Convincing 4th Edition players to consider 5th Edition

D'karr · Aug 27, 2012

Tony Vargas said:
I agree. An obvious weak-spot should be exploitable, but it shouldn't be absolute. In the d20 system, I'd say that swings of up to 5 in either direction are about the limit. So a monster might have 5-higher than baseline in one defense, and 5 lower in it's worst, for instance, and still be usable.

Instead of giving the base monster the weakness, give the DM information to make that call. The +2 /-2 (DM's best friend) can be adjusted to size for whatever situation the DM prefers.

In the case of the Grell, as an example, the DM could have assigned a bonus +2, but given a bonus +4 if attacking from above.

These type of things are better, IMO, when given to the DM as guidelines for running all sorts of situations. Instead of "hardcoding" it to only the situation with one creature by putting it in the stat block. YMMV.

Tony Vargas · Aug 27, 2012

D'karr said:
Instead of giving the base monster the weakness, give the DM information to make that call. The +2 /-2 (DM's best friend) can be adjusted to size for whatever situation the DM prefers.

In the case of the Grell, as an example, the DM could have assigned a bonus +2, but given a bonus +4 if attacking from above.

A +2 situational modifier that's always there isn't really situational. I mean, a Grell is prettymuch committed to being a floating brain for the rest of its life. And, if it's supposed to be a floating brain that's a challenge to a lot of adventurers with big choppy weapons, it can't afford to be quite as vulnerable as you'd expect an exposed brain to be...

..maybe it instinctively uses TK to deflect attacks, for instance?

D'karr · Aug 27, 2012

Tony Vargas said:
A +2 situational modifier that's always there isn't really situational. I mean, a Grell is prettymuch committed to being a floating brain for the rest of its life. And, if it's supposed to be a floating brain that's a challenge to a lot of adventurers with big choppy weapons, it can't afford to be quite as vulnerable as you'd expect an exposed brain to be...

..maybe it instinctively uses TK to deflect attacks, for instance?

My point is that it's not always there. (I'm unsure what TK stands for so I can't comment on that.)

The base assumption of the rules is that the creature is doing its best to defend itself. The defenses account for this.

In this particular case the player "discovered" a weakness, and the DM decided to "roll with it." The DM could have easily said, "no, there is no weakness." The DM made a value judgement of what would have been fun at that moment and decided to go with it. This situation warranted it in the DM's view.

-

Tony Vargas · Aug 27, 2012

D'karr said:
In this particular case the player "discovered" a weakness, and the DM decided to "roll with it." -

Maybe this is just a particularly silly example. The player discovered that the Grell was a giant floating brain, so shot it in the brain instead of ... what? it's beak?

If the Grell's brain is really just an exposed brain, logically, it'd be very vulnerable to attack, and have a really low AC. But, a monster of that level with that low an AC wouldn't be viable. So give it a level-appropriate AC. Either provide a rationale or let the DM come up with one if it matters to him: Is it a giant, floating, /psionic/ brain? Maybe it instinctively uses telekinesis to deflect attacks, giving it a strong defense against weapon attacks. Is it a giant, floating, brain made of non-terrene matter from beyond space and time? Maybe it's improbably resilient in spite of it's brain-like appearance?

LostSoul · Aug 27, 2012

D'karr said:
In this particular case the player "discovered" a weakness, and the DM decided to "roll with it." The DM could have easily said, "no, there is no weakness." The DM made a value judgement of what would have been fun at that moment and decided to go with it. This situation warranted it in the DM's view.

Kind of... I have a table that lists the different defences in game-world terms. I looked at its fleshy brain-bits and figured: AC 11.

(Which was a good choice at the time because it showed me that my system is broken at points. Two reasons why it's broken: there's only one real choice in an encounter with a grell (shoot it in the brains), and because the risk - reward ratio is skewed.)

Tony Vargas said:
Maybe this is just a particularly silly example. The player discovered that the Grell was a giant floating brain, so shot it in the brain instead of ... what? it's beak?

