14 réponses à ce sujet

[Will Scarlet]

Matheau wrote...
Parry is a vastly underrated skill that most people never bothered figuring out how to use properly. Against melee opponents, a high level Duelist in parry mode wins. Yes, there is a bug in the skill, but it only applies to enemies with 4+ attacks and you still always get to use Parry against three of them.

As the hypothetical, lets say a Duelist with 4 attacks and Improved Parry is fighting 2 enemies with 4 attacks each:

Scenario 1: No Parry Mode
- You throw 4 attacks against 1 enemy and have to dodge 8 attacks.

Scenario 2: Parry Mode
- You throw no attacks. You parry out 3 attacks each. Due to being a level 7+ Duelist, you are pretty much guaranteed to succeed all 6, since only the sixth one has a -3 penalty which is minor compared to your bonus. You have a very high chance of also Riposting all of those attacks. You only have to beat them by 5 and the Duelist bonus means you almost win the roll by default. That lets you throw 6 total attacks in the round (Riposte doesn't have the same limitation at normal attacks. You have to dodge 2 attacks due to the bug (though without Parry mode you would have had to dodge 8).

So, let's see, Parry let's you cancel out most, if not all, attacks against you and throw out more attacks per round than should be possible. That doesn't strike me as a very weak skill. It's just a situational skill since you shouldn't be running around with it turned on all the time.

I can see where that can be effective.  However, as a player that's never used parry, I have questions.

1. How does parrying work with Circle Kick? If you riposte and hit with an unarmed strike, will you still get the extra attack against an adjacent opponent? [I guess the same would apply with Cleave]
2. How does parry work with dual-wielding?
3. Does weapon size matter with parrying? Is there a difference in parrying with a greatsword or dagger?
4. What is the bug in the skill that was mentioned?

[Arkalezth]

http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Parry

Modifié par Arkalezth, 15 février 2011 - 04:35 .

[manageri]

Will Scarlet wrote...
4. What is the bug in the skill that was mentioned?

The bug is that there's a delay between how many parry checks you can do in a given time period. That means because the game has characters doing 3 "flurries" in a round that contain all their attacks, parry only tries to avoid the first attack in those flurries. So when you try to parry an enemy with 4 attacks, he has 2 attacks in his first flurry, the second of which you don't get to roll a parry check against.

This is however not the only way this bug screws things up as this guy is claiming, it also means you don't get to parry against two different enemies if they are attacking you at roughly the same time. So the ONLY scenario where parry works as intended is one enemy with max 3 attacks. It might be worth using in some situations, like if you invested in the skill with your rogue and he's getting mauled by a horny bear and can't do anything to escape, but I certainly don't find investing feats or levels in a PRC just to boost parry to be anywhere near worth it.

[NWN DM]

What if the bear isn't horny... does Parry work then?

All kidding aside, I've found that in a low powered setting, Parry is actually quite a strong ability to maximize, for the right PC.

[manageri]

NWN DM wrote...
I've found that in a low powered setting, Parry is actually quite a strong ability to maximize, for the right PC.

What kinda PC and for what purpose (meaning is your party's tank relying on it most of the time, or maybe the wizard when he's getting mauled)?

[NWN DM]

In my experience, a PC with high dexterity, Improved Parry and Skill Focus: Parry is pretty well teflon coated in a low magic, low level setting.

[M. Rieder]

NWN DM wrote...

What if the bear isn't horny... does Parry work then?
All kidding aside, I've found that in a low powered setting, Parry is actually quite a strong ability to maximize, for the right PC.

If he's not horny, there's nothing to parry.


It's really too bad that parry is so bugged up.  It really should be a very useful and interesting skill.  It really just doesn't seem right that a tank can just lumber around and pound a light and dexterous fighter.  I also don't think that dexterity armor class bonuses are really sufficient, but I guess no system is perfect.  I wonder if anyone has been able to fix the parry bug.  I would like to try it out as a skill but haven't for reasons already stated. 

