D&D 5E [Very Long Indeed] Reconciling Combat as War and Combat as Sports in 5ed

[steenan]

Not every combat can have high stakes aside from death.

Sometimes the bandits just want to steal the party's gold. The players have the choice of fighting and winning the combat, making their next encounter harder, or running away and making the next encounter easier. (I mean, they could surrender their gold, but of the three I think that's the least likely.)

In this situation, party's valuables are at stake. It means that escaping with their gold intact IS overcoming the challenge. Being defeated means losing the stake - either surrendering the gold or being knocked out and looted.

 

[Aenghus]

Two comments.

First, I think CaS is much easier for new referees, as CaW requires a lot of system knowledge and background prep to make possible. New referees generally need relatively simple straightforward linear adventures, which CaS works better for IMO. The proposal for a single unified style sounds very complicated to run on the face of it, not something I would want to hand to a novice GM.

Secondly, to a great extent CaW is about testing the system to destruction and exploiting any available loophole. Whater isn't forbidden is permitted. The 15 minute workday is the natural result of such thinking, as it's the best way to minimise PC risk in 3e if it's permitted. It's in the spirit of CaW to bypass as many restrictions as possible, and expoit any nova potential to the maximum. And nova potential will be in the next edition, which is why the 15 minute workday will be in force in the next edition unless it's written to make it less desirable.

 

[Aenghus]

The real problem with 'encounter' and 'daily' powers is that they make no sense for non-magical classes. If a fighter can swing his sword in a special way to do three times as much damage once any time he wants, why can't he do it every time?

It's a disassociated mechanic; it disrupts verisimilitude; it takes you out of the game-world and reminds you you're playing a tactical combat game, which is a lot different than what people originally wanted from D&D.

This isn't a fact for everyone, as I have no such problem,as to me such abilities reflect the exploits of typical action film heroes, and want non-magical classes to have such resources. Old Irish folk tales had warriors as the heroes, and they performed amazing feats which would be most closely described as encounter or daily abilities.

The modular nature of the next edition is necessitated by such opposing tastes, as that way I can get a fighter class with access to such powers, and you don't have to use that module.

 

[Fanaelialae]

In this situation, party's valuables are at stake. It means that escaping with their gold intact IS overcoming the challenge. Being defeated means losing the stake - either surrendering the gold or being knocked out and looted.

So the only way to not get hosed (win penalty) is to get hosed (suffer some serious setback as a result of the encounter)?

I don't see such a game, that presents constant lose/lose scenarios, gaining much popularity. Players like to feel like they're winning. That doesn't necessarily mean never suffering any setbacks, but this seems like overkill. Everything becomes a setback.

 

[Libramarian]

I don't think it's possible to achieve good balance without serious constraints on character, encounter and adventure structure - if the balance is static.

What is the alternative? Dynamic balance - one that uses a feedback. A system that reacts to character performance and sets up difficulties accordingly. It may be done by the mechanics working this way automatically, or by giving the GM tools to easily rebalance things on the fly and guidelines on when to do that.

Let's assume the system has low lethality, but reasonable chance of failure. In other words, in most combats it's not PC lives that is at stake, but something else they see as important. And some of the fights (somewhere between 1 in 3 to 1 in 5) are lost.

In such setup, it would be possible to let PCs recover some kind of resource (surges, daily powers or something like that) when they lose and subtly ramp up difficulty (eg. by increasing monster crit ranges or monster power recovery ranges) when they keep winning. By introducing this kind of negative feedback, the system becomes self-balancing. And player actions affect the balance point.

CaW players won't trivialize all encounters by strategy, but they can aim for long winning streaks. They still have the enjoyment of outwitting the opposition, but each victory makes the next one harder to achieve; at some point it's only their strategy and creativity that can keep them going, with all other factors stacked against them.

CaS players get their interesting, dramatic encounters, no matter how good they are tactically, because the encounters balance themselves to provide challenge without overpowering.

Of course, this approach is not perfect. For some players it may feel metagame and artificial. But I feel it solves a lot of problems with balance without putting too much work on the GM and has a potential of keeping various types of players happy.

Yeah! Dynamic balance is where it's at.

Can we do that without metagaminess though.

How about the classic sandbox campaign. Where instead of visualizing a string of encounters that systematically get easier or harder based on demonstrated PC performance, you give the PCs a choice of encounters (or adventuring areas), and they do their own balancing.

