Thoughts on "Test of Spite [3.5.3]"

deathdealingjawa · Post by **deathdealingjawa** » Wed Dec 16, 2009 10:55 pm

My friend and I were discussing ways to handle 3.5 I brought up Tomes, he brought up the Test of Spite. I was wondering what other denizens think of it?

Leress · Post by **Leress** » Wed Dec 16, 2009 11:11 pm

Doing a quick glance and seeing Lighting Mace feat banned I would say it is not worth doing the test. Unless you like Xbox achievement it doesn't really prove shit. It uses a changed rule set, it seem like it is suppose to make people think outside the box but I see no real point.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Wed Dec 16, 2009 11:13 pm

The Test of Spite rules are bullshit as a method if "fixing" 3.5.

They are one guys increasingly arbitrary set of houserules that amongst other things, completely strip iconic parts of D&D, instead of fixing them.

Polymorph is ass in 3.5, and we all know it. But the Tome proposes fixes, and the Test of Spite bans.

Druids are awesome, Tome raises everyone's awesome, Test of Spite nerfs Druids to an arbitrary stupid power that is lower than any other caster class. Thus, no one plays Druids.

Ect.

It's fine for what it is, but it is not a 3.5 fix.

Take for example, WBL. Test of Spite just gives people a number and doesn't care, because no one last long enough for it to matter, and all players are PCs and can abuse consumables equally.

On the other hand, Tome has an incredible vision, somewhat short on implementation admittedly, of just straight up making an awesome wealth system that does away with most problems.

Playing Test of Spite rules in an actual game, you come across situations like "My player spent everything on consumables, and now is under wealth. What do I do?"

What's the answer? Same as in 3.5. Um... something that fucks up the game no matter what you do.

Tome actually has a solution.

deathdealingjawa · Post by **deathdealingjawa** » Thu Dec 17, 2009 12:27 am

So Test of Spite "solutions" are similar to like Pathfinder "solutions"? oh god, I am glad my old DM didn't see this he would have loved these rules. That DM had greater weapon focus banhammer, and nerfstick.

It seems like were the tome raises the lease common power level, the ToS lowers the power level.

Ack look at what they did to SLA. SLAs are not free of expenses or somatic components.... have fun with that Naga.

Ice9 · Post by **Ice9** » Thu Dec 17, 2009 12:42 am

Well, they're basically arena-style competition rules. They seems to work fine for their intended purpose, but I wouldn't call them a general fix for campaign-style games.

Being competition rules, a lot of stuff gets banned because of potential exploits (like Lightning Mace, because one character generated hundreds of attacks a round with it), whereas in a campaign it would be better to tweak it slightly or just allow it as long as it wasn't abused.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Thu Dec 17, 2009 12:48 am

deathdealingjawa wrote:So Test of Spite "solutions" are similar to like Pathfinder "solutions"? oh god, I am glad my old DM didn't see this he would have loved these rules. That DM had greater weapon focus banhammer, and nerfstick.

It seems like were the tome raises the lease common power level, the ToS lowers the power level.

Ack look at what they did to SLA. SLAs are not free of expenses or somatic components.... have fun with that Naga.

That's being uncharitable to ToS to compare with Pathfinder.

1) Yes, absolutely, the goal of Test of Spite is to ban or nerf everything over the arbitrary power level he prefers, and everything he personally considers cheesy. Furthermore, when nerfing, the goal is to make it worse than the power level he prefers to punish anyone who wanted to use it.

So, when nerfing, nerf to a lower level than a straight Wizard 20 focusing on save or dies.

That's not a good fix, in fact, it's a terrible fix. But:

2) The solutions are not meant to be solutions for actual games.

That's important. He is not trying to create rules that make a good or sensible party game. He is creating rules in an attempt to make an interesting PvP game out of D&D.

So things that are important in play "I cast Charm Monster, then use Diplomacy" are not a problem when the rules stipulate "You walk in without any minions."

His solutions are not failed solutions of a retarded "role play not roll play" monkey who can't do math. They are solutions to different problems than the ones that exist in actual D&D games.

Using test of spite rules to fix 3.5 D&D is a bad idea. In fact, terrible. But it's not because the rules themselves are that bad, it's because anyone who attempts to use them as a fix for a party vs Monster game is basically attempting to drill for more oil to prevent overfishing.

