The Official "4e Critique and Rebuttal" Thread

[Fuchs]

[quote="Roxolan]You are missing the point and I'm getting tired of repeating myself. This is not about normal gameplay. We're trying to determine if a character is a meaningful help to the party. To do so, we examine how a group would fare against the same encounter with or without him and see if there's a noticeable difference. As I've been saying, if you also add a monster then you're instead measuring whether the character is more or less powerful than the party average, which is a completely different question. It is inevitable that some characters will be less powerful than the party average, but in a well-designed game there shouldn't be a class that can't meaningfully contribute. Goddamn, how complicated is that?[/quote]

If the character is significantly less powerful than the rest of the party then he's not contributing significantly in any well-designed game.

If every character is shitty, then a shitty character can still contribute since the measuring bar is so low.

[Username17]

I'm still kind of floored by the notion that you shouldn't put an encounter with a dragon focused on strafing attacks, or a roc that behaves as described, into a game just because the PCs are a bunch of DMFs.

And well you should be, because that shit is fucking retarded.

And yet, in 4e it is actually true. Characters are defied by their handheld equipment to such an enormous degree that Paladins basically can't even use bows. If there aren't melee brutes to grind against, the melee characters are useless. And having characters engage in the fight is the entire point of the entire game.

When we talk about the monsters being MMO Mobs that "spawn" into combat and don't otherwise exist, that's not us making fun of 4e. We might say it in a disparaging fashion, and certainly I find the idea offensive personally, but that's literally the way 4e monsters "work". That was the entire point of the "Devil's in the Details" article that Bill Slavicsek put up as a preview for the edition. Pit Fiends, he gushed, did not need rules to interact with the world, because they only "actually" existed for a few rounds during combat. I repeat: that is not a joke, he really said that!

So from the 4e worldview, a monster's only purpose is to be beaten on by the PCs. They don't have an ecology or interact with each other, or advance the plot in any way while not being stabbed in the face. So if an encounter shows up that is not "well rounded" (as defined by having something for the abilities of all the different PCs to interact with), it is a bad encounter. Because the encounter has no other reason to exist. You're not fighting harpies because you know that there are harpies in the area and they pester travelers or guard the dark one's castle or something, you're fighting "a level 9 encounter" because you were walking along and "a level 9 encounter" spawned. Seriously, that's the actual frame of mind of the actual writers.

Personally, I find that worldview incomprehensible. It's not just that I am offended (although I am), it's that I genuinely do not know why I would want to play such a game. All of the things I roleplay for have been dismissed as irrelevant, and the entire game reduced to a tactical challenge that is very easy. It's a waste of time.

-Username17

[lighttigersoul]

I'm still kind of floored by the notion that you shouldn't put an encounter with a dragon focused on strafing attacks, or a roc that behaves as described, into a game just because the PCs are a bunch of DMFs.

Should I clarify beyond what I said? If you send a group of all fliers (Or the strafing dragon.) against a party that cannot do anything to them, except with off Ability basic attacks, and YOUR (The DM) intent is they must kill the enemies to 'win' (This regards successful completion of an encounter, the key to earning XP.) then you (The DM) are being a shit head and breaking the game.

If, on the other hand, these enemies who aren't likely to be effectively attacked are more a set dressing (Because the world is merely a collaborative story telling mind space.) to encourage this theoretical all melee party to run or something else and your (The DM) definition of 'successfully completing the encounter' is merely survival and reaching some arbitrary destination (Again, it's in your head, whether the set dressing is a castle or a hole in the ground is the same mechanically.) then the encounter COULD be interesting.

So, has anyone brought up horse archers recently? Pewpewpew... I'm in your grind game, soloing your MOBs.

You challenge Mongolian raiders the same way you challenge any 4th edition party: by presenting them with encounters that are appropriate for their characters. The Monster manuals have plenty of options, and, if those fail, an entire section on building level appropriate monsters from scratch (Which I use more often than the manuals.).

