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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5970904" data-attributes="member: 42582">Why would the encounters that the PCs have be independent of the choices made by their players? I said I don't like random encounters or &quot;wandering monsters&quot;. You are the one who has introduced the notion of &quot;planned encounters&quot; - all I've said about planning is in post <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/usertag.php?do=list&amp;action=hash&amp;hash=86" target="_blank">#86</a>&nbsp; upthread, where I saidOverall, I keep my planning reasonably fluid, because I prefer to respond to what the PCs do, and what happens as a result - and find that this provides enough &quot;randomness&quot; or &quot;unexpectedness&quot; in outcomes.Maybe 0%, if the discovery would add nothing to the game. Maybe 100%, if it obviously would. Maybe something in between that, if the &quot;hanging around&quot; is being resolved as a skill challenge, with being discovered one possible consequence of failing a skill check (the example I have in mind is Frodo and Sam &quot;hanging around&quot; in Mordor after inadverently engineering the deaths of all those orcs in Cirith Ungol).I said a bit about how I would handle this sort of thing in post <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/usertag.php?do=list&amp;action=hash&amp;hash=86" target="_blank">#86</a> also.EDIT: Ninja-ed by [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION], although I think I might plan a little bit more than that. I often have ideas for thematically appropriate adversaries that also fit into the current general direction of ingame events, and will have them statted up, but will make decisions about where or exactly how to introduce them based on the dynamics of play. But Campbell is right that 4e's statblocks make it easy to introduce new or different adversaries easily. And it is also easy to level creatures up - if I statted up the hobgoblin captain 3 months ago, expecting that the PCs would confront him then, and then for various reasons that confrontation has been delayed for multiple sessions, I might still want the captain to be a worthy opponent even though the PCs have gained a level or two. 4e makes it very easy to do this.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 5970904, member: 42582"] Why would the encounters that the PCs have be independent of the choices made by their players? I said I don't like random encounters or "wandering monsters". You are the one who has introduced the notion of "planned encounters" - all I've said about planning is in post [URL=http://www.enworld.org/forum/usertag.php?do=list&action=hash&hash=86]#86[/URL] upthread, where I said [indent]Overall, I keep my planning reasonably fluid, because I prefer to respond to what the PCs do, and what happens as a result - and find that this provides enough "randomness" or "unexpectedness" in outcomes.[/indent] Maybe 0%, if the discovery would add nothing to the game. Maybe 100%, if it obviously would. Maybe something in between that, if the "hanging around" is being resolved as a skill challenge, with being discovered one possible consequence of failing a skill check (the example I have in mind is Frodo and Sam "hanging around" in Mordor after inadverently engineering the deaths of all those orcs in Cirith Ungol). I said a bit about how I would handle this sort of thing in post [URL=http://www.enworld.org/forum/usertag.php?do=list&action=hash&hash=86]#86[/URL] also. EDIT: Ninja-ed by [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION], although I think I might plan a little bit more than that. I often have ideas for thematically appropriate adversaries that also fit into the current general direction of ingame events, and will have them statted up, but will make decisions about where or exactly how to introduce them based on the dynamics of play. But Campbell is right that 4e's statblocks make it easy to introduce new or different adversaries easily. And it is also easy to level creatures up - if I statted up the hobgoblin captain 3 months ago, expecting that the PCs would confront him then, and then for various reasons that confrontation has been delayed for multiple sessions, I might still want the captain to be a worthy opponent even though the PCs have gained a level or two. 4e makes it very easy to do this. [/QUOTE]

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