The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

[xechnao]

A minion is just 1/4th of a monster, Xp wise.

So it would be the equivalent of killing one monster with his daily.

Whoop-tee.

If what the OP says is correct minions of 30 level can be killed at give way more XP than appropriate to 5th level characters.

 

[Andor]

How do the rules for diseases look like?

Poisons are rarely long-term stuff in real life, are they?* I mean, most poisons are there to incapacitate the target now, not for a week. That's because they are usually attack or defense mechanism.

Some are quick acting, but some will really stick with you. Boomslang venom for instance does nothing, for about a day, then you start bleeding from the eyes and kinda dissolve. A lot of neurotoxic poisons will leave you with permanent damage in the event you survive. And some of the tissue destroying venoms (spider is particular) can still be causing tissue necrosis for years after the bite.

Now I'll grant you this isn't terribly "heroic" perhaps but it does have precedent in myth and fantasy. In the Illiad an archer (I forget his name) drops one of hercules's poison arrows and pricks himself in the foot. He doesn't die but the wound oozes black gook and the sailors drop him off on an island out of fear. When they go back years later he is still there and the wound is still oozeing.

 

[lutecius]

As for immersion, that's not a problem for me. I see Encounters/Dailies as, well, matters of dramatic presentation. Why can't the fighter use a Daily in every fight? Because he's all ready done his big spot-light thing for the day. The same reason why even though Bond can dive off a cliff and glide down on a car hood once doesn't mean that he's going to be doing it every ten minutes.

"Speed of Plot" and all that jazz.

I find blatantly artificial narration and inconsistent plot devices even more annoying in fiction. If a character can do something at some point, there'd better be a good reason why he couldn't even try it again in a similar situation.
And movies are linear. The point of rpgs is not having a nicely predetermined outcome or scenario.

 

[greatn]

If what the OP says is correct minions of 30 level can be killed at give way more XP than appropriate to 5th level characters.

Why would a fifth level character ever be facing a horde of lvl 30 minions? Or even one?

 

[xechnao]

Why would a fifth level character ever be facing a horde of lvl 30 minions? Or even one?

Why would advnturers go after monsters?

 

[greatn]

Why would advnturers go after monsters?

Level 5 guy is just going to decide I'm going specifically to go search for a lvl 26 Demon Soldier Legion, all I have to do is find a portal to hell, go in, roll a 20 or get it to end its turn next to me, and then escape hell... PROFIT

 

[abyssaldeath]

If a 5 level fighter is fighting epic tier minions it is not an problem with the game system. It is a problem with the DM. To even suggest that this is a mechanics issue is rediculous. What DM in their right mind would even let this happen.

 

[Vorhaart]

Level 5 guy is just going to decide I'm going specifically to go search for a lvl 26 Demon Soldier Legion, all I have to do is find a portal to hell, go in, roll a 20 or get it to end its turn next to me, and then escape hell... PROFIT

I know you're being sarcastic, but the sad thing is some player's brains see no fault with this plan.

 

[lutecius]

re: Encounter/Daily powers
There is an easy way to change Encounter and Daily powers into non-discrete scenarios and I'm pretty sure Mearls et al thought of it.

Simply put a penalty for every use of encounter (say -2)/Daily (say -5) past a certain point (a.k.a psionics) in the time frame mentioned. Main reason against it is that you force players to have to keep subtracting more modifiers for every round.

I think there was a similar mechanic in Iron Heroes.

There are other possibilities. if monsters can randomly recharge some of their powers, i don't see why PCs couldn't use a similar mechanic.

Another thing that could make encounter/dailies less artificial would be to allow power swapping like the 3e sorcerer, so you could actually use the same power twice when needed.

The problem if you want to implement a variant mechanic is that you have to balance things yourself.

 

[Keenath]

That being said, it would be nice if certain fairly basic concepts weren't mostly foreclosed by the current system. (You can't easily make a heavily armored guy who is very effective with a bow, for example)

Umm... can't you just use a ranger or similar and take armor proficiency feats?

Anyway I'm not sure why you'd want to do something like that, since heavy armor and dexterity don't really get along, and never have...