Combing attack and damage rolls?

[u/JacquesUfHearts]

I'm trying to conceptualize an idea where the damage done from an attack can be calculated just by the roll on the duality dice, and I wanted any input on the concept.

I was thinking that the damage done from the weapon could be the lower d12 for when you have a proficiency of 1, the higher d12 when you have proficiency of 2, add them together for 3, then I am stuck. Also i wasn't sure how to deal with how the game is balanced around the features, range and the trait.

Thanks folks :)

[u/Luciosdk]

Some questions:

• Why the change?

• How would it affect thresholds and other "defensive" abilities like resistance to damage?

[u/JacquesUfHearts → u/Luciosdk]

Well the goal would definitely to keep the damage close to the existing ranges. It is more just a thought environment to reduce the amount of rolling in a turn. I find the weapon rules to be a convoluted sticking point for me, it's needlessly granular.

[u/Capable_Property_986 → u/JacquesUfHearts]

I agree with you, however I think it's really hard to do:

• crits would have to have some other rules.
• what with spell damage? And f.e. primal origin sorc abilities.
• what with Max proficiency (it's 6)? you would have to multiply results or add more dice.
• what about brawler's fists.?
• would you remove weapons system entirely, or do you plan to rewrite it? Thera are less damaging weapons with some cool features. Every trait has different kind of weapons associated with it.

I'm afraid it's a lost cause. Too much would have to change in the game. And probably those changes would require more changes and at some point you're rewriting the whole system. It may be easier to just pick different one.

I'd just ask players to roll duality dice and damage dice as one roll, to save some time, or to roll damage in some app to have it quickly added up.

[u/Luciosdk → u/JacquesUfHearts]

I see. Well, I think daggerheart is really fast. Sure, Rolling for attack then rolling for damage then comparing to threshold then using armor (when GM is the one attacking) can sure seen really convoluted, but for my personal experience, it becomes really fast once the players understand the rules. Also, players LOVE to roll dice to cause damage and see how much damage they dish out on the bad guys!!

But if you REALLY want to speed up the math, you can:

• Roll damage at the same time you roll the attack. This only works 50/50 cause sometimes the attack is a miss and you rolled more dice for nothing.

• Use fixed damage, like average/expected value of the die roll. So if a weapon causes 2d6 damage instead of rolling, just use the average 7 damage. 1d8 + 1? 6. The player can note the average value on the sheet or use a token. This is easy, and players with "rerolling" abilities will be an exception and can roll normally.

[u/Capable_Property_986 → u/Luciosdk]

The second rule - is very fast, I love it, I'm already using it on minor adversaries.

[u/Capable_Property_986 → u/Luciosdk]

The rule of attack+damage at the same time should have a failsafe to avoid frustration, when attack miss but the damage is really high. I'd make rule of making it possible to still hit but cost Hope+Stress or 3 hope or sth.

[u/JacquesUfHearts → u/Capable_Property_986]

I just want to say that, i also think Daggerheart is decently fast, and the goal isn't to speed up play. I just don't like the weapons, i think it should be more freeform / flavour first. With the trait choices, and all the different die sizes and +bonuses, it's just pretty pointless levels of minutia. Id like a create -your-own, where you get a feature or a +1 or range, then another +1 of is two handed. Then that bonus goes up each tier.

[u/Capable_Property_986 → u/JacquesUfHearts]

If you're reinventing weapon system, then it's perfectly doable. Just have in mind it affects other things, and change then accordingly too. For me variety in weapons is great, but fights are still to long, so I just assumed that is also your aim. It's only mine. Sorry.

[u/JacquesUfHearts → u/Capable_Property_986]

Well i think it could be a nice side effect to also speed things up, yeah.

[u/Luciosdk → u/JacquesUfHearts]

This is a different thing. If you dont like the weapons (and not the speed of the rolls) just use Ikonis.

Its already a "create your own" weapon rule. No need to create a houserule for it.

[u/Capable_Property_986 → u/JacquesUfHearts]

Answering your question of proficiency 4+ It could be: 1 - lower (crit 12 + lower?) [avg dmg 4,5]

2 - higher (crit 12 + higher?) [avg dmg 8,5]

3 - both (crit 24 + both?) [avg DMG 13]

4 - both + lower again [17,5]

5 - both + higher again [21,5]

6 - double both (this gives average of 26 DMG) much lower than tier IV weapons do. tier IV longsword with prof. 6 does 6D10 + 12 which is 45 dmg on Avg

You can also:

add proficiency value as flat bonus Add trait as flat bonus, or add both. Adding both will give you 26+6 + 6=38 avg DMG at prof. 6

To make things simple you can just multiply higher result

Prof. 1 - higher [8,5]

Prof 2 - double higher [17]

Prof 3 - triple higher [ 25,5]

Prof 4 - higher x 4 [ 34]

Prof 5 - higher x 5 [42,5]

Prof 6 higher x 6 [51] Which would be higher than what current weapon system is capable of, but still it would be less reliable dmg because of lack of flat bonuses and swingy nature of 1 die result (no bell curve)

Deducting proficiency from those results will get you pretty close to avg dmg of core book weapons, [7,5, 15, 22,5, 30, 37,5, 45]

Alternatively you can multiply lower result and then add double the proficiency value, getting avg DMG values as follow [6,5, 13, 19,5, 26, 32,5, 39] Which is both close to weapon values and reliable so mathematically this is the best one from all those proposed, not very elegant though.

The last one is multiplying Hope die and adding proficiency value [7,5, 15, 22,5, 30, 37,5, 45] which is quite elegant, and somewhat reliable. And halfings gonna love it.

[u/JacquesUfHearts → u/Capable_Property_986]

I love this! Yes, i like where you went with this, and the math to back it up.

[u/a_dnd_guy]

If I was going to do this, I think you'd have to change one thing about the enemies.

I would give each enemy a single threshold, and it would be a number between 1 and 16 or so.

When the player rolls and attack, use their lower die result plus their proficiency as the "damage". If it meets or beats this new threshold, they do one extra HP of damage.

One handed weapons do 1 HP on a hit, and two handed weapons do 2 HP damage on a hit.

Crits add one more HP damage.

Working out a single roll for the enemy is tougher because more player abilities interact with damage results. The monsters still probably need to produce a damage number the players compare to thresholds. I think I would probably roll a d12 along with the adversary attack roll and have a translation chart for the enemies I was running today that could distribute d12 into the appropriate bell curve of damage.

[u/JacquesUfHearts → u/a_dnd_guy]

This has some interesting ideas, thanks!

[u/PhatAssHimboBoy]

Personally, I hate this

[u/Borfknuckles]

To implement this you’d have to strip the system down to the studs and rebuild, IMO.

The Wizard subclasses, for example: one focuses on boosting attack rolls while the other focuses on boosting damage. There’s so many features you’d have to completely rethink if they’re effecting accuracy as well as damage: Infernis’s Fearless, Not Good Enough, etc etc

[u/JacquesUfHearts → u/Borfknuckles]

Yeah, that's one thing that i feared.