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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: Mr. Death on April 27, 2015, 09:30:18 PM
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So, after playing a bunch of Sentinels of the Multiverse, I had an idea. There's a handful of ways in that game to redirect an attack away from a friendly target and into someone else, so how about:
Redirect Attack: After a successful defense against a melee attack, you can skip your next turn to attack another target using the Weapon rating of your attacker.
I'm stuck on whether this should act like Step Into The Blow, where you get to roll another attack immediately, or like Riposte, where you'd just use your defense roll as your attack roll. Wording may also need some work.
Thoughts?
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Wouldn't making a "I stole ur knife!" maneuver be an easier, non-refresh way of using your opponents weapon scores?
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If you're no good with a knife, it's useless, and you can't steal the +2/4/6 from your opponent's strength powers. You also can't do so in reaction without a stunt.
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The challenge of doing it like ripost is that ripost allows you to take the difference in your defense vs the attack as the number of shifts for your ripost attack. When you involve another target, I feel like they should also get a separate defense. That's an extra roll, so it seems less smooth.
Step into the blow doesn't really make as much sense to me. You've been hit AND you redirected their attack? I think it's balanced but the fluff doesn't make sense to me.
Why don't you make it more like Redirected Force? You get to place a maneuver as part of your dodge as long as you lose your next turn. It just lets you place that maneuver on another target (limited to the zone you're in, I'd think).
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I would just go with a hybrid solution....On a successful defense, you can redirect the attack. The first opponent's weapon damage becomes "your" weapon damage. Your "to defend" becomes your "to strike" against a second opponent. That opponent gets a defense. If it's equal to or lower than your "to strike" roll, the blow lands.
That or, maybe a bit more simply, use the original attacker's strike roll and have the second opponent defend against it. Effectively, the stunt would allow you to sacrifice your next action on a successful defense to force an attack from one opponent against another.
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Maybe instead of rolling against your opponent, sacrifice a fate point to redirect to a new target. Redirecting attacks sounds like a 'only once in a while, when it's important' kind of thing anyways.
I mean, when are you going to want to do it? Every day, all day or when it's most dramatic?
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I mean, when are you going to want to do it? Every day, all day or when it's most dramatic?
That depends. There are some characters where this might be central to their fighting style. Think of Jackie Chan's movies. He spends 99% of his "attacks" as redirects, sending on of his opponents' attacks at another. This stunt is trying to do exactly that. It requires input from the attacker (their roll), defense and a redirection from the original defender (defense roll and stunt to convert into attack roll) and defense from the new defender (a second opponent rolling defense).
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That depends. There are some characters where this might be central to their fighting style. Think of Jackie Chan's movies. He spends 99% of his "attacks" as redirects, sending on of his opponents' attacks at another. This stunt is trying to do exactly that. It requires input from the attacker (their roll), defense and a redirection from the original defender (defense roll and stunt to convert into attack roll) and defense from the new defender (a second opponent rolling defense).
I honestly think the ordinary rules cover that behavior much better than attack redirection, because those guys almost certainly have worse stats than Jackie, so it would take a ridiculously long time for that combat to end if all of those individual punches and kicks counted as redirected attacks. Much better to just describe Jackie redirecting those attacks and actually have him be making Fists attacks against the nameless goons.
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I think Jackie is doing maneuvers and following up with attacks. Which is why I think redirected Force would work nicely.
That said, how about a stunt that lets you use your enemy's weapon rating for your fist/weapon strikes?
So you could just attack normally, but use the weapon value of your enemy to narrate how you redirected an attack. It would only apply on attacks where you were attacked by the weapon in question.
It's not so great if you're wielding a Great sword, but if you're wielding fists/daggers or a light weapon, it'd be cool.
So, opponent A attacks you.
On your turn, you attack opponent B with your attack chance but with opponent A's weapon value.
Edit: and/or you could make it like step into the blow, except it only applies when you dodge. You give up an attack to get an immediate attack against another opponent in the zone, using the first opponents weapon value.
I might allow you to use opponents strength value on top of that...I dunno.
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That could actually work pretty well. But does it let you redirect their equipment only or equipment and power bonuses?
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I edited. see above.
I'm not actually sure. If you redirect someone coming at you with Mythic force, wouldn't that force be redirected to the new target?
Or, would the act of redirecting it, slow it down too much?
Maybe it could be a second stunt with the first as a pre-requisite?
-1 refresh gets you weapon value only
-2 refresh gets you strength bonus too?
There's an advantage, then, to not taking out the mythically strong person and, instead, using them as a weapon against others...but if you don't attack them and take them out, you're risking being hit by them...
