Does hitting a milestone need more sizzle?

[Duelpersonality]

I know you can only spend one per encounter...which is part of the incentive to rest after every encounter provided the plot will allow it. And let's face it, the Tomb of Horrors has been sitting there for 500 years...the next room can wait another 6 hours.

What happened was the party spent round 1 maneuvering into position, then on round two every player except one unloaded with the encounter power - action point - daily power combo that totally destroyed what should have been a difficult (if not overwhelming) encounter.

Now, I realize the ability to pull this off with teleport/word of recall type spells being rituals now (so you can't just hit the panic button in the middle of a dungeon) is a bit tougher. I'm just looking for some sort of karmic carrot that would make adventurers want to press on instead of always wanting to take on every encounter at full strength...where full strength = full hp, all dailies, and 1 action point.

In going with the action movie theme of 4e, it would seem reasonable that the farther the heroes press on, the more improbable and amazing things they pull off to win the day. I think a more powerful action point that can only be earned by reaching a milestone in between extended rests might help.

Technically it would have to wait for 18 more hours (extended rests need 12 hours in between), but I understand your point.

In the end, I think it has a lot to do with just talking to your players and letting them know what kind of game you want to run. If they don't agree to that kind of game, then carrot-dangling is only going to make the game less fun for everyone.

You could also try simply preparing for one encounter a day, and just run them against really tough encounters. It's a band-aid, but it might work depending on how cinematic the constant, really tough fights are.

 

[Blackeagle]

A while back somebody who wanted to do the same thing (encourage a longer adventuring day) proposed increasing the XP for each encounter of the day. So:

1st Encounter: 80% of normal XP
2nd Encounter: 90% of normal XP
3rd Encounter: 100% of normal XP
4th Encounter: 110% of normal XP
5th Encounter: 120% of normal XP
6th Encounter: 130% of normal XP
etc.

 

[Festivus]

Why not occasionally toss the wandering monster at them while they rest? Fear will keep the other systems in line.

 

[malraux]

Parties will always be better off resting after every fight if resting produces a benefit. What I hope will result is not that there's never a motivation to rest, but that it's not a big motivation. The only things that reset with a long rest are HS and dailies. But characters still keep encounter powers, at will powers, ability to activate magic items, etc. Moreover, the ability to nova is much less than earlier editions. I suspect the ideal is the party resting about the time everyone's HS run out.


Hmmm, maybe if at each milestone, everyone could recharge one daily (2 at paragon, 3 at epic) that might keep things going longer. Might be an idea for a high powered game.

 

[JesterOC]

Hmmm, maybe if at each milestone, everyone could recharge one daily (2 at paragon, 3 at epic) that might keep things going longer. Might be an idea for a high powered game.

Even at 2nd level the party members will have more daily magic items reset per milestone than there class dailies. They might not be as powerful, but it seems like a big carrot to me, especially Dwarven armor it is level 2 and you get an extra healing surge in combat that will keep the fighter going much longer.

JesterOC

 

[Anax]

I agree with the people who are mentioning throwing encounters at the party while they are resting. If they are going all alpha-strike on you, remind them: a) why that's not such a good idea (it leaves you completely spent, having used up all of your most powerful abilities), b) that they can survive and fight just fine without using those abilities, and c) you aren't going to leave them alone just because they're resting after using up all their best stuff.

More than this: an alpha strike in a hard encounter is potentially a very very bad idea. Why? Because there's no guarantee that the guy you just took out with everything you have didn't have a big brother who wakes up and comes through the door just after everybody has finished going to town.

 

[Regicide]

Milestones are such an awkward, non-sensical mechanic they break game immersion. They should be pulled out of the game, not enhanced.

"Okay, we've used our action point last fight, before we open the door into the next room lets go back to town and get in a barroom brawl to get an action point back so we're more powerful for the next fight!"

Ugh. This isn't a freaking video game.

 

[Derren]

Milestones are such an awkward, non-sensical mechanic they break game immersion. They should be pulled out of the game, not enhanced.

Exactly.
When you want to encourage longer adventuring between rests do it by quest/dungeon design and not by such a mechanic.

 

[Lackhand]

Derren, Regicide: I see what you're saying, I just think that you're both wrong

While you say that Milestones break immersion, I'm not sure why they're any more immersion-breaking than rolling a 1 or a 20 on a hit -- which is completely metagame, and while it maps back to events in-game, is far more exciting as a metagame event.
(That's just an example. There are others.)

My point is that milestones are a game mechanic, admittedly -- but I feel that they're a good one. They are one way -- and there are others -- of rewarding characters for not stopping to rest. This is a worthy goal for several reasons: it means that the players can experience a model of attrition, it means that the characters adventure for more than 15 minutes a day, and it means that there's a way of rewarding players for playing the damn game.

Regicide: Your point about going to get a bar brawl before the next encounter is well taken, but this is the "anthill = million XP" problem from previous editions. If the bar brawl is interesting and fun and in some way relevant to a plot (not necessarily the plot), then sure, no reason not to treat it as a real encounter and grant AP.
If it's just the players being metagaming munchkins, then the DM is explicitly within his rights to deny them the AP from it.

Derren: Yeah, adventure design is one great way to keep the players playing. So's this. They're both good.

I agree with the OP that this method could be a little stronger, though. I think my house rule to make them more important -- when I start house-ruling -- will be the scaling xp advice from above.

 

[Derren]

Derren, Regicide: I see what you're saying, I just think that you're both wrong

While you say that Milestones break immersion, I'm not sure why they're any more immersion-breaking than rolling a 1 or a 20 on a hit -- which is completely metagame, and while it maps back to events in-game, is far more exciting as a metagame event.
(That's just an example. There are others.)

Fighting very good/bad (Natural 20/1) is something different than items recharging after two combats, no matter how much time lies between those combats or what is happening in them.