Topic: Feint rules

[pastaav]

I have decided to change the rules for feints in my game. Any feedback or input is welcome.

Combat - feint rules.
*A character commit OB when he want to make a feint during his attack.
*A character can not devote more to a feint move than he has in the feint skill.
*A character must devote at least 10 of his OB to his feint attack.
*The defender subtract his available OB (OB before parry but modified by penalties caused by injuries). Success is resolved on the moving maneuver table with difficulty very hard. If the result is a number the DB of the target is lowered by that number. On success half of the OB commited to the feint is regained. If the feint moves fails the OB is lost and character must make an attack with the remaining OB.
*Feint may be used to counter any kind of DB except such based on the target not being able to see the target or being able to predict the moves of the character. For instance feint does not affect DB gained from blur, antipations or invisibility but will affect DB gained from parry, shields, shield spells, positional db, adrenal defence, fighting from higher ground etc. Feint will also not affect DB granted from partial or full cover.
*TIP: In general devoting large OB to the feint is benificial if the enemies usable OB is 40 or lower.

[Fenrhyl Wulfson]

I practice ancient fencing.

You will never, ever, nullify protection from a shield larger than a target shield with a feint, because you simply don't move these monsters, you just use them as an "interdiction zone" where the enemy can't attack (and he indeed can ot) and sometimes you slam or bash your foe with it, if he is stupid enough to close in.

A target shield is different, it moves to protect the weapon hand or to intercept a strike while the other hand attacks (usually in the same movement). Feinting against a target shield may be efficient, but since the weapon covers the attack angles that the shield leaves open, i'd say you may lose only half the BD.

Besides this, you got it right but this method seems a bit sluggish. Maybe I'll try it.

(I am still not convinced that feint is a separate skill, it comes naturally when you gain proficiency with a weapon. As far as I am concerned, it is part of the OB)

[pastaav]

You will never, ever, nullify protection from a shield larger than a target shield with a feint, because you simply don't move these monsters, you just use them as an "interdiction zone" where the enemy can't attack (and he indeed can ot) and sometimes you slam or bash your foe with it, if he is stupid enough to close in.

A target shield is different, it moves to protect the weapon hand or to intercept a strike while the other hand attacks (usually in the same movement). Feinting against a target shield may be efficient, but since the weapon covers the attack angles that the shield leaves open, i'd say you may lose only half the BD.

Thanks for the input. Shields are a bit tricky in my experience since very few game mechanics balance the advantage of the wall shield. For this reason I am reluctant to make feints work towards small shields but not large shields. Having feint work towards shields at all are mostly to give martial arts users something back from having these rules that are rather customized to combat adrenal defence.

(I am still not convinced that feint is a separate skill, it comes naturally when you gain proficiency with a weapon. As far as I am concerned, it is part of the OB)

The thing that convinced me was the "problem" that high DB users like monks have such advantage over armored fighters. A master fighter is pretty chanceless against a master monk and it feels wrong that missile weapons are about the only thing the fighter can do to even the score.

The rules are inspired by the feint rules in the martial arts companion. The additions are mostly that you must devote 10 to the attempt since feint attempts with lower OB spent are too good compared to the benefit. (Nothing really happens between 15 and 10, but if you go below 10 it soon turns ugly...at 1 OB spent the benefit are basically given for free) I also added the aspect that injuries reduce what OB skill the enemy defend against the feint to make it into a tactical question how soon you dare to attempt feints. If you can guess the OB of the enemy you have a large advantage.

[Fenrhyl Wulfson]

The thing that convinced me was the "problem" that high DB users like monks have such advantage over armored fighters. A master fighter is pretty chanceless against a master monk and it feels wrong that missile weapons are about the only thing the fighter can do to even the score.

I agree with you on this point. That's a problem I decided to solve by giving a net critical hit modifier to weapon experts. Every rank above 20 in a weapon has +1 to the minimum critical it can do, with a maximum of 30 minus the target AT. This way, a very proficient fighter will have better chances to stun a naked foe.
(I did the same to MA strikes and MA sweeps, but it does not have the same impact since even thieves often have some king of leather armour).

