Themes: What's the Catch?

[TarionzCousin]

Not to stumble too far off-topic here --

And remaining off-topic just a little longer (sorry!)--

As the OP, I recommend, nay DEMAND that this off-topic stuff be declared on-topic! In bright pink bold letters, too!



And now, for no apparent reason, a dancing monkey:

 

[Old Gumphrey]

Well, let's look at this from a different angle. What's the pain this is introducing into the game? Either all the players at the table will have themes or all the players won't have themes.

Well, no, they are optional. You don't have to take one. I have at least one player that would not take a theme unless it specifically fit his character, even if the entire rest of the party had them (although he would probably want to work out a custom theme, but that's a different discussion).

This is across the board. So everyone has a theme. Okay, that's cool. If it's really noticeable in a game, the DM can toss an extra monster in the fight or something.

So your solution for increasing player power for no good reason is to add grind to every combat? No, thanks.

Not to stumble too far off-topic here, but since you brought it up, why backgrounds of all things? It doesn't even save you a feat, since you still only get the same number of trained skills.

It can also give you +2 to any trained skill. I know this is a minor thing, but it's there. You can't just decide it's not there because it doesn't break a campaign to its base components in and of itself.

I don't know who decided "more options = power creep" but I don't buy into it one bit. These are mutually exclusive concepts that only coincide when the people producing the extra options doesn't take into account game balance.

Versatility is absolutely power, and it's one of the most powerful things you can have. There's a reason CoDzilla exists in 3e--that reason is versatility. If you have one character that can do more things, that character is better and more powerful.

I wouldn't even call themes "power creep" since that term seems to imply the increase in power levels is accidental, while themes are wholly intentional. And, for that matter, wholly optional. If you like the idea of themes but not the execution, you could even just take away from the free scaling encounter and call it a day.

I can definitely see a case for that, but my issue runs deeper. To me, a gladiator isn't a guy that can push another guy 2 squares and slow that guy and his buddies; any character should be able to do that. A gladiator is a guy that can kill you with a broken chair, or kill a tiger using only a helmet, a skirt, and a gladius. Put on a show for the crowd, stuff like that.

And don't get me started on the "Elemental Priest" that is a primal spirit conjurer...

Quite frankly, themes are the best idea WotC have brought to the table since skill powers. Say what you will, but 4e is a much better game now than it was two years ago.

Sure, it's a better game; quite frankly, characters should have had themes before they were released as a game mechanic. I don't need a theme to tell me that my wizard is a disciple of the frost acolytes, nor do I need to be enticed into doing so with a free "gimme" power. I just pick some cold powers and some cold feats and I freeze some punks to the floor.

I'm not going to disagree that themes are power creep

So we are in agreement.

Most of the other theme feature powers seem to be at the level of awesome at-wills; they're often something like 1[W]+ability and a very useful effect. That's a power level I'm quite comfortable with, it's rather like giving every character a version of the Dilettante feature that doesn't actually suck.

You are comfortable with every single character getting a (better) Dilettante? First off, Dilettante is amazing, if you optimize. Second off, if you have to pump up the bad guys to compensate for this new free power, that's just stacking more power creep on top of the existing power creep.

tl;dr Sure I can ignore themes now, but what happens when they go core, and monsters get a power increase across the board?

 

[Gradine]

Well, no, they are optional. You don't have to take one. I have at least one player that would not take a theme unless it specifically fit his character, even if the entire rest of the party had them (although he would probably want to work out a custom theme, but that's a different discussion).

Interestingly, you've hit on the biggest problem with themes; that there aren't enough of them. Players who don't like any of the themes present are slightly behind the curve, which either requires a homebrew theme to match what the player wants, or dealing with having one fewer encounter power than their ilk (now they know how dwarves feel!).

Ironically, the other solution to this problem is for WotC to release more official themes, which by your definition equals more power creep.

It can also give you +2 to any trained skill. I know this is a minor thing, but it's there. You can't just decide it's not there because it doesn't break a campaign to its base components in and of itself.

Oh... uh... yeah... well... your face gives a +2 to any trained skill!

