The Official "4e Critique and Rebuttal" Thread

[Kaelik]

Just curious, can you make any arguments that insult anyone besides PR?

I mean, so far we have:

1) TGD is stupid because PR thinks you guys are mean for not liking him!
2) TGD is stupid because PR likes you guys!
3) I hate PR, therefore TGD is stupid!

We get it, you don't like PR except when he doesn't like us then suddenly he's cool. Whatever. We don't like PR either. We also don't like you. So if PR would throw another hissy fit and leave, and you would go whine like a bitch about how we don't analyze anything on WotC, we could fucking do something worthwhile instead of dealing with a retarded STD that spouts gibberish.

[TavishArtair]

The really dumb thing about the Gibbering orb is that if your DM lets you use the 'beeswax in the ears' trick they become laughably easy.

I can't say for sure whether this trick would work or not.

We played using the traditional "this is Gauntlet, not a role playing" game assumption of 4e, so we just had to suffer through it. I'll note that the eye rays can be a bitch for people it can get/keep in close range, though, even without the stupid gibber.

[NativeJovian]

So guys, we still feeding the troll in here?

I guess so. Have fun with that.

[Zinegata]

Of course he can swear as much as he wants. I never said that he couldn't. Obviously you fail at reading yet again. Though given that you fail at pretty much everything else, that is utterly unsurprising.

Liar,

"I'm all for swearing, but just because you can swear doesn't mean you should do so all the time"

I'm saying he can swear as much as he fucking wants.

And you should go get the fuck off TGDMB already.

And of course you care. You wouldn't respond to my threads so rabidly if you didn't care. You have something you feel obligated to prove. Other people can claim they don't care about me, but someone who said that they left the WotC boards because of me, then came here and railed against me because I'm here now really doesn't have that luxury.

That was before "The Self Destruction of Titanium Dragon because he tried to find wiggle room in the fucking Less Than Sign"

Context matters

Now, you're really just the board's chewtoy. And as long as you choose to continue being the chewtoy, I'm gonna have fun with it. Don't flatter yourself thinking that you actually matter just because I choose to spend half an hour a day posting how idiotic you are as a form of petty vengeance and stress relief.

[Zinegata]

So guys, we still feeding the troll in here?

I guess so. Have fun with that.

If he gets banned/ignored, he'll probably go whining to the WoTC boards how the TGDMB people "oppressed" him in an effort to marginalize TGDMB.

I say we keep feeding him and let him dig deeper holes. So when the sane WoTC folks ask "What's this about TD", we just show his threads and say "He's a fucking idiot".

[Draco_Argentum]

If he gets banned/ignored

You can't get banned here without posting guro porn or doing something similarly horrible. That hundreds of thousands of times worse than just making crap arguments.

[Doom]

There's a few important things to understand here:

1) Whoring healing is only good if the DM lets you take extended rests all the time. If he is, he is "doing it wrong". If you have to go through 5 encounters, you're better off having a more balanced party which can take down the monsters more quickly. Of course, this is still a symptom of the five minute workday, which, while mitigated a little, still can exist if the players choose for it to.

Incorrect, short, not extended, rests allow for massive heal whoring...level 8 cleric in my party has a "take your surge +20 power" during short rests, practically makes the surges meaningless.

Also, an extra healer ridiculously ramps up the healing in combat, not in extended rests. Do you even play the game? Extended rests give back daily powers and all health/surges, completely irrelevant of 'whoring', don't even need a healer for that.

2) If everyone has healing powers, then it may not seem very tactical. If you have only one healer in a party of 4, it becomes much more tactical, as it does if you have to go through five encounters per day.

Yep, but no way to force a party to have only one healer, eh? So much for tactics, then. My players trivially go through 5 "level +2" or more encounters without being low on healing...oh wait, two healers in the party (not counting the pseudo-multiclassed cleric), game doesn't work as designed, since not playing like the devs, I guess.

One thing that helps mess up the PCs is suddenly changing targets mid-stream after using several area attacks; basically, you beat on someone while simultaneously dropping AoE powers on them...PCs to "waste" healing as the suddenly healthy target, who they thought was the primary, now is more difficult to kill than someone else and thus they may have healed them for more than was necessary.

Alot of confusion here; my players certainly aren't so stupid as to do that, anyway. Once a player is outside of bloodied, really no reason to spend healing on him.

