4th Edition Quirks

[Murtak]

Spells that allow a rather easy reversal for anyone who can cast them - like flesh to stone or polymorph - are not kill spells. Unless of course you consider any temporary setback for PCs a "kill". I see waking up in prison after the wizard reversed his spell as a bit different from waking up in the afterlife.

Once again, WTF is it with you and your no one ever wants their enemies dead bullshit. These aren't liberal hippy Orcs, if they unstone you, it's only to coup de grace your tied up ass and start eating your body. Baleful Polymorph and Flesh to Stone are not temporary setbacks, they are permanent ones. Because when you get Stoned, they break the statue into pieces and when you get squirreled they cook they squirrel over a fire.

Unless they wanted to capture you in the first place, which, if I recall correctly, was one of the points under discussion in this very thread. And when you state this never happens you are quite simply and obviously wrong.

[Kaelik]

Unless they wanted to capture you in the first place, which, if I recall correctly, was one of the points under discussion in this very thread. And when you state this never happens you are quite simply and obviously wrong.

No, that isn't one of the points under the discussion. Every single enemy in the universe always wanting to capture and never ever for any reason wanting to kill is just Fuchs's cop out to avoid TPKs.

[Roy]

Unless they wanted to capture you in the first place, which, if I recall correctly, was one of the points under discussion in this very thread. And when you state this never happens you are quite simply and obviously wrong.

No, that isn't one of the points under the discussion. Every single enemy in the universe always wanting to capture and never ever for any reason wanting to kill is just Fuchs's cop out to avoid TPKs.

Except for that 'opposite of what author intended' bit.

[Fuchs]

Unless they wanted to capture you in the first place, which, if I recall correctly, was one of the points under discussion in this very thread. And when you state this never happens you are quite simply and obviously wrong.

No, that isn't one of the points under the discussion. Every single enemy in the universe always wanting to capture and never ever for any reason wanting to kill is just Fuchs's cop out to avoid TPKs.

Well, avoiding TPKs is the point. And again, not every NPC wants to capture, not kill. But it's a good way to avoid a TPK for my group. Having the Party get perma-TPKed is not even in the running, that would not only be no fun, but it would also cause a lot of work (starting a new campaign) for absolutely no gain.

As far as it being stupid - you must be blind if you take issues with that, and not with the whole "enter a dungeon and clear it room for room in separate encounters while the enemies never mass and swarm you" idea. I actually find it less contrived to have NPCs (I don't use monsters that much) having interests in capturing the PCs alive than having the PCs only ever encounter enemies they have a chance to beat, which is what usually happens in most Adventures.

As far as resurrection goes - please, if pcs can afford that they can afford to leave some diamnods and gold with a priest who can cast True resurrection, and arrange to have that cast once they are killed.

Frankly, your stance looks to me like "my suspended disbelief is better than yours". We simply have different playstyles.

[Username17]

Fuchs, I want you to be less passive aggressive about your fucking playstyle.

-Username17

[Kaelik]

Well, avoiding TPKs is the point. And again, not every NPC wants to capture, not kill. But it's a good way to avoid a TPK for my group. Having the Party get perma-TPKed is not even in the running, that would not only be no fun, but it would also cause a lot of work (starting a new campaign) for absolutely no gain.

I know that you are trying to avoid TPKs. My entire point is that you start with unoptimized Party, and you don't want TPKs, so you completely tear apart any semblance of game sense in order to not TPK. By for example, having exactly zero enemies trying to kill them.

As far as it being stupid - you must be blind if you take issues with that, and not with the whole "enter a dungeon and clear it room for room in separate encounters while the enemies never mass and swarm you" idea. I actually find it less contrived to have NPCs (I don't use monsters that much) having interests in capturing the PCs alive than having the PCs only ever encounter enemies they have a chance to beat, which is what usually happens in most Adventures.

There are lots of situations in which swarming would not occur. I am opposed to swarming not occurring when it should. But to claim that it makes way more sense for people with access to speak with dead, divination, and polymorph to capture people and then not guard them at all and give them back their items. That's just ridiculous.