The problem and solution are unrelated.

deathdealingjawa · Post by **deathdealingjawa** » Thu Dec 17, 2009 2:27 am

Ice9 and Kaelik, thanks for clarifying the intent and use of the ToS rules.

Nihlin · Post by **Nihlin** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:11 am

Keep in mind that, in contests like this, a winning method often has a component banned just to discourage copycats. So, regardless of how powerful item X objectively is, it might be banned just because it happened to be part of a winning combo.

koz · Post by **koz** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:15 am

Nihlin wrote:Keep in mind that, in contests like this, a winning method often has a component banned just to discourage copycats. So, regardless of how powerful item X objectively is, it might be banned just because it happened to be part of a winning combo.

So ToS is like trying to apply the rules of Constructed MtG from years and years ago to DnD? Dear god, it's WORSE than I suspected...

Nihlin · Post by **Nihlin** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:56 am

Mister_Sinister wrote:
Nihlin wrote:Keep in mind that, in contests like this, a winning method often has a component banned just to discourage copycats. So, regardless of how powerful item X objectively is, it might be banned just because it happened to be part of a winning combo.
So ToS is like trying to apply the rules of Constructed MtG from years and years ago to DnD? Dear god, it's WORSE than I suspected...

Yes, pretty much. Even though WotC has moved on since then, it got stuck in at least some people's minds. I've found it in other gaming communities, as well, including those divorced from Magic. For example, you'll often see mods or admins trying to ban or soft-ban the most popular/effective thing at the moment in a FPS. To some extent, this also occurs in professional sports, with the rules changed hamper effective-but-boring strategies. See the shot clock in basketball, for example.

Provided that your goal is to keep the field of entries constantly turning over and changing, it's not a terrible way to go. Not really ideal. but it does the job in a rather crude and blunt way.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 6:21 pm

Per round, no more than the following is permitted:
Two full round actions Or three full attacks per character
Three Standard actions per character
Three Move actions per character
Two Swift actions per character
Thirty Free actions per character
Immediates count against your maximum of swifts

Per round, no more than the following is permitted per minion, familiar, or companion:
One full round action.
Two Standard actions.
Two Move actions.
One Swift actions.
Ten Free actions.
Immediates count against the maximum of swifts

Hmm..... ban everything.... then give away a retarded amount of basic "slots" every round that could be spent on literally hundreds of different types of actions, all of completely different values in a fight?

Yeah, not only is it problematic, it's broken based on the basic ideas of "action cost" that D&D operates on.

Three full attack actions? What the fuck.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 6:31 pm

I think what's being said is that you can't optimize a character into having more than three full attacks a round. I doubt that every PC automatically gets what is stated to be a max allowable number of actions per round.

imperialspectre · Post by **imperialspectre** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 6:53 pm

You don't automatically get the actions, it's a cap on how many you can get. There are many ways to access more actions than that via magic, psionics, or minions, all of which wreck arena fights. So, the max number of actions is capped at a more manageable number.

Red_Rob · Post by **Red_Rob** » Fri Dec 18, 2009 9:29 pm

imperialspectre wrote:You don't automatically get the actions, it's a cap on how many you can get. There are many ways to access more actions than that via magic, psionics, or minions, all of which wreck arena fights. So, the max number of actions is capped at a more manageable number.

So no Octopus Druid 8 full action shenanigans or Quickened Time Stop abuse? Seems like a fair restriction in PvP.

Doc Roc · Post by **Doc Roc** » Thu Jan 21, 2010 3:00 am

Before Kae finishes ramming my head into the mud, I'd like to mention that the ban list was not and is not intended as a primary solution to the core issues of 3.x. We do offer other things that are a more complete and compelling set of changes, but that's neither here nor there.
Let me repeat that more clearly.

No banlist will fix all your problems with a game as deeply damaged as 3.x.
Suggesting that I think one will?
You make us both sound like idiots.

The ToS ban list is a patch that's intended to remove certain deeply problematic elements from 3.x. It is arbitrary. It is not comprehensive. However, it's certainly useful as a set of guidelines and pointers.

Another point:
It's not incompatible with other, bigger, better fixes.
It's not a replacement for the Tomes and it can be used with them to help make the larger body of 3.x more palatable.

A final point:
PvP is not SGT. It is, however, useful data, considering that many monsters will have class levels, that many spells are SLAs, and that many NPCs are going to use PC classes.