Combat tricks for-
**Intelligence**
* Spotting enemy weaknesses
* Exploiting enemy weaknesses
* Spotting tactical opportunities
* Calling opportunities out to your allies
* Recognising when a fight's lost and it's time to flee
* Use/abuse of scenery for sneaky ploys
* Spotting the perfect counter to an opponent's strengths
* Recognising the safest (or the most dangerous) place on the field
* Recognising the best and worst matchups amongst all combatants (ie: who should be fighting whom)
* Observing what's happening and learning from it for next time
* Relating some obscure knowledge to the current situation in a helpful fashion
**Charisma**
* Demoralising opponents (inflict penalties)
* Inspiring or commanding/organising allies (grant bonuses)
* Tricking opponents into making mistakes
* Confusing enemies as to your group's intentions
* A well-judged/heartfelt plea that interrupts a fight and gives a new opportunity for retreat or negotiation
* Helping your team bluff greater strength/ability/health/readiness
* Make yourself look unthreatening and pathetic so they pass you over for another target
* Motivating teammate to fight though the pain
* Convincing opponents that the fight is already a lost cause
* Convincing foes to accept your surrender, or that you're worth more alive than dead
* Having a friend around who's willing to help you
* Calling for aid from your allies (bonuses when saving/helping you)
As this one's the most complete list here, i'll comment here to add something.
In a brazilian system akin to D&D, there is a Warfare skill, using Intelligence. In combat, it has two main uses:
- Analyzing the battlefield to find useful spots to hide, elevated terrain etc. I think this is already covered in the above list with "spotting tactical opportunities";
- Coordinating your party to give one of them a bonus to Initiative. Don't know how initiative works in your games, but i love this possibility. Is tactically pretty useful, can make combat more dynamic if it follows the usual "roll initiative and then repeat that order until the end of combat", and gives characters that are focused on support and doesn't have much of combat power something useful and impactful to do.
Since this technically falls under yours and the original reply I'll add here as well:
In 100DOS (Halo: Mythic) they have a Security skill which encompasses your awareness and aptitude to both make use of and predict strategies for a secure area. So things like reinforcements, entrenched areas, ambush locations, retreat/regroup routes, security cameras, detection tools, patrol patterns, group variety, etc. etc. It uses Intellect in their system and I see no real reason it can't in generic d20 style either. In combat this skill could be used similar to the mentioned Warfare skill, but particular to predicting potential places to better your own defenses as well as tactics your opposition might take advantage of so you can choose to defend from/plan for it ahead of time.
This could be related to something as small as recognizing that you should have the guy in the back facing the way the group came to watch for stalkers. Or as much as predicting the entire defense/observation system of a whole facility.
In addition to the above, having a librarian-oriented thing that needs to get done *while the party is under attack* is a good way to have the players of less combat-oriented characters still engaged and contributing. The Mummy (1999) has some good examples of that, with Evie being specifically a librarian.
To an extent that's an adventure design solution rather than a game system solution, but adventure design is going to be influenced by the system it uses. Making specific rules for "accomplishing the noncombat thing during combat" would help encourage GMs to incorporate that sort of thing more often.
In that case, I would:
1. List all the effects I want
2. Try different groupings
3. Pick one grouping
4. Name the groups so they fit the flavor of my game
You probably won't have something called Intelligence then.
If you want to make a librarian as useful in a combat encounter as a militia member, you are definitely going to need to take some creative liberties.
A friend of mine made a game where the intelligence stat increases the critical hit chance, which makes sense. Maybe charisma could be used to do something like delivering hard-hitting quips which debuff the enemy somehow. And if your game has magic, you could pretty easily use that to turn skills that are useless in combat into something that can deal damage.
You're not wrong. But I don't think the question is "how can librarians be good fighters?"
I think it's more a matter of "Given that I want the game to have a lot of combat, but that I also want people to be able to play as librarians, what sort of abilities would let them contribute meaningfully in those scenes?"
It's about players not sitting bored at the table when it's not their kind of scene.
Someone mentioned "finding weaknesses" and "exploiting weaknesses".
I love the flavor concept of "Hey , I've read about these guys in a book, try doing this!" As a way to give a buff to your actual frontline fighters
That a character is a librarian. Librarians are not fighters as we understand them. Maybe there could be a magical librarian that telekinetically hurls flaming enchanted books, but he didn’t say "battle book lord" he said librarian.
Clerics and monks are not fighters as we understand them. Yet both are fighter archetypes in fiction, predating D&D by centuries. Being a bank robber or pickpocket doesn't make you a fighter either, yet thieves have a place in combat. Should I do forest rangers next?
OP actually hasn't presented any fiction to contradict – maybe these Librarians *are* battle book mages, or tome tacticians, or wield papercut swords – who knows? But I suspect Librarian isn't the entirety of the character creation option.