As far as resurrection goes - please, if pcs can afford that they can afford to leave some diamnods and gold with a priest who can cast True resurrection, and arrange to have that cast once they are killed.

So if the PCs can afford the 5000gp for Raise Dead on one person, then they can afford the 30,000gp per PC to have a Cleric on retainer to Scry them and True Res them when they TPK? Don't kid yourself.

Frankly, your stance looks to me like "my suspended disbelief is better than yours". We simply have different playstyles.

Frankly, you completely destroy any pretense of sense in the game, declare everyone immortal, make enemies easily capable of beating the PCs incompetent as crap five minutes later, and then you declare it "playstyle differences" because you are so lost you can't see the giant pile of shit in front of you. Yes it is possible to play a game that makes less sense than Austin Powers with a voice over of a B Kung Fu movie. That doesn't mean that anyone even remotely sane can't see that your game is a huge joke, and the fact that you think it's a realistic model of anything is disturbing.

You can absolutely play a joke game that removes all sensible motivations for all parties, but you should recognize it for what it is.

[Parthenon]

EDIT: Stupid fallible memory making me think stupid things. Why can't I be like all the cool kids and have eidetic memory.
Well, Fuchs has a sort of point about having lots of easy encounters. The DMG suggests that most of the encounters should be of an EL lower than your party. (I can't remember the exact proportions) Since fighting one on one is stupid since the enemy will be gang-raped it will be the equivalent of the PCs beating on midgets.

So, following the guidelines for the encounters but missing out the encounters where the EL is 4 above the party's doesn't sound too bad to me.

---

Fuchs: I think there are a couple of big questions about capturing you really need to explain. Mainly the point Roy keeps bringing up (quite reasonably) about how the PCs get equipment back. Its a simple fact that the PCs need equipment. Can you give at least three scenarios where the PCs only have to fight weak enemies for a compelling reason. Or they immediately get their equipment back. Hell, even how they escape from cells without a really really stupid guard.

This is a real question. I would love to know a reason why orcs or even most non-Good humanoids wouldn't at least remove a hand and cauterise it to stop them escaping. After all Clerics can regrow limbs. And even more so if the PCs managed to kill some of their buddies.

And even if they don't, and they somehow escape the cells, how the hell do I manage to let them have lots of equipment? Especially if a fighter uses a unique weapon such as a meteor hammer or fullblade.

If one can't come up with a reasonable answer to these then capturing shouldn't be done because it breaks the rest of the campaign even if it is the sensible thing for the antagonists to do.

[Roy]

Since when is most = 10%? Because that's exactly what it is. Most (50%, and this is a significant majority when 100% is being divided 5 ways) are the same level. Then it's like 20% puzzle monsters, 15% higher level, 5% much higher level. So the 4 (or more) levels higher thing comes up about twice per 3 levels. It's not all the time, but you definitely need to be prepared for it, as it is a very real possibility.

As for the equipment thing, yes that is a very real concern. That's also only part of it, since if we're assuming this isn't the Worst Prison Ever you're also secured in a way that will actually hold you, you don't have spells because the guards intentionally disrupt your sleep or prayer or whatever, and the enemies are still as hard or harder than they were when they kicked your ass at full power, while potentially at less than full power themselves depending on whether or not they needed to hold back to capture without killing.

And refusing to think of those things, at all leads to the Epic Fucking Fail where someone actually thinks they can start a level 20 campaign by making people auto magically disappear and reappear in a fucking metal cage, and have that actually stop them or even remotely concern them (the person in question seems to think a whole adventure can be devised out of breaking out of a level 2 area).

Edit: It's more frequent. I thought the 15% was 1-3. Since it's 1-4, obviously some of that would be 4, and therefore it's coming up once a level, or perhaps even more frequently than that.

