*D&D 4ed*

[Koumei]

Dragonborn actually make good Warlocks, because they have the Charisma boost and a bonus to Intimidate. Remember, Intimidate is the new way to win fights - bloody them then scare them into tapping out. Save yourself six hours for those boss monsters by only chiselling away half its HP.

[josephbt]

If it only weren't for that clause in Intimidate description. It says:
Your Intimidate checks are made against a target’s Will defense or a DC set by the DM. So more handwaving will happen. If the DM deems that this or that critter is immune, well, the DC is colossal.

[Calibron]

3.x does disappoint me with the schizophrenic assortment of spells and classes, but 4e does not remedy the problem by taking it all away.

That reminded me that when the frontal lobotomy was first invented they used to use it to "cure" some mental illnesses. This seems fairly similar.

[Koumei]

I have confidence that no DM will houserule the DC into being massive, simply because they too want the fight over quickly and can't bear to live through another day and a half of "I use an at-will ability".

Caliborn: Medicine used to be awesome.
Mental problem of any kind? Frontal lobotomy!
Moody woman syndrome? Get the doctor to give her a hand-job! (No, seriously, but then doctors decided they were sick of that (???), so basically invented the vibrator.)
Any ailment at all? Mercury! How could something so awesome as that be bad for you?
Toothache? How about cocaine! (used here on kids in hospitals. No rly)
Have a cough or headache? Just take Diacetylmorphine (given how much pain I frequently suffer, without apparent injuries to match the intensity, thus my doctor unwilling to prescribe any kind of real pain medication, I wish this trend here still existed. At $5 per prescription, I guarantee that I could afford an addiction, and I'm below the Australian poverty line.)

Ah, the wacky ideas they used to have. Although even now they have some moronic ones. "Hmm, if someone takes too much codeine, they might not feel their pain. They could also enjoy themselves. I know! We'll mix all codeine tablets with huge amounts of para-fucking-cetamol (tylenol for the Americans), so that if they take more than we tell them to, they will die slowly, painfully, and irreversibly from liver failure!"

Fucking genius.

...this was originally about 4E being shit, wasn't it?

[Fwib]

The skill bonuses given by race are un-named, yes?

So the diplomat is a half-elf, and carries around someone who didn't pass the diplomat exam in a sack.


And on the subject of stacking bonuses: want to travel fast? Hire a group of elves all with the light step feat - you'll also be harder to track.

Imagine the speed of elven armies!

[virgil]

All of the races have their personal bonuses unnamed, while any bonuses given to others are racial bonuses. There's no crazy stacking going on.

[Voss]

Huh. And they didn't do what they did with the floating elven perception bonus- it only works for non-elves. (Apparently elves are incapable of reading each other's body language).

All right lads, we're getting into enemy territory. Keep an eye on the elf. If his ears twitch, we're in trouble.

[RandomCasualty2]

That specific change was shit however. It removed grappling from the game. A better change would have been something like "You gain a +1 bonus (or whatever) per caster level to resist grapple checks." The best change would be to give fighters nice things and get everyone on the RNG. As it is now, it makes combat less interesting and it removes fun character and monster archetypes.

Yeah, though IMO the real problem was how the numbers scaled. Handing out ridiculous strength bonuses to monsters and then handing out a huge size bonus on top of that. Pretty much means PCs are screwed in the grapple game.

The grapple mechanics were just really flawed anyway, and FoM was like the bandaid (aka "Lets just remove it from the game")

Only if that was your groups playstyle. If every combat was solvable by a save or die, and if the monsters always failed their saves, then yes, combats would be uninteresting.

Well, sometimes the monsters could survive, but that's only surviving one character, and there are about 4 PCs.

When you have encounters with multiple monsters. When you have multiple encounters in a day. If your viable single target SoD's outnumber your opponents, then yes, your combats will become derivative.