[Roxolan]

[quote="Roxolan]You are missing the point and I'm getting tired of repeating myself. This is not about normal gameplay. We're trying to determine if a character is a meaningful help to the party. To do so, we examine how a group would fare against the same encounter with or without him and see if there's a noticeable difference. As I've been saying, if you also add a monster then you're instead measuring whether the character is more or less powerful than the party average, which is a completely different question. It is inevitable that some characters will be less powerful than the party average, but in a well-designed game there shouldn't be a class that can't meaningfully contribute. Goddamn, how complicated is that?

If the character is significantly less powerful than the rest of the party then he's not contributing significantly in any well-designed game. [/quote]As long as he makes the encounter noticeably faster/easier, he's contributing significantly. The only way that this does not happen in 4E is if the group is broken-optimized or if the player does stupid things with his ability scores (which really should have been removed from 4E or used very differently, but sacred cow).

[lighttigersoul]

And yet, in 4e it is actually true. Characters are defied by their handheld equipment to such an enormous degree that Paladins basically can't even use bows. If there aren't melee brutes to grind against, the melee characters are useless. And having characters engage in the fight is the entire point of the entire game.

This is true, though it's more they're defined by their ability scores than equipment, as inherent bonuses prove it doesn't matter.

When we talk about the monsters being MMO Mobs that "spawn" into combat and don't otherwise exist, that's not us making fun of 4e. We might say it in a disparaging fashion, and certainly I find the idea offensive personally, but that's literally the way 4e monsters "work". That was the entire point of the "Devil's in the Details" article that Bill Slavicsek put up as a preview for the edition. Pit Fiends, he gushed, did not need rules to interact with the world, because they only "actually" existed for a few rounds during combat. I repeat: that is not a joke, he really said that!

Yes, he really said that, because he, unlike all of you, apparently, realized that the rest of the world is a series of socially accepted norms that your group decides on. Your group and the next group will absolutely have different interpretations of even the same world, the purpose of various monster types, or even if those types exist at all.

The Pit Fiend in your example can do anything you want it to do out of combat and the rules don't even pretend to define it. This saves word count in printed products, and leaves more time for fixing mechanical issues time wise for the designers.

So from the 4e worldview, a monster's only purpose is to be beaten on by the PCs. They don't have an ecology or interact with each other, or advance the plot in any way while not being stabbed in the face.

That's because the term monster is a mechanical definition. Monsters are meant to be killed. NPCs are intended to be interacted with. As soon as the fight ends, if you leave a monster alive, it becomes an NPC. Note that there are no rules for the combat capabilities of NPCs, you shouldn't be fighting NPCs.

So if an encounter shows up that is not "well rounded" (as defined by having something for the abilities of all the different PCs to interact with), it is a bad encounter. Because the encounter has no other reason to exist. You're not fighting harpies because you know that there are harpies in the area and they pester travelers or guard the dark one's castle or something, you're fighting "a level 9 encounter" because you were walking along and "a level 9 encounter" spawned. Seriously, that's the actual frame of mind of the actual writers.

Now you're totally wrong. You are right that a balanced encounter is the point, and just above I explained that the harpies could be interesting, if the goal of the encounter is different than 'kill everything that moves.' The issue is, motivations and goals don't need rules, they're part of that shared head space you and your players created and will vary based on the moment.

Personally, I find that worldview incomprehensible. It's not just that I am offended (although I am), it's that I genuinely do not know why I would want to play such a game. All of the things I roleplay for have been dismissed as irrelevant, and the entire game reduced to a tactical challenge that is very easy. It's a waste of time.

-Username17

'I don't like that I'm told to just 'make it up' in a believe about make-believe!'

[ScottS]

I'm still kind of floored by the notion that you shouldn't put an encounter with a dragon focused on strafing attacks, or a roc that behaves as described, into a game just because the PCs are a bunch of DMFs.

Should I clarify beyond what I said? If you send a group of all fliers (Or the strafing dragon.) against a party that cannot do anything to them, except with off Ability basic attacks, and YOUR (The DM) intent is they must kill the enemies to 'win' (This regards successful completion of an encounter, the key to earning XP.) then you (The DM) are being a shit head and breaking the game.

