 12 hit points compared to an average of 4.5 hit points for a OD&D 3 LBB fighter doesn't mean characters have an easier time of it in 5e compared to OD&D 3 LBBs. There are consequences to the increased hit point and damage totals for 5e that isn't one of them.
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 21, 2021 11:39:32 GMT -6
Certainly for D&D style magic. But is not uncommon with other magic system including older ones like Runequest. One of the attractions of taking a mage is not having to roll to hit. Just remember with 5e, this stuff is "in addition to" not "in lieu of". Magic Missile still auto hits. Fireball, web still impacts everything in its area of effect. But instead of resorting to staff, daggers, (and darts if AD&D) when you run out of spells, you can fall back to a cantrip that requires a to hit roll.
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Post by sepulchre on Sept 21, 2021 12:35:39 GMT -6
Agreed, there is nothing wrong with hit points.
Further, weapon damage and hit points are scaled. No normal man, even if a knight or leader (equivalent of a veteran), can withstand the full damage of weapons.
Levels and hit points are scaled towards heroic fantasy, the more a fighting man advances from normal man towards 'hero', the less likely melee/missile combat will be a simulation, which seems appropriate for a heroic fantasy game.
Gygax alluded to this in Dragon: As the object of the game was to provide a continuing campaign where players created and developed game personae, the chance for death (of either character or monster) was reduced from that in CHAINMAIL, so that players could withdraw their characters from unfavorable combat situations (19 Dragon 15)
Arneson and his players evidently added hit points due to the mortality rate of characters as well. Thomden wrote:
I disagree, the hit point spread in OD&D is scaled with weapons and damage for normal men. Lower numbers would only serve to undermine that abstraction.
Heroes and swordsmen are always at risk of vainly delving too deep, unwittingly falling down a chute into the lower dungeon levels, or encountering the same monsters wandering up from those levels. Both aspects are sure to remind players of their character's mortality.
robertsconley wrote:
Hit points are not just an enumeration of combat endurance, they can signify injury, otherwise insinuative poison would never take effect. What's important to observe about the abstraction is hit points represent the possibility for any of these factors or the combination thereof, e.g. fatigue, luck, favor of the gods, constitution etc. dwindling away a character or monster's defenses and eventually being felled by a telling blow. While hit points remain, they essentially enumerate why the last attack did not kill the character.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 21, 2021 16:29:29 GMT -6
One of the attractions of taking a mage is not having to roll to hit. Just remember with 5e, this stuff is "in addition to" not "in lieu of". Magic Missile still auto hits. Fireball, web still impacts everything in its area of effect. But instead of resorting to staff, daggers, (and darts if AD&D) when you run out of spells, you can fall back to a cantrip that requires a to hit roll. FWIW, the Magic Missile spell requires a hit roll in GH and Holmes: odd74.proboards.com/thread/8804/story-magic-missile
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 21, 2021 17:00:14 GMT -6
But if we are going to white room this, let's white room this. Nice work. I love combat simulations and analysis However, we shouldn't be tempted to attribute 100% of the variance in win rates to the fighter, when the orc is changed between editions also. A handful of other nuances to consider might include: * We should keep the weapons and armor of both combatants fixed between comparisons. Otherwise, some of the variation in win rates will be attributable to the different performance of the equipment, rather than the performance of the fighters themselves. E.g., in the above example the 0e fighter was "upgraded" to plate armor whereas the 5e fighter had mail armor. Also, the 5e orc was "upgraded" to a two-handed axe. These variables need to be controlled. * If we use the normal combat rule (M&T p5) then the 3LBB fighter (with FC Man+1) has one attack as a man (THAC2 17) at +1 versus normal types (including orcs). * Who strikes the first blow is very consequential in 3LBB combat, particularly for normal types, but how initiative was determined wasn't mentioned. This might differ between editions, which would need to be accounted for. * Using rounded up average hit-point totals distorts the outcome somewhat. I.e., the ratio of 4.5:12 hp is not the same as the ratio of 5:12 hp. It would be more accurate to roll hp fairly for each bout. * As already noted, a single comparison between fighter and orc does not really tell us much about the fighter alone. It tells us something about the change in the orc-fighter relationship between editions. To learn about the overall performance of the fighter, we would need to do a similar comparison between a fighter and several of his most commonly encountered opponents. We could then infer something about the fighter from his performance across all these outcomes. With just a single comparison, there is a risk that orcs have changed more between editions than fighters have, and we attribute the result of changes in orcs to fighters. The other elephant in the room is that one-on-one duels are not very representative of actual play. It's as much about number of orcs appearing in an encounter as it is about their individual quality, and about the ratio of players to monsters. But that is much harder to model. Hope that's helpful. Nice work
