D&D 5E You can't necessarily go back

[S'mon]

But those are the outliers anyway. In my longer running 3E campaigns maybe 5% of the total game time was spent at levels 1-3, and maybe 10% of the time was spent beyond level 12 and the other 85% of the campaign was spent at levels 4-12. During that so called “sweet spot” I never experienced characters getting taken from full hitpoints to -10 hitpoints from a monster crit. Yes, it’s theoretically possible for a fighter with a scythe to rip apart a pc, but when the rubber met the road at the game table what we wound up with were ogres and gnolls and gelatinous cubes and trolls and warriors with swords or axes and whatever else in the MM and PCs with full hitpoints didn't get one shot killed by a single monster's turn.

I've seen 5th-6th level 3e PCs killed by a single full attack from a troll, due to its Rend ability. I think that's the only sweet spot monster that does that, though. 3.0 Orcs with their 1d12+3/x3 great axes could easily one-shot 1st level PCs on a crit, of course.

 

[S'mon]

In short, 3E games with CLW wands tend to have more of a 4E feel to them, and 3E games without CLW wands have more of an AD&D feel to them.

Hmm - I nerfed wands in my 3e games (20 charges instead of 50) and clw wands were not used. Even so, the divine caster PCs (and cohorts!) had so much healing that it did not feel at all like my AD&D/OSRIC or Labyrinth Lord games. PCs would always heal to full after every fight, and rest when the casters got low on spells.

With eg AD&D, PCs would routinely go into battle with reduced hit points, and the casters would not determine when the party had to rest. Fighter types were considered the equals of full casters, just as able to take on challenges at any level. Clerics and Druids were generally valued more for their utility magic than for combat prowess or healing.

 

[Tony Vargas]

LOL - yeah. IME what a real newbie player actually needs to begin with is something resembling an Elite Monster stat block; an Essentials PC is still far too complicated.

Not my experience - and I've run a lot of introductory games at conventions over the years, and seen a lot of new players coming into Encounter. Ironically, genuinely-new players never had much trouble with a 4e pregen out of the old off-line CB. The 'cards' make the powers pretty clear, and everything's calculated out for you. Conversely, new-to-4e players who feel confident they 'know D&D' often get thrown by them, they look for weapons instead of attacks, and flip around the sheet, looking to add up bonuses that have already been added up for them.

But Essentials' main failings were:

(1) Bad titling - the "Heroes of" books didn't even appear on the radar of most newbie players. Should have called Heroes of the Fallen Lands "Player Class Book 1" or similar.

Or they could have gotten really nostalgic and called it "Men & Magic."

(2) Horrible presentation on the Online Character Builder. Players would bring charbuilder PCs to my game and neither they nor I could work out what the Hell their abilities were.

I can't say much in it's defense. The on-line CB sheet is 4 pages long even with the simplest character - twice what it needs to be - and still leaves stuff out.

But, the Encounter's pre-gens, half-sheets, are decent. The power blurbs aren't quite as clear as the card-pages, but they generally work out OK.

 

[S'mon]

Not my experience - and I've run a lot of introductory games at conventions over the years, and seen a lot of new players coming into Encounter. Ironically, genuinely-new players never had much trouble with a 4e pregen out of the old off-line CB.

The offline charbuilder is definitely a lot better, and is what I use if I want to make a PHB PC - for an Essentials PC I'll do it by hand.

 

[Abraxas]

Really? You found that CLW wands tended to make 3e work like AD&D and absence of them pressaged 4e?

Or are you just saying you never saw anyone make much use of wands?

More of a point by point disagreement on the effect of WoCLWs on the game. I really didn't notice the last sentence when i posted. Having gone back and read it - WoCLWs did not make the game work/feel like the 4E games I've been playing since 4E came out. Also, WoCLWs were not a major element in making 3E feel different from 1E/2E (there are so many other things that had a greater effect).

IME Badapple's bullet points 1, 2 and 4 didn't happen, and bullet point 3 happened - but at a real cost in resources. YMMVAPD

It is completely reasonable that Badapple's experiences were vastly different from my own, of course there are lots of things said on the internet as if they were universal (or nearly so - not that Badapple was doing that). However, more and more I'm starting to think that those differences become more pronounced the farther away you get from your gaming groups central location. Like accents and dialects - they have a root that is modified by people in different areas in different ways.

