Tomb of Battle ques.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 7:59 pm

So, at 15th level you can get super duper invisibility, and all you give up is Maze, or Mass Charm Monster, or Polymorph Any Object, or Trap The Soul? No thanks.

Heck, even Screen is flat out better.

Winnah · Post by **Winnah** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 8:47 pm

K wrote:
But who cares about it in the first place?

Superior Invisibility is a player option. If the PCs have some advantage on monsters out of the MM it doesn't matter. PCs are supposed to win fights against monsters, and in fact are supposed to win entire adventures.

There is no elaborate game of counters because the published monsters usually don't have counters. They usually have some flat immunities and one or two tricks, and the players are the ones with counters.

I agree that the PC's are supposed to overcome challenges, but saying that player abilities are not relevant is slightly disingenuous.

Take the Balor that was being discussed on the previous page. It has a host of special abilities that fall into the realm of what some player characters are capable of. It's permenant True Seeing will cut through any invisibility in range and it has a host of abilities that allow it to potentially lay down the hurt on an enemy that it can't precisely detect. If offense fails, it can potentially attempt to withdraw.

This is obviously an edge case. Many monsters will not be able to do a thing against certain types of tactics. There are however, a few monsters that are capable of using countermeasures against PC tactics, even utilising similar types of tricks to PC's. Most of these creatures are well known for being notoriously dangerous, such as Dragons with high level sorcerer spell access, for example. A lower level equivelant would be something like a Drider.

I'm not advocating the use of Balor death squads or intelligent Dragon tactics by any means, I'm just suggesting that there is no perfect strategy or win button that allows a player to breeze though to level 20 without challenge.

K · Post by K » Tue Oct 04, 2011 9:18 pm

Winnah wrote:
I'm not advocating the use of Balor death squads or intelligent Dragon tactics by any means, I'm just suggesting that there is no perfect strategy or win button that allows a player to breeze though to level 20 without challenge.

And yet, Swordslinger is saying that because PCs have tricks like "shock trooper, astral projection, wraithstrike, Superior invisibility, ray of stupidity, shivering touch and a bunch of other crap at one point," somehow the entire game revolves around counters to various builds when clearly it's not because the monsters aren't using those spells, feats, and tactics.

The players are using spells out of the Spell Compendium like superior invisibility and optimized builds, not the monsters the player's are fighting. Any counters the monsters are using are preset and known and certainly fewer than the players are using.

So when a Balor or Pit Fiend pops up, you really do know that you need to stop him from casting blasphemy because he's a known element. Every Balor has it, so ever party should know to defend against it.

This means that the fact that powerful player tactics exist says nothing about a game where PCs are supposed to have an advantage over monsters. Only on an internet forum deathmatch are people matching tactics with defenses and playing counters and counter-counters and trying to build the most cheese build, so judging the game by those isolated and unnatural cases is disingenuous and unfair.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 10:31 pm

What about for NPCs? It sounds like you're starting to advocate a 4E-style divide between player and monster abilities.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Tue Oct 04, 2011 10:53 pm

This is subject to some interpretation (depending on whether you think that this was intentional or not) but just because you have PC/NPC transparency doesn't mean that NPCs are the generic equal of PCs. NPCs in both the DMG, MM, and various sourcebooks by-and-large suck compared to moderately optimized characters. Partly because a DM is not only not punished but actively encouraged to do things like give NPCs unhelpfully overlapping (like Starfire) or downright bullshit (like Slade) schticks since memorability and personality are the overriding concerns--not personal combat ability.

So the fact that a DM could run every NPC as a character that's a specific counter to PCs that needs to be overcome in three-dimensional chess doesn't mean that they will or should. That kind of thing should be saved for important encounters like the Psycho Rangers or Legion of Doom-style teamups.

K · Post by K » Wed Oct 05, 2011 12:07 am

fectin wrote:What about for NPCs? It sounds like you're starting to advocate a 4E-style divide between player and monster abilities.

