[MA] Technique Mastery for DWA?

[the_matrix_walker]

Originally Posted by Kromm

"A skill's core uses aren't eligible" catches this one. The actual roll against Dual-Weapon Attack is for core use: standard attacks. You can have Technique Adaptation only for peripheral attacks. It would take a very lawyer-like reading to claim, "Attacking once with one hand is a core use, sure, but once you do it with both hands at once, that changes." That would be like saying it's okay to use Technique Adaptation to get +4 to Wrestling as long as you insist that it only covers two-handed grapples.

I would disallow most technique mastery perks on general principal, and I thought this was extreme myself, hence the thread.

I think you picked a poor example however, as Wrestling's default is a two handed grapple and has no technique listed in chapter 3 of MA, IIRC, and DWA is a technique that starts out as a skill feet at -4.

If a player says "I'm going to grapple him" I assume he's using two hands by default, and if they say "I attack with my sword" I assume they are attacking with one. Looks like a different animal to me.

Sure DWA would become your default if you improved it to Skill (or higher), but I think that's true of any widely useful technique you've bought up to skill (or higher).

And it does have it's drawbacks, no benefit in resisting feints, or bonus to parry, doesn't help with skill on added attacks on Extra Attack or AoA, and you loose the benefit if you drop a weapon or are disarmed... so that's why I thought it was at least possibly legal.

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker

Sure DWA would become your default if you improved it to Skill (or higher), but I think that's true of any widely useful technique you've bought up to skill (or higher).

And it does have it's drawbacks, no benefit in resisting feints, or bonus to parry, doesn't help with skill on added attacks on Extra Attack or AoA, and you loose the benefit if you drop a weapon or are disarmed... so that's why I thought it was at least possibly legal.

I'm with you there. It seems bizarre to me that DWA would be barred as a "core use of skill", when techniques like Kicking are explicitly allowed.

[DangerousThing]

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

I'm with you there. It seems bizarre to me that DWA would be barred as a "core use of skill", when techniques like Kicking are explicitly allowed.

DWA is already a technique that is allowed to be improved to the limit of the defining skill.

And so is Kicking. You can't improve kicking past Karate (or Brawling if it's a technique of Brawling also).

And as GM I wouldn't allow kicking to be extended because I feel that kicking is also a core use of Karate. Buying off the -2 penalty with a technique is fine, but making Kicking even better sounds wrong to me

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by DangerousThing

DWA is already a technique that is allowed to be improved to the limit of the defining skill.

And so is Kicking. You can't improve kicking past Karate (or Brawling if it's a technique of Brawling also).

And as GM I wouldn't allow kicking to be extended because I feel that kicking is also a core use of Karate. Buying off the -2 penalty with a technique is fine, but making Kicking even better sounds wrong to me

Originally Posted by MA pg 52

A skill’s core uses aren’t eligible; e.g.,
Technique Mastery (Judo Throw) and Technique
Mastery (Kicking) are fine, but Technique Mastery
(Judo Grapple) and Technique Mastery (Karate
Punch) aren’t.

By RAW, Technique Mastery is unambiguously allowed for Kicking (if allowing TM at all). So, where would you draw the line? How about Upper Cut, Knee Strike, or Exotic Hand Strike? Those certainly aren't "core" techniques, but after improving them they may replace basic attacks. And if barring those, what would you allow, if anything?

The sense I get from this whole discussion is that people think TM is a point crock and shouldn't be allowed at all. I haven't had that experience with it. As Peter says, it's helpful to represent some of the hyper-specialized martial artists from fiction.

[Peter V. Dell'Orto]

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

As Peter says, it's helpful to represent some of the hyper-specialized martial artists from fiction.

It's really where it came from. I watched some ridiculous kung fu movie - dubbed from Cantonese to Mandarin, with bad subtitles, etc. It had a kicking master, a guy who had this one great punch, etc. and I called up Sean and this resulted from that discussion. We needed some way to manage those guys who do one thing really well.

Like a few of the other perks, it's fairly easily abuseable, but that's no reason to take the tool out of the hands of worldbuilding GMs. Use it where it seems appropriate and like it won't result in badness in your campaign. Like, you know, any rule in any book. :)

[Sunrunners_Fire]

Originally Posted by Peter V. Dell'Orto

It's really where it came from. I watched some ridiculous kung fu movie - dubbed from Cantonese to Mandarin, with bad subtitles, etc. It had a kicking master, a guy who had this one great punch, etc. and I called up Sean and this resulted from that discussion. We needed some way to manage those guys who do one thing really well.

And its' appreciated!

Originally Posted by Peter V. Dell'Orto

Like a few of the other perks, it's fairly easily abuseable, but that's no reason to take the tool out of the hands of worldbuilding GMs. Use it where it seems appropriate and like it won't result in badness in your campaign. Like, you know, any rule in any book. :)

Heh. I especially find this thread amusing for the simple reason that I have a player who loves dual-wielding, always takes DWA and always takes TM(DWA) regardless of whether her character is using melee or firearms. It comes with so many downsides, and the player gets so used to having that bonus, that managing to take it away thrashes the player's familiarity with how the character fights; it tends to nicely represent the confusion of disarming events rather than the smooth transition that a lot of players do as it forces a change of tactics.

Besides, it is +4 for [5]. Meh. It may be a bit cheap at the lower skill levels (sub 20s), where it is more typical to get +3 for [6], but where my group plays it isn't especially noticeable.

[DangerousThing]

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

By RAW, Technique Mastery is unambiguously allowed for Kicking (if allowing TM at all). So, where would you draw the line? How about Upper Cut, Knee Strike, or Exotic Hand Strike? Those certainly aren't "core" techniques, but after improving them they may replace basic attacks. And if barring those, what would you allow, if anything?

The sense I get from this whole discussion is that people think TM is a point crock and shouldn't be allowed at all. I haven't had that experience with it. As Peter says, it's helpful to represent some of the hyper-specialized martial artists from fiction.

I did say that I wouldn't allow it, not that RAW wouldn't allow it.

As with most things, I will negotiate with players. While I might not like Kicking for TM, I wouldn't mind more specialized kicks and hand strikes using TM.