Let's talk about the tank fallacy! Which is sort of misnamed, but whatever. The design lesson here: it doesn't matter how tanky your are if the enemies don't have any reason to hit you. #dnd #dnd5e #spellboundsea 1/10 - ThreadSky

somanyrobots.com • 5 days ago

Let's talk about the tank fallacy! Which is sort of misnamed, but whatever. The design lesson here: it doesn't matter how tanky your are if the enemies don't have any reason to hit you.

#dnd #dnd5e #spellboundsea
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zarpaulus.bsky.social•4 days ago

How about tanks who get in the enemy’s face and force them to attack them or provoke attacks of opportunity?

somanyrobots.com•4 days ago

Those can be functional, for sure (I mentioned my Fencer up above, which can force AoO's to miss). It can be tricky to write those "force the enemy to attack me" features without them feeling too videogamey, though - I think softer taunts generally work better in TTRPGs.

domainofmanythings.bsky.social•5 days ago

I half designed a game once where I built in an aggro system.

HP was low, so DMG was low too, so as you hurt a mob, you'd take an equivalent number of his HP tokens into your agro pile.

Tanks had taunt that took some aggro off whoever and put it on themselves.

Mobs attack pc with highest aggro.

somanyrobots.com•4 days ago

That is neat! Most hard taunts I find stretch believability too much (though tons of GMs do a version of your aggro math in their heads)

stubbenz.bsky.social•4 days ago

I've been a big fan of using the same tactics for subclass design that I use to encourage players to attack certain monsters.

There's nothing like seeing a PC charge up a giant, telegraphed attack that looks more like it belongs on a Dark Souls boss!

It gives the DM a great reason to rather the PC

somanyrobots.com•4 days ago

I worry with something like that that there's too much potential for feels-bad moments. Like when a wizard immediately loses concentration, but more so, since it's the linchpin of the subclass

stubbenz.bsky.social•4 days ago

That's definitely fair, though I've found that in playtests, players LOVED the feeling of monsters desperately trying to take them down, with successful CON saves reinforcing the idea that they were just shrugging of the hits.

somanyrobots.com•5 days ago

Quick definitions: A tank is a durable character whose job it is to get hit — usually to keep others from getting hit. An off-tank is like a tank, but less so — usually pretty durable, but not as much as a proper tank.
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somanyrobots.com•5 days ago

It's pretty easy to build an off-tank in D&D: any character decent hit points and AC. Use a shield, cast Stoneskin, hang out near a paladin. But true tanks are tough because of the tank fallacy: you can be the toughest in the world, and the enemy doesn't care if you punch like a noodle.
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somanyrobots.com•5 days ago

So in *writing* tanky archetypes, you need to give them tools to get the enemy's attention. The most basic is a taunt mechanic: something to force enemies to attack you. They're everywhere in CRPGs, but rarer in TTRPGS — they tend to feel very artificial, since they deny a character's agency.
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somanyrobots.com•5 days ago

So how does Spellbound Sea handle tanks? Well, it doesn't have a lot of them, tbh. The closest is the Oath of Iron, a paladin order from Storm's Eye Citadel that uses ferromancy. They're proper tanks (paladins, duh), but their abilities are mostly geared towards making their *allies* tankier.
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somanyrobots.com•5 days ago

Rather than making a 25 AC supertank, they can buff up allies to a limit - giving someone free proficiency-less plate, and giving the whole party an AC boost.
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somanyrobots.com•5 days ago

Another off-tank would be the Fencer I talked about the other day - it's not great at taking hits, but it can force enemies to miss their opp attacks. The Duelist Swashbuckler gets a similar feature, drawing attacks and forcing them to miss.
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veritastabletop.bsky.social•4 days ago

This is something I miss that D&D 4e handled so much better than 5e. You had taunts that didn’t necessarily COMPEL you to attack, but did impose major penalties (ongoing damage, debuffs to hit anyone other than the tank) if you refused to take the taunt and attack the tank.

somanyrobots.com•4 days ago

Yeah, you can draw a distinction between soft taunts like those and hard taunts (you must hit the tank). The swashbuckler gets a soft taunt, and the barbarian's reckless attack is sort of the softest taunt.

ladylunah.bsky.social•4 days ago

I’m currently designing a game & tossing around the idea of taunts. Our game is narrative focused, so I don’t know if the holy trinity finds purchase in our game when a final encounter can be “Escape the crumbling temple!”

somanyrobots.com•4 days ago

For a really narrative game, I could see a taunt mechanic going either way - it might take too much from the storytelling, or it could help keep combat breezy and light on rules

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