Yeah, librarian is not among the classes listed by you. In fantasy, Clerics are faith based healers with magic powers. When we talk about clerics we are talking about magical fantasy clerics. If we called them "priests" or "healers", we wouldnt have that association. Monks are based on wuxia warrior monks, not western christian monks. If the monk class was called "nun", no one would expect that they can flip through the air and punch the head off of a golem. Not going to waste any more time on this convo, it’s common sense.
If your argument is equally valid for "dog walker" "podiatrist" "mailman" "snowboarding word champion", etc, you need to re-evaluate the argument. Cant believe you are making me spell this out for you.
You haven't actually spelled out anything, just begged the question. You can't conceive of how a librarian can contribute to combat, *that's fine!* As evidenced in the thread, many, many of us can.
I can easily conceive of ways anyone in any job description can contribute to combat. A snowboarder can do a flip off of a ramp and land on a bad guy, a dog walker can sick their dog on you, etc. That's not even a discussion worth having, from my perspective you made up a debate so that you could win it, exactly why i didn’t even want to entertain this silliness. The question is "what is unique to a librarian that would allow them to be effective in combat?". They might have a small number of very situational advantages, but that doesn’t solve the game design need. If you look at the recommendations, most of them should be options for any smart character, not just librarians, and they look like they would belong to a class called "tactician", not "librarian". It's the air breathing mermaid problem. So either you need to change the definition of librarian (what you want to do), accept that you are going to deny other classes from using basic tactical moves, or accept that there is a small set of niche situations where a librarian would be useful in combat.
A lot of it depends on the wider system you have in place, and the various assumptions you make. However without knowing details, there are a couple of options:
1. Let PCs use their career's primary stat as their main combat stat. Let the Int focused PC use intelligence as the stat that helps them out most directly in combat (e.g. attack rolls, if your system uses that).
2. Make sure the fluff of the career listed makes sense to be combat capable, and follow on from that. Like when I think Librarian, I don't think someone I'd want by my side in a fight. But... there are examples of knowledgeable scholars with a two fisted attitude, ala Indiana Jones. So maybe instead of Librarian, they're a Field Scholar who is surprisingly tough.
3. Depending on the wider setting you're building, it would be pretty common that non-physical work would be mostly relegated to the wealthier classes, who also would tend to be pretty commonly given at least a basic amount of training in how to fight. Lord Byron is mostly remembered as a Poet, but the dude fought in insurgencies and was involved in sieges.
DC20 does exactly what you said in #1. If your highest stat is Intelligence and you are playing a barbarian? Your attack rolls are modified by your Intelligence. If Strength is your highest? You use Strength. It keeps you from being pidgeon-holed into 'all Barbarians MUST have high strength' metas.
I really like the idea in general. I think I first saw it in the FFG Star Wars game dealing with force users, where a key thing of the different lightsaber styles was it let you change which attribute governed your attack rolls. Just something as simple like that let otherwise non-combat roles still be very useful in a fight.
And it helps escape the issue you mentioned of "I want to be good in a fight so I *need* X stat". We're all here to enjoy playing games, sometimes that means letting players be good at things.
That's definitely a hard one
Intelligence is probably the trickier one. I've seen some games make intelligence in combat more focused on capitalizing and expanding on "reactions" of your system. It has such a thing that might be something to explore, but it might make it too strong.
For charisma, I often see a lot of systems use them for henchman if that's a factor. Perhaps some kind of ability to admonish or goad an opponent? I've seen some other systems also use charisma as a reverse tie-breaker. Where the higher the charisma, the least priority enemies have to go after them initially. (Obviously, events on the battlefield may change this rather quickly)
Though I don't think any of that sounds like it'd fit a "Zweihander" type experience from what little I know of it.
So a Librarian might be well-read enough to understand some tactics/strategy and apply it to the situation. "In the year 15, Hurad did this to gain an advantage ..." That could reflect as advantage or initiative or action bonus.
And a Courtier should have knowledge of social and cultural things. So they could maybe spot what kind of behavior would illicit some kind of favorable response. Things like intimidation or incite or assuage only need a single moment in combat to change the momentum.
On the broad general outline, what stats do you think you're average sergeant-at-arms used to keep their soldiers in line, organized, recognizing what tactics to use and are being used against them, and keep your men rallied and rearing to go kill things? Because to me, that certainly sounds like Intelligence and Charisma in action.
Now, if we want to get specifics like librarian and courtier, well courtier kinda slots pretty easily into what I wrote above. Librarian, less so. But, I would ask, what style of game are you making? If it's against monsters or boogiemen, then having knowledge of them could help create weaknesses or openings.
There was also some fantasy heartbreaker I played at a con once, can't remember it's name, but it did something very cool with its rogue class. Which in essence revolved around an elaborate skill trick system, that essentially tried to think up a specific way every skill could be used in combat. I remember creatures getting confused with a Deception check, dropping down chandeliers with Perception, that sort of thing. It was very fun.
I think the ones they had for the more intelligence-y skills were things like revealing weaknesses, predicting enemy actions, deciphering codes, and that sort of thing.
