I've been scrutinizing the action cards, but I haven't found any actions that perform an important party-based combat requirement: tanking.

Essentially, it seems to me that the combat would become even more tactical and interesting if there was some sort of taunt action that would draw opponents to a particular high-armor, high-defense party member.

Am I missing something? Is there a tank-like combat action card in the game?

In lieu of such an action, how are players/GMs simulating enemy tanking?

Thanks in advance.

Tanks, "ugh", boring. Push 'em in the river and watch 'em drown.

But if you must, use a skill if you like such as Guile to fake out someone into coming for you.

As a GM, my goblins are going for the weak and the ratcatch'er's little dog, and leaving the dwarf in plate to the wargor pack leader, thank you very much.

Mage Knight Kevin said:

Just like they do in most other games ... roleplaying.

Amigo, I think you've been playing MMOs too long.

First the bad:

Remember that Tanking doesn't work in real life . If a monster is intelligent, they won't attack the giant in plate yelling things about their mother that can take incredible punishment, they go for the skinny guy in the back warming up flamey-liquid death made of Aqshi. Healers in this game frequently wear plate and wield greathammers, and fight on the front lines. Its a very different mentality.

Remember that the RPG came from a strategic battle minis. Its a dark, grim world filled with unfair fights where you're frequently outnumbered 3-to-1or more. There's a time honored tradition of advancing to the rear (IE grabbing your objective and GETTING THE HECK OUT). You try to win by being smarter than the bad guys, and trying to get the on them, making sure your squishies are way the heck in the back, hoping to toast anything that gets close long before they get trapped in melee.

This leads to much less 'glass cannon' type characters, and much tougher healers/mages/rogues overall. Toughness 2 characters for example don't belong in combat (god did we learn that our first session). The brutality of the world simply consumes anyone trying to pull this off for any length of time.

Now the Good:

While you can't tank in the MMO sense (or the 4th ed sense) that doesn't mean you can't accomplish similar objectives. Your heavy toughness, big plate wearer will probably live to fight another day long after the squishy mage. There are several cards that allow you to 'guard', meaning you can add black dice to attacks against people you're protecting (see improved guarded position for example). There are also cards like grapple, which can keep a monster from moving. And just the basic mechanics of combat.

Remember for example, that monsters don't take fatigue for extra moves - they substitute wounds. So any time you can lock a critter down in melee, it has to disengage and then try moving, which causes it to bleed out. If your clothies keep moving back you can bleed a monster dry if it keeps pushing to move up.

And some final thoughts:

'Tanking' is a concept that was introduced by MMOs, and brought into RPG legitimacy by 4th edition (I think Descent the FFG game also has some possibilities with that). Overall it doesn't really work in a realistic setting, although as mentioned it does add a fair bit of strategy. The best 'tanking' you can hope for is to fill up a corridor, and have your squishies hiding behind you. Out in the open though, its just really difficult to pull off.

In good news, the game is flexible. If cards like that which you are hunting don't exist, you can always make some with your GMs approval. The games themes are more about the brutality of the world, wounds being deadly and taking a long time to heal, and strong stories. The system is streamlined for vicious, cinematic, action oriented combat that doesn't rely on heavy tactics (there is no playmat, squares of movement) which stresses storytelling as opposed to mini's moving. Unfortunately tanking, and the strategic options it may put on the table doesn't really fit in with this.

The problem with 'tanking' actions is that they do the same thing in pen and paper RPGs as they do in online MMOs...ie, they reduce most encounters to 'tank and spank'. Personally I find that dreadfully boring.

So far in WHFRP, my players have just more or less 'decided' who would engage. For example, the Swordmaster moves forward and engages the enemy while the Apprentice hangs back and the Messenger plinks away with this bow. If the Swordmaster wants to protect his buddies, he tells me something along the lines of "I want to try and make sure they dont get by me". I'll often give him a few black dice to his attack and/or a white die to enemy attacks against him and that covers his 'moving to cover' his friends. If its a wide open area or some of the bad guys start closer to the Apprentice/Messenger, well they'll just have to look out for themselves for a while...

WHFRP is much more 'narrative' system than things like D&D (3 or 4). I find it works better just to let the players decide what their characters WANT to do and then I apply the modifiers and restrictions to see if they accomplish that. If that includes the Swordmaster 'taunting' and enemy or 'threatening' him, I resolve those actions and the continue. Played this way, I dont see the need for mechanical 'taunt' or other 'tanking' actions.

