The Power System, Combat, and the Rest of the Game

[Hexmage-EN]

Fourth Edition's power system is a huge departure from what came before and is a sign of the fundamental shift in design goals relative to Third Edition, one I'm not exactly sure how I feel about.

Things I Like
- Martial characters have many more options than in previous editions.
- The use of powers simulates a cinematic-feel to battle by keeping combatants moving and preventing situations where the same attack is used over and over (In movies combatants don't often stand toe-to-toe in one spot repeating the same attacks; They move around and try many different tactics).

Things I Don't Like
- The power listings eat-up huge amounts of space that could have been used for other purposes, such as flavor text.
- Some powers (Come and Get It!) are difficult to rationalize or have effects that seem unrelated to each other (such as the Cleric's hit-and-heal powers).
- Some powers seem unneccesarily restrictive.
- Although the limited-use powers keep battles interesting and simulate the sort of fights you see in movies, their mechanical limitations can seem jarring in terms of suspension of disbelief.

The biggest issue in my opinion, and the one I have mixed feelings about, is the difference between realistic and cinematic combat. It's probably one of the biggest distinctions between 4E and 3E.

In Third Edition non-spellcasters got the basic options (trip, disarm, sunder, bullrush, etc), a few class features (rage, sneak attack, etc), and maybe some feats (spring attack, shot on the run, etc). However, all of these options were usable at any time as long as requirements were met. This resulted in believable combat without artificial limitations. Unfortunately, this also meant that battles could become monotonous and that players could specialize their characters into using a limited amount of highly effective maneuvers constantly.

Fourth Edition's change in goals for combat affected nearly everything about the game. Powers were designed not just to represent the character's abilities, but to also enable interesting and varied combat. It did this by increasing the level of abstraction in combat relative to Third Edition and by imposing artificial rules on what the PCs can do.

For example, in Fourth Edition Martial characters cannot use the same encounter power more than once even though they are free to use another, equally as strenuous power. There's no good way to explain why this is so and retain verisimilitude. However, that's not the rule's purpose. It's purpose is to keep combat interesting and varied, and I think it's safe to say that Fourth Edition's gamist ruleset does that very well.

Combat in Third Edition (and previous editions) is designed to simulate a fantasy world (aside from certain abstractions, such as 6-foot swordsmen being able to kill giants with their blades), and combat in Fourth Edition is designed as a playable action movie scene that eschews realism in exchange for excitement. This approach to combat colors the rest of the game; in Fourth Edition's case, this approach rendered the game nearly unrecognizable as the newest edition of Dungeons and Dragons.

Remember how I mentioned that I liked 4E's cinematic feel to combat but didn't it's lack of verisimilitude? The problem is this: Cinematic combat and realistic combat seem to be diametrically opposed to one another.

Do you agree or disagree with my analysis? Which approach to player ability and combat do you think the next edition of the game should subscribe to? I personally hope for some sort of middle ground that can bring back a bit of simulationism without sacrificing mobile and exciting combat.

 

[merelycompetent]

Fourth Edition's power system is a huge departure from what came before and is a sign of the fundamental shift in design goals relative to Third Edition, one I'm not exactly sure how I feel about.

I am not sure that I agree with everything in your analysis, but I do find your thoughts very intriguing.

I think that you are on to something: Cinematic combat and realistic combat are diametrically opposed... in 4E. They didn't have to be.

I agree in large part with your analysis. I think it is too early to tell what approach will be taken with 5E - we need more play at Paragon and Epic levels before we can see the problem points in the current edition. I also hope for a middle ground, where game rules aren't jarring me out of the immersion so completely that I decide to walk out on this edition - much like I walked out of the theatre for a certain movie sequel long ago.

I'm interested in your thoughts on how this relates to other parts of 4E, and if you have more detailed examples of this effect in combat.

 

[chriton227]

For example, in Fourth Edition Martial characters cannot use the same encounter power more than once even though they are free to use another, equally as strenuous power. There's no good way to explain why this is so and retain verisimilitude. However, that's not the rule's purpose. It's purpose is to keep combat interesting and varied, and I think it's safe to say that Fourth Edition's gamist ruleset does that very well.