If you have large groups of monsters to take out, that's what your AoEs are for. A swarm of weaker monsters just doesn't do well against a couple of fireballs, especially if you took sudden maximize.

Armies of monsters are shit in 3.5. Once you get to like 6 CRs under the PCs level or so, where you can have like 8 or more of the monster, it just turns into a game of one or two AoEs to end the entire encounter.

For your group maybe. For others it is laughably untrue. Protecting allies can be a large, and viable, part of the game. That is what battlefield control is all about.

Nah, battlefield control is about divide and conquer or denying monsters actions. It has really little to do with defending your allies. Nobody in 4E really plays to soak damage. I mean the fighter can try to, but he's just not very effective at it.

Yes. The point is that in some situations, you are unable to kill the enemies fast enough, and you must use battlefield control spells and abilities to neutralize the enemy's offense.

Sure, but at high levels, you're way better off just tossing down real battlefield control like wall of force or evard's black tentacles than you are fooling around with illusions or doing anything legitimately creative.

I don't think this is true. If you have a foundation of houserules at the start of a campaign, it is possible to have encounters and adventures on the fly.

Well, not really. Even wtih house rules, the innate complexity in the system is still there, unless your house rules are so intense as to make 3.5 look like 4E. I mean so long as NPCs need magic items and are made like PCs, it's pretty much impossible to create one on the fly. Even creating a high level fighter is a pain in the balls because you've got to select all those feats.

So that means that basically NPCs can't exist in the high level game in a large capacity, because they're just too hard to use and take too long to make. Monsters are fine in 3.5 for the most part, except for dragons, which are annoying as fucking hell.

You can't really use simple monsters like 4E because the 3.5 game requires that you possess so many counters to stuff that it's just not possible to make anything simple at high levels. You've got to go down the laundry list of abilities you need to not instantly lose a battle.

That means you've got to be able to see invisible stuff somehow, you've got to be able to hit flying targets, and if you're not a mook, you've got to have a good shot of surviving save or dies. You need teleportation or disintegrate for a force cage. You have to be able to survive someone grappling you for Evard's black tentacles.

And if you miss one of those, then your monster may just get fucked up in round 1 of the combat and not even get to take an action.

After you're done with that, you need to assign the monster attacks that are deadly, but not too deadly. So it pretty much has to be a save or die of some kind, because at high levels, hit point damage is shit. Choosing that DC is going to be a real bitch though, because of how divergent people's saves are. They may not even be playing the same game.

You're not going to make that shit work on the fly, because all that takes careful consideration. It's not just taking a bunch of numbers and throwing them down on a pad, then adding a few colorful abilities. 3.5 at mid to high levels is so complex that you really can't do anything without at least 20 minutes of planning. I mean just look at how many creatures in the MM, or even the ELH, can be defeated with nothing more than greater invisibility and ranged attacks.

[virgil]

You don't have to make every aspect of a monster able to withstand every angle of assault, because there are only so many actions that can be brought to the table against them. The name of the game becomes surprise attacks, and we just let the monsters not survive long, acknowledging that combat is short and lethal.

High level campaigns become more political, because of this.

[Koumei]

One thing I've seriously considered doing (and in a few cases, have done) for games where the party thankfully share the same RNG (or for solo games. Online, it's more often than you think) is to just give some "end result" numbers and declare "screw the rules, I have money."

Now, if that was actually the thought process behind designing the game, it'd be terrible, but for a DM, what the players generally want is for the monsters to be ______ challenging. So you just say "it's AC is enough so that no-one needs more than a 15 or less than a 5 to hit, that makes it X. Average damage seems to be Y, so let's make it 5Y or whatever. ACs are around this mark, and it should hit about half the time, so we'll give it Z to hit..."

Nobody ever needs to know. This saves time actually designing things in such a way as to get those end results. But as I said, that shouldn't be part of the game design, merely a DM tool.

