D&D General Fixing the Offense Tunnel Vision problem

[Sacrosanct]

You know, changes in perception is a funny thing. I think all too often people end up entrenching themselves into their biases and hell will freeze over before they admit that what they were arguing against had merits.

When 4e came out, I ignored it completely. Which wasn't hard, admittedly, because I had largely been ignoring 3e anyway and stuck with AD&D. But 4e really didn't feel like D&D to me.

Many of the "problems" I've described here are more 5e problems than AD&D ones, largely due to how AD&D's rules are. But even I have to admit, many of these problems can be resolved by borrowing from 4e. Specifically having abilities or maneuvers that help allies, buff defense, or debuff enemies. As mentioned earlier, 5e is built around hit points and as much DPR to end the encounter as early as possible. I understand why. I enjoy 5e as a game. But this nagging thing in my OP? I think borrowing a bit more from 4e would have been a good thing. IMO anyway.

It's weird. As I'm getting older, I see more appeal with a game like 4e. Still not my jam, really, but I can see value in several things with that rules system.

 

[Artamo]

The problem from what I’ve witnessed in 5e is that defense is only going to delay a hit, and eventually you have to pivot to offense anyways. If you have a party, you can get away with everyone being offense focused because the rules support the idea of a “the best defense is a good offense.” The opposite just isn’t true unless the DM sets up a very particular set of circumstances such as lasting against an unbeatable horde until the cavalry arrives in 4 turns. You can up the damage output of monsters to the point that it forces someone in the party to take up controlling the battlefield, healing or defense as their purpose, but you will still need someone to dish out the damage.

 

[Zardnaar]

The problem from what I’ve witnessed in 5e is that defense is only going to delay a hit, and eventually you have to pivot to offense anyways. If you have a party, you can get away with everyone being offense focused because the rules support the idea of a “the best defense is a good offense.” The opposite just isn’t true unless the DM sets up a very particular set of circumstances such as lasting against an unbeatable horde until the cavalry arrives in 4 turns. You can up the damage output of monsters to the point that it forces someone in the party to take up controlling the battlefield, healing or defense as their purpose, but you will still need someone to dish out the damage.

Yeah. Focus fire and eliminating everything ASAP always bedtime approach.

Even 4Evi remember people saying striker heavy parties were way to go. Kill stuff faster you need to heal less anyway.

 

[MichaelSomething]

The key is to have the battle in a place where DPS won't help them at all...

 

[Kurotowa]

It's weird. As I'm getting older, I see more appeal with a game like 4e. Still not my jam, really, but I can see value in several things with that rules system.

You know how people talk about flawed masterpieces, where you can list the flaws but they don't change the fact that the end result is really good? I see 4e as the mirrored version of that. A work with a lot of good ideas, or at least the intent of tackling real problems, that utterly failed to win me over as a complete package.

I'm all for stealing the best bits of 4e and incorporating them into future works. I still never want to actually play that edition again. And it seems like the current game devs have a similar outlook, because look at that Bloodied is back.

 

[Zardnaar]

You know how people talk about flawed masterpieces, where you can list the flaws but they don't change the fact that the end result is really good? I see 4e as the mirrored version of that. A work with a lot of good ideas, or at least the intent of tackling real problems, that utterly failed to win me over as a complete package.

I'm all for stealing the best bits of 4e and incorporating them into future works. I still never want to actually play that edition again. And it seems like the current game devs have a similar outlook, because look at that Bloodied is back.

4Es good to mine for ideas and I used its engine in my hybrid game.

Players were familiar with it via Star Wars Saga edition.

4E playstyle was the big sin and enforced roles imho. Class design basically. If you like that sort of thing its great.

Most people do not.

 

[Kurotowa]

4E playstyle was the big sin and enforced roles imho. Class design basically. If you like that sort of thing its great.

I think it's important to reference my earlier post about what TTRPGs do better and what video games do better. We've had stories from inside WotC of that era that they felt video games were eating D&D's lunch, and so they made a common business plan error. Instead of asking "What does our competition do badly that we can do better?" they said "We need to challenge our competition head on and try to outdo their strongest points." Which almost never ends well, and definitely didn't in this case.

 

[Sorinth]

The thing is, that no matter what mooks do, the boss is either going to do more damage, having more negative impact, or the mooks will likely run away or disperse or disintegrate with boss' fall, so it is obiectively superior strategy to take out the boss first.

While that is no doubt true some of the time, it doesn't have to be true all the time. A boss will of course always be individually be doing more damage, but as a total the mooks could be doing more damage then the boss. Additionally if the boss is doing AoE damage, and the mooks are focus firing even if they are doing less total damage, they might be doing more damage to a single enemy which makes them a bigger threat.

And then of course you can have the mooks buffing the boss, think of the Orin the Red fight in BG3, the mooks in that fight make Orin much more powerful so tactically you are better off dealing with them first.


If you make the mooks a nuisance because they are just mooks, then of course just blasting the boss is the most effective tactic. So if you don't like/want that, don't self inflict that problem, make your mooks be more then just a nuisance.