I've read this paragraph through, twice, and no, this isn't a viable tactic at all, at least against semi-competent players.

Hydras are "well designed" in the sense that they get around a lot of the problems other solo monsters face (particularly stun locks) but suffer from not having enough options.

And, you fail to mention, woefully insufficient damage. Hydra is also vulnerable to blindness...but really it's the stupid weak damage that's the problem. All my solos and elites have x2 damage as a matter of course (sometimes bumped to x3), still not really enough to do anything, but at least they can inflict decent scratches, over time.

I'm guessing you haven't played much past level 8 or so; the amount of healing at this point is positively ridiculous, and I totally have to make the monsters vastly more difficult than they are 'supposed to be' in the MM to even come close to keeping the encounters semi-challenging.

Yes and no. The game itself is pretty simple.

Actually, just plain 'no'. Dude, seriously, I have 10 models on the board (6 players, 4 monsters), and 20 different effects going off and on like Christmas tree lights, and that's not even counting terrain. Off, on, off, on, off, on, different intervals, some random, some stacking, some overlapping, some mattering on my turn, some on the player's turn...sure, each individual effect is easy, but that's like saying playing piano is trivial, since you're never hitting more than 4 or 5 keys at a time, each key makes only one well defined sound, and any idiot has enough fingers for that. I trust you don't buy that every human being is a concert level pianist.

Ok, perhaps you don't get the piano metaphor, so let's look at other games. Let's go over to Battlelore, another tactical miniatures game. 100 models on the board...and at most 3 'single turn' effects going off, not counting terrain. Ten times as many models, and yet much more streamlined.

Let's go to Quatre Bras, hardcore Napoleonics game...still has nothing on DnD4.0 after a few levels, with only a few situational effects in play at any given time...tired, exhausted, hidden, formation choice, leadership, in command, maybe I missed one. Maybe. Still not a couple dozen.

Mechwarrior? Uh, pushed, used last turn, artillery incoming, heat...might have missed one.

WFB? Routed, a few spells that linger...again, I'm not counting terrain effects, since I didn't in DnD4.0.

I'm hard pressed to think of any game with so many situational effects going off like this, effects that 'consistently' go in and out of play turn after turn.

We're talking a game with 10 dolls on the board, and a couple dozen effects to keep track of, not even counting powers and abilities and terrain and tactics.

No, no way, no how, can you call this 'streamlined', much less 'more streamlined than Dungeons and Dragons'. It doesn't matter if it's 'standardized'...it's nuts just how much of it there is to keep track of on a round by round basis.

I don't know if you've ever played the board game Arkham Horror, but it is somewhat similar in principle; the game itself looks incredibly complicated because there are a huge number of pieces, but the gameplay itself is easily comprehended.

Used to own an old copy of Arkham Horror (at least, if that's the board game with monsters wandering the streets, and you're primarily putting down elder signs to win)...Dude, no way you can compare the two, unless you've got 20 monsters going in and out of the buildings, each with random effects, that randomly shift around from monster to monster to player at random intervals.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Doom314, how many encounters do you run in a workday?

I'm frankly kind of skeptical about the claim that healing pwns you if you actually do the '4-5 combats in a day' that D&D expects you to do; you'll probably run out of healing surges before the workday ends if you whore that much.

[Username17]

In fact, the moment anyone disagrees you people start flaming them

Nah. Mostly just you. On the grounds that you're an idiot who seriously argues that hundreds of thousands are bigger than millions. You saying something makes the thing you said less likely to be true.

Now we're finally at the levels of real ad hominems. An argument is less likely to be true because it was made by you than if it was signed anonymously. This statement, like all forms of inductive empiricism, is logically invalid and therefore a formal fallacy. But that doesn't mean that it isn't a good thing to bet on. Black swans exist, but you seriously shouldn't put actual money on black.

And if you haven't checked figures and primary sources yourself, you should assume that an argument made by Titanium Dragon is a priori false. Because he's an intellectually void sandal fucker who makes arguments composed of lies and chicanery that smaller numbers are bigger than larger ones. So you'll be doing pretty well if you just pack an umbrella every time Titanium Dragon says the sun is shining.

That is an ad hominem. And I stand by it. Because it's a good life principle. Logically invalid doesn't mean that it isn't right.

-Username17

[Zinegata]

In fact, the moment anyone disagrees you people start flaming them

Nah. Mostly just you. On the grounds that you're an idiot who seriously argues that hundreds of thousands are bigger than millions. You saying something makes the thing you said less likely to be true.

