Armor and Fatigue

[Hypatia]

Not that its necessary; but anyone who has worn actual armor knows it doesn't really slow you down or limit your movement much, but it does make you tired faster.  On that note..  I was thinking maybe armor should add to your exhaustion ticks a little bit per weight category. 1 for light, 2 for medium and 3 for heavy.

A little more incentive to travel out of armor. and the more realistic way that armor should tire you out a little quicker when you're exerting yourself in it.

I know that unarmored combat is already vastly more effective than it should be, and so armored warriors probably don't need any more drawbacks; but it could be a nice realism flavor thing I suppose.

[APorg]

While this is realistic, I don't like the idea of accentuating a system which is really not interactive enough at the moment.

Personally,  I find it to be annoying that the main way I have to interact with Fatigue is through OOC debug messages.  Yes, there are some IC status messages, but they can be hard to keep track of and arrive only when you're already quite deep into exhaustion and are almost receiving, or already receiving, exhaustion penalties.  There's no "you are winded" message when you get at half your exhaustion, for example, it's "10 out of 20".   IMO the first thing we need for the Exhaustion system is some equivalent of the Barely Injured/Injured/Badly Wounded/Near Death status markers we have for HP, for example.

There's not a lot of transparency about how it works, either. I think Lesser Restoration lets you recover from Exhaustion penalties while Bard Song removes Exhaustion itself? I think it's worth re-visiting that because I think making Exhaustion even worse for some classes while it being a non-issue for others may well be aggravating existing balance issues.

[SardineTheAncestor]

I'm posting in opposition. I think armour is in a precarious place right now and if we are to implement something like this, which could eventually be a viable change, it needs to come with a buff to the direct combat benefits of wearing armour.

I disagree that there should be any incentive to travel out of armour -- in the context of adventuring, for example, it makes little sense to walk all the way to a dangerous area and then get your harness on only once you're there. This makes the armoured person vulnerable but the enemy can't counter it, because the dungeon enemies are permanently on the defence & will not come out to attack you if you do something like this. There are other ways to get people to walk to their destination.

I think Lesser Restoration lets you recover from Exhaustion penalties while Bard Song removes Exhaustion itself? I think it's worth re-visiting that because I think making Exhaustion even worse for some classes while it being a non-issue for others may well be aggravating existing balance issues.

I learned by mistake once that restoration spells remove the attack debuff and spell failure, but not the movement speed reduction, until the next exhaustion tick occurs. Not sure about bardsong, but it should just be the feat that does that.

[APorg]

Right.  I think Freedom helps with the movement slow down, I think.  But this is kind of my point: this is a domain where not a lot of clarity or transparency of the game mechanics is available, but it's not in the "FOIC" genre of mystery.  If it's reasonable to know what a Cure Light Wounds spell does, it's surely reasonable to know which spells interact with Exhaustion, but AFAIK such tends to be discovered by accident.

Right now, the Exhaustion system is in a state where it's not very user friendly.  This is OK for its limited objectives -- it makes PCs run around less, and gives some classes a nice little edge in some circumstances, but it's not so overwhelming that reasonable precautions can't mitigate this.  Change the latter fact and suddenly people will be needing to interact more with Exhaustion...

[Marcus Weyland]

I like the idea, though I share concerns that, for heavy armor users, it'd be a pretty unilateral nerf. Considering how comparable platemail users' defenses are to dodge/tumble/parry light armor users', I worry we might be making armor less viable than it should be.

I'd be in favor, though, of tying fatigue rate to characters' total carried weight relative to their encumbrance threshold. An incentive to travel lighter might be immersive.

[Leezil]

I like the idea, though I share concerns that, for heavy armor users, it'd be a pretty unilateral nerf. Considering how comparable platemail users' defenses are to dodge/tumble/parry light armor users', I worry we might be making armor less viable than it should be.

I'd be in favor, though, of tying fatigue rate to characters' total carried weight relative to their encumbrance threshold. An incentive to travel lighter might be immersive.

I agree, this feels like it could be a penalty for non-magic characters. I'd be for it so long as there are benefits too.