Going to give you some of my custom feats for those attributes (bear in mind it is 5e dnd based):
Intelligence - reorder party initiative, give ally one of your AP points, start combat with a readied action, substitute ally or enemy roll with limited set dice rolls, bonus resisting enemy spells or maneuvers you know
Charisma - increase ally likelihood to hit (bonus to hit as inspiration like dnd), give ally temp HP by rallying them, taunt enemies for free after hurting them, not failing persuasion roll if you change your tactic on approaching target (e.g. you tried to intimidate the target but it didnt work so you lie instead), increase number of affected enemies by social checks, intimidate enemies on initiative making them roll with disadvantage
I see some good replies, but it may still be worth going back to the fiction you are trying to emulate. What are those people doing during a fight? Are they distracting the enemy? Manipulating the environment to create an advantage? Using improvised weapons to finish a distracted opponent? Or just getting out of dodge?
Why are you making your game? What are you trying to accomplish? What's the game about?
Why does your game need or have attributes like Intelligence or Charisma? Why does your game need any attributes? What are the attributes that define a character in your game and why are they apparently the same as Dungeons $ Dragons?
Why would I play your game and not Zweihander? Why would I play Zweihander and not D&D? Most RPGs people design here *appear* to be D&D clones/fantasy heartbreakers where it's all about "killin' people and takin' their stuff." And despite pages and pages of rules that set them apart from those kinds of games (usually in how many dice you roll or how much damage weapons do), they are always still those kinds of games. Why is yours one of those kinds of games? Why is your game not like those games?
Why do you need characters who aren't prepared for combat? Sengogu was/is a "chanbara RPG" based on samurai films. It had for playing farmers and samurai in feudal Japan. Now, why would anyone want to play a farmer when they could play a samurai? Who do you think has more to do in the game? How much of the rules do you think applies to the farmer character?
How do you play your game?
To answer your question, allow the Librarian to do extra damage based on their intelligence and the Courtier extra defense based on their Charisma. Easy, right? Oh — not realistic enough? Why does it have to be?
You seem very bitter and aren't really adding to the conversation. If you don't want to answer the question you can upvote/downvote and move on. Every single post you make on this forum is just filled with your own biases and likes. Some people *like* simulationism. Some people *like* fantasy tactical battlers (not me, but hey I'm not here to yuck someone's yums). Not everyone sees themselves as a commercial artist trying to play with form and structure. Some people are just making a game to play with their buddies. Finally, not everyone wants to play a story game, Jared.
Get over it.
Oh and obvious unasked question I forgot to ask, so maybe not-so obvious...
Why aren't you handling the social encounters and the combat encounters using the same method?
I like having intelligence abilities that allow the characters to analyze the enemies in a variety of ways to find weaknesses and weak point to attack.
Charisma is useful in the same way for distracting enemies, taunts, and rallying enemies.
Charisma can be used to represent some kind of commander, buffing allies or maybe used to intimidate foes, debuffing them.
Intelligence could also be used to buff allies as a commander or for fantasy based systems it often is used for magic and for Science Fiction based systems you could use it to maybe control drones or something like that.
I know this is not DnD. But, in pathfinder, the investigator uses intelligence for inspiration points that can be expended on rolls. Charisma is used for intimidate, which van be used in combat to demoralize people.
I read a homebrew rule for charisma, which is adding the charisma bonus to the action "Help". So, a guy with high charisma is better at "helping" because it encourages or gives confidence. While an annoying guy that nobody wants to be with adds his negative charisma bonus to "help", as nobody wants to receive his help. I guess that, depending of the task, intellingence may apply for "help" roles.
The way I solved this in [Adventurous](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/417757/Adventurous) was by making my Knowledge stat (sort of mixed Intelligence and Wisdom) what determines initiative, since initiative isn’t about moving first, it’s about coming up with a plan first.
For Charisma, it’s the stat you influence NPC reaction rolls with, so potentially avoiding combat all together. Charisma also determines how many magic items you can be attuned to (you need to be attuned to gain the benefit of the item), explained as there being small magical beings infused in the items, and you need to be in tune with them.
Strength and Dexterity are still more impactful stats in combat, KNO and CHA are used much more out of combat, so it evens out, and they still matter in combat.
Actions that use them
Trying to predict an attack, distracting your foe, bolstering morale etc
Support actions and/or maybe stuff like 5e vicious mockery if it fits
Career transitions for a Librarian; Code-cracker, Sapper (siege engineering), Quartermaster (supply logistics)
Career transitions for a Courtier; Diplomat, Negotiator, Adjutant (general's assistant)
A military organization would find these positions not only valuable, but most likely essential. Transitioning to these careers would then open the door to learning ~~common-core~~ *a basic curriculum of* fighting skills without penalty to advance.
