GM Prep Time - Cognitive Dissonance in Encounter Design?

[MrMyth]

Nope, I apologize, I read it wrong and interpreted it with a bias that I felt was being expressed in this thread. Sorry about that.

Hey, no worries, always better to try and get these things clarified - and given that I think there are useful areas of this discussion to still explore, making sure things don't stray purely into edition-delineated arguments is certainly a good thing!

 

[Wicht]

You said their place in the market. Not the number of modules sold.

Am I understanding that you think they are a bigger market force but are selling less than they were two years ago. That is their product output is shrinking but their market influence is growing?

 

[billd91]

Ok, I do see what you are saying better now. And you are right - a good DM can definitely keep such encounters interesting. Every enemy being the same mechanically doesn't mean they act the same tactically, or display the same personality.

<snip>
For most DMs, it is more engaging to run an orc band that has one or two leaders, several warriors, and a number of grunts. Even if you can just take 10 identical guys and have one act like the chief and a few act like his bodyguards, I think something is lost of he is identical to the least of his grunts. It certainly works in a pinch, but wouldn't be an approach I think most would favor.

Nonetheless, your preferred gaming style is certainly your own choice to make. But I will still find it strange that you actively dislike 4E for taking this approach. If you don't choose to use it, it certainly doesn't impede your games - and I think it benefits many, many others.

I actively dislike 4e for a lot of things, some of which probably stem more from ignorant 4e fans than the game itself. For instance, anyone who thinks that orc groups were undifferentiated warriors in any edition previous to 4e hasn't really been paying attention to the orc entries in the Monster Manuals, yet some 4e fans seem to think it's novel. So, in some ways, I think 4e suffers in my esteem because of the company it keeps.
That doesn't mean there are real design philosophies I dislike (like Noonan's statement indicates) but there you have it.

 

[Barastrondo]

So, in some ways, I think 4e suffers in my esteem because of the company it keeps.

Every game ever suffers in someone's esteem for that reason. I try to balance it out by taking into account that there are some really talented, excellent human beings out there who enjoy almost any system I can name. (The few exceptions are not worth naming.) Otherwise I couldn't play anything.

 

[Beginning of the End]

The deception is that except in rare cases (spellcasting monsters), 4e isn't a hell of a long way ahead of 3e in terms of options for the monsters.

You can't have it both ways: Either 4th Edition stat blocks feature more options for monsters or they feature fewer options for monsters. Make up your mind.

Or do you seriously roll for all your monsters when DMing when they aren't interacting with PCs?

I never said that I did.

What we're talking about is the interaction between NPCs and PCs. You, like Noonan, are apparently equating "things happening outside of combat" with "time the PCs aren't interacting with the NPCs".

The middle that you're falsely excluding is that many of us run adventures that aren't combat slogs. Stuff happens outside of combat. The actions of NPCs are not limited to 5 rounds of combat and "they're done".

It is, as I have said before, precisely this attitude of "five rounds later, they're done" -- an attitude that NPCs don't exist outside of combat -- on the part of the WotC designers that results in modules which don't have anything happening outside of combat.

The connection between "I don't think NPCs exist outside of combat" and "I've designed an adventure in which nothing happens outside of combat" is so crystal clear I am baffled that there are people in this thread (or anywhere else) arguing that there isn't a connection.

I agree with both. If you read some of the things I've said, I would like more non combat elements added to WoTC adventures. None of my home games are combat only either.

Then why did you describe Noonan's claim that NPCs exist only in combat a being a "truthful statement"?

Yes, 5 x 5 i= 25... But if it takes 5 hours to get from here to East Overtheresville, putting 5 people in the car isn't going to suddenly turn it into a 25 hour trip! (Although I suppose if one of those people is your mother in law it might FEEL like 25 hours...)

What relevance does that have to what we're talking about?

Each round each NPC has to select an action. If there are 5 NPCs using the same stat block and 5 rounds, then 25 actions have to be selected from that stat block.

(In reality the number is actually higher because of passive and reactionary abilities.)

There might be a couple of abilities out there where two identical creatures have to cooperate to achieve a particular effect (which would be analogous to everyone in the car participating in the same activity), but they're the exception to the rule.

2) If the combat is over in 5 rounds, each monster won't necessarily live that long. Some will be dying out in rounds 3 and 4, and so forth.