And, if you make it take up your next turn, then you can only do it every second exchange
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Also, wrinkle. If there's a precedent for redirecting attacks of some kind, does that mean its ok to redirect attacks of all kinds?
See: wizard rocket tennis.
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Also, wrinkle. If there's a precedent for redirecting attacks of some kind, does that mean its ok to redirect attacks of all kinds?
See: wizard rocket tennis.
Rocket tennis could be a cool extended test between two wizards during a combat!
at the same time, I'd love to see the surprise on a players face when you redirect their weapon 12 evocation back at their ally!
Honestly, redirecting missile weapons should be close to impossible. Probably the realm of powers and not stunts. That said, I could see that, if you're in melee with someone and someone else shoots into that melee, you could move out of the way, or use your opponent as a shield against the incoming attack.
This is stuff I'd allow with maneuvers. A player uses might to create a maneuver of "human shield" (maybe while grappling). Then tags for effect when another opponent attacks in order to have that attack hit the shield instead.
Overall, I'd limit it to melee and limit it to other characters in the same zone. But you have a good point.
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Not to mention social and mental attacks. I think before working on redirection I should probably go familiarize myself with all the ways to cause stress in the game.
I do kinda feel like redirection should be limited somehow besides rolls. It sounds cool, but 4 or 5 rolls into a tennis match with one increasingly powerful attack I think the other players will be getting bored with declaring and maneuvering to help one person not get blown into tiny pieces.
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I would just go with a hybrid solution....On a successful defense, you can redirect the attack. The first opponent's weapon damage becomes "your" weapon damage. Your "to defend" becomes your "to strike" against a second opponent. That opponent gets a defense. If it's equal to or lower than your "to strike" roll, the blow lands.
That or, maybe a bit more simply, use the original attacker's strike roll and have the second opponent defend against it. Effectively, the stunt would allow you to sacrifice your next action on a successful defense to force an attack from one opponent against another.
That's more or less how I initially thought of it -- seems to make the most sense.
That depends. There are some characters where this might be central to their fighting style. Think of Jackie Chan's movies. He spends 99% of his "attacks" as redirects, sending on of his opponents' attacks at another. This stunt is trying to do exactly that. It requires input from the attacker (their roll), defense and a redirection from the original defender (defense roll and stunt to convert into attack roll) and defense from the new defender (a second opponent rolling defense).
Murphy's Aikido comes to mind, too -- there's one bit in Proven Guilty where she does exactly this, redirects one of the Hammerhands dude's attacks into his own foot.
Rocket tennis could be a cool extended test between two wizards during a combat!
Isn't that kind of how Harry and Ortega's duel worked out?
But yeah, redirecting projectiles would be a lot trickier -- the only way I could see it working mundanely is something like if you're standing directly between your attacker and one of his goons, and you duck at just the right moment. Like the Deadly Dodging trope.
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Not to mention social and mental attacks. I think before working on redirection I should probably go familiarize myself with all the ways to cause stress in the game.
Well, social attacks don't have a weapon value, so it'd kind of be useless
I could see some kind of mental defense power that lets you redirect an attack at someone else - like some kind of jedi mind trick....does that make you a Lawbreaker? :) j/k. Let's not have that discussion.
I do kinda feel like redirection should be limited somehow besides rolls. It sounds cool, but 4 or 5 rolls into a tennis match with one increasingly powerful attack I think the other players will be getting bored with declaring and maneuvering to help one person not get blown into tiny pieces.
He's not suggesting you re-direct it back at the person who attacked you. That would be riposte. He's suggesting that you redirect it at a 3rd party. If that 3rd party had the same stunt, he could re-direct it to someone else, but it wouldn't affect the weapon value at all. It always uses the same weapon value of the original attack. And, if everyone is giving up their turn to do this, it can't go on infinitely.
Isn't that kind of how Harry and Ortega's duel worked out?
Yeah, pretty much!
But yeah, redirecting projectiles would be a lot trickier -- the only way I could see it working mundanely is something like if you're standing directly between your attacker and one of his goons, and you duck at just the right moment. Like the Deadly Dodging trope.
Yeah, exactly.
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Well, social attacks don't have a weapon value, so it'd kind of be useless
I could see some kind of mental defense power that lets you redirect an attack at someone else - like some kind of jedi mind trick....does that make you a Lawbreaker? :) j/k. Let's not have that discussion.
After looking up Incite Emotion and the social skills, I'd have to agree with you on that.
But if redirecting magic nastiness is lawbreaking, then I'm gonna have to go look at Proven Guilty again. I thought it was standard WC practice to bat back incoming bad stuff.
