The Gaming Den

MGuy wrote:Thank you for explaining your reasoning Kaelik.

As for this point:

The same number as are lost when people decide that True seeing is better than being bitched by invisibles. The same number as when people decide that EBT doesn't work any more because everything is flying and large or larger. The same numbers as any other set of levels in the game when a new spell level comes online for people.

I see your point here but I don't really like the fact that certain spells provide an end all answer to half the things that might give a number of monsters their CR in the first place. True Seeing fucks up more than just invisibility. It fucks up any illusion. And I personally don't like that. One spell makes nearly a whole list of other spells not worth using anymore.


Flying doesn't just screw over tentacles or ground hazards, it makes anything that is grounded or ground based obsolete and useless. Hell, invisible flying makes many encounters pointless because at this point half the monsters on a given level won't even know whats hitting them. I don't like it. So I want cheesy tactics like that to be nerfed. Barring another system I'd like mechanics to balance things like that out. Even handing out flying to every class is "changing the rules" so what is so wrong with going in another direction and changing the rules so that flying isn't so fucking cheap?

If you don't like the "change the entire system idea" I'm fine with that too. I'm not even married to the idea because I'm not working on it yet. However, I would like to get some ideas forming about making it so that everyone doesn't NEED to fly to succeed. I would like having flight to be an interesting option, but one that doesn't completely over shadow fighting on the ground.

Then play a lower level. Flight is worked into the CR system. Past level 10 or so, the MAJORITY of your enemies should be fliers. Many of them will fly faster than the PCs.

Regardless of Kaelik being needlessly dickish, he has a point. It's much easier to steal rules from other areas of the game and apply them to flight than it is to invent your own flight-specific rules.

Most of the environmental hazards of combat on the ground can be replaced by the hazards of falling to the ground when you're fighting while flying. The SRD says you fall 150 ft in the first round of falling and 300 ft every round thereafter (though confusingly enough, this is hidden away in the section on planar travel). This means that in most circumstances, falling during aerial combat is going to drop you to the ground (doing 1d6 damage for every 10 feet you fell, to a max of 20d6 at 200 feet). This makes falling a good punishment for doing something stupid while flying -- it does damage that's not overwhelming, but isn't completely ignorable either. Also, the higher you get into the air (ie the farther away you get from the guys who can't fly), the greater that punishment is. In addition, hitting the ground gives those folks a good chance to stab you (or grab you so you can't go sailing away again, if they're smarter), which is also good. I'd rule that hitting the ground leaves you prone in the square where you landed. If you want to be especially mean, make them dazed or stunned as well (fort negates?).

I'd say allow any special attack usable on the ground to be used in the air as well. Replace "prone" with "falling" in the case of trips and overruns. A bull rush replaces the target's moved distance with the distance he was bull rushed for purposes of stalling (ie, if they were bull rushed 5', then they count as having moved 5' that turn to see if they stall or not). Grapples are resolved as on the ground, except that a pinned combatant is dead weight and must be held aloft by the one pinning him, or else both fall. "Falling" (or "plummeting" if you prefer) would mean you're in an uncontrolled decent, losing altitude as if in free fall (ie, at a rate of 150 ft the first round and 300 ft thereafter), losing your dex bonus to AC, and drawing AoOs as normal for movement. A Flight check would allow you to recover from a fall as a move action that draws an AoO. It strikes me that being AoOed while recovering from a fall should increase the Flight check's DC, but I'm not sure how exactly that should work.

Now let's take a look at the questions you posted earlier.

MGuy wrote:How are things like flight maneuvers covered?

Depends on what you mean by "maneuvers". If you mean things like trips and grapples, I already covered that. If you mean the sort of stunts you'd see at an air show (ie, more complicated movements than just "going in this direction"), a flight check with a flat DC. If you mean the sort of techniques you use to get an advantage over your opponent in a dogfight, then an opposed flight check.

MGuy wrote:What should be the DC for a barrel roll?

What does a barrel roll do? Does doing a barrel roll give you some sort of mechanical advantage? Does it just look cool? DCs should be tied to how much it helps you accomplish a specific goal. If you're just showing off, then treat it like a Perform check (as you can with Tumble or Slight of Hand checks).

MGuy wrote:What should be the damage threshold per hit before you start falling/plummeting? How does it scale for smaller/bigger creatures/objects?