Missed a few pages of the discussion but I can butt in here and say I've had to do this a lot as a 4e DM (e.g. have a solo red dragon fly down and get in the PCs' faces rather than hover out of reach). I haven't looked at the DMG1 for a while, so not sure if/where it was spelled out beyond "tailor the encounters to the party", but you really have to look at 4e as the "Don't Bust the PCs' Balls" edition. From a mechanical standpoint, this is implicit in the fact that monster abilities don't factor into encounter "CR" at all. The only things that contribute to XP are hp and defenses (and average damage to a lesser extent), so if they really meant dragons to be intelligent strafers, the whole system is even more retardedly broken than when you throw at-will AOE dazers, multiple controllers, "unintended" combos like gel.cubes + ghouls, etc. into the mix. Reading special movement modes like flight etc. as anything other than "enhanced combat mobility to get the creature to a wider variety of spots at ground level" is a sure path to madness.

[talozin]

If you send a group of all fliers (Or the strafing dragon.) against a party that cannot do anything to them, except with off Ability basic attacks, and YOUR (The DM) intent is they must kill the enemies to 'win' (This regards successful completion of an encounter, the key to earning XP.) then you (The DM) are being a shit head and breaking the game.

The problem I have with this is that, if an honestly quite common fantasy trope like a gang of harpies or a strafing dragon cannot be thrown up against an average party without breaking the game, then something is Wrong.

I mean, you're not incorrect. If you throw a monster at a party that is ill-equipped to deal with it, and you just throw up your hands and hope they figure out the one magic combo that might actually let them kill it, then you are being what the Den has previously referred to as "a Gygaxian ass pirate." But we're not talking about fucking Wind Walkers here, where you can only kill them if you have memorized a 7th level cleric spell that you may have forgotten even exists. It's just flying monsters! They're in the Wizard of Oz, for God's sake!

Don't get me wrong -- 3.X is in no way a paradigm of allowing fighters (and other people who don't have the Magic tag) to usefully deal with encounters more complicated than "orcs charge you, roll for initiative". Its failure in doing so is one of the main reasons why people are so dissatisfied with it. And I've stayed mostly out of this argument because I honestly don't have a clue if 4E is better or worse at handling these situations. But it is flat not acceptable for an encounter with flying monkeys to be something the DM can't throw at a group without risking ass piracy.

[Novembermike]

By that logic we can skip just about every encounter, since those are meant to be able to handled by the party.

Does that mean you skip every encounter while playing 4E, given that it's so boringly easy?

Oh come on, are you willfully misinterpreting his logic? The harpy attack forces 80% of that hypothetical party to sit on their thumbs. That is why it's unsuitable for that party. I have no idea how you get to the conclusion that no encounter is suitable.

Read the bolded part. He said that if the party can deal with the encounter he is wondering why one would put it in. And his reasoning does make one wonder why he'd play at all, since "fighting just keeps them where they were with some bodies around them and a little less health" applies to just about every 4E encounter.

It's fairly simple. An encounter where all of the enemies are fliers is bad. First off, it's likely that a number of the PCs won't be able to meaningfully contribute. This is independent of the edition, since a 3.5 Barbarian or Paladin is also going to just have to pull out their shortbow and start going at it. Secondly, the system isn't particularly well designed for it. It can handle ground based encounters very well because the entire grid based system works well for anything 2d, but it's hard to keep track of the heights and all of the other data for 5+ data.

The only way to make this reasonable vs a standard party is to make the enemies very weak relative to the party, and then it's still a boring fight. The only reasonable way I can see of using something like this is to use it force the players to run (into some story event).

The problem I have with this is that, if an honestly quite common fantasy trope like a gang of harpies or a strafing dragon cannot be thrown up against an average party without breaking the game, then something is Wrong.

It's a fantasy trope, but it's not a trope where the protagonist kills all of the monsters. I don't remember Dorothy pulling out her nunchaku, leaping into the air and killing the flying monkeys by adding her ki to her attack.

[Crawfish]

wait so what makes the "flyers are a bitch" specifically apply to 4e? what would an earlier edition rogue, fighter, or barbarian do?

[violence in the media]

I'm still kind of floored by the notion that you shouldn't put an encounter with a dragon focused on strafing attacks, or a roc that behaves as described, into a game just because the PCs are a bunch of DMFs.