...
Actually, I didn't even realize that was option; I always just thought of backgrounds as tool for when your chosen class lacks a skill that would make sense given your character's concept. That's certainly how I use them as a DM... I'd probably snip "+2 to trained skill" from the things backgrounds can give you.

Versatility is absolutely power, and it's one of the most powerful things you can have. There's a reason CoDzilla exists in 3e--that reason is versatility. If you have one character that can do more things, that character is better and more powerful.

No, the reason that CoDzilla exists is because is that WotC didn't know how to balance classes back in the days of 3.x. Bards are infinitely more versatile than clerics and druids, but nobody ever talks about how broken they are compared to the divine classes, namely because they aren't.

And besides, we're not even talking about more options in this sense. A cleric or druid who could sit down with the PHB and Spell Compendium and completely redress their character every day is an entirely different beast from a 4e character who instead of choosing between four level 3 daily powers now gets choose between nine or ten. They still only get one. That's only power creep if the newly introduced powers are much better than the core ones in every instance. They so far generally haven't been.

Sure I can ignore themes now, but what happens when they go core, and monsters get a power increase across the board?

I had thought we'd figured out by now that Dark Sun monsters aren't really any more powerful than MM3 monsters, and one extra encounter power doesn't exactly strike me as something that would cause across the board power surges in all monsters of any noticeable quality.

And if it does somehow get to that point? Either there'll be enough themes out by that point that players will be comfortable settling with one, or you can adjust your encounter difficulties accordingly. If your campaign's houserules make your PCs slightly weaker than core PCs, then your monsters need to be weakened accordingly. This really isn't a new phenomenon by any stretch of the imagination.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Yes, adding more options at chargen & level-up tends to cause power inflation. Each new options might interact with any prior option to create a broken combo of some sort. For power inflation, they don't even have to be that broken - just a little better than previous options.

 

[Klaus]

Oh... uh... yeah... well... your face gives a +2 to any trained skill!

...
Actually, I didn't even realize that was option; I always just thought of backgrounds as tool for when your chosen class lacks a skill that would make sense given your character's concept. That's certainly how I use them as a DM... I'd probably snip "+2 to trained skill" from the things backgrounds can give you.

Actually, you don't have to be trained in a skill to choose the "+2" option from a background.

 

[tyrlaan]

Well, no, they are optional. You don't have to take one. I have at least one player that would not take a theme unless it specifically fit his character, even if the entire rest of the party had them (although he would probably want to work out a custom theme, but that's a different discussion).

Eh, I consider this a weak argument because (a) the DM can and should inform the players upon character creation whether themes will or will not be used and (b) if the DM has players that cannot find themes they like for their characters, the DM should be working with said players to come up with a solution, be it homebrew themes, reskinned themes, or something else of a similar power level.

Basically, arguing there aren't enough themes is a valid argument, but it's not a valid argument for supporting the claim that some people at a gaming table will have themes and others won't, and therefore its power creep.

So your solution for increasing player power for no good reason is to add grind to every combat? No, thanks.

Well, you know, everyone will have an extra encounter power now, so how much grind are we seriously introducing here?

Seriously though, sidestepping a grind argument, there are plenty of alternatives, I just threw out one suggestion. If someone truly finds themes to be too powerful they could also, I dunno, increase monster damage.

Although... if you have grind concerns, themes should be a welcome addition to the game since it provides players another resource to speed things up.

Sure, it's a better game; quite frankly, characters should have had themes before they were released as a game mechanic. I don't need a theme to tell me that my wizard is a disciple of the frost acolytes, nor do I need to be enticed into doing so with a free "gimme" power. I just pick some cold powers and some cold feats and I freeze some punks to the floor.

You can't have it both ways. In the first sentence you say that themes are a great thing that should have always been here. In the second sentence you put them down, using the tired argument* that having them suggests that WotC thinks you need training wheels. Which one is it? And if they're a great thing, why are we even discussing power creep concerns?


*Yes, this is the first time I've heard this with regards to themes, but the line of thinking has been raised in other discussions of other topics plenty of times.