He's not suggesting you re-direct it back at the person who attacked you. That would be riposte. He's suggesting that you redirect it at a 3rd party. If that 3rd party had the same stunt, he could re-direct it to someone else, but it wouldn't affect the weapon value at all. It always uses the same weapon value of the original attack. And, if everyone is giving up their turn to do this, it can't go on infinitely.
But if you beat their roll in order to redirect, are you using the original roll or new roll in the final stress count? Also, why couldn't redirect be the same mechanic as riposte? Is there a difference between them besides target? If there isn't, why differentiate?
And if everyone is giving up their turn, then of course it can go on infinitely. The PCs smack back an attack, the BBEG + flunkies turns it around on them, and the two sides just spend each round doing nothing but sending the attack back where it came from until somebody rolls a -4 and everybody on their team is out of tags. That's a potentially indefinite series of redirects.
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Redirecting spells does not break any of the Laws, because it's not your magic doing it. The entropy curse in Blood Rites, the phobopages in Proven Guilty and the [CENSORED] in Skin Game all skirt around Lawbreaking by effectively shunting the magic away from its original target. The only danger comes from the original caster because it was their decision to make a spell lethal or non-lethal in the first place.
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And if everyone is giving up their turn, then of course it can go on infinitely. The PCs smack back an attack, the BBEG + flunkies turns it around on them, and the two sides just spend each round doing nothing but sending the attack back where it came from until somebody rolls a -4 and everybody on their team is out of tags. That's a potentially indefinite series of redirects.
I'm now imagining like some huge ogre with a hammer being swung in circles for like 20 minutes before someone loses the world's deadliest game of hot potato.
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But if redirecting magic nastiness is lawbreaking, then I'm gonna have to go look at Proven Guilty again. I thought it was standard WC practice to bat back incoming bad stuff.
You're probably right but I was just kidding. Lawbreaking conversations can get a thread widely off topic.
But if you beat their roll in order to redirect, are you using the original roll or new roll in the final stress count? Also, why couldn't redirect be the same mechanic as riposte? Is there a difference between them besides target? If there isn't, why differentiate?
And if everyone is giving up their turn, then of course it can go on infinitely. The PCs smack back an attack, the BBEG + flunkies turns it around on them, and the two sides just spend each round doing nothing but sending the attack back where it came from until somebody rolls a -4 and everybody on their team is out of tags. That's a potentially indefinite series of redirects.
With riposte, one guy attacks and another defends. If the defense beats the attack, the defense becomes an automatic attack on the first attacker. The amount of success depends on the difference of shifts between those two original rolls. You don't make any extra rolls. That makes it hard to include a third person.
That said, you could do as Dragoonbuster suggested and have the 3rd person make a defense against the original defense roll(since that defense roll has become the attack).
With Step into the Blow (which I'm suggesting you use), if you fail to defend, you get an immediate attack against your attacker at +1.
I'm suggesting that, if you dodge, you get an immediate attack against another person in your zone using the attackers weapon value. You have to give up your next turn to do it. So you can only do this 1 time every 2 exchanges.
Example:
Ogre swings club at Bob.
- Bob defends, re-directs club at Alex (Bob rolls an immediate attack and uses the Ogres weapon value)
- Alex can defend. If Alex also has the stunt, he re-directs at Thomas. (Alex rolls an immediate attack and uses the Ogres weapon value)
- Thomas rolls to dodge. If Thomas also has the stunt, he re-directs at Bob. (Thomas makes an attack roll and Bob gets to defend. Bob has already used up his next action, so he can't use the stunt again. If he successfully dodges, then the attack hits no-one).
This scenario would be coolest (and most like a bugs bunny cartoon) if Thomas re-directs the attack back at the ogre and the ogre smacks himself in the face. :)
On the next exchange, Alex, Thomas and Bob can't act. They've all given up their action for that exchange. It, therefore, goes straight back to the Ogres turn and the whole process starts again.
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I'm suggesting that, if you dodge, you get an immediate attack against another person in your zone using the attackers weapon value. You have to give up your next turn to do it. So you can only do this 1 time every 2 exchanges.
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On the next exchange, Alex, Thomas and Bob can't act. They've all given up their action for that exchange. It, therefore, goes straight back to the Ogres turn and the whole process starts again.
I don't see how it would be something only doable once per two exchanges. There's nothing stopping everyone from using the stunt again on the Ogres second attack, as it's a new exchange.
Exc 1: Ogre attacks, everyone stunts it around (using up their action for Exc 2) until it's back to someone who already redirected, or someone fails to defend.
