[Martial Arts] Technique to offset -4 for grappled

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by JoelSammallahti

However, I started wondering whether maybe there's a reason such a technique doesn't appear in the book - it would, I think, logically be a part of most styles that teach grappling skills. So, is this perhaps too powerful a technique?

When I wrote Technical Grappling, it never even occurred to me as I was re-jiggering the penalties to make a technique to be able to ignore the penalties of a grapple. The penalties are the entire point of grappling someone - they represent restricted motion and a reduced ability to bring your strength to bear.

And there is a technique (an action, really) to reduce the penalties already - it's called Break Free (or attack to break free in Technical Grappling).

If a player brought that technique to me on a character sheet, I'd veto it on the spot.

From a game design perspective, the penalties are not the same kind of penalties you get for "I'm doing something hard." The penalties are the grappling equivalent of damage. They're the effect.

Now, you could potentially buy "slipperiness" (Control Resistance in Technical Grappling) that makes it harder to achieve that effect in the first place. There are already advantages that give you bonuses on skill rolls to break free. So there are things that make you difficult to grab, and difficult to hold on to, already. I'd look to those.