D&D 4E 4E: New power sources, new resource management

[Jhaelen]

For those of you who have yet to run a D&D game with per-encounter mechanics, let me tell you just this: it's really unbelievably obvious when an encounter is over. Trust me, you're smart enough to notice.
-blarg

It's obvious for combat encounters, but what about non-combat encounters?

 

[Horacio]

1) I loathe 'per encounter'. What does that mean anyway? How often is 'per encounter'? Do the guys that design 'per encounter' assume that everything is a distinct set peice engagement? Heck, what does 'per encounter' mean to a video game?

If it's like Star Wars SAGA, and they have said it's one of their main inspiration sources, resources (Force powers there) are renewed by resting several minutes.

No abstract "encounter" definition, if you can rest for a while and recover your breath, your power renews.

I rather like the concept.

 

[blargney the second]

It's obvious for combat encounters, but what about non-combat encounters?

There are two answers:
1) Most per-encounter abilities are combat effects which don't have any bearing on non-combat encounters, so it's generally a non-issue.
2) If push comes to shove and you really need to measure it, you recover from an encounter when you've got one minute to catch your breath. This has come up a grand total of two times in all the time we've been using per-encounter material. And even then, it's dead simple to sort it out - the player asked "Have I refreshed?" and I just said yes (once) or no (the other time).

If you're okay with saying "night falls", letting one minute pass by is seriously no big deal. Heck, it's usually over by the time they've looted the bodies.
-blarg

 

[William Ronald]

I think per encounter can work. One of the problems with past and even the current edition of the game is the character who uses a limited resource (spells or psionic points) for example, and cannot recover them. The extreme example of this was a 1st level wizard in 1st Edition who cast a sleep spell, and then tried to keep from getting killed as he was generally useless unless he had a bunch of different languages. The effect of this is to limit the fun of the player whose character has limited resources.

Possibly, there might be a mix of always usable abilities by characters (some spells, combat maneveurs) that are always usable in an encounter, and some more powerful resources that have a limit per day.

The key thing is to avoid the "fifth wheel" feeling that can happen with limited resources. (I presume all classes will have things that they can always draw on, such as maybe a basic combat maneveur for a fighter, some magical ability for the mage and clerics, or maybe a maneveur a rogue can always do.) As for power sources, it does seem that there is an emphasis on putting more power in the character, as opposed to items. So, possibly what best defines a character is not the equipment, but the character's abilities and personality.


So far, I like what I am seeing, but I want to know more.

Ruin Explorer, it is good to have you back here!! Maybe we will see a few more board veterans swing by in the next few months as we approach 4th Edition.'s release.