 

[Old Gumphrey]

When I said "characters should have had themes" I'm not talking about new game mechanics that did not even exist before last week, I'm talking about actual themes. You know, the word: theme. Wherein I can say "my wizard is a frost acolyte", and that is the theme of my character; I can then take largely cold based powers and feats and use those primarily, solidifying (heh!) my theme as a frost acolyte wizard. Again, I was not talking about the new game mechanic that I don't really support (why would I have been).

I swear it's nothing personal, but I'm really disappointed that our game is so rule-intensive now that I have to meticulously explain my use of the word "theme" in order to avoid confusion.

 

[Aegeri]

To be honest the drama some are making over this doesn't match how effective themes are in practice. They have the most dramatic effect at level 1 (duh) and rapidly drop off in significance. The power increase at heroic is noticeable yes, but they don't give you any more than an additional encounter power and balance out pretty evenly. Parties with themes have an additional neat option, but aren't significantly more powerful than a party without a theme by epic (where you'd expect that power creep to really hit if it was). In fact what I've noticed is that a theme makes lower level heroic tier battles more fun. It delays the "at-will" spam fest in many combats and means you can do a little more, like level 1 solo battles (I playtested a certain level 1 solo in my new Dark Sun game I am writing).

I do agree that this kind of power creep can get rapidly imbalanced and concerning if it's stacked on top of more elements. For example, if they make a background path that adds another encounter power or whatever else. At the moment, themes are a neat new option that doesn't imbalance anything that I can see at all (an extra encounter at level 1 makes heroic more fun IMO actually). It is entirely at the DMs discretion to use anyway and a character will suffer at first if they don't take one: but by the end of heroic tier it's a minor increase in effectiveness - not something that requires the DM to throw more monsters at the party (seriously, has anyone even tried playing with themed vs. unthemed parties? They are nowhere NEAR that mechanically ridiculous).

In the end 1 power is not worth the running around screaming that the power creep sky if falling. When they add more powers through backgrounds, free feats or something that bloats a PC into getting an additional 3+ encounters, dailies and this all stacks on top of themes we have a major problem.

At the moment we have a cool, balanced and not game breaking addition to 4E. Hell, I think levels 1-3 play far better with themes than without. The 2 games I've playtested with themes work out to be more fun at those really low heroic levels than my current IRL game (that is going to hit level 4 next week) did. They don't break the game at high levels and they reduce at-will spam fests in hardish early heroic tier encounters. Both of these argue that themes are a good new mechanic.

The only complaint you've made I see any real merit to is that there aren't enough themes to suit a variety of players. That I firmly agree with and I can't wait for the "core" themes to be added to the game.

One thing though:

So your solution for increasing player power for no good reason is to add grind to every combat? No, thanks.

Adding grind isn't required, they turn out to be a balanced and easily insertable element into 4E. It's just his idea and it would probably even work, but you act as if this is something that has to be done like we've determined they are imbalanced: As far as I've seen they aren't. I built both my upcoming new campaigns with themes in mind the same as I built my current IRL game. The games with themes just feel more fun in heroic and less grindy - but certainly not imbalanced or requiring the DM to throw in an extra monster. If you must know, my Dark Sun game TPKed both the theme and non-themed parties and took a lot of adjusting. The same adjusted encounters were a little less problematic for the party with themes - but bear in mind that is expected - but ultimately still very challenging for either group. What I did notice? The themed party were less reliant on pure dumb luck at level 1, having the extra encounter adds a solid "back up" option. It helps manage party resources more and reduced grind: But it didn't trivialize my encounters whatsoever. That's a success in my book.

Maybe I didn't see something game breaking when playtesting the early heroic, late paragon and late epic PCs that I built to model my parties in those games, but I didn't feel 1 theme encounter power broke anything anywhere. I felt the early heroic tier was more fun and I can't wait to see if my PCs feel the same!

 

[DracoSuave]

Yes, the themes give you an extra encounter power... but they aren't super-awesome encounter powers. The effects of some of them are pretty darn close to those of at-will powers...

...so... if themes are a huge power creep, then Diletante was the best racial in the game.

 

[tyrlaan]

"You must spread some Experience Points around before giving it to Aegeri again"