 

[Tony Vargas]

More of a point by point disagreement on the effect of WoCLWs on the game. I really didn't notice the last sentence when i posted. Having gone back and read it - WoCLWs did not make the game work/feel like the 4E games I've been playing since 4E came out. Also, WoCLWs were not a major element in making 3E feel different from 1E/2E (there are so many other things that had a greater effect).

OK. So, you really didn't see the use of cheap item healing, like the WoCLW? Or you didn't see it have the effect of getting PCs up to full hps after every fight? What about daily hp recovery? You didn't see clerics dumping their un-used spells to Cures at the end of the day (no one got drained, and there's no underground stream or anything near this chamber we're resting in, so this lesser restoration and water walking can become healing...)? Or you didn't see it, plus items healing, resulting in PCs being full hps each day?

It is completely reasonable that Badapple's experiences were vastly different from my own, of course there are lots of things said on the internet as if they were universal (or nearly so - not that Badapple was doing that).

It is, people can approach the game differently or change it, sure. But, the resources he's talking about were there, quite real, and the wealth/level guidelines were there, and the phenomenon makes sense given those factors. Like anything in a game, it could be changed/avoided, but it's not unreal because of that.

However, more and more I'm starting to think that those differences become more pronounced the farther away you get from your gaming groups central location. Like accents and dialects - they have a root that is modified by people in different areas in different ways.

Definitely a phenomenon I've noticed, especially in the past. The internet's making the community 'smaller,' that way, though, so I don't know how well it holds up today. Maybe pretty well: group-think in individual groups, regional variations, and on-line group-think, as well?

 

[Steely_Dan]

Yeah, it's pretty easy for a 3rd Ed Party to be at full HP going into every combat it seems (my experience DMing), not so much in 1st/2nd Ed.

Healing should obviously be campaign specific (many options/variants).

 

[Abraxas]

OK. So, you really didn't see the use of cheap item healing, like the WoCLW? Or you didn't see it have the effect of getting PCs up to full hps after every fight? What about daily hp recovery? You didn't see clerics dumping their un-used spells to Cures at the end of the day (no one got drained, and there's no underground stream or anything near this chamber we're resting in, so this lesser restoration and water walking can become healing...)? Or you didn't see it, plus items healing, resulting in PCs being full hps each day?

I did not see it have the effect of getting PCs to full hit points after every fight. The encounters didn't happen in a vacuum - there often just wasn't time. 1d8+1 per round just isn't much when multiple PCs are down. I'm curious, was it common for a party to carry a large number of WoCLWs in the games you were in?

As for daily, yep, the clerics used up their spells - but usually 1) they kept some in reserve so that they weren't helpless and 2) they usually didn't have too many left. So they did their best, but i remember many times starting at less than full HP and a number of times with ability damage or a disease or a curse on top of that.

It is, people can approach the game differently or change it, sure. But, the resources he's talking about were there, quite real, and the wealth/level guidelines were there, and the phenomenon makes sense given those factors. Like anything in a game, it could be changed/avoided, but it's not unreal because of that.

Didn't say it was unreal - just said it wasn't universal.

Definitely a phenomenon I've noticed, especially in the past. The internet's making the community 'smaller,' that way, though, so I don't know how well it holds up today. Maybe pretty well: group-think in individual groups, regional variations, and on-line group-think, as well?

I think holds up pretty good now days and is even more common online. People seem to gravitate to the things they agree with - in fact people can find sites that pretty much cater to any particular view point with out having to bother with dissenting views.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I'm curious, was it common for a party to carry a large number of WoCLWs in the games you were in?

As the cost became trivial, yes - and to have more than one PC who could activate them, too.

As for daily, yep, the clerics used up their spells - but usually 1) they kept some in reserve so that they weren't helpless and 2) they usually didn't have too many left.

So, also no '5MWD' issues?

Didn't say it was unreal - just said it wasn't universal.

Nod. Need a flaw or a feature be universal to be relevant?

 

[Abraxas]

As the cost became trivial, yes - and to have more than one PC who could activate them, too.

Cool.

So, also no '5MWD' issues?

No more so than in the 4E games I've been playing for the last several years (Actually the MM3 math made the 5MWD even more prevalent).

Nod. Need a flaw or a feature be universal to be relevant?

Nope, but sometimes when everyone is just agreeing with everyone else on a "how something is" it's good to be reminded that that may not be the case.