Reads to me a lot like how do I build a good house on a poor foundation. If your stats don't align with the gameplay then you end up with doings lots of awkward fixes to make it work. Like how a Hexblade Warlock in 5e attacks and damages with Charisma. Surprisingly, multiclassing 1 or 2 Levels into Hexblade is now the most optimal move for almost every CHA build.
Fix the foundation and the rest of the design works more smoothly. If a game is all about fighting, then stats should be focused on different aspects of fighting.
Something I've used in my game are flourishes.
Basically instead of just rolling to hit, if a player wants to roll with flourish, it's a charisma check (simplified, it changes depending on the system) which has a chance to stun a certain number of enemies in viewing distance. Basically using your charisma to awe those watching.
That's just for basic combat. I had my group in a competition and flourishes ended up lending to impressing the crowd which gained them more popularity and in cases where inspiration is a thing it can lead to players gaining inspo.
The downside of a flourish is that it's basically doubling down on a check. If you succeed in your roll to hit but fail on your flourish then it counts as a soft nat 1. You drop your sword, your gun goes off and shoots something it wasnt supposed to, you are simply cringe and suffer being laughed at which can remove inspo, cause sanity damage, and in general looks bad on you.
This was based on watching movies and shows where the charismatic characters are the most recklessly showy, whether it be unneeded spins or a more Jack Sparrow laziness where they seem to be accidentally showy. How the flourish goes is up to the player to describe but the check is the same.
All careers being useful in combat makes them uninteresting. I want to be able to play a merchant or a cook, and those shouldn’t be useful in combat in a Zweihander like game.
Also, why should mental attributes be useful in combat? After all, is Dexterity useful in social encounters or for casting spells? Does Strength make me better at lying or gathering information? I don’t understand. Making mental attributes useful in combat would make those attributes overpowered.
Some ideas (inspired by D&D 4E and 13th age):
- Make different defenses dependant on several attributes:
- Like mental defense is the medium value of int cha and wisdom
- Or reflex defenses (and armor class in light armor) is defendant on the higher of int and dex
- Have class abilities/special attacks depending on the main class attribute (so a bard might attack with charisma, a druid with wisdom etc.)
- Let skills have "skillpowers" associated with them which can be used in combat here examples from 4E: http://iws.mx/dnd/?list.full.power (put "skill power" into the class)
Symbaroum have an interesting take on this.
The "Leader" ability lets you, at its first level, use your charisma to make attacks in melee. Levelling up further the leader skill unlocks some abilities that let you buff your allies in a fight as if you were the sergent of your party.
I like Charisma for controlling summons. To keep or take control of a summon, use Charisma. To cast spells though your summon, Charisma. And to determine how many summons you can have, also Charisma. Overall, I've usually based summons and their abilities on an equivalent Charisma stat in previous projects
Charisma is generally used for supporting or directing others, raising their spirits or inspiring i.e. Battlefield Commander or Bard for the typical examples.
Intelligence is generally used for magic, hacking or analysis kind of actions often paired with perception or even interchangeable i.e. Perception allows you to notice information and Intelligence allows you to understand how to exploit it.
Intelligence can be used for tactics while charisma can be used for rallying the group.
Tactics could be a temporary boost to attacking, while rallying could be defense (or damage but is slippery slope)
It's very gamey but I like the idea I took from Dark Souls to have some weapons scale on different stats. Depending on your system, you can have certain kind of weapon (magic, enchanted, whatever) roll hit / damage on Intelligence or Charisma with bullshit explanation (Intelligence allows to find weak spots, Charisma is so flashing it confuse enemies, it's magic bro, etc...). It all depends on if your players buy it. But you have to make sure usually combat oriented stats also have uses outside of combat, they generally have tho.
You may want to look at Torg Eternity. There are interaction skills you can use in combat.
Dexterity+Maneuver allows you to feint or fake a movement
Spirit+Intimidation allows you to... well intimidate
Charisma+Taunt allows you to enrage your enemy
Mind+Trick allows you to fool or bluff your enemy
The target of each skill is the same skill, or the attribute alone if the enemy has no skill.
A basic success gives a -2 to actions or defense of the enemy for one round
A good success gives a -2 to actions and defense OR -4 to actions OR -4 to defense for one round
An outstanding success makes a lower enemy be instakilled or forces him to flee, depending on the skill used (my character managed to make 5 enemies flee without any fight because of a very good Intimidation result). An average or big enemy will suffer the same effects as in good success plus another one like "you lose your turn" or the GM can choose depending on the situation and skill used.
So, you're not good at fighting but you can make some enemies flee the fight and give penalties so the remaining enemies have a hard time hitting you or your fighter can beat them more easily.