I don't think you should start falling just from damage unless you're reduced to 0 or fewer HP. If you want to knock someone from the sky, then you want to trip or bull rush or overrun them.

MGuy wrote:What kind of bonuses/penalties do you get based on size?

I'd give the Flight skill bonuses for size equal to what Hide gets: that is, Fine +16, Diminutive +12, Tiny +8, Small +4, Large -4, Huge -8, Gargantuan -12, Colossal -16. Generally speaking, smaller things are going to be better at flying. A mosquito is better at flying than a hummingbird, which is better than a pigeon, which is better than an vulture.

MGuy wrote:Should fighting at different altitudes produce differing effects?

Fighting at "treetop level" (where hitting the ground if someone trips you is a real possibility) is tactically different enough from fighting in "open sky" (where you'll virtually always be able to recover before you hit the ground) that it doesn't need explicit mechanics. If you like, increase the windspeed as you go higher. When you get to a certain altitude, dealing with cold becomes an issue, and somewhere above that so does suffocation. Both can be dealt with as indicated by the SRD.

MGuy wrote:What about dogfights? Do windy conditions fuck up your flying checks?

Dogfighting as we know it is an outgrowth of the physics of the fixed-wing aircraft, and doesn't apply very well to high-level combat in D&D, where PCs would be more like helicopters (with precise control over their position) than fighter jets (who have to keep moving forward to avoid crashing). Dogfighting is probably best handled as a simple opposed flying check. But in any case, I would put the penalties to flying for wind at the same as the penalty for a listen check as noted in the SRD; -2 at "strong winds" and doubling for every category after that (including -16 in a hurricane and -32 in a tornado, which aren't actually listed for listen checks).

MGuy wrote:What kind of advantages (bonuses/penalties) do you get for different flight maneuvers/abilities/skill checks?

I'm not sure what you're referring to here. Flight should probably use dex as its key skill, and maybe have a synergy bonus from Tumble? Other than that I don't know what you mean.

MGuy wrote:Should maneuverability be tied to bonuses?

I think maneuverability in terms of "clumsy, poor, average" etc is dumb and skill checks should replace everything that those deal with.

MGuy wrote:Should it be relegated by size/propulsion (whatever is keeping you airborne)?

I'd say not; too complicated. It doesn't matter whether you're flying because you've got wings or because of a spell; either way someone can still send you topsy-turvy in midair with a trip attack that causes you to fuck up your flying and head toward the ground at painful speeds.

MGuy wrote:Lower levels have their charms but I don't think my game should be limited to lower levels just because the authors decided fly was to be the norm. Changing these things I don't like is the whole point of me looking for these house rules. "Don't play at higher levels" seems like the lazy way to approach it when instead of limiting my game from going up I can adjust the rules so that I can make the game function.

Except that the game *does* function. It just doesn't function the way you want it to. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

ubernoob wrote:It just doesn't function the way you want it to.

That sounds like another way of saying "broken" to me.

If he wants to make houserule changes, let him. No one's forcing you to do the same, and if it makes him happier to play it his way, what do you care?

MGuy wrote:Maneuvers like trip, bull rushing, overruning, trample, only work on the ground to any satisfying effect. What does being prone mean if you're 100ft in the air? Nothing.

It means you're falling, isn't the default rate of fall for something in D&D like 10'/round or something?

You get bullrushed in the air. What does that do to you? Nothing (at least on the ground you could push someone into a pit).

Seriously? It means you're being thrown around in one direction or another, which could mean a number of things, like getting thrown into something's deadly aura, or the wizards AoE range, or thrown towards the ground, etc.

So what does bringing up ground based maneuvers that only ever do anything on the ground actually mean in this context?

Nothing, which is why Kaelik didn't do that, he brought up manuevers that mean some thing pretty regardless of where you are.

What does bringing up ANY ground based maneuver (like tumble) mean 100ft off of the ground?

depends on the manuever, as I pointed out...

I don't know where you got the idea that I want ghosts and humming birds to have trouble flying from but if you're referring to the fact that I don't want them to auto win against grounded opponents then I don't see the harm in wanting that.

I think it's the fact that you want a a skill, will implies a task is difficult.

