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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dykstrav" data-source="post: 4867368" data-attributes="member: 40522">Yeah, in my first 4E campaign I had only one character actually die over the course of thirteen levels. That came as a bit of a surprise after previous editions, where I commonly saw a character death every three to four sessions.After playing in the new heroic tier game I just started, I think that I figured out why characters can be tough to threaten some times: healing surges. What makes combats really dangerous in 4E is when characters start running low on healing surges. It used to be where characters wanted to rest when they started running out of spells for the day. Because powers refresh so quickly, it's healing surges that really become the issue. Attrition is more dangerous than the raw power of the monsters the characters fight.In that first campaign, the characters were based in a city where they could basically rest any time they wanted. They could easily take on two or three encounters before resting because they always had a safe place to bolt up for the night. In my new game, they're in a wilderness area where I make them check for encounters when they take an extended rest. We had a character death in the second session, and once healing surges hit about half, the characters want to hunker down for the night.</blockquote>