Actually, one of the first things I noticed about the Action Cards is how they give many options to guard and help other characters. They create a great diversity of ways in which characters can do combat, and many of them go around protecting others. There are some Actions that make you influence your target, and that could mean getting their attention. That is one Card that states you take the damage (or some of the damage) in the place of a friend, isn't there?

I think supportive combat actions and protective ones make a good base for a narrative "tank type" character.

Intelligent creatures, such as ourselves, wouldn`t go after the weakest enemy at all. Intelligent creatures would try to eliminate what he thinks is the greatest threat to his own life or well-being. Even cowardly goblins would go against a full plated fighter, if he is percieved as the greatest threat (or run away).

attacking a scrawny-looking man that happens to be a bright wizard would only be logical if the enemy (goblins) have identified him as an threat or risk to their own life or well-being. Otherwise the more thougher members of the party would be attacked.

It make no sense that even cowardly monster races like goblins or skaven would ignore a greater threat to their life, just to deal damage to non-threatening party members.
So in a sense tanking or drawing AGRO should be taken into consideration by the individual GM, even if it is a concept taken from computer games. Only most veteran GMs do it automatically without thinking, and often get it right.

Having rules for AGRO is best done as a house rule (I had a similar thread a while back).

A sidenote: The 20% percent guys

American and german studies from ww2 showed that in any battalion, company or platoon, the same small group of men, performed outstanding, took the worst of the risks and held initiative. Like Saving Private Ryan, in the opening scene on the beach, a fairly small group of individuals do open the way for hundreds of other US rangers and soldiers. This is no coincidence, and I like to call them the 20% percent guys. It is that small group that a whole battalion or company rests on, it is they who take the risks, initiative, while the great majority, somehow lagg behind, or avoid taking personal risks. Analyzes of both the relative inexperienced US army and the brutalized but efficient German army shows almost identical information.

It might be far fetched to comparise fantasy battles with statistical analyses from the brutal fighting in europe, but can it be used? in a group of 20 goblins it can fair to say that at least 3-4 of them are resourceful individuals. of 20 goblins 4 of them could be a real pain in the *** for a party of adventureres while the rest would run arround make a lot of commotion and fight rather inefficently. while the rest of the goblins throwed themselves at the intruders, the 4 would be smarter or more experienced and even identify the wizard for being the real threat here. I
ts how I do it anyway.

Good gaming (sorry about my lecturing style, I sometimes get too carried away)

Maybe it's just an unfortunate use of words, but it does bring to mind MMOs. I hate MMOs and their brain dead "mobs"....If this game had an "official" taunt card, I don't think I'd be playing it.

As far as "how to do it?", I am with Doc Weasle, let him RP it out. Now of course if it were in "my" game, where a player wanted to draw all the "agro" to him,...he would most likely learn quickly it is not a good idea. He also might be making a new character in very short order.

Taunts should be roleplaying only.

Besides never understood the: "Yes this cloth clad wizard is speewing insanely damaging spells on me, that tears me apart, but I think I'm gonna focus on this fully metal armoured guy who's saying stuff about my mother..."

Intelligent opponents will not be affected by taunts, they should attack who ever looks dangerous or weak, it's wat the players do, so why should the monsters do any different?

My players would be pretty miffed if I told them they had to attack the chaos armoured champion, and let the wizard keep bombing them with spells, oh and let the priest keep healing the champion...

There are two mindless quintessential tanks in this game. Both are dwarfs and because stereotypes, I've not seem much in the way of them being inherently interesting outside of combat.

Ironbreaker: Gromril armor and Saga of Grugni (forces opponents to you, D&D 4e "marking"-style)

Trollslayer. Two weapon tank without armor.

Here are your other min-maxed twinks:

* Anyone with rapid fire or two weapon fighting and a 5 in their WS or BS. Elves make really twinky ballistic skill characters because of their high agility.

If your Gm runs a combat-only game (D&D 4e style), these characters are for you.

jh

Guys,

Thanks for the answers...all good quality stuff.

Tanking should be a player/GM choice. It takes tactics to TANK. If your group wants a tank, make sure the tank gets out there and does his job. One of my games at the LGS has a Tank in it. They do a great job, but the players work cooperatively to make sure they can Tank. By making this a passive ability you eliminate elements of player choice and makes combat more of a passive experience rather than an active one.

Commoner,

Can you explain a bit as to how the players and the assigned 'tank' perform this? I agree somewhat with your point (group cooperation, vs using a single card and forcing the enemies to attack) but I'm just curious how it plays out.