Modifié par M. Rieder, 16 février 2011 - 12:27 .

[manageri]

NWN DM wrote...

In my experience, a PC with high
dexterity, Improved Parry and Skill Focus: Parry is pretty well teflon
coated in a low magic, low level setting.

As long as he doesn't get many enemies hitting him at once (depends on luck whether their attacks are synced), doesn't have to deal with ranged attacks, and doesn't get knocked down or stunned etc. A tank not depending on parry doesn't suffer from any of those limitations and it's not like your "parry AC" will be beyond a nonparry tank's AC, all gear, buffs and feats considered so why gimp yourself going the parry route?

You mentioned low level so let's pick a level 5 fighter.
20 Dex , improved parry, skill focus parry, two-weapon defense and maxed skill ranks means a parry modifier of 18 so that's parry AC 19-38 which is 28.5 average (which will start dropping if you tank 4+ enemies).

A 12 dex fighter with full plate, a tower shield, luck of heroes and combat expertise is at 27 AC, just 1.5 AC away from that average parry AC.

Now consider what happens when you start buffing these guys. What can we add to the parry guy at this level? Heroism and cat's grace (+4 combined) is all I can come up with, whereas the fullplate mofo can benefit from shield of faith, barkskin, improved mage armor (+11). You might complain the fullplate dude gets more buffs but even if you drop the best buff his total AC would be just 0.5 points behind the parry guy.

At best parry can match a traditional tank in handling a few low level melee enemies (and even that only when not flatfooted or prone and if they don't smack you at the same time), is clearly inferior against enemies with 4+ attacks or many enemies at once, and fails completely in handling ranged attacks. I see no reason at all to use it as the primary tanking method in a group, but it can still have situational uses.

Modifié par manageri, 16 février 2011 - 01:11 .

[NWN DM]

I guess we have a fundamental philosophical difference in our approach to the game; all those buffs would never come into play in a game I run, nor would most of the kinds of attacks that would incapacitate totally, so it's a moot point from my perspective.

A 5th level fighter would already be considered mid-level in any game I run, not low, so yet again there's a difference.

No big problem; the question was asked and I had my input. Everyone is free to agree or disagree at their leisure.

[Haplose]

Another problem with Parry is that Riposte aqttacks slowly whittle down everyone attacking you. They have plenty of time to heal themselves/each other, etc.

In general taking foes one-by-one, as fast as possible, is preferable. Then you get less enemies attacking you and your situation improves over the course of combat.



And I think I don't need to elaborate on the need to take the enemy spellcasters out as soon as possible... Like has been mentioned, ranged attacks are another weak spot.

[Matheau]

Personally, I've never noticed the bug that causes you to not parry if too many enemies attack at once. I have definitely been able to parry multiple enemies in a single round. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, just that I've played Duelist quite frequently and any scenario I turn Parry on, neither bug is actually a big deal. I was only demonstrating that Parry is not completely and totally and utterly useless like a lot of people say because they have never touched the Parry button once or put a single point in the skill.

Parry is a very situational defense that is primarily for offensive melee users who took at least 7+ levels of Duelist and otherwise do not have great AC. If a character does not meet those criteria, I would not recommend they put a single point into it. If you do meet those criteria, it is a very effective and cheap method of defense that it not feat (Improved Parry helps, but it isn't truly necessary), equipment, or buff dependent.

It isn't a skill you run around with turned on 100% of the time, no matter how you build it. Ideally, your goal is to never have to turn it on. It's the defense for a class that isn't a stand up fighter and would only ever have the attention of a couple of enemies at any given time.

Not really sure why there is so much tank discussion. Parry is not a tank skill, Duelist is not a tank class. Even if parry worked absolutely perfectly, the cumulative penalty per attack each round would cause the check to be difficult to impossible if you are taking the number of attacks per round a tank normally would. Also the fact Duelists aren't very good with ranged (they do get Deflect Arrows for free, but it still stands) and spellcasting defense doesn't make sense. It's like complaining about Eldritch Knight because it doesn't improve metamagic. If you want to improve metamagic, you choose Arcane Scholar, because that is not Eldritch Knight's specialty.