Now we're finally at the levels of real ad hominems. An argument is less likely to be true because it was made by you than if it was signed anonymously. This statement, like all forms of inductive empiricism, is logically invalid and therefore a formal fallacy. But that doesn't mean that it isn't a good thing to bet on. Black swans exist, but you seriously shouldn't put actual money on black.

And if you haven't checked figures and primary sources yourself, you should assume that an argument made by Titanium Dragon is a priori false. Because he's an intellectually void sandal fucker who makes arguments composed of lies and chicanery that smaller numbers are bigger than larger ones. So you'll be doing pretty well if you just pack an umbrella every time Titanium Dragon says the sun is shining.

That is an ad hominem. And I stand by it. Because it's a good life principle. Logically invalid doesn't mean that it isn't right.

-Username17

Shouldn't we just say he's a person without any credibility as opposed to the complicating it and making him a living avatar of the ad hominem?

Besides, it's not logically invalid to see TD as lacking credibility. Logic is based on variables that can be observed and measured - and I think we've got a good enough sample of TD's posting style and modus operandi to determine objectively that he does, actually, flame anyone who disagrees with him even when his position is unreasonably asinine.

[tzor]

Just curious, can you make any arguments that insult anyone besides PR?

I'll raise the question one level further, can TD even comment in a thread without going off tangent on some stupid non-topic argument.

We have bullshit arguments over "millions" in Dark Sun threads, we have bullsit arguments over "cursing" in a 4E critique thread; this asshole is the biggest thread derailer I've seen in ages.

As I said I want to discuss Dark Sun in the dark sun thread and 4E in the 4E thread. If you want to discuss other things TD, make your own god damned thread for it!

[Doom]

Doom314, how many encounters do you run in a workday?

I'm frankly kind of skeptical about the claim that healing pwns you if you actually do the '4-5 combats in a day' that D&D expects you to do; you'll probably run out of healing surges before the workday ends if you whore that much.

No way, plenty of surges to go around. Let's go over it abstractly, though I see it in practice every time.

With two healers in the party (bard and cleric, the latter focused on healing, and the ranger is multi into cleric, not that she uses it much), we're talking 4 'quick heal' minor actions...factor in healing bonuses, and each one of those heals around 2 healing surges at a time (except for the 100+ hp fighter, who has 12 surges anyway).

Also factor in the temp hps that go all over the place, from the bard and, now, from the warlock, who can transfer them to other players. Now factor in the Seal at-will from Divine power...still more temp hps, great sloshing healing from all directions, honest, and I haven't even gotten to the daily cleric powers.

I believe the weakest character in my party has 9 surges, a brutal rogue with 2 more surges from a feat. Let's see what happens in five encounters.

I totally drop this character in one fight...no problem, 2 surges later and he's back to near full strength, or full, if the dice are favorable.

I do it again next fight? 2 more surges.

Next fight? 2 more surges.

Next fight? 2 more surges.

Next fight? Now comes the 'as if you spent a surge' power, with one surge as emergency backup.

Now, dropping a player at 9th level is hardly a trivial thing...that's 80+ hp, and 10th level monsters do mathematically less than 10 hp damage per attack, so I have to surround the guy on all sides (or otherwise focus fire) and attack and be semi-lucky to pull this off in a single round. Realistically, it takes around 5 stupidly played rounds by the player...and in that time, a number of those monsters will drop. And note I'm above level +1 in the encounter budget to even pull this off.

Now, while this character is playing exceptionally stupidly and being mauled, the bard and the cleric's 'spare' healing and the warlock's granted temps are still more than sufficient to heal/protect the rest of the party as needed (with the ranger/pseudocleric every once in a while used as well), not counting damage negating powers granted by abilities and items.

So, if I drop the same, weakest, character, every fight for five straight battles because he's playing really stupidly with no luck, then, yeah, that one character is out of surges, almost. Believe it or not, that's happened...but the rest of the party is deeply unlikely to be debilitated, so he'll just sit back, protected by two fighters, and toss daggers to fairly good effect anyway.

"Same level" encounters are supposed to be fairly easy with no dropping characters, so I'm not just even using 'same level' encounters (in fact, I never use them, as it's very clear the experience point budget in DnD4.0 is just as messed up as the CR thing in Dungeons and Dragons), I consistently use above level encounters, but, as you can see above, I'd need five such encounters, all focusing on the weakest player, all being successful in that regard, in order to accomplish that goal, almost.

