Crippling Strike

[Rycird]

So I'm just going to put this here since I wasn't sure if it's "complaint" enough to be in that category.

Let me bring up a couple of points here.

* If you have backstab listed as an affect, you have been subject to a
crippling strike, and your strength has been lowered. Like most other
affects, this will go away with the passage of time. This being a non-magical
affect, magic can not remedy it.

Crippling Strike as a physical effect cannot be cured through any means besides simply sitting there.

* Ability points lost to crippling strikes return slowly on their own at over
the course of a couple of days.

And its duration is absolutely ridiculous for how much it reduces strength. I'm suggesting it be nuked down to a max of eight to ten game hours, because let's face it. You get hit with Crippling Strike as an Abjurer, Ranger, Thief, (dexterity) Fighter or Bard, you're not going to be fighting again for a few real life hours. I got hit with a -4 to strength, personally, which gimps my character fairly well. I'm not sure if it's because it stacks, which it might still, but that's the penalty my character got.

To add to my point, I'm going to throw out an example. You're a Bard, you're not strength-based much at all, you might have full leather or studded leather armor on and some stuff tucked away in your bag(s) as well as your weapon in its container. A Thief NPC backstabs you, you lose four strength and are suddenly at a massive disadvantage because you've just lost two points of damage and now you're at medium encumbrance for the duration unless you stash your armor with your horse or cart and go naked or in cloth. Your options are pretty much either to idle or go attempt to find some casual RP for four real life hours, if the helpfile is correct.

You can't do anything about it, you can't raise your strength to compensate like most Wizards and Clerics could, you're not hardy like a Fighter and able to just tough it out for a couple more small skirmishes (even though Fighters suffer similar detriments, especially light-armored dexterity-based Fighters). You're simply out of luck until it wears off.

Honestly, making it removable by certain high-power healing spells would suffice, but if not that, please at least reduce its duration to eight or ten game hours. It's bad enough that it removes four of your strength points with all of the detriments that come with that, but having it last four real life hours? Come on, nobody deserves to have to sit in the corner for two (or more) IC days because they're suffering from being jabbed in the muscles with a knife.

[Beskytter]

I'm actually against this suggestion, even though Besky has suffered far worse at the hands of a master thief.
At the time it hit him many, many times. He was stranded for a very long period of time and yet it was actually a good way to work on his RP.

I get that it's frustrating to be locked up like that, but if your muscles have been so severely damaged that they don't work anymore. It can take months of RL physical therapy to full recover. A few hours RL isn't actually as bad as some have made it out to be. Roleplay through it, deepen your RP with other characters and strengthen bonds. Even characters who're self reliant and wary of others ICly can find a way to make such RP work for them if they try.

Afterwards, plan better when you go out. Build up your spot skill so that you don't get backstabbed as much next time. Work out ways to overcome potential hazards other than just suggesting the hazards be removed or nerf'd.

[Rycird]

I get that it's frustrating to be locked up like that, but if your muscles have been so severely damaged that they don't work anymore. It can take months of RL physical therapy to full recover. A few hours RL isn't actually as bad as some have made it out to be.

I'll... I'll just point out now that we regrow fully functioning limbs here. Repairing muscles would be a cakewalk in comparison to making someone's arms regrow. It's really just an unfair effect that encourages idling and shying away from confrontation because of the huge hit to your ability to survive in combat.

[Beskytter]

Or, as I noted, bettering your character's skills through more RP and more grouping.

Besky's not perfect at spot, but for a while he was practicing it through RP with a master thief. The same thief who also crippled him during a spar.

I will also posit the concept that full limb regrowth as a deific power governed by that deity is likely far simpler than pinpointing the minute nerve clusters and muscle fibre bundles that have been effected. A crippling strike isn't just hamstringing an opponent or slicing through their biceps or triceps. You're finding the most critical tiny spot possible to strike so that they can't use that particular muscle anymore. It's not exactly an easy fix in my book. If you take a look at how power is channeled through clerics, it's more of a broad brush stroke than an ultra fine tipped sharpie.

