How I Broke Up With Item Dependence and Bad Math

[Tequila Sunrise]

These were my two issues:

1. I like my players to be able to use improvised and secondary weapons, but at high levels they need their first-rate weapon’s enhancement bonus to have a decent chance to hit. I also like to be able to drop my players fun loot whenever it’s dramatically appropriate, and not have to worry about treasure parcels or the enhancement bonuses they need for level-appropriate challenges.

2. I don’t like how monster stats scale faster than PC stats. Over the course of 30 levels, monsters gain about 29 bonuses to attacks and defenses while PCs only gain about 25 bonuses. As a result, surviving at paragon and epic levels requires players to power game, have the right kind of leaders and focus a lot of attention on tactics. Some players don’t mind this, but I don’t like to play games where fine tuned tactics, warlords or power gaming are necessary.

Here’s how I broke up and cut my baggage loose:

1. Masterwork armor does not exist.

2. Weapon/Implement Expertise, and any future feats that grant a constant bonus to attack rolls or defenses, are not allowed.

3. At the third and seventh level of each tier (3, 7, etc.), PCs get a +1 enhancement bonus to weapon/implement attack rolls, weapon/implement damage rolls and all defenses. They also get a 1d6 critical die at these levels, which does not stack with the critical dice of any weapon or implement they might have.

4. At the first and fifth level of the paragon and epic tiers (11th, 15th, etc.), PCs get an extra +1 level bonus to all attack rolls and all defenses. When a character wears heavy armor, this bonus doubles for the purpose of AC.

And I haven’t looked back since:

1. I can now drop loot whenever I want. If I want to run a low-wealth campaign, or if my campaign has a dry spell, I don’t have to rebalance monsters. Characters can now hope to hit with secondary and improvised weapons. It’s about the characters, not their bling.

2. PC stats now increase at a mostly consistent +1 per level, losing at most two relative points at certain levels. Optimizers, player tacticians and warlords can get higher bonuses, but they’re not necessary for high level survival anymore--they just make the PCs more effective now. Because PCs hit more often, there’s less grind and swing-miss repetition. And if I need to tweak monsters to make them easier or harder for my players, I only need to lower or raise their stats by a flat amount, rather than having to scale the tweaks with level.

Comments

Simple fix to a big problem!

[fissionessence]

As I was reading the first half of your post, I was going to suggest pretty much what you wrote in the second half But . . .

I may have missed it, but where in your numbers did you compensate for pulling masterwork armor?

Also, It looks like the difference between magic weapons and non-magical improvised weapons is still there. The bonuses to hit apply to both those, and stack with magic weapons, right? So it's still a much lower chance to hit with, for example, a chair.

~

[Tequila Sunrise]

Originally Posted by fissionessence

I may have missed it, but where in your numbers did you compensate for pulling masterwork armor?

The bonuses that #4 grants make up for the lack of mw armor.

Originally Posted by fissionessence

Also, It looks like the difference between magic weapons and non-magical improvised weapons is still there. The bonuses to hit apply to both those, and stack with magic weapons, right? So it's still a much lower chance to hit with, for example, a chair.

The enhancement bonuses that #3 grants do not stack with weapon/implement enhancements, so at most a PC will have two more bonuses with his newest weapon/implement than with a chair. (Barring ability scores, of course, or the DM giving a 1st level PC a 30th level sword.) The #4 bonuses apply to all weapon/implement attacks, even if the weapon is a chair, so no difference there.

[Tequila Sunrise]

Originally Posted by fissionessence

I may have missed it, but where in your numbers did you compensate for pulling masterwork armor?

The bonuses that #4 grants make up for the lack of mw armor.

Originally Posted by fissionessence

Also, It looks like the difference between magic weapons and non-magical improvised weapons is still there. The bonuses to hit apply to both those, and stack with magic weapons, right? So it's still a much lower chance to hit with, for example, a chair.

The enhancement bonuses that #3 grants do not stack with weapon/implement enhancements, so at most a PC will have two more bonuses with his newest weapon/implement than with a chair. (Barring ability scores, of course, or the DM giving a 1st level PC a 30th level sword.) The #4 bonuses apply to all weapon/implement attacks, even if the weapon is a chair, so no difference there.

[Irda Ranger]

I thought about doing this for the exact same reasons you mentioned. I hate item dependence and love improvised weapons. Prior to 4E my game of choice was Iron Heroes.

