Potions of Resistance - bad for the game?

[keterys]

Why would they need to go to town to buy resist potions?

'If your party has resist potions, and sees an enemy that they work well against' is all that has to happen.

 

[Infiniti2000]

It's an issue all right. The simple example is a bunch of epic level characters. They can basically have infinity heroic tier resistance potions.

I think that's a false assumption. Infinity? Why doesn't that assumption fall under the bag o' rats rule?

Does everyone here just let the players keep clicking "Add" on the character builder?

 

[Rothe_]

I actually think that resist potions would have been a lot better if they worked a bit differently. I'd prefer some kind of ablative system, so that they work only on X attacks, or they have X total which gets reduced each time you are hit or something like that.

 

[eamon]

Resist 5 isn't enough (at epic) to cause game breakage. It's a solid advantage, sure. Combined with the action cost, I'd say it's fine: it's useful, but not broken. It rewards actually thinking about the enemy, and rewards planning - which can be a useful thing in a DM's toolbox; it's a minor plothook.

But, in general, I don't see the problem with PC's occasionally overwhelming an opponent simply by outsmarting them. Having situational effects matter makes the game world more real to me, and it's a way to bind the more power-gaming players into the plot.

I mean, compare this to 3.5 - there such effects were typically far more extreme, without rendering the game unplayable. Just because a few battles become trivial or impossible doesn't make the game unplayable, particularly in 4e, where retreat is actually a survivable option.

So, if you want to confront the players with a mono-culture of monsters dealing typed damage that they can easily prepare for, then yes, the potions of resistance are powerful. But I don't consider that a problem.

 

[tylermalan]

I think that's a false assumption. Infinity? Why doesn't that assumption fall under the bag o' rats rule?

Does everyone here just let the players keep clicking "Add" on the character builder?

This is exactly what I'm thinking. How could this ever actually happen?

 

[Ryujin]

Resist 5 isn't enough (at epic) to cause game breakage. It's a solid advantage, sure. Combined with the action cost, I'd say it's fine: it's useful, but not broken. It rewards actually thinking about the enemy, and rewards planning - which can be a useful thing in a DM's toolbox; it's a minor plothook.

But, in general, I don't see the problem with PC's occasionally overwhelming an opponent simply by outsmarting them. Having situational effects matter makes the game world more real to me, and it's a way to bind the more power-gaming players into the plot.

I mean, compare this to 3.5 - there such effects were typically far more extreme, without rendering the game unplayable. Just because a few battles become trivial or impossible doesn't make the game unplayable, particularly in 4e, where retreat is actually a survivable option.

So, if you want to confront the players with a mono-culture of monsters dealing typed damage that they can easily prepare for, then yes, the potions of resistance are powerful. But I don't consider that a problem.

The action cost can be key. Given that I have two ways to enhance damage that are contingent upon using a minor action, Warlock's Curse and Dirge of Inescapable Doom, actions are at a premium.

The first couple of rounds in any combat typically involve me tossing at will attacks while jockeying for position, singling out the toughest opponent for Death Mark, and then cutting loose with Cursebite and Cursegrind to soften up the field/sweep minions.

Then there's the action required to select the proper off-hand implement. Want to make sure that those minion archers on the hill go down? Well I'd better have the Rod of Corruption ready. The big guy is in the back where I can't curse him? That means starting with the Quickcurse Rod. No time for a potion. Think that I'd better pick up that Dawn Warrior Armour when I get the chance.

 

[Rothe_]

I mean, compare this to 3.5 - there such effects were typically far more extreme, without rendering the game unplayable. Just because a few battles become trivial or impossible doesn't make the game unplayable, particularly in 4e, where retreat is actually a survivable option.

In 3.5 edition you had more of a "protection vs. dispel" war going on. I did not like that so much, but one effect of that was that even high resistances could fall during the encounter and then you'd have to recast them or use scrolls or potions or whatever - it was a bigger drain on actions and resources in those kinds of fights.

 

[inkmonkeys]

Potions of resistance are not a problem. Ignoring the action cost, what the potion allows you to do is decide that one of your healing surges is worth less than reducing each [typed] hit by 5 for the rest of the encounter. The math on the healing surge depends on spending one not shortening your adventuring day: spending a healing surge to deal more damage is usually unacceptable, while spending one to reduce the damage you take is good, when balanced, because it translates directly into hit points reserved to be spent on fighting a later encounter.

The math looks something as follows: The game anticipates 15-25 monster attacks in a given fight. Equally spread over all the PCs, this is 3-5 attacks on each PC, or 1.5-2.5 hits. A heroic-tier potion is worth, then, 7.5-12.5 hit points (5 per hit) for that PC when all damage is of the right type. In practice, some PCs (such as defenders) take more attacks, which could inflate the value of a heroic-tier potion to 20-25 hit points. This is still far below the value of an epic character's healing surge. It increases present effectiveness at a cost of long-term effectiveness - it is the DM's responsibility to make this trade matter if he or she choose.

Naturally, the value of the potion varies by specific situations. Against enemies who all deal a small amount of fire damage followed by ongoing 5 fire damage, potions of fire resistance will make victory trivial. In a combat where the creatures dealing necrotic damage are artillery with good soldiers keeping you off their backs, there might be many more necrotic monster attacks, increasing the value of your potion. There are also fights where only one monster fights with typed damage, or where the monsters have multiple types at their disposal.

They're in the right place.

 

[keterys]

There are definitely many situations they're not worth using and many characters they aren't worth using on. But in the situations where they're worth using, they're often far more valuable than that.

For example, against a Beholder Eye of Flame they prevent 15 damage per turn (ongoing 5 + vulnerable 10 blocked), in addition to the 5 per hit. Against a Lich it blocks 5 per round from aura plus 5 per hit. Against a Pit Fiend potentially 5-15 per round, etc. And poor minions. 5-10 resist destroys energy-based minions entirely.

There are many characters who have sufficient surges that they are in no danger of running out of surges, but amount of usable hp in a single encounter is a big deal. For those characters (ie, many defenders and many Con-based other characters), the surge cost may be negligible or even non-existant. This is particularly true of LFR where it's insanely difficult to go through more than 8 surges per day, ever.

Now, for average use on average fights if you put it on everybody every fight - no way, totally inefficient.

 

[Diirk]

For example, against a Beholder Eye of Flame they prevent 15 damage per turn (ongoing 5 + vulnerable 10 blocked), in addition to the 5 per hit. Against a Lich it blocks 5 per round from aura plus 5 per hit. Against a Pit Fiend potentially 5-15 per round, etc. And poor minions. 5-10 resist destroys energy-based minions entirely. /QUOTE]

It doesn't actually prevent the vulnerable condition, so it would block 20 per turn, 10 from the fire ray, then 10 from the ongoing (which would be 15 due to the vulnerable). It costs a surge tho, which is fair considering the other ways to get resistance...

* In the paragon tier, you can get magic items that have 10 resistance to 1-2 types as properties.
* You can take a heroic item that lets you pick an energy type to gain 5 resistance to for the entire encounter when you spend an action point. * There's a background in Forgotten Realms that gives you minor energy resistance to several different energy types.

There's plenty more ways too, that don't cost healing surges.