This said, the OB minimum price for your feint maneuver seems okay..

[markc]

Pastaav,
 Good to see you back.

 I think that maybe fient amneuver should be included in the weapon skill for free becuase IMO it is something you learn when you take up studing the weapon. Also the better you are at a weapon the easier time you should have of decoying an opponet of lesser skill. So maybe it should be a RR roll based on a chart you design. So if I am 30 ranks higher than my opponet in a weapon I have a much easier time of getting him to commet to my feint maneuver than if my opponet had the same knowledge as the attacker does.
 
 The case of Monks vs Fighters or unarmed vs armed combat IMO is a different question. And as you pointed out Adrenal Defense can play a big big part in unbalancing the game. IMO I might limit the AD skill total to a number to prevent it from over shadowing the people who wear armor and I might and have in my game moved unarmored people to AT2. [And I am thinking of maybe switching that back to AT 1 but with a big penalty for non-fast creatures. Maybe -25 for humans etc.] The switch to AT 2 or the penalty to AT 1 IMO will also help fix the problem.
 But IMO you should also test it out as it may make the profession unplayable at higher levels against super bad epic creatures. I also think that martial arts has a good place in a RPG but its limitations also need to be worked out. This IMO will make the PC branch out into other areas for defense and offense at higher levels.

Ramble done.
MDC

[pastaav]

The reason I settled for a seperate skill is that I think the adrenal defense users will complain otherwise. Yet I could imagine feint as built into the weapon skill instead.

I also use the AT2 for standard clothes..except for those occasions when the character is a monk robe without any backback or worn objects. You should see the face of the monk character when he realize that he is AT2 if want to carry any loot back.

BTW the interaction of much OB that is spent and how gives DB deduction is actually quite complex...spent a while until I could figure it out. More OB spent often give return value, except very skilled opponents that only fall for feints when the attack open end their roll. Maybe I should post a few lines about it when I am not busy writing LARP scenarios.

[RandalThor]

I can see the reasoning for having the feint skill be part of the weapon skill, but not for RM - it is "lets have many, many skills" game after all. If you have a seperate skills for preparing herbs and using herbs, then you should have feint seperate from the weapon skill.

The idea of making it an RR I like The character's levels, or ranks in their respective weapon could be refrenced. But I also like it being a sort of MM where you can end up getting partial success. How to combine the two?

[Marc R]

We tried something not to far off of this, with attack skill split OB/DB/Feint. . .

The only variation is we did it as an RR with attacker ranks in Feint + amount of OB put into Feint vs defender ranks in weapon + Combat perception. . success the attacker has wasted the OB they assigned to Feint, failure the Defender's DB was reduced by double the amount of OB the attacker assigned to Feint.

It worked fairly well, and definitely started an "arms race" of Feint vs Perception skill of combatants comparable to OB vs DB. . .And the doubling was perhaps too much, your MM method might have worked out better for more graduated results.

But it definitely slowed down combat, adding another calculation and another roll into every attack, so we stopped using it.

[pastaav]

My version of Feint is inspired by MAC and in my experience it is mostly useful for breaking through adrenal defense. You can at least in theory avoid the boring two-monks-duel-and-can-never-get-a-hit situations.

[Marc R]

It definitely allowed you to blow a hole in high DB, the AD issue, and also someone playing for time like going Full parry while screaming "GUARDS!". . the problem ended up being as handy as it was in those situations, it also was really handy for high level PCs to chop a bloody swath through low level opponents by doing a 33/33/33 split, the parry negating feint usually won, the 33% DB was usually enough to negate their attack, and the 33% OB vs no parry tended to kill them. . .

When it became habitual use we dumped it as an extra die roll in play delay problem.

It's one of those things we wanted, we got, then found it perhaps wasn't what we wanted problems.

I like things that offer advantages to fighting smart, but slowing down combat can make a mid sized fight eat up most of a session.