D&D 4E A Primer on 4e Terminology (Non-4e players please read)

[FireLance]

I get the impression that some of the posters on this forum don't play 4e and thus either don't have a good understanding of 4e terms, or worse, have been misinformed about what the 4e terms actually mean. This is just an attempt to clarify certain 4e terms so that I don't have to keep typing "the leader role does not necessarily imply that the character leads the party" every time I encounter it in a thread.

Right now, I can think of two terms that are in dire need of clarification. 4e players, please feel free to add to this thread as and when you encounter others.

1. Leader The leader role in 4e does not imply that the character leads the party (say, in the sense that Gandalf led the Fellowship of the Rings). It means a character whose abilities are mostly centred around helping his fellow party members to recover from injuries and conditions, and to perform better in combat and non-combat challenges. To take a Dragonlance example, Goldmoon the cleric of Mishakal, had a leader role (healing), even though Tanis Half-Elven was considered the party leader.

2. Encounter The term "encounter" suffers from the problem of having different meanings in different contexts. In can be used in the most comonly-understood sense of a challenge to be overcome, which can comprise both combat and non-combat elements.

When used in the context of an "encounter power" it means a power that can be regained after a short rest (usually five minutes long), in much the same way as a daily power can be regained after an extended rest (usually six hours long) or (in previous editions) a daily spell or ability can be regained after a night's rest. PCs who do not rest do not regain their encounter powers.

When used in the context of a duration that "lasts till the end of the encounter", the maximum duration is still capped at five minutes even if the encounter takes longer than five minutes. However, although there will of course be exceptions, encounters do not normally last longer than five minutes and the PCs would normally take a short rest at the end of each encounter. Hence, such effects typically would last for a single encounter and would not carry on to the next since they would terminate during the short rest. PCs who wish to continue enjoying the effect could simply choose not to take a short rest.

 

[Vayden]

Good idea. Here's another one:

Hit Points: Hit points do not usually represent actual damage. They are representation of your heroic resolve and ability to keep struggling against opponents. This is why you can recover hit points (not just gain temp ones) by using your second wind or having a Warlord yell at you (etc etc) in 4e.

 

[enrious]

I was thinking the same thing - could someone define out the various monster roles and possibly the PC roles?

There's a lot of jargon in a simple 4e discussion, for instance it took a me a few minutes to recall what an Extended Rest was.

 

[FireLance]

I would actually like to see this thread finished with definitions of the other party roles and those of the creatures. The definition of "the leader" was actually the first time I understood the role.

Well, I'm glad you found this thread useful! I think the other class and monster role names are a bit more intuitive, so they tend to be understood better, but here goes, anyway. Note: I think Wotc may have some official definitions somewhere, but I'm away from my books right now. These are just my take on the roles. Others may chip in if they think I haven't got them quite right.

Striker (class) Classes with a striker role focus on dealing damage. They usually have either some benefit that increases the amount of damage that they deal with their attacks or increases the accuracy of their attacks so that they hit more often.

Defender (class) Classes with a defender role tend to have two related characteristics: they have some ability that encourages their opponents to attack them instead of their (presumably squishier) allies, and they tend to have higher than average hit points and defenses in order to survive those extra attacks. I should add that 4e defenders hardly ever draw "threat" or "aggro" in the CRPG/MMORPG sense. Instead, the "defender" mechanics typically involve interfering with their enemies' attacks or gaining extra attacks against enemies who choose to attack their allies.

Controller (class) The controller role is probably the least well-defined, but broadly speaking, they "control" the battlefield with area attacks (encouraging their enemies to spread out), imposing conditions on their enemies, or actually changing the battleground by creating effects that damage or hinder enemies in a particular area.

As a side point, class roles are supposed to inform what a specific class is designed to be good at. However, nothing prevents any character from trying to act in any of the roles. A striker might try to get an enemy to attack him, e.g. by getting between it and a weaker party member, even though he might not have any ability that would encourage the enemy to do so. Similarly, even though a defender might not have a striker's accuracy or damage bonus, he can still attack and deal damage.

Controller (monster) The controller monster role is quite similar to the controller class role. Controller monsters tend to make area attacks and inflict conditions on the PCs.

Skirmisher (monster) Skirmisher monster tend to be mobile and often have some ability that encourages them to move around, e.g. dealing extra damage when flanking.

Brute (monster) Brute monsters tend to have higher hit points, deal higher amounts of damage, and have lower defenses. Fights involving brutes tend to be shorter and swingier, as the party would either take the monsters down quickly or get taken down quickly.