However I decided instead to freeze Attacks and Defenses at 1st level (except for some feats) and bring down the Attacks and Defenses of monsters by 1/level. This preserves the usefulness of low level NPCs and monsters across all levels of the campaign, allows PCs of different levels to adventure together and keeps the PCs a bit more grounded in the campaign world. They're Heroic without being Superman-Heroic or Gods Among Men.

[Garthanos]

Originally Posted by Irda Ranger

I thought about doing this for the exact same reasons you mentioned. I hate item dependence and love improvised weapons. Prior to 4E my game of choice was Iron Heroes.

However I decided instead to freeze Attacks and Defenses at 1st level (except for some feats) and bring down the Attacks and Defenses of monsters by 1/level. This preserves the usefulness of low level NPCs and monsters across all levels of the campaign, allows PCs of different levels to adventure together and keeps the PCs a bit more grounded in the campaign world. They're Heroic without being Superman-Heroic or Gods Among Men.

Wow there is a lot of goals in there I like, in particular the allowing pc's of all levels to play together is on my list... since I re-read the lord of the rings, yeah back in the late seventies.

Are there incidental distortions felt... since damage dealing is now "the combat advancement" noting that damage goes up in [w] bounds, doesnt this make specific levels even more noticeably potent jumps in your game?

[Irda Ranger]

Originally Posted by Garthanos

since damage dealing is now "the combat advancement" noting that damage goes up in [w] bounds, doesnt this make specific levels even more noticeably potent jumps in your game?

A bit, but it's not too bad. Consider that:
1) You get more HP every level.
2) Skills and feats improve in some respect every other level.
3) You get new, higher-level powers fairly regularly.
4) (Another house rule is that magic items act if they're the same level you are, so they "level up" too, which means that ...) Your gear unlocks new abilities at independent intervals.

So while there's definitely a jump at 11th and 21st level (when most powers get a [W] bump) there's a lot of other stuff going on too that smooths it out.

But yeah, The Lord of the Rings is my favorite argument in favor of this approach. How else can you have a 20th level Wizard, a 10th level Ranger and Warlord, two 7th level Fighters and four 1st level halflings all adventuring together? That would just be flat-out impossible in RAW D&D. RAW D&D only really supports A-Team / Mission: Impossible scenarios where you've got a group of similarly-skilled individuals.


UPDATE EDIT: Actually, I'm trying to think of a good fantasy example where everyone's the same level and I'm blanking. Maybe they're all just copying LotR, but with the few exceptions where a couple 'kids' go off by themselves there's usually a mix of levels/experience.

[Tequila Sunrise]

Originally Posted by Irda Ranger

UPDATE EDIT: Actually, I'm trying to think of a good fantasy example where everyone's the same level and I'm blanking. Maybe they're all just copying LotR, but with the few exceptions where a couple 'kids' go off by themselves there's usually a mix of levels/experience.

LotR is my favorite story ever, and I can see your HRs working, but I'm having trouble imagining a group of players swallowing the style. Have you ever played in an rpg where the characters of different players were so vastly different in power? I know in earlier editions, a new character was supposed to start at level 1 even if the others were at level 20, but I don't know if DMs actually enforced that rule.

[Irda Ranger]

Originally Posted by Tequila Sunrise

LotR is my favorite story ever, and I can see your HRs working, but I'm having trouble imagining a group of players swallowing the style. Have you ever played in an rpg where the characters of different players were so vastly different in power?

No I've never actually had a Gandalf and a Pippin in the same party, but with 4E RAW even a 5-level difference would be really frustrating to deal with. That's not a problem now.

Honestly though 4E is so new I don't have a lot of (long term) playtest with this, so there just hasn't been an opportunity to answer questions like "Well, everyone's in the early 20's and Joe needs a character - what level should he be?"

When it comes up, ask me again.

[Garthanos]

Originally Posted by Irda Ranger

A bit, but it's not too bad. Consider that:
1) You get more HP every level.
2) Skills and feats improve in some respect every other level.
3) You get new, higher-level powers fairly regularly.

some of those new powers arent even better because they are higher level...but I guess that is arguably fixable.

Originally Posted by Irda Ranger

4) (Another house rule is that magic items act if they're the same level you are, so they "level up" too, which means that ...) Your gear unlocks new abilities at independent intervals.

