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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celtavian" data-source="post: 4443023" data-attributes="member: 5834">I didn't invite because everything you post isn't going to change my mind one little bit. All the reasoning you posted suits you, but does not satisfy me at all. Your explanations may be true, but that truth isn't something I want in the D&D I like to play.Already knew this. I don't like this form of mechanical  narrative control . I want the characters to feel like theirs powers work as though they learned them and can use them just like a trained gymnast can flip whenever he feels like it.What 4E did was make metagaming the standard form of play, disregarding anything close to realistic simualation. The above example you mentioned is metagaming.It isn't actually the DM saying "You see a weak point you can strike." It is the player saying "I use my power regardless of whether the enemy is weak or not." The player just decides a random time to use his power. The DM must fit it in regardless of the circumstances of necessity.It is the player controlling the narrative, not the DM. I don't like that. A player should have powers and a DM should control the narrative as to when those powers can be used.The DM still has that powers for dailies. But he has completley lost that power for encounter powers. The narrative control is completely up to the player with encounter powers. Something I do not like since encounter powers are not learned skills, but repetitious narrative control by the player.They won't leave you to do that in the first place, thus the reason they have opportunity attacks. If this is how you justify tumble, then so be it. Me, if you can do it, there shouldn't be any reason you can't do it again. It isn't like enemies have the means to stop you from tumbling again other than an arbitary narrative means like you describe.In essence, you are coming up with excuses why a power works. That arbitrary DMing has worked in every edition of the game. This is what you're not understanding. Yes, I can do that. But it is artificial.Me, I immerse myself in DMing. I think of the enemy as intelligent and I think of them as acting in an intelligent group of creatures. That means giving the players no rest once the fight is set off.I don't get all these recommendations just to handwave or create artificial encounters that "simulate" what I want to do. This is in essence the problem I have with 4E. That everything is simulated, artificial, and a bunch of handwaving. It takes me out of the game.Telling me to design an encounter from a metagame standpoint to simulate what I want to do isn't going to make me feel better. Why do you think that it is? My biggest problem with 4E is all the handwaving and assumption you are talking about. Did I not convey well enough that I want things to work and work all the time?For example, let's say I have a recurring villain who has fought the character before in the same adventure. In your example for Tumble, then why wouldn't he be able to stop me from tumbling again since he knows I will do it? But he can't because I can do it once per encounter regardless of what the other characters do. So why wouldn't I be able to do it all the time? what about against a stupid undead zombie who wouldn't have the intelligence to stop me from tumbling all around. Do I need contrive a different excuse for such dumb creatures as to why I can't tumble more than once every five minutes?So I need an endless box of excuses for the endless number of times that each character can use his encounter power every five minutes? Seriously, I've heard this argument a ton. All it amounts to is me having to think up endless justifications for encounter powers. Something that ruins my immersion in the game.Recharge rolls would prevent it. So would the fact that dragon breat weapons are so small. Did you notice that an ancient blue dragon can only hit three targets with that line of lightning?A dragon waiting for a recharge roll for its breath weapon is yet another thing that takes me out of the game. If it doesn't you, that is you. It takes me out of the game and not a single explanation from you will change that viewpoint.Recharge rolls for dragon breath weapons are bunk. I like a dragon that knows his breath weapon well enough that he will be able to use it every 1 to 4 rounds, not sweating whether he gets a six over the course of a combat.I get into my monsters. The recharge rolls take me out of the game.Once again, artificial and as I stated makes the monster for me feel like he is waiting for the dice machine to come up with his number before he can use his power. As a DM that truly likes to immerse myself into the monsters I play to the point where I alter my voice around the table and think about the personality of the creature, that recharge roll is a big old immersion destroyer. Not to mention a series of unlucky recharge rolls renders a monster much weaker than he would be if the power worked. Since I experienced that a few times why running the game, I was rather put off by it. The fact that a monster won't do his job as controller or leader because he was unlucky on the recharge roll doesn't sit well with me. Never will.I had to double and triple some encounters to make them challenging. I put four ghouls in one encounter and all my players did was trap them in a hallway and kill them two a a time making for a long, tedious battle.The ghoul is underwhelming. He hits, immobilizes, hopes the player doesn't make his save and that he is able to hit a few more times to stun them. They get one attack per round, thus can immobilize one character which doesn't take that character out of the game. And must keep on hitting the same character.Sure the other ghouls can go after someone else, that still leaves three other players to beat them down. Then with two minor words from the leader, a second wind from everyone, and temporary hit points from encounter powers for the entire group, let's just say that ghouls were a rather underwhelming fight.I was told to use this excuse for 3E as well.I could use it. And it would be funny as heck to run a lvl 30 Archmage wizard and wonder why he couldn't level lvl 6 Skirmishers with his "awsome" power.Even a high level wizard only gets 2d6 for his scorching blast. Levels may make a significant different for defenses, but damage is so depressed in 4E that his damage boost wouldn't be all that much save perhaps when he critted.If a Jedi doesn't play like a Jedi, I wouldn't like that game either. Jedi are the strongest in the game bar none, whether it is a 30 lvl jedi versus a 30 lvl smuggler. If the game doesn't have that feel, I wouldn't play. Thus why I never played Star Wars the MMORPG or RPG. I want my games to feel like storybooks, not egalitarian environments where we can all be equal.Once again you are bringing up the artificial nature of 4E. That is what I was getting at. It is all artificial, a bunch of smoke and mirrors. That lvl 20 demon minion you are fighting isn't really powerful, he just a puffed up smoke and mirror creature for the DM to throw at you.You want to know what phrase comes up in my mind for 4E over and over again, one that keeps getting confirmed arguments like the one you used above."All style, no substance."That is 4E in a nutshell. It looks great on the suface, but dig a little deeper and you find fluffy cotton in your monsters and balloons filled with air that pop when when you hit with them a +6 greatsword or poke with a finger.True enough. But no, I don't think there is anything wrong with games that aren't perfectly balanced.It may be easier to work with a well-balanced whole. But as with things that generally easier, they are less satisfying as a whole. It may take more work to make a 3E adventure, but by did I used to feel satisfied when I beat the Big Bad Evil Guy. I didn't feel like he was an artificial bag of hit points with some marginally dangerous powers aimed at creating the illusion of challenge verus being an actual challenge.And that is how I feel in 4E. I've fought a few solos. TAll those nice hit points don't amount to a hill of beans with one attack per round while five or six people are blowing encounter powers on him and probably dailies as well as using second wind and minor words.The entire game is balanced in such a way as to make sure the players always win. And so that they don't have to work too hard to do so. Thanks for continuing to confirm my initial feeling that 4E is all style and no substance. Handwaving and artifice that takes me right out of the game and rings the "this is a game" bell in my head.I'm not going to convince you to dislike 4E. But don't think for a second you're going to convince me my views are incorrect. I very much understand the intent of 4E mechanics used to simualate narrative events.I just prefer the mechanics 3E used to simulate those same narrative events. They feel more real for me and do a better job immersing me in the story. If 4E does that better for you, then I'm happy that the new version makes you happy. I certainly wish I could say the same.</blockquote>

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