Soldier (monster) Conversely, soldiers tend to have higher defenses and deal lower amounts of damage. Soldier monster tend to cause longer fights because of their higher defenses and lower damage.

Artilley (monster) Artillery monsters have better ranged attacks and lower hit points. They are thus dangerous when attacking from a distance, but tend to get taken down quickly in melee.

Lurker (monster) Lurker monsters are slightly more complex. While lurkers can be ambushers, the defining characteristic is actually the ability to enter and leave a "lurk" mode, and the most interesting lurkers are able to switch between modes in the same fight. Fighting a lurker is thus ideally like fighting two different monsters from round to round, and the tactics for dealing with one in "lurk" mode should be different from the tactics used in the other mode.

Leader (monster) Unlike the class role, leader is actually a sub-role for monsters. Like class role leaders, monster role leaders typically have some ability to restore their allies' hit points or make them fight better, but they would also also have some other role (controller, skirmisher, brute, soldier, artillery or lurker).

As with class roles, monster roles are supposed to give an idea of what the monster is designed to be good at. A DM should try to keep artillery monsters out of melee, for example, and should look out for how a leader sub-role monster can use its abilities to help its allies. No doubt, a DM should be able to infer this from reading the monster's abilities, but the roles would also provide a bit of extra clarity.

 

[Aluvial]

Okay, the names make sense to some degree. Thanks for posting them here. This is where I feel that the game has gone too far though.

Let me ask this, are there specific game rules that work with these "abstract" role names? For instance, are there any instances of a power or ritual that specifically deals or benefits a specific roll? If so, then the abstract naming convention for that character or creature (leader, controller, or lurker for example) then falls into the trap of over-design because then you are pigeon- holed into that role because their are specific game rules that cover that role. The first I can really think of is the minion. What other rules might be specific to a certain role?

 

[ferratus]

Okay, the names make sense to some degree. Thanks for posting them here. This is where I feel that the game has gone too far though.

Let me ask this, are there specific game rules that work with these "abstract" role names? For instance, are there any instances of a power or ritual that specifically deals or benefits a specific roll? If so, then the abstract naming convention for that character or creature (leader, controller, or lurker for example) then falls into the trap of over-design because then you are pigeon- holed into that role because their are specific game rules that cover that role. The first I can really think of is the minion. What other rules might be specific to a certain role?

Leaders are best at healing/buffing and have powers for that, Controllers have powers which disrupt opponents attacks and movement, Defenders have powers that aborb damage, and strikers have powers that do lots of damage. So yes, you are pigeon-holed by your class. Sometimes too much, because you can't make a really effective Theurge with the cleric or a damage-dealing fighter without choosing a similar class (ie. invoker) or a different class build (ie. fighter slayer). I defineately think there is room to improve this.

On the other hand, not having roles or rewarding people for having different roles, pretty much turns D&D into a game where all that matters is maximizing damage output and minimizing damage input. That's why in editions from 1e-3e if you had a party of clerics (the masters of minimizing damage input) you were good to go. If you have a party of clerics (or any other party comprised of a single role) in 4e, you're paste.

So by pigeon-holeing a class (or monster) like they did in 4e, they opened up more options in how the party should work as a team. I think however there should be a way to have customized party dynamics without losing customizable classes.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I have split off all the discussions about these things to this thread http://www.enworld.org/forum/new-ho...about-primer-d-d-4th-edition-terminology.html

Any further discussion posts appearing in this thread are likely to be deleted. Please keep this one to the definitions (and/or requests for definitions).

Thanks

 

[mach1.9pants]

Okay, the names make sense to some degree. Thanks for posting them here. This is where I feel that the game has gone too far though.

Let me ask this, are there specific game rules that work with these "abstract" role names? For instance, are there any instances of a power or ritual that specifically deals or benefits a specific roll? If so, then the abstract naming convention for that character or creature (leader, controller, or lurker for example) then falls into the trap of over-design because then you are pigeon- holed into that role because their are specific game rules that cover that role. The first I can really think of is the minion. What other rules might be specific to a certain role?

No there is nothing that does that. You can't have a ritual that targets 'lurkers only' for example. They are, in the way that the interact with the PCs, DM tags only. Obviously minions are one shot kills (though I often made them 2 shot.. one to bloodied, second kill)
If you go in the monster building guides there is specific numbers for each role and rank e.g. a soldier of X level should have an AC of between Y and Z. But that is it.
No over design there just helpful tags for DMs

 

[pemerton]

are there specific game rules that work with these "abstract" role names?

Just to emphasise the post above this one - no, there are not.

The role names, both for PCs and for NPCs/monsters, are simply meta-level tags that carry design information. They are not part of the action resolution rules.