Should I clarify beyond what I said? If you send a group of all fliers (Or the strafing dragon.) against a party that cannot do anything to them, except with off Ability basic attacks, and YOUR (The DM) intent is they must kill the enemies to 'win' (This regards successful completion of an encounter, the key to earning XP.) then you (The DM) are being a shit head and breaking the game.

If, on the other hand, these enemies who aren't likely to be effectively attacked are more a set dressing (Because the world is merely a collaborative story telling mind space.) to encourage this theoretical all melee party to run or something else and your (The DM) definition of 'successfully completing the encounter' is merely survival and reaching some arbitrary destination (Again, it's in your head, whether the set dressing is a castle or a hole in the ground is the same mechanically.) then the encounter COULD be interesting.

I appreciate your clarification. I don't know that I necessarily agree with that point of view, but that has more to do from my view of the "story" being an emergent property from gameplay and less of a plotted narrative.

Sure, the proposed adventure might be about rescuing the princess from the evil duke, but the game isn't about playing that out so that it reads like a novel. We might run afoul of a hydra in the swamps and all get eaten, we might say "fuck it" in the middle and abandon the quest, maybe we switch sides, maybe we assassinate the duke in the loo, whatever. The point is, what actually happens becomes the story; and it doesn't necessarily need to follow dramatic structure.

In this POV, the dragon or the roc aren't there as plot devices or set pieces, they're there because there are dragons and rocs in this mountain range and we happened to come across one of them. Quite possibly as a literal, dice-generated, surprised-the-MC-too, random encounter.

[Fuchs]

As long as he makes the encounter noticeably faster/easier, he's contributing significantly. The only way that this does not happen in 4E is if the group is broken-optimized or if the player does stupid things with his ability scores (which really should have been removed from 4E or used very differently, but sacred cow).

Look, stop the bullshit. 4E is not a mass pvp MMOG, where you fare better the more people you have on your side, even if they only absorb some damage that would otherwise have hit you.

4E is made to have groups of PCs handle size-appropriate encounters. Balanced, challenging encounters. You can only judge a character's efficiency within this frame work.

A hypothetical situation that only comes up if you stop following the core design of 4E is not, in no way at all, a measuring stick to judge a character

[lighttigersoul]

It's just flying monsters! They're in the Wizard of Oz, for God's sake!

But it is flat not acceptable for an encounter with flying monkeys to be something the DM can't throw at a group without risking ass piracy.

I like how 'it's in all the fiction' is your guys' primary defense for it, totally ignoring that in fiction, movie, book, or otherwise, that the flying enemies were used to push the characters along OR the characters had a means of dealing with them.

Smaug was defeated by Bard with a special arrow sure to do the job.

The flying monkeys came down to ground level during the one time they were actually fighting the group.

The Witch King was fighting with his feet on the ground when Eowyn defeated him.

Heracles used a god gifted item to scare the Stymphalian Birds and then shot them with a bow and arrow.

Show me a single time in fiction that the protagonists met a flying enemy and didn't have sufficient handwavium to defeat it, or ran until they could escape or fight it on better terms.

Flying enemies are a plot device.

[Novembermike]

Sure, the proposed adventure might be about rescuing the princess from the evil duke, but the game isn't about playing that out so that it reads like a novel. We might run afoul of a hydra in the swamps and all get eaten, we might say "fuck it" in the middle and abandon the quest, maybe we switch sides, maybe we assassinate the duke in the loo, whatever. The point is, what actually happens becomes the story; and it doesn't necessarily need to follow dramatic structure.

In this POV, the dragon or the roc aren't there as plot devices or set pieces, they're there because there are dragons and rocs in this mountain range and we happened to come across one of them. Quite possibly as a literal, dice-generated, surprised-the-MC-too, random encounter.

There are no hydras in the swamp until you put it in there. There are literally zero hydras in any swamps on Earth, so there isn't really a huge naturalism reason to put them there. If you put something in your world and it didn't work out, it was a bad idea on your part and you fucked up as a dm. This isn't saying that the players have to always win, but if the players systematically lose it's probably not the system or the players.

