Embracing an Adversarial DM/PLayer Relationship in 4E

[Reynard]

What you're describing is, and pretty much always has been, standard operating procedure both for my game and for almost all the games that I have played in.

However, I think it can sometimes be difficult to engage in this kind of play when certain aspects of the rules can create unintended "unfairness" -- the CR system, frex. Look at the difference between the Night Hag and the Frost Giant in 3E. Both are CR 9 enemies, but where the frost giant might kill a front line fighter with a couple lucky rolls (at best), the Night Hag is really scary with special and spell like abilities that could easily result in a TPK if played "to the hilt". I'm just saying that assuming the 4E design team met its goal of evening out this problem -- not to mention the problem of disparate PC power levels based on optimization -- the DM actually has more freedom to go all out on the party while still maintaining a sense of fair play.

In any case, I think the idea has enough merit that I am going to explore it. Look for a blog entry in the next few days.

 

[Jasperak]

I think this thread is an excellent discussion of the different DM styles throughout all of the editions.

1e, 2e, OD&D, B/X, BECMI, and RC
These editions trusted the DM to fairly adjudicate the game. There were no real guidelines for balancing encounters against the party. The DM was tasked with using experience and knowledge of the rules to create the types of encounters he desired.

3e
This edition gave us CRs. It expected that if the PCs were at a specific power level then 4 PCs would be a match for and equivelent CR. While CRs may have been helpful at early and mid-levels, I started noticing them break down around level 9 or so, like the above poster mentioned.

This edition also gave us wealth by level guidelines and the ability for PCs to easily create magic items to supplement their abilities. So for the DM to use the CR system he had to determine what power level the party was at.

This was the first major attempt that I remember to find balance.

4e
This edition in the quest for balance redesigns its power structure, assumes the PCs will be able to purchase whatever magic items they want, restricts the abilities gained from magic items by tier, and designs the monsters so that at comparable level the PCs will be able to hit on average 60-65% of the time. In essence even if the DM creates a monster from scratch, if he follows the guidelines, the players will have an excellent idea (with 10%) of what the monster's stats are.

This in my mind takes the idea of balance to its logical extreme. Food for thought: can 4e get even more balanced?

What does this mean with respects to the OP's thought about adversarial DMs? The original editions (not 3e or 4e) relied on the DM to generate the sandbox and gave little tools on how to fill it aside from maybe using XP as a guideline.

Third edition relied heavily on a broken system for generating appropriate challenges and even so much as tied the XP system directly to the new system, but did not really help the DM generate appropriate encounters without a lot of extra work.

Fourth edition takes a lot of the guess work out of the system, but wonder and fear went right along with it IMHO. At any given level a player should be able to guess the numbers behind the system and act accordingly. The DM should feel free to drop any equal level encounter on the PCs and not worry too much, provided he follows the rules and the players have each of the roles covered. Balance seems to have been reached in such abundance that any one can generate appropriate challenges for a group of players regardless of their other intangible abilities as a DM.

As long as the numbers add up, the DM could throw whatever he wanted and not worry too much. Most of the guesswork has already been taken out.

 

[Vegepygmy]

1e, 2e, OD&D, B/X, BECMI, and RC
These editions trusted the DM to fairly adjudicate the game.

You never actually played 1e, did you?

 

[Jasperak]

You never actually played 1e, did you?

That's what I loved about D&D, that with one system there was room for all types of play. (If I understand your implication )

 

[Tewligan]

I laugh, my voice full of gleeful malice, when I slay a pc. Of course, I don't really mean it, but it keeps my players on their toes.

Man, you've got it totally backwards! When a PC dies, I put on the sympathetic sorry face, but inside I'm cheering for my humble giant crayfish who just snipped that mouthy cleric in half with his badass pinchers. Yeah!

 

[LostSoul]

You'd set it up like this:

The DM would get a certain amount of XP in his budget, with restrictions on how much he can spend at once. That would determine the level of the dungeon; a level 1 dungeon is 5000 XP, a level 5 dungeon is 10k XP, etc.

A level 1 dungeon would have a single-encounter limit of 1000 XP.

DCs for everything would be keyed off the level of the dungeon, using the Easy/Medium/Hard DCs.

No damage or conditions could be applied on failed skill checks if not in combat; you need to use a trap or a hazard for that (spending some of the XP budget).


I would also suggest, from the player's side, that the XP you get is divided by the number of times you take an extended rest + 1.

In campaign play, the level of the dungeon increases by 1 each time. The PCs would only level up when they have enough XP.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

You'd set it up like this:

The DM would get a certain amount of XP in his budget, with restrictions on how much he can spend at once. That would determine the level of the dungeon; a level 1 dungeon is 5000 XP, a level 5 dungeon is 10k XP, etc.

A level 1 dungeon would have a single-encounter limit of 1000 XP.

DCs for everything would be keyed off the level of the dungeon, using the Easy/Medium/Hard DCs.

No damage or conditions could be applied on failed skill checks if not in combat; you need to use a trap or a hazard for that (spending some of the XP budget).


I would also suggest, from the player's side, that the XP you get is divided by the number of times you take an extended rest + 1.

In campaign play, the level of the dungeon increases by 1 each time. The PCs would only level up when they have enough XP.

Sounds like a good start:
I suggest you would base your formula also on the number of PCs.
#PCs x [XP for monsters of your Level] * 1.5 = Encounter Budget
#PCs x [XP needed to level] = Adventure/Dungeon Budget

I think you should use extended rests differently. Instead of reducing XP, each extended Rest increases your encounter budget as if there was one additional PC, and also adds [XP for monster of their level] to his total budget. This extra XP are not awarded to the PCs.
This allows the DM to bring in reinforcements, or to reorganize the dungeon/scenario reacting to the players actions.

Mustrum "Teutonic Overengineering FTW" Ridcully

 

[wedgeski]

In campaign play, the level of the dungeon increases by 1 each time. The PCs would only level up when they have enough XP.

You know what, that sounds like it could work. It does seem to render D&D down to a Warhammer-point-buy battle, but a good and well-stretched set of rules along these lines could actually be quite fun.

 

[LostSoul]

I think you should use extended rests differently. Instead of reducing XP, each extended Rest increases your encounter budget as if there was one additional PC, and also adds [XP for monster of their level] to his total budget. This extra XP are not awarded to the PCs.
This allows the DM to bring in reinforcements, or to reorganize the dungeon/scenario reacting to the players actions.

Yeah, I think that's a better solution.

 

[Reynard]

I really wasn't thinking of creating a whole new game, though that's certainly an option. Rather, I was thinking that the high degree of balance inherent in 4E's design would allow me to let out my inner RBDM without being called on it.