Did WotC underestimate the Paizo effect on 4E?

[JRRNeiklot]

You realize that failing the first two saves actually DOES do something to your character, right? It's not just giving you two extra saves - each time you fail those there's a penalty. So in a paralysis example, first you are Slowed, then Immobilized, and then turned to stone.

Again, it amuses me that when I talk about 3e it comes from literally years of experience, and when so many talk about 4e it comes from the experience of hearing about something you think was in the book you haven't read.

I am well aware that failing the first save slows you. No one cares. It's a minor annoyance. The second save actually matters a bit, but it requires failing two saves. Not very likely to happen and on the rare occassions it does, it still doesn't matter. There's no penalty, other than a bathroom break. Only on the third save does the player actually care, other than being mildly annoyed. There's no excitement until the 3rd save.

I have read the book several times. I don't know it verbatim, but I know enough that I judge it by it's content rather than it's logo.

 

[Odhanan]

In an SoD, there is no suspense. There is "You are attacked roll your save welp that's it." It is surprise. It's a sudden "Oh no!" followed by "Welp that's it!" You have yet to comment on this.

What you do not seem to be getting is that many people who like save-or-die do not look at the game rule on its own, but consider the circumstances where it is used, and how it is used, in the game world, as part and parcel of the SoD process.

In other words, the rules are not the game, the game is not the rules.

What matters in a SoD is the way it comes into play. What matters is not that you roll, what matters in the game is IF you roll, how you come to the point where you deal with the potential of a SoD. For this, the players must be aware of the presence of lethal elements in the game setting. As a DM, you basically present the players with clues of what's awaiting them down the middle corridor where the SoD trap is. They might have found the scribbling of a monk talking about the horror down the corridor. They might see some people with their faces half melted against the wall of the corridor.

All these elements being designed as clues to allow the players to make meaningful choices as to the manner in which they want to proceed through their exploration of the dungeon. SoD is effective when it comes into play with the players being aware of its existence. For example, they might know that the shortest path to stop Lord Thormul to escape the dungeon is the middle corridor with it's SoD melting trap, while the corridors to the left and right lead to other types of obstacles, if any. They have a choice before them to choose different paths to the same goal, and they can manage the risks they are taking, including taking the middle path and risking instant death.

Same thing about creatures with SoD effects. In the best scenarios, players become aware of the presence of such threatening creatures ahead, and have choices to confront, avoid, parley, etc etc with such creatures to avoid the direct confrontation with SoD effects. Of course, they can still choose to fight the creatures in question, but this means they are making a choice to confront potential SoD effects.

What matters is the circumstances that surround the rule, not the rule itself.

I personally call this "good DMing."

 

[BryonD]

I personally call this "good DMing."

You are correct. But I think the issue is even more fundamental.
If someone doesn't get the point, they can never be good, or bad, at DMing that idea. A bad DM can improve.

 

[Odhanan]

You are correct. But I think the issue is even more fundamental.
If someone doesn't get the point, they can never be good, or bad, at DMing that idea. A bad DM can improve.

I don't think anybody's doomed to play role-playing games just one way, with no chance to ever grasp how someone else might run a different game using different assumptions.

I'm sure there are people out there who are running, say, both First Edition AD&D, and 4th edition D&D, and adapt their DMing style according to the game's basic assumptions and, most importantly, the expectations of the people they play with. I think adaptation is actually a sign of good DMing skills in action. Just like you would adapt to different in-game situations at the drop of a hat, I guess an adaptable DM can and will gear his particular DMing towards the most appropriate fit for the game and people he's playing with.

I see different editions of the game as just as many tools in my DM toolbox. I run a game based on what the players and I want out of the game we play. Sometimes people will want a ginormous rules kit with which to model anything in the game world based on the same basic premises, in which case I might use, say, 3rd edition D&D, other times people will want structure and tactical actions contained within the rules themselves, in which case I might run Essentials D&D, or they will want the simplest possible rules with us making up our version of the game as we go, in which case I'd probably use OD&D (1974).

What I do not accept in Cirno's premise is that his take on save-or-die is the be-all, end-all of the concept, and therefore, from his point of view, it's bad, the end, period. Well, no. His take is not the only take on the topic of SoD one might have, as exemplified by you and I and everyone who says here "yes, I actually do like SoD in my games."

 

[BryonD]

I don't think anybody's doomed to play role-playing games just one way, with no chance to ever grasp how someone else might run a different game using different assumptions.

Oh, I agree. But there also comes a point when you have to realize that not everyone is going to pursue that chance.

I have no argument whatsoever with different preferences or tastes. But when you are told that your own taste doesn't exist and then explain it twice, only to get the same misrepresentation thrown back at you each time, that is when you realize that you already went around the block one time too many and it is time to move on.

