Defenders require bad AI from monsters

[Elric]

Well, I'll give you this one. The five minute rest is a new 4e conceit that I don't really use.

My PCs rest for all of 30 seconds and that's if it take that long to reach the next encounter.

Basically, once the hectic fight is over, they check temselves for wounds, take a deep breath (and regain encounter powers!) and then resume hunting the monsters. If they haven't successfully killed everyone before they could sound the alarm, they run into monsters in the next room and the twenty seconds delay since the end of the previous fight barely explains why they had the time to grab a weapon and gather in a more sensible formation.

A four encounter dungeon like, say, the Room of Eyes in the Thunderspire labyrinth would probably be cleaned out in about three minutes to four minutes of real world time.

Imagine a bunch of commandos sweeping a terrorists hide out.

I don't know that particular dungeon, but I imagine if the alarm gets sounded immediately when the PCs attack at encounter 1, encounters 3 and 4 will have time to group themselves together. In a five encounter dungeon, that at least encounters 4 and 5 will manage to group themselves together after an initial alarm seems even more likely. Of course, as GM you could use a 4 encounter dungeon rationalized as "the last encounter is the hardest because two groups of monsters were able to band together in the chieftain's room."

If you essentially assume that a short rest takes 0 time but can't be used in combat, and that monsters try to gather themselves into larger groups to fight the PCs if given sufficient time, then PCs will start sweeping through dungeons killing everything as quickly as they possibly can.

This has some consequences for their ability to find stuff as they go along (and disarm traps or the like), and makes "per encounter" and "spending healing surges after the encounter" an even stranger concept, but those are just game concepts, not simulationist ones, anyway.

 

[Stalker0]

In 4e DnD, the adventurers are the HEROES. In fact, they are the ONLY heroes in the entire world. The whole world literally does revolve around them, and there is no expectation that the monsters and NPCs have ever encountered anything like them before.

Yep, this is my rationale for why the monsters don't finish pcs when they are down. In all the other battles they have faced, the guy they just ripped up is dead on the ground. Its one heck of a surprise when the guy suddenly gets right back up and hits you again!

 

[LittleFuzzy]

I don't know that particular dungeon, but I imagine if the alarm gets sounded immediately when the PCs attack at encounter 1, encounters 3 and 4 will have time to group themselves together.

2 and 3 when I ran it. The party ambushed group 1 and only one of the goblins managed to get away. He ran and got the boss, who managed to get encounters 2 and 3 together into the main hall when the PC's busted down that door. Vicious fight.

 

[Skallgrim]

To second what several posters have said, the party is a band of "Heroes". They are distinct from most of the people wandering around. If the local lord could just order his guards to go and rescue the hostages, or defeat the undead, or storm the keep, he would have already done that. Those people aren't Heroes.

The party is chock full of Heroes. People who can take a hit, fall down, and get back up. People who can perform miracles for their deity, or astounding acts of magic. In most cases, the opposition isn't expecting Heroes. They are expecting regular people. That's why they don't mass at the battlements and shoot 20 arrows a round. What are 5 regular people going to do?

Spoiler Alert:




For instance, at the Horned Hold, why is the Hold guarded by just a few orcs. Several reasons. Aside from the fact that the Hold was designed to guard the minotaur city from invasion from the Underdark (on the other side), not from the city itself, and the fact that the Hold isn't on any marked routes, a few orcs and a porticullis are sufficient to guard a door from regular people. What are regular people going to do to 5 orcs? Die, that's what.

Heroes, on the other hand, are a different matter.

I think that, in general, most monsters in populated areas should be expecting regular people, not Heroes. Now, if you are adventuring in the Bone Citadel in the Wastes of Evil, what regular person ever goes there? If the 5 guys defeated your first and second lines of defense, they are probably Heroes, too. But, in general, it's not stupid of the monsters to expect that they can beat the PCs. Most opposition is regular people, and they can beat them pretty easily. Heck, they might even be extra-overconfident, because 5 people attacking your keep are either suicidal fools, or Heroes, and when's the last time anybody saw a Hero around here?

This allows the PCs to use their cool abilities without the monsters swamping them, and turning every adventure into one single level 20 bloodbath, composed of the PCs versus every guy in the place at once. It also explains why the adventurers are even there, instead of just having all the troubles put down by the local soldiery.


If, on the other hand, the PCs aren't anything exceptional or unusual in your game world (everybody has character levels), then you've already altered the game expectations considerably, and you probably have (or should have) already thought out reasons why the PCs are even needed (maybe they ARE the guards). In that case, most monsters will need to be a lot more cautious, because, from past experience, everybody they meet is an actual threat to them. This assumption seems to alter the fabric of the game world well away from 4E assumptions (though it is fine, and fun to run), so I think I'll let it pass without further comment as it is definitely a special case.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

I don't know that particular dungeon, but I imagine if the alarm gets sounded immediately when the PCs attack at encounter 1, encounters 3 and 4 will have time to group themselves together. In a five encounter dungeon, that at least encounters 4 and 5 will manage to group themselves together after an initial alarm seems even more likely.

If they manage to sound the alarm or if the dungeon is small enough for the sound to carry to the next locale, then yes, they can try grouping.

Mind you, these monsters in the living quarters aren't battle ready; that's what the guards are for. If the heroes, acting like any self respecting commandos or just old fashioned action heroes have busted through the gate and the second encounter zone in roughly over a minute, how ready do you expect the rest of the dungeon to be when the PCs take the fight to them?