I hate auto win abilities, in fact I hate any ability or feature that allows you to auto win against someone of equal level who doesn't have the same ability. So part of my future plans to "fix" flight is that I want the advantages that flight gives you to be more tenuous. I don't have perfected ideas for things like ghosts currently (Flight isn't even the thing I'm working on right now) but I know I want a dragon/caster who was hit hard enough to fall out of the air.

well, there's three options for that, one, make a Flight skill that has you make a check to stay airbound if you're hit (10+damage), make casters/dragons use Concentration to stay aloft (which would be 10+damage, and would give Concentration a purpose for non-casters), or have them make a dex or level check.

Of those three options, you seem dedicated to choosing the one that's probably the worst. The other two make things already extant in the game matter more than they do, which is to say "at all".

For things like being bigger and its effects on flight I have checked my MM and nowhere within does it say that being bigger=clumsier. True the dragon gets that way but that's fixed by feats/spells so then what? He's a big average maneuvering flying dragon who suffers no penalties in flying thanks to a feat or two he picked up out of Races of the Wild. While other huge targets (enlarged Balor who went to the same RotW book) can have perfect maneuverability.

I thought the general consensus was that feats as they are in most WotC published products suck. Besides, the dragon's got other shit it could be using those feats on, like metabreath feats.

mguy wrote:Lower levels have their charms but I don't think my game should be limited to lower levels just because the authors decided fly was to be the norm. Changing these things I don't like is the whole point of me looking for these house rules. "Don't play at higher levels" seems like the lazy way to approach it when instead of limiting my game from going up I can adjust the rules so that I can make the game function.

then take out flight. Maybe your game world has a higher gravity so flight is impossible/impractical.

NativeJovian wrote:That sounds like another way of saying "broken" to me.

No, it's a way of saying "not tailored to everyone." If I pick up a pair of pants at the store that don't quite fit me and I make them fit, I'm not fixing them, I'm altering them.

The quick and dirty solution to flight is just to say, no spellcasting while flying and no ranged attacks.

That pretty much solves most of the problems associated with it.

Finally Kaelik. Finally.

Ok let me ask like this:
How are things like flight maneuvers covered?
-The Flight Manueverability Rules. What sort of Maneuvers are you talking about that the current rules don't cover?

What should be the DC for a barrel roll?
-What's the DC for..... the same thing on the ground? If you have the Maneuverablity, you don't give a damn, and just do it. If you are less, you make the same sort of check as you would on the ground.

What should be the damage threshold per hit before you start falling/plummeting?
-Trip Check. Your manueverability affects if you fall or not.

How does it scale for smaller/bigger creatures/objects?
-See above

What kind of bonuses/penalties do you get based on size?
-Same as normal? Look at Dragons. Ubernoob mentioned this.

Should fighting at different altitudes produce differing effects?
-Unless you're going high enough, not really. If there's no air, you use the Drowning rules. I don't see what's so hard about that.

What about dogfights? Do windy conditions fuck up your flying checks?
-Use Weather Rules. Dogfighting occurs just as much as real-time movement does in D&D. You need 1 second rounds to do that. Right now we have 6 second rounds.

What kind of advantages (bonuses/penalties) do you get for different flight maneuvers/abilities/skill checks?
-No. Manueverability is it's own bonus. A speed of 120 on the ground is worth a speed of 120 on the ground. Use that as you wish. A speed of 240 in the air (Average) is worth what it is worth.

Should maneuverability be tied to bonuses?
-see above

Should it be relegated by size/propulsion (whatever is keeping you airborne)?

-See above


I'm not worried (at this time) about how to make everyone fly but more how should flying work
-Use the fucking rules that already exist. You're not even making mountains out of molehills. You're creating imaginary mountains.

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Edit, I didn't read page 3. -_-;;

Flying doesn't just screw over tentacles or ground hazards, it makes anything that is grounded or ground based obsolete and useless. Hell, invisible flying makes many encounters pointless because at this point half the monsters on a given level won't even know whats hitting them. I don't like it. So I want cheesy tactics like that to be nerfed. Barring another system I'd like mechanics to balance things like that out. Even handing out flying to every class is "changing the rules" so what is so wrong with going in another direction and changing the rules so that flying isn't so fucking cheap?

Wrong. Stop lying.

