4E at higher levels question?

[Iron Sky]

If you move the 4E line on Merrick's chart up an inch or two, then it would be more accurate. A 1st level 4E combat probably takes as long as a 10th level 3.5 combat, and steadily increases. 3.5 length of combat increases more sharply over time, but 4E starts way up there to begin with.

If that is the case, there have been/are probably half-a-dozen threads on "How to Speed up 4e Combat." I've never looked at them since we've never had a problem with 4e's combat speed, but they are out there.

MerricB's chart is pretty much right on for my experience.

 

[Plane Sailing]

The graph doesn't match my experiences. Low level 3e was simple but still took quite a while as there tended to be more whiffing. Nor was high level 3e going up so steeply (certainly up to 16th level). In fact the most common complaint from 10th level up was that 3e combats were too short apart from the rare circumstances with lots of magic flying around on both sides.

 

[Shazman]

There is also a whole lot of whiffing at low level 4E, but monster hit points are about 4-5 times as much at that level as in 3.5, so it's going to take a while. Then the hit points and (to a certain extent) defenses rise faster than PC damage output and to hit bonuses. 3.5 also has hit point bloat as levels increase, but it is mitigated by ititerative attacks and more potent spells.

 

[Gimby]

There is also a whole lot of whiffing at low level 4E, but monster hit points are about 4-5 times as much at that level as in 3.5, so it's going to take a while. Then the hit points and (to a certain extent) defenses rise faster than PC damage output and to hit bonuses. 3.5 also has hit point bloat as levels increase, but it is mitigated by ititerative attacks and more potent spells.

Thing is though, its partly those iterative attacks that make the whole thing take longer. I've had single turns as a high level 3.5 fighter using variable Power Attack, changing cascading buffs and trip/disarm chains that have taken the better part of 45 minutes to resolve.

 

[Shazman]

Seriously, I've never seen anyone's turn in any edition at any level with any amount of buffs on them take that long. This seems to be a very extreme example.

 

[NewJeffCT]

The graph doesn't match my experiences. Low level 3e was simple but still took quite a while as there tended to be more whiffing. Nor was high level 3e going up so steeply (certainly up to 16th level). In fact the most common complaint from 10th level up was that 3e combats were too short apart from the rare circumstances with lots of magic flying around on both sides.

Interesting - we had a single 3.5E combat at the end of the campaign that took us a good 12 hours at the table to complete over 2 sessions. And, that is with me having recruited a DM's helper to run monsters for that final double session. If I had to run all the bad guys myself, it would have it likely would have taken 3 sessions.

Of course, there were 8 PCs, a couple of major NPCs and a few allies for the good guys, maybe 80 minions for the BBEG, plus a pit fiend, a pair of ice devils, some mid level clerics, a high level mage... plus the BBEG gated in a fiendish beholder to anti-magic the party. The BBEG himself was a half-fiend level 20 cleric. (the minions all died pretty quickly from AoE spells like Holy Word and Acid Storm)

 

[Scribble]

I would say this graph actually very acurately maps my "time it takes to prep for a good fight" in the two systems.

 

[Gimby]

Seriously, I've never seen anyone's turn in any edition at any level with any amount of buffs on them take that long. This seems to be a very extreme example.

Yes, it certainly was and was a result of extensive use of Sundering Cleave, Trip and Disarm on multiple targets during an ambush so only a portion of the usual buffs (and hence the pre-calculated buffed character sheet) applied. The bad guys had just been dispelled too as I recall, so the DM was recalculating their stats while all this was going on.

While it was certainly the worst case scenario, it was also something that arose from entirely normal circumstances - it was more luck than anything else that we didn't see it more often.