Funny you should mention that... At one point it was face-to-beak with the dragonborn fighter, who tried to hack its beak off. He couldn't reach its brain because he was pinned inside an elevator. Its beak was AC 20-something.

*

I think the problems with my approach are based on the way 4E handles colour - explained in one of my posts above - and how I'm pushing back against that. A more elegant solution would be to use modifiers, as you guys have suggested, with little variation in level-based defences.

Anyway. How the colour is translated into mechanics and how that feeds into the reward system is pretty interesting.

pemerton · Aug 29, 2012

LostSoul said:
I've come to believe that 4E might be stronger without those absolute DCs in the game - along with a lot of text on why it's built that way, how to set your own colour for certain DCs, and how that colour relates to Paragon Paths and Epic Destinies.

I agree completely with this. The absolute DCs are a needless distraction, with one exception - incombat jumping distance probably needs to be codified in some sort of way, in order to work in conjunction with teleport and flight powers.

The bit about PPs and EDs is something I've been saying for a while now. In my own game I handle this through ad hoc modifiers (probably too small for your taste). For example, when the warpriest of Moradin was overseeing the reforging of Whelm into Overwhelm, and the dwarven artisans were getting anxious that the process would release too much untameable magic energy, he used Diplomacy to reassure them. I gave a +2 bonus to the Diplomacy check because the PC, given who he was and what he had recently achieved, naturally commands a lot of authority among the dwarven artisans.

Emerikol · Aug 30, 2012

@OP
I haven't read this entire thread just the op's opening entry.

It seems to me that you want a second edition of fourth edition. Whereas the other side wants a fourth edition of the first three editions.

It is a big challenge. I find even the few places they've made "concessions" to the 4e design philosophy annoying. Here is hoping for modularity.

Yes I do disagree with some of your judgments and characterizations but I don't doubt you feel that way. I just don't see how to get what you want without the game essentially being a minor variation of 4e. And I think that would do worse than 4e did because a lot of us bought 4e but wouldn't buy 4.5e.

Dornam · Aug 31, 2012

+1 to Emerikol

I don't play game systems, I play adventures, and while 4e might give me a very good game system, it just doesn't give me very good adventures.

However I sympathize with the OP because the ones that don't like 4e have Pathfinder and, so it seems, 5e. What do the ones that love 4e have?

AbdulAlhazred · Aug 31, 2012

LostSoul said:
I think the problems with my approach are based on the way 4E handles colour - explained in one of my posts above - and how I'm pushing back against that. A more elegant solution would be to use modifiers, as you guys have suggested, with little variation in level-based defences.

Anyway. How the colour is translated into mechanics and how that feeds into the reward system is pretty interesting.

I think people get way the heck too wrapped up in 'RPG as intellectual exercise'. Don't overthink it. That's what kills the fun.

Fundamentally 4e's approach works pretty well, but it isn't designed to support grossly mismatched situations. If you try to touch the ponderous monster that is 10 levels above your level you will probably still have a hard time, even when its REF is set to be a weak point to a guy of equal level. You can see this as a weak point, but at least 4e stuck its weak points away in closets like "taking on something you cannot hope to overcome" instead of having them right square stuck in the middle of the most common aspects of play that come up every session like some editions do.

It just isn't generally worth trying to eliminate those issues. You can only do it by recreating other worse and more constant issues. This is why all I can do is roll my eyes at the 5e playtest. Ugh, all of yesteryear's mistakes recapitulated, how droll...

keterys · Aug 31, 2012

4E actually did say "Hey, don't use things so far out of their level range" (ie, 10 levels) - so really you'd take your +10 lvl standard grell and make it a lvl + 1 solo, and call it a day.

Convincing 4th Edition players to consider 5th Edition

D'karr

Adventurer

Tony Vargas

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D'karr

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Tony Vargas

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LostSoul

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pemerton

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Emerikol

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Dornam

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AbdulAlhazred

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keterys

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