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| Grappling issue/requested fix; Problem with grappling rules | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jan 5 2017, 02:44 AM (896 Views) | |
| mishli | Jan 5 2017, 02:44 AM Post #1 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Hey, my GM was setting up a fight that used a lot of grappling, and we realized there's a rather large hole in the grapple rules. (page 243) [If a target has dominance in a grapple, they may either end the grapple, secure the grapple, attack for unarmed struggle damage, or move, dragging the target] this makes sense... however "If a target begins their turn as part of a grapple, but without dominance they MAY choose to contest the grapple" And since "pokemon and trainers that are grappled gain a -6 penalty to accuracy rolls if targeting anyone OUTSIDE the grapple" this literally means that if you start your turn and do NOT have dominance, there is nothing stopping you from using bite, flamethrower or even hyper beam, at point blank range, with no penalty against whoever has dominance in the grapple. Meanwhile whoever has dominance may only choose to do unarmed struggle damage. There is nothing in the rules stating that anyone in the grapple without dominance may not use normal attacks against whoever has dominance, one of the players pointed this out and then the entire fight broke down into "you win the grapple, i proceed to murder you" A simple fix we decided on later is "whoever starts the grapple without dominance MUST either contest the grapple, or make a -6 attack against someone not involved in the grapple" and I'd like to see this reflected in the rules so people can't exploit this loophole |
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| Jarulso | Jan 5 2017, 03:00 AM Post #2 |
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Resident LIBRE WRASSLER
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The only issue is that it isn't a loophole, it's intended. Grappling a target is designed to take your entire effort to reduce them to vulnerable and force them to focus on the grappler (who may, for all intents and purposes, be a tank) whereas being grappled requires no effort on your part. The target inside the grapple can choose to attack their grappler with everything they have to try to incapacitate them, or gain dominance to reverse the grapple and create an advantage for their own allies. |
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| Flamewolf9 | Jan 5 2017, 07:18 AM Post #3 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Additionally, there is nothing in the rules that says the grappler with dominance can't attack with a move instead of taking the full action. It only adds options using the grapple to your advantage by re-positioning, making sure you keep control, auto hitting with an attack, or ending the grapple. Here's a whole thread about grapple shenanigans Dratini Libre and Partners Examples Long story short, grappling adds options if you have Dominance at the cost of giving up evasion and shift actions. |
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| l33tmaan | Jan 5 2017, 07:39 AM Post #4 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Go catch a Tangrowth and come back and say that. God, I love those noodle balls, there's something hilarious about grappling someone from 2 squares away, getting free attacks, and still be able to try and put them to sleep. |
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| mishli | Jan 5 2017, 11:33 AM Post #5 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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But often a grapple would be most useful to disable another combatant, in a 1v1 scenario this is useless, because of the aformentioned loophole, and in a multiple combatant scenario, it's often unlikely that someone tanky enough to survive the grapple would actually be able to maintain it. Many of the more offensive pokemon have higher grapple scores, but as I mentioned, they don't even want to use them, since it's more advantageous to simply destroy the person who is winning the grapple. For a bit of context, we were tasked to trap a large pokemon inside a cave, but the thing was we couldn't kill it, so we were intended to grapple the pokemon and drag it into the cave, the boss had some minions that would try to grapple the players to stop them, only for one of the players to realize 'you won the grapple, which means i get to murder you' the fight literally broke down after that, since that also meant the boss could freely destroy us as we tried to drag it around |
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| Jarulso | Jan 5 2017, 12:10 PM Post #6 |
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Resident LIBRE WRASSLER
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Before this goes forward, I would like to definitely apologize by creating confusion with my first post, I wasn't looking at the Grapple rules and was going off them by the top of my head, and didn't also realize you could still attack normally while grappling. I tend to use Full Actions myself in my grapple monkey builds so I never noticed. To point out Flamewolf9's previous post, the Grapple options state: "If a target begins their turn as part of a Grapple and has Dominance, they may take one of the following actions as a Full Action. »» End the Grapple. »» Secure: They gain a +3 Bonus to the next opposed check they make in the Grapple. »» Attack: They may automatically hit with an Unarmed Struggle Attack. »» Move: They Shift, dragging the other person in the grapple with them. The user’s Movement Capability is lowered by the other grappler’s Weight Class." This is certainly true. Grappling for the sake of immobilizing is usually not the best case scenario. However, say the opponent has +9 Speed Evasion (through a mixture of stats and features), then hitting them is hardly your best option. Contain them in a grapple, and while it won't help in the accuracy department, once you get a hold, beating over them is certainly easier. Many of the Pokemon designed for well-handled grappling are generally very sturdy rather than overall glass cannon (Dragonite being my favorite example), but in the exceptions, Grapple is moreso designed to briefly allow allies to get as many free hits on a target as possible. There are certainly other ways of doing it that are more efficient, but all Pokemon have access to Grapple by default. Edited by Jarulso, Jan 5 2017, 12:18 PM.
