Walking Death

[Garthanos]

Still 20 damage save ends is absurdly useless...

either it needs to reed: 20 ongoing. Heal xxx ends.

Save ends absolutely makes no sense here...

Ah good idea...I like that.... or even make it a skill challenge to place the silly thing and make it well relatively absolute the injury is an affliction and the subject/there companions will need to recognise its not just a gas attack and an accelerated remove afliction ritual brought to bear or the character is dead. Now the npcs might twist the plot by putting in a replacement for the one you killed and you have to find away to reveal the duplicate insert plotting and such.....

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Well, not every poisonable NPC needs to have hundreds of hit points. If you want to take down an (non-combatant) enemy king that hides behind thousands of soldiers without getting killed in the process, you slip Walking Death into his food and go away. A few hours later, he's dead.

This poison serves more of a storytelling device than an actual weapon for the PCs.

Wouldn't such a character be a minion? You shouldn't need such an expensive poison.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

As for the main article, I don't mind them taking risks on concepts, you need to do that if you're going to get more interesting content. If you end up with the joker or that wierd one about crippling people occasinally. . . .so be it.

However, the poison itself resides in a pretty dodgy quasi-system space. Clearly this should be a plot event either way- done by an npc, or done by PCs as part of the plot.

Thing is, they could have a system for plot events like poisons and major curses- even if it was more of a tickbox or organised summary of the idea pre-packaged with tropes and advice, just a way of organising them so the GM could look over such options.

And of course, this is a consumable item, and like most of them, it's just wierd to be dropping all that permanent cash in a game where most of yourr cash stays with you. They really need to fix rituals/items/consumables.

I don't think there's any fundamental issue with consumables, but I agree that these kinds of 'plot device' sorts of elements really don't belong in the realm of defined system mechanics. Poisoning someone like this isn't something that happens in combat, and outside of combat we're into the realm of unstructured play, skill challenges, and DM fiat.

I'd think a good article on how DMs can work in plot devices, the appropriate ways they can interact with mechanics when there is a transition from unstructured play to structured encounters, and related storytelling techniques would be a great thing. This is an area where most DMs are weak and opportunities to fudge things up are multitudinous.

This kind of thing has been a need since long before the advent of 4e as well. I don't know if it was ever touched on in the 3.5 days, but it was certainly an aspect of the game that was completely ignored back in AD&D. I seem to recall various attempts at different times to introduce game elements that operated in this space, but they were all largely similar to this Walking Death thing, pretty much useless as is.

Personally if I were introducing something like Walking Death into my game I would use the disease track to structure its effects on a PC. For an NPC I would just designate a plot effect, the NPC dies or the NPC is incapacitated for X amount of time, or the NPC's stats are modified in such-and-such a way (say if the PCs still have to encounter the NPC later).

In terms of costs for these kinds of 'plot devices' I don't think a fixed cost factor really works. I guess it is OK to have some sort of cost basis you can work from, but the cost really should be a reflection of the plot leverage gained by the players. If they were to say have a choice of fighting the NPC or offing them with a poison then charging them some gold so they can follow the more reliable and safer course is fine. Truthfully it is a choice between acting like adventurers and acting like part of the plot themselves at that point. Not much different from a PC wizard who can go adventuring to make money or kick back and sell magic items to make less money. Nobody in that case would complain that the less money is a 'cost' to the character, but it effectively is.

 

[Garthanos]

I don't think there's any fundamental issue with consumables, but I agree that these kinds of 'plot device' sorts of elements really don't belong in the realm of defined system mechanics. Poisoning someone like this isn't something that happens in combat, and outside of combat we're into the realm of unstructured play, skill challenges, and DM fiat.

I'd think a good article on how DMs can work in plot devices, the appropriate ways they can interact with mechanics when there is a transition from unstructured play to structured encounters, and related storytelling techniques would be a great thing. This is an area where most DMs are weak and opportunities to fudge things up are multitudinous.

This kind of thing has been a need since long before the advent of 4e as well. I don't know if it was ever touched on in the 3.5 days, but it was certainly an aspect of the game that was completely ignored back in AD&D. I seem to recall various attempts at different times to introduce game elements that operated in this space, but they were all largely similar to this Walking Death thing, pretty much useless as is.

Personally if I were introducing something like Walking Death into my game I would use the disease track to structure its effects on a PC. For an NPC I would just designate a plot effect, the NPC dies or the NPC is incapacitated for X amount of time, or the NPC's stats are modified in such-and-such a way (say if the PCs still have to encounter the NPC later).

