How Did Your Lair Assault 2 Go? (spoilers)

[D'karr]

Because it was advertised as being akin to the "Ultimate Delves" of years past, which were definitely brutal challenges but were also puzzles to be solved. Find the trick, answer the riddle, get the hidden macguffin, and suddenly this brutal event becomes extremely manageable.

I don't recall any of the stuff that we playtested to have even a remote comparison to Ultimate Delve, but that is entirely possible. I don't even recall WotC advertising them as such or giving us instructions to playtest them as such, but I could be wrong.

This? This is just hard for the sake of hard. And the delves, from what I remember, didn't cheat the design to get around player "cheese" either; they just found interesting designs where that cheese didn't matter. It's clear that certain elements of both of these modules so far have had some things "penciled in" to account for apparent flaws discovered in playtesting that made it "too easy" for their liking, which makes the whole thing feel cheesy anyway.

It's better than having very loose playtesting as was the case with the Ultimate Delves. BTW, adventures should have things that "break" or stretch the "rules". If WotC decided to put out a Lair Assault that was populated with all Level + 3 encounters it would be by the rules, but it would be either impossible or not fun. Just because something follows the "rules" does not make it more, or less challenging, and some of the stuff that they are doing for Lair Assault occupies an entirely different design space that what you'd use at your regular game table.

The main difference is that Ultimate Delve had a time limit. You had 6 encounters to finish in a set real world time limit. The parameters of that are entirely different than one/two encounters in whatever time you want.

The delves were challenging because they were hard, and particularly stressful because you had no time to lollygag. That is not at all the design space for Lair Assault.

If they said, you have 1 hour to complete this encounter I can see the same challenge as in Ultimate Delve. As it is, season one had 20 rounds as the limit, but you could take 8 hours to do those 20 rounds if you wanted.

Time is a hell of a lead to stress. Lair Assault in the past two seasons have not had that stressor in place. So they are not even remotely comparable for the "at the table" effect. When there's a time limit people will make "mistakes" and that was when the Ultimate Delve slammed you, not because you made a mistake but because your mistake usually ended up costing you time. In Lair Assault with no "metagame" mechanic forcing errors the challenge is not even comparable.

It's uninspired and boils down to a numbers game. Sure, there's a market for that, but it's a letdown compared to the hype that WotC themselves gave to it. It could very well be that the community at large and the R&D dept don't actually agree on what made those old delves fun, so that could explain part of the discrepancy. I don't know.

Having players try the cheesiest things they can to win is cheesy, and simply a numbers game. But some people like that. I don't, so I playtested these things because that was what we were doing, and I don't play them now. They don't interest me. But that does not preclude some people from enjoying them, and me nagging that I don't like it is just a way of complaining for the hell of complaining. If some people like them, then I hope they enjoy them.

I get the feeling that LA as currently designed also reinforces a fairly negative impression of min/max and CharOp concepts to the community as a whole, which is doubly unfortunate since they provide a pretty amazing perspective on the game's design as a whole but are often lambasted for their methodology or philosophy.

I don't have a problem with people optimizing their characters mechanically. Heck, I've done it myself with one, or two of my characters. I have a problem when everything is looked at only through the prism of CharOp. Just because someone optimizes does not preclude them from role playing an awesome character. But when CharOp is the only thing that people focus on, then there is a problem, IMO. When I played Lair Assault the only reason I did particular things was because of their metagame effect. It had nothing to do with what I would want my "character" to do. It had everything to do with what would be mechanically effective. So if I really wanted to play a gnome illusionist but he was sub-par for the challenge I would make an Eladrin Wizard, because he was optimized for the challenge. I didn't play what I wanted because it was not the best for the particular challenge, that was one of the metagame reasons that I decided I was not interested in Lair Assault.

I want more to my role playing game than a "cheesy" killer adventure designed for "cheesy" characters. I already know that is the premise to Lair Assault. And it is purposely designed to be "unfair" within certain limits. That is not by accident, it is by design. If you complete it, you have braggin' rights that you completed something that was "unwinnable." And if you don't survive the first run, then it's meant to be replayed, which is another metagame effect. So I don't play Lair Assault, not because it's bad, but because it's not to my taste.