Not to mention puzzle monsters can also be in the hard, very hard, or even impossible group if you can't figure out what tools to use, and then have them to use it. Seriously. Take all the magic weapons off a level 20 beatstick and he can't even scratch a stock MOB shadow. Who is 17 levels lower. Of course he should really have a magic weapon, or at least a ghostblight capsule even at level 3 but regardless, that's a puzzle monster. And not all of them are that easy to figure out.

Since the group is clearly lacking essential things and basic competence, it is much more likely a puzzle monster is unsolvable and thus gets a huge upgrade to effective level, except without the benefits thereof.

So really Kaelik, it'd be more accurate to say he's ignoring 90% of the game.

[Kaelik]

Well, Fuchs has a sort of point about having lots of easy encounters. The DMG suggests that most of the encounters should be of an EL lower than your party. (I can't remember the exact proportions) Since fighting one on one is stupid since the enemy will be gang-raped it will be the equivalent of the PCs beating on midgets.

10% EL below party level.

50% EL of party level.

15% EL 1-4 greater than party level.

5% EL 5 greater.

20% puzzle monsters.

So no. It's not. It's explicitly ignoring 70% of the encounters. The 70 hardest percent. That's not playing D&D minus some annoying parts. It's playing a game missing any hint of challenge.

[Parthenon]

Okay, your right it is stupid. For some reason I got it onto my head that the majority of the encounters were supposed to be just under the party's level. Not quite sure where.

Sorry about that.

[Roy]

Okay, your right it is stupid. For some reason I got it onto my head that the majority of the encounters were supposed to be just under the party's level. Not quite sure where.

Sorry about that.

Don't worry about it. Getting stuff wrong is only a problem if you refuse to be corrected, like him. Otherwise it happens to everyone, is not a big deal, and is a measure of personal growth.

Oh yeah, and another thing. Even if it is possible to capture someone with no loss of efficiency simply by choosing to detain rather than kill, you're still going to need to greatly outclass them in order to actually hold them.

Consider. Most criminals on Earth are at worst, dude with gun. Yet there are entire precincts filled with dudes with guns that are employed to bring people like this down and in, and indeed it is extremely likely more than one of them will be actively involved at any time. And if the police force cannot handle it, then better dudes with bigger guns step in in the form of SWAT, National Guard, FBI, military, etc until the criminal is sufficiently outclassed and arrested or killed. And these are all people who only go for the kill as a last resort.

So anyways, the guy gets arrested and he gets thrown in a cell, minus any weapons and pretty much everything else with a bunch of other guys in the same and other cells. And there's lots of guarded checkpoints and locked doors and cameras and such between him and freedom. Then the guards in the towers outside are armed, and the only reason the others aren't is so prisoners can't get their gun. And if you do get past all that and get out, you're right back to the police and FBI and whatthefuck ever else trying to arrest your ass. If anything, they're more determined now, because they need to make an example of you.

See how they outclass the criminal in pretty much every way? And these are just normal humans. No magic, auto fire only, FINAL DESTINATION. In the context of D&D, this barely even qualifies as a story about mooks. But look at all the effort required to detain them. Now consider how much it takes to hold people that actually matter. Even if the people doing the holding also actually matter, many new avenues of escape are opened up. And the counters are often harder to employ than the thing they're meant to counter. Which means in order for an NPC to even be considering this sort of thing, without being automatically dismissible as a total dumbfuck he needs to have about 10 levels on the PCs. And the moment the DM is introducing stuff 10 levels higher that is in any hostile to you everything that follows is automatically powertripping douchebag wankery.

[Leress]

Okay, your right it is stupid. For some reason I got it onto my head that the majority of the encounters were supposed to be just under the party's level. Not quite sure where.

Sorry about that.

Probably from this:

http://www.thealexandrian.net/creations ... esign.html

[RandomCasualty2]

So no. It's not. It's explicitly ignoring 70% of the encounters. The 70 hardest percent. That's not playing D&D minus some annoying parts. It's playing a game missing any hint of challenge.

Well depends on the party.