[SardineTheAncestor]

Yeah, Freedom does mitigate the slow part.

If that change goes through, if the system does become more robust, I would be okay with something like this. More thoughtful play is good (as long as it's not too repetitive) but for any nerf that reaches heavy armour, I'd be disappointed not to see it balanced out by a reasonable benefit for the loss, no matter how small.

Tying it directly to weight/limit ratio instead of armour would be better imo, both for realism and game balance purposes, even without the system changing to be a bit more readable. It would enhance atmosphere to have it give more regular feedback, though.

[Day Old Bread]

I think the current system works just fine.

[Khornite]

The current exhaustion system is fine, if anything I'd make it a little slower so you aren't hit with exhaustion after running a few zones. As it is, the system really doesn't do much to encourage anything more than "Hey, we got to stop for a minute" or have someone emote that they're breathing heavily and drop an small penalty (Or larger) penalty on you. I don't see how speeding it up would do anything to actually contribute to RP and not just slow things down.

[Kinga]

Please, let's not try to find ways to make playing on this server more difficult than it already is.

[BraveSirRobin]

I'd be down for exhaustion becoming more prevalent in environmental settings. If you're in Har'Akir without water, you become exhausted more easily just by walking until you've found water.

Exhaustion from being soaked in the rain without an umbrella item equipped or adequate clothing.

Exhaustion from being in the cold without a cloak model on, regardless of cold resistance stats.

I'd be down for armor being exhaustible as well, to be honest. Years ago they used to have a speed penalty on full plate armor, I think 2012-2014 or so. They removed that, but I often feel like people wear their armor like it's a second skin and that's not really immersive in the slightest. No-one wore armor like that.

[Devil's Moon]

The inclusion of more features that do nothing to facilitate the quantity or quality of roleplay aren't neccessary.

[Nemesis 24]

The rabbit hole of realism is a slippery slope of bad precedent.  It very rarely adds anything to making the 'game' experience more fun in this regard.  It gradually turns more and more into a painful chore instead.

First its armour having realistic movement limits.  Then its robes must reflect armour rather than hide it (actually I think they're supposed to already).  Then it becomes a five minute forced pause in game to put on and remove armour.  Then armour and weapons need to be repaired.  Then they can break. 

And not a single thing of any of these affect any dedicated arcane caster.  That's a hard nerf, up and down the board.  So maybe we need to go worse on casters.  They need to have spellbooks, and their spells need to be inscribed into the books, and if they lose the books they lose the spells and have to make a new one instead.  And clerics need to dedicate an entire in game hour to prayers at a set time per day cycle that they're allowed to refresh their prayers....


You see where this going.  Deeper, and deeper, and deeper into a frustrating escalation of busywork.  Realism doesn't mean more fun.  It's not a simulator.  Let people play it as they want to play it.

[Kinga]

I agree with Nemesis and Haeresis here. If someone craves realism in this game that much, I suggest going outside.

[Iridni Ren]

While this is realistic, I don't like the idea of accentuating a system which is really not interactive enough at the moment.

Personally,  I find it to be annoying that the main way I have to interact with Fatigue is through OOC debug messages.  Yes, there are some IC status messages, but they can be hard to keep track of and arrive only when you're already quite deep into exhaustion and are almost receiving, or already receiving, exhaustion penalties.  There's no "you are winded" message when you get at half your exhaustion, for example, it's "10 out of 20".   IMO the first thing we need for the Exhaustion system is some equivalent of the Barely Injured/Injured/Badly Wounded/Near Death status markers we have for HP, for example.

There's not a lot of transparency about how it works, either. I think Lesser Restoration lets you recover from Exhaustion penalties while Bard Song removes Exhaustion itself? I think it's worth re-visiting that because I think making Exhaustion even worse for some classes while it being a non-issue for others may well be aggravating existing balance issues.

+1

I like the idea of exhaustion for the immersion and realism it might add, but the current system seems like much overhead for little payoff. It is also buggy and open to exploiting.