The bottom line is the healing so greatly exceeds the damage capacity of the monsters (as written), that it's rather tough to make a balanced encounter with 2 healers involved. If you use monsters that deal enough damage, they'll typically have defenses so high the players can't hit them...use more monsters (and I'm not talking about minions, which are flat out stupid now matter how much 'damage' they might do in the MM2), and they just get destroyed that much more quickly by the plethora of burst/blast powers that every class has a few of, and you'll have to pick monsters that can focus fire, or all do AOEs, or the like, and that rather limits the kinds of encounters the players won't yawn through.

[souran]

Doom3114

I have seen none of the effects you are talking about.

I do agree that if the players bring more healing then encounters can be easier but the hard limit on number of surges per day means that the total healing they get is pretty limited.

I don't see how your characters in the 8-9-10 range are getting +20 to healing. Also, out of combat if you knock somebody down its straight up 4 surges to get them to full.

I assume this means that you are letting your players use the healing powers of classes during extended rests. However, the dmg basically says don't do that. Out of combat healing is really simple 1 surge is 1/4 of your hp.

If you want to be really RAW it takes 5 minutes at least to get your short rest benefits. If your players are taking a half time after each fight to get the use of powers to amp up the effect of surges make them face wandering monsters. 20 minutes =/= 5 minutes.

The whole idea of the surges was to get rid of the "we cast arcane lock on the door and sleep in the closet of the dungeon of uber death" Players can't take extended rests inside dangerous areas and they can't take multiple short rests in those conditions either.

Honestly, surges are the economy of 4th edition. If you let players run with double effect surges then yes it should take twice the effort to brng them down.

Also, most of the 10th level monsters do more than 10 damage per attack or at least the when you combine the monsters into encounter groups the low damage monsters are made up for by the striker type monters inflicting 20+ damage an attack. I just ran an adventure right in this level range and the damage on the monsters is pretty good.

Honestly, in 4-5 encounters you drain every healing surge. Whats more as players are wittled down in healing surges they do become more cautious. At the levels you were talking it takes about 13-15 damage per surge for a defender, about 10 for a leader or striker and about 8 for a controller. Those surges have to come from somewhere.

Anyway, yes 2 leaders will make individual encounters a lot easier by making more surges available within an encounter but over a day it should be evened out by the fixed number of surges per character.

The only time I have really had an experience that matches yours is when I played a party that had 6 pcs without adding additional monsters. Are you running the a standard party of 5?

[violence in the media]

I assume this means that you are letting your players use the healing powers of classes during extended rests. However, the dmg basically says don't do that. Out of combat healing is really simple 1 surge is 1/4 of your hp.

So you're allowed to use encounter powers outside of encounters except in any situation where doing so is actually useful? What the hell?

If you want to be really RAW it takes 5 minutes at least to get your short rest benefits. If your players are taking a half time after each fight to get the use of powers to amp up the effect of surges make them face wandering monsters. 20 minutes =/= 5 minutes.

If the characters cannot manage to squeeze a 5 minute rest into a dungeon exploration, then how are they searching for anything? Why aren't they fighting the entire population in one massive battle? How are they expected to use the Knock ritual as written? If the characters have all of their alloted encounters in one SWAT-style dungeon invasion before noon, does that mean they should not have any more encounters for the rest of the day?

The whole idea of the surges was to get rid of the "we cast arcane lock on the door and sleep in the closet of the dungeon of uber death" Players can't take extended rests inside dangerous areas and they can't take multiple short rests in those conditions either.

First, you are aware that people have slept in dangerous situations before, right?

Second, I guess this means that 4e doesn't support the existance of any structure or complex that might take more than a day to explore. If you can't rest in Undermountain when you want, you can't rest in Undermountain at all.

Third, you're setting up a situation for conflict because the players are going to feel at times that they're being forced to do stupid things because it's what the game demands.

DM: You can't rest here, it's dangerous.
Player A: Fine. We leave.
DM: Leave? You can't do that!
Player B: Why not? We aren't on a time crunch mission here. There are no maidens about to be sacrificed or doom spells to avert. It's an old tomb some dude paid us to explore.
DM: But what about the 5 encounter workday? If you just leave, you'll trivialize the danger of this adventure!
Player A: Exactly the point. Danger isn't fun if we have to be holding the Idiot Ball to make it exist.
DM: Well, you might have a random encounter....
Player B: Listen, you do what you gotta do, but keep in mind that all forms of entertainment have to compete with staying home and watching porn.*


*Player B is apparently Koumei.