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| Flamewolf9 | Jan 5 2017, 02:04 PM Post #7 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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First I'll enter this post as evidence that most pokemon that are well qualified by skill to grapple are bulkier than average thanks to abilities and moves. In a 1v1 scenario, taking away a less defensive targets evasion leaves them wide open to massive damage from your grappler. Yes they get easy attacks on you, but you are prepared with defense, HP, Moves and Abilities for that situation and they aren't. Hit them with a paralysis and watch as the do nothing half the time. They already lost their Shift Action so all that's left to lose is their Standard Action. Or Sleep and have them do nothing for a while while you set up; add DoTs to taste. It's not useless, just different. It requires more forethought than pump (Sp.) Attack, Speed for Evasion, HP to survive maybe one hit, use strongest available move. But it can be crippling. In a multi-combatant situation, you paint a nice big target on both grapplers because they are both vulnerable. If your teammates take advantage of that. It's likely they won't even need to hold the grapple for more than one turn. And you are prepared for that exact situation, they aren't. It's much easier to hit someone with evasion 0 than evasion 6 or 9. And damage the high defense, high hp grappler takes is damage that the squishier members of the party didn't. Grappling isn't something you wade into lightly. It's a high risk, high reward situation if you are prepared to reap those rewards.
I don't mean to be dismissive, but this sounds like you were trying to use the wrong tool for the job. Why not put the boss to sleep? Or paralyze it? Or knock it out, drag it into the cave, use a revive and run? Blind it? Push it with Push moves? Use the Push Maneuver? These either mitigate the damage of the boss while being grappled or move the boss around without putting someone who isn't ready to grapple at risk. |
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| l33tmaan | Jan 5 2017, 05:20 PM Post #8 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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For some reason, Flamewolf, your post made me want to run a Hunter/grappler build who just grabs pokemon while telling his team to wail on them. Grab something, get your pokemon next to it, and Surprise! it for a hilarious beatdown thanks to Pack Hunt. If they break out and try to run away? AoOs for everyone! The only way I could think it would be more fun would be if Finisher worked on Vulnerable targets. Is there a "grappler" Trainer class? The closest I can think of is a Judo Martial Artist. |
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| Flamewolf9 | Jan 5 2017, 05:40 PM Post #9 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Athlete and Guts Martial Artist are the two that benefit it most directly. Athlete gives you access to Bind and Bonus accuracy on Combat Maneuvers, and possibly a bonus to resist them getting dominance. Guts Martial Artist lets you take two options from the full found action. Roughneck is a nice paring for Endure and Slack Off for recovery and survivabiltiy. With Hunter, just drag your foe. The shifted, they get AoOed. They get slowed via Don't Look Away. The get pack hunted by you. Finisher now triggered. Repeat until satisfied. Don't even think about looking at things like Tree Oath Druid or Maelstrom. That's not nice to anyone. Maybe also looking some leftovers though. Hex Maniac also pairs well with all this. Getting more DoTs and lowering defenses will make things go much quicker. Edited by Flamewolf9, Jan 5 2017, 05:54 PM.
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| l33tmaan | Jan 5 2017, 07:15 PM Post #10 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Oh man, you're giving me some gnarly mental images. It's a good thing I plan to have numerous assassins sent after my party for most of the campaign, so I can include enemies that are as gimmicky as possible. If anything, they're more memorable, no? Just throw all of that together and you have a dude who rushes out of some bushes while hypnotizing you, then dragging you back into the bushes while you're sleeping so his pokemon can literally curbstomp you. That sounds pretty scary to me. |
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