D&D 5E Every Fight a Nova: Consequences and Considerations

[UngeheuerLich]

I don't feel like you understood the premise, which is probably my fault for being unclear: the assumption by everyone at the table going in is that the combat challenges in the game (however the come about) will be the only one for the "day" (between long rests) and it is presumed that PCs will be able to unload without concern over whether they will not have anything left in the tank for the next fight because there explicitly will not be one before the next rest. So, given that, what are the consequences and considerations, both fore the GM on the design side and for the players.

In 5e as is?
Tell this you players before chosing character classes, as the only viable ones are full casters.
Every other class will suffer because of limited nova capabilities. The only non full caster that might have a small chance to be semi capable could be the paladin.

 

[Mort]

I'm not sure why the thread has slid in the direction of "cram a day's worth of encounter XP budget into a single encounter" since that's not the presumption. The only presumption is that adventures have a single set piece encounter in which it is established that nova is the way to go.

Because, since the party's resources are presumed to be at full for every given encounter, anything less would mostly be theater instead of an actual "challenge."

But (as I, and @iserith , mentioned upthread) the way to overcome that is to have fights have different win conditions than simply "defeat all enemies." Then the difficulty of the actual combat isn't always relevant.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

I'm not sure why the thread has slid in the direction of "cram a day's worth of encounter XP budget into a single encounter" since that's not the presumption. The only presumption is that adventures have a single set piece encounter in which it is established that nova is the way to go.

The OP seemed to be asking for potential issues when only having a single encounter between long rests is the norm.
There is a general assumption that that encounter will be demanding, but without information as to how the OP is judging what to put into that encounter, it remains a potential issue rather than a definite issue or a complete non-issue.

 

[Reynard]

In 5e as is?
Tell this you players before chosing character classes, as the only viable ones are full casters.
Every other class will suffer because of limited nova capabilities. The only non full caster that might have a small chance to be semi capable could be the paladin.

I was actually thinking this morning that one might want to only allow half casters in a game of this type. Everyone is likely to release their big guns initially, but full caster big guns pretty much dwarf everyone else's.

 

[Flamestrike]

I was actually thinking this morning that one might want to only allow half casters in a game of this type. Everyone is likely to release their big guns initially, but full caster big guns pretty much dwarf everyone else's.

But the natural outcome of any such 'Nova' game, is one in which a TPK is inevitable.

One day, the PCs will lose initiative and that Deadly++ encounter will wipe them out.

Like I said before, in a game with even a 5 percent chance of a TPK, after 10 encounters, odds are that your party has been wiped out. In a game with a 25 percent chance of a TPK in any fight, the odds are that after 3 such fights, they PCs are wiped out.

If the PCs are roughly equal in power to their enemies, its a coin toss if they're rolling up new characters every night or not.

5E is intentionally forgiving in that the consequences for a standard medium-hard battle going against you is 'we used more resources than we wanted to, and we might need to short rest to heal' and not 'we need to roll new characters'.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Like I said before, in a game with even a 5 percent chance of a TPK, after 10 encounters, odds are that your party has been wiped out. In a game with a 25 percent chance of a TPK in any fight, the odds are that after 3 such fights, they PCs are wiped out.

Actually, the expectation value is 1/p.
So woth 5% chance of TPK, the average survivability is 1/0.05 = 20. And 1/0.25 = 4.

I don't know what the standard deviation is from the top of my head, but the chances of a TPK after 10 encounters is probably not too close to zero.

 

[Reynard]

But the natural outcome of any such 'Nova' game, is one in which a TPK is inevitable.

One day, the PCs will lose initiative and that Deadly++ encounter will wipe them out.

Like I said before, in a game with even a 5 percent chance of a TPK, after 10 encounters, odds are that your party has been wiped out. In a game with a 25 percent chance of a TPK in any fight, the odds are that after 3 such fights, they PCs are wiped out.

If the PCs are roughly equal in power to their enemies, its a coin toss if they're rolling up new characters every night or not.

5E is intentionally forgiving in that the consequences for a standard medium-hard battle going against you is 'we used more resources than we wanted to, and we might need to short rest to heal' and not 'we need to roll new characters'.

I don't think just asserting that it's a failure waiting to happen is very helpful. If the Deadly++ encounter is a non starter, then that's a considering in talking about how to manage the form, not a reason not to do it.

 

[Flamestrike]

Actually, the expectation value is 1/p.
So woth 5% chance of TPK, the average survivability is 1/0.05 = 20. And 1/0.25 = 4.

Roll a d20, looking to score a 20 (5 percent chance). Odds are greater than 50 percent that you'll roll one after 11 attempts.

So the odds are that after 10 fights with a 5 percent chance of a TPK each, that you've had a TPK. Close to 50/50 but definitely on the side of TPK.

 

[Flamestrike]

I don't think just asserting that it's a failure waiting to happen is very helpful. If the Deadly++ encounter is a non starter, then that's a considering in talking about how to manage the form, not a reason not to do it.

There are plenty of reasons not to do it. Not all classes have Nova buttons to mash for starters, and not all Nova buttons are equal. So it creates a huge gap between certain classes (independent of the encounter they face).

The effects on class balance when either running a game with single Deadly+ encounters per long rest, as opposed to half a dozen Medium-Hard encounters per long rest (broken up by a short rest every 2 encounters) is massive.

Putting class balance to one side, there is also the issue of the game lacking any strategic and tactical complexity. It devolves into 'win initiative and mash buttons' rocket tag.

 

[Flamestrike]

More importantly, the question should be 'why do it'?

What reasons could you want to do it? What does it add to your game?