[Lago PARANOIA]

I assume this means that you are letting your players use the healing powers of classes during extended rests. However, the dmg basically says don't do that. Out of combat healing is really simple 1 surge is 1/4 of your hp.

Here's what the DMG says about the whole thing.

Legitimate Targets
When a power has an effect that ocurs upon hitting a target-or reducing a target to 0 hit points-the power functions only when the target in question is a meaningful threat. Characters can gain no benefit from carrying a sack of rats in hopes of healing their allies by hitting the rats.

When a power's effect involves a character's allies, se common sense when determining how many allies can be affected. D&D is a game about adventuring parties fighting grops of monsters, not the clash of armies. A warlord's power might, read strictly, be able to give a hundred "allies" a free basic attack, but that doesn't mean that warlord characters should assemble armies to march before them into the dungeon. In general, a power's effect should be limited to a squad-sized group--the size of your player character group plus perhaps one or two friendly NPCs--not hired soldiers or lantern-bearers.

So no healing torch outside of encounters. However, the game does expect you to use other such healing powers outside of an encounter.

Restful Healing
Benefit: After you take a short rest or an extended rest, any healing power you use before the start of your next encounter resotres the maximum number of hit points possible.
For example, if a 6th-level cleric with Wisdom 18 and this feat uses healing word after a rest, that power allows the target to regain hit points equal to his or her healing surge value plus 16 (the maximum result of 2d6+4).

[Doom]

Doom3114

I have seen none of the effects you are talking about.

I don't see how your characters in the 8-9-10 range are getting +20 to healing. Also, out of combat if you knock somebody down its straight up 4 surges to get them to full.

I assume this means that you are letting your players use the healing powers of classes during extended rests. However, the dmg basically says don't do that. Out of combat healing is really simple 1 surge is 1/4 of your hp.

If you want to be really RAW it takes 5 minutes at least to get your short rest benefits. If your players are taking a half time after each fight to get the use of powers to amp up the effect of surges make them face wandering monsters. 20 minutes =/= 5 minutes.

Also, most of the 10th level monsters do more than 10 damage per attack or at least the when you combine the monsters into encounter groups the low damage monsters are made up for by the striker type monters inflicting 20+ damage an attack.

The only time I have really had an experience that matches yours is when I played a party that had 6 pcs without adding additional monsters. Are you running the a standard party of 5?

You really don't seem to understand alot about the game, which is probably why you haven't seen the concepts I'd addressed, reinforced with basic mathematical ideas.

You've already been schooled on the use of healing outside of encounters, but I'll address some of the confusion you've displayed, above.

It does not, 'straight up' take 4 surges to bring a downed character to full, at least not with a cleric. I don't have my PHB handy, but even at first level, a cleric gives a bonus to his healing keyword powers that allows him to heal someone up to maximum in three surges, trivially. After a few levels, and easily created magic items, two surges is quite possible; see also another thread addressing this at level 20.

It is QUITE reasonable for a healing class player to pick/create items that enhance his healing. Lago has quoted you where a level 6 cleric is adding 16 points to a surge. That bonus, 16, is the surge value of a 64 hit point character, and there aren't many of those at level 6, honest.

You also seem to be confused about how 'expectation' works. I'm not exactly motivated to go over it in detail, but if a monster hits for an average (crud, another word with meaning you might not know, and I mean in terms of expectation here anyway) of 15 points, with a 50% chance to hit, its expectation is for 7.5 points of damage, well under 10. Please, go to the listing of level 10 monsters and see for yourself that most monsters at that level aren't hitting for an average of 15, much less at much past 50% chance of hitting.

And yes, I have 7 players, and yes, I adjust the encounters accordingly. But the mathematics is still goofy wrong, 'accordingly' is well past the guidelines in the gamemaster's guide.

Well, two chats going, and a class in a few minutes, so I'll stop here. Seriously, though, don't knee-jerk response, read what others have posted and intelligently think it through. "I haven't seen it" is not a valid response, especially when you follow up with repeated displays of simple ignorance.

[RandomCasualty2]

So no healing torch outside of encounters. However, the game does expect you to use other such healing powers outside of an encounter.