[Rycird]

Yeah, but to create a functioning limb, there has to be muscle otherwise you get a wet noodle. Lore-wise, I'm sure holding a limb together via magic would only be temporary unless you were a powerful Wizard using a focal object that would recycle the energy.

Also, raising up a point here. You can't completely ruin someone's muscles in seconds with a dagger, especially if they're in armor. Finding chinks in some armor types can be difficult, using them can be even more difficult if they're not positioned exactly ontop of a joint. Doing such fine damage to someone's muscles requires precision beyond what surprise attacks or standard combat would allow.

I imagine Crippling Strike being used as you jab for the muscles specifically with the aim of doing exactly a hamstring slice, since you're not going to do anything precise with a large, double-edged knife that most daggers are.

Edit: Speaking of that, why is it possible to use Crippling Strike with blunt weapons?

[Areia]

See viewtopic.php?f=77&t=20139&p=129756 for a kind of recent discussion on this.

1. It actually does 2 STR damange, but the effect does indeed stack. I've been the happy victim of -6 and higher by crippling strike.

2. It *can* be removed, and rather easily.

3. Nerfing one of the few useful abilities of an already weak class is definitely not the way to go about fixing this problem (if there is even a problem at all).

And I'll echo Besk on a few points:

1. It's not the worst thing that can happen to you, by a longshot. I know, I've been backstabbed down to immobility more than once on my lower-strength higher-dex PCs, and I still managed alright. I personally prefer (even enjoy) the challenge of trying to make it out alive when the odds are stacked against me than, say, suffering multiple permanent level drains because I couldn't get out of the vampire's way quickly enough.

2. And this is a big one. Group up. If you need to head to an area where you know this sort of issue might arise, bring other people with you. Most tanks suffer this kind of thing for a living and probably won't have a problem with one more time.

3. Practice those anti-thief skills! It's one of the first things I concern myself with when building most sorts of fighters and thieves.

[Rycird]

1. It actually does 2 STR damange, but the effect does indeed stack. I've been the happy victim of -6 and higher by crippling strike.

2. It *can* be removed, and rather easily.

3. Nerfing one of the few useful abilities of an already weak class is definitely not the way to go about fixing this problem (if there is even a problem at all).

I don't know, Areia, this sounds pretty masochistic to me.

It can be removed? Then the issue lies in the helpfile that says it cannot be cured via magic.

Thieves do need some love, but given their many, many options for landing sneak attacks, they ARE powerful in their own right. It's just keeping yourself alive to land the skills.

1. It's not the worst thing that can happen to you, by a longshot. I know, I've been backstabbed down to immobility more than once on my lower-strength higher-dex PCs, and I still managed alright. I personally prefer (even enjoy) the challenge of trying to make it out alive when the odds are stacked against me than, say, suffering multiple permanent level drains because I couldn't get out of the vampire's way quickly enough.

2. And this is a big one. Group up. If you need to head to an area where you know this sort of issue might arise, bring other people with you. Most tanks suffer this kind of thing for a living and probably won't have a problem with one more time.

To be fair, it's not like playing a low strength halfling with mid-tier constitution and trying to do the Waterdeep tutorial area where gibberlings eat 50% of your health on a good hit. But it's still pretty bad, though not on the Vampire level. I've dealt with a few weak ones before.

On the grouping bit, I have, in fact, tried to find people to group up with me. Building a party is actually somewhat hard once you leave the very low-end areas, because not everyone wants your help especially if you're playing the kind of Fighter I am.

[Beskytter]

If I remember right, it isn't magic that removes it but that's something to learn ICly.

Besky hasn't suffered from a crippling strike like the one he suffered way back when, but even still he's also gotten smarter about taking on areas.

I can agree that getting groups together can be difficult for some characters and level groups because of the dichotomy our playerbase has. With the few routinely active characters you have either very low level alts being played or high to max level mains being played with long established roles.

There's not much to be suggested there other than to keep trying and perhaps even host an event or two around your character to try and gather people together for a purpose.