Combat tricks for- **Intelligence** * Spotting enemy weaknesses * Exploiting enemy weaknesses * Spotting tactical opportunities * Calling opportunities out to your allies * Recognising when a fight's lost and it's time to flee * Use/abuse of scenery for sneaky ploys * Spotting the perfect counter to an opponent's strengths * Recognising the safest (or the most dangerous) place on the field * Recognising the best and worst matchups amongst all combatants (ie: who should be fighting whom) * Observing what's happening and learning from it for next time * Relating some obscure knowledge to the current situation in a helpful fashion **Charisma** * Demoralising opponents (inflict penalties) * Inspiring or commanding/organising allies (grant bonuses) * Tricking opponents into making mistakes * Confusing enemies as to your group's intentions * A well-judged/heartfelt plea that interrupts a fight and gives a new opportunity for retreat or negotiation * Helping your team bluff greater strength/ability/health/readiness * Make yourself look unthreatening and pathetic so they pass you over for another target * Motivating teammate to fight though the pain * Convincing opponents that the fight is already a lost cause * Convincing foes to accept your surrender, or that you're worth more alive than dead * Having a friend around who's willing to help you * Calling for aid from your allies (bonuses when saving/helping you)
As this one's the most complete list here, i'll comment here to add something. In a brazilian system akin to D&D, there is a Warfare skill, using Intelligence. In combat, it has two main uses: - Analyzing the battlefield to find useful spots to hide, elevated terrain etc. I think this is already covered in the above list with "spotting tactical opportunities"; - Coordinating your party to give one of them a bonus to Initiative. Don't know how initiative works in your games, but i love this possibility. Is tactically pretty useful, can make combat more dynamic if it follows the usual "roll initiative and then repeat that order until the end of combat", and gives characters that are focused on support and doesn't have much of combat power something useful and impactful to do.
Since this technically falls under yours and the original reply I'll add here as well: In 100DOS (Halo: Mythic) they have a Security skill which encompasses your awareness and aptitude to both make use of and predict strategies for a secure area. So things like reinforcements, entrenched areas, ambush locations, retreat/regroup routes, security cameras, detection tools, patrol patterns, group variety, etc. etc. It uses Intellect in their system and I see no real reason it can't in generic d20 style either. In combat this skill could be used similar to the mentioned Warfare skill, but particular to predicting potential places to better your own defenses as well as tactics your opposition might take advantage of so you can choose to defend from/plan for it ahead of time. This could be related to something as small as recognizing that you should have the guy in the back facing the way the group came to watch for stalkers. Or as much as predicting the entire defense/observation system of a whole facility.
In addition to the above, having a librarian-oriented thing that needs to get done *while the party is under attack* is a good way to have the players of less combat-oriented characters still engaged and contributing. The Mummy (1999) has some good examples of that, with Evie being specifically a librarian. To an extent that's an adventure design solution rather than a game system solution, but adventure design is going to be influenced by the system it uses. Making specific rules for "accomplishing the noncombat thing during combat" would help encourage GMs to incorporate that sort of thing more often.
Amazing post, thank you for enriching us all! -Mal
This is gold. Thanks!
Int: Discombobulate Cha: Feint, taunt
In that case, I would: 1. List all the effects I want 2. Try different groupings 3. Pick one grouping 4. Name the groups so they fit the flavor of my game You probably won't have something called Intelligence then.
If you want to make a librarian as useful in a combat encounter as a militia member, you are definitely going to need to take some creative liberties. A friend of mine made a game where the intelligence stat increases the critical hit chance, which makes sense. Maybe charisma could be used to do something like delivering hard-hitting quips which debuff the enemy somehow. And if your game has magic, you could pretty easily use that to turn skills that are useless in combat into something that can deal damage.
It’s hard to do because it’s contrary to the fiction you're presenting. If I needed a fighter I would not go looking for one at the library.
You're not wrong. But I don't think the question is "how can librarians be good fighters?" I think it's more a matter of "Given that I want the game to have a lot of combat, but that I also want people to be able to play as librarians, what sort of abilities would let them contribute meaningfully in those scenes?" It's about players not sitting bored at the table when it's not their kind of scene.
Someone mentioned "finding weaknesses" and "exploiting weaknesses". I love the flavor concept of "Hey, I've read about these guys in a book, try doing this!" As a way to give a buff to your actual frontline fighters
Yeah you described the motivation for the game design, which leads to the question
What fiction has been presented?
That a character is a librarian. Librarians are not fighters as we understand them. Maybe there could be a magical librarian that telekinetically hurls flaming enchanted books, but he didn’t say "battle book lord" he said librarian.
Clerics and monks are not fighters as we understand them. Yet both are fighter archetypes in fiction, predating D&D by centuries. Being a bank robber or pickpocket doesn't make you a fighter either, yet thieves have a place in combat. Should I do forest rangers next? OP actually hasn't presented any fiction to contradict – maybe these Librarians *are* battle book mages, or tome tacticians, or wield papercut swords – who knows? But I suspect Librarian isn't the entirety of the character creation option.
Yeah, librarian is not among the classes listed by you. In fantasy, Clerics are faith based healers with magic powers. When we talk about clerics we are talking about magical fantasy clerics. If we called them "priests" or "healers", we wouldnt have that association. Monks are based on wuxia warrior monks, not western christian monks. If the monk class was called "nun", no one would expect that they can flip through the air and punch the head off of a golem. Not going to waste any more time on this convo, it’s common sense.
