Doing away with "Bigger Fish" problem.

[Sunseeker]

Oh, I just noticed something else. If you treat level as rarity as well as power, you end up with a kind of expertise curve. This is based heavily (by which I mean stolen outright) on this blog post.

1st: 1 in 12 – The best in an extended family
2nd: 1 in 40 – The best in an estate or hamlet
3rd: 1 in 100 – The best in a tiny barony or village
4th: 1 in 200 – The best in a small barony or large village
5th: 1 in 500 – The best in a barony or large village
6th: 1 in 2,000 – The best in a march or town
7th: 1 in 6,000 – The best in a county
8th: 1 in 10,000 – The best in county
9th: 1 in 30,000- The best in a small duchy or big city
10th: 1 in 100,000 – The best in a duchy

If you extend this to the monsters, you get a good idea of how much of a threat a particular creature is. A 5HD orc is a warboss of a village. A 10 HD orc commands a Horde, or at least is the most dangerous orc in the horde.

Your 10th level fighter probably won't be encountering many 10th level threats unless she travels across the continents, but you can extrapolate backwards to find out how many of what level threats there are in an area.

This also lets you gauge what level you want to start at. A 1st level fighter might be the most gifted fighter in his squad, or the 1st level thief might have to work as a backalley pickpocket. If you want to play a more 'epic' game, you can start at 4th level as the best wizard in the entire wizard school.

Similarly, this relates to the reason that Superman mostly fights super-threats as opposed to thugs and robbers. Power attracts power. Powerful enemies seek out new challenges, and powerful allies seek out other powerful allies. So the proverbial "distance" one has to travel could be seen as only "half" the distance because while you seek them out, they also seek you out.

 

[JonWake]

So I took this system out for a test run last night, and it worked marvelously. The PCs faced off against a 6 HD ghost as six 2nd level characters as well as 12 1HD flaming zombies. Both fights were tense affairs, and I didn't have to inflate to-hit bonuses or damage to make them a challenge. The ghost was telekineticaly throwing the barbarian across the room, doing 3d6+4 damage (base TK punch of 2d6, +1d6 for 5th level), scored a critical hit on the thief, but we defeated when they salted and burnt the body.

The fight against the zombies was saved mostly by the Alchemist doing a bombing run and the cleric kicking butt with a turn undead, but even that almost dropped two of the characters.

All in all, I'm very happy.

 

[Rhenny]

I'm a fan of flatter math for a number of reasons.

First, I think it makes the game a little more gritty. I like the idea that creatures, no mater if they are lowly goblins or orcs, can have the potential to be dangerous to more PC levels. This doesn't mean that the PCs will encounter the same creatures over and over again. The DM will still be able to mix it up, but when needed, the goblins and orcs can come back into the picture.

Secondly, it just makes sense for some stats. For example AC. Since D&D hit points are already an abstraction that represents more than just physical damage taken, AC should be grounded to something real like type of armor or hide plus dexterity bonus. Heavily armored creatures with excellent dexterity should push AC 20-25, but that should be nearly the limit (with some magical exceptions). It just makes more sense. In 4e, I hate how clumsy, leather hide creatures (level 10 or 12) have AC of 32. Then, if AC is lower generally, there is no need to have "to hit" bonuses escalate at a fast rate.

With lower AC, players will also feel as if they have more chances to get lucky against superior foes. This will make the game more exciting, and make decision making more interesting. If PCs encounter creatures that are more powerful than they are (especially if they have high AC and other defenses that are high)..there really isn't any choice. If the PCs realize the danger, they should flee or try to avoid. If there was a chink in the armor so to speak, the PCs will have to make more meaningful decisions. Perhaps they can divide and conquer, or if there is only a small number of biggies, they can take a chance, and cut and run when they realize the encounter is going "sour."

Thirdly, if the base or core is flatter, groups can always add bonuses "to hit" or to "AC" to flavor their own campaigns as they like. If they want PCs to feel more heroic and deadly...apply +1 or +2 for training...or grant them magic to help them. It is always easier to add than to take away.

 

[Glade Riven]

I dunno..I have no problem reskinning stats to the appropriate fluff for players. 3e/Pathfinder makes it easy-yet-time-consuming by adding level. 4e makes it easy by "oh, hey, that stat block looks nice. That balrog is now an abyssal orc, bred from orcs doing [CENSORED] to [CENSORED] in in the [CENSORED] so that they can strengthen the bloodline." Off the top of my head. No problem. Feel free to use it, too. CC0.

Oh, you don't want your lvl 1 enemy orc to be a threat to a level 12 halfdragon. Wait, that's DM story time...what was the problem?

 

[Khaalis]

You don't have to do anything to the overall power scale to do something about the Bigger Fish problem. I hate to sound like a broken record, but Fantasy Craft solved the bigger fish problem too.

All creatures/NPCs are built generically so that they scale from level 1-20. If you want the PCs to face a dragon at level, you can do it. If you want them to face an orc at 20th, that's possible too.

Why can't WotC use something similar rather than the stale and tired old set CR "bigger fish" ladder. You fight kobolds at 1st, goblins at 2nd, hobgoblins at 3rd, orcs at 4th, etc. Bleh.

 

[JonWake]

I sort of have a huge problem with minion rules. It's an ugly hack with a lot of unintended consequences, it makes very little in-world sense and leads to some of the more egregious metagaming I've seen at a table.

I have the same problem with extant reskinning-- it shows just how broken the power progression is when you have to essentially re-write each monster every time a character gains a level. It also leads to the Oblivion problem people were talking about earlier.

Using a flatter power curve increases the levels that monsters are threatening while maintaining a sense of increasing power. A well-armed and prepared group of low-level characters know that attacking the 10 HD dragon in its cave is probably a death sentence, but with a lower power curve it's not set in stone. They could get very lucky. In 3.0 and 4e, they simply have no chance to even hurt it.

I'd like to throw my support in for keeping AC relatively static. When HPs increase and AC increases, you get 4e's notorious grind.