4E at higher levels question?

[fba827]

In my personal experience, game -prep- is just as easy at any level.

In-game rounds for combats seem to remain about the same average duration. (i.e. how many rounds it takes from start to finish is about the same, presuming that we stay in the same range of difficulty for encounters and don't spike up to be level+4 when all the comparisons have been level+1 up to that point)

Combat real-time duration does increase around levels 8-11, again a small increase around level 15/16. This is mainly because both PCs and enemies are flinging around conditions - some of which are easy to track/remember, others need that constant "I forgot what does that thing you do mean?" Of course, the more familiar the -players- are with each others powers and effects, the less that happens.

But back to the DM perspective, as said at the start of this little missive, regardless of level, I have found prep time to be constant. If I'm ever taking longer its for plot development story arcs (creativity on my own part), not for the crunch of encounters...

Again, all that just based on my own experiences -- your experiences can vary...

 

[Dice4Hire]

Interesting - I know the conditions can be a chore to track, but I don't think it would be significantly harder than all the buffing & debuffing that goes on with 3.5. It wasn't unusual for both sides to have up 6-8-10 buffing spells up going into a combat situation, and then when the dispels started getting fired around, you had to recalculate them all the time, and also remember what type of bonus it was and if the original buff spell was superseding a magic item or another buff.

I really agree with this. Yes conditions are sometimes annoying to remember, but at elast they are always the same. Stunned is stunned is stunned.

Man, I got tired of a couple simple 2nd level spells (like Bear's Endurance) changing nearly every number on a character's sheet.

Let alone polymorph and the like.

 

[Iron Sky]

If you actually saw a 4E combat for 1st level PC's run faster than a 3.5/Pathfinder combat for 1st level PC's, it must have been an anomoly. 4E combat at low levels generally takes about twice as long as 3.x/Pathfinder and only gets worse as the levels go up. This isn't necessarily a bash on 4E but a personal observation. 4E combat is extremely time consuming and can be even more complicated with various conditions that can last for various times on various combatants.

I'm not sure exactly how long our combats took in various editions. I do remember a couple 3.x fights that took the whole session(5+ hours) - some that didn't feel like it and some that really felt long.

The longest fight we've had so far in 4e(one campaign to 11th, one to 17th), I'd say the longest combat was probably about 4 hours, but I can't think of an individual fight since they don't feel as long. That said, we've had 4e fights that felt like they were really long (like one last session in an area saturated with moths that dazed the players every round), but it was only 2.5 hours long.

The biggest difference for us (and what pretty much sold 4e to us, aside from the high-level caster/non-caster power disparity) is that the long 4e fights are usually long because there's a dozen rounds of intense action where as long 3.x fights were usually(though not always) long due to buff/debuff calculations, spell complications, and the like.

As a specific example, the longest battle I can remember in my 3.x SH campaign was a battle against a Nightwing and its summoned creatures lasted 5 rounds and took 5 hours.

The longest combat I can remember in 4e was a running battle through a town with several waves of reinforcements and that resulted in stealing an airship. Probably about 10 rounds of combat in about 3 hours.

After seeing how quick, easy, and fun it was to prep for 4e as a DM, I decided I'd never run 3.x again (though I'll still play).

 

[NewJeffCT]

I'm not sure exactly how long our combats took in various editions. I do remember a couple 3.x fights that took the whole session(5+ hours) - some that didn't feel like it and some that really felt long.

I had a big group (myself & 8 players) for my 3.5 campaign that just ended and some of the climactic combats at the end took a solid two sessions of wall-to-wall combat.

 

[Dragonblade]

If you actually saw a 4E combat for 1st level PC's run faster than a 3.5/Pathfinder combat for 1st level PC's, it must have been an anomoly. 4E combat at low levels generally takes about twice as long as 3.x/Pathfinder and only gets worse as the levels go up. This isn't necessarily a bash on 4E but a personal observation. 4E combat is extremely time consuming and can be even more complicated with various conditions that can last for various times on various combatants.