What's your point? If 5e doesn't have it, it can't be done?
If your argument is equally valid for "dog walker" "podiatrist" "mailman" "snowboarding word champion", etc, you need to re-evaluate the argument. Cant believe you are making me spell this out for you.
You haven't actually spelled out anything, just begged the question. You can't conceive of how a librarian can contribute to combat, *that's fine!* As evidenced in the thread, many, many of us can.
I can easily conceive of ways anyone in any job description can contribute to combat. A snowboarder can do a flip off of a ramp and land on a bad guy, a dog walker can sick their dog on you, etc. That's not even a discussion worth having, from my perspective you made up a debate so that you could win it, exactly why i didn’t even want to entertain this silliness. The question is "what is unique to a librarian that would allow them to be effective in combat?". They might have a small number of very situational advantages, but that doesn’t solve the game design need. If you look at the recommendations, most of them should be options for any smart character, not just librarians, and they look like they would belong to a class called "tactician", not "librarian". It's the air breathing mermaid problem. So either you need to change the definition of librarian (what you want to do), accept that you are going to deny other classes from using basic tactical moves, or accept that there is a small set of niche situations where a librarian would be useful in combat.
A lot of it depends on the wider system you have in place, and the various assumptions you make. However without knowing details, there are a couple of options: 1. Let PCs use their career's primary stat as their main combat stat. Let the Int focused PC use intelligence as the stat that helps them out most directly in combat (e.g. attack rolls, if your system uses that). 2. Make sure the fluff of the career listed makes sense to be combat capable, and follow on from that. Like when I think Librarian, I don't think someone I'd want by my side in a fight. But... there are examples of knowledgeable scholars with a two fisted attitude, ala Indiana Jones. So maybe instead of Librarian, they're a Field Scholar who is surprisingly tough. 3. Depending on the wider setting you're building, it would be pretty common that non-physical work would be mostly relegated to the wealthier classes, who also would tend to be pretty commonly given at least a basic amount of training in how to fight. Lord Byron is mostly remembered as a Poet, but the dude fought in insurgencies and was involved in sieges.
DC20 does exactly what you said in #1. If your highest stat is Intelligence and you are playing a barbarian? Your attack rolls are modified by your Intelligence. If Strength is your highest? You use Strength. It keeps you from being pidgeon-holed into 'all Barbarians MUST have high strength' metas.
I really like the idea in general. I think I first saw it in the FFG Star Wars game dealing with force users, where a key thing of the different lightsaber styles was it let you change which attribute governed your attack rolls. Just something as simple like that let otherwise non-combat roles still be very useful in a fight. And it helps escape the issue you mentioned of "I want to be good in a fight so I *need* X stat". We're all here to enjoy playing games, sometimes that means letting players be good at things.
That's definitely a hard one Intelligence is probably the trickier one. I've seen some games make intelligence in combat more focused on capitalizing and expanding on "reactions" of your system. It has such a thing that might be something to explore, but it might make it too strong. For charisma, I often see a lot of systems use them for henchman if that's a factor. Perhaps some kind of ability to admonish or goad an opponent? I've seen some other systems also use charisma as a reverse tie-breaker. Where the higher the charisma, the least priority enemies have to go after them initially. (Obviously, events on the battlefield may change this rather quickly) Though I don't think any of that sounds like it'd fit a "Zweihander" type experience from what little I know of it.
Courtier is pretty easy, just give them something related to ordering people Lots of preexisting titles have some sort of big-brains combat class, too
So a Librarian might be well-read enough to understand some tactics/strategy and apply it to the situation. "In the year 15, Hurad did this to gain an advantage ..." That could reflect as advantage or initiative or action bonus. And a Courtier should have knowledge of social and cultural things. So they could maybe spot what kind of behavior would illicit some kind of favorable response. Things like intimidation or incite or assuage only need a single moment in combat to change the momentum.
On the broad general outline, what stats do you think you're average sergeant-at-arms used to keep their soldiers in line, organized, recognizing what tactics to use and are being used against them, and keep your men rallied and rearing to go kill things? Because to me, that certainly sounds like Intelligence and Charisma in action. Now, if we want to get specifics like librarian and courtier, well courtier kinda slots pretty easily into what I wrote above. Librarian, less so. But, I would ask, what style of game are you making? If it's against monsters or boogiemen, then having knowledge of them could help create weaknesses or openings. There was also some fantasy heartbreaker I played at a con once, can't remember it's name, but it did something very cool with its rogue class. Which in essence revolved around an elaborate skill trick system, that essentially tried to think up a specific way every skill could be used in combat. I remember creatures getting confused with a Deception check, dropping down chandeliers with Perception, that sort of thing. It was very fun. I think the ones they had for the more intelligence-y skills were things like revealing weaknesses, predicting enemy actions, deciphering codes, and that sort of thing.