However, if some people enjoy it, then more power to them. I don't have to be the fly in the ointment for their enjoyment, and my complaints though entirely valid are not appropriate for a thread where people should be able to freely discuss what worked, and what didn't work for them during their run.

 

[D'karr]

Edit: And to carry your final question a bit further, it seems fairly reasonable by extension that we should allow those who may be interested in the concept but displeased with the result to voice their opinions, preferably without having their very opinion itself picked apart. I haven't seen anyone with positive feedback get told why they're wrong, but I've seen plenty of the inverse. (Please note this is an entirely subjective response, I don't intend to re-read both LA threads to ratify it.) If you enjoyed it, great! But that doesn't mean that some people didn't.

Sorry, I didn't see this edit.

Sure I agree, but a lot of the complaints here are how X or Y "breaks" the rules. So what? Go into Lair Assault already knowing that some things might stretch, or break the "rules". That is part of the design parameters. This is not a long term campaign in which the DM is breaking the "rules" in every adventure. These are self-contained adventures that are designed to beat the crap out of optimized characters, and there are things in there that will stretch/break the "rules", and be "unfair". That should not be a surprise.

If I don't like that type of game I just don't play in it. I don't go play in it, and then come to a forum where people might want to discuss their strategies for winning, or losing ( ), and spend my time complaining about how this or that was unfair or broke the "rules."

I have my preferences, and some other people have theirs. Some of the conversations on these forums are more about "WotC killed my dog", than about our preferences.

 

[talok55]

I think some people think that it is cheesy that they literally had to break the rules to make lair assault challenging. Either they were being lazy about it, or it's just too difficult to make challenging, killer encounters for optimized 4E characters. I think it would make for a much better encounter if they tried to make it challenging without resorting to cheezy things like halving your energy resistance or autokilling you PC when you fall in the water.

 

[keterys]

Halving your resistance is probably more fun than removing it entirely (lots of things remove it for the encounter and... yeah)

The auto-die in the water thing could have been expressed differently. Maybe just say you get attacked 8 times for 25 damage each. Would that have been better, though? Does it at least describe the water as extremely dangerous before you find out?

At any rate, exceptions are the norm in D&D. Most encounters will have something - and that's not "breaking the rules" - that's a specific exception to spice things up. For Lair Assault, in particular that's part of the challenge. Whether you get hit by a "cannot heal" or "die if you go here" or "lose this ability" or "screws with this ability" - that's something you factor in and deal with.

 

[D'karr]

autokilling you PC when you fall in the water.

LOL, sorry but I almost spit Dr. Pepper on the keyboard of my computer.

Really??? There's a friggin' kraken in the water and you're actually saying that it's not appropriate to get mauled to death, do not pass go, do not collect $100?

Were you not one of the people that was advocating for "more realism" in the rules? More consistency? More "not stupid"? I don't know, this might be just my opinion, but knowing that there's a kraken in the water, and then not trying to stay out of the water seems like a really bad idea. Getting autokilled seems entirely realistic and quite appropriate to me.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

LOL, sorry but I almost spit Dr. Pepper on the keyboard of my computer.

Really??? There's a friggin' kraken in the water and you're actually saying that it's not appropriate to get mauled to death, do not pass go, do not collect $100?

Were you not one of the people that was advocating for "more realism" in the rules? More consistency? More "not stupid"? I don't know, this might be just my opinion, but knowing that there's a kraken in the water, and then not trying to stay out of the water seems like a really bad idea. Getting autokilled seems entirely realistic and quite appropriate to me.

How did a low-level NPC like the Baron get the help of an Epic auto-killing beast like The Kraken? No creature should be able to auto-kill you. Even The Kraken can roll a 1.

Why wouldn't the designer of the module use the 10th-level solo Sea Kraken from MM3? That would have been a much more interesting foe and could have tested DMs and players alike with aquatic combat.

And since when can forced movement slide you over a barrier? Or was this a REALLY weird ship with no railings? I would have been slightly less POed with the adventure if the tentacles had to at least spend a turn ripping a section of railing off.