You can gate the CAW-supportive elements of the system (e.g. spells/magic items notorious for off-label use) in the unbalanced areas, so the group will have to demonstrate a CAW preference in order to get more CAW toys.

 

[Libramarian]

Two comments.

First, I think CaS is much easier for new referees, as CaW requires a lot of system knowledge and background prep to make possible. New referees generally need relatively simple straightforward linear adventures, which CaS works better for IMO. The proposal for a single unified style sounds very complicated to run on the face of it, not something I would want to hand to a novice GM.

Secondly, to a great extent CaW is about testing the system to destruction and exploiting any available loophole. Whater isn't forbidden is permitted. The 15 minute workday is the natural result of such thinking, as it's the best way to minimise PC risk in 3e if it's permitted. It's in the spirit of CaW to bypass as many restrictions as possible, and expoit any nova potential to the maximum. And nova potential will be in the next edition, which is why the 15 minute workday will be in force in the next edition unless it's written to make it less desirable.

However CAS systems generally have more rules, and express them more precisely (i.e. jargon), which makes system knowledge and content prep more difficult pound for pound.

 

[Daztur]

Now that my fun adventures in the land of potato genetics are done, let's get another batch of responses done

General comment on balance: I don't think that getting balance without an acceptable band is THAT hard, the main problem with 3ed balance was that if one party had a cleric and a fighter and another party had two clerics the second party would be better if they had one fight a day (could Nova) and would be better if they had ten fights a day (better at staving off attrition). A lot of the non-nova classes sucking in 3ed was just due to those specific classes sucking, not to some intractable problem with nova/non-nova balance. For example look at Rules Cyclopedia D&D, thanks to the Weapon Mastery rules the Fighters compete just fine with the Magic-Users until the rules start breaking down at very high levels (tying Fighters to specific weapons is probably my least favorite way of powering them up, but as a balancing tool it works). If you get rid of the 15 minute adventuring day and make sure that the mundanes can be awesome, they'd be able to compete with the casters just fine (as in Rules Cyclopedia).

Response to Fanaelialae:

In general I'm not really disagreeing with you because 4ed isn't an edge case, characters can use up Dailies and Healing Surges so if things go wrong in a fight there are consequences besides death (lost Dailies and Healing Surges). However, if 4ed nixed dailies and had Healing Surges be encounter-based instead of daily then that'd be a problem for me since what happens in one fight doesn't really impact what happens in another. There's still attrition in 4ed.

"However, things become far less predictable, so it's a pretty heavy trade-off."

Indeed, exactly the point I was making in my OP. For me this trade-off is well worth it.

"(low combat campaigns, where attrition is not a factor because you'll almost never see more than one combat per day)."

Unless characters don't refresh all of their resources at the start of the day but at the start of each story arc/longer time frame.

"Just to point out an alternative (though one that would be highly unpopular), you could completely eliminate the 15 MWD by eliminating all daily resources."

Including HP/healing surges? That goes back to the sliding scale of meaning/balance problem that I discussed earlier.

"Tactical play will always take longer than non-tactical play, IMO."

To some extent yes, but I think this can be helped by having more things for each character to worry about rather than having lots of modifiers. There's different ways to make combat more tactical and some eat up more time than others (modifier bloat is the worst IMO).

---------------
response to pemerten:

"These posts give one illustration of how encounters can be balanced yet tactically meaningful within PC death being on the line to any significant extent: the abilities of the participants in a fight - both antagonists and protagonists - can be configured so that death is not a serious threat provided that the players play their PCs with mechanical and tactical cleverness."

But those examples were predicated on making the PCs use up their resources and how many resources get used in previous fights can throw off the balance of later fights.

---------------------------------

Response to Tony Vargas:


"I think 'based design' is out of place, then. "

I think you're misreading me/I'm not being clear, I don't mean that 4ed as a whole is "based" on Encounters, just that certain elements are.

"The alternative of simply balancing class resources so class balance isn't impacted by different pacing just seems a more elegant, more complete solution."

The problem is that is puts a constraint on class design. For me the 15 Minute Adventuring Day is bad in EVERY edition so you've got to get rid of it no matter what to make D&D fun (for me). If the 15 Minute Adventuring Day is dead then the issue of dealing with nova vs. non-nova classes mostly goes away (at least for me).

