Annoying Game Questions You Want Answered

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Wed Mar 25, 2015 6:46 pm

Pet clases, like a ranger with a wolf buddy or a druid with a bear, is there any D&D-esque level based game that's gotten that to work? Any TOME pet class made on TGDMB worth looking at?

Should treating the pet like another PC with its own actions be avoided, or should it be sharing the action economy of its master? If so how to do that without feeling gimped in some way.

angelfromanotherpin · Post by **angelfromanotherpin** » Wed Mar 25, 2015 6:58 pm

The Pokemaster and it's IP-scrubbed reskin the Monster Tamer has done good service in a game I ran. Also, someone else was praising the Bonded Summoner as a workable pet class, although the pet is an elemental.

hyzmarca · Post by **hyzmarca** » Wed Mar 25, 2015 7:09 pm

OgreBattle wrote: If so how to do that without feeling gimped in some way.

Oh, that's easy. You're a pokemon master. Your pet is your weapon.

The fighter's sword does not get separate actions from him. Likewise, the wizards spells usually don't get separate actions.

All that's needed to avoid a feeling of being your bear bear gimped is for commanding the bear be a viable combat action in and of itself.

Fighter casts sword.
Wizard casts fireball
Beastmaster casts bear

And all three are effectively contributing to the encounter.

The gimped feeling comes when you have powers that are substantially better than bear, to the point that spending on action to cast bear would be stupid. This is the druid problem. He's a full spellcaster and he could just wildshape into a bear if he really wanted to. Having a pet bear really doesn't contribute anything to the encounter.

Likewise, if feels gimped if you nerf a multitasking beastmaster such that casting bear and swinging a sword at the same time is equal to a fighter just swinging a sword.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Wed Mar 25, 2015 11:20 pm

hyzmarca wrote:Beastmaster casts bear

Welp, that's a line that will be going into Princes of the City.

Dean · Post by **Dean** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 12:01 am

Pathfinder's Summoner works well. The trick that both Pathfinder's Summoner and Bonded Summoner get right is making the pet a DMF that the caster is a pocket buffer for. A DMF can be competent enough to be dragged along into the upper levels with enough caster pity and having your own caster who's dedicated to pitying just your pet it works out pretty well.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 8:24 am

How 'bout when the pet is not the main feature of the class but a supporting element? Say a ranger with a pet hawk or wolf, the ranger is still the primary contributor of that relationship:

I'm thinking something like the rogue's sneak attack progression, but the bonus to attack is tied to master and pet attacking together. Master and pet would also get opportunity attacks to protect one another so you don't just end up with one of them focus fired to death early on in the fight.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:30 am

In that case, your class features are

Pet: You are followed around by some sort of animal. Its attacks are weak, but just as accurate as your own.
Pet Protector: If someone attacks your pet, that provokes an AoO from you. Even if you don't currently threaten them. Even if you're wielding a ranged weapon.
Maulings: Whenever you successfully attack someone currently threatened by your pet, your pet gets an AoO against that person. This AoO deals +1d6 damage per two Pethaver Levels. Also, you never risk accidentally shooting your pet with ranged weapons, even when firing into a melee or a grapple.
Pet Power: Your pet uses your max HP, HD, Saves and AC if yours are better.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 1:46 pm

Grek wrote:
Pet Power: Your pet uses your max HP, HD, Saves and AC if yours are better.

Don't make the polymorph mistake.

The pet's stats should be fully replaced by the pet template, then modified by customization.

(Alternatively, keep the existing stats and modify with template, but that seems riskier)

Chamomile · Post by **Chamomile** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 3:41 pm

Just custom build the pets to balance with the PC, then add them to the Monster Manual, rather than pulling pets balanced to oppose PCs from the Monster Manual. The game would not implode if lions and tigers and bears were optimized slightly differently and possibly had their CRs shuffled around.

Hadanelith · Post by **Hadanelith** » Fri Mar 27, 2015 6:46 am

Grek, I'd play that. I'd play that a lot. And I'm not a huge fan of Pokemon, or the PF Summoner, or any of that. But that little distilled list of abilities...I've played in games where that would be better than half the shit that went on the character sheets. And that simultaneously makes me sad (by the surly beard of Mrifk, those games were shitty) and enthused (because hell, that's 80% of a character sheet in one bloody paragraph, and that's some sweet game design). Well done.

Lokathor · Post by **Lokathor** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 5:34 am

As a way to give lowest level casters a boost in daily staying power, what if the restriction on bonus spell slots needing to have at least one spell slot of that level normally were lifted?

That is, a wizard with 16 Int gets 1 bonus spell slot for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd spell levels. At 1st level they normally only get to use the 1st level bonus slot and the 2nd and 3rd level slots are ignored. What if they could use all bonus slots granted by their stat right away? They'd just load up on more 1st level spells until they level up.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 7:30 am

Hm. I actually kind of like that idea. Like, they're intelligent/wise/charismatic enough to channel more magical energy, they just haven't learned more powerful spells, so they get to focus that extra energy into what they do know.

I like it, I might look at using it in future games I run.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 10:16 am

Give casters a couple more 1st level spells at 1st level. Polish up the progressions so they start with 3-5 spells rather than 1-3 by class and it evens out later on.

3
4
4 1
4 2
4 2 1
4 3 2
4 3 2 1 <- normal at 7th level Wizard, plus bonus spells.

Also, do not stack more bonuses onto a Wizard's Intelligence score. No.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 6:36 pm

Not wishing to (further) threadshit the Constructing D&D thread-

I'm still not clear on how "Infinite Location=Infinite Inhabitants."

