The New Design Philosophy?

[The Shaman]

Rubbish. Monsters are required for interesting combats. However, you don't really need the big bad guy to have a special ability saying "has minions". Minions can be assumed by good adventure design.

Piffle. Magic is as part and parcel to fantasy as monsters.

Using charm person instead of 'minions' adds two wholly different elements to an encounter. First, it rewards spellcasters who invest in divination magic (and players smart enough to use it to identify where magical compulsion may be in play). Second, it creates a situation where the adventurers may want to prevent harm to the compelled but otherwise unwitting character, as opposed to hacking their way through minions.

Huh? Something that the CR system already covers is a weakness in the CR system? I really don't understand.

If a monster's CR doesn't reflect the whole of its abilities, then that's a weakness in the system.

Flip-a-coin encounters are rarely fun.

IME, D&D combats are fun when the players need to work to overcome the challenges. The attritional nature of D&D combat is great because they can see they're in danger as their HP and spells are expended.

When every encounter becomes about managing resources without ever facing an immediate, serious threat, that is a recipe for boredom.

IMO.

 

[monboesen]

As Mark already said earlier, that's a weakness in the CR system.

No. That is an ADVANTAGE of the CR system. That way your piddly mastermind can create more encounters for the players. They then get rewarded (including with XP) for handling along the way, but don't get an undue amount of XP when they finally corner and defeat the relatively weak mastermind in combat.


As to the toe to toe vs. the clever tactical fight. CR needs to assume toe to toe fights, that is the only way of making them even halfway accurate.

Does that mean you as a DM have to play the monster dumb and rush it into melee. No, it means you need to remember that when a monster getting the drop on a group you should increase it's CR by 1 or 2 for that encounter to reflect that advantage.

Same thing goes for other advantages in combat, like prior knowledge of player tactics and abilities (or adjusting down if players have prior knowledge of the same things), some kind of environmental advantage (monster with swim speed encountered in chest high water) and so on.

Why not? Why does every encounter have to be about diminishing resources? Why can't some encounters just be plain deadly on the luck of the dice?

Because it is pretty dull to watch your PC of 3 years playing experience die from a freak bad roll?

I vastly prefer PC dying due to bad decisions rather than to an untimely rolled 1 on a d20.

 

[monboesen]

If a monster's CR doesn't reflect the whole of its abilities, then that's a weakness in the system.

Are you reading what we are posting?

Those "mastermind" abilities will create obstacles that will be resolved by themselves, without the mastermind being present, being of their own CR, giving their own XP.

There is absolutely no need for that kind of ability to be accounted into the "masterminds" CR, because they don't make it more dangerous when you finally fight it.

 

[The Shaman]

Are you reading what we are posting?

Yes, and I also read these:

The logic of this new philosophy is lost on me. Since some creatures, like the ogre mage, were essentially gutted by the revision of certain spells during the switch to 3.x and as they are now ineffectual because their CR is too high for them to be combat threats, the plan is to individually revise each creature based on what can transpire during a five or six round combat? I would have thought it better to address the perpetually enigmatic CR system.

I don't understand the belief that the CR system can be or should be anything other than approximate guideline to help inexperienced DMs judge the difficulty of generic encounters. This forcing of CRs into discrete electron-like conformity is misguided and doomed to disappointment.

And I also find disagreeable the philisophy of making a couple rounds of combat the sole arbiter of a critters utlity.

I'll leave it to you to figure out with whom I agree.

 

[monboesen]

Ok. Guess we will have to disagree completely about what CR is/should be and how it is applied by the dm.


Could you explain to me please how you would judge the CR of a creature like the Ogre mage or Vampire taking into account their non-combat ability.

Or is your position that CR shouldn't be used at all?

 

[ThirdWizard]

When every encounter becomes about managing resources without ever facing an immediate, serious threat, that is a recipe for boredom..

He's not talking about threat level. He's talking about glass death stars, thus the 1 HD creature with the death attack.

This is, of course, what high level D&D can turn into. If you go first, you win. If he goes first, you lose. Witness an enemy wizard with disintegrate or finger of death vs an equally prepared wizard. It's a initiative off.

 

[The Shaman]

He's not talking about threat level. He's talking about glass death stars, thus the 1 HD creature with the death attack.

So am I.

This is, of course, what high level D&D can turn into. If you go first, you win. If he goes first, you lose. Witness an enemy wizard with disintegrate or finger of death vs an equally prepared wizard. It's a initiative off.

Yep - no problem as far as I'm concerned.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Well... you can have a high threat level without the glass tiger. The Ogre Mage in question is an example.

It's worth noting that I remember Mike as being against the extreme glass tiger syndrome.

Seeing as how I killed a PC last sessin in a surprise round without him getting to roll anything, I'd be a hypocrite to say I'm against quick kills as a possibility.

 

[hong]

Yep - no problem as far as I'm concerned.

Play more high-level D&D.

 

[Treebore]

You guys make me so glad I don't DM 3E anymore.