General RPG DiscussionDiscussion of all RPGs and non-system-specific topics. DM/GM/player issues, settings, etc. Rules discussion belongs in one the forums below.
My first inclination was to say no, but then I figured what the hell; it would turn a vaguely useful permanent magic item into a very useful one-adventure magic item, it was creative, and it made complete sense in an adventure that requires stealth. Reducing movement by one square made the decision into something that wasn't a no-brainer.
Now see, you don't really make a big deal out of this, but this is, IMHO, one of the most important DM-ings lessons I think I've taken away from you, over the years. Finding ways to say 'Yes' to the players instead of saying 'No'. It's not always easy, but it usually is very rewarding. One of the hardest things for me to master as a DM is learning how to let go a little and find a way to let the players guide the ship in ways I might not have expected. That doesn't work for everyone, but it did for me and I KNOW it works for you. Hell, I've seen that first hand.
I am also thrilled to hear how much fun you guys are having. We enjoyed the heck out of using KotS for our 4e dry-run, but running a campaign with it had me slightly concerned, because I haven't DM-ed it, yet. It's nice to hear that the game remains the game, essentially.
__________________ "I'd say it's more appropriate to say that videogames are RPG-ish, wouldn't you?"
or our older WizarDru's Story Hour? You Should.
I ain't linking to Piratecat's story hour...no sir, I just won't do it. He can just get the next half-million reads on his own.
Did I mention that I have a Livejournal? It's possible that I have.
...but running a campaign with it had me slightly concerned, because I haven't DM-ed it, yet. It's nice to hear that the game remains the game, essentially.
So far my initial concerns aren't justified. There is just as much roleplaying, just as much behind-the-scenes maneuvering, and just as much character interaction -- with far easier DM prep, faster and more tactically rich combat (now that the learning curve for each player's powers is diminishing), and a longer adventuring day. Yeah, I'm having a blast, enough that I'm starting a second campaign in three weeks for different players.
We had some discussion about the healing potion mechanics last night. It struck people as odd that the healing potion uses a surge, and that it effectively stopped working after you ran out of surges. It also bothers Blackjack that his healing skill wasn't appreciably useful outside of combat. He did use it with great effect when Logan was having his head munched on, though, darting in to give him a free surge mid-combat.
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It also bothers Blackjack that his healing skill wasn't appreciably useful outside of combat.
It seems a little silly to me, at least, that the Heal skill only benefits the healing of wounds in mid-combat. (And even then, it just makes the healing faster, not stronger.) Once the combat is over, having someone with a high Heal skill gives you absolutely no benefit at all.
It's a consequence of 4e's more cinematic approach to healing (e.g. "a good night's sleep heals all injuries"), really.
It doesn't make me regret my character concept, mind you, and once the combat was over, I still spent time checking in with all the injured parties and applying salves and bandages and the like, even though doing so gave no tangible in-game benefits.
Now see, you don't really make a big deal out of this, but this is, IMHO, one of the most important DM-ings lessons I think I've taken away from you, over the years. Finding ways to say 'Yes' to the players instead of saying 'No'.
I consider it so iconic a piece of GMing advice that our group just calls that "The Piratecat Rule". So do lots of the people I see at the Game Days and GenCon.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackjack
It seems a little silly to me, at least, that the Heal skill only benefits the healing of wounds in mid-combat. (And even then, it just makes the healing faster, not stronger.) Once the combat is over, having someone with a high Heal skill gives you absolutely no benefit at all.
It's a consequence of 4e's more cinematic approach to healing (e.g. "a good night's sleep heals all injuries"), really.
It doesn't make me regret my character concept, mind you, and once the combat was over, I still spent time checking in with all the injured parties and applying salves and bandages and the like, even though doing so gave no tangible in-game benefits.
I have a houserule that addresses both of these issues (being fully healed after an extended rest and making Heal useful outside combat). I can post about it if you're interested. Or possibly Piratecat saw the thread I had about it at CM.
It also bothers Blackjack that his healing skill wasn't appreciably useful outside of combat. He did use it with great effect when Logan was having his head munched on, though, darting in to give him a free surge mid-combat.
Considering that leaders would probably be able to use their inspiring doo-dads every 5 minutes out of combat (in the 'expend healing surges to heal yourself up' phase) in order to give added value to the healing surges, It would seem reasonable that healing skill could be used in the same way.
A simple solution which doesn't reward higher skill levels much would be
Quote:
Heal: You can use this skill to 'aid another' who is using healing surges after an encounter to heal up. If you succeed at the DC10 'aid another' check, they get +2 added to their healing surge value.
This would give a small but nice mechanical benefit to having a competent healer around.
It might be possible to do a version which scales with level better by taking a leaf from DMG p42 - set the DC and the bonus hit points recovered according to party level. I'd probably use 'moderate' DC and Normal/low damage expression.
So at 1st-3rd level a DC15 Heal check would result in 1d6+3 bonus hit points recovered by the treated persons healing surge - similar to the clerics healing word bonus.
Just some thoughts on the issue.
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I have a houserule that addresses both of these issues (being fully healed after an extended rest and making Heal useful outside combat). I can post about it if you're interested.
I really like Plane Sailing's ideas, but would you please post your house rule here as well, Rel?
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DC 10 seems awfully low, though. Everyone will be able to beat that, a competent healer will not even need to roll.