You don't want to think. Stop lying about what you "want" in your games.

You do NOT want to fucking think when it comes to challenging your players.

Flying is a big deal, but it's not the be-all and end all. You avoid bullshit monsters, and that's the point, to avoid bullshit monsters.

Forcing the players to fight some random shit because you want them to is shitty DMing. The whole point of gaining new abilities that negate old foes, is that now the PCs can face new foes.

One of the points of flying is that you can just ignore ground stuff with melee attacks.

If players can never do that, then they just have "special" movement that merely ignores most terrain.

Remember, if the players never feel as if they are gaining different power, then they really won't feel as if their characters are "advancing". Nerfing Flying into the ground, and countering their "cheesy tactics"; that were meant to deal with what were once bullshit trolls or ogres, with flying ogres and flying trolls makes baby Jesus cry.

I really have to agree with MGuy; at the core level, flying is not significantly different from ground movement. At the core level there are only two differences; flying requires a 3D mentality where in ground combat 3D is often not considered (but if you have any multi-story terrain situation it does have the same effect); some flying modes require maintaining a minimum movement rate – failure means falling. The latter does require a different mindset than the normal run – stop – fight mode of combat, but it is really no different than two knights with lances constantly charging at each other.

MGuy wrote:I'm merely suggesting that there be level appropriate counters to flying beyond just saying "you can fly now". I'm not saying I want things on the ground to be able to melee flying creatures, I'm saying that the answer to handling flight shouldn't be "everyone flies now".

The problem is that having a fly skill and a bunch of weird flight maneuvers doens't help that, which is why I can't really understand why you want all that. Flight maneuvers can make the aerial game more interesting, but it won't make it actually weaker.

The main problem with flight isn't so much with people that can attack fliers, but it's that some people can't attack fliers at all. So even if you can knock a flier down or some bullshit like that, it doesn't really matter, because you won't reach him.

I seem to remember there being some discussion on this before. You don't need to change much if you want more 'counters' to flight. Cover and ranged attacks are the two primary ones.

MGuy wrote:I want flight maneuvers because I'd like to incorporate air ships and aerial battles at some point in my games. They have stats for air ships in the Eberron Setting but I have yet to see any detailed mechanics around air battles. But that can be saved for another time if I can get some idea ball rolling over what I've mentioned.

But that’s slightly different. First you need to have moving objects combat and then you have to apply it to 3D. Basically you are talking about sea battles although you might be able to get into the really complex and fast paced Indiana Jones parallel rail car battles as well. There are some third party rules for sea battle encounters and they can be adjusted easily to 3D. (Generally speaking in real 3D combat the notion of up and down is so predominant that the old 2D combat style of Khan generally applies most of the time, but looking above and below never hurts.)

MGuy wrote:I want flight maneuvers because I'd like to incorporate air ships and aerial battles at some point in my games.

Yeah, well that's a different story. If you want to make flight more of a focus, then I can understand wanting more mechanics for it.

Honestly, the first thing to do is toss the battlemap. Seriously. When you're handling a fast and furious dogfight, you're not going to bother to plot out what units are where, because that's constantly changing. It also saves you from having to consider any real 3D aspects (which are really difficult to map anyway).

Units have distance to each other up until the point that they enter a dogfight, in which case the dogfight itself is treated as one common area. A new stat, position, represents if you're on a target's tail or not. If you have neutral position, neither of you has really gained any kind of edge on the other, you're just flying around in circles or what not. By default everyone in a dogfight starts out with neutral positioning. With a move action, you can try to gain the advantage. This is basically an opposed roll of some kind. If you win, your position improves by one step.

Position becomes important because certain abilities (sometimes even attacks) can only be executed if you have an advantage over your foe. A dragon for instance can only breathe on a foe when he's on his tail. Many airship weapons may well work that way too.

That's at least a basis to start with.

MGuy wrote:What third party systems are you referring to?

Offhand I can't remember. I really have to go through my old 3E collection and reorganize it. It might be a good exercise on a Sunday morning, so I'll probably have the info tomorrow.

Tomorrow's Edit: My Hardcover books are more organized than I thought. The 3rd party supplement for just sea battles only is Legends&Lairs Seafarer's Handbook (2001) and there is a more generic write up in the old 3E Arms and Equipment Guide (2003)