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Post by Desparil on Sept 21, 2021 17:13:06 GMT -6
But if we are going to white room this, let's white room this. Nice work. I love combat simulations and analysis However, we shouldn't be tempted to attribute 100% of the variance in win rates to the fighter, when the orc is changed between editions also. A handful of other nuances to consider might include: * We should keep the weapons and armor of both combatants fixed between comparisons. Otherwise, some of the variation in win rates will be attributable to the different performance of the equipment, rather than the performance of the fighters themselves. E.g., in the above example the 0e fighter was "upgraded" to plate armor whereas the 5e fighter had mail armor. Also, the 5e orc was "upgraded" to a two-handed axe. These variables need to be controlled. * If we use the normal combat rule (M&T p5) then the 3LBB fighter (with FC Man+1) has one attack as a man (THAC2 17) at +1 versus normal types (including orcs). * Who strikes the first blow is very consequential in 3LBB combat, particularly for normal types, but how initiative was determined wasn't mentioned. This might differ between editions, which would need to be accounted for. * Using rounded up average hit-point totals distorts the outcome somewhat. I.e., the ratio of 4.5:12 hp is not the same as the ratio of 5:12 hp. It would be more accurate to roll hp fairly for each bout. * As already noted, a single comparison between fighter and orc does not really tell us much about the fighter alone. It tells us something about the orc-fighter relationship between editions. To learn about the overall performance of the fighter, we would need to do a similar comparison between a fighter and several of his most commonly encountered opponents. We could then infer something about the fighter from his performance across all these outcomes. With just a single comparision, there is a risk that orcs have changed more between editions than fighters have, and we attribute the result of changes in orcs to fighters. The other elephant in the room is that one-on-one duels are not very representative of actual play. It's as much about number of orcs appearing in an encounter as it is about their individual quality, and about the ratio of players to monsters. But that is much harder to model. Hope that's helpful. Nice work I assume his comparison was based on starting gear. In OD&D, it's fairly easy to buy plate mail at 1st level, but in 5E you start with chain and plate is out of reach until 3rd level or possibly even higher (barring some unusual financial windfall). Similarly, the 5E orc is using the standard Monster Manual stats - by default, every orc has a two-handed axe. If you wanted to take that away and reduce his damage to 1d8, you'd also have to give him a shield and then his AC would be 15 instead of 13. As for initiative in 5E, it could potentially skew 1-in-20 in favor of either combatant but realistically it's just as much of a toss-up as in OD&D - just rolling a d20 instead of a d6.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 21, 2021 17:25:03 GMT -6
Sure. But the difference between starting gear in different editions is another variable to control (e.g., by imposing identical equipment) if you specifically want to tease out the difference in combat performance attributable to the fighters themselves. FWIW, in M2M-inspired 3LBB combat initiative is determined by who is the attacker and relative weapon size. If everything is a tie, you'd dice. The difference between dicing for initiative with d20 versus d6 is largely that the probability of a tie is much higher with d6.
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Post by Desparil on Sept 21, 2021 18:09:12 GMT -6
Sure. But the difference between starting gear in different editions is another variable to control (e.g., by imposing identical equipment) if you specifically want to tease out the difference in combat performance attributable to the fighters themselves. FWIW, in M2M-inspired 3LBB combat initiative is determined by who is the attacker and relative weapon size. If everything is a tie, you'd dice. The difference between dicing for initiative with d20 versus d6 is largely that the probability of a tie is much higher with d6. On the other hand, one could argue that 5E chain is equivalent to OD&D plate - both offer an armor class 6 points better than unarmored. Initiative ties are indeed more common on a d6, though they're also something of a gray area since neither OD&D (Chainmail notwithstanding; despite the name, the "alternative combat system" is the standard way of playing. In any case, in a white room simulation, one can reasonably assume the fighter and the orc have an equal chance of being the attacker and/or having the longer weapon and leave the determination up to dice) nor 5E has a concrete rule for handling ties beyond "the DM decides how it plays out."