My experience is the opposite. I have found that overall combat time in 4e is similar to the time it takes to run a comparable combat in 3e, but in that time we generally get through twice as many rounds or more, meaning every player got to do twice as much because their turn came up more often.

 

[Scribble]

Combat was a real pain with multiple conditions, ongoing damage, marks and other stuff flying all over the place. Much more annoying than 3e was.

I will say I both agree and disagree here.

I agree that there are a lot MORE conditions to track then previous editions. Every combatant most likely has the ability to apply a condition, so it's not unusual to see someone with a bunch of conditions layered.

Where I disagree though, is that since they generally don't change the numbers, there isn't any calculating involved. You just need to track on/off. We just tracked it on the white board we used to track initiative, and it was pretty simple. The net effect being that while your tracking a lot of stuff, the time it takes to do so is cut way down. (At least it was for us.)


Also since more often then not a lot of them are just ongoing HP damage, missing a round isn't a huge deal.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I will say I both agree and disagree here.

I agree that there are a lot MORE conditions to track then previous editions. Every combatant most likely has the ability to apply a condition, so it's not unusual to see someone with a bunch of conditions layered.

Where I disagree though, is that since they generally don't change the numbers, there isn't any calculating involved. You just need to track on/off. We just tracked it on the white board we used to track initiative, and it was pretty simple. The net effect being that while your tracking a lot of stuff, the time it takes to do so is cut way down. (At least it was for us.)

In 3e most (of our) people just had buff-ready versions of the character sheets (or more frequently had their character on an auto-calculating spreadsheet) so the ripple through of buff effects wasn't much of an issue with that proviso, although of course it did get more complicated at higher levels.

The other thing I neglected to mention with 4e was all the fiddly little bonuses which ended up causing more hassle than the 3e cascading effects. You know the 'warlock gave me a +1 power bonus, I get a +2 feat bonus here, and the clerics at-will gives me a +2 bonus (so I disregard the warlocks bonus this round but get it next round) and I'm using a light blade with combat advantage for an extra +1 and I'm bloodied for +1 and he hit me last round so I get a +1 bonus for that...

There are no cascading bonuses in 4e (huzzah!) but they ended up being replaced by an array of overlapping bonuses that change round by round by design (boo!)

Cheers

 

[Nebulous]

We track conditions with colored squares under the miniatures. It's fast, easy to apply and easy to remember. If we weren't using those i think 4e combat would slow to a crawl and you would have a hard time remembering the little wonky details of who marked who, or who is dazed or stunned or whatnot. I have only dabbled in paragon level, but i have no intention of ever running an Epic game. I'll probably cap the campaign by 15th or so and start over.

 

[NewJeffCT]

In 3e most (of our) people just had buff-ready versions of the character sheets (or more frequently had their character on an auto-calculating spreadsheet) so the ripple through of buff effects wasn't much of an issue with that proviso, although of course it did get more complicated at higher levels.

Cheers

True, it's easy enough to create a buffed & debuffed (normal) character sheet. However, if you're at higher level and half the buffs are dispelled and half are not, then it's not so easy. Or, if you walk into a beholder's anti-magic ray and not only are your buffs gone, but all the plusses from the various magic items you have are gone as well (at least temporarily.) Not to mention there are conditions in 3.5 as well - dazing PCs from Blasphemy was pretty common for my bad guys (not to mentioning Weakened if the caster is 1 level higher than the PCs) ... and no save spells like Maze & Otto's Irresistible Dance take a PC completely out of the action for several rounds, or Waves of Exhaustion (also no save) can leave the PCs exhausted for an hour.

 

[Shazman]

Unless you are prepared to massively reduce monster hit points via houserules, be prepared for some fights that seem like they will never end. One of the most irritating things about 4E is that every single fight seems to take forever. The fiddly penalties and bonuses that every combatant can throw around for various durations can make high level 3.5 almost look simple by comparison. I truly believe that the developers not only failed to make combat quicker and more streamlined, but actually made the problems of lengthy combats and complexity of running/playing the game worse.