D&D 4E Are 4E powers mimicking poor playability of Dodge?

[Graf]

I agree that this is a bit of an unfortunate trend.
In principal I think their goal is to push people toward using the electronic gaming system (which will auto "flag" different effects on characters).

I may just try to get a bunch of multi-colored tokens and a white board.
Everybody keeps their tokens in front of their seat or something?

 

[hennebeck]

I try to remember everything I'm supposed to.
If I forget, oops.
I agree with the poster's sentiment that said we should just make it 50% to hit.
I don't understand why people are houseruling a game they haven't seen yet.
Who is to say that the +1 isn't helpful?
It adds it to everyone in the group. Pretty simple.
If you don't have an elf with you, you don't get a +1.
You could use a computer to calculate all the binuses and negatives, then have a computer calculate which hero is the greatest threat, then calculate what the monsters should do based on that.
WoW, that would be cool, if I could just have a computer do all the work, and I just grind for XP.

 

[Li Shenron]

IMO dodge wasn't complex, it was just a weak feat with an irrelevant bonus.

However, nearly everyone who house ruled it changed it so that it was always active vs everyone, and didn't increase the bonus.

 

[Bold or Stupid]

I agree that this is a bit of an unfortunate trend.
In principal I think their goal is to push people toward using the electronic gaming system (which will auto "flag" different effects on characters).

I may just try to get a bunch of multi-colored tokens and a white board.
Everybody keeps their tokens in front of their seat or something?

I must admit that my impression from the statements they've made about DDI is that the virtual game table will be rules free, it'll be a board with minis you can move. It will have the ability to show light areas (for visibility) but that's it. As far as I remember it looks like I could run Shadowrun (with weird ass minis) on the VGT if I wanted too, or indeed 3rd ed.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I may just try to get a bunch of multi-colored tokens and a white board.
Everybody keeps their tokens in front of their seat or something?

No idea how we will eventually do it, but we started to use a Initiative board (there is a product for it, but I don't know the name). You could mark conditions (or condition marks?) on it.

 

[med stud]

I agree that this is a bit of an unfortunate trend.
In principal I think their goal is to push people toward using the electronic gaming system (which will auto "flag" different effects on characters).

I may just try to get a bunch of multi-colored tokens and a white board.
Everybody keeps their tokens in front of their seat or something?

I write up an initiative-table, containing all combatants at the middle of the paper. Going down, I write HP. Going up, I write statuses.

Example:

Acid 5 ---- Marked ---
Fighter --- Kobold 1 --- Kobold slinger
HP 33 ---- HP 17 ------ HP 24

Then you just add or remove HPs and conditions as the combat progresses. Surprisingly easy to work with.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I write up an initiative-table, containing all combatants at the middle of the paper. Going down, I write HP. Going up, I write statuses.

Example:

Acid 5 ---- Marked ---
Fighter --- Kobold 1 --- Kobold slinger
HP 33 ---- HP 17 ------ HP 24

Then you just add or remove HPs and conditions as the combat progresses. Surprisingly easy to work with.

Smart. I should try it myself...

 

[broghammerj]

But they have a few things in common:
- They don't change round to round
- They affect multiple allies
- The caster doesn't need to keep track of them after he initiated many rounds (or encounters) ago.
4E buffs seem to be "Character X gives Character Y a bonus => Player of X tells Player Y that he has a bonus." And that happens each round.

I see from a technical standpoint that bard song is different for the above reasons you listed. However, take two players (Bob the Bard and Frank the fighter) when Frank's turn comes up, Bob reminds him about his +2 bonus. I don't see that as much difference on a person to person interaction. The same conversation is likely still going on......and it will happen each round because someone is always forgetting. If anything bard song should be easier to remembers because it continues. Players will still be talking to one another.

I guess one could argue that since bonuses may change every round so you are forced to have a conversation. I just see that as slowing down gameplay with metagame talking, recalculation of bonues, etc.

 

[med stud]

I see from a technical standpoint that bard song is different for the above reasons you listed. However, take two players (Bob the Bard and Frank the fighter) when Frank's turn comes up, Bob reminds him about his +2 bonus. I don't see that as much difference on a person to person interaction. The same conversation is likely still going on......and it will happen each round because someone is always forgetting. If anything bard song should be easier to remembers because it continues. Players will still be talking to one another.

I guess one could argue that since bonuses may change every round so you are forced to have a conversation. I just see that as slowing down gameplay with metagame talking, recalculation of bonues, etc.

I thought 4e combats would be a pain to keep track of, but in play it really was no problem at all. I used the method I described above, with the initiative strip, but I think even without that that it would be easy to manage. This is strange, because I found 3e to be very confusing.

I think it has to do with the fact, as you say, that you interact with the active effects every round. A bull's strength that has 3 rounds left isn't something you interact with, it's easy to forget, and all of a sudden you sit there, thinking about whether the bull's strength has expired or not. With active acid damage, you roll every round. It might be that, it might be something else, but from the DM-chair I had no problems keeping track of seven monsters.

 

[Xorn]

No problems tracking stuff thus far, but maybe I players are just really, really smart. The fighter used Tide of Iron to provide cover to the paladin (who what taking a pounding from a blazing skeleton), and the paladin used his encounter ability to grant the fighter +3 AC.

Oddly enough, when the blazing skeleton opted to attack the fighter instead of trying to hit the paladin through cover, the fighter said, my AC is 22 right now.

Probably just genious players, though.