D&D 4E Some musing about 4E, the WLD and encounter design.

[Warmduscher]

So, there has been talk in our D&D group about giving the Worlds largest dungeon a try, possibly with 4E even and with all the discussion about encounter setting I got some ideas that sounded pretty interesting... in my head at least. One of the problems I see with using the WLD setup in 4E is that the encounters are difficult to prepare in advance.

The best thing about it is that the players get to choose how to interact with all the different humanoid tribes... attack them on sight, trade with them, maybe even ally against a stronger foe? What brings me to an idea... don't stat out specific encounters or decide what exactly a certain tribe consists of but give every tribe or large group of humanoids an xp pool as an abstraction for their numbers, resources and overall capabilites and decide on some general tactics they use to confront enemies. From that you can come up with specific encounters depending on what your players are doing at the moment.

Say the PCs run into a kobold tribe for example. The GM decided beforehand that the tribe got 2000 xp in resources total and their usual tactic with unknown intruders is sending one or two of their weakest up ahead to confront the intruders and find out what they're up to (spending only minimal exp on it as those two are minion at best). In the case that they're hostile they heavily trap the corridor their scouts go through (spending a good bunch of the tribe xp on traps) while the rest of the strong warriors await the result.

The fun thing is that you can play politics with that. The players helping a tribe could have the effect of it gaining more xp which could help them in turn to have more powerful allies. Heck, one could use this model for a larger scale as well. Say the players are in a typical PoL setting and adventure to help their hometown. As they succeed in securing new resources and proecting the town the xp pool of it grows and as such again the capabilities that they can command as allies.... propably a good way to model the resources the ruler of their town trust them with (if they don't rule it themselves).

So, any comments? I think this could get used to make the simulationist crowd happier with the new system again. Devising a mechanical way how their choices and aventures have a profound effect on their surrounding could go a long way.

 

[Mr. Teapot]

So, any comments? I think this could get used to make the simulationist crowd happier with the new system again.

I'd actually expect them to hate this idea.


But the overall idea seems pretty good, as a way of emasuring how much opposition they can offer the PCs and such.

(We're playing the WLD in 4e right now, and our GM is very pleased with how easy it is to adapt to the new system. Much happier than she ever was designing encounters for 3rd ed. Then again, we're fighting the goblin empire, which seems like it might be easier to adapt than other parts of the WLD could be.)

 

[Danceofmasks]

Well, in 3e, I was one of those world-builders that ignored PC capabilities.
Stuff is around, and if PCs were to walk into a level 15+ encounter with a level 3 party, they die.
To the point that lower-level parties will hunt down the PCs for their gear if they're famous enough.

The premise of 4e of "the world revolves around the PCs" is nice for the game it is, but the simulationist in me is not so happy.
Fixed encounters simply do not work: the minion mechanic is a notable example.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

I think that sounds like a really good idea, and a really good method of abstracting this kind of thing.

 

[77IM]

I'm currently starting a West Marches game using 4e. It's a similar premise -- the world is set up beforehand, and while the PCs can explore it and interact with it, they're not the central focus of some plot line. Since 4e values encounter balance so highly, it becomes really important to broadcast danger levels to the PCs, so that as they explore they know which areas are maybe a bit too high level and should be avoided for the time being.

-- 77IM

 

[Schmoe]

That's a really cool idea. It starts to put some concrete foundation behind strategic choices the players make, in terms of which sides they help and which they oppose. Forces lost in direct conflict with the party come directly out of the group's total, of course, but you can also use it to quickly model conflicts between the tribes.

In fact, this area is really a rich one to explore for different ideas on how far you want to take it. Here's a quick example of how you might model conflicts between tribes (behind the scenes):

1. Each side gets a +1 bonus per 100 XP of tribe resources. You might have other modifiers for favorable terrain, superlative leadership, etc.

2. Roll a d20 for each side and compare results. High roll is the winner, with ties going to the defender.

3. The losing side suffers losses of 10-20% of the winning side's XP pool. The winning side suffers half of those losses.

Once you add in actions that PCs can do to influence XP pools, or bring tribes into conflict, you can easily develop this into a whole campaign-model of play. In fact, this might be the genesis of a kingdom-building strategy sub-game. Hmm...

 

[LokiDR]

I'd actually expect them to hate this idea.

I'm a simulationist and I like it.

My problem is in application. A 2000xp group sounds like a good measure, except it doesn't tell me how much that group can use at once. A tribe of kobolds would be better off getting templates/levels to have a single group of the most powerful they could have for the best chance to succeed. One encounter of level 10 is not the same as 10 encounters of level 1. I really don't want to stat every encounter for a 50,000 xp organization.