Back on the note of nerfing crippling strike, I honestly feel that it's fine as it is in terms of damage and length of wait for recovery (without that mentioned possible way of healing).

[Vaemar]

You're a Bard, you're not strength-based much at all

One of my two bards has got 18 strength, so I definitely disagree. Some bard builds benefit a lot from a high strength.

Other than that, I am not against reducing the duration of crippling strike a little or making the penalty more easily removable, but in the end when you have an area with mobs who have crippling strike, the way to go is to get a high level thief buddy with improved uncanny dodge to confront them. Same thing as if there are traps, you either bring a thief or you find somewhere else to go.

[Yemin]

This is coming from a person who in living memory has never actually gotten hit by a NPC thief yet so here's my take.

I suggest people use their amulets more. Can't tell you the amount of times I've seen 14+ players on, all doing solo things. All perfectly capable of communicating with other people.

As for crippling strike, I don't believe any of it's purposes were to force people to sit there and do nothing. I don't personally think it's effects should be any longer than short duration. It's current length is inconsistant with the other rates of healing we have in the game. And even those 2 or so minute long fights against IIM Spawned story NPCs never last longer than short duration. It won't affect any PC thieve's effectiveness against each target and will make nPC thieves far more fun to face off against.

A lvl 50 fighter can get from 0% to 100 in about 20 or so minutes, perhaps less if he sleeps. Any debating the finer points of biology is somewhat moot since there is a suspence of beliefe about recovery in general because of how injury is represented here.

[Horkul]

Although sitting whatever RL time isn't desirable at all, it might accomplish something in the end, bringing with you someone for the task at hand, otherwise people would sit and shrug it off.

Suggestion: Cleric Restoration spell should return in a single cast all lost strength, if that is not the case.

Also; bring rogues with you.

[Yemin]

Although sitting whatever RL time isn't desirable at all, it might accomplish something in the end, bringing with you someone for the task at hand, otherwise people would sit and shrug it off.

Suggestion: Cleric Restoration spell should return in a single cast all lost strength, if that is not the case.

Also; bring rogues with you.

I feel this- notion is positive overall, but it's too vague. There are already systems in the game designed specifically to encourage grouping and dragooning this one class feature isn't the right way to go about it. I.e. there are many things about backstab that don't suit the purpose of encouraging grouping. A few are:

Thieves aren't always available. In my experience their among the least played class here.

Grouping with a thief is usually morally ambiguous for a bunch of characters. perhaps not the majority but a significant number.

Even if you take a thief with you. it only takes one round to be hit with multiple crippling strikes, and in an an area well populated with thief NPCs, it really won't matter if you have a rogue with you or not... etc.

I don't see whats wrong with sitting down and shrugging it off. Thats generally how your going to solve normal damage and ability damage from other effects. I'd not like to see other effects that do ability damage gaining a longer duration as well because of this vague notion.

[Vaemar]

Thieves aren't always available. In my experience their among the least played class here.

Right in this moment there are 5 thieves online out of 15 players. Least played class, sorry?

[Rycird]

Rangers and Druids are the least played classes by far. Not sure why on the latter, but Rangers are kinda'... meh in comparison to Fighters. They need a small pool of bonus feats.

As far as it goes, simply reducing the duration of the effect wouldn't gimp Thieves more at all, especially if it's still like eight game hours, which is forty real life minutes. Though, I'm less worried about being gimped down to six strength myself now that I know there's at least one way to remove the effect.

[Yemin]

Thieves aren't always available. In my experience their among the least played class here.

Right in this moment there are 5 thieves online out of 15 players. Least played class, sorry?

An outlier, an outlier I say!

[Bellayana]

To be fair, Thieves aren't played much here. At least they haven't been the 5+ years I've played here. They def are underpowered if anything. Just had to throw my two cents in. I have played many thieves in this game, but hey! Perception is reality

[Talos]

Just to add, this is something being looked at/worked on.

