GM Prep Time - Cognitive Dissonance in Encounter Design?

[I'm A Banana]

It's also why I've always thought the idea that 1st level was the most common level was sort of silly. 1000 xp is pretty easy to get, given enough time, and 3000 xp total is not out of reach of your average life. I've always considered 2nd and 3rd level to be a better baseline upon which to model your average citizen.

The 3e DMG wouldn't disagree with you. 2nd and 3rd level NPC's, according to it, were certainly present (even if 90% of the world was 1st level). I assumed this was mostly because the first battle most NPC's fought happened to kill them, so there's only a few that survive, and more than those few survivors protect.

 

[ExploderWizard]

I was at one point and time, but I have canceled my subscription. I think this clouds the issue as this brings in additional tools one must pay for to use... so yes I understand your point but I think it is irrelevant to someone who only has the books and is trying to design their own monsters.

Honestly, without the monster builder, I wouldn't be running 4E at all. If I had to do all the work by hand then a system with much less baggage than 3 or 4E would be played.

 

[Imaro]

Okay. You're right, nothing forces you to do anything at all. What do YOU do, though, when you have a party of highly optimized pcs stomping over your encounters and you don't want to make stuff up?

Hmm... I could increase the EL.

Your assumption, that anything beyond what is already given in the DMG (and can be implied by perusing the examples in the MM) 'needs' to be addressed is false, too.
No custom-created monster will ever be perfectly balanced (heck, official monsters aren't either!), but they don't need to. The system is robust enough to deal with minor imbalances.

Who is asking for perfect balance... but these are big, glaring holes that some players (even in this thread) want the answers to when designing their own stuff. If 4e is as balanced as most claim it is this shouldn't be that big of a deal to stick in a reference chart.

Further, no amount of rules will ever be able to guarantee perfect balance in a system (that is not trivial). I think you are looking for rules where none are needed.

Again you're creating this call for perfect balance and thus arguing against a point that was never made. I think you are dismissing the fact that these rules could help people better design (for both personal and professional use) monster, NPC's and powers. You don't need them, great for you... but if you aren't using them now, how will their inclusion in any way affect you? Or will you suddenly be forced to use them?

You see, I believe that sometimes providing rules can even be a bad thing. One example for this are the item creation guidelines in the 3.5 DMG. If you strictly follow these guidelines you can end up with all kinds of broken stuff. All that these guidelines really achieve is to provide DMs with a false sense of security that everything will work out just fine if all of the formulas have been properly used.

No these rules can also show flaws in the system DM's should be aware of... the design mechanics of the game, and so on. Your view seems a little narrow on what these type of rules provide.

A couple of years later the MIC came along and told the DM to forget about the item creation guidelines and just compare custom creations with existing items to come up with reasonable costs because (here it comes!) no amount of rules could ever hope to provide an accurate guideline. Best. Advice. Ever.

WOW, you really have a knack for making general sweeping statements of opinion as if they were fact... all I'll say is... Best. Advice. Ever. FOR YOU.

Personally I would have preferred a system that worked.

So what ARE you asking for?

More comprehensive does not equal more complicated... in fact sometimes when something is more comprehensive it can make it easier to use.

 

[pemerton]

Imaro, there's something I'm not following in your posts.

You're concerned that in 4e there's not much guidance for balancing conditions vs damage (but trap creation in DMG 2 helps a bit here), or enc vs recharge X vs recharge Y. I agree that such guidance might help, although my experience is consistent with that of others who say that there is a fair bit of "give" in the system, such that eyeballing things is unlikely to cause too much trouble.

But I think it's generally accepted that the CR rules for 3E are not especially robust, especially when used with HD advancement, templates, adding classes etc. So I don't understand how you think you're better off with 3E in this respect. After all, if you can eyeball it in 3E, why not in 4e?

 

[ExploderWizard]

Imaro, there's something I'm not following in your posts.

You're concerned that in 4e there's not much guidance for balancing conditions vs damage (but trap creation in DMG 2 helps a bit here), or enc vs recharge X vs recharge Y. I agree that such guidance might help, although my experience is consistent with that of others who say that there is a fair bit of "give" in the system, such that eyeballing things is unlikely to cause too much trouble.

But I think it's generally accepted that the CR rules for 3E are not especially robust, especially when used with HD advancement, templates, adding classes etc. So I don't understand how you think you're better off with 3E in this respect. After all, if you can eyeball it in 3E, why not in 4e?

I kind of have to agree here. When creating monsters for my Basic/1E games I kind of just slapped something together and went with it. In my curent 4E campaign I use the monster builder as a huge menu of starting ideas, then proceed to just slap stuff together and go with it.

