D&D (2024) The Great Nerf to High Level Martials: The New Grapple Rules

[Gammadoodler]

The fundamental flaw with grappling and other alternative subsystems is that these target defenses that for many monsters are ridiculously low.

The game needs to be built from the ground up with the expectation that these defenses will actually be used; that the monster might get grappled, and that the attacking character is a properly minmaxed grappler. And D&D just ain't that game. A monster's Athletics check just is a piss poor choice for a defense mechanism. A skill bonus is never determined with nearly the same care as a monster's AC. The only set of numbers that provide even a passable alternative to AC are the saves (and Fort Ref Will saves were much better in this regard than the current set of six)

And a monster's resilience and "heft" will never feel right unless hit points are involved. Any system that lets a martial bypass a monster's hit points will be broken full stop.

As a very topical example of this, consider pushing monsters off cliffs in BG3. You don't want heroes to be able to do this in the pen and paper game, not in the general case. (If a DM prepares a combat with pushing in mind, that's okay; but the important distinction here is that the DM makes an active choice to make a strategy much much more effective than we normally assume it to be)

I don't think there's anything fundamentally wrong with a martial bypassing either or both of HP and AC so long as there is a relevant alternative defense that has been appropriately designed for the creature.

With that in mind, I'm not inclined to care overmuch whether it is a contested skill check or overcoming a DC as long as the martials' investment in the relevant skill and the creature's archetype are impacting the chances of success. If the strong, bruisery type creatures and nimble, skirmishy type creatures are pretty good at resisting grapples while others aren't, I think that's a win.

But if the complaint is that the monsters weren't given appropriate skills to defend against grapples, it sounds like it's as much a monster design problem as a systems problem. And it's a problem that it's hard for me to have a lot of sympathy for.

Grappled and prone are like the only two conditions (short of death) most martials can inflict. And it only takes a monster being appropriately statted in one of 2 skills to adequately defend against it.

 

[Quickleaf]

This is why I have had so much difficulty grokking the playtest material. They're not showing us any monsters (or really anything besides player-facing class/background/race/spells) – which is critical to understand how certain changes will play out.

Will monsters have higher initiative scores? Perception scores? Be more often trained in Athletics? All those things matter. Without knowing them, it's really hard to evaluate.

Edit: I gave WotC that feedback repeatedly. Now I gave up.

 

[fluffybunbunkittens]

As a very topical example of this, consider pushing monsters off cliffs in BG3.

Oh yeah, I cannot believe that we still don't have a clear answer on this. The game has more pushing now than ever before, and it's still just up to the GM's vibe check whether any character is immune/gets a Dex save/automatically plummets down 200 feet.

 

[CapnZapp]

I don't think there's anything fundamentally wrong with a martial bypassing either or both of HP and AC so long as there is a relevant alternative defense that has been appropriately designed for the creature.

Yeah, except there never seems to be one, so...

But if the complaint is that the monsters weren't given appropriate skills to defend against grapples, it sounds like it's as much a monster design problem as a systems problem. And it's a problem that it's hard for me to have a lot of sympathy for.

If you're talking to me: no the problem is that a dev came up with an alternative to regular attacks and decided some skill or other alternative value (not HP & AC) would be the defense.

Without thinking this through*.

It's happened countless times over the history of roleplaying.


*) Do note that just about the only well-thought out response is to... scrap the idea entirely.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Yeah, except there never seems to be one, so...

I'd argue that it's less an issue of the defense not existing and more a matter of designers failure to apply them.

It's not like giving 5e monsters the appropriate skills to defend against grappling would have unbalanced their performance in other areas.

 

[CapnZapp]

Oh yeah, I cannot believe that we still don't have a clear answer on this. The game has more pushing now than ever before, and it's still just up to the GM's vibe check whether any character is immune/gets a Dex save/automatically plummets down 200 feet.

Note: I deliberately brought up the video game. I don't think pushing happens nearly often enough in regular D&D for it to be a problem.

(But yes, theoretically it's exactly the same issue)

 

[mellored]

assume some old normal grappler,

5 (str) + 6 (athletics prof) vs Monster Athletics or Acrobatics

This is half the problem.

Current grapple rules assuming the defender has Acrobatics or Athletics.


The other half is that the rest of the game assumes skills won't be used in combat and can be boosted to +20.

 

[CapnZapp]

I'd argue that it's less an issue of the defense not existing and more a matter of designers failure to apply them.

It's not like giving 5e monsters the appropriate skills to defend against grappling would have unbalanced their performance in other areas.

During the history of roleplaying games it never seems to work out.

I just think you're asking too much of people creating monsters.

You have a choice between two ways to proceed:

Either you insist that grappling (or spell dueling or what have you) should exist (and not target the usual defenses), and you end up with an unbalanced mess of a game in 99 cases out of a 100...*

...or you realize this ahead of time and simply drop the idea.

The third option is to keep trying to create alternatives, but always scaling them back when they're shown (by gamers) to not be working (=players find ways to abuse these rules). This usually ends when the devs realize they've created a second way to target AC and HP; when they realize there's no real difference between their systems in practice.

*) A constructive avenue here would be to stop trying to reinvent the same very difficult wheel and instead ask ourselves "is there even one game with a successful number of competing attack modes" and then, you know, lifting the mechanics of that game...

 

[CapnZapp]

This is half the problem.

Current grapple rules assuming the defender has Acrobatics or Athletics.


The other half is that the rest of the game assumes skills won't be used in combat and can be boosted to +20.

The list of problems with the skill approach is nearly endless...

 

[Gammadoodler]

During the history of roleplaying games it never seems to work out.

I just think you're asking too much of people creating monsters.

You have a choice between two ways to proceed:

Either you insist that grappling (or spell dueling or what have you) should exist (and not target the usual defenses), and you end up with an unbalanced mess of a game in 99 cases out of a 100...*

...or you realize this ahead of time and simply drop the idea.

The third option is to keep trying to create alternatives, but always scaling them back when they're shown (by gamers) to not be working (=players find ways to abuse these rules). This usually ends when the devs realize they've created a second way to target AC and HP; when they realize there's no real difference between their systems in practice.

*) A constructive avenue here would be to stop trying to reinvent the same very difficult wheel and instead ask ourselves "is there even one game with a successful number of competing attack modes" and then, you know, lifting the mechanics of that game...

Ennhh..is it too much?

We're talking 2 relevant and directly PC-symmetric skills, and a checked box for either of them does the trick. Like this is not heavy duty, iterative design work.

I'd just about wager you could have an intern go through all the existing monsters in 5e and have something pretty reasonable mapped out in a day or 2.