Confused About Confused

My honorable work on the Codex Venenorum, Ed. IV. continues. Now in 3e, we had the always fun, but quintessentially fiddly confused condition. If you need a refresher, here’s what confused looked like in the last edition:

A confused character’s actions are determined by rolling d% at the beginning of his turn: 01-10, attack caster with melee or ranged weapons (or close with caster if atacking is not possible); 11-20, act normally; 21-50, do nothing but babble incoherently; 51-70, flee away from caster at top possible speed; 71-100, attack nearest creature (for this purpose, a familiar counts as part of the subject’s self). A confused character who can’t carry out the indicated action does nothing but babble incoherently. Attackers are not at any special advantage when attacking a confused character. Any confused character who is attacked automatically attacks its attackers on its next turn, as long as it is still confused when its turn comes. A confused character does not make attacks of opportunity against any creature that it is not already devoted to attacking (either because of its most recent action or because it has just been attacked).

That is so not 4e. Yet, confused is a worthwhile condition to have in the game for both plot and strategy purposes. So how do we spoof confusion for 4e? We can start by looking out how the wizards at Wizards did it.

Confusion: The 27th-level wizard spell is an obvious place to begin. Essentially, it lets you dominate the target, moving him and making a basic attack against one of his allies.

Umber Hulk: The master of confusion himself is another obvious example. The target slides and is dazed.

I’m not a fan of these iterations. They don’t actually model confusion all that well since the enemy dictates the actions. In the case of the wizard’s spell, the player always gets a strategic advantage from the effect. Likewise, for the umber hulk, the DM gets to position the PC as best he can. These effects lack the randomness that should be inherent to confusion.

So, a couple more:

Beholder: The confusion ray forces the victim to charge his nearest ally and make a basic attack.

Black Lotus: This DMG poison is particularly relevant to the discussion at hand. Basic attack against the nearest creature (whether friend or foe).

These are good. They have that randomness. But I think we can do better. Here are some confused effects I’ve come up with:

• The target drops all items he is carrying and pulls off any clothes or armor he is wearing (perhaps simulating hallucinations of crawling bugs).
• The target uses an encounter attack power to attack a phantom enemy in an empty square.
• The target attacks himself with a basic attack.
• The target moves double his speed, changing direction each square and never entering the same square twice, provoking attacks of opportunity as normal.

So what can you come up with?

1. fred, February 25, 2009:

   For me, the encounter attack power option you list is too punitive. Don’t kick a guy in the junk (his limited, most potent attacks) when you can just punch him in the face.

   The “charge an ally” option works because it sticks to the basic attack arena, and I would stipulate that any attack actions that result from a confusion-style effect should do the same.

   Suggestions:

   * All creatures on the field of battle are considered enemies for the purpose of determining flanking when attacking the victim. (Can’t tell who your friend is? Then they’re providing flanking for your enemy!)

   * -2 on all attacks. If the attack misses, victim must attack the nearest adjacent ally with a basic melee attack. (Your vision clouds — you strike at an enemy, only to find your blade burying into a friend!)

   * At the beginning of your turn, choose one of the following conditions to suffer from: Slowed; Deafened; Prone. You must choose a new, different condition each turn that you suffer this effect. (Unable to tell which way is up, you stagger around the battlefield, trip over yourself, and miss the cries of your allies and enemies.)

2. justin, February 25, 2009:

   To clarify, I’m not looking for a singular representation. The waste-an-encounter-power might appear on a 25th-level poison for example. Certainly not a heroic-tier poison.

   I like your additions, Fred. In particular, the last one is genius. Pick your poison — pun fully intended — is one of my favorite bits of Jonathan Walton’s Geiger Counter game (http://bleedingplay.wordpress.com/geiger/)

3. David, February 25, 2009:

   No specific recommendations, but I like Fred’s ideas. Your proposals seem more psychosis than confusion.

4. fred, February 25, 2009:

   Yeah, I think I’m most fond of the last suggestion I made too.

   I *was* clear on the notion that you’re looking for many different implementations of confusion rather than just one — sorry if I made it seem otherwise!

5. justin, February 26, 2009:

   @Dave, surely someone with a psychosis is confused.

   But your point is well taken. I think the traditional or colloquial intepretation would be, say, disorientation. But I’m looking for a broader range of effects than just that. So, yes, I’d certainly want some on the disorientation end of the spectrum, but I’d also like some on the psychosis/hallucination end too. Those are both flavors that I could see different kinds of poison bringing on.

6. Gumby, February 27, 2009:

   I would avoid basic melee attacks or charges. There is a big difference between a barbarian making a basic melee attack and a wizard doing the same. I could even see situations where a crappy melee attacker tries to become the target of such conditions so as to invalidate them.

   I would instead lean towards “if you miss the enemy, your attack grazes an ally for 1/2 damage” or “you strain yourself in attempting to concentrate and make your attack normally. Take damage equal to your level”.

7. fred, February 27, 2009:

   Basic melee attacks aren’t all that bad. Yes, there’s the potential for a BMA to do craploads more damage if a class’s features lets you consider one of its at-wills to be a BMA, but in general all that a striker-oriented class’s build tends to get you — since the player in these situations will almost certainly not be making use of all the bells and whistles when making his BMA against an ally — is an extra +1 or +2 to hit and an extra +2 to +3 damage (on average, based on die-size — every bump up in die type only nets a +1 average gain on damage, and “fighty” melee classes usually end up with melee weapons that are two to three die-bumps up).

   While that does stack up over time, and is particularly amplified when a fighter or barbarian or whatever is able to layer on their class abilities, in the “do your least damaging attack” sense, the BMA is still a pretty good option for this sort of design.

8. rob, February 27, 2009:

   I dig the core impetus to have it really be something unpredictable, and I wonder if it might be served by a poor man’s domination. You take either your move or standard action, then the DM makes the other one (with the standard limitations of domination). Variations determine who chooses and which action happens first.

   -Rob D.

9. fred, February 27, 2009:

   Oooh. Partial domination is a hot, hot idea, man.

10. eric, March 3, 2009:

    Basic melee attack is usually the least effective attack, so it is appropriate to have a confused character use that to attack a party member.

    I seem to remember a 4e module where the character was confused, he had a 50/50 chance of attacking a party member. In my game, he chose to do nothing.

    Slowed can mimic staggering around easily.

    I didn’t see granting combat advantage up here. That’s pretty standard.

11. Eric Finley, March 4, 2009:

    A Confused character must dig out a Roborally set. Deal both the player and the DM a hand of N cards, where N is your speed. DM plays first, face-down; you respond face-up, he plays face-down, and so forth. You may opt to stop at any point and just not play any more this turn. Flip ‘em all up and execute; the first time the program causes you to bump into another mini you make a basic melee attack; on any bumps after that, the player of the bumped mini may either have you ignore the move, or make a free slide to either side and let you go by. Once you have made turns and moves equal to your speed, your turn ends.

    (Glances around) Well? It would work, wouldn’t it?

12. justin, March 5, 2009:

    I’d make one slight change, if you bump another creature, you either make a basic melee attack … or push them down the hole.

    Bonus: An excuse to break out Robo Rally.