The Hardest Part

[bknuckles]

Well, I do remember an instance long ago between Aesa and Ife, where the former was on the receiving end of some spilled wine - so she struck Ife. Now, Aesa's... very strong, very very strong - so if it was handled in engine against my level 5 self, I don't think it would've been too interesting!

It wasn't handled that way. Instead, though I forget the details, Ife had just enough energy to survive and kick Aesa right in the face, puncturing her cheek with a heel. This is before she gets knocked cold by a punch.

I thought it was well done, and one of the more memorable experiences I've had with conflict. I'm glad it wasn't handled in the engine, even though it came to "a battle".

Therefore, I will respectfully disagree! I don't think the conflict has failed.

[Edge]

I'm with Bass. (And apparently ninja'd.)

The reason I'm with Bass is because if you're adding in everything that should be added in, then that failure to one-shot Ife should have happened regardless of the engine or not. If engine-combat would have one-shotted her but rolling didn't, something clearly got forgotten or deliberately omitted, which I consider either a mistake or a "cheat" (for lack of a better word).

RPed-out, roll-by-roll combat has too many opportunities to, intentionally or not, leave out information like that. Which as a GM bugs me immensely and I'm not incredibly fond of it from playerside either. I have to deal with that on a regular basis with some of my newer players in PnP games, forgetting to add bonuses from feats, spells, items, or otherwise. The convenience of NWN calculating and handling combat for you spares me at least one of those irritants. I love D&D as a game (well, more accurately, Pathfinder) but having to keep track of all the fiddly math and minor details like that is my least favorite part, especially in high-level play, and I'm immensely happy that NWN takes care of all that for me.

That and doing dice-roll combat in PnP takes an immense amount of time, increased exponentially the higher level you go, and NWN is - more often than not - slower. That may be slightly sped up now that we have the /roll commands rather than having to use the dicebag, but likely not by much.

[bknuckles]

I should say, there was no rolling! It was RPed. It's very clear Ife, as a normal civilian, was no match for amazon-Aesa... so at least to give it flavor, I believe we skipped rolling.

Otherwise yes, your logic is sound!

Sometimes it's just about trusting the people involved to play it out well.

[Edge]

Ah, see now that is a completely different situation, in which I have no opposition. I thought we were referring to where some GMs drop the in-game combat engine and have everyone break out the dicebags and the /roll commands and play through combat round-by-round, as if emulating a PnP combat session.

Carry on.

[The Red Mage]

Yeah. I'm not a fan of dice roll combat. You may as well just use the engine. One of the best pvp excursions I've ever seen on the server though was tobias and aesa dice roll combating in the woods for Marziima's (expensive) amusement. It was truly epic and ending with both of them lazily punching each other in the face while exhausted on their backs, because each player played to their strengths and rolls were rather even between dex and strength. 10/10 there. I would've given them a big rp bonus if I were topside while I probably would've been salty betting if they used the engine.

[Garage Trashcan]

The best I've had was an epic thumb-wrestling match between Calabask and Felix. I wish I had saved the screenshots.

[Fire Wraith]

Ultimately, dice rolls (or engine combat) are just tools to help us, but they're imperfect for various reasons stated above - and if everyone involved can agree roughly on what happens, then the dice aren't necessary at all. It's only when you can't agree, or aren't willing to be flexible, that dice are needed... and even then, so much comes down to "well, what do I roll, and vs what target/opposing skill?" A lot of the times when I roll, it's only to display the modifier, rather than to actually make the check (nevermind that it's patently silly that there's a static 5% chance of miserable failure even at basic tasks...)

[Edge]

Well technically not, since people tend to forget that a 1 on a skill check isn't an auto-fail. >_>

[Garage Trashcan]

Oct 13, 2014 17:35:33 GMT -5 Edge said:

Well technically not, since people tend to forget that a 1 on a skill check isn't an auto-fail. >_>

And the reason you don't constantly roll 1s (like me in real life) walking around the house is because you can "take 10" on everything while not in combat.