"Considering the sheer number (and power) of spells that could be recovered in one rest, I think they did bounce back pretty hard. But, sure, at low levels in early eds, that 1 hp/day was pretty pathetic..."
Right but note that a TSR-D&D cleric at most levels can heal a far smaller number of HPs than a 3ed cleric due to many spell levels not having any healing spells.

"Suggestion, IIRC, required the victim hear you, while Charm Person did not (but if he didn't, it'd be harder to persuade him to help you using gestures than just talking, which I don't think any ed needs to spell out)."

Right, which is what I'm talking about.

---------------

Response to Mokona:

Indeed. I've always hated the "dumb no skill fighter."

--------------

Response to steenan:

"What fun is fighting if nothing is at stake? It's just a waste of time. One may as well narrate victory in a few sentences and move forward. We engage the system when there is something important to be decided."

This exactly. Attrition is one way to do this.

--------

Response Aenghus:

I'd agree with you that CaS is easier for newbie DMs, but I think that CaW is often easier for newbie players since you can rock at CaW without knowing any rules at all but you can't do that in CaS, CaS relies on the players knowing the rules well enough to take advantage of how they interact.

 

[steenan]

So the only way to not get hosed (win penalty) is to get hosed (suffer some serious setback as a result of the encounter)?

I don't see such a game, that presents constant lose/lose scenarios, gaining much popularity. Players like to feel like they're winning. That doesn't necessarily mean never suffering any setbacks, but this seems like overkill. Everything becomes a setback.

Why don't look at it as a win-win scenario?

Either you overcome what gets in your way, win your stakes and your satisfaction and shape the fiction your way, or you get something to help you win the next time.

And both ways, what happens is interesting. You keep winning and things become harder to provide a challenge - winning without any significant effort is boring. You lose and suffer consequences that shape the situation in surprising ways and the system helps you get back on top.

It's about the dramatic structure much more than about a game of numbers. In good stories, protagonists neither win every time nor get blocked by obstacles and left powerless. Usually, early success leads to an unexpected defeat, shocking revelation and a plot twist; characters are forced to change or abandon their plans, but they adapt and overcome the opposition. And often the cycle repeats. The "dynamic balance" I proposed aims for this kind of dynamics.

 

[Tony Vargas]

N A lot of the non-nova classes sucking in 3ed was just due to those specific classes sucking...

"The alternative of simply balancing class resources so class balance isn't impacted by different pacing just seems a more elegant, more complete solution."

The problem is that is puts a constraint on class design.

Yes, the constraint is "do not make classes that suck."

Besides, I'd rather see constraints on class design (which, generally is done by a few, very dedicated/gifted people) than constraints on adventure design, campaign pacing, play style, and player choice (which are things done by gamers trying to have fun).

For me the 15 Minute Adventuring Day is bad in EVERY edition so you've got to get rid of it no matter what to make D&D fun.

Yet it's something many groups have gravitated to, and could be legitimate in any number of campaign settings and styles (not least of which is 'CaW,' in which every advantage is ruthlessly taken, and that would include aproaching every challenge as well-prepared as possible, including as resource-rich as possible).

Besides, you don't get rid of something by including incentives to reward it. Vancian casting rewards the heck out of the 15-min work day.

 

[pemerton]

So the only way to not get hosed (win penalty) is to get hosed (suffer some serious setback as a result of the encounter)?

I don't see such a game, that presents constant lose/lose scenarios, gaining much popularity. Players like to feel like they're winning.

Why don't look at it as a win-win scenario?

Either you overcome what gets in your way, win your stakes and your satisfaction and shape the fiction your way, or you get something to help you win the next time.

Steenan, good reply. And am I right in thinking you're influenced by HeroQuest revised in the ideas you're suggesting?

It's about the dramatic structure much more than about a game of numbers.

This is true - especially in Robin Laws' hands - but I think this sort of design could also be put to work for gamist purposes, because, like you say:

You keep winning and things become harder to provide a challenge - winning without any significant effort is boring.

However, while I like the idea, and would really like to see it developed for a D&D-ish game (HeroQuest is a bit less crunchy than I'm used to), I don't think D&Dnext will go this way. This sort of metagame-driven setting of DCs - which 4e uses quite a bit, although not as elegantly as HeroQuest - seems to be one of the things that WotC is now reacting against in putting out a new edition.