Primal said:
Yet I think that a certain amount of randomness is what makes most games fun and exciting to play, because if I didn't want any unpredictability at all, I'd just play Chess, Go or Amber.
Of course there needs to be SOME randomness to add tension to the game. D&D is all about the moments like "Will this attack hit?" and "Can I do enough damage this round to kill the monster?"
However, randomness in rolls that are rolled once and then have a long term effect on a character is not a good idea because it extends the result of a good or bad roll over a long period of time.
For instance, if you roll really well for hitpoints or stats it makes the rolls the enemy makes against you less dramatic and have less tension. It doesn't matter if the enemy hits this round since you know that you have a couple more rounds to survive than the monster can possible beat you in. It negates the randomness of some rolls due to randomness of others.
If you fail a save or die roll it creates long term consequences. Failing a save or take -2 to hit for 3 rounds creates short term consequences and adds to the tension.
Primal said:
Why not just give all PCs, as the "protagonists" of the "story", +100 HP at 1st level? Would it make the game more fun? Or would you think that it'd better if attacks and damage were static, too? Or, even better, what if all PCs (as the protagonists) would get a +20 modifier to their static attacks and monsters/NPCs just +10? Again, would it make the game more fun from a player's perspective? If not for anything else, these suggestions *would* remove most of the randomness in combat, and more or less ensure that the PCs always win.
Some of those suggestions might be good depending on the rest of the math in the game as a whole. The idea is to create tension and uncertainty in each round of combat rather than randomness. You want controlled randomness so that the players feel they have a chance of losing but also have a greater chance to win based on their decisions.
Stacking the odds so far in the PCs favor that they never lose at all removes the tension, which is bad. Making the game so random that the PCs know their decisions don't matter, that the roll of the dice is the only thing that is important ALSO removes tension. You need to find a balance between the two.
I've seen characters get so powerful in 1st, 2nd, and 3rd edition that it removed all tension from the game. Mostly this involved getting too many pluses to hit and damage, too many hitpoints or ac, or too high stats(which normally caused one of the other two problems). Anything that slanted odds in their favor too much pretty much removed the randomness from 90% of die rolls.
Primal said:
Death is part of the game, in my opinion. Even TPKs. If it's all about fun and tactics and eliminating randomness and "unfair" elements, I fear we may see things I suggested above in 5E. Would do you think -- would it be a step forward or backward in game design?
Death is part of the game. However, I don't think a random TPK is much fun for almost anyone. At least no one I've met. I haven't encountered a situation where people were jumping for joy because they all get to roll up new characters, the DM has to come up with a story solution to why a whole new group of people are finishing the adventure started by the first one or start an entirely new campaign.
The death of one player when it happens on a rare basis can be fun(since it adds to the tension to know that death IS a possibility), the death of an entire group rarely is fun.