I'm not advocating anything, but recognizing that 3e does not put monsters and players on the same scale.

I mean, if the DM is spending several hours a week statting up monsters and NPCs as complicated and tactically deep as players, then there is a good chance he's skimping on hours he could spend on story and it's going to waste because the combat lasts three rounds and so any more than five or six abilities is wasted paper space.

Frankly, players can't handle equal challenges because most of them suck at DnD. The way the game compensates for this is to give players more abilities and monsters fewer, thus keeping players happy with variety and the illusion of challenging fights, and also making DMs happy by making monsters easy to run and use.

The game is players vs monsters, so judging it by player vs player is just stupid. Even player vs. NPC is lame because it assumes the DM is wasting hours of every week statting up setting- and story-appropriate NPCs specifically designed to make PCs lose combats instead of just using monsters out of the books.

I'm sure there are people that do that, but I also know that they are radically skewing the basic assumptions of the game for the purpose of making the game less fun.

Winnah · Post by **Winnah** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 8:31 am

I use 'player' options to spice up encounters occasionally. The only reason I do this is I have experienced players and I like to keep them guessing. Plus it keeps me entertained. For novice players, I would not bother.

9 out of 10 trolls they encounter are as portrayed in the MM. 1 out of 10 might be an oiled up brute that likes wrestling and has altered feats to reflect this.

More often than not, there is no appreciable difference to the encounter difficulty. I suppose I could be a jackass and give every monster non associated class levels in order to give the players a hard time, but I have never seen it as neccesary, even if I has the time to go all out on optimizing every little detail...Fuck, as a DM it would be easier to cheat and fudge dice than getting into that kind of dick measuring contest.

Swordslinger · Post by **Swordslinger** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 8:57 am

K wrote: Superior Invisibility is a player option. If the PCs have some advantage on monsters out of the MM it doesn't matter. PCs are supposed to win fights against monsters, and in fact are supposed to win entire adventures.

Sorry for thinking I could design challenging encounters for PCs. Gosh, silly me. I forgot we were playing the edition where the monsters automatically lose and the PCs never feel threatened because they're walking around with several dozen "I win" buttons.

K · Post by K » Wed Oct 05, 2011 9:30 am

Swordslinger wrote:
K wrote: Superior Invisibility is a player option. If the PCs have some advantage on monsters out of the MM it doesn't matter. PCs are supposed to win fights against monsters, and in fact are supposed to win entire adventures.
Sorry for thinking I could design challenging encounters for PCs. Gosh, silly me. I forgot we were playing the edition where the monsters automatically lose and the PCs never feel threatened because they're walking around with several dozen "I win" buttons.

Rather than fake apologize to me, you should actually apologize to your players because you took the time to make them have less fun.

RPGs are about feeling powerful and telling a heroic story, and any time you spent making people's abilities not work or not letting them be heroes is you being an asshole.

Try to remember that next time you design an encounter. Monsters are only supposed to feel threatening, not actually be threatening because the instant people start dying they have to stop having fun for the rest of the session or until they roll up a new character or get raised.

Having your abilities not work as advertised makes people feel powerless and that's not fun.

Challenging the PCs is not your job as DM. Your job is to ensure that people have fun.

If letting other people have fun playing DnD is not fun for you and you need to challenge them to get your rocks off, you should not be DM. Don't feel bad if you don't have the temperament to be a DM, but don't think it's not your fault either.

Ps. Since monsters in 4e are actually less capable of being an actual threat to PCs considering PC healing surges and loads of abilities vs a monster's own profound lack of interesting abilities, I don't know why you seem to think that this is a 3e issue. It's an RPG issue.

Swordslinger · Post by **Swordslinger** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 10:05 am

K wrote: Challenging the PCs is not your job as DM. Your job is to ensure that people have fun.

If letting other people have fun playing DnD is not fun for you and you need to challenge them to get your rocks off, you should not be DM. Don't feel bad if you don't have the temperament to be a DM, but don't think it's not your fault either.