An odd thought struck me when I read this - do you think it would work if you decoupled the use of encounter (and possibly daily) powers from which specific power is used? For example, a 7 level character knows 3 encounter attack powers (lets call them A, B, and C). Instead of restricting the character to using each one once, they could use them in any combination, up to 3 per encounter (the number of encounter attack powers they know). So they could use A three times, or B once and C twice, or each one once, etc. You would probably need to keep the different categories separate (racial encounter powers, utility encounter powers, utility dailies, etc.), but this would return some of the flexibility that characters had with special combat maneuvers in 3.x.

 

[Cadfan]

I mostly agree with the OP.

The only quibble I'd give is this:

If you look into the issue of realism in combat in terms of "why can or can't I do X" then 3e is more realistic than 4e because in 3e you can try pretty much anything, although the rules might be set up so that it won't be a good idea, and in 4e you may flat out be unable to do something unless your DM is generous with ad hoc stunts. 3e's barriers are "soft" barriers in that regard. You can break through them if you like, but the game is set up so that you mostly will not want to. 4e's barriers are hard barriers. You simply can't go through them.

On the other hand, if you look at things in terms of "is the way this power is actually used in game realistic?" then 4e may present the more realistic outcome. Maybe. Its not guaranteed, and of course its all opinion. But for me, at some point plausibility of fight choreography as a whole should come into it.

3es system created barriers to the use of special attacks by martial characters. Generally it was some combination of opportunity attacks, auto failure if the OA hits you, multiple die rolls that all have to work right, the chance of having the special attack happen to you instead, and the loss of the chance to deal damage. That's a pretty significant barrier. But if you spent the appropriate feats to eliminate the barrier, it generally vanished completely, and you usually even got additional bonuses. You often reached the point where you might as well do the special attack every possible time its available, which due to the "realistic" rule of "you can always try anything you know how to do" means every single round against a special attack- vulnerable opponent.

And its just not that realistic for someone to use Whirlwind Attack every single round of the game for the rest of the career. Or at least it doesn't seem so to me. Ditto Trip, or Sunder. With the right feats all of these attacks can be rendered into every-round options that stack with or even increase regular damage. Its possible that others can as well, but I don't know the method.

I just don't think its a good idea to discuss reasonability or plausibility or realism without keeping in mind not only the question of "when can I or can't I do X," but also the question of "was my use of X over the course of my career, taken as a whole, plausible?"

It would be possible to construct a game system that was both realistic in the "when can I try X" and the "overall, how frequently is it plausible that I try X" manner. But neither game answers this completely for me at the moment, and I'm not quite sure how to make such a system without bogging things down in rules. For me, outcome is most important, not process, so I can deal with abstraction that brings about plausible outcomes better than I can deal with specificity and realism that ends up being gamed and bringing about unrealistic outcomes. So I favor the 4e system.

If an alternative cropped up, or some good houserules, I'd consider them, but I consider ease of play awfully important so they'd have to be reasonably elegant. I play D&D for the story and the roleplaying and the tactical choices, not the minutia.

 

[chaotix42]

An odd thought struck me when I read this - do you think it would work if you decoupled the use of encounter (and possibly daily) powers from which specific power is used? For example, a 7 level character knows 3 encounter attack powers (lets call them A, B, and C). Instead of restricting the character to using each one once, they could use them in any combination, up to 3 per encounter (the number of encounter attack powers they know). So they could use A three times, or B once and C twice, or each one once, etc. You would probably need to keep the different categories separate (racial encounter powers, utility encounter powers, utility dailies, etc.), but this would return some of the flexibility that characters had with special combat maneuvers in 3.x.

Probably a bad idea. As you move up in level you'll be getting powers that are quite often better than your earlier choices. This would allow players to use their 7th lvl encounter power 3 times, leaving their 3rd and 1st lvl powers to collect dust. Of course you'll see characters with 1st lvl and 3rd lvl powers that have their own merits when compared to their 7th lvl power, but I think it's a change to the system with a dangerous amount of potential.

 

[Ariosto]

The problem of repetitiveness comes from a game that essentially is just a puzzle with an ideal solution.

Is that a realistic feature in a representation of hand-to-hand combat? Does it resemble actual boxing or fencing? It does not seem so to me.

It might seem so if observed with a very gross level of resolution, an imprecision that blurs distinctions into a dull abstraction. It is details that make the difference.

