Are milestones enough of a motivation to avoid the 15 minute adventuring day?

[Ethalias]

Discussions on the Barbarian thread got me wondering; what are people's experiences in regard to PCs burning all their dailies in a Nova-fest? Has it been an issue? Are players reserved with their dailies, or somewhat trigger happy? Do you enforce longer days through adventure design/RP reasons/something else? Do action points serve as a reason to press on?

I ask this hypothetically, I'm yet to start my first 4E campaign, and wondered what other's thoughts were.

Cheers

Ethalias

 

[Jack99]

13 sessions played, and I have yet to experience my players going nova when it isn't needed. So I do not think it is a big issue. In general, I would say that daily powers have little effect on their decision to rest or not (this statement is true for both campaigns, one is level 6ish, one is level 14)

So to answer your question, milestones are not enough motivation to avoid the 15 minute day, simply because they have very little impact. For us, it has been the surges that are the decisive factor. When people hit 0 surges, it's time to crawl into a hole and rest.

 

[Alaxk Knight of Galt]

I'm a big believer of time in the gaming world. Without time pressure placed on their characters, players have no need to place their characters in undue risk (and undue risk is exciting). When time becomes a factor, players are forced to make decisions based off in game events and not powers per day. Of course, to make this work, there has to be a tangible effects for success or failure. Deadlines are a great thing for adventures

As for my 4E experiences, I've yet to encounter the 5/15 minute adventuring day. At wills and encounter powers are, in my mind, the bread and butter of the character. Using a daily only reduces the character's effectiveness for the next battle a little. The bigger constraint on the adventuring day is healing surges. Running out of them probably means a rest is coming very soon.

 

[Remathilis]

My groups not high enough level yet to go nova (2-3) but so far, I find they horde their dailies and rely primarily on a Encounter/At-will/At-will pattern. Perhaps in paragon, it will look different...

 

[Cadfan]

No nova problems here. Surges don't run out fast enough, and dailies, while better than regular attacks, aren't so much better that you find yourself desperate to nova.

Most of the awesome, game changing dailies are set up so that you probably won't want to use too many of them at once. They might be "sustain minor" or something along those lines. Or else they just provide too much of a good thing, like stacked healing dailies, and you don't use them together simply because there isn't a need to do so.

 

[blargney the second]

The characters in my party frequently go to sleep with their dailies unused. It's the surges that keep you going or force you to stop - we stop for the day when someone is down to their last one or two. If we just hit a milestone, we're more likely to press on if we're low on surges.

 

[Ethalias]

It's the surges that keep you going or force you to stop - we stop for the day when someone is down to their last one or two. If we just hit a milestone, we're more likely to press on if we're low on surges.

Quite how I missed that out of the equation I don't know.. The test-run I did with a buddy to show him the ropes was RP-free (he was controlling the whole party) so the adventuring day didn't enter into it so much.

Glad to hear everything is working for you guys, thanks for responding (first started thread )

 

[Morrus]

In my game, no. An Action Point isn't enough incentive to not die by not using Dailies etc.

I'm running Thunderspire, and the group is a little underpowered, though, so that might have something to do with it. But it is one encounter per day for them!

 

[Ethalias]

In my game, no. An Action Point isn't enough incentive to not die by not using Dailies etc.

I'm running Thunderspire, and the group is a little underpowered, though, so that might have something to do with it. But it is one encounter per day for them!

Are they also out of surges? Or resting purely to regain dailies?

Thank you for honouring me with your post Lord Morrus! XD

 

[I'm A Banana]

If an Action Point gave me back my precious daily, maybe.

As it is, not really. But then, I've never been a fan of the 15 minute adventuring day personally, so I try to avoid it in the metagame.

But I totally get why people who have blown their action point don't bother going for another combat to get a new one. "Pfft. I could risk life and limb, or I could just sleep. Guess which one sounds like a better survival strategy."