I get it dude, you love having your uber wizard jizz all over the monsters and the plot with impunity.

Why do you immediately assume that the PCs don't want to be challenged? When I'm a PC, I'm bored when the game is too easy. Part of playing a hero is feeling like I'm doing something difficult, not shooting fish in a barrel. 3E just had too many godmode abilities that made the game trivially easy and boring.

It's one thing to actively choose to design an easy quest, but when you're building encounters that should challenge the PCs and they can rofl-stomp it anyway, that's a poorly designed game dude. The game designers failed.

Zak · Post by **Zak** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 10:50 am

Stop being an idiot Swordslinger. You are not playing a TTG. You do not win by killing the PCs.

You have a very weird view on what a challenging encounter is.

The moment you plan to actually kill a PC you plan to ruin that players evening. If you do that you are an ass, but we figured that much by now.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 10:52 am

Putting Swordslinger's stupidity aside for now, I'll mention there is one way the Swordsage can be useful: use the variant provided in ToB that lets you cast spells as manoeuvres. So you're a Sorcerer with possibly less spells known, infinite spell slots (though a weird recharging mechanic so "infinite per day", not "infinite per encounter", which is really stretching the definition of the word infinite) and slightly better hit points, unless lowering the hit die is one of the drawbacks.

You then take a few combat spells but focus on spells that are better usedabused as out-of-combat unlimited use stuff. Charm/Dominate Monster being an obvious one, but there are plenty of things to use.

I suppose at that point though you're not really playing something from ToB, you're just using some weird ToB stuff for your spellcaster.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 2:13 pm

I has a healing shiv charming whip dominating cattle prod!

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 6:37 pm

The assumption that monsters "automatically" lose is hilarious.

Players tend to "lose" more often at higher levels than they do at lower levels, because there are so many more things to take into account for, that could easily slip through a crack, and just auto-kill a PC b/c you get grappled by a pair of Krakens at level 20, and two +40 grapple checks will probably see you losing.

Or you fight N CR 7 creatures; and if you have to melee enemies, you need to be able to make a DC 18 fort save (per creature, 1/24 hours) or be petrified; as well as other shit like your gear having to take DC 23 fort saves to only take 1/2 of 2d8+10 damage.

At level 16+, PCs don't even get experience for fighting something like that.

Remember, more power scaling than you realize. At level 8, you can kill an almost unlimited amount of the creatures that were a credible and scary threat at level 1.

At level 16, you can kill an indefinite amount of CR 8 creatures.

Using the analogy of a commonly known system, WoW; a level 60 character is equivalent to a 6th level adventurer. They can now ride a flying mount whenever they want; and can teleport to one or two locations easily. If they save their pennies, they can get a vroom-vroom model of their favourite gryphon, just like you can get templated or elite versions in D&D.

The level 60 character can also take on a large, but probably countable amount of level 10 creatures, and only will get into "uncountable" territory once they hit 80.

In D&D, the game really changes a lot every 5 levels. Thor, Loki and Cucullain time is not the same as Aragorn Gimli and BMX Bandit time; which again, is not like Gandalf, Elisha and Angel Summoner time.

Count Arioch the 28th · Wed Oct 05, 2011 6:39 pm

RadiantPhoenix wrote:I has a healing shiv charming whip dominating cattle prod!

This might be weird, but am I the only person to feel slightly turned on by that?

K · Post by K » Wed Oct 05, 2011 7:09 pm

Judging__Eagle wrote:The assumption that monsters "automatically" lose is hilarious.

Yeh, I don't even know where that comes from.

I mean, it is a forgone conclusion that PCs will wins fights for the simple reason that not winning fights means that you don't get to play any more, but there is never an assumption that any fight is easy. Considering that monsters often have SR and high saves, there really are no godmode abilities and anyone who thinks there are is just objectively wrong.

