Pathfinder 1E WotC desperately needs to learn from Paizo and Privateer Press

[Obryn]

The effort it takes to create fluff spontaneously is greater than the effort it takes to convert existing fluff. The converse is much harder- removing pointless time-wasting combats from the adventure changes the difficulty- less combats mean less loot and exp.

This is completely opposite what I experience.

I can create fluff all day long. Heck; fluff arises spontaneously during my games on a regular basis. Crunch is what has taken up my prep time from the beginning, and it's fairly plug-and-playable to any campaign. Fluff is much, much harder to re-use, and requires much less time. All IME, of course.

According to who? There is a middle ground. Now if only they'd work in it...

IMO, what you're looking at in 4e is the middle ground. Oldschool products often have much less fluff (look at Tomb of Horrors as an example), and Paizo represents the opposite extreme. (And Earthdawn was probably even higher for lots of its products.)

-O

 

[Dice4Hire]

Combat is great fun, and I think combat in 4e is the most fun of any edition.

I very strongly agree with this with a single cavet.

I really do not like the attrition expectation of 4E combat. If you have one encounter a day, the characters blow through dailies and really give themselves a nice power boost, especially with effects that last till the end of the turn. 4E seems to be set up for 4 or so encounters per day.

It is quite hard to balance a very nasty single encounter fight. Especially if it is the only fight of the day.

 

[Hjorimir]

It is quite hard to balance a very nasty single encounter fight. Especially if it is the only fight of the day.

I've had good success with n+5 for the encounter budget for a single encounter meant to really push them to near limits.

 

[delericho]

I wouldn´t refer to it as a "campaign-in-a-box" (see below why).

Maybe a slight disconnect: by "campaign in a box", I just meant any campaign where everything is provided for you to use as-is - the adventures, the setting, source materials... and so an Adventure Path (or megaadventure like "Castle Whiterock" could qualify), not just an out-of-the-box sandbox. (And, heck, "Legacy of Fire" even includes pre-gen PCs!)

It is, of course, possible that I was using it incorrectly.

An Out-of-the-box campaign with a sandbox feeling to it, on the other hand, can be a great experience, if done right.

Yes, I quite agree.

 

[Hussar]

/snip
To my mind WotC don't need to "learn" from the likes of Paizo, they have simply chosen to do things differently. Paizo know their market, they know the kind of person that is buying their product, and they're aiming at them with complete precision. Similarly, WotC know how to sell their game, and it seems to be doing very well for them. It's a mistake to think that the folks at either company are simply better at what they do than their equivalents at the other... they're all immensely talented, and operating under the instructions given to them by the guys shouldering the risk.

Buried on the first page, but, this cannot possibly be repeated enough. Different strokes, folks. Different strokes.

 

[Hussar]

Bedtime stories make for excellent adventures.

Sorry for the bit of dogpile here, but, this point also needs to be repeated. Mostly because when I go to the local library, I've got dozens and dozens of professionally written fantasy novels to choose from. Why oh why do I need to buy that in my game books as well?

 

[Jack99]

I've had good success with n+5 for the encounter budget for a single encounter meant to really push them to near limits.

Sounds about right. Just beware to run that kind of fights when they have had 4 fights and no rest before. That will put a stop to your campaign.. *cough*

 

[Mr. Wilson]

I've had good success with n+5 for the encounter budget for a single encounter meant to really push them to near limits.

I agree. I ran a 9th level one shot to test some solo monster mechanics for an adventure I may write, and I used a 5k XP budget. Combat lasted forever (3 1/2 hours) but it was because they had 2 solos (one brute, one skirmisher) to blow through plus assorted minions, 2 controllers, and a soldier. One player had never played 4E before, and the group has never been above 5th level before, so that probably also played a factor in the amount of time it took. The encounter left them gassed and out of powers (as it should), but they said they had a blast.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Woo hoo! A 3.X/4e thread where I can take an edition neutral stance!

I was not all that happy with WotC's 3.X adventures, for much the same reason that I do not like 4e - they felt... generic, and kind of bland. Not offensive, but nothing that I ever felt the need to buy. Sort of like fast food - strong flavors offend some folks, so there is a tendency toward the bland, not because anyone will love it, but so that no one will hate it.

So, I bought from 3rd party publishers, largely on the grounds that I liked their fluff. The late and much lamented Monkey God Publishing comes to mind, in particular. Paizo's Adventure Paths, both current and in Dungeon, had a good deal of flavor, and also did not go out of their way to lock into the one adventure=one level mentality - while most gave at least one level's worth of XP, some gave more, and a few gave two levels worth.

Privateer Press... I love the setting, but the Witchfire Trilogy was more than a bit of a railroad, and did not go far enough in regards to the unique flavor of the setting. (In some cases they couldn't - the game mechanics supporting some of that flavor had yet to be released.)

So, yeah, while fluff and setting flavor can make it hard to transport an adventure to a different setting, they are really some of the things that I look for. I like to feel that the adventures are part of the setting, whether the setting is the Iron Kingdoms or Eberron.

The Auld Grump, come to think of it, that was part of the reason the recent X Files movie fell flat for me - there was no reason for the heroes to be Moulder and Skully, they could have been anyone.

 

[JeffB]

Worth repeating.

Did anyone like the 3e modules that went from 1-20?

(I liked Speaker of Dreams, but then that was the first module I bought. It was an urban adventure with monsters. It did it for me.)

I bought them all- TSC was decent (if only for the B1 reference) , and FoF, a bit less so. I didn't care for any of the other adventures in that series at all. Fundamental disconnect between what WOTC thought was "cool" and what *I* think is cool, I guess.