I like it on some gear but not necessarily all. I do like that my cloak of hiding in shadows ... will eventually be the relic which lets me teleport between shadows and distract attackers with shadows enhancing my ac or enable me to become a shadow and intangible.
And discovering that eventually I didn't even need the cloak because I was the lord of shadows and it was a mere conjuration to molify my mortal incarnation.
However that eladrin made silvered dagger I had... doesn't necessarily become wolfsbane were-slayer able to change into a scimitar.
Do you have ways to let the player control this? IE the items they invest in become unlocked or awakened or revealed?

Originally Posted by Irda Ranger

So while there's definitely a jump at 11th and 21st level (when most powers get a [W] bump) there's a lot of other stuff going on too that smooths it out.

Since you did strip one of the things that was smoothing it out... so a bit of impact I expected.

[Irda Ranger]

Originally Posted by Garthanos

Do you have ways to let the player control this? IE the items they invest in become unlocked or awakened or revealed?

What I meant was that if you have a Dragonslayer Axe, it's a +1 axe while you're level 1 to 8, then becomes a +2 dragonslayer axe with the listed properties once you're level 9, and upgrades further as you reach levels 14, 19, 24 and 29. The items just follow the level progression given in the PHB.

If the item was a custom item that the PC was involved in the creation of then they'd have some control of what powers were in there, but the level the power becomes available at would be based on the guidelines in the rules.

[Draz]

Originally Posted by Irda Ranger

But yeah, The Lord of the Rings is my favorite argument in favor of this approach. How else can you have a 20th level Wizard, a 10th level Ranger and Warlord, two 7th level Fighters and four 1st level halflings all adventuring together? That would just be flat-out impossible in RAW D&D. RAW D&D only really supports A-Team / Mission: Impossible scenarios where you've got a group of similarly-skilled individuals.

This has become my favorite argument (well, maybe) in favor of E6-style D&D. A Level 20 Wizard and a Level 2 halfling rogue adventuring together isn't so ridiculous if the Level 20 Wizard is actually just Level 6 with 14 extra feats. (Still pretty wacked, but altering some other rules -- like giving Level 1 characters a half-decent amount of starting HP -- can fix it.)

UPDATE EDIT: Actually, I'm trying to think of a good fantasy example where everyone's the same level and I'm blanking. Maybe they're all just copying LotR, but with the few exceptions where a couple 'kids' go off by themselves there's usually a mix of levels/experience.

The Chronicles of Prydain come to mind -- there's a reason Gwydion (Level 6 ranger?) usually gets separated quickly from the Level 3-ish characters (Taran, Eilonwy, Gurgi, Fflewddur, Doli) when the action starts up!

[evilgenius8000]

Hey, this looks really good. A question, though: Do monsters made with the DMG's DM's toolkit work with this system, or is this meant for use with your monster creation rules? Thanks.

[corwyn77]

Here's a question for proponents of this HR or something similar.

I plan on giving everyone an 'enhancement' bonus of 1/3 their level - this covers item bonuses as well as the apparent discrepancy at higher levels between monsters and PCs so we'll see how that goes.

My question is how do you deal with the changes to the magic economy. Since they no longer 'need' a magic weapon/armour/whatever, do you reduce the cash the party gets? What if they want to buy an item with a specific property? What do you charge? If you leave the cost the same, those with no special weapon have a lot of excess cash to spend. If the cost is less, you need to reduce the amount of monetary rewards significantly.

[Garthanos]

Originally Posted by corwyn77

Here's a question for proponents of this HR or something similar.

I plan on giving everyone an 'enhancement' bonus of 1/3 their level - this covers item bonuses as well as the apparent discrepancy at higher levels between monsters and PCs so we'll see how that goes.

My question is how do you deal with the changes to the magic economy. Since they no longer 'need' a magic weapon/armour/whatever, do you reduce the cash the party gets? What if they want to buy an item with a specific property? What do you charge? If you leave the cost the same, those with no special weapon have a lot of excess cash to spend. If the cost is less, you need to reduce the amount of monetary rewards significantly.

This is something I want to figure out as well.. I mean I need to figure out how to make the magic economy of D&D fit my world...
do you have people buying there magic items? sure its possible or is it also possible most of their magic is discovered in ancient ruins and traded in for the ones they really want or bartering a big ones for stake in some land....
I've always liked a silver economy instead of one so heavily awash in gold... my world has enough disaster zones.. caused by amok magic... magic items are more popular with pcs and a narrow set of npc's who want to take over the world... magical devices that can give someone an edge without being obvious are also in demand.