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General Tabletop Discussion
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
[Very Long] Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War: a Key Difference in D&D Play Styles...
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<blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5810279" data-attributes="member: 54877"><p>I pretty much run 4E the way I ran Arcana Evolved, 3E, and Fantasy Hero--the style we like, which is a mix of sandbox, lots of mystery/intrigue, and action adventure. So as you say, story predictability is put heavy on the players' shoulders--i.e. they can get wiped out if they aren't careful, and I won't save them.</p><p> </p><p>One of the most difficult things that we had to adjust to with 4E was the extreme focus on the action economy. It is mitigated somewhat by usually having a larger group than normal, but my experience with 4E is that the risk of unexpected character death is lower, but the risk of a TPK is far higher as a percentage of all deaths. We had a 3 year 3E campaign that had several deaths in it, but was never in the slightest danger of a TPK. The Fantasy Hero game had deaths avoided only by special resources, but no TPK. We had one close TPK when only 4 players showed and I did not adjust the adventure.</p><p> </p><p>But in 4E, we've had everyone down into single digits or dying many times--and I don't merely mean in that well-known 4E manner of "seemed almost dead and then broke out the dailies to reverse the trend." In fact, it reminds me of the TPKs I had in Basic and 1E, except that there are enough hit points and other resources that it isn't so swingy, and thus the TPKs have been avoided. But you probably know the ones I mean, where the cleric went down, and within 2 rounds, everyone else was either dead or about to be. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite8" alt=":D" title="Big grin :D" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":D" /></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Crazy Jerome, post: 5810279, member: 54877"] I pretty much run 4E the way I ran Arcana Evolved, 3E, and Fantasy Hero--the style we like, which is a mix of sandbox, lots of mystery/intrigue, and action adventure. So as you say, story predictability is put heavy on the players' shoulders--i.e. they can get wiped out if they aren't careful, and I won't save them. One of the most difficult things that we had to adjust to with 4E was the extreme focus on the action economy. It is mitigated somewhat by usually having a larger group than normal, but my experience with 4E is that the risk of unexpected character death is lower, but the risk of a TPK is far higher as a percentage of all deaths. We had a 3 year 3E campaign that had several deaths in it, but was never in the slightest danger of a TPK. The Fantasy Hero game had deaths avoided only by special resources, but no TPK. We had one close TPK when only 4 players showed and I did not adjust the adventure. But in 4E, we've had everyone down into single digits or dying many times--and I don't merely mean in that well-known 4E manner of "seemed almost dead and then broke out the dailies to reverse the trend." In fact, it reminds me of the TPKs I had in Basic and 1E, except that there are enough hit points and other resources that it isn't so swingy, and thus the TPKs have been avoided. But you probably know the ones I mean, where the cleric went down, and within 2 rounds, everyone else was either dead or about to be. :D [/QUOTE]
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