[Calibron]

Now, if that was actually the thought process behind designing the game, it'd be terrible, but for a DM, what the players generally want is for the monsters to be ______ challenging. So you just say "it's AC is enough so that no-one needs more than a 15 or less than a 5 to hit, that makes it X. Average damage seems to be Y, so let's make it 5Y or whatever. ACs are around this mark, and it should hit about half the time, so we'll give it Z to hit..."

Nobody ever needs to know. This saves time actually designing things in such a way as to get those end results. But as I said, that shouldn't be part of the game design, merely a DM tool.

Actually that is what you want to do when you design monsters. Assuming you have a game that actually has people on more or less the same RNG, you set the target numbers for attack, AC, damage, hp, and saves based on how easy/hard you want it to be to effect/be effected by and how long you want the combat to take. Once you have those numbers you assign stuff like hit dice and ability scores and racial bullshit bonuses so that they end up with those numbers.

[RandomCasualty2]

You don't have to make every aspect of a monster able to withstand every angle of assault, because there are only so many actions that can be brought to the table against them. The name of the game becomes surprise attacks, and we just let the monsters not survive long, acknowledging that combat is short and lethal.

Yeah, I guess I don't like high level combats to be short and lethal. I don't want a drawn out sawing affair, but the fight that's over before it began just doens't say "heroic fantasy" to me. That kind of thing is cool for games like shadowrun, where the characters play tactical special forces type characters in a modern style world, but for D&D... I don't really like it.

I want heroes and villains to be badass, and dying in one round isn't very badass.

High level campaigns become more political, because of this.

Honestly, I don't think so. If anything, they just become more deadly.

The problem with politics in 3.5 is that there's no point worrying about them. For politics to matter, that means that getting yourself in command of a bunch of underlings has to matter. But it doesn't really do anything for you besides telling them to "go make gold so I can break the wealth by level guidelines.", there's just not much minions do that you care about in D&D, because numbers almost never win the day and sending a bunch of minions after a high level guy is just bound to fail.

It isn't like White Wolf where a bunch of low level guys can swarm a high level vampire and kill him.

Also unlike a game of Vampire, you don't really have many high level organizations. Generally power is distributed in a pyramid. That means that while Manshoon may be a bad ass, the majority of the Zhentarium isn't. The PCs have the advantage that they're 5 high level guys organized together.

Since the attacker has a big advantage in 3.5 due to surprise conditions and such, there's really no reason to be political and possibly let your opponents strike first when the PCs are divided. Since the PCs are a huge advantage if they all go their separate ways building keeps and towers and stuff, because that means their enemies can pick them off one at a time.

In fact, high level 3.5 encourages you to be anti political. The best strategy is to lock yourself in a lead room somewhere where people can't find you or scry on you and nobody knows what it looks like because you're the only one who has been there. Much like in Shadowrun, it helps to stay off the grid and only perform assassinations and stuff when the time arises. Unlike Shadowrun though, you're not fighting groups, you're fighting individuals. You can go ahead and assassinate the CEO of a megacorp and nobody might care, because numbers and equipment is more valuable than individual skill. There's very little that guy could do that his successor can't do.

In D&D though, Manshoon is seriously the man, and if you kill him and his little circle of other high level mages, then you've basically crippled the Zhentarium. Because the high level guys are doing the important shit, not the grunts. In fact, without the backing of high level characters, the organization pretty much goes from being a major world player to being some backwater mercenary/bandit group. And unlike in Shadowrun, they can't just appoint a successor and be close to where they were before. A 10th levle mage just isn't the same as having a 19th level one.

[Bigode]

The real 4E motto's "Restrictions, not options." Bonus points for keeping flavor separate from effectiveness (infernal tiefling warlock).

[Voss]

Now, if that was actually the thought process behind designing the game, it'd be terrible, but for a DM, what the players generally want is for the monsters to be ______ challenging. So you just say "it's AC is enough so that no-one needs more than a 15 or less than a 5 to hit, that makes it X. Average damage seems to be Y, so let's make it 5Y or whatever. ACs are around this mark, and it should hit about half the time, so we'll give it Z to hit..."