Restful Healing
Benefit: After you take a short rest or an extended rest, any healing power you use before the start of your next encounter resotres the maximum number of hit points possible.
For example, if a 6th-level cleric with Wisdom 18 and this feat uses healing word after a rest, that power allows the target to regain hit points equal to his or her healing surge value plus 16 (the maximum result of 2d6+4).

Yeah, this was one of the biggest mistakes I thought they made. They should have really limited those powers to combat, because the entire point of the short rest was to eliminate that 3.5 bullshit where a cleric is endlessly ticking off minor charges from a wand of CLW, and bogs the game down doing it.

The whole point of short rest should have been to get healing back in the hands of the person resting and not worry about what others are doing. The fact that you can use healing words during rest (and it's actually more effective) really annoys me. Since then you get those weird situations where people will want to short rest twice.

[souran]

So you're allowed to use encounter powers outside of encounters except in any situation where doing so is actually useful? What the hell?

As I understood it and as Lago points out later the text condems the use of encounter powers outside of combat for achieving maximum mechanical benefit. To do something specfic it reccomends you allow it in the section on saying yes. I don't have my books with me so I cannot go to a specific section but its one of several "don't let the players be complete dicks" discussions.

If the characters cannot manage to squeeze a 5 minute rest into a dungeon exploration, then how are they searching for anything? Why aren't they fighting the entire population in one massive battle? How are they expected to use the Knock ritual as written? If the characters have all of their alloted encounters in one SWAT-style dungeon invasion before noon, does that mean they should not have any more encounters for the rest of the day?

The idea is to not let them chain extended rests together. The rituals are supposed to take to long to cast because the game assumes that the players cast all their spells from scrolls. (Scrolls cut casting time in half and don't cost any more than the spell itself would. However you would have to make up scrolls in advance. Basically scrolls take the place of memorized spells) This would cut down knocks casting time to match a short rest. Infact, it makes most of the games adventuring spells have the same casting time as a short rest. (Also, I am not saying I agree with this its just that this is how that system is designed to work.)

All of that is beside the point of weather or not players can chain rests between events.

First, you are aware that people have slept in dangerous situations before, right?

There is a difference between danger and immenant danger. The delta force does not sleep in a cave filled with terrorists.

Second, I guess this means that 4e doesn't support the existance of any structure or complex that might take more than a day to explore. If you can't rest in Undermountain when you want, you can't rest in Undermountain at all.

I honestly have to say I like this feature. However, once again this is a matter for the dm. Can players rest in menzoberanzan or mith drannor. In some places ok. Can they take extended rest in castle ravenloft. no way in hell.

Third, you're setting up a situation for conflict because the players are going to feel at times that they're being forced to do stupid things because it's what the game demands.

LOL. I actually think it does the exact opposite of what you were saying. Players can have adventures that are time crunches and into places and not feel like in order to be successful they have to do something that makes no sense.

My players were always using the various mystical hut spells, arcane locks or just sleeping and having guards because there was no way there were going to go up against a bad ass dude without most of their powers available. It made it really stupid and artifiical. To me it was cooler to have a system where the players didn't pitch their tents on vecna's front lawn because otherwise they wouldnt' have enough turn undead attempts for the dungeon.

Anyway, I agree that if your players can leave the dungeon without penalty and go take extended rests then that is a better strategy. I just don't think that gygaxian dungeons where when you clear level 2 it stays empty are good designs. However, even as RAW players are restricted to one extended rest in 24 hours.

Doom,

First the 16 point bonus to a healing surge represented the maximum that character can provide. Whats more it requires that they have something either an item or a feat to use that. That means that they have given up using that for something else. While that could extend 1 surge to almost 2 it still requires a surge to use.

You also seem to be confused about how 'expectation' works. I'm not exactly motivated to go over it in detail, but if a monster hits for an average (crud, another word with meaning you might not know, and I mean in terms of expectation here anyway) of 15 points, with a 50% chance to hit, its expectation is for 7.5 points of damage, well under 10. Please, go to the listing of level 10 monsters and see for yourself that most monsters at that level aren't hitting for an average of 15, much less at much past 50% chance of hitting.

Actually, this is not what you said before. What you said before was:

Now, dropping a player at 9th level is hardly a trivial thing...that's 80+ hp, and 10th level monsters do mathematically less than 10 hp damage per attack, so I have to surround the guy on all sides (or otherwise focus fire) and attack and be semi-lucky to pull this off in a single round.