What I actually said (echoing what Noonan said): "If we have an encounter with 5 of those monsters at the same time and each of them survives an average of 5 rounds, then that stat block actually needs to fill up 25 rounds worth of actions." (emphasis added)

Some monsters will last 1 round. Some monsters will last 9 rounds. But if their average lifespan is 5 rounds and there are 5 of them, then they will have 25 actions (assuming 1 action per round).

That's the heart of the debate. Detect Thoughts is an example of something that would very occasionally have a scenario in which it is especially useful. Noonan would, perhaps, feel that these scenarios are rare enough that it is not needed to be preserved in the stat block. Some might agree, some might object. That's one thing.

I agree. That is the heart of the debate.

And I'm arguing that when you use "is this ability useful in combat?" as your standard for whether or not abilities should be cut, then it's highly suggestive that your focus is on combat. Furthermore, the implications for applying this standard in terms of support for combat encounters vs. non-combat content is clear.

And, furthermore, when that question is being asked because your underlying philosophy is that NPCs and PCs don't interact outside of combat, the impact of that philosophy on your adventure design should be obvious.

(As others have mentioned - an encounter that consists of 5 copies of the same monster is completely against standard 4E encounter design.)

Someone should tell WotC's designers.

Let's take Keep on the Shadowfell. There are 14 encounters 5+ copies of the same monster (On the Road, A2, A3, Area 4, Area 5, Area 7, Area 9, Area 10, Interlude 3, Area 12, Area 13, Area 17, Area 18, Area 19); there are 6 encounters with 3-4 copies (A1, A4, Area 2, Area 3, Area 6, Area 14); and only 4 encounters without 3+ duplicate stat blocks (Area 1, Area 8, Area 11, Area 15).

That's a 5:1 ratio of 3+ duplicates to non-duplicate encounters.

Maybe this has changed? The most recent Dungeon adventure I have access to is Throne of the Stone-Skinned King.

5+: 1
3-4: 4
< 3: 5

That's at least an even-split, but still seems to be showing duplicate stat block encounters to be fairly common. What about Prince of Undeath? The random encounters are:

5+: 4
3-4: 4
< 3: 3

The tactical encounters are:

5+: 18
3-4: 4
< 3: 8

For a whopping total of 30:11. The ratio has shrunk somewhat from KotS, but is still showing a heavy preponderance of the types of encounters you claim shouldn't exist in 4th Edition.

But I do think it is fair to say that encounters with more diversity are inherently more interesting...

Sure. And since there's no difference in the amount of mechanical support for diverse encounters between 3rd Edition and 4th Edition, that particular issue is essentially irrelevant.

For example, I've been recently prepping Monte Cook's 3.5 adventure Dark Tidings.

1 stat block: 4
2+ stat blocks: 6

But what I'm talking about the tactical flexibility which comes from a single stat block. Encounter build only becomes important in pointing out one of three separate flaws in Noonan's argument, and even then the diversity of encounter build is not important -- only the presence of multiple instances of a single stat block in a single encounter (which has been amply demonstrated above).

 

[FireLance]

You can't have it both ways: Either 4th Edition stat blocks feature more options for monsters or they feature fewer options for monsters. Make up your mind.

It actually depends on the monster. It's a broad generalization, but 4E "spellcaster" types tend to have fewer options and 4E "melee attacker" types tend to have more options than their 3E and earlier counterparts.

In addition to having a basic melee attack, a 4E melee attacker might have a more powerful encounter or rechargable ability that it could use once or twice in a fight. And instead of having a dozen or more spells or spell-like abilities, a 4E spellcaster would have not more than six combat options (and possibly a few more if it is an elite or a solo monster).

The general rule of thumb, it seems to me, is for 4E monsters to have between two to four options in combat, at least at the start, before encounter abilities are used.

 

[Imaro]

It actually depends on the monster. It's a broad generalization, but 4E "spellcaster" types tend to have fewer options and 4E "melee attacker" types tend to have more options than their 3E and earlier counterparts.

In addition to having a basic melee attack, a 4E melee attacker might have a more powerful encounter or rechargable ability that it could use once or twice in a fight. And instead of having a dozen or more spells or spell-like abilities, a 4E spellcaster would have not more than six combat options (and possibly a few more if it is an elite or a solo monster).

The general rule of thumb, it seems to me, is for 4E monsters to have between two to four options in combat, at least at the start, before encounter abilities are used.