Nobody ever needs to know. This saves time actually designing things in such a way as to get those end results. But as I said, that shouldn't be part of the game design, merely a DM tool.

Actually that is what you want to do when you design monsters. Assuming you have a game that actually has people on more or less the same RNG, you set the target numbers for attack, AC, damage, hp, and saves based on how easy/hard you want it to be to effect/be effected by and how long you want the combat to take. Once you have those numbers you assign stuff like hit dice and ability scores and racial bullshit bonuses so that they end up with those numbers.

I think 4e takes it to an extreme, however. Its too transparent and the system fails to obscure the fact that all the leveling in the world doesn't change the game from: you hit on a 12+, now do that 2 more times (and +2 times if its 'paragon tier' and an additional +2 times if its 'epic'). Those numbers aren't exact, but that seriously seems to be the entire game. You hit each of 4-6 creatures in 240-300 encounters 3-7 times, and you win D&D. This is fairly sad.

[Calibron]

That's a different problem entirely. It's the problem of 4th ED leaving you, and to a lesser extent the monsters, with no fun options rather than being tightly designed.

[RandomCasualty2]

I think 4e takes it to an extreme, however. Its too transparent and the system fails to obscure the fact that all the leveling in the world doesn't change the game from: you hit on a 12+, now do that 2 more times (and +2 times if its 'paragon tier' and an additional +2 times if its 'epic'). Those numbers aren't exact, but that seriously seems to be the entire game. You hit each of 4-6 creatures in 240-300 encounters 3-7 times, and you win D&D. This is fairly sad.

Well to a degree, this is what you want out of a level system. The idea is that the numbers stay relatively constant, and nobody diverges off the deep end. The only problem is that none of the abilities they hand out are all that interesting. It's not so much that the system precludes it, but just that the ones they wrote were really bland.

[virgil]

And you can still see real advancement, even if the numbers don't expand outside the RNG, just in sheer scope/tactic/range of options; as opposed to the same thing you got five levels ago with a bigger damage bonus.

[SphereOfFeetMan]

Armies of monsters are shit in 3.5. Once you get to like 6 CRs under the PCs level or so, where you can have like 8 or more of the monster, it just turns into a game of one or two AoEs to end the entire encounter.

Yes. That is why you use groups of monsters that are all still individually a credible threat.

Nah, battlefield control is about divide and conquer or denying monsters actions. It has really little to do with defending your allies.

WTF? You've just fucking defined battlefield control as defending your allies.

I mean so long as NPCs need magic items and are made like PCs, it's pretty much impossible to create one on the fly.

Right. So you don't make Npc's like that.

And if you miss one of those, then your monster may just get fucked up in round 1 of the combat and not even get to take an action.

That is fine. That is why you have more than one monster. If you have the Pc's face single targets with glaring weaknesses, then expect the monster to go down fast.

it pretty much has to be a save or die of some kind, because at high levels, hit point damage is shit.

It doesn't have to be. You can give monsters relevant damaging attacks.

Choosing that DC is going to be a real bitch though, because of how divergent people's saves are. They may not even be playing the same game.

Right. That is why I said it is important to make sure the players are on the RNG before the game starts.

You're not going to make that shit work on the fly, because all that takes careful consideration. It's not just taking a bunch of numbers and throwing them down on a pad, then adding a few colorful abilities. 3.5 at mid to high levels is so complex that you really can't do anything without at least 20 minutes of planning.

My point is that it really can be that easy. Koumei is exactly right here. Just look at your player's numbers. If you want a monster to be easy to hit, give him an AC 5 more than the average attack bonus in the party. Just plug in the numbers for the monster as a reaction to the Pc's numbers.

3.x tries to make you believe that it is a requirement that you jump through all those hoops in order to create an Npc. You really don't have to do this. I've read enough of your posts to know you are a smart guy RC. I'm sure you can do this.