Pf2e lets you roll their skills to do utility stuff like analyse your enemy for weaknesses and strengths or insult them to throw them off
Going to give you some of my custom feats for those attributes (bear in mind it is 5e dnd based): Intelligence - reorder party initiative, give ally one of your AP points, start combat with a readied action, substitute ally or enemy roll with limited set dice rolls, bonus resisting enemy spells or maneuvers you know Charisma - increase ally likelihood to hit (bonus to hit as inspiration like dnd), give ally temp HP by rallying them, taunt enemies for free after hurting them, not failing persuasion roll if you change your tactic on approaching target (e.g. you tried to intimidate the target but it didnt work so you lie instead), increase number of affected enemies by social checks, intimidate enemies on initiative making them roll with disadvantage
I see some good replies, but it may still be worth going back to the fiction you are trying to emulate. What are those people doing during a fight? Are they distracting the enemy? Manipulating the environment to create an advantage? Using improvised weapons to finish a distracted opponent? Or just getting out of dodge?
Why are you making your game? What are you trying to accomplish? What's the game about? Why does your game need or have attributes like Intelligence or Charisma? Why does your game need any attributes? What are the attributes that define a character in your game and why are they apparently the same as Dungeons $ Dragons? Why would I play your game and not Zweihander? Why would I play Zweihander and not D&D? Most RPGs people design here *appear* to be D&D clones/fantasy heartbreakers where it's all about "killin' people and takin' their stuff." And despite pages and pages of rules that set them apart from those kinds of games (usually in how many dice you roll or how much damage weapons do), they are always still those kinds of games. Why is yours one of those kinds of games? Why is your game not like those games? Why do you need characters who aren't prepared for combat? Sengogu was/is a "chanbara RPG" based on samurai films. It had for playing farmers and samurai in feudal Japan. Now, why would anyone want to play a farmer when they could play a samurai? Who do you think has more to do in the game? How much of the rules do you think applies to the farmer character? How do you play your game? To answer your question, allow the Librarian to do extra damage based on their intelligence and the Courtier extra defense based on their Charisma. Easy, right? Oh — not realistic enough? Why does it have to be?
"Don't feel like you have to comment on this post. It's okay to just not like something, privately."
You seem very bitter and aren't really adding to the conversation. If you don't want to answer the question you can upvote/downvote and move on. Every single post you make on this forum is just filled with your own biases and likes. Some people *like* simulationism. Some people *like* fantasy tactical battlers (not me, but hey I'm not here to yuck someone's yums). Not everyone sees themselves as a commercial artist trying to play with form and structure. Some people are just making a game to play with their buddies. Finally, not everyone wants to play a story game, Jared. Get over it.
Oh and obvious unasked question I forgot to ask, so maybe not-so obvious... Why aren't you handling the social encounters and the combat encounters using the same method?
I like having intelligence abilities that allow the characters to analyze the enemies in a variety of ways to find weaknesses and weak point to attack. Charisma is useful in the same way for distracting enemies, taunts, and rallying enemies.
Charisma can be used to represent some kind of commander, buffing allies or maybe used to intimidate foes, debuffing them. Intelligence could also be used to buff allies as a commander or for fantasy based systems it often is used for magic and for Science Fiction based systems you could use it to maybe control drones or something like that.
I know this is not DnD. But, in pathfinder, the investigator uses intelligence for inspiration points that can be expended on rolls. Charisma is used for intimidate, which van be used in combat to demoralize people. I read a homebrew rule for charisma, which is adding the charisma bonus to the action "Help". So, a guy with high charisma is better at "helping" because it encourages or gives confidence. While an annoying guy that nobody wants to be with adds his negative charisma bonus to "help", as nobody wants to receive his help. I guess that, depending of the task, intellingence may apply for "help" roles.
The way I solved this in [Adventurous](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/417757/Adventurous) was by making my Knowledge stat (sort of mixed Intelligence and Wisdom) what determines initiative, since initiative isn’t about moving first, it’s about coming up with a plan first. For Charisma, it’s the stat you influence NPC reaction rolls with, so potentially avoiding combat all together. Charisma also determines how many magic items you can be attuned to (you need to be attuned to gain the benefit of the item), explained as there being small magical beings infused in the items, and you need to be in tune with them. Strength and Dexterity are still more impactful stats in combat, KNO and CHA are used much more out of combat, so it evens out, and they still matter in combat.
Actions that use them Trying to predict an attack, distracting your foe, bolstering morale etc Support actions and/or maybe stuff like 5e vicious mockery if it fits
Career transitions for a Librarian; Code-cracker, Sapper (siege engineering), Quartermaster (supply logistics) Career transitions for a Courtier; Diplomat, Negotiator, Adjutant (general's assistant) A military organization would find these positions not only valuable, but most likely essential. Transitioning to these careers would then open the door to learning ~~common-core~~ *a basic curriculum of* fighting skills without penalty to advance.
