Ideas about using powers outside combat

thanson02 wrote:

Unfortunately, there are too many people who play Pathfinder and earlier versions of D&D that spread false rumors like this.  It expresses their ignorance in the system and it is easier to just rip something down then it is to see what is going on.  4E is not perfect, no system is.  If it is not his preferred system, that is fine.  I get upset when they try to misrepresent the system to bate you into arguments.  They do not have to play 4E anymore then you have to play Pathfinder or any other RPG.  And if you want to play them, that is fine.  It is a game.  Why does he have to justify that his system is better then yours and what is that saying about the RPG community that he is playing with if he does?

Yeah, he's a good friend and I know that Pathfinder is his preferred edition of D&D. But what you said was basically what I was trying to tell him. He didn't have to play 4E and he didn't have to prefer it. I think he was just being more antagonistic than actually trying to argue about systems. But he definitely got a few great big eye rolls from me with his comments.

thanson02 wrote:

skwyd42 wrote:

As a side note, this is something I'm working on. I can't stand the fact that when we DO have a combat encounter every single one of them drops their eyes to their summary sheet to see what power they want to use.

But definitely, to get back to the original topic, allowing and even encouraging players to use their attack powers outside of combat in unconventional ways is an awesome thing and I wholeheartedly encourage and support this!

I think that might be one of two things.  Either they do not know what their character options are or they are using strategy and exploring their options in combat much like a wizard who pours through their spells to see what they want to cast, which has been around since at lest 2nd Edition.  The first one is a issue, the second is not, IMO.

Although that brings up the topic of how real feeling and instinctive is a system's combat structure.  I don't think there has been any combat system in any version of D&D that is realistic feeling (coming from martial art experience).

In the case of one of my players, I know he's exploring his options. However, he has a habit of waiting until I call his initiative and then he looks at his sheet and then looks at the board, then at the sheet, then at the board and so on. I keep telling him that he could be considering options while others are taking their turns. I realize that the positions of enemies and allies can shift on the board while the turn is progressing. But he has claimed in our conversations that it is not possible for someone to even begin to consider what to do until they know exactly how things are going to be positioned. I pointed out to him that everyone else seems to have an idea of what they want to do when their turn comes up. So he and I are still at an impasse.

The other players, however, I find that most of them seem to think that they are 110% limited by the mechanics as spelled out on their character sheets. If there is an obstacle between them and their intended target, like a pool of water, they want to find on their character sheet the skill or power or feat that specifically says "cross pool of water" so they can see what their modifier is and decide whether or not they want to do that.

In other words, most of my players don't think "outside of the mechanics" very well. And so I've been working on getting them to be more descriptive and narrative in telling me what they are doing. I'm working on a house rule that will give them a minor bonus or something whenever they are more descriptive beyond things like:

"My turn? Okay, move action to go here (count squares along a path with their mini), then standard action I use twin strike (roll attack and damage), then I'm done."