We fought our way through the first encounter and made it out with almost no time to spare.

Everything was going fine in the second encounter. It was tough, but no one was down. My druid was pushing 1-2 tentacles each round 3 sqaures and knocking them prone, which helped reduce damage. Until someone finally bloodied one of the tentacles, triggering the FREE ACTION save or die ship tilt, causing 2 characters to fall overboard. Luckily the remaining characters bloodied the baron and convinced him to surrender. Even that seemed ridiculous. He had us severly bloodied or dead and still had four tentcle allies and he gave up?! Completely unrealistic to me.

We considered the scenario beat and won't be playing it a second time.

 

[D'karr]

How did a low-level NPC like the Baron get the help of an Epic auto-killing beast like The Kraken? No creature should be able to auto-kill you. Even The Kraken can roll a 1.

Why wouldn't the designer of the module use the 10th-level solo Sea Kraken from MM3? That would have been a much more interesting foe and could have tested DMs and players alike with aquatic combat.

Sure that could have been a way to design it. Maybe having a 10th level Solo, as well as all the other things going on might have been something they didn't necessarily want. They could have designed it as a hazard, or a trap, or just like they did. Is it crappy? Possibly, but it's not something that I would see as inappropriate for what was being described. Would I be pissed if I fell in and got autokilled? Absolutely. Is it totally inappropriate for what is being described? I don't particularly think so.

Falling into the middle of an active volcano might be examined in the rules in many different ways, getting killed by it might be one of those expressions.

And since when can forced movement slide you over a barrier? Or was this a REALLY weird ship with no railings? I would have been slightly less POed with the adventure if the tentacles had to at least spend a turn ripping a section of railing off.

I would not consider the railing a barrier. It is not blocking terrain if that is what you mean. I would probably have allowed a second save attempt, or a save bonus to the roll. I don't have the adventure in front of me so I can't say. If the tentacles are attacking on the deck I can see how a DM might rule that the railings have pretty much already been destroyed.

 

[KarinsDad]

LOL, sorry but I almost spit Dr. Pepper on the keyboard of my computer.

Really??? There's a friggin' kraken in the water and you're actually saying that it's not appropriate to get mauled to death, do not pass go, do not collect $100?

Were you not one of the people that was advocating for "more realism" in the rules? More consistency? More "not stupid"?

LOL, sorry but I almost spit Dr. Pepper on the keyboard of my computer.

It's a friggin' kraken. Why didn't it just destroy the ship? End of encounter. Go home.

Oh yeah, because we wouldn't want to play a plausible game now would we. Sheer silliness is the phrase of the day.

On top of that, it's a friggin' kraken that cannot be attacked at all. No way to address the problem except by the "led by the nose" way that the designer gives the players. No chance at being creative.

Designer: "Uh, you hafta destroy the tentacles. Or, you hafta intimidate the Baron. Uh, no other solutions."

zzzzz

 

[KarinsDad]

I would not consider the railing a barrier. It is not blocking terrain if that is what you mean. I would probably have allowed a second save attempt, or a save bonus to the roll. I don't have the adventure in front of me so I can't say. If the tentacles are attacking on the deck I can see how a DM might rule that the railings have pretty much already been destroyed.

Yeah. Can't say that I'm a big fan of save or die. In fact, WotC said for years how crappy that mechanism is. But, you're here supporting that mechanism. Why?

 

[KarinsDad]

That seems to be a lot of what I see in these threads. Complaints about Lair Assault because they are unfair.

You misinterpret the complaints. Many of the complaints are about the lack of good design in the LA modules, not how unfair they are.

The first module had a fairly decent story, but the implementation and the ability to change it up for future use was totally inadequate.

The second module had a slightly better and interesting story, but again, the implementation was very subpar.

After all of the hype, they are just slugfests. No splitting up of the party. No cool traps. No terrain that hasn't been seen a lot before. Just damage.

Having PCs dropped into the water where they would have been hard to see and difficult to heal or whatever would have been awesome and challenging. Instead, swimming was not required at all, at least at our table. What a letdown and a waste of character design for something that isn't needed in the module, but was even advertised as needed in the module.