It is not unreasonable to read "do less than 10 hp damage per attack" as on a hit they do less than 10 hp damage. This statement is false. So yes, put your second way you have something closer to a point. The avrage damage, and expected damage is lower than 10. However, not the individual attack damage.

Anyway, I do disagree with whichever designer thought it was a good idea to stick in a bunch of feats and equipment to make surges more powerful which is RC2's point I think.

[Username17]

As I understood it and as Lago points out later the text condems the use of encounter powers outside of combat for achieving maximum mechanical benefit.

That is not what it says. It condemns the use of attack powers on non-combatants to get the side benefits. So for example, Paladins are not supposed to walk into battle having their Charisma mod in temp HP from having attacked a wall every 5 minutes.

Healing Words are specifically useful and used outside of combat.

-Username17

[Doom]

So, basically, your eyes simply cannot see the word 'mathematically'? Or is it your brain cannot process the concept?

Yes, the 16 hp is the maximum...it's also the minimum. And, yes, a feat does that. A single, obvious, very useful, feat that can be easily chosen by a player.

[souran]

So, basically, your eyes simply cannot see the word 'mathematically'? Or is it your brain cannot process the concept?

There is no context to otherwise tell me you mean statistically as compared to arithmatically.

However, your complaint that healing is too good is also affected by your large party. You have to leaders and a other characters grabbing healing powers. Yes your players have more healing than the game expects.

As you admit your party can wipe out the gains from the individual attacks from monsters without much effort. Therefore it looks like instead of adding more monsters you should probably increase there effectiveness. Which you have been defacto doing by running them against more challenging monsters.

All of this makes sense. Larger parties can beat challenges above their level. This is true in pretty much any rpg you could play. You can call it a failing of the game but it just was not designed for that many pcs. Its not wow, you don't need one of every class to down the final boss.

So, yeah the healing is good, its probably a bit to good even if you just had a party with 5 people and 2 leaders. However its not nearly as broken as described here.

[mean_liar]

So, basically, your eyes simply cannot see the word 'mathematically'? Or is it your brain cannot process the concept?

There is no context to otherwise tell me you mean statistically as compared to arithmatically.

I try to keep insults to a minimum, but holy fuck, eat a bag of dick, souran. This is seriously the same reason why Titanium Dragon's recent arguments are met with derision.

Saying shit like this makes you sound like either a colossal idiot who never deserves to post in any thread involving numbers greater than 2 or like a total shitmonster who will say anything other than "oops".

[violence in the media]

As I understood it and as Lago points out later the text condems the use of encounter powers outside of combat for achieving maximum mechanical benefit. To do something specfic it reccomends you allow it in the section on saying yes. I don't have my books with me so I cannot go to a specific section but its one of several "don't let the players be complete dicks" discussions.

Why is there this persistent idea in this edition that the players are being dicks if they don't play exactly as the designers intended?

The idea is to not let them chain extended rests together. The rituals are supposed to take to long to cast because the game assumes that the players cast all their spells from scrolls. (Scrolls cut casting time in half and don't cost any more than the spell itself would. However you would have to make up scrolls in advance. Basically scrolls take the place of memorized spells) This would cut down knocks casting time to match a short rest. Infact, it makes most of the games adventuring spells have the same casting time as a short rest. (Also, I am not saying I agree with this its just that this is how that system is designed to work.)

All of that is beside the point of weather or not players can chain rests between events.

No, this is not about chaining rests together. You were advocating not letting them rest period. In case you forgot:

If you want to be really RAW it takes 5 minutes at least to get your short rest benefits. If your players are taking a half time after each fight to get the use of powers to amp up the effect of surges make them face wandering monsters. 20 minutes =/= 5 minutes.

The whole idea of the surges was to get rid of the "we cast arcane lock on the door and sleep in the closet of the dungeon of uber death" Players can't take extended rests inside dangerous areas and they can't take multiple short rests in those conditions either.

However, your point about scroll use is interesting. Is there some reason that the PCs shouldn't be allowed to benefit from a short rest while they're sitting around waiting for someone to cast from a scroll?

There is a difference between danger and immenant danger. The delta force does not sleep in a cave filled with terrorists.

