D&D 4E 4e Constitution - what a waste of time !

[Regicide]

If a fight isn't challenging enough to at least be able to take someone to unconcious, i.e. about 4 healing surges of damage on a single member, then it's really no different than fighting a bag of rats, now is it? It's boring and tedious and it's where MMOs and adventure games come up with the obnoxious term "grinding". Pointless, irrelevant fights that are there simply to take up play time because it's easier for the developers to force on players than make actual content/story.

That is sort of my guideline for the MINIMUM DIFFICULTY a fight should be. If the party didn't use at least 4 healing surges from a fight (spread across all members), then it was probably too easy, and maybe shouldn't even have been worth (combat) XP or have allowed the PCs to trigger powers (like the bag of rats rule) as it probably wasn't a credible threat.

If a defender is spending 2-4 surges per fight, adding a couple points of con is'nt really going to extend the fight day, particularly with those points having to come from somewhere such as hitting or damageing more (thus making fights shorter and less healing surges needed), or another defence stat. If a 2 bonus shift in reflex takes the chance of an enemy hitting from 60% to 50%, thats a 20% damage difference which could easily equate to a lot more saved healing surges than it would with the same points spent getting a high con, particularly for classes that are boosting STR anyway.

 

[chaotix42]

I'm not sure where this conversation is going (nor do I have anything to add) but I actually agree with Regi's last post!

That's worth XP.

 

[HeirToPendragon]

My Defender has about 16ish Surges

In the event that he spends four a battle, that means he can enter into 4 or 5.

1 < 4 < 5

So either your party has very very poorly made defenders, or something is seriously wrong with your battle planning.

 

[Mengu]

If a fight isn't challenging enough to at least be able to take someone to unconcious, i.e. about 4 healing surges of damage on a single member, then it's really no different than fighting a bag of rats, now is it? It's boring and tedious and it's where MMOs and adventure games come up with the obnoxious term "grinding". Pointless, irrelevant fights that are there simply to take up play time because it's easier for the developers to force on players than make actual content/story.

We're obviously on opposite ends of the spectrum here. I feel the exact opposite. A series of Level+2 and Level+3 encounters is going to be a complete grind as players quickly run out of daily and encounter powers and resort to a series of repetitive at-will powers. It's possible to keep the adventure/story going at a great pace with lower level encounters.

 

[Caliban]

Either that was a crazy over-level encounter or those leaders were jumping the gun on the healing. I've seen times where my fighter was the only one low on surges after an entire adventuring day, but one encounter?

It might have been the Core Special mod "Shades of the Zhentarim" - I know that the first combat in that mod starts you off in a poor tactical situation that gets much worse if the bad guys beat you on initiative (which they have a good chance of doing).

Most of the time one character get's flanked by the bad guys before he can move, and the terrain restricts movement after that, and he just get's hammered for several rounds straight (flankers with attacks that Daze you, and an Elite that causes everyone to do extra damage to the dazed person).

Some of the mod authors really like setting up combats that favor the NPC's in an attempt to counteract all the cheese LFR characters tend to have. (LFR is a "kitchen sink" campaign - everything wotc publishes from splat books to dragon magazine stuff is allowed.)

 

[Herschel]

Healing Surges are your true hit point value. There's a difference between a Fighter with a Con of 13 and a Fighter with a Con of 14. That difference is about 7 hit points. 1 for the Con, and 6 more for the Healing Surge value. When you're talking about an entire party with difference makeups, it's believable for a beginning Paladin to truly be in the hundreds for hit points because of Healing Surges.
If your class gets other bonuses for Con, like the Battlerage Vigor Fighter or the Barbarian, then Con is fantastic.
The only reason that Con would be worthless to someone in this edition is if they didn't understand it.

Yes and no. If you are simply running RPGA characters I can see it as a bit of a "lesser" stat for certain classes. For LFR characters, you can use your background for starting HP based on Int or Wis and most modules are only two or three combats so a lower number of actual surges could be okay.

Campaign-wise I'd never dump it.

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

I haven't seen a character yet who put 8 in CON using point buy. I have seen every other stat get an 8 from at least somebody.

(Not an exhaustive list)
8 STR: Wizards, Warlocks, Archer Rangers
8 DEX: Wizards, Warlocks
8 INT: Everybody except Wizards, Warlocks, and Taclords
8 WIS: Artful Rogue, Feylocks
8 CHA: Rangers

But everybody could use a little CON. Most characters will take at least 12, and I've seen a lot of 14s for that extra surge. Any axe-wielding character who also has high STR will want 17 by epic. Starting at 14 also means deadly axe is available at 11th.

Then I certainly hope they've been playing their characters as having the sub-average intelligence they've assigned them. Personaly, I can't dump Int with any character, no mater what their prime abilities need to be. I just wouldn't have fun playing "dumb".

Well.. okay, that's not entirely true. I've played comedy relief characters. But I've usually made wisdom dumps the blame on those, rather than int.

 

[bert1000]

Personally I just let players refresh healing surges after a 5 minute rest, and don't require surges for potions. I don't like the one-fight-a-day mentality that 4E promotes.

Yep, if the OP has a similar house rule to this then CON is pretty weak.

 

[GoLu]

Then I certainly hope they've been playing their characters as having the sub-average intelligence they've assigned them. Personaly, I can't dump Int with any character, no mater what their prime abilities need to be. I just wouldn't have fun playing "dumb".

Well.. okay, that's not entirely true. I've played comedy relief characters. But I've usually made wisdom dumps the blame on those, rather than int.

8 int isn't comic relief. Compared to the average person, you only have a -1 penalty. Your friends might notice eventually, but it's not something that'll be immediately obvious to strangers or anything like that. Besides, it might represent lack of formal education rather than being a total doof.

 

[evilgenius8000]

Constitution is not a waste. Perhaps having a ton of surges isn't necessary, especially if you don't play a lot of encounters per in-game day, run little or no hard (level +2 to +4) encounters, or if you allow different ways of refreshing surges. I agree with Regicide up there: there should be a noticeable amount of surge loss if the DM is doing his job right and not letting the party become glorified meat grinders. Because of that, every extra surge helps.

Aside from surges, Con, just like all the other stats, is heavily used for the powers of many classes. Warlock is the prime example, but Con is also used by the Artificer, Bard, Barbarian, Fighter, Invoker, and Shaman (as far as I know; there might be more). So, I can't imagine ever considering it worthless.