You've played enough the way you are "supposed to" that you have mastery of the system. You know what numbers you need to challenge a party. You know what actions are interesting abilities for any level.

I mean just look at how many creatures in the MM, or even the ELH, can be defeated with nothing more than greater invisibility and ranged attacks.

That is only partly a problem. Not every creature should have see invisibility or a good ranged attack. That is why you factor a monster's capabilities (or lack thereof) into its challenge to a party. A Bulette burrows. A melee fighter has an Int score of 3 or better. You work with the things a monster has.

[Koumei]

Actually that is what you want to do when you design monsters. Assuming you have a game that actually has people on more or less the same RNG, you set the target numbers for attack, AC, damage, hp, and saves based on how easy/hard you want it to be to effect/be effected by and how long you want the combat to take. Once you have those numbers you assign stuff like hit dice and ability scores and racial bullshit bonuses so that they end up with those numbers.

I actually meant that it's a bad thing for the designers to just assume that's how the game will be run and put no real effort into it themselves. I was more than a little unclear.

[Calibron]

No, I understood your intent(and you're right of course), just felt like throwing in the tidbit I posted to steer the conversation somewhere more interesting.

[JonSetanta]

That's a different problem entirely. It's the problem of 4th ED leaving you, and to a lesser extent the monsters, with no fun options rather than being tightly designed.

Then perhaps tight-design is the wrong way to go.
It might also be labeled "sterile design".

What I want is "proactive design" with both frameworks for creating new material using pre-existing sources, and rules to ensure that new creations also follow guidelines that don't throw the interaction between creations of past, present, and future into chaos (or obvious one-sided favor).
Proactive would probably require, at most simple, a rock-paper-scizzors mechanic involved in every aspect of interaction.
Any publishing company producing Official Materials must also follow the rules set by previous designers, unless changing the rules (universally) would balance most contributions better.

[RandomCasualty2]

Yes. That is why you use groups of monsters that are all still individually a credible threat.

Yeah, just saying that it's a pretty narrow window in 3.5.

WTF? You've just fucking defined battlefield control as defending your allies.

The difference wtih most battlefield control is that you also prevent anyone else from attacking the monster Which is divide and conquer, not really defense.

That is fine. That is why you have more than one monster. If you have the Pc's face single targets with glaring weaknesses, then expect the monster to go down fast.

The problem is that it's really not glaring weaknesses, it's more about a monster that hasn't completed the laundry list of defenses it needs.

Right. That is why I said it is important to make sure the players are on the RNG before the game starts.

This is one thing that 4E does pretty well. 3.5 was notoriously horrible at it.

My point is that it really can be that easy. Koumei is exactly right here. Just look at your player's numbers. If you want a monster to be easy to hit, give him an AC 5 more than the average attack bonus in the party. Just plug in the numbers for the monster as a reaction to the Pc's numbers.

Yeah, I guess you can do that, but at that point, you're not really playing 3.5 anymore and are just playing magic tea party with dice. And it still doesn't solve the problem of pushing people off the RNG at high levels.

3.x tries to make you believe that it is a requirement that you jump through all those hoops in order to create an Npc. You really don't have to do this. I've read enough of your posts to know you are a smart guy RC. I'm sure you can do this.

Well, yeah, I can ignore the rules. But that's still a pretty big flaw with the rules.

And you can make similar claims about getting around 4E's flaws with houserules too. The main advantage that 4E has is that it's numbers are at least non-divergent, so that means at least if you make up numbers you don't push people off the RNG.

[SphereOfFeetMan]

The problem is that it's really not glaring weaknesses, it's more about a monster that hasn't completed the laundry list of defenses it needs.