[The Fred]

manageri wrote...
A 12 dex fighter with full plate, a tower shield, luck of heroes and combat expertise is at 27 AC, just 1.5 AC away from that average parry AC.

Surely, though, Combat Expertise lowers your own attack, so a "standard" fighter mightn't be using it? Furthermore, parry-boosting buffs might be rare (though I think one of the Bard inspirations also works), but parry-boosting items are much less expensive than AC-boosting ones - simply get a pair of Gauntlets of Swordsmanship (or Greater Gauntlets), which give +3 (or +6) to parry, and cost a pittance. In a scenario where full plate and/or tower shields aren't easily available either (rare I know, but could happen), the AC-based fighter suffers further penalties. So, at low levels (consider that good equipment is rare at the very starts of games, anyway), parry could work, imo. It's just that as you level-up, you become less and less effective.

EDIT: Also, iirc, parry buffs stack, whereas AC ones don't necessarily.

Modifié par The Fred, 19 février 2011 - 04:02 .

[manageri]

The Fred wrote...

manageri wrote...
A 12 dex fighter with full plate, a tower shield, luck of heroes and combat expertise is at 27 AC, just 1.5 AC away from that average parry AC.

Surely, though, Combat Expertise lowers your own attack, so a "standard" fighter mightn't be using it?

It's not a "standard" build in the way you imply, it's made for tanking, just like parry is for defense instead of whooping ass and also lowers your offense (especially focused offense) far more than CE.

Furthermore, parry-boosting buffs might be rare (though I think one of the Bard inspirations also works)

Cancelled out by inspire defense in the 5th level example, for lower levels than that it'd help.

but parry-boosting items are much less expensive than AC-boosting ones - simply get a pair of Gauntlets of Swordsmanship (or Greater Gauntlets), which give +3 (or +6) to parry, and cost a pittance. In a scenario where full plate and/or tower shields aren't easily available either (rare I know, but could happen), the AC-based fighter suffers further penalties. So, at low levels (consider that good equipment is rare at the very starts of games, anyway), parry could work, imo. It's just that as you level-up, you become less and less effective.

EDIT: Also, iirc, parry buffs stack, whereas AC ones don't necessarily.

Yes, if it's low level and you can't even get basic proper armor yet and/or there's gloves of swordmanship around, parry can be better for tanking a very limited amount of melee enemies.

[The Fred]

What I meant about the equipment is that you can get gloves of swordmanship before you can get +AC items, and they provide +3 to +6 vs the point or two a similarly-leveled AC item would give you. Obviously you are unlikely, in most games, to be able to get these gloves before you can get full plate (though my campaign is an oriental one, and heavy armour is probably going to be restricted) but in that situation, the AC tank loses out, and the parrier is unchanged. Another point to note is that light/no armour characters such as monks and rogues can parry well too; in fact, a caster could probably take it as well.

EDIT: P.S. Inspire Competence gives a bigger bonus than Inspire Defence, and can be gained with only 2 Bard levels, meaning a character could take a Bard dip or be a Bard with, say, Fighter levels, and still get the bonuses. Obviously in a party situation, Defence would probably be more useful since it would cover non-parriers, though they might get other advantages from Competence.

Of course, AC is still probably more reliable than parrying, but early on the latter can be nice. It seems that the bug is an engine issue, but I'm still looking at other ways to try and adjust parry so that it's a viable option.

Modifié par The Fred, 20 février 2011 - 07:39 .

[Tanlaus]

One of the biggest problems with parry outside of the flurry bug in the way attacks per round are divided at high levels, is the soft cap of 23 (or 24 I forget). A high dex character is going to max that out relatively early on (especially with items that give a parry bonus) at which point parry kind of stalls out while your opponents AB keeps climbing.