The Delta Force also does not attempt to conform to notions of appropriately challenging encounters or feel a system-mandated need to get into five firefights a day. The other thing is that a cave full of terrorists is a seriously tiny dungeon in D&D land. It might be like 8 guys. Is that what you're proposing? Should 4e PCs be conducting a sweep and clear of 2 or 3 dungeons per day?

I honestly have to say I like this feature. However, once again this is a matter for the dm. Can players rest in menzoberanzan or mith drannor. In some places ok. Can they take extended rest in castle ravenloft. no way in hell.

OK, beyond a reasoning of "just because," why should players be able to rest in locations A or B, but not C?

LOL. I actually think it does the exact opposite of what you were saying. Players can have adventures that are time crunches and into places and not feel like in order to be successful they have to do something that makes no sense.

My players were always using the various mystical hut spells, arcane locks or just sleeping and having guards because there was no way there were going to go up against a bad ass dude without most of their powers available. It made it really stupid and artifiical. To me it was cooler to have a system where the players didn't pitch their tents on vecna's front lawn because otherwise they wouldnt' have enough turn undead attempts for the dungeon.

I guess we're just down to taste here. I think the notion that the game is properly played by rushing headlong into a fortified area full of hostiles and just "reacting to things as they come up" is kind of dumb. The ideal dungeon raid approach should be more Shadowrun and less Superman.

[RandomCasualty2]

I guess we're just down to taste here. I think the notion that the game is properly played by rushing headlong into a fortified area full of hostiles and just "reacting to things as they come up" is kind of dumb. The ideal dungeon raid approach should be more Shadowrun and less Superman.

4E is never going to be like Shadowrun.

Mainly because Shadowrun expects reinforcements and 4E basically breaks as soon as reinforcements enter into the battle. Unfortunately, all that generally stops monsters from going and getting reinforcements in a fortress is some code of honor dedicated to comic book stupidity where monsters fight to the bitter end instead of just running and getting help as soon as they realize the battle will be remotely difficult.

Because really, if monsters start to run away, there's just nothing you can do. There's no way to play D&D SWAT style because you just can't kill things fast enough. I mean, you can't even slow them down very effectively.

[Doom]

There is no context to otherwise tell me you mean statistically as compared to arithmatically.

However, your complaint that healing is too good is also affected by your large party. You have to leaders and a other characters grabbing healing powers. Yes your players have more healing than the game expects.

As you admit your party can wipe out the gains from the individual attacks from monsters without much effort. Therefore it looks like instead of adding more monsters you should probably increase there effectiveness. Which you have been defacto doing by running them against more challenging monsters.

All of this makes sense. Larger parties can beat challenges above their level. This is true in pretty much any rpg you could play. You can call it a failing of the game but it just was not designed for that many pcs. Its not wow, you don't need one of every class to down the final boss.

So, yeah the healing is good, its probably a bit to good even if you just had a party with 5 people and 2 leaders. However its not nearly as broken as described here.

More confusion and ignorance, alas.

First off, it's probability, not statistics, not arithmetic...and all mathematical in any event, and still the bottom line is you don't understand, and that's ok, honest.

It's not a 'complaint', it's an observation, and it applies in a party of 5 just as easily in a party of 7, as demonstrated. Your implication that healers 'grabbing' healing powers and items is somehow wrong is, simply, bizarre, and indicative of unfamiliarity with how DnD4.0, or frankly most any RPG, is played. The underlying concept is called 'specialization', and a game that shatters when a player acquires a single easily acquired feat in a common class indicates a problem with the game, not the players.

Your comment about how larger parties can handle tougher encounters again betrays confusion. Obviously, they can, but there's quite a bit more going on here than your eventual understanding of the obvious. In the game master's guide, guidelines are given for creating suitable encounters for parties of 4, 5, or 6 players, and these guidelines indicate a linear progression of ability, not exponential or otherwise.

You claim the game wasn't designed to handle 7 players...can you reference a quote on that? I rather like the mix of players I have now, from highly skilled to fairly weak, but if the rules say I need to turn someone away, I'd like to know.

But, number of players is besides the point, the fact still remains, as demonstrated, that healing overmatches monster capacity, overwhelmingly so with two leaders (quite possible in a 6 player party, which is clearly allowed in the game master's guide). I'm not sure why you're using the word 'broken', as a game where the monsters are mathematically (translation, " ") incapable of harming the players once they start to use their abilities intelligently, may well be a design paradigm of DnD4.0.