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 21, 2021 19:11:13 GMT -6
Nice work. I love combat simulations and analysis However, we shouldn't be tempted to attribute 100% of the variance in win rates to the fighter, when the orc is changed between editions also. Brian the Orc for the 5e fighter is stated out per 5e while Brian the Orc in OD&D is stated out per Monsters & Treasures. * We should keep the weapons and armor of both combatants fixed between comparisons. Otherwise, some of the variation in win rates will be attributable to the different performance of the equipment, rather than the performance of the fighters themselves. E.g., in the above example the 0e fighter was "upgraded" to plate armor whereas the 5e fighter had mail armor. Also, the 5e orc was "upgraded" to a two-handed axe. These variables need to be controlled. I disagree, in OD&D it is reasonable for a 1st level fighter to spend the 50 gp to buy plate. In 5e Plate costs 1,500 gp and a 1st level character can't afford it. Also in 5e armor has trade off between Base AC and the maximum Dex bonus a character can apply to AC. Plate doesn't allow for a dex bonus to be applied but it grants a base AC of 18. Which is one better than Half-Place which has a base AC of 15 but allows a dex bonus of up to +2 to applied for a base AC 17. Unlike the following points, I am highlighting this specific because more so than later in OD&D equipment matters as you level. It is as important as the incremental improvement gained in character levels. Whereas in 5e what you gain as one levels is far more important. * If we use the normal combat rule (M&T p5) then the 3LBB fighter (with FC Man+1) has one attack as a man (THAC2 17) at +1 versus normal types (including orcs). * Who strikes the first blow is very consequential in 3LBB combat, particularly for normal types, but how initiative was determined wasn't mentioned. This might differ between editions, which would need to be accounted for. * Using rounded up average hit-point totals distorts the outcome somewhat. I.e., the ratio of 4.5:12 hp is not the same as the ratio of 5:12 hp. It would be more accurate to roll hp fairly for each bout. * As already noted, a single comparison between fighter and orc does not really tell us much about the fighter alone. It tells us something about the change in the orc-fighter relationship between editions. To learn about the overall performance of the fighter, we would need to do a similar comparison between a fighter and several of his most commonly encountered opponents. We could then infer something about the fighter from his performance across all these outcomes. With just a single comparison, there is a risk that orcs have changed more between editions than fighters have, and we attribute the result of changes in orcs to fighters. It never going to be an exact science. What the data tells me and,and this is backed up by actual play, is that 5e and OD&D are as not far apart as folks would think. The nuances of how each achieves this differ greatly but in the end they get to the same ball park as character progress. Especially if one sticks to the elements of 5e that echo OD&D the most like the Fighter-Champion, Rogue-Thief, Cleric-Life Domain, and Wizardry-Evoker. If you play Fighter-Battlemaster, or a Warlock those classe have elements that echo 3e and 4e than older editions. The other elephant in the room is that one-on-one duels are not very representative of actual play. It's as much about number of orcs appearing in an encounter as it is about their individual quality, and about the ratio of players to monsters. But that is much harder to model. Hope that's helpful. Sure, and I agree to an extent. My view is that rules work best if they reflect how the setting works whether it is OD&D or GURPS. Because most RPG system are about humans having adventures I found there is a degree of commonality. More than what most thing there are. The figure out where things line up with OD&D from when I ran things using AD&D, Fantasy Hero, and GURPS, I wrote that tool as one starting point. After that it was onto actual play because of the points you raised. Situations are nuanced and the only way to figure that out is to play out the situation in a campaign. Nice work Thanks One point I would like to mention is a lot of folks put too much credence into rules as written. For example there was a complaint that Wizards get to fire spells every round with a to-hit roll. D&D 5e won't break because a referee decides to jettison that. Decides to jettison prepared spells in favor of traditional memorization. I would however keep the spell descriptions and the fact that the power of the spell is based on the level of the slot used to cast it not the level of the caster. That goes hand in hand with how tough monsters are.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 21, 2021 19:17:03 GMT -6
On the other hand, one could argue that 5E chain is equivalent to OD&D plate - both offer an armor class 6 points better than unarmored. I'm not sure that this approach would be helpful in determining the relative effectiveness of a fighter across editions? I'd argue that plate is plate, and chain is chain, irrespective of how they are implemented in either system. However, perhaps the best approach would be to remove armor from the simulation altogether? Eliminating armor would remove one more variable, and therefore make it more transparent how the fighter alone actually performs. Of course, then we encounter the exact same problem with weapons. Again, I would advocate that a sword is a sword, regardless of how it is implemented in either system. In any event, I suspect that equipping both fighters and orcs of either edition with the bog-standard x-edition-sword would probably be the fairest comparison we could make. All good fun to think about
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 21, 2021 19:28:04 GMT -6
I disagree, in OD&D it is reasonable for a 1st level fighter to spend the 50 gp to buy plate. In 5e Plate costs 1,500 gp and a 1st level character can't afford it. Then your conclusion can really only be: A plate-armored 0e fighter wins more often than does a mail-armored 5e fighter. Intuitively, the difference is that the plate-armored fighter is better off. And so any real difference between the 0e fighter and the 5e fighter is obscured.
