This was brought up in another thread, but it's a pet peeve of mine so I'm splitting it off.
One of the things I really hated about 3E was how NPCs were weaker than PCs. It didn't look that way - they were both built using the same system, after all - but the default was to give them much weaker equipment and stats, and this often translated into greater problems at the table. It didn't help that the Challenge Ratings system for 3E (and going forward into PF) were often a joke when applied to NPCs.
This also applied, in a different way, to 4E. 4E did solve the problem of "too many +1 swords" which the earlier approach to NPCs gave, but at the expense of having NPCs and PCs working off different systems - which really was a problem when you wanted ambiguous characters, who could work with or against the PCs. (I liked Companion characters, but they weren't good opponents).
My preference for NPCs is that they should be the (potential) equal of PCs in every way.
Any thoughts?
One of the things I really hated about 3E was how NPCs were weaker than PCs. It didn't look that way - they were both built using the same system, after all - but the default was to give them much weaker equipment and stats, and this often translated into greater problems at the table. It didn't help that the Challenge Ratings system for 3E (and going forward into PF) were often a joke when applied to NPCs.
This also applied, in a different way, to 4E. 4E did solve the problem of "too many +1 swords" which the earlier approach to NPCs gave, but at the expense of having NPCs and PCs working off different systems - which really was a problem when you wanted ambiguous characters, who could work with or against the PCs. (I liked Companion characters, but they weren't good opponents).
My preference for NPCs is that they should be the (potential) equal of PCs in every way.
Any thoughts?