D&D General Explain Bounded Accuracy to Me (As if I Was Five)

[Crimson Longinus]

The point of the escalating numbers is to generate play that unfolds through the three tiers so as to yield "the story of D&D">

That's not really about the numbers. Also, if it is, then why use altering monster stats to undermine those numbers?

You could take out all the half-level bonuses to attack and defences and the game would, mechanically, play the same but it wouldn't yield the same story. And elements of the fiction would stop making sense - eg why is my demigod still finding a single giant a threat?

But the fiction is not tied to the numbers, as the numbers get changed arbitrarily anyway. There is no fixed giant stats, as it could be solo giant with low AC and attack bonus or a minion giant with high AC and attack bonus. You don't have a static benchmark to compare the numbers to.

Yes, one could use escalating numbers to show that higher level creatures completely outclass lower level ones, but 4e doesn't do that as enemies are always level appropriate and their stats get changed so that things are hittable.

 

[TheSword]

As I've said more than once, 5e overall has a culture of play antagonistic to the very idea of game design being a tool that can be made better. Pockets of resistance to that notion do exist, some of them focused on 3PP options. But by and large there is a pretty committed belief that, because the rules cannot be perfect, because they cannot prevent abuse, because they cannot guarantee improvement, because they aren't custom-tailored to every single individual case, there's nothing to be gained from even trying.

Wait a minute, isn’t there a new official revision coming out in a few months that improves upon the base 2014 rules? I think it’s called OD&D or 2024e or some such?

Not to mention Tashas and Xanathars providing new ways of doing things. A slower speed of change doesn’t mean change isn’t happening.

Not sure how you’ve reached the conclusion that 5e culture is against improvement.

 

[Charlaquin]

That's not really about the numbers. Also, if it is, then why use altering monster stats to undermine those numbers?

I mean, it kind of is. 5e’s math paints a picture of a universe in which even the mightiest swordsman the world has ever seen can be overwhelmed by a swarm of untrained peasants. 4e’s math paints a picture of a universe in which, with enough training, you can become so powerful that no mere mortal poses any threat to you (unless they have trained just as extensively).

It’s true that if you want to pit an Epic-tier party against goblins under the 4e paradigm, all you need is stat blocks for Epic-tier goblins. But Epic-tier goblins represent something very different than Heroic-tier goblins do. The number of them you fight at a time remains roughly the same, but the goblins themselves become stronger, in contrast to 5e where the goblins remain the same, but you can handle more of them at once.

A 4e campaign where you fight nothing but goblins from 1st level to 30th has you graduating from fighting the nameless hordes that dwell beneath the Sawtooth Mountains, to fighting Gargaroth the Elf-Slayer and his personal entourage of peerless goblin warriors, to fighting the unholy legions of Maglubiet, hand-chosen from among history’s greatest goblin warlords to ascend to her side. A 5e campaign where you fight nothing but goblins from 1st to 20th level has you graduating from fighting four or five goblins, to fighting six or seven goblins, to fighting ten to twelve goblins, yo fighting twenty to thirty goblins. Neither story is strictly better or worse, but they are very different.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I mean, it kind of is. 5e’s math paints a picture of a universe in which even the mightiest swordsman the world has ever seen can be overwhelmed by a swarm of untrained peasants. 4e’s math paints a picture of a universe in which, with enough training, you can become so powerful that no mere mortal poses any threat to you (unless they have trained just as extensively).

It’s true that if you want to pit an Epic-tier party against goblins under the 4e paradigm, all you need is stat blocks for Epic-tier goblins. But Epic-tier goblins represent something very different than Heroic-tier goblins do. The number of them you fight at a time remains roughly the same, but the goblins themselves become stronger, in contrast to 5e where the goblins remain the same, but you can handle more of them at once.

A 4e campaign where you fight nothing but goblins from 1st level to 30th has you graduating from fighting the nameless hordes that dwell beneath the Sawtooth Mountains, to fighting Gargaroth the Elf-Slayer and his personal entourage of peerless goblin warriors, to fighting the unholy legions of Maglubiet, hand-chosen from among history’s greatest goblin warlords to ascend to her side. A 5e campaign where you fight goblins from 1st to 20th level has you graduating from fighting one or two goblins, to fighting six or seven goblins, to fighting a few dozen goblins, but they’re all the same goblins. Neither story is strictly better or worse, but they are very different.