[Roy]

Oh come on, are you willfully misinterpreting his logic? The harpy attack forces 80% of that hypothetical party to sit on their thumbs. That is why it's unsuitable for that party. I have no idea how you get to the conclusion that no encounter is suitable.

Read the bolded part. He said that if the party can deal with the encounter he is wondering why one would put it in. And his reasoning does make one wonder why he'd play at all, since "fighting just keeps them where they were with some bodies around them and a little less health" applies to just about every 4E encounter.

It's fairly simple. An encounter where all of the enemies are fliers is bad. First off, it's likely that a number of the PCs won't be able to meaningfully contribute. This is independent of the edition, since a 3.5 Barbarian or Paladin is also going to just have to pull out their shortbow and start going at it. Secondly, the system isn't particularly well designed for it. It can handle ground based encounters very well because the entire grid based system works well for anything 2d, but it's hard to keep track of the heights and all of the other data for 5+ data.

The only way to make this reasonable vs a standard party is to make the enemies very weak relative to the party, and then it's still a boring fight. The only reasonable way I can see of using something like this is to use it force the players to run (into some story event).

The problem I have with this is that, if an honestly quite common fantasy trope like a gang of harpies or a strafing dragon cannot be thrown up against an average party without breaking the game, then something is Wrong.

It's a fantasy trope, but it's not a trope where the protagonist kills all of the monsters. I don't remember Dorothy pulling out her nunchaku, leaping into the air and killing the flying monkeys by adding her ki to her attack.

In 3.5, the beatsticks can be archery specced. At low levels, even if they aren't, pewpewpew actually works. At higher levels, they're flying too. So in that game, the melee builds are a bit disadvantaged by flying opponents, but they aren't OMGWTF unbeatable.

In 4.Fail, the MOB hovers 10 feet off the ground and shuts all the melees down.

Ignoring more Fail about MOb spawn points.

[Roy]

That's because the term monster is a mechanical definition. Monsters are meant to be killed. NPCs are intended to be interacted with. As soon as the fight ends, if you leave a monster alive, it becomes an NPC. Note that there are no rules for the combat capabilities of NPCs, you shouldn't be fighting NPCs.

But I don't care that the dot is green, that fucker pissed me off. Fuck you video game invincibility.

[Fuchs]

wait so what makes the "flyers are a bitch" specifically apply to 4e? what would an earlier edition rogue, fighter, or barbarian do?

Well, I can tell you what my 3E party's "fighters" would do: Ride up on their flying carpets, jump and pounce/grapple (from ground or from carpet), use their ranged techniques (like Lightning Throw), or something stunt-like, like throwing nets.

I'd at the least expected the melee-focused fighters in 4E to deal with flying enemies by flying, or jumping so well it's almost flying, as seen in countless animes - but then I expected 4E to be better than 3E, not worse.

[Crawfish]

Read the bolded part. He said that if the party can deal with the encounter he is wondering why one would put it in. And his reasoning does make one wonder why he'd play at all, since "fighting just keeps them where they were with some bodies around them and a little less health" applies to just about every 4E encounter.

It's fairly simple. An encounter where all of the enemies are fliers is bad. First off, it's likely that a number of the PCs won't be able to meaningfully contribute. This is independent of the edition, since a 3.5 Barbarian or Paladin is also going to just have to pull out their shortbow and start going at it. Secondly, the system isn't particularly well designed for it. It can handle ground based encounters very well because the entire grid based system works well for anything 2d, but it's hard to keep track of the heights and all of the other data for 5+ data.

The only way to make this reasonable vs a standard party is to make the enemies very weak relative to the party, and then it's still a boring fight. The only reasonable way I can see of using something like this is to use it force the players to run (into some story event).

The problem I have with this is that, if an honestly quite common fantasy trope like a gang of harpies or a strafing dragon cannot be thrown up against an average party without breaking the game, then something is Wrong.

It's a fantasy trope, but it's not a trope where the protagonist kills all of the monsters. I don't remember Dorothy pulling out her nunchaku, leaping into the air and killing the flying monkeys by adding her ki to her attack.

