So is it fun?

[jimmifett]

@Piratecat

7 players. How long did the combats take? Did the DM do anything special to keep the pace up during rounds? I am asking because it seems like more often than not, 7 players will be the default number in my group, at least for the next couple of months.

I'm running 6 players. I found that printing out Ander00's power cards, putting them in magic sleeves, and using a thin tip sharpie to fill in attack bonus and damage roll info made combat really fast.

On the DM side, I use a 5x7 notepad and list each char's init, defenses, bloodied HP, and current HP. I even esily added extra monsters to encounter without slowing things down much.

 

[jimmifett]

I'm really enjoying this first few encounters as a DM for KoTS. Once i got familiar with the kobold's abilities and how to properly use them, they were putting a real hurting on the PCs and forced them to make decisions on who to fight and who to ignore. They got a kick out of the Kobold Dragonshield's immediate interupt shifting as they'd try to flank, and the kobolds wouldn't have any of that.

The mob tactics made it so they were absolutely brutal to the meat shields. +1 for each kobold adj, ouch. poor pally with his AC 20 had to back off and use a second wind after the first round just so the others could catch up to the fighting. He was bloodied and just short of unconcious.

A total blast

 

[Zil]

Maybe the better question would be, "did you have to make fun of 4e to have fun that session?"

Heh, good spin on things. Yes, we did make fun of a few things while playing 4E (minions, things we thought were way too video gamish, etc) but... no, we didn't have to make fun of 4E to have fun. The game is indeed fun to play (just as every previous version of D&D has been fun to play). Is it the version for my D&D games? Probably not, but I would certainly play it again if someone else were to run the game because it was fun.

 

[Storminator]

I'm running 6 players. I found that printing out Ander00's power cards, putting them in magic sleeves, and using a thin tip sharpie to fill in attack bonus and damage roll info made combat really fast.

On the DM side, I use a 5x7 notepad and list each char's init, defenses, bloodied HP, and current HP. I even esily added extra monsters to encounter without slowing things down much.

Rather than print out whole sets and overwriting them, I'm just editing the cards directly and only printing what a player needs.

I did have to hack up a card to get all the Channel Divinity powers on one card tho.

PS

 

[beldar1215]

Can someone post a link for the power cards?

Beldar

 

[Vanuslux]

I ran my first 4th Edition session yesterday. I was the only one who had the rulebooks and I'd only had them for a few days so it was a clumsy start, but it was a lot of fun and once I started to get a better grasp of the rules and the players started to get a better grasp of their characters abilities it got a lot more fun. I'm really liking the new edition and can't wait for the next session.

 

[psionotic]

We played 4e for the first time on saturday, doing a test fight and then the first part of Keep on the Shadowfell. Seems to be reallly fun, and I <3 my halfling rogue, who is a sneaky little death dealer. Definitely makes low level combat much more fun and tactically interesting.

 

[Wormwood]

DMed my first *real* 4e game yesterday (everyone finally got their books, so I began Keep on the Shadowfell).

A remarkable success (if I say so myself!). It helps that the last game this group played was a 3.5 adventure which was tedious and slowly paced, leaving the group hungry for 4e's promise of more dynamic play.

But yeah, I totally rocked it. I'd never DMed for this particular group before, but they were suprisingly receptive to both my 'fly by the seat of your pants' gaming style and the new 4e rules which facilitate that approach.

Chargen took a couple of hours, yet we still had time to complete the first two combats as well as a fun series of roleplaying encounters in Winterhaven.

Gwen the half-elf Fey Pact Warlock really got into her persona as 'the Forest Witch', and loved knocking out kobolds with her Elf Shot (ie. Eldritch Blast repurposed as a spectral bow). She was all over the battlefield, taking full advantage of Misty Step, Shadow Walk and Eyebite. A lot of fun to play and watch.

Tarn the Dragonborn Paladin had the worst case of 'low rolls' I've seen in a long time. He was surprised at how close he came to being killed---by kobolds of all things. He's developed a really nice hatred for the little buggers. That said, he enjoyed his Divine Challenge (actually bellowing "Face me, coward!" when using it) and he had great satisfaction in wiping out some minions with his icy dragon breath.

Morituri (sigh) the Eladrin Wizard had a great time with his character, toasting kobolds with Flamin Sphere and breaking their formations with Thunderwave. He was this group's former DM, and was a little skeptical about 4e---but now he's playing with the zeal of the converted. He really liked the Wizard's ability to maintain a zone of control, as well as the Eladrin's ability to get out of dodge if the zone gets overrun.

Bastia, the human fighter played by my wife (hi baby!) was a pleasant surprise. I'd done a couple of playtests, but failed to notice how important a 4e fighter can be. It took her a while to grok the importance of teamwork in 4e (she's used to playing loner/scout type characters), but once she started coordinating her actions with the group, she became my worst nightmare. Combat Challenge and Superiority were particularly effective, and she always seemed to know when to use Passing Attack to really screw up my plans. One more game like this and we're going to need marriage counseling.

Well, that was long-winded and meandering. How about: Yes, it's fun.

That said, I'm really looking forward to *playing* with my other gaming group this Thursday. Infernal Pact Warlock, here I come!

 

[ThirdWizard]

It was a blast playing this weekend! Check my sig.

There were so many great moments in the game. From when the players went from thinking it was a simple goblins attacked a mine to realizing that a strange illness was out there, to the players realizing that it was a zombification bite and that, you know, one of those guys in town had a bite wound, to when they arrived back in town and had to gather survivors to try and protect through the night from the hoard of zombies outside.

It was one of my better sessions as DM, and that's my first 4e session.

 

[Trickstergod]

The first session was a bit shaky. We were constantly referencing books to check up on our powers and a few of us changed our powers around mid-session as we figured out what did and didn't suit us.

The second session, though? Fantastic. We had a solid grasp on the rules, our characters were more or less statted out without further edits, and we all knew more or less what the other folk in our group could do and how best to benefit each other. Things gelled together nicely.

The first session wound up with a TPK against the goblin leader and his kobolds - we were too quick to spend our dailies, too quick to spend our action points, and were a bit disorganized in our tactics. By the second session, though, we faced the goblin again and came out of it with just one dead player. Encounters prior to this and later on also proved a bit easier, or at least more fun, now that we knew more or less what we were doing.

So, yeah. Fun so far. I'm really looking forward to the next session.