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Why is Hoard of the Dragon Queen such a bad adventure?
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<blockquote data-quote="MoutonRustique" data-source="post: 6480240" data-attributes="member: 22362"><p>If there's no information that the party can obtain to tell them that they are not prepared for the battle, then it's bad design.</p><p></p><p>In D&D, the <em><strong>extremely</strong></em> basic premise is often : confront, loot.</p><p></p><p>Considering the game's history, that players expect an encounter presented w/o significant tells to be w/ their power range is pretty standard. You may not agree, and you are most certainly allowed to, but I would put forward that you are wrong*.</p><p></p><p>*By this I mean that your interpretation is based upon your personal preference and that it does not align with the "standard" interpretation.</p><p></p><p>If you play with a group of players who have "been trained" to always* attempt to gain information on foes before they confront them and that this information can be related to in-game power levels, then, indeed, you can use any level of power for encounters and it does not constitute bad design since it is assumed that players will be in a position to make an informed choice.</p><p></p><p>I would argue that this is not the case for most campaigns/encounters/situations/players. When players don't have the information to make an informed choice, presenting them with a situation for which there is a "right" and a "wrong" answer is, in modern design theory, pretty bad design.</p><p></p><p><em>As a example of my meaning:</em> If your characters include "knight" types and you face them with a wandering goblin band from which they should hide to notice that the band is stronger than first appeared - you've just created a badly designed situation : if your players role play, the game ends. If your players break character through meta-game habits, you've "broken" the knight character(s) and rewarded him(her) for it. From my perspective, that's a lose/lose.</p><p></p><p>Having the game require specific approaches can be good, as long as it's explicit. I believe, that in D&D's case, it isn't - which can lead to many bad situations.</p><p></p><p>While I've not finished reading the DMG completely, I have not seen this addressed... which is a shame, as it is a core component of a great play experience! (IME)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="MoutonRustique, post: 6480240, member: 22362"] If there's no information that the party can obtain to tell them that they are not prepared for the battle, then it's bad design. In D&D, the [I][B]extremely[/B][/I] basic premise is often : confront, loot. Considering the game's history, that players expect an encounter presented w/o significant tells to be w/ their power range is pretty standard. You may not agree, and you are most certainly allowed to, but I would put forward that you are wrong*. *By this I mean that your interpretation is based upon your personal preference and that it does not align with the "standard" interpretation. If you play with a group of players who have "been trained" to always* attempt to gain information on foes before they confront them and that this information can be related to in-game power levels, then, indeed, you can use any level of power for encounters and it does not constitute bad design since it is assumed that players will be in a position to make an informed choice. I would argue that this is not the case for most campaigns/encounters/situations/players. When players don't have the information to make an informed choice, presenting them with a situation for which there is a "right" and a "wrong" answer is, in modern design theory, pretty bad design. [I]As a example of my meaning:[/I] If your characters include "knight" types and you face them with a wandering goblin band from which they should hide to notice that the band is stronger than first appeared - you've just created a badly designed situation : if your players role play, the game ends. If your players break character through meta-game habits, you've "broken" the knight character(s) and rewarded him(her) for it. From my perspective, that's a lose/lose. Having the game require specific approaches can be good, as long as it's explicit. I believe, that in D&D's case, it isn't - which can lead to many bad situations. While I've not finished reading the DMG completely, I have not seen this addressed... which is a shame, as it is a core component of a great play experience! (IME) [/QUOTE]
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Why is Hoard of the Dragon Queen such a bad adventure?
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