I call bull on this, the only way a 3e melee attacker monster/NPC has fewer options than a 4e melee attacker monster/NPC is if you disregard the application of classes, feats, prestige classes, etc. when designing it. Otherwise it becomes a matter of number of options being relatively scalable in 3e to how much effort one is willing to put into personalizing the monster.

Edit: I actually think one of the downsides to 4e is the fact that there isn't a base creature that can be built upon and personalized by the DM... but a continuous stream of individual variations, that, IMO, are defined by pretty minute differences.

 

[pemerton]

True. But everything is relative. I know there are a lot of people who really enjoy having more depth to non-combat than simply "these are resolved via skill challenges, with DCs set in accordance with the rules in the DMG and DMG2."

I'm sure there are such people. But in my view this is not an issue about depth of non-combat resolution. It is about method of non-combat resolution. I suspect that such people wouldn't like games like HeroQuest or Burning Wheel, which use mechanics broadly comparable to skill challenges to resolve non-combat encounters. But these other games are hardly ones that can be described as being shallow in their non-combat encounter resolution.

What I think is an issue directly relevant to encounter design is that WotC seems to have great difficulties in presenting published examples of non-shallow skill challenges. I'm not a subscriber to Insider, so haven't seen more recent examples in the magazines, but even the examples in the DMG2 are somewhat underbaked. Of the adventures I've seen, the best developed skill challenges in thematic and narrative terms are probably in Heathen, an adventure in one of the early free 4e Dungeon magazines. But these could also use work.

So giving a particular system credit for the variety that these changes provides is kinda disingenuous to the actual point. The question is: does the system mechanics (creature stat block specifically in the case, but not limited to that) add to the game beyond what simply changes tactics and terrain gives to ANY game?

For 4E the answer is YES. Very much yes. 4E is a good game.

But, there are better games out there. And it is reasonable to say that, compared to those games, the statblocks and mechanics of 4E don't provide enough tactical flexibility.

OK, but I wouldn't share the view that 3E or PF is that better game. Certainly, that's not the experience at my gaming table - features of 4e (which include as a minor contributer, but are cetaily not limited to, its stat blocks) make it a much better vehicle for achieving tactical flexibility and interesting tactical play in a fantasy RPG.

 

[FireLance]

I call bull on this, the only way a 3e melee attacker monster/NPC has fewer options than a 4e melee attacker monster/NPC is if you disregard the application of classes, feats, prestige classes, etc. when designing it. Otherwise it becomes a matter of number of options being relatively scalable in 3e to how much effort one is willing to put into personalizing the monster.

Sure, I could add extra levels, feats and classes to a 1st-level orc warrior in 3E, but I could also add extra powers and abilities to a 4E orc if I wanted to. In particular, by applying a class template, I could add a minimum of three powers, and more at higher levels. The difference between editions (at least, with respect to the number of combat options) is probably more stark in the "normal" monsters - NPC classed humanoids and animals.

Edit: I actually think one of the downsides to 4e is the fact that there isn't a base creature that can be built upon and personalized by the DM... but a continuous stream of individual variations, that, IMO, are defined by pretty minute differences.

I partly agree with this. IMO, the differences between monsters are not minute - a kobold slinger, kobold dragonshield and kobold skirmisher have quite distinct abilities and are run and fought very differently (from the perspective of the DM and the player respectively).

However, I would have preferred a more "building block" approach to monsters, or more tools to customize monsters, beyond templates, monster themes and "just substitute whatever ability you think is appropriate". The list of alternate powers for dragons in Draconomicon I and II is a start, but I think it would be a mammoth task to come up with substitutions for each individual monster entry. One possibility may be a list of alternate abilities by monster role (brute, artillery, lurker, soldier, etc.).

 

[Sir Wulf]

Every game ever suffers in someone's esteem for that reason. I try to balance it out by taking into account that there are some really talented, excellent human beings out there who enjoy almost any system I can name. (The few exceptions are not worth naming.) Otherwise I couldn't play anything.

At the risk of further derailing the thread, that's similar to my conclusions when reviewing the discussion. One of my frustrations with 4e has been its failure to live up to the "increased options for non-spellcasters" claim so often repeated about it. Reflecting on who I play with, my 3.5/Pathfinder friends are just more savvy, experienced players than the ones playing 4E. Part of my frustration may be caused by comparing these groups, led by RPG veterans, to Living Realms sessions filled with newer players.