How about adding a scale to the organization for how much space it covers. In KotS, the kobolds of the beginning would be about 3125, but a scale of 5. An average encounter would be more than about 675 xp because the group is spread out. A local despot who rules his city with an iron fist? 50,000 scale 5, average encounter of about 10,000: major enforcers to keep the people in line. A valley of losely-associated farm towns, 50,000 scale 10, average encounter 5,000. The despot could take over the valley but his power would be so diluted he couldn't face the uprising. With Warmduscher ideas of description of tactics, you could determine how much the group would risk: send weak scouts - low risk, you are looking to survive; send high powered hit squads - high risk, your hold is tenuous.

One advantage of this scale is that it would let you determine how long it would take to wipe out. Scale 10 means around 10 encounters to kill them all, that's a long dungeon. This would also explain how a small point of light could survive against broad sea of evil: the light is just more concentrated. A small force can keep a much larger force at bay in a small space. A large scale organization covers lots of space and gives you a guide of how much they can control. Maybe scale 50 is the government of a large city: there are a lot of civil servants all over. Killing a few defenders doesn't destroy the organization, you have to find another way or do a lot of grinding.

The other advantage of the scale is tells you what kind of characters can face the group. A 5,000xp group, scale 10 make level 1 encounters. This might be a sprawling sewer filled with rats and other minor threats. If you force the threats into a smaller space, the group gets nastier as only the strong survive. It also makes it easy to determine the total organization: XP for average encounter times number of fights to wipe out. They make friends instead of fighting? You know how much their new friends can help in terms of real numbers.

Bottom line: 4e is heavily focused on encounters, so any concept of world design with numbers must have some conversion to encounters.

 

[Warmduscher]

Good points there with the scale problem. It's clear that thinking about the actual encounters when the players decide to attack is still something the GM needs to do, but assigning number to organisations allows the players to be more creative themselves how to approach bigger-scale problems propably trying to divide their opposition up into a smaller scale when outmatched, while allowing the GM to be flexible with the reactions of their opponents.


The stats for an organisation would be so far then:

Total exp: Representing the number and strength of the available combatants as well as other measures (traps or similar) they can take. Ranging from only a few 1000 for small tribes up to multiple 100,000 for big nations or exceptionally powerful organisations (like a demon army or something).

Scale: Represents how far the organisation is spread out. Total exp divided by scale is the usual measure for a single encounter against this organisation. Ranges between 1(single creature or small band) and 100 (vast empire).

How about mobility as another stat? That would model how much the organisation is able to shift their available exp around to better react to threats. Say the 50k exp scale 5 city state is under attack by a 20k force. The city state usually can only bring 10k at once against an opponent but with a mobility of 50% it can take measures to amass up to a 30k force by concentrating their assets in a single big and 4 halved forces.

Also good points about offscreen activity as well. For that we propably need some stats how fast a damaged organisation can recover, propably with a resources stat. That would be one of the things the players could influence directly by adventuring.

 

[Paul Strack]

I think scale and XP total are not enough. You need to factor in level as well. A large group of weak creatures isn't equivalent to a smaller group of strong creatures and will react differently to threats.

Here is how I would stat out an organization:

* Level: A rough measure of a organization's average threat. "Normal" member would be this about this level or slightly lower, but there could also be leaders up to 5 levels higher.

* Scale: A measure of the total size of the organization. Roughly the number of members of the organization.

The XP value of the entire organization would be (XP Value for Level x Scale), but odds are low the PCs would actually kill them all before they left the area. If the PCs destroyed 25% of the group, the rest would probably try to at least negotiate. If 50% or more were killed, the rest would likely leave the area.

I would design encounters with groups inside the organization using the encounter XP budget table on DMG 57 (using the 5 PC column). I'd break encounter groups down by size:

Small (XP Budget of Level - 2): An encounter with a random set of group members, not looking for trouble. Could be several average member or a single Elite.

Medium (XP Budget of Level + 0): An encounter with a regular patrol or outpost, ready for trouble but not looking for it. Roughly 4-6 average members. Could also have some minion cannon fodder or an Elite leader. Could also be a single Solo.

Large (XP Budget of Level + 2 or Level + 4): A war group or strike team, a group put together to deal with specific problems (like the PCs) or to guard something important. Could vary considerably: roughly 7-10 normal members, but could include a small horde of minions, a Solo leader or maybe a larger group of Elites.

If the PCs were lower level than the organization, even Small group might fight the PCs. If PCs were about the same level as the organization, a Small group would probably try to get away, but Medium or bigger groups would fight. If the PCs were doing serious damage or were higher level, the organization would send large groups out after the PCs. Once the PCs were more than 5 levels better than the organization, the organization would probably decide they were too dangerous and would try to keep away, beg for mercy or get help from a more powerful organization.