Running those guidelines with people highly min/maxed may well play a game missing any hint of challenge. Or running encounters of EL = party level may well be a series of reasonably tough fights for an underpowered party.

It's all relative.

[FatR]

I seriously don't think, that capturing PCs is a solution to the problem of lethality. Undead and predatory animals don't capture you. And being taken alive by ogres (and most traditionally evil humanoids, for that matter) or psychopatic evil cultists is likely to result in a fate worse than death, really fast. Moreover, after PCs escape once, the next bunch of bad guys, working for the same organization will likely be instructed to Just Shoot Them. So, while you can use it sometimes, it is not going to work as a regular solution.

What works for reducing lethality my games so far, is fielding a lot of humanoid/giant/undead grunts, with opponents of equal or higher CR (particularly those who are full spellcasters, have a lot of built-in magic or are monsters that have really good stats for their CR) being used sparingly, as bosses. This fits the common tropes of heroic fantasy, with characters that cutting through small hordes of lesser opponents, and makes the combat significantly less swingy, as long as PCs are smart enough to avoid being gangbanged. And also plainly reduces the difficulty, compared to routinely using opponents who are at least as strong individually as one of PCs. This approach, of course, generally requires appropriate plot measures to avoid overuse of hit-and-run tactics and 15-minute workdays. More plot measures than published adventures, which quite often are built on this model, tend to provide. I'm also afraid that it will stop working at high levels, but so far none of my games got high enough.

EDIT: By "high levels" I mean two-digit levels. I never had any signficant experience with them, campaigns that start from level 1 tend to fold before that (although my current one is almost there), and no one within my reach is willing to run games that start at this point or shortly before, even one-shots.

[Roy]

Okay, your right it is stupid. For some reason I got it onto my head that the majority of the encounters were supposed to be just under the party's level. Not quite sure where.

Sorry about that.

Probably from this:

http://www.thealexandrian.net/creations ... esign.html

Wow. That's a Fail article. Mostly because they think routine encounters are slow and deadly.

[virgil]

I was under the impression that the people that likely take out the party are among the best that Team Evil has, and they're not going to devote themselves to guard duty on the party they just defeated. This means that the opposition is very much NOT as powerful as when they took out the party, because the actual dudes that K.O'd the party actually have other things to do. They HAVE to leave someone less capable than they to watch the party.

[Lago PARANOIA]

The real reason the people who take down the perps actually don't spend time on guard duty is because while Superman keeping an eye on Arkham Asylum and every supervillain prison in the world is do-able (if time-consuming) and would certainly increase crime, few people would be able to tolerate Superman: Jailer for very long.

[Orion]

Oh, having the party *actually* captured is as gamebreaking as a total party kill; both require a DM-fed Deus Ex Machina to get the party back in action.

However, if Team Monsters' GOAL is to capture, that means individual PCs who get taken out aren't actually dead. As long as the PCs win the fight, they can then recover their wounded.

Even if the enemies do escape with an unconscious PC, you can set up a ransom culture in which his gear is expected to come back with him.

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

I would like to point out that what enemies exist in the universe and what enemies are thrown at the PCs is essentially up to the DM. In the Star Trek Universe, the characters (except in alternate timelines and universes) very rarely get killed. However, at least one crew member gets captured nearly every episode which in D&D would equal death. I remember watching Voyager DVDs and noting 6 simultaneous episodes in which at least one crewmember was captured or incapacitated.

[Roy]

I was under the impression that the people that likely take out the party are among the best that Team Evil has, and they're not going to devote themselves to guard duty on the party they just defeated. This means that the opposition is very much NOT as powerful as when they took out the party, because the actual dudes that K.O'd the party actually have other things to do. They HAVE to leave someone less capable than they to watch the party.

So their best is wasting their time. Gotcha. And that isn't even necessarily, or likely true as chances are any sort of organization (and since we're assuming this sort of thing is even possible at all, they're organized) is introduced with low level operations and goes from there. In other words, you aren't meeting the top brass in any capacity at first. Because that's how organizations work, and they get used as campaign arc creators.