In 3.5, the beatsticks can be archery specced. At low levels, even if they aren't, pewpewpew actually works. At higher levels, they're flying too. So in that game, the melee builds are a bit disadvantaged by flying opponents, but they aren't OMGWTF unbeatable.

In 4.Fail, the MOB hovers 10 feet off the ground and shuts all the melees down.

Ignoring more Fail about MOb spawn points.

why do you keep on saying MOB it isnt an acronym

you know melee characters have access to ranged weapons in 4e too, right? and in fact the rules for it are almost literally exactly the same: 1d20 + dex mod > targets AC, do bow damage.

[Fuchs]

There are no hydras in the swamp until you put it in there. There are literally zero hydras in any swamps on Earth, so there isn't really a huge naturalism reason to put them there. If you put something in your world and it didn't work out, it was a bad idea on your part and you fucked up as a dm. This isn't saying that the players have to always win, but if the players systematically lose it's probably not the system or the players.

A game system where you can't put in a bunch of flying enemies as a "random" encounter without breaking the party is a bad system. We're not talking enemies tailored to defeat a given party, we're talking a damn stock encounter for common fantasy games.

[Novembermike]

If it's easy for the PC to fly, then why put in flying enemies since you're just trivializing them? Even in 3.x there's no reason to use a bunch of flying enemies because it's either trivial or impossible.

[Crawfish]

wait so what makes the "flyers are a bitch" specifically apply to 4e? what would an earlier edition rogue, fighter, or barbarian do?

Well, I can tell you what my 3E party's "fighters" would do: Ride up on their flying carpets, jump and pounce/grapple (from ground or from carpet), use their ranged techniques (like Lightning Throw), or something stunt-like, like throwing nets.

I'd at the least expected the melee-focused fighters in 4E to deal with flying enemies by flying, or jumping so well it's almost flying, as seen in countless animes - but then I expected 4E to be better than 3E, not worse.

So it's not any different at all then? Cool

[Fuchs]

If it's easy for the PC to fly, then why put in flying enemies since you're just trivializing them? Even in 3.x there's no reason to use a bunch of flying enemies because it's either trivial or impossible.

Everyone knows a decent 4E party (even more so an optimized one) will win every encounter built according to the guidelines. By your logic, the entire damn combat game of 4E (and it has nothing else) is pointless since it's so trivially easy.

[Fuchs]

wait so what makes the "flyers are a bitch" specifically apply to 4e? what would an earlier edition rogue, fighter, or barbarian do?

Well, I can tell you what my 3E party's "fighters" would do: Ride up on their flying carpets, jump and pounce/grapple (from ground or from carpet), use their ranged techniques (like Lightning Throw), or something stunt-like, like throwing nets.

I'd at the least expected the melee-focused fighters in 4E to deal with flying enemies by flying, or jumping so well it's almost flying, as seen in countless animes - but then I expected 4E to be better than 3E, not worse.

So it's not any different at all then? Cool

No, it is different - flying was nerfed for the PCs in 4E. Instead of lifting up everyone to the caster level, all were dumbed down to MMOG melee idiot level. A game designed after 3E shouldn't make the GM double-check if his party can handle a bunch of harpies.

[ScottS]

wait so what makes the "flyers are a bitch" specifically apply to 4e? what would an earlier edition rogue, fighter, or barbarian do?

Fly (the spell) would normally come online at the start of the sweet spot, which is technically where 4e is supposed to begin (the rule of thumb I use is lv1 4e = lv4 older editions). You could also play races with intrinsic flight like aarakocra. Also see above (slightly ninja'd in re flight items; you can get stuff like this after a while in 4e, pretty sure Ebony Fly is the lowest at 9, living 'griff mounts are supposedly 5 but they're costed as lv9).

[Fuchs]

And before the stupid "3E was the same" gets brought up again: We all know 3E has a lot of faults. Not surpassing 3E in core areas doesn't make 4E a good game.

[Crawfish]

I wish there was some sort of ritual at level 10 that allowed the PCs to fly so anybody who took the ritual caster feat could take it, that seems like it would fix the problem, maybe it could be called "Eagle's flight" or something