Something Awful leak.

[howandwhy99]

Just out of curiousity EW, what would you consider a good (for a given value of good) pace of a round? Presume 5 players and a DM, low to mid-low level and no really funky stuff going on. How long should a round take and how long should a given player take to resolve his turn?

Blindness is typically permanent until magically healed in my game. As encounters aren't necessarily about being able to see, being blind does not hinder a player's ability to continue playing or enjoying overcoming yet another challenge.

 

[KarinsDad]

I heard the designers use this argument too, and I think they missed a point which is very important to me.

I want demons/devils who can use a certain proportion of their spells in *this fight* and in the next time they are encountered use *a slightly different subset of spells*. In the third encounter there is another one of their spells which isn't of much use in combat but actually sets up the whole foundation for the encounter (e.g. the 3.0 devil 'animate dead' power).

Trimmed down power lists means every time you fight the same devil it is always the same, because it can only spam the same 3 kinds of attack.

Spell lists for those creatures is not about the encounter viability of the creature, it is about the campaign viability of the encounter. The focus purely on encounter design in 4e missed that important point to my mind.

This is why I hope that 5e does have a wider range of spells and/or powers for higher level creatures - give them more versatility, so that there are more options for the campaign.

It's actually a very difficult subject.

I just went online and grabbed a 23rd level creature. I picked the first one in the list that was just a little complex (which happened to be the second one in the list).

Braxat Lord

Resist Acid 20
Action Point
Threatening Reach (3 squares instead of the normal 2)
Maul (marks foe)
Crushing Pain (immobilizes and then slows foe)
Attack Flurry (2 Mauls, 1 CP, 2 or more foes)
Vitriolic Spew (twice per encounter, and the DM has to remember to use it when the BL gets bloodied)
Overawe (recharge)
Telekinetic Harness (marked foe ends turn non-adjacent)

There's a lot going on with this guy. And, he's only one NPC in the encounter. Most of the Epic level foes are Elites, so quite a few have similar levels of complexity that this guy does.

And this is considered a trimmed down list from 3E. Now imagine that this guy had multiple different spells. He'd be even more complex.

I really don't know of an easy way to resolve the issue and I don't think WotC can. The best I think that they can do is to create a stat block with something like:

Easy Version
x
y
z

Complex Version
a
b
c

And DMs that are a bit overwhelmed stick to the easy portion of the stat block and DMs that can juggle 20 things at once can use elements (including spells) out of the Complex Version list. One advantage of this model is that even DMs that are overwhelmed can every once in a while, pull something out of the Complex Version list.

As a DM, I have run into a lot of circumstances where the monsters run out of juice pretty darn quick and I'm thinking "Boy, if this guy just had one more area effect, that would really have made this a challenging encounter. Instead, it has to spam it's melee attack again. Boring.".

 

[avin]

This is why I hope that 5e does have a wider range of spells and/or powers for higher level creatures - give them more versatility, so that there are more options for the campaign.

4E made my life easier, when I don't needed to go to PHB figure out how some spell from those big 3.5 spell lists worked.

I know some people are terribly good at remember things and know D&D editions like the back of their hands... but some don't. Or just don't have the time...

I'm glad DDN will keep 4E's monster simplicity, but hope there's options to add class levels to a basic mold, for monsters that really matter

 

[catastrophic]

Ironically, I found 4e to be a throwback to 70's design in this respect - because the implementation of 'exception based design' which was used meant that every monster could do something different. The troglodyte would pin you one way, the devil would pin you another way, a third creature had yet another way of pinning you - all slightly different in their implementation. Maybe every creature had its information in its statblock, but in 3e you just needed to know how stun (or petrification) or something worked once and it always worked that way.

This move away from standardisation of attacks was one of the things I personally found difficult in 4e.
Cheers

The effects of attacks were standardised in 4e. I also question the claim that such effects were standardised in 3e, considering the number of effects, spells, exceptional and supernatural abilities, ect ect that monsters had.

Your description of 4e is misleading because you're confusing attacks with conditions. While it is true that 4e allows for custom and monster-specific attacks and conditions- one of it's clear strengths- it also has a base of uniform conditions, that are as if not more uniform than those found in 3e.

Stun, petrification, and similar conditions are standardized in 4e. The fact that they can be built into larger custom conditions, or can be delivered in various ways (such as on hit, on a failed save, ect) simply makes monsters more unique- and it's all there in plain speech on the monster sheet. Stun, ect are still uniform in any event.

Compare this to 3e's tangle of generic bag-o-hit point monsters, spell lists, and worse. I know which system myself and everyone I know finds easier to keep track of, and it's 4e by a mile.

That's not to say 4e is without flaws- and piles of conditions in combat is certainly one of those issues. It's just a pity we'll have to wait until 6th edition to see any progress on such a design.

 

[KarinsDad]

For the non-combat abilities, you do what I mentioned before for dragons: slap on training in Arcana and give the creature any rituals you like.

For combat abilities, choose three or four "spells" you want it to use and just give it to them. You don't have to justify caster level, supernatural abilities, which ability score to use, etc.

Want your marilith to be able to raise skeletons to fight for her? Just say "Minor action: four [insert skeleton name here] appear in unnocupied squares within 5 squares of the marilith". You don't need to follow the rules for animate dead, you just give her the ability to create whatever you need, be it skeletons, ju-ju zombies or jujubees.