 

[Odhanan]

I have to agree. *nod*

 

[Kafen]

Or, to quote Hitchcock, true tension is seeing the bomb under the table.

You are talking about the guy that suggests giving the audience pleasure of the sort they get from waking up to a nightmare. Somehow, the idea of three saving throws to avoid death does not fit anything to do with Hitchcock's style if you ask me. Not being mean, I just do not see 4e death standards being related to the style you see in his movies. You get too many chances to live for it to be Hitchcock.

"Give them pleasure, the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare." - Alfred Hitchcock

EDIT: I suppose that a really good GM could convince a player that three saves is a tense moment, but I suspect it is a tough sell for most of us as GMs. "You are almost dead" three times in a row does not seem to have much bite to it however you phrase it...speaking for myself.

 

[Hussar]

For those who think that SSSoD has no dramatic tension, I would point back to the baseball example used above.

Baseball uses 3 strikes and you're out. Would baseball be more or less tense if it used one strike and you're out?

I'd say it would be a lot less tense very quickly. And a whole lot shorter game (which might not be a bad thing). But, the increasing tension that occurs as a batter racks up strikes is exactly the same thing as the increasing tension that occurs in SSSoD. Sure, strike one isn't exactly nail biting, and neither is the first failed save, but, it is an increase. The second strike is a big deal, because you know that that next pitch might be your last. Of course, the third strike or third failed save is the release.

In SoD, you have only the release. There's no ramping up of the tension.

The thing is, people keep talking about how it's playing the game up to the point of saving throws that increases the tension. You wander into the lair, see the statues in odd poses with horror on their faces, you don't know where the medusa is, but, you're pretty sure she's around here somewhere...

Why does that change in 4e? That scene is precisely the same in any edition.

But, my issue with SoD is purely mathematical. SoD is an area of effect ability. That means everyone has to make a saving throw. The odds state that if everyone has a chance of failing, someone is almost automatically going to fail. It stops being SoD and starts being just die. You might as roll a random check, point at one player and say, "You die." Because that's how the math works.

You can ameliorate this somewhat. Snake poison, for example, in 1e was SoD, but the snake had to hit you and it could (usually) only hit one PC at a time. This breaks down if you have ten snakes though (completely arbitrary number with no specific significance). Now, suddenly, again, SoD becomes, just die.

In my mind, that's the problem with SoD. It's not about the tension, it's about the fact that it's entirely binary and WAY too swingy for my taste.

 

[Odhanan]

Baseball uses 3 strikes and you're out. Would baseball be more or less tense if it used one strike and you're out?

For me the example is not appropriate, because the sum of the activities played out and the tension experienced by the players as they play a role playing game is not contained within the rules. It's what's going on around them.

See my example with the corridors before. My point was to show how SoD matters in terms of choices before you, when you are aware you are about to be confronted to a save-or-die situation if you negociate it in a certain way (i.e. taking the middle corridor with a SoD effect instead of left or right, which are less troublesome paths but longer to go through, or the example of the creature which you know will trigger a SoD if you confront it by fighting it, like the beholder in the next room, or the rust monster as far as your equipment's concerned).

The tension isn't in the action of making a roll when you are confronted to a SoD. It is in knowing that there is a SoD situation ahead, and thereby thinking of strategies and tactics that will allow you to avoid the threat or deal with it in ways that will not trigger a SoD (by negociating with the beholder for instance and pointing out how the dragon from the prior level stole some magic item he cared about, thus agreeing to retrieve the item for it in exchange for passage through his lair, or in the case of rust monsters either go down the chasm and fight the monsters, with the risk of losing your equipment, or fighting with sticks and stones instead, at your disadvantage, or instead taking the rope bridges above the monsters, or improvising another solution altogether).

The tension and dramatic choices are not contained within the rules. It goes on in the actual game, aside of the rule, while the presence of the rule itself is a tool that help provide significant obstacles and threats that are mitigated by a number of choices in the game.

The game is not the rules. The rules are not the game.

 

[Hussar]

So, we're back to the argument that every encounter will be sign posted? After all, the only way you know that there's a SoD encounter coming up is if the DM tells you. Either it's brain damaged medusa's who refuse to do any housekeeping or whatever.

The point is, that's still true whether it's SoD or SSSoD. Obviously, a medusa, for example, is a dangerous encounter. Granted, in 4e, it's not one that's rendered utterly pointless with a low level cleric spell, but, that's a different issue. But, people will still react much the same way to a beholder in the next room regardless of edition - beholders are pretty bloody dangerous.

All of your examples Odhanan are edition neutral. There's no reason you wouldn't do any of that in any edition. Yet, when the midden hits the windmill, in one edition, you have gradually increasing tension, and in the other, you have Boom you're dead!