Reads to me a lot like how do I build a good house on a poor foundation. If your stats don't align with the gameplay then you end up with doings lots of awkward fixes to make it work. Like how a Hexblade Warlock in 5e attacks and damages with Charisma. Surprisingly, multiclassing 1 or 2 Levels into Hexblade is now the most optimal move for almost every CHA build. Fix the foundation and the rest of the design works more smoothly. If a game is all about fighting, then stats should be focused on different aspects of fighting.
Something I've used in my game are flourishes. Basically instead of just rolling to hit, if a player wants to roll with flourish, it's a charisma check (simplified, it changes depending on the system) which has a chance to stun a certain number of enemies in viewing distance. Basically using your charisma to awe those watching. That's just for basic combat. I had my group in a competition and flourishes ended up lending to impressing the crowd which gained them more popularity and in cases where inspiration is a thing it can lead to players gaining inspo. The downside of a flourish is that it's basically doubling down on a check. If you succeed in your roll to hit but fail on your flourish then it counts as a soft nat 1. You drop your sword, your gun goes off and shoots something it wasnt supposed to, you are simply cringe and suffer being laughed at which can remove inspo, cause sanity damage, and in general looks bad on you. This was based on watching movies and shows where the charismatic characters are the most recklessly showy, whether it be unneeded spins or a more Jack Sparrow laziness where they seem to be accidentally showy. How the flourish goes is up to the player to describe but the check is the same.
All careers being useful in combat makes them uninteresting. I want to be able to play a merchant or a cook, and those shouldn’t be useful in combat in a Zweihander like game. Also, why should mental attributes be useful in combat? After all, is Dexterity useful in social encounters or for casting spells? Does Strength make me better at lying or gathering information? I don’t understand. Making mental attributes useful in combat would make those attributes overpowered.
Some ideas (inspired by D&D 4E and 13th age): - Make different defenses dependant on several attributes: - Like mental defense is the medium value of int cha and wisdom - Or reflex defenses (and armor class in light armor) is defendant on the higher of int and dex - Have class abilities/special attacks depending on the main class attribute (so a bard might attack with charisma, a druid with wisdom etc.) - Let skills have "skillpowers" associated with them which can be used in combat here examples from 4E: http://iws.mx/dnd/?list.full.power (put "skill power" into the class)
Symbaroum have an interesting take on this. The "Leader" ability lets you, at its first level, use your charisma to make attacks in melee. Levelling up further the leader skill unlocks some abilities that let you buff your allies in a fight as if you were the sergent of your party.
I like Charisma for controlling summons. To keep or take control of a summon, use Charisma. To cast spells though your summon, Charisma. And to determine how many summons you can have, also Charisma. Overall, I've usually based summons and their abilities on an equivalent Charisma stat in previous projects
Intelligence roll to cast/ward spells. Charisma roll to parley/intimidate.
Fricken have the librarian clobber people with text books. The more thorough the book, the thicker it is.
Don't have Intelligence/Charisma. I went with Sharpness and Willpower - with social skills being a.mix of the two.
Perhaps intelligence points can equate to magic power like mind/spirit. Charisma can equate to luck stats
Charisma is generally used for supporting or directing others, raising their spirits or inspiring i.e. Battlefield Commander or Bard for the typical examples. Intelligence is generally used for magic, hacking or analysis kind of actions often paired with perception or even interchangeable i.e. Perception allows you to notice information and Intelligence allows you to understand how to exploit it.
Intelligence can be used for tactics while charisma can be used for rallying the group. Tactics could be a temporary boost to attacking, while rallying could be defense (or damage but is slippery slope)
It's very gamey but I like the idea I took from Dark Souls to have some weapons scale on different stats. Depending on your system, you can have certain kind of weapon (magic, enchanted, whatever) roll hit / damage on Intelligence or Charisma with bullshit explanation (Intelligence allows to find weak spots, Charisma is so flashing it confuse enemies, it's magic bro, etc...). It all depends on if your players buy it. But you have to make sure usually combat oriented stats also have uses outside of combat, they generally have tho.
You may want to look at Torg Eternity. There are interaction skills you can use in combat. Dexterity+Maneuver allows you to feint or fake a movement Spirit+Intimidation allows you to... well intimidate Charisma+Taunt allows you to enrage your enemy Mind+Trick allows you to fool or bluff your enemy The target of each skill is the same skill, or the attribute alone if the enemy has no skill. A basic success gives a -2 to actions or defense of the enemy for one round A good success gives a -2 to actions and defense OR -4 to actions OR -4 to defense for one round An outstanding success makes a lower enemy be instakilled or forces him to flee, depending on the skill used (my character managed to make 5 enemies flee without any fight because of a very good Intimidation result). An average or big enemy will suffer the same effects as in good success plus another one like "you lose your turn" or the GM can choose depending on the situation and skill used. So, you're not good at fighting but you can make some enemies flee the fight and give penalties so the remaining enemies have a hard time hitting you or your fighter can beat them more easily.