I agree with your sentiment here.

But, my experience shows that most DMs do not think outside the box like this. If it isn't in the monster stat block, the DM doesn't use it.

WotC could encourage more of this thinking outside the box, but I also see a bit of an issue with it. In the example I just posted where monsters that I run sometimes run out of juice early in an encounter, it would feel a bit like cheating if I suddenly "recharged their once per encounter power" or added a new power on the fly to the monster.

Doing it pre-game is where I think this type of solution works best. The DM can balance it out a bit and it doesn't seem like he is pulling stuff out of his butt mid-encounter.

 

[KarinsDad]

While it is true that 4e allows for custom and monster-specific attacks and conditions- one of it's clear strengths- it also has a base of uniform conditions, that are as if not more uniform than those found in 3e.

I found that the duration aspect of monster-specific (and PC-specific) conditions to be a major weakness of 4E.

This effect lasts:

until the beginning of the user's next turn
until the end of the user's next turn
until the beginning of the target's next turn
until the end of the target's next turn
save ends
until the end of the encounter
until the user forgets to (or chooses not to) use his minor action to sustain

Not only are there too many powers in 4E, both monster and player, that impose conditions, but there are two many different types of duration of conditions that have to be tracked.

There should be 3 durations: until the end of the user's next turn (i.e. a one round duration), save ends, and until the end of the encounter for a good 95% of all effects.

I do hope that 5E makes a good 2/3rds of all attacks just plain damage. Special attacks should do special things, but most normal attacks should just do damage so that the bookkeeping nightmare goes away.

I also think that more instantaneous effects can be used, even for "normal attacks". Foe is moved x squares. Foe is knocked prone. Foe is moved x squares and knocked prone. At least when using miniatures, these types of effects can be tracked with virtually no effort on the part of the player because their duration is either instantaneous, or in the case of prone, until someone stands up the miniature (prone is less nice if miniatures are not used because it has to be tracked).

But, forced movement and prone do not work well without miniatures. The solution to that, of course, is to just ignore them in a game that doesn't use miniatures.

 

[Szatany]

DM: "Hey guys! Where are the Blinded cards?"
Player 1: "Well, they should be here with the Stunned cards? You know we have 6 of each of these card, one for each condition. There's only 120 cards. Where could have those gotten to? Darn."

Yeah, totally happens to me every time I play magic the gathering or talisman. Just can't hold onto those stupid cards Lose them all the time.

 

[Hussar]

I agree with your sentiment here.

But, my experience shows that most DMs do not think outside the box like this. If it isn't in the monster stat block, the DM doesn't use it.

WotC could encourage more of this thinking outside the box, but I also see a bit of an issue with it. In the example I just posted where monsters that I run sometimes run out of juice early in an encounter, it would feel a bit like cheating if I suddenly "recharged their once per encounter power" or added a new power on the fly to the monster.

Doing it pre-game is where I think this type of solution works best. The DM can balance it out a bit and it doesn't seem like he is pulling stuff out of his butt mid-encounter.

Again, to satisfy my curiousity, how many DM's are we talking about here? I can totally see having a poor experience with a DM or three, but, I'm not about to paint with THAT broad a brush - "We need to have monsters with fifteen different abilities because my DM won't add new powers to a creature" doesn't seem like a particularly good criteria.

 

[Gort]

Yeah, totally happens to me every time I play magic the gathering or talisman. Just can't hold onto those stupid cards Lose them all the time.

*Shrug* in my 4e game we had one A4 sheet with the conditions written on it. Pulled it out about once every three sessions, when unusual conditions came up, like "restrained".

Play enough sessions and you'll know all the common conditions off by heart pretty quickly.

 

[keterys]

I found that the duration aspect of monster-specific (and PC-specific) conditions to be a major weakness of 4E.

Agreed!

I actually prefer until end of target's turn being the default duration, cause then you can associate a condition with a creature, then slash it off when its turn ends. If it's save ends, then it has to make a save to do so. Easy peasy.

WotC could encourage more of this thinking outside the box, but I also see a bit of an issue with it. In the example I just posted where monsters that I run sometimes run out of juice early in an encounter, it would feel a bit like cheating if I suddenly "recharged their once per encounter power" or added a new power on the fly to the monster.

Well, in addition to the general 4e design of just letting you do whatever you want to alter monsters, WotC made themes, so people can trivially mix and match abilities on monsters, gave options for replacing variable resistance on demons to show a good system for that, etc. You can also rule 42 it, or terrain power it, and have it make a skill check to do something to the environment to mix things up.

Really want a close-ish attack and don't got it? Knock down the pillar next to you, maybe bringing some of the roof down. Your players should appreciate that kind of detail, and your pacing problem's solved.

Really, I think the biggest thing they needed to do was have the start of 4e look a lot closer to what it does now and to have some big advice on letting things do cool stuff that isn't in their stat block. "Ancient dragons are powerful ritualists whose magic can be used in a myriad of ways to protect their hoards, control the minds of others, change into other forms, or even summon or animate armies. Each dragon has its own powers and preferences, so fights with different dragons rarely play out the same." Maybe it even gives some examples of a black dragon which animates undead to lurk in pools within its lair and has a vortex of acid it can trigger during the combat, while a silver dragon changes into a person to interact with the party beforehand then triggers a contingent teleport if things go awry, etc.