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Post by jeffb on Sept 21, 2021 19:37:54 GMT -6
My view is that rules work best if they reflect how the setting works There's that thing again
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Post by Desparil on Sept 21, 2021 19:42:00 GMT -6
I disagree, in OD&D it is reasonable for a 1st level fighter to spend the 50 gp to buy plate. In 5e Plate costs 1,500 gp and a 1st level character can't afford it. Then your conclusion can really only be: A plate-armored 0e fighter wins more often than does a mail-armored 5e fighter. Intuitively, the difference is that the plate-armored fighter is better off. And so any real difference between the 0e fighter and the 5e fighter is obscured. Equipment is an integral part of a D&D fighter's effectiveness in any edition. Obviously a generous or stingy DM can change this, but even before 3E explicitly printed its "Wealth By Level" recommendations there was always an implicit degree of "a level X character should have approximately Y amount of loot," as seen in pre-generated characters and NPC allies/villains in various modules, as well as NPCs in the Monster & Treasure Assortment and The Rogues Gallery. If the goal is to compare same-level to same-level across editions, then the equipment given should reflect what a character of each edition is expected to possess at that level. To give the 5E fighter plate armor at 1st level is to deviate from the expected fighting-strength progression of that edition.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 21, 2021 21:23:29 GMT -6
If the goal is to compare same-level to same-level across editions, then the equipment given should reflect what a character of each edition is expected to possess at that level. To give the 5E fighter plate armor at 1st level is to deviate from the expected fighting-strength progression of that edition. I think this argument conflates the fighter's innate effectiveness and his equipped effectiveness. I don't think there's any doubt that having better equipment is an advantage. The issue (in my mind) is that equipment is usually more variable; it's hard to argue that all 1st level fighters will always have "x". All I was trying to do was to illustrate that it is possible to isolate the impact of better equipment from the impact of a better fighter. If that is not of interest that's fine too I guess. Here's a couple more thoughts for that line of discussion: While plate mail is certainly attainable for the wealthier 1st level fighters in 0e, is it fair to assume every 0e fighter will have it? missiles (specifically bows) and plate armor are probably the two big advantages an 0e fighter can have. With an average purse and a handful of adventuring necessities (food, water, pack, rope, light, oil, spikes?) the 1st level fighter might have to choose between either plate armor or bow and arrows, but not both. Just as an example. Another simulation that could be useful is to compare the win rate of the plate-armored 0e fighter to the mail-armored 0e fighter. Any difference in win rate presumably represents the advantage of plate armor over mail (in 0e). The same could be done for 5e. Having that information, one could then return to the comparison between the plate-armored 0e fighter and the mail-armored 5e fighter and review the outcome in that light.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 21, 2021 21:59:27 GMT -6
From an OD&D perspective, having an unlimited cantrip that does a d4 or d6 damage doesn't seem to unbalance much. Particularly when the MU has to roll to hit. I guess one of the problems for me is that I have always had a problem with a mage having to roll to hit with a spell. Seems to me to be an odd thing. Tim the Enchanter wasn't a particularly good shot.
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 22, 2021 7:11:03 GMT -6
Another simulation that could be useful is to compare the win rate of the plate-armored 0e fighter to the mail-armored 0e fighter. Any difference in win rate presumably represents the advantage of plate armor over mail (in 0e). The same could be done for 5e. It the same in any edition due to the 1d20 resolution system that hasn't changed. However the advantage conferred by +2 AC increase the greater the number of hit points the combatants has. With 5 hit points each it only a 13% advantage but with 50 hit points each and all else equal then it is 36% advantage with Alex winning 86% of the time.