Which would be fine. Except why undermine it by altering monster stats then? How 4e instructs to be played is that once monster would no longer be threat to you due the number discrepancy, you replace it a lower they (from solo to elite to normal to minion) version, which represent similar monster, but can hit and damage you. It just feels confused.

I have no objection to escalating stats making higher creatures unhittable, if that's what is wanted, but 4e doesn't commit to that, it uses additional elements to undermine it, so having it it in the first place seems pointless.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Which would be fine. Except why undermine it by altering monster stats then? How 4e instructs to be played is that once monster would no longer be threat to you due the number discrepancy, you replace it a lower they (from solo to elite to normal to minion) version, which represent similar monster, but can hit and damage you. It just feels confused.

I have no objection to escalating stats making higher creatures unhittable, if that's what is wanted, but 4e doesn't commit to that, it uses additional elements to undermine it, so having it it in the first place seems pointless.

That just has to do with people wanting to tell the other kind of story within 4e's system. It could do BOTH - if you designed it that way. For example, I would often create a "goblin horde" using the 4e swarm rules, that might just as well have the stats of a higher-level elite or even solo (I doubt I ever built it as a solo) so that I might be able to overwhelm a PC with thematic numbers (even if mechanically it was represented by a single monster).

Heck, I still do that in 5e occasionally, if only because I don't want to have to run more than 4-6 monsters in an encounter. IMO, "swarm" rules is the best way for D&D (whatever edition) to simulate mass-combat. (Something, you'll note, that it tends to fail to do "officially" in spite of a solution being right there in front of its nose).

 

[ezo]

I've never played or even seen 4E in play, but it seems to me to suffer the same problem most D&D games have IMO:

You go through a region at low levels, finding goblins, wolves, etc. Later on you return to the same region only now to find it plagued by giants and lycanthropes and such. Still later on, the region is overrun by dragons, beholders, and liches.

The world should not "change" simply because the PCs become higher levels.

So, as I understand it, at higher levels in 4E you can fight the same monsters you did at lower levels, but now they are simply "more powerful" versions of the same things? You go from orc, to orc warrior, to orc marauder, to orc war chief, or orc warlord and orc elite rampagers...

All of those different sorts of orcs should already exist, and their rarity determined by things other than the PCs' levels.

 

[Charlaquin]

Which would be fine. Except why undermine it by altering monster stats then? How 4e instructs to be played is that once monster would no longer be threat to you due the number discrepancy, you replace it a lower they (from solo to elite to normal to minion) version, which represent similar monster, but can hit and damage you. It just feels confused.

Did… did you skip over the part about the higher-level version of a monster representing something different? That was like 3/4 of my post.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I've never played or even seen 4E in play, but it seems to me to suffer the same problem most D&D games have IMO:

You go through a region at low levels, finding goblins, wolves, etc. Later on you return to the same region only now to find it plagued by giants and lycanthropes and such. Still later on, the region is overrun by dragons, beholders, and liches.

It would be extremely weird (and IMO, very boring) to have all those things take place in the same location. No. You usually move on at higher levels to more dangerous places to find those more dangerous monsters.

The world should not "change" simply because the PCs become higher levels.

Yeah, it doesn't. You go places. This is one of the meta-reasons that the planes exist, though you don't have to go there, it could be a fantastic location on the material plane.

So, as I understand it, at higher levels in 4E you can fight the same monsters you did at lower levels, but now they are simply "more powerful" versions of the same things? You go from orc, to orc warrior, to orc marauder, to orc war chief, or orc warlord and orc elite rampagers...

I mean, yeah, you could, if that's the story being told. It's not necessarily the standard, though. They're not really "the same monsters", though. They, like YOU, are champion versions of their species.

All of those different sorts of orcs should already exist, and their rarity determined by things other than the PCs' levels.

Yeah, they do. That's the point.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Did… did you skip over the part about the higher-level version of a monster representing something different? That was like 3/4 of my post.

They usually don't. Minion ogre is just the same ogre than normal one, but for higher level characters.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

They usually don't. Minion ogre is just the same ogre than normal one, but for higher level characters.

That's one way to look at them, sure. The game mechanically represents the equivalent creature in a mechanically different way in order to make it an encounter that is fun and dynamic to play (when done well).

They're not the same individual ogre, though - I mean, the game is already "weird" in that every "normal" ogre is exactly the same. I'm not sure why representing the same-ish creature mechanically differently should be all that more "weird".