In terms of costs for these kinds of 'plot devices' I don't think a fixed cost factor really works. I guess it is OK to have some sort of cost basis you can work from, but the cost really should be a reflection of the plot leverage gained by the players. If they were to say have a choice of fighting the NPC or offing them with a poison then charging them some gold so they can follow the more reliable and safer course is fine. Truthfully it is a choice between acting like adventurers and acting like part of the plot themselves at that point. Not much different from a PC wizard who can go adventuring to make money or kick back and sell magic items to make less money. Nobody in that case would complain that the less money is a 'cost' to the character, but it effectively is.

I will call bingo on that entire post! ... very good.

 

[Garthanos]

Ah good idea...I like that.... or even make it a skill challenge to place the silly thing and make it well relatively absolute the injury is an affliction and the subject/there companions will need to recognise its not just a gas attack and an accelerated remove afliction ritual brought to bear or the character is dead. Now the npcs might twist the plot by putting in a replacement for the one you killed and you have to find away to reveal the duplicate insert plotting and such.....

I would like to note that I treat real wounds on npcs as pretty much as an affliction (they are not really hit point loss ... invigoration and inspiration wont fix it) so this goes right along with those commenting on the target are they a minion? doesnt matter.

 

[Klaus]

Wouldn't such a character be a minion? You shouldn't need such an expensive poison.

I think the poison would be better served if it imposed a penalty to saves. That makes the Epic poison deadlier regardless of the actual ammount of damage.

Hmm... now I want to posion the PCs with Walking Death...

 

[Dausuul]

It's worth noting that the new executioner assassin poisons are much better. They typically take effect immediately, and in most cases impose penalties that last until the end of the victim's next extended rest. Of course, you have to be an assassin to make them.

Walking Death, on the other hand, is worthless.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Poison in general hasn't been handled well in 4e. The original DMG rules for it were OK as far as they went, but the subject needed a more in-depth treatment. Then over time instead of building on that base they simply introduced a whole slew of incompatible and contradictory different mechanical approaches to the same thing. You have the old DDI poisoner feats, then the Alchemy poisons, and then various other things including some of the mechanics used with various monsters that weren't particularly consistent either. Now we're back with more alchemy based stuff AND the newer versions of the assassin with yet more slightly different ways to handle it.

I wish they would just go back to the DMG and update everything else to be consistent with that. Alchemy is ALMOST mechanically consistent, only the terminology is a bit different. The new assassin stuff is a bit different. I can see why mechanically they had each approach, but it really doesn't do much except make the whole subject confusing.

 

[RangerWickett]

Does anyone know of an alternative alchemical system for 4e? My players who want to use alchemical items and poisons are both annoyed and disillusioned. They're pretty much never worth the money and action economy, and that just seems like a shame.

First, use the inherent bonuses system.

Second, scrap the entire magic item economy, especially the prices. There's no longer any such thing as a +2 sword. It's just a magic sword with some sort of special power. Any sort of 'daily' power should cost healing surges.

Third, create a whole new system. Decide if you want alchemicals to be trinkets that are useful in niche situations (and so don't need to be rare), or very powerful (so they should be hard to come by).

If the former, maybe make a variety of alchemicals akin to the number of weapons. Some target Fort, some Ref, some Will. Some use Dexterity because you throw them. Others use Intelligence because you deploy them. Most are one-handed, but a few are two-handed. If they do damage, it's usually less than a comparable weapon. They don't have proficiency bonuses.

Like for instance:

Alchemist Fire. One-handed. Dex vs. Reflex. Target: One creature. Hit: Ongoing 5 fire damage (save ends). Add your inherent enhancement bonus to this ongoing damage.

Tanglefoot Bag. One-handed. Dex vs. Reflex. Target: One creature. Hit: Target is restrained (escape DC = 10 + half your level).

Thunderstone. One-handed. Dex vs. Fortitude. Area burst 1 within 10. Target: Creatures in burst. Hit: Target is deafened and grants combat advantage (save ends).

Caltrop Grease. Two-handed. Area: Wall 3 within 1. Effect: You create a zone in the area that lasts until the end of the encounter. Whenever a creature enters the zone, make the following attack. Int vs. Fortitude. Hit: 1d4+Int damage and the target is slowed (save ends).


If the latter, balance them with the action economy. Sure, your dread alchemist incendiary will make a huge explosion, but it requires a standard action to mix the alchemicals, and another standard action to hurl it. And if you don't hurl it within a round, it explodes in your hand.

Either way, nothing should cost a lot of money, because money should not be a critical resource. Having 100,000 gp doesn't make you better at killing than someone with just 100 gp. You just have a wider selection of toys.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Treating it like an affliction more or less translates into:

heal xx ends!

The important part here however is, that a hard check is needed to succed, and endurance does not help here, as you already failed your fort check...

If it is a minion, 20 damage dave ends is too much, if it is not, it makes no sense.

If you need a heal check, you have not so much ime to call for help, but it is still possible, if a healer happens to hang around, and suddenly your HP make a difference between dying and surviving.