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 22, 2021 7:21:39 GMT -6
I disagree, in OD&D it is reasonable for a 1st level fighter to spend the 50 gp to buy plate. In 5e Plate costs 1,500 gp and a 1st level character can't afford it. Then your conclusion can really only be: A plate-armored 0e fighter wins more often than does a mail-armored 5e fighter. Intuitively, the difference is that the plate-armored fighter is better off. And so any real difference between the 0e fighter and the 5e fighter is obscured. And I reported on this Finally lets drop Alex down to just Chain + Shield AC 4. Running the fights we find that Alex wins 66.1% of the time over Brian the Orc.
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Post by aramis on Sept 22, 2021 18:13:01 GMT -6
From an OD&D perspective, having an unlimited cantrip that does a d4 or d6 damage doesn't seem to unbalance much. Particularly when the MU has to roll to hit. I guess one of the problems for me is that I have always had a problem with a mage having to roll to hit with a spell. Seems to me to be an odd thing. One of the principles of 5E is that anything doing damage either gets a save, needs a to-hit, or only does damage upon ending movement in. There are a handful of exceptions, namely Magic Missile. Cantrips come in both save and to-hit varieties. It's also worth noting that there is an expected damage per spell level table in the 5E DMG. Magic Missile is below it.
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Post by tkdco2 on Sept 22, 2021 18:45:44 GMT -6
When I was new to the game, I didn't like the fact that Magic Missile automatically hit, and I liked the AD&D rule that a Shield spell could block it. Now a hit roll seems strange; I guess I just got used to the concept of automatic hit.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 22, 2021 18:54:23 GMT -6
I took the liberty of plugging some numbers into Robert's combat simulator. Here are some results (averaged over four simulations of 10,000 bouts each): First up, the 5e 1st level Dragonborn Champion with chainmail+sheild (AC 19 because of the +1 AC "defense" fighting style) and then with plate armor+shield (AC 21) versus the standard 5e orc.
| 0e | 5e | 5e |
| Veteran vs Orc | 5e L1 Dragonborn Champion vs Orc | 5e L1 Dragonborn Champion vs Nerfed Orc | Chainmail |
| 57.4, 58.8, 57.7, 57.3 = 57.8% wins |
| Plate |
| 69.6, 68.9, 68.3, 69.1 = 69.0% wins |
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So 5e-plate armor enabled a ~10.2% higher win rate over 5e-chainmail in these simulations. But the 5e orc is notionally "upgraded" (compared to the 0e orc) with a two-handed axe. What happens if we give the 5e orc a regular (one-handed) battle axe and shield instead? Then the orc's AC is upgraded 2 pips (to 15) and its damage is reduced (from d12) to d8. Then we get:
| 0e | 5e | 5e |
| Veteran vs Orc | 5e L1 Dragonborn Champion vs Orc | 5e L1 Dragonborn Champion vs Nerfed Orc | Chainmail |
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| 64.5, 64.0, 63.3, 65.2 = 64.3% wins | Plate |
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| 77.5, 76.9, 76.8, 77.4 = 77.2% wins |
So here we see that a 5e orc with battleaxe+shield enables the mail- and plate-armored 5e Champions to win ~6.5% and ~8.2% more frequently, respectively. Looking at it the other way around, this means that 6.5 and 8.2% of the 5e Champion's potential win rate in the first table was eliminated by the Orc's "upgrade" to a two-handed axe. Now let's look at the 0e Veteran with chainmail+sheild (AC 4, THAC4 15) and with plate armor+shield (AC 2, THAC2 17) versus an 0e-orc (AC 6, leather+shield, THAC6 13).