Regarding armor and realism, over time physical conditioning would improve. Those "wearing it like a second skin" would tire less and less from doing so. For example, the standard of the Marine Corps is being able to carry 152 lbs for nine miles: https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/research/a25644619/soldier-weight/

Particularly in a fantasy setting, I don't think making the inventory Tetris and weight management parts of the game more challenging would add any enjoyment.

[herkles]

The rabbit hole of realism is a slippery slope of bad precedent.  It very rarely adds anything to making the 'game' experience more fun in this regard.  It gradually turns more and more into a painful chore instead.

First its armour having realistic movement limits.  Then its robes must reflect armour rather than hide it (actually I think they're supposed to already).  Then it becomes a five minute forced pause in game to put on and remove armour.  Then armour and weapons need to be repaired.  Then they can break. 

And not a single thing of any of these affect any dedicated arcane caster.  That's a hard nerf, up and down the board.  So maybe we need to go worse on casters.  They need to have spellbooks, and their spells need to be inscribed into the books, and if they lose the books they lose the spells and have to make a new one instead.  And clerics need to dedicate an entire in game hour to prayers at a set time per day cycle that they're allowed to refresh their prayers....


You see where this going.  Deeper, and deeper, and deeper into a frustrating escalation of busywork.  Realism doesn't mean more fun.  It's not a simulator.  Let people play it as they want to play it.

I agree with Nem here on this regard.

[Hypatia]

I think the above is a slippery slope argument. Saying wearing armor ought to make you tire faster doesn’t mean I want an exhaustive list of bathroom meters etc. sardine is right in that it only makes sense if armor is also made less awful in D&D. But Ita just a thought anyway.. The problem with D&D is it doesn’t do what it should and it doesn’t penalize armor correctly. It puts the negatives on your dex and skills; but armor doesn’t work that way. It’s very easy to move in and the idea that someone without armor is going to swordfight someone in full harness.. and win.. is nuts. At least unless there is a crazy skill gap. I agree with Sardine that this idea doesn’t work because armor is already completely under powered. We have this great fatigue system and there is potential... but the rule set itself kind of kills it before it takes off.     Best way for unarmored to beat armor would be full defense until armored guy is too exhausted to fight back. Risky but viable. But since armor goes to AC instead of absorbing damage as it should... whatya do? That said; realizm can be really fun. Try frost forge on Skyrim if you don’t believe me.

[Little Lotte]

The rabbit hole of realism is a slippery slope of bad precedent.  It very rarely adds anything to making the 'game' experience more fun in this regard.  It gradually turns more and more into a painful chore instead.

First its armour having realistic movement limits.  Then its robes must reflect armour rather than hide it (actually I think they're supposed to already).  Then it becomes a five minute forced pause in game to put on and remove armour.  Then armour and weapons need to be repaired.  Then they can break. 

And not a single thing of any of these affect any dedicated arcane caster.  That's a hard nerf, up and down the board.  So maybe we need to go worse on casters.  They need to have spellbooks, and their spells need to be inscribed into the books, and if they lose the books they lose the spells and have to make a new one instead.  And clerics need to dedicate an entire in game hour to prayers at a set time per day cycle that they're allowed to refresh their prayers....


You see where this going.  Deeper, and deeper, and deeper into a frustrating escalation of busywork.  Realism doesn't mean more fun.  It's not a simulator.  Let people play it as they want to play it.

+1

[tylernwn]

Also, not wearing armor versus carrying the same weight in your back pack? How much fatigue would you really be saving in real life? Carry weight is probably a reasonable catch all.

[Khornite]

Also, not wearing armor versus carrying the same weight in your back pack? How much fatigue would you really be saving in real life? Carry weight is probably a reasonable catch all.

Carrying the armor in your bag would be MORE exhausting than if you were wearing it due to how the weight is being distributed. Also, the exhaustion system already factors carry weight into it. You get exhausted way faster when encumbered. There have been times where my character will be freshly rested and be so encumbered that they're heavily exhausted after one minute of walking. Characters should not be facing a negative while unencumbered, especially on a server that encourages characters to be carrying a wide variety of supplies to survive. Fighters especially have to carry around tons of potions and items as it is on top of weapons and armor, this would just be a nerf to a character type that does not need one. Maybe if weapons and heavy armor did more, I could see it. Like if heavy armor granted a small bit of DR and adamantine armor gave more DR for heavier suits, maybe upgrade the dr 3 to a dr 5 on heavy addy. As it is, chitin armors are the most popular and the negatives they face versus steel and adamatine are covered with a single spell.

