Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Blue" data-source="post: 7005157" data-attributes="member: 20564">I no longer play 4e because of combat length, it literally killed our last campaign when we tried to switch to 5e because any non-trivial combat was taking a session and a half.   However, I propose that it is mainly based on the amount of information that needs to be processed.  On the number of options and conditions for PCs and foes.Take a first level 4e party.  Do a few sample combats so the players are up to speed on their characters.  Then run some fights.  While yes, there are less rounds then a paragon or epic combat it's not linear.  But still, each round goes so much faster because the amount of options you have are limited.Run the same group with the same prep at 5th.  Not too much slower, but it is slower.  Each character has a few more options, each of which needs to be evaluated seperately becasue they don't build directly on each otehr but each is a unique construction.  Plus a few more modifiers are out there each combat - who grants advantage, who's prone, etc.  The player and DM need to deal with more information and make more choices to complete the same action.Now go up to paragon.  See how much slower it is.  Added to the greatly expanded information of more powers and more options, there also more focus on synergy, something 4e was very good at.  If you're playing at a high level for many of the classes you need to think about how to best set up and support your fellows.  For strikers it might be just who to target, but defenders, controllers and leaders have more choices how to maximize their teammates.It leads to so much information that each turn takes  significant amount of time.Which also leads to another slowdown though more time based then rules based.  Once players have too long between their actions (regardless of rulesystem) it's really easy for them to get distracted and therefore need recaps to push this information to them.  "This one got hit and bloodied, this one was proned and poisoned".We used colored and labelled base magnets to show conditions, both to speed the tracking of them as well as convey it quickly to players.  In paragon medium sized foes would often find their stack of modifier magnets was more than the height of the mini itself.Compare this to 5e - much fewer conditions are applied, and usually there isn't stacking of them.  Most abilities outside casting are straightforward, you don't need to individually examine a number of similar but not-similar enough options to see what fits best.  "Oh, this is burst 2 but it's not ally firendly, that's no good."  Casting options are kept down via spells known/prepared, and unlike dailies where it's "if I use it I won't have it again today", you often have multiple slots of the same level so you don't need that caster's remorse slowing things down.  Many classes are a lot closer to the Essentials classes in that you have a reasonably powered at-will and then just a few extra options.</blockquote>

Verification