Just because a dog park is a square mile does not mean that dogs are evenly distributed across that square mile, and while the Elemental Plane of Dog might be full of infinite dog (as dog is the component material of that plane), just because the material plane is infinite should not mean there are infinite dogs, because they're not evenly distributed over that infinity. It should be reasonable to say "Dogs only exist on this continent of the infinite plane."

So why does "infinite size" mean "infinite population?"

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 6:50 pm

Prak wrote:So why does "infinite size" mean "infinite population?"

Because, to quote Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Any finite number divided by infinity is as close to zero as makes no odds.

If an area of infinite size doesn't have an infinite population, then it's an empty set. Infinity is really, really big.

Douglas Adams wrote:It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.

If space were actually infinite and population finite, that would be literally true.

-Username17

spongeknight · Post by **spongeknight** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 7:04 pm

FrankTrollman wrote:
Prak wrote:So why does "infinite size" mean "infinite population?"
Because, to quote Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Any finite number divided by infinity is as close to zero as makes no odds.

If an area of infinite size doesn't have an infinite population, then it's an empty set. Infinity is really, really big.

Douglas Adams wrote:It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.
If space were actually infinite and population finite, that would be literally true.

-Username17

Also, outsiders aren't made of flesh, they are made out of the same stuff that the actual planes they inhabit are made out of. That is, demons are formed out of The Nine Hells itself instead of being birthed. So with the infinite space in the Hells, there are infinite demons being created at all times. Same with devils, angels, and a few others.

deaddmwalking · Post by **deaddmwalking** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 7:04 pm

If you assume 1 dog per square mile, an infinite dog park would have an infinite number of dogs (but only 1 per square mile). If you assume a population of only 1 dog per quadrillion square miles, because you are talking about infinity, you don't have quadrillions of quadrillion square mile dog parks - you still have an infinite number of them.

All you've done is put more distance between individuals - there still must be an infinite number of them...

You've certainly heard about monkeys, typewriters, and the complete works of Shakespeare. Infinity is big enough to make everything that could happen do so again and again and again.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 8:16 pm

Doesn't this presume that there isn't a causal relationship between people close together? (A finite subset of the universe with a nonzero population density, and an infinite uninhabited space around it)

John Magnum · Post by **John Magnum** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 8:20 pm

If you're going to posit a finite inhabited space surrounded by an infinite uninhabited space, why are you bothering to include the infinite uninhabited space instead of just writing down that wherever is finite?

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Sat Mar 28, 2015 8:32 pm

I suppose I would go with what Frank suggested for the Abyssal Sea, where nobody has discovered edges or wrapping to it, and leave it for DMs to decide what's up with that.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sun Mar 29, 2015 12:27 am

Prak wrote:Not wishing to (further) threadshit the Constructing D&D thread-

I'm still not clear on how "Infinite Location=Infinite Inhabitants."

Just because a dog park is a square mile does not mean that dogs are evenly distributed across that square mile, and while the Elemental Plane of Dog might be full of infinite dog (as dog is the component material of that plane), just because the material plane is infinite should not mean there are infinite dogs, because they're not evenly distributed over that infinity. It should be reasonable to say "Dogs only exist on this continent of the infinite plane."

So why does "infinite size" mean "infinite population?"

It doesn't. But if you wander an infinite space, your odds of finding any finite thing in that infinite space are exactly zero. The odds are not slim, they are mathematically zero, and it's impossible. Using the example I mentioned in the other thread, the Endless Maze has a wandering monster table, which means you are explicitly supposed to bump into things while wandering this infinite space. And for that to be true, there have to be infinite things.

You could have a finite area that contains a finite amount of stuff inside an infinite region that is otherwise empty, and you can reach that finite region because of greater teleport, and then you can wander that finite area bumping into the finite stuff contained therein appropriately. But that's not how the Endless Maze works. And it would make the whole "infinite part" just a way of saying "here be dragons; no one goes there, it's just a bunch of empty tunnels."

RadiantPhoenix wrote:I suppose I would go with what Frank suggested for the Abyssal Sea, where nobody has discovered edges or wrapping to it, and leave it for DMs to decide what's up with that.

I'm pretty sure you're talking about my post, unless Frank also said that somewhere and I missed it, in which case disregard that I suck cocks.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Sun Mar 29, 2015 1:28 am

DSMatticus wrote:It doesn't. But if you wander an infinite space, your odds of finding any finite thing in that infinite space are exactly zero. The odds are not slim, they are mathematically zero, and it's impossible. Using the example I mentioned in the other thread, the Endless Maze has a wandering monster table, which means you are explicitly supposed to bump into things while wandering this infinite space. And for that to be true, there have to be infinite things.

This is only true given a uniform distribution. If you have a normal distribution centered around some point in the Endless Maze (for example: the entrance) then your odds are not zero even if there are finite monsters. Likewise if the monsters aren't randomly distributed at all, and instead a some portion of finite number of monsters are Greater Teleported into position whereever you happen to be in the infinite maze.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sun Mar 29, 2015 2:36 am

Weird math logic. Got it.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sun Mar 29, 2015 2:47 am

Grek, you're mistaking very large numbers for infinity.

If there are finite monsters distributed binomially around some point in an infinite expanse, then there is an infinite amount of space without any monsters in it, and your chance of being anywhere near the space with the monster cluster is zero.

What you have is literally a finite space of finite monsters that you can either specifically travel to or you will never see at all. There's a special case that the edge of that finite space is connected to an infinite void, rather like our planet is sitting in space (though that again is just a very large space, rather than an infinite one), but it's still a "finite space with monsters in it" in every conceivable way.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Sun Mar 29, 2015 2:50 am

DSMatticus wrote:I'm pretty sure you're talking about my post, unless Frank also said that somewhere and I missed it, in which case disregard that I suck cocks.

Might have been.

All you avatarless people look alike to me.