[Yemin]

Thanks for that Talos mi amigo

[Zorinar]

A couple of notes about Crippling strike.
1) I can be removed easily as Areia pointed out, but it is code abuse to do so. It is basically taking advantage of something that is removing the effect because of the way Crippling Strike is flagged on the Character Object. I believe it has been bug reported.

2) in 3.5 D&D the effect is intentionally long, it is one of the few nasty things a thief can do to you, as opposed to say... insta kill by a wizard/priest, mega damage by Wizard/ Priest, superior AC and damage by a fighter and etc. etc...

Considering that FK lacks so many of the things a thief should have available, like a plethera of different kinds of poisons, communication with party members while hidden, severe lack of magical equipment and so on.. it seems that removing the crippling strike effects are not in line with any form of balance.

3) It takes a precious bonus feat point, and until recently, a rather hard to get to trainer to get that feat.

4) Simply removing the effect because it is not enjoyable to the victim is unjustified. Otherwise, I would ask for wail of the banshee to be removed from the game. It would be better to allow the restoration spell to perhaps reduce the time affect, (by one category only) that way it can not be abused in the heat of combat by using a single spell to utterly nullify a character ability that requires a bonus feat to actually get.

5) Its really better to be friends with a thief, everyone wins that way:)

[Rycird]

A couple of notes about Crippling strike.
1) I can be removed easily as Areia pointed out, but it is code abuse to do so. It is basically taking advantage of something that is removing the effect because of the way Crippling Strike is flagged on the Character Object. I believe it has been bug reported.

2) in 3.5 D&D the effect is intentionally long, it is one of the few nasty things a thief can do to you, as opposed to say... insta kill by a wizard/priest, mega damage by Wizard/ Priest, superior AC and damage by a fighter and etc. etc...

Considering that FK lacks so many of the things a thief should have available, like a plethera of different kinds of poisons, communication with party members while hidden, severe lack of magical equipment and so on.. it seems that removing the crippling strike effects are not in line with any form of balance.

3) It takes a precious bonus feat point, and until recently, a rather hard to get to trainer to get that feat.

4) Simply removing the effect because it is not enjoyable to the victim is unjustified. Otherwise, I would ask for wail of the banshee to be removed from the game. It would be better to allow the restoration spell to perhaps reduce the time affect, (by one category only) that way it can not be abused in the heat of combat by using a single spell to utterly nullify a character ability that requires a bonus feat to actually get.

5) Its really better to be friends with a thief, everyone wins that way:)

Even though I never said to remove it, instead to nerf its duration down to a cap of forty minutes and probably add an upper cap of how much strength you can remove so you can't just cripple a mob over the course of an hour and half just to get an item.

1. Yeah, I noticed this much, but it's stupid that it can be removed in the manner that I was exposed to and should be accounted as major bug abuse.

2. You have to take into account that this isn't tabletop. It's played in real time, on real schedules.

3. I admit, this is where I'll start being a bit harsh. So what? Fighters misplace bonus feats all the time and some of their bonus feats are extremely hard to locate despite being very basic. The difficulty in locating a feat doesn't necessarily label it "We shouldn't nerf this even if it's broken levels of overkill".

4. Again, I did not say to remove it, nor did I say to "remove it because I find it unenjoyable". Having a single OP ability for a particular class is not balancing, it's making the class into a one-trick pony. I admit that Thieves need love, but they also don't need the ability to ruin a Fighter wholly for four or more real hours. Imagine the unlucky guy who gets -10 strength for four hours just before he has to log out due to work-related business. I said multiple times that I'd prefer it to be reduced to forty minutes of real time instead of just asking for it to be a minus two to the target's strength that lasts ten minutes.

5. This isn't a valid point because it's an RP game and RP games require some form of conflict, lest they become dull and stagnate forever. In fact, trying to be legitimate friends with everyone regardless of race and alignment is pretty bad roleplay, especially for someone who builds their life as a mercenary warrior. Even moreso for a race that has intrinsic hatred of one or more races, and pretty much every race including humans has a couple of these. You can't just expect to befriend everyone and for everything to be okay.

I may have been a bit harsh with this, but it does irk me a bit that one of your suggestions is "befriend everyone".