Exc 2: Anyone who redirected last exc can't act. Ogre attacks again. Everyone stunts it around (using action for Exc 3), as above.
Exc 3: Lather, Rinse, Repeat
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I don't see how it would be something only doable once per two exchanges. There's nothing stopping everyone from using the stunt again on the Ogres second attack, as it's a new exchange.
Exc 1: Ogre attacks, everyone stunts it around (using up their action for Exc 2) until it's back to someone who already redirected, or someone fails to defend.
Exc 2: Anyone who redirected last exc can't act. Ogre attacks again. Everyone stunts it around (using action for Exc 3), as above.
Exc 3: Lather, Rinse, Repeat
That's what my example laid out. I guess what I mean is you can only attack 1 time per exchange and not twice. You can only attack on your turn or the ogres turn, not both.
So, if the ogre attacks and you use your redirect, then you get no action in the next exchange if the ogre decides to attack someone else.
We're on the same page, I just said it wrong the first time.
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Another quick question would be whether you can give up your turn in the next round if you've already had your go in this one.
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Another quick question would be whether you can give up your turn in the next round if you've already had your go in this one.
That's how I run Riposte and Redirected Force. I'd allow it for something like this, too.
After seeing a lot more discussion on this...I think the idea of a stunt letting you use an opponent's weapon rating on your next attack on a successful defense is the "cleanest" approach to the situation. As far as strength stacking, I'd say yes, because strength in Dresden is less about force=ma and more about simple supernatural mojo. Also because it's not really a very good stunt otherwise.
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Another quick question would be whether you can give up your turn in the next round if you've already had your go in this one.
That's the whole purpose of giving up your next action. If you've already gone, you have give up your next on the next round, otherwise you'd get a free extra attack which doesn't happen in this game at all(action economy and all that).
I think the stunt (riposte and Step into the Blow) specifically says, "Your next action". It doesn't specify what exchange.
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I just thought of a good way:
If you successfully dodge, you may apply that same attack against another opponent in the same zone. They may dodge the attack.
Just simple. And it means you can't turn a pathetic attack into a hugely damaging attack.
For instance, the way I had it before, If I had a weapon skill of +5 and someone attacked me with a +1 attack, I could take that same attack and redirect it at an opponent with a skill of +5. Which doesn't make sense to me.
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I just thought of a good way:
If you successfully dodge, you may apply that same attack against another opponent in the same zone. They may dodge the attack.
Just simple. And it means you can't turn a pathetic attack into a hugely damaging attack.
For instance, the way I had it before, If I had a weapon skill of +5 and someone attacked me with a +1 attack, I could take that same attack and redirect it at an opponent with a skill of +5. Which doesn't make sense to me.
Seconded. Though I'm assuming you're still assuming 1 per exchange via sacrificing your next action.
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Seconded. Though I'm assuming you're still assuming 1 per exchange via sacrificing your next action.
yes.
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I just thought of a good way:
If you successfully dodge, you may apply that same attack against another opponent in the same zone. They may dodge the attack.
Just simple. And it means you can't turn a pathetic attack into a hugely damaging attack.
For instance, the way I had it before, If I had a weapon skill of +5 and someone attacked me with a +1 attack, I could take that same attack and redirect it at an opponent with a skill of +5. Which doesn't make sense to me.
It makes sense to me -- and doing it that way would make the stunt vastly less useful.
Look at it this way -- a really good defense means you have more control over your opponent. You could redirect a terrible, wild swing however you wanted. The stunt is an application of your own skill in redirecting the attack.
And doing it your way makes for an extremely narrow utility -- where it's only useful if your opponent rolls just under your defense roll, but still high enough to hit someone else. It makes little sense and makes it so that a larger difference between your defense roll and the attack roll means nothing, when logically a defensive stunt should be better with a high defense roll. Hell, the book already outright says that it's kind of a ripoff that hugely good defense rolls are basically worthless.
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It makes sense to me -- and doing it that way would make the stunt vastly less useful.
Look at it this way -- a really good defense means you have more control over your opponent. You could redirect a terrible, wild swing however you wanted. The stunt is an application of your own skill in redirecting the attack.
And doing it your way makes for an extremely narrow utility -- where it's only useful if your opponent rolls just under your defense roll, but still high enough to hit someone else. It makes little sense and makes it so that a larger difference between your defense roll and the attack roll means nothing, when logically a defensive stunt should be better with a high defense roll. Hell, the book already outright says that it's kind of a ripoff that hugely good defense rolls are basically worthless.
Hmmm...good points.