If your adversaries have any "Honour" system that they follow tanking makes sense, Big fighters take on big fighters so there lesser allies can take on the opponents lesser forces.

Imagine a battle involving a mercenary (excellent combatant), A gambler (a fair combatant) and a Scholar (not a combatant) versus 10 goblins and 2 orcs,

The 2 orcs look at their opponents and say they could probably gang up on the big one, (other two are too easy, not worth the orcs time) the ten goblins would then see that the most powerful adversary is occupied so they should kill/delay his allies, 8 of the goblins go to attack the duelist, who if left to his own devices could effect the mercenary-orc battle, the scholar is then attacked by two goblins as the goblins believe that they, being the weakest members of there group (of goblins) would only be able to contribute by attacking their weakest member.

In general, the strongest party member gets most stuff thrown at him, he probably likes it that way too.

shinma said:

A little...it is a bit hard to do it without the dynamics of combat actually taking place without a bunch of details, but here is an overview.

First off the tank has My Life For Yours. If the "tank" doesn't have this, they should. This card allows him to mitigate damage and defense for his allies.

In a straight up fight (open field), they play it in one of two ways. The tank himself either takes on the largest henchmen group or he charges the biggest thing on the table (a troll in a bunch of Goblins per se). Once locked in engagement, he will weaken up the odds. Weaker character's will actually typically join him after said creature has attacked. The following turn he goes before the creature and the weaker character and activates my life for yours. He will also make ample use of the assist maneuver. This way the weaker fighter can damage while being well protected by the tank. The other players, by now generally split and act in groups of two. This way enemies are more likely to hit one or the other and can damage on an individual foe. Since the tank is generally locked with an ally, it has a tendency to draw Aggro from other monsters who come over to pick off the tank or weaker character. It doesn't matter as the Tank happily takes it with My Life For yours.

If in the event another PC is wounded, the Tank will shift over to interfere on their behalf.

One thing that does make it easier for Tanks and all PC's, we do allow an assist maneuver to add a black to a player's defense since they can add a white die to hit. This is hugely helpful and helps the tank succeed.

Scenario 2. Sometimes, the tank waits to go last or near the end, once the major NPC's have chosen their attacks. Generally PC's don't go down in one hit. The tank either joins and activates My Life For Yours or hits with a massive attack (Thunderous Blow/Reckless Cleave, Judgement of Vengeance, or Double Strike). This generally draws aggro to him, because if the creature doesn't attack him, it's dead. I put that in bold because it's important to quality tanking.

Now as the Tank moves, players move with him. So, if he is engaged and doing well drawing attention, they will pick off the guys around the side of his fight. If the Tank is in the thick, and they can't handle the opposition, they generally fall back to assist the Tank to make sure the enemy he's fighting dies so he can move on to the next big baddy.

When someone is about to go down, the Tank always activates My Life For Yours to help them survive.

The Tank also quickly identifies who is the biggest threat from the enemy side. He puts them in order, such as Troll, Orc, Goblin, Snotling. He will normally act ahead of them (if he thinks he can take them out) or reacts to them depending on what they do. He goes when he needs to. So if the Troll charges a Scribe, he can go and intercept right away. But if the Troll charges the Witch Hunter, he's pretty sure the Witch Hunter will still be up, so he takes on the Orc hoping he can take it down.

Range Savvy character's obviously never enter the fray. They let the tank do their work and move in only when needed.

Narrow corridors make this even easier. He makes sure he always pulls up rear when escaping or on point when carving. Other PC's attack around him or assist him. The shifting initiative system allows for ease of use between these elements as well.

That is a short overview, without an actual play break down. Hopefully it is what you were looking for.

The formula that could be applied:

DPT (Damage Per Turn) + High Soak = highest Aggro, meaning you are monster bait that can take it. If they don't, they're dead.

I do not really like looking at gaming in those terms, but since we're talking about Tanking, I figured I should put it up there.

Excelent breakdown Commoner, Magnus (my priest of Sigmar) thanks you ^_~ While we do spend alot of time investigating, negotiating, and debating, its good to have some decent ideas on how to use cards that aren't broken in that regard (Saga being an example) to pull this off cleverly.

You could also check out this thread:
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efpag=3&efid=149&efcid=3&efidt=320226

where this has been discussed before, I (and others) posted some ideas on how to give roleplayed taunts a mechanical effect.

Trollslayer. Two weapon tank without armor.

Hehe, that's not what I would call a tank. He will probably attract a lot of attention, but will also not be able to stay alive to keep doing it.