4E involves a great mass of details, but they happen not to be realistic. The fencing rules in GDW's classic En Garde are orders of magnitude simpler, yet at once more realistic and not so "solvable" as quickly to grow stale. The WW1 aerial duel game Ace of Aces is another example. A skilled player may be able to pull "sure things" on novices time and again, but a match between two who know what they are about is a test of cunning. Both games are essentially variations on "rock, paper, scissors", distinguished chiefly by a larger number of possible permutations and by consequences of one choice upon the next.

I suspect it is only the arbitrary limitations that keep 4E tactics from becoming as stereotyped as those of some 3E optimizers. That is perhaps a bit offset by efforts so to balance Powers with each other (and everything else within the bigger scheme) that the choice of one or another is less significant. That (along with the shortage of external referents I can grasp) leaves me disengaged from the "kewlness" others see in the system.

We get variety in tactics when we can identify better from worse choices, but not always a single best one. It is most interesting when different options have notably different consequences of failure as well as of success, and when the range of possibilities depends upon a choice of similar scope on an opponent's part.

As I previously observed, that seems to me the nature of real-life fights. If that observation is accurate, then introducing similar factors should yield similar results.

For a "cinematic" game, it is a matter of introducing a set of appropriately unrealistic options with a similar set of factors.

 

[Cadfan]

I suspect it is only the arbitrary limitations that keep 4E tactics from becoming as stereotyped as those of some 3E optimizers.

Well, yes. Although I'd dispute whether it takes an optimizer to realize how to use Improved Trip, or how to stack it with another feat that grants a bonus to trip attempts. This seems to set the bar for "optimizer" dreadfully low.

We get variety in tactics when we can identify better from worse choices, but not always a single best one.

It would be better to say that the games you mention obtain variety in tactics through a bluffing mechanism, much like most fighting games, whether electronic or boardgame. This is close to what you're describing here, but is a very different context. Its one that could be translated into an RPG (just as you could have an RPG where combat was resolved through a card game, you could have one that resolves combat through a boardgame fighting game), but it would be tough and definitely strenuous on the DM, since the very concept relies on a competent opponent actively and seriously attempting to defeat you. It would be tough to do that simultaneously versus five players.

As I previously observed, that seems to me the nature of real-life fights. If that observation is accurate, then introducing similar factors should yield similar results.

For a "cinematic" game, it is a matter of introducing a set of appropriately unrealistic options with a similar set of factors.

That's very easy to say. The question, of course, is how to actually accomplish that without creating other negative effects, like a bloat of minutia that must be memorized to properly evaluate and carry out the choices you make.

This isn't the first thread where you've said this. I still have no idea how you expect this could actually be accomplished. Have you ever elaborated?

 

[wedgeski]

We get variety in tactics when we can identify better from worse choices, but not always a single best one. It is most interesting when different options have notably different consequences of failure as well as of success, and when the range of possibilities depends upon a choice of similar scope on an opponent's part.

When you DM and watch a 5 player 4E combat encounter in action, what quickly becomes clear is not that players are always asking themselves "What is the optimal Power for me this round?", but instead, "What is the optimal Power for the party this round?". I see this much more in the current edition than I did before, YMMV.

When interesting strategic options have the potential for a cool, dramatic, or simply high-damage pay-off, players will look for them. D&D combats are not duels. Powers weave with those of other PC's and create synnergies that often aren't obvious, but that an experienced group will start to look for and try to make happen.

The Power system absolutely nails this as far as I'm concerned, but the trade-off's in simulated realism are there and you have to be prepared to accept them.

 

[Mallus]

In Third Edition non-spellcasters got the basic options (trip, disarm, sunder, bullrush, etc), a few class features (rage, sneak attack, etc), and maybe some feats (spring attack, shot on the run, etc). However, all of these options were usable at any time as long as requirements were met. This resulted in believable combat without artificial limitations.

As the player of a successful 3e pole-arm trip-monkey and the DM of a successful 3e melee archer, I politely disagree that 3e resulted in believable combat.

3e resulted in combat that was as strange and game-y (and fun!) as 4e, just in a different way.

Also, those artificial limitations boil down to 'during the course of the day, some martial attacks are more effective than others'. This is true for every edition of D&D. The only difference is 4e places more control over when those effective attacks occur in the player's hands, rather than relying on probability and the DM creating exploitable opportunities via fiat.

 

[TerraDave]

in Fourth Edition's case, this approach rendered the game nearly unrecognizable as the newest edition of Dungeons and Dragons.

(Without reading the rest of the thread) I was with you for a lot of your post. But this, I do not agree with. Its still D&D and very recognizable as such.