But in any case, since we're assuming a halfway competent prison the cells are meant to actually hold people with actual abilities. The party has no equipment, and no spells. Even if the guys watching them are weaker, are they really any better off or more likely to succeed in getting back to the actual plot?

Also, ransom cultures break down hard when your stuff is worth far more than you. So either you have to somehow justify them trading a 100 for a 1 proverbially speaking, have to charge such exorbitant amounts so as to be more than even their loot which then begs the question of 'who would pay that' or... Giant Frog. Those sorts of things only work when the person is more valuable than the tool.

[RandomCasualty2]

Also, ransom cultures break down hard when your stuff is worth far more than you. So either you have to somehow justify them trading a 100 for a 1 proverbially speaking, have to charge such exorbitant amounts so as to be more than even their loot which then begs the question of 'who would pay that' or... Giant Frog. Those sorts of things only work when the person is more valuable than the tool.

Well, the people are more valuable than the loot for the most part. Having a shitload of magic items is worthless if you have no one to effectively use them. A level 3 fighter with a +5 sword is still shit.

[Roy]

Also, ransom cultures break down hard when your stuff is worth far more than you. So either you have to somehow justify them trading a 100 for a 1 proverbially speaking, have to charge such exorbitant amounts so as to be more than even their loot which then begs the question of 'who would pay that' or... Giant Frog. Those sorts of things only work when the person is more valuable than the tool.

Well, the people are more valuable than the loot for the most part. Having a shitload of magic items is worthless if you have no one to effectively use them. A level 3 fighter with a +5 sword is still shit.

The point is why would they return a guy with a +5 sword for anything less than what they could get for the +5 sword + a bit? Now expand that to all his gear. With Star Trek or whatever the main value is in getting your crew back. Because equipment does not have a significant value. Here, even if you do get the guy back without the sword, he's basically a civilian now, so for all practical purposes he's out of the game. Sure, it's great he's not sitting in jail now, but the player is still probably wishing you just made the enemy kill his character so he could go out with a bang.

Since this thread REALLY doesn't need to devolve into Elennsar brand Fail, where the ransom thing gets batted around can we go back to mocking other wrong things?

[RandomCasualty2]

The point is why would they return a guy with a +5 sword for anything less than what they could get for the +5 sword + a bit? Now expand that to all his gear. With Star Trek or whatever the main value is in getting your crew back. Because equipment does not have a significant value. Here, even if you do get the guy back without the sword, he's basically a civilian now, so for all practical purposes he's out of the game. Sure, it's great he's not sitting in jail now, but the player is still probably wishing you just made the enemy kill his character so he could go out with a bang.

Yeah, from a player's metagame standpoint it totally sucks. But that's because the player could just go make a new character.

From a logical standpoint within the world however, ransom makes sense. A single high cleric or wizard is worth more than his gear.

[MartinHarper]

If the players lose their magical bling, isn't that just an excuse to put loads of magical bling into the next dungeon/caravan/wageslip?

[Roy]

If the players lose their magical bling, isn't that just an excuse to put loads of magical bling into the next dungeon/caravan/wageslip?

Only if you consider making whole scenes for the purpose of power tripping douchebaggery and yanking the players around a good idea. And if you do, well that's a self correcting problem.

See, even if a group keeps getting TPKed over and over, that is at most the enemies bitchslapping them for great justice. Of course it's more likely the TPK happens once, then the other group just stays the fuck away from there. But anyways, something like that is the whole fucking world abusing them like a dog. And while making powerful enemies in the world that annihilate you is one thing, becoming the DM's fucktoy is quite another. One is purely an in game obstacle, and you can just avoid that group. The other requires the Folding Chair of Salvation IRL. Yes, we get it. You're the DM, and you can pull a RFED anytime. Shut up about it.

Speaking purely in world, if the single high cleric or wizard died and got revived, he'd lose less than being captured and returned sans gear. The latter forces retirement. The former, not necessarily.