I think Swordslinger is just a profoundly uncreative person and 4e is the right game for someone like him. I mean, he can't even handle the idea that the PCs might affect his plot with their abilities, so he'd prefer that no one had any abilities to affect the plot and needs a game with training wheels.

Since he obviously can't create a compelling narrative and thus resorts to playing bait-and-switch with player agency, he's left with one tactic: creating dramatic tension by trying to kill the PCs.

It's pathetic, but it does prove that 4e is right for some people, so I guess I walked away from this with a lesson learned.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 8:16 pm

Count Arioch the 28th wrote:This might be weird, but am I the only person to feel slightly turned on by that?

This may or may not have been an intended result.

Chamomile · Post by **Chamomile** » Wed Oct 05, 2011 8:39 pm

K wrote:I mean, it is a forgone conclusion that PCs will wins fights for the simple reason that not winning fights means that you don't get to play any more, but there is never an assumption that any fight is easy.

How can a fight possibly get any easier than "victory is inevitable?"

K · Post by K » Wed Oct 05, 2011 10:10 pm

Chamomile wrote:
K wrote:I mean, it is a forgone conclusion that PCs will wins fights for the simple reason that not winning fights means that you don't get to play any more, but there is never an assumption that any fight is easy.
How can a fight possibly get any easier than "victory is inevitable?"

It's a resource allocation game, so the question is not "will I win," the question is "will I blow too many resources on this fight and not want or be able to do the next one or complete the adventure objective?"

I mean, you can win the fight and lose the adventure because you lack to the resources to continue. This is because fighting is not the point of the game and telling a story is. If you don't get to the princess in time, the lich will sacrifice her. If you leave the dungeon halfway through, the demon stocks it with new traps and monsters. If the assassin's guild in not cleaned out completely in the first assault, they regroup and someone still kills the king.

I mean, Swordslinger probably feels cheated with the PCs figure out how to avoid a fight, even if they complete the adventure by doing so. He's probably happy with DnD as a wargame with just enough plot to grease the passage to the next battle.

As an aside, it feels weird to have to explain Basic Role-playing 101 when I'm often getting attacked by just those guys when I demand better rules.

Swordslinger · Post by **Swordslinger** » Thu Oct 06, 2011 1:34 am

K wrote: I mean, it is a forgone conclusion that PCs will wins fights for the simple reason that not winning fights means that you don't get to play any more, but there is never an assumption that any fight is easy. Considering that monsters often have SR and high saves, there really are no godmode abilities and anyone who thinks there are is just objectively wrong.

Winning a hard fought battle and having your game be a transparent cake walk are too different things.

I love the amount of straw men you're setting up here... now lets finish up the denfail and complete this strawman argument with a personal attack.

I think Swordslinger is just a profoundly uncreative person and 4e is the right game for someone like him.

Check.

Now that you've satiated your bruised ego with the required denfail insult, lets look at the facts.

Funny that you'd go with "uncreative" when you're the one advocating the easy game. It seems to me it takes a lot more creativity and intelligence to be a PC in a challenging game than an easy one. Seriously how much creativity does it take to fight a monster that can't even fight back? And it seems you've pretty much conceded that 3E can't challenge your PCs, or at least you said that playing that way is an incorrect way of playing the game.

3E has high level abilities that make you near invulnerable without the proper counter. Ghost form, superior invisibility, Astral projection... these things take the risk out of the game.

Astral projection eliminates even the illusion of danger. You can run around just punching balors at that point because you're playing with an infinite life code. If you "die", you no longer lose anything. I really wonder why you'd even run combats at all. Your magic items can't be sundered or disjoined and you're immune to almost anything that the game can toss at you. Unless someone finds your helpless body. In that case, it's just an auto "game over" screen, because the guy can just run over and slit your throat and you won't know about it.

The only wins you have are cheesy ones where the monsters can't even truly fight back and the losses you have are cheesy ones where someone finds your body and instakills you with no input on your end. People who want challenge don't want blatantly cheap bullshit.