Also, if your 3E party does not consist of Tordek, Mialee, Lidda, and Jozan the CR's will be out of whack anyway. The only useful thing that I found 3.X monster construction did was provide a bit of backwards deconstruction for custom monster builds in the event of a monster audit.

 

[Imaro]

It's not about 3e vs. 4e. Let me reiterate, I am playing 4e right now... I would like these rules for 4e... regardless of 3e's faults, the priciple of robust and comprehensive monster/NPC guidelines is, IMO, a good one. Just because 4e's designers haven't implemented an idea well (as expressed in the Peter Schaefer blog linked to earlier) doesn't make the idea a bad one... especially if they were on what I feel was the right track and there are plenty of rpg's that have implemented the idea well.

I guess my question is how would these rules hurt people who already make up or handwave their own stuff? Keep doing it and I'll use my rules, why is this even an issue?

Note: It's funny how in that blog I saw an admittance that the templates for 4e sucked, a reason, and....surprise, surpise... a fix. Again maybe it's the implementation and not the idea that is flawed in 4e.

 

[Gimby]

It's not about 3e vs. 4e. Let me reiterate, I am playing 4e right now... I would like these rules for 4e... regardless of 3e's faults, the priciple of robust and comprehensive monster/NPC guidelines is, IMO, a good one. Just because 4e's designers haven't implemented an idea well (as expressed in the Peter Schaefer blog linked to earlier) doesn't make the idea a bad one... especially if they were on what I feel was the right track and there are plenty of rpg's that have implemented the idea well.

I guess my question is how would these rules hurt people who already make up or handwave their own stuff? Keep doing it and I'll use my rules, why is this even an issue?

Note: It's funny how in that blog I saw an admittance that the templates for 4e sucked, a reason, and....surprise, surpise... a fix. Again maybe it's the implementation and not the idea that is flawed in 4e.

I suppose some of the confusion may be over whether 3e actually had some of the things you are worrying about. It had strong rules/heavy guidelines for advancing existing monsters by HD, a strong procedural method of adding class levels (and a huge library of classes to add) but creating stranger monster abilities was, to my recollection more handwaved.

Compare the Medusa with the Ogre Barbarian:

Medusa :: d20srd.org
Ogre :: d20srd.org

Both apparently CR7, but how do you come up with the poison and petrify effects? I don't recall any strong guidelines on when to introduce these types of properties. Both the 3e and 4e guidelines are good at producing something like the Ogre (a slab of numbers to hit people with) but less guidance is given for the more involved stuff. Chaos beasts (also apparently CR7) would be another good example.

As I recall it, the guidance was to compare with other example monsters, essentially what's being suggested for 4e rider effects.

Now the differences I see are that 3e gave you feats as a baseline, so something like Awesome Blow, which would be a power rider in 4e was part of the design process while 4e's more codified effects should allow for a stronger point-buy method for riders that the designers just seem to have failed to publish. Is that fair?

 

[Hussar]

Using Pathfinder rules:

Queen - 80 years old; /snip

Umm, what? Where in my example did we specify that Queen Victoria has to be inches from her deathbed?

Yes, you can move the goalposts as far as you like to prove your point, but, it would be nice to give a bit of warning first.

Well IMHO and all that, the idea that hit points model reality at all is kind of ludicrous.

Then why the beefs with minions? Or, do I have you mixed up with someone else?

KM - the problem with trying to model Queen Victoria as a 1st level aristocrat is that the rules get in the way in all sorts of ways. Any significantly higher level character will never fail in a skill contest with her. Ever. She will be totally dominated by those around here. No matter what.

This does not model Queen Victoria to me at all. I want someone who is savvy enough to be able to run the most powerful nation on the planet without being able to kick every commoner's ass.

Now, cheating by making her on her deathbed and then altering our commoner smith to an elite array and more than 2 hit points doesn't prove anything.

The problem is, if I want a skilled NPC, I HAVE to have a leveled NPC and those levels come with all sorts of abilities that do not fit with the concept. Never mind the time it takes to stat up that NPC as well.

 

[pemerton]

It's not about 3e vs. 4e.

OK, I'd missed that.

 

[billd91]

KM - the problem with trying to model Queen Victoria as a 1st level aristocrat is that the rules get in the way in all sorts of ways. Any significantly higher level character will never fail in a skill contest with her. Ever. She will be totally dominated by those around here. No matter what.

This does not model Queen Victoria to me at all. I want someone who is savvy enough to be able to run the most powerful nation on the planet without being able to kick every commoner's ass.

I think, at this point, I'm going to have to advise you to stop using Queen Victoria as an example. Some of us know enough about her that seeing her, early in her reign, as a 1st level aristocrat is fairly appropriate and that she didn't have to be particularly savvy or skillful to be the monarch of a powerful empire.