| 0e | 5e | 5e |
| Veteran vs Orc | 5e L1 Dragonborn Champion vs Orc | 5e L1 Dragonborn Champion vs Nerfed Orc | Chainmail | 64.7, 65.9, 66.2, 65.8 = 65.7% wins |
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| Plate | 76.3, 75.0, 75.9, 75.4 = 75.7% wins |
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So 0e-plate armor enables roughly 10.0% higher win rate over 0e-chainmail in these simulations. These 0e results are very similar to the 5e Champion vs nerfed-orc, above. With chainmail the 0e-veteran performed slightly (1.4%) better than did the 5e-champion. But with plate armor, the 0e-veteran performed slightly (1.5%) worse than did the 5e-champion. Across these 40,000 bouts. My speculation is that combat performance is as much about the changing AC:attack adjustment ratios between editions as is it is about the changing damage:hit points ratios between editions. All this together is non-trivial to model precisely because: 1) The 5e armor system is built at a different granularity to the 0e armor system: In 5e there are four 2-pip steps from unarmored to plate armored. In 0e there are only three 2-pip steps from unarmored to plate armored. So, in 5e plate and chain armor give 8 and 6 pips of AC. In 0e the same armor types give 6 and 4 pips of AC. A different scale. 2) 5e shields contribute 2 pips of AC versus 0e's 1 pip of AC. Again, different. 3) Both armor systems are coupled to the corresponding to-hit adjustments. While 0e has fewer AC pips and lower to-hit targets, it also has lower attack adjustments to go with it. 5e has more armor pips and higher to-hit targets, and also higher attack adjustments to go with it. Hence, tweaking only one side of the equation would more or less "break it". All good fun to play around with Thanks to Robert's simulator too!
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Post by howandwhy99 on Sept 23, 2021 13:18:04 GMT -6
When I was new to the game, I didn't like the fact that Magic Missile automatically hit, and I liked the AD&D rule that a Shield spell could block it. Now a hit roll seems strange; I guess I just got used to the concept of automatic hit. IIRC, Melf's Acid Arrow had to be cast on an arrow, usually one someone else had knocked. I remember being told that Thac0 was for Fighters and Saves were for the magic system. That all spells, once they are successfully completed, manifest in the world. The Saves are to avoid an effect which alters the world regardless of saving, unless that world was your body. (Charm, Polymorph, and the like) To-Hit rolls are a Strength or Dexterity-based action by comparison. Spellcasting requires mental strain. On the other hand, Illusionists require a high Dexterity...
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Post by Mordorandor on Sept 23, 2021 13:40:13 GMT -6
I remember being told that Thac0 was for Fighters and Saves were for the magic system. That all spells, once they are successfully completed, manifest in the world. The Saves are to avoid an effect which alters the world regardless of saving, unless that world was your body. (Charm, Polymorph, and the like) I always felt it natural to have to-hit rolls for Fighters to see if their “ability” would succeed and to have only some saving throws for Wizard spells to see if their “ability” would succeed, given the Fighter had unlimited or less limited uses of their ability than the Wizard. Basically, given that the Wizard often has but few options, once they use it, why not let them succeed more so than not. And it seemed to me that Wizards were always meant to make limited contributions to combat. What contributions they could offer were generally for a certain type of combat, like Fire Ball for larger scale battles.
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Post by tkdco2 on Sept 24, 2021 17:19:17 GMT -6
We could always do it the MERP way. Wizards would have to roll to cast their spells successfully. If you allow critical hits and fumbles for combat, then there can also be critical successes and failures for spellcasting.
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Post by jeffb on Sept 24, 2021 19:57:14 GMT -6
We could always do it the MERP way. Wizards would have to roll to cast their spells successfully. If you allow critical hits and fumbles for combat, then there can also be critical successes and failures for spellcasting. Works for me.
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Post by angantyr on Sept 24, 2021 22:41:19 GMT -6
We could always do it the MERP way. Wizards would have to roll to cast their spells successfully. If you allow critical hits and fumbles for combat, then there can also be critical successes and failures for spellcasting. The original TFT: Wizard rules also had rules for critical successes and fails. I'd have to look up the new Legacy rules and see if that made it in.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 25, 2021 12:31:57 GMT -6
Y'all lost me at "Brian" the orc.
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Post by hamurai on Sept 25, 2021 15:39:14 GMT -6
Certainly for D&D style magic. But is not uncommon with other magic system including older ones like Runequest. One of the attractions of taking a mage is not having to roll to hit. There are still plenty of damage spells in 5E which don't require a to-hit roll. Those auto-hit spells grant the target a saving throw, though. Spells requiring a hit roll don't allow a saving throw. This also applies to several cantrips. @topic: I don't think HP need a fix, maybe just a new name so folks will be aware of their original meaning; luck and stamina. So instead of narrating the enemy orc's hit roll as "His sword smashes brutally into your shoulder! 10 damage!" the DM should say "The orc's blow only misses your shoulder by a tiny margin, and only because you dive sideways just in time by a combination of skill and pure luck. You loose 10 HP/Luck/Stamina/whatever." But, modern "heroic" combat (as also seen in movies and video games) seems more natural to many people: The hero can take a dozen melee hits and arrows and still keep going.
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