I know what you are talking about here. Death effects, charms, ability damage, incoporealness, etc, all can be one shot effects. I think a combination of 3 things can fix most of those problems.
-Alter or ban stupid stuff. You shouldn't allow Shivering Touch.
-Allow players to wade through monsters. Let the Wizard Sleep a group of kobolds and then coup de grace them. Let the Fighter great cleave through armies.
-Use situations, terrain, and time to cover a monster's weaknesses. A Monstrous Scorpion isn't a threat in the grasslands, but it can be a challenge even at high level when it is blocking the party's timed escape route.

Yeah, I guess you can do that, but at that point, you're not really playing 3.5 anymore and are just playing magic tea party with dice.

I don't know what you mean by this. If the standard monsters are an appropriate challenge for the Pc's, everything is fine. If you need to alter the numbers, you do so. Forcing yourself to jump through hoops doesn't make your game better, only the end result matters.

Well, yeah, I can ignore the rules. But that's still a pretty big flaw with the rules.

And you can make similar claims about getting around 4E's flaws with houserules too. The main advantage that 4E has is that it's numbers are at least non-divergent, so that means at least if you make up numbers you don't push people off the RNG.

All true. For me, it is easier to adjust the numbers in 3.x and keep interesting abilities like Whirlwind Attack, grappling, charm spells, illusions, divination's, etc. I think it would be much more difficult to layer interesting and powerful abilities onto 4e's tight RNG framework.

[RandomCasualty2]

I know what you are talking about here. Death effects, charms, ability damage, incoporealness, etc, all can be one shot effects. I think a combination of 3 things can fix most of those problems.
-Alter or ban stupid stuff. You shouldn't allow Shivering Touch.
-Allow players to wade through monsters. Let the Wizard Sleep a group of kobolds and then coup de grace them. Let the Fighter great cleave through armies.
-Use situations, terrain, and time to cover a monster's weaknesses. A Monstrous Scorpion isn't a threat in the grasslands, but it can be a challenge even at high level when it is blocking the party's timed escape route.

Well, I mean there are times I let people wade through monsters. Of course, sometimes I really want a monster to be a legitimate threat. That's the problem where you've got to consider all the immunities or resistances a monster needs just to last a couple rounds.

All true. For me, it is easier to adjust the numbers in 3.x and keep interesting abilities like Whirlwind Attack, grappling, charm spells, illusions, divination's, etc. I think it would be much more difficult to layer interesting and powerful abilities onto 4e's tight RNG framework.

Yeah I dunno. I mean I actually like that 4E is starting more or less balanced (or so it would seem), because it makes it easier to adapt new powers to the framework.

The problem with 3.5 is that the balance is so all over the place that's there's really no way to balance new mechanics or even monsters except to your party, and if your party happens to have a monk and a druid in it, well then it's just completely impossible to balance the monsters. Regardless of what you do, the monk is going to suck, or the druid is going to steamroll everything.

[SphereOfFeetMan]

Of course, sometimes I really want a monster to be a legitimate threat. That's the problem where you've got to consider all the immunities or resistances a monster needs just to last a couple rounds.

That is a challenge in 3.x. I don't find it to be too difficult when dealing with a party in a long term campaign. On the other hand, in one-shots and the like, especially at high level, it can be really difficult because you don't know what to expect.

Yeah I dunno. I mean I actually like that 4E is starting more or less balanced (or so it would seem), because it makes it easier to adapt new powers to the framework.

But all those new powers by definition have to be on the same scale as the previous powers. That means that almost everything is an attack with a shift or 1 round status effect or whatever. You can't have Charm Monster, Animate Dead, Silent Image, grappling, great cleave, or anything at all like those powers in 4e.

Yes, it is easier to adapt. Buy you can't adapt the fun powers of 3.x into 4e.

...and if your party happens to have a monk and a druid in it, well then it's just completely impossible to balance the monsters. Regardless of what you do, the monk is going to suck, or the druid is going to steamroll everything.

Yup. Fortunately for us, Frank and K have done most of the work for us, and we have a viable Monk.