TL;DR: unless armor gets an upgrade, there's no point in nerfing armor wearers.

[tylernwn]

Also, not wearing armor versus carrying the same weight in your back pack? How much fatigue would you really be saving in real life? Carry weight is probably a reasonable catch all.

Carrying the armor in your bag would be MORE exhausting than if you were wearing it due to how the weight is being distributed. Also, the exhaustion system already factors carry weight into it. You get exhausted way faster when encumbered. There have been times where my character will be freshly rested and be so encumbered that they're heavily exhausted after one minute of walking. Characters should not be facing a negative while unencumbered, especially on a server that encourages characters to be carrying a wide variety of supplies to survive. Fighters especially have to carry around tons of potions and items as it is on top of weapons and armor, this would just be a nerf to a character type that does not need one. Maybe if weapons and heavy armor did more, I could see it. Like if heavy armor granted a small bit of DR and adamantine armor gave more DR for heavier suits, maybe upgrade the dr 3 to a dr 5 on heavy addy. As it is, chitin armors are the most popular and the negatives they face versus steel and adamatine are covered with a single spell.

TL;DR: unless armor gets an upgrade, there's no point in nerfing armor wearers.

Yeah. Weight is already factored into the exhaustion system. So this suggestion is already accounted for somewhat.

[Kaninchen]

I am on camp of "would this have be a positive improvement to the player experience?"  I'm inclined to say no.  As with all suggestions, the next question is, would this be a good way to spend limited developer time? I'm inclined to say it would not be.

Now that my realistic, negative Nancy opinions are known, I will say I like the idea of having a more friendly way of knowing my character's exhaustion level. That is an idea I can get behind, as that would improve the player experience, in my opinion.

Also, I don't know that bard song does anything for exhaustion, but there is a feat "Epic of the Lost King," I believe that does.

edit: Type of Feat: Class
Prerequisite: Bard Song, Perform 6 ranks.
Specifics: The character may spend one of his bard song uses to remove exhaustion from all allies (including himself) within 60 feet.
So, I was half correct. Not bard song, but tied into bard song uses.

[Alan Hunter]

Not that its necessary; but anyone who has worn actual armor knows it doesn't really slow you down or limit your movement much, but it does make you tired faster.  On that note..  I was thinking maybe armor should add to your exhaustion ticks a little bit per weight category. 1 for light, 2 for medium and 3 for heavy.

A little more incentive to travel out of armor. and the more realistic way that armor should tire you out a little quicker when you're exerting yourself in it.

I know that unarmored combat is already vastly more effective than it should be, and so armored warriors probably don't need any more drawbacks; but it could be a nice realism flavor thing I suppose.

+1 An interesting Suggestion. I know some people are negative to this suggestion and have offered their polar opinions. In comparison to some topics and mechanics in comparision its not a bad suggestion. Yes, this game is already hard. But, thats the challenge of it to some. Each their own I suppose. But, I get the concept maybe a person with out armor recuperates exhauation faster than one in armor. Would make sense for Monks, Rangers, or Rouges who travel light. Just an idea not a bad suggestion. I hope more people will give it some thought as maybe we may find ways to improve our current Exhaustion system. Heres looking at the positive of thia suggestion.

We know weight applies to Exhaustion, as well as combat, and actions like mining. I wouldn't mind seeing this applied to other crafts in application.

[PlatointheCave]

Armour should also reduce movement speed and take much longer to put on and take off.

[Alan Hunter]

Armour should also reduce movement speed and take much longer to put on and take off.

Agreed. But i think this is already done via full plate+tower. I think they also effect individually hardcoded to nwn. Not certain with all thr changes with Beamdog. As for harder to put on think thats refrenced in Combat whetr you can't. Could make a msg txt where X seconds before equip.