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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5306939" data-attributes="member: 82106">Honestly, how many of these 'fluff doesn't match mechanics' issues are there in 4e? I hear people complain about swarms and oozes constantly, and one guy that insists that solos with anti-lockdown mechanics are an issue (though I don't understand that one to be honest).I just think this is WAY overblown. As Plane Sailing just said sometimes you are a badass in one situation and sometimes you are just not going to be able to handle another situation. The grabby fighter sucks against a swarm. BFD. I don't know of ANY swarm filled adventures personally. Once in a while a swarm rears its ugly head and ALL the fighters swear up and down and do the best they can (or fall back on some trick or other like Come and Get It. Just like PS says your melee ranger is dirt against archers on a ledge, that's what the archer or wizard are there for.I totally agree that a large swath of monsters like undead having a blanket type of immunity can suck. I'm happy with the way 4e mostly deals with this. Undead and poison maybe is a marginally bad case but poison in the hands of PCs has NEVER been a particularly encouraged or common thing in any edition of D&D. I mean you CAN make a character build that leverages poison a whole bunch but said character can also easily have other things they can do. I'd be very surprised to find a PC running around that is hapless against undead in 4e.So really I just don't have a problem with the DM being able to say NOW AND THEN in certain restricted situations "well, that doesn't work, you just can't grab a swarm grabby fighter." Yeah, it will put a dent in him against that one opponent but them's the breaks. The whole ooze thing is too trivial to even bother with and this is an example of where the FAQ is correct, just make up some reason why prone makes sense for that one tiny little instant in time. It just isn't that big a deal. It has come up a few times in play with us and the players were perfectly happy with the way it worked. They asked and I just said "eh, the ooze is knocked back and confused by your attack" and it was fine. It happens once in a blue moon.I don't see encounter and daily use limits as really having anything to do with 'realism' at all. I know I've said this 100 times in other threads but it seems never to sink in. These limits are NOT character limits, they are player limits that are imposed on the player's power to alter the narrative of the story by having his character do cool extra powerful things. You only get so many chances to do this in a day. It is just like limits that exist in any game, they are there to allow the game to play. If it REALLY becomes urgently necessary to justify this in game you can but it is VERY rare that it comes up. DMs simply need to point this out to the players. I know I did way back at the start of each of the games I run and that was all that ever really needed to be said on the subject.In other words overall you can easily play 4e in an acceptably 'realistic' seeming way without any big hassle. It does that as well as any other edition of D&D ever did. Now and then you CAN redescribe something, and now and then you CAN alter the application of the rules to a specific situation. Finally you can simply understand that the game is played by the players, not the characters, and some rules are there to balance PLAYER interaction with the game, not explain things in terms of the characters.</blockquote>

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