Also, it doesn't scale with level.
Maybe something like this would be nice...
a Heal Check (once for each set of injuries, i.e. only once after an encounter) heals the check result minus 20 hit points (maximum of the patient's healing surge value) to the patient. Takes 1 minute and requires a healer's kit, which gets used up over time (to add some cost to this at least).
Bye
Thanee
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Sagiro, Pkitty, one of the most commonly cited things people want 'fixed' in 4e (in another current thread) is to make combat not take so long. What are you thoughts on the speed of combat? How long does a typical combat take you guys?
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Ok, so here's the gist of it: It's possible for the PC's to take "Wounds" that cause some sort of incapacitation. These can range from the very small (broken finger that causes -1 to hit or AC from a weapon or shield in that hand) to the fairly nasty (you're in a coma and unconscious). After an Extended Rest you get a Saving Throw to recover from such a wound. Successful Heal checks (based on level-appropriate DCs because tougher monsters inflict tougher wounds) give a bonus to this roll. There are also a couple Rituals that give bonuses to the Save or heal these conditions outright.
The question obviously arises "When do the PC's take such wounds?" I've come up with two possibilities, of which I'll probably pick one or the other when I go to run my campaign. Either on a Critical Hit OR when a PC fails a Death Save after falling below zero HP.
If I do the Critical Hit thing, I plan to let the PC's spend a Healing Surge to avoid taking the Wound. This represents the ability to turn what would have been a nasty hit into something not so bad (merely the loss of HP).
Anyway, obviously this adds a layer of complexity to the game but the chart that I'm working on for the wounds is fairly brief. And the wounds themselves are designed to impose one condition that should be fairly easy to track. The benefit that comes at the cost of this added complexity is that the PC's are not necessarily "good as new" the morning after the big fight with the dragon. It also adds more need for the Heal skill and Rituals, which makes investment in those skills meaningful and worthwhile for those PC's.
All of that said, something like Thanee's idea above holds a lot of appeal in terms of simplicity. But if I were going to implement that then I would definitely say that Healing Surges regenerate during an Extended Rest but Hit Points do not.
I've thought about a really simple way to handle wounds:
Definition: Wound - the character has taken an injury severe enough that it will take time to heal. A character with a Wound has his maximum healing surge rating reduced by 1 per wound. If the character is at full healing surges when he takes a Wound, he loses one healing surge.
At the end of each day, he may make an Endurance or Heal check to recover from the Wound, with a DC equal to 18 + 1/2 the character's level. Another character may also make a Heal check, substituting it for the Wounded PC's Endurance or Heal if it is higher. A character can only roll a Heal check for Wounds per day per tier, whether they use it on themselves or others.
If a character is reduced to 0 healing surges by Wounds, they slip unconcious until they have at least 1 healing surge.
Aquiring Wounds - If a player is bloodied during a fight, then after the fight they make a saving throw. If it fails, they take a Wound. If a character is dropped(0 hp or less), they take a Wound automatically. A PC can't take more than 1 Wound per encounter.
Think I'm going to implement it in my 4e game. Simple to track, wounds persist, sometimes for a while, hindering the characters enough to make them worth watching without requiring tracking of additional penalties.
Also makes the Heal and Endurance skills useful to invaluable...
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Last edited by Iron Sky; 1st November 2008 at 11:40 PM..
Ari's Advanced Players Guide has a nice system for long term wounds using the disease track. It is definately worth looking at if you want to add a wounds to your campaign without adding a new subsystem.
Sagiro, Pkitty, one of the most commonly cited things people want 'fixed' in 4e (in another current thread) is to make combat not take so long. What are you thoughts on the speed of combat? How long does a typical combat take you guys?
So far it seems fine, though that may be a function of our low level.
The first combat of last game, which involved 5 PC's and 8 or 9 enemies, took (I think) about an hour, maybe less. That felt snappy-quick to me, and the pacing felt fine.
The complaints I've read involve fights against enemies with lots of hit points, and I don't think we've faced an Elite monster yet, let alone a Solo. So I don't think we've yet had the kind of combat that folks are griping about. I'll let you know if I think things slow down too much as we progress.
So far it seems fine, though that may be a function of our low level.
I admit, I'm waiting to see how it plays out for you guys. When we did our six or seven sessions, we felt that combat was, as you say, 'snappy'. We managed to make it to 3rd level with a group of 5, involving combats with upwards of 15 enemies at one point. At it's worst, it didn't feel anywheres near as slow as combat sometimes could in 3e. I'm sure that higher levels will feature some degree of slowdown, but I found more of our slowness in the first session or so was due to the unfamiliarity of the system, not the system itself.
__________________ "I'd say it's more appropriate to say that videogames are RPG-ish, wouldn't you?"
or our older WizarDru's Story Hour? You Should.
I ain't linking to Piratecat's story hour...no sir, I just won't do it. He can just get the next half-million reads on his own.
Did I mention that I have a Livejournal? It's possible that I have.
I haven't artificially reduced any monster's hit points, and combat has felt really fast. Of course, we have a jillion strikers and we're coming from epic-level 3.5, so it's bound to be quicker at this point. The complaint I've heard is that some fights become a "I know we'll win in 40 minutes" situation, so I'm keeping an eye open for that.
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Currently editing the 4e War of the Burning Sky adventure path. Support EN Publishing, get excellent modules!
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