I expect some races, like say, Drow, to be quicker on the uptake than Gnolls, for example. But if your heroes are moving at a brisk pace, it ain't a strectch to let them mop up several pockets of resistance on the way. Depends on the scenario.

Beside, the nature of a dungeon and of the game means that the level of the monsters is a bigger factor than their numbers in a restricted area. If you decide that the last two encounters have successfully combined together in a big one, you have made that fight tougher, yes, but not nearly twice as tough. As long as this is a dungeon and therefore maneuvering space is restricted, the PCs will have a good time; Seeing every enemies gathered, they'll enter in an orgy of dailies and Action points. The wizard in particular is going to be giddy like a little girl.

 

[Elric]

If they manage to sound the alarm or if the dungeon is small enough for the sound to carry to the next locale, then yes, they can try grouping.

Mind you, these monsters in the living quarters aren't battle ready; that's what the guards are for. If the heroes, acting like any self respecting commandos or just old fashioned action heroes have busted through the gate and the second encounter zone in roughly over a minute, how ready do you expect the rest of the dungeon to be when the PCs take the fight to them?

This requires the PCs to be moving exceptionally quickly and pretty much necessitates the game to be using an instantaneous short rest (or a short rest that doesn't take longer than the round or two you spend moving to the second area), and have the PCs spend no almost time searching, disarming traps, or bypassing other obstacles. I'd also expect that guards would almost never fail to sound the alarm because unless the PCs get a total jump on very weak guards, there should be one near the back who makes it to the next encounter zone, even if there's no built in alarm/the dungeon isn't small enough for shouting to work.

Beside, the nature of a dungeon and of the game means that the level of the monsters is a bigger factor than their numbers in a restricted area. If you decide that the last two encounters have successfully combined together in a big one, you have made that fight tougher, yes, but not nearly twice as tough. As long as this is a dungeon and therefore maneuvering space is restricted, the PCs will have a good time; Seeing every enemies gathered, they'll enter in an orgy of dailies and Action points. The wizard in particular is going to be giddy like a little girl.

Not nearly as hard? Not as hard, likely. But a level +1 encounter combined with a level +3 encounter is essentially a level+6 encounter. If it was a hard as those two encounters put together, a typical (and not especially difficult) end to a dungeon would usually result in TPKs. I believe the infamous (though I'm trying to avoid too many spoilers, since I may play through the module later) Irontooth encounter that often results in TPKs is the result of two encounters being combined into one, with disastrous results for the party.

 

[Regicide]

For the same reason that the PCs don't immediately flee the battle the moment they get marked by some monster. They have a vested interest in winning and think that it's still possible, or even likely, despite momentary setback.

Getting marked? Is that supposed to be a serious argument? It certainly made me laugh. We're talking about a party, well equipped, co-ordinated and tossing effects and spells the monsters have never even imagined the power of before. We're talking about creatures with some intelligence, often times even MORE intelligent than some of the characters in the party, not being able to identify the fact that they are outclassed to the point that they have less than a 1% chance of winning the fight. Minions falling over dead by the merest flick of a PC's wrist. Blows landing on the battlerager to absolutely no effect.

Even IF it wasn't BLATENTLY OBVIOUS even before the fight started (which requires an enormous amount of stupidity or overconfidance), it will be crystal clear after a round or two. We're not talking "hey, I'm overconfidant I see a 40% chance of winning as 60%", we're not talking "hey, I'm overconfidant and drunk and myopic and am seeing a 20% chance of winning as a 60%", we're talking "hey, my head is shoved so far up my ass I'm seeing a 0.5% chance of winning as good odds."

I mean SERIOUSLY, how are you even able, in one sentance to say "oh, the monster can tell the controller's AC is 2 lower and has a few less HPs and is doing 20% more damage so the Defender has a hard time because the monster will go after them instead" then in the next sentance say "oh, the monster can't tell that it's going to loser the fight, even after it's engaged and has had a few friends die."

 

[Starfox]

Returning to the title of the thread, my problem is that the optimal tactic for the monsters is always to whale whole-heartedly on the defender. All defenders like to take some aggro, but no defender likes to take all the aggro. There are plenty of techniques to draw aggro to the defender, none to pull it away.

As a DM, I feel I have to play the monsters with the distinct goal of killing everyone BUT the defender. If the monsters strive to get by the defender and hit the rest of the team, defender mechanics (especially the Fighter) work excellently. If I put full pressure on the defender, he gets minced into mulch.

So, yes, Defenders require bad AI from the monsters - bad AI in this case being monsters that don't want to attack anyone but the defender.

 

[Danceofmasks]

Well, I was in a poorly matched group recently for an LFR special ... 3 leaders + 1 fighter + 1 wizard.
Sure, we had plenty of healing effects, but then our fighter was down 10 surges after the first encounter.
My cleric lost 10 surges in a single encounter, too ... 'cos rushing forwards was going to be the only way to prevent other characters from dropping and staying down.

Concentrated fire is simply common sense IMO .. without it, DMs are wearing kid gloves.

 

[GoLu]

Getting marked? Is that supposed to be a serious argument?

It seemed reasonable given where the conversation was coming from:

The key to being a good defender is to give enemies a basic choice: waste attacks against me, or try to attack my buddies and be punished horribly for it. That way, no matter what the DM does, you win.

So, you've now put the enemy in the position where it's bad to attack the defender and bad to attack someone other than the defender. The good option is to not attack, but to run. Yet, the monster doesn't run. Why?

As far as I'm concerned, those two quote excerpts form the foundation for this thread. But, you know, I'm getting the feeling that your issue isn't actually about defenders any more, and maybe even that it never was.