But I guess it's just a symptom of modern gamers. Games have went from Nintendo hard, where winning was actually an achievement, to modern games where winning is a foregone conclusion and just requires time. Concepts like challenging the players are outdated in today's world. Modern gamers just don't want to treat victory as something that has to be earned, they want it to be a foregone conclusion.

It takes all the fun out of it if you ask me, but I guess that's a generational thing.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Thu Oct 06, 2011 2:46 am

Are we going to need another random animal be drawn that has more intelligence than a poster on these boards?

Leress · Post by **Leress** » Thu Oct 06, 2011 3:15 am

Sword, aren't you doing the very thing that you say that K is doing with "denfail" insults?

K · Post by K » Thu Oct 06, 2011 4:52 am

Swordslinger wrote:
Astral projection eliminates even the illusion of danger. You can run around just punching balors at that point because you're playing with an infinite life code. If you "die", you no longer lose anything. I really wonder why you'd even run combats at all. Your magic items can't be sundered or disjoined and you're immune to almost anything that the game can toss at you. Unless someone finds your helpless body. In that case, it's just an auto "game over" screen, because the guy can just run over and slit your throat and you won't know about it.

LOL. You aren't even immune to what the Balor can toss at you. If you played the game, this would be obvious.

Go ahead and punch Balors. After they strip your Mind Blank and protection from evil with their Greater Dispel, they'll Dominate monster you and it won't matter that your character can't die because your days as a playable character are over. It's a fate worse than death considering death became a minor problem ten levels ago.

That's even before we get into Wishes that can literally take a Balor anywhere in the planes, like your resting spot, but then you want it both ways where people who use invincibility tactics also don't take risks (nicely done with the bitching about both the effect, and the downsides of the effect).

That being said, you are correct that there is a generational divide. The old guard thinks that people should be punished for wanting to play heroic fantasy, and the new generation simply wants to have fun.

Gygax is dead and being a dick to players for the temerity of wanting an evening of fun is so 1975.

Chamomile · Post by **Chamomile** » Thu Oct 06, 2011 5:20 am

K wrote:It's a resource allocation game, so the question is not "will I win," the question is "will I blow too many resources on this fight and not want or be able to do the next one or complete the adventure objective?"

But that means that there comes a point where victory is no longer a foregone conclusion because you've already blown through however many resources. Which would imply that there is also a spot between "guaranteed success" and "guaranteed failure" where you and the monsters both have reasonable odds of coming out on top, which leads to the decision of whether or not you want to risk it.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Thu Oct 06, 2011 5:21 am

Quick Hits:

1: Using astral projection does not remove all risk. It removes nearly all risk of death. You can still lose fights, and by extension lose adventures. If you bothered to astrally project out of your fortress of solitude it's because you wanted to achieve something in the outside world, which you might or might not succeed in doing.

2: Accumulating and deploying enough overpowered spells and abilities to constitue and "I win" button in 3E is actually rather complicated and requires quite a bit of energy be invested in tactics and character design. From a player effort perspective, 3E is anything but an auto win. 3E monsters actually have shockingly dangerous attacks and abilities compared to 4E and most video games, so if you do something dumb like play a fighter or a wizard who uses the wrong spells, you do face a very real risk of death.

3: 4E, by comparison, has a reputation of being very very easy. I haven't played it myself beyond level 1, but comparing sample characters to the printed monsters suggests to me that all you need to do is pick a class and follow the recommended build to handily defeat level-appropriate opponents every time. Picking the best option of 4 (or 2!) when you level up is not that challenging, and knowing which move to use really isn't either.

4: You tacitly acknowledge this by complaining about 3E becoming "a game of counters." In other words, you acknowledge that in 3E specific items or abilities sometimes become necessary for survival or victory, meaning that in order to win the players need to have made smart choices. The game where monsters typically have no significant defenses, movement modes, or disable moves, thus allowing "Tide of Iron. Again" to win nearly all fights would be 4e.

5: Who's your daddy?