D&D 5E How We Beat the HD, HotDQ, Spoilers

[KarinsDad]

I have definitely come to see people's thoughts on the adventure as falling into the "Combat as War" or the "Combat as Sport" camps. Hoard of the Dragon Queen (at least the first episode of it) is very much combat as war.

Thaumaturge.

What exactly do you mean by this?

 

[KarinsDad]

Then you should read the thread again.

It won't help.

 

[Thaumaturge]

What exactly do you mean by this?

"Combat as sport" vs "Combat as war" is a concept I first read about here on enworld a couple of years ago.

Generally speaking, "combat as war" type adventures are adventures where there are high levels of risk and there is no sense of fairness. There can be asymmetric combats (4 PCs vs 2 kobolds or 4 PCs vs 20 hobgoblins). Caverns of Chaos is probably a good example of this, because low level PCs can find themselves in way over their heads through bad luck and/or bad decisions.

A "combat as sport" adventure, however, will be designed so each combat encounter is balanced and fair for the PCs. In my experience, most Living Forgotten Realms adventures in 4e fit this bill. Combats tend to be symmetric (4 PCs vs an 'appropriate' number of kobolds).

(I have to run and catch my kindergartener at the bus. Sorry if this isn't enough to clarify.)

Thaumaturge.

 

[Prism]

Then you should read the thread again.

- The dragon is "winnable" because it pulls punches and gives the Pcs plot armor. Adventure expects the players to attack something much stronger than them and, if they do, is scripted.

How does it pull punches? When I played it, it all seemed pretty realistic and behaved naturally as far as I can tell. Now admittedly it isn't supposed to be a standard pcs vs dragon encounter and you do realise this during the game but as a player I can tell you it was pretty scary and a good encounter. Have you played it?

 

[Derren]

I have definitely come to see people's thoughts on the adventure as falling into the "Combat as War" or the "Combat as Sport" camps. Hoard of the Dragon Queen (at least the first episode of it) is very much combat as war.

Thaumaturge.

No, it is some of the worst Combat as Sport encounter there is. The teams might come from the different side of the rankings, but after the game everyone stays up, shakes hands and continues to the next game.
The only way to really lose is when yoh do the smart thing and dont even show up for the first game.

 

[KarinsDad]

"Combat as sport" vs "Combat as war" is a concept I first read about here on enworld a couple of years ago.

Generally speaking, "combat as war" type adventures are adventures where there are high levels of risk and there is no sense of fairness. There can be asymmetric combats (4 PCs vs 2 kobolds or 4 PCs vs 20 hobgoblins). Caverns of Chaos is probably a good example of this, because low level PCs can find themselves in way over their heads through bad luck and/or bad decisions.

A "combat as sport" adventure, however, will be designed so each combat encounter is balanced and fair for the PCs. In my experience, most Living Forgotten Realms adventures in 4e fit this bill. Combats tend to be symmetric (4 PCs vs an 'appropriate' number of kobolds).

(I have to run and catch my kindergartener at the bus. Sorry if this isn't enough to clarify.)

Thaumaturge.

No, that helps.

So Greenest in Flames was supposed to be a "Combat as sport" adventure disguised as a "Combat as war" adventure?

In other words, the DM knows that the bad guys are basically impossible to beat (without DM assistance), but the players do not know that. The adventure is combat as sport because the goal of the really tough monsters is not to kill the PCs. But it looks like a combat as war because on the surface, it appears that the battle are asymmetric.

 

[KarinsDad]

This new system dups a lot.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Then you should read the thread again.

Luckily for me I don't need to. I only need to get to the third post in this thread to give me the conclusion I just gave:

... screw an encounter designed to kick my ass. If the adventure designers are going to put this type of total garbage into a module,...


The encounter reminded me of the Green Dragon in the Starter Set and the Blue Dragon here.

I don't understand what lesson the module designers are trying to "teach players", but it's total crap IMO. These impossible encounters (and this one would have been if not for the DM) just teach me to not buy WotC adventures in the future.

Instead of rat bastard DMs, we now have rat bastard adventure designers. Whatever. I'm playing the game to have fun, not to have a player humiliated by the power of the DM (and more specifically, by power of the module designer).

There's nothing wrong with difficult encounters, but ones designed to screw over players via the supreme power of high level monsters are just plain garbage. It's a fricking game.


.

so yeah, I stick by my claim that it seems certain people (KD obviously but not the only one) get really upset if they are presented with an encounter that they don't think they can beat in combat. There's a whole lot of vitriol and hyperbole in that post.

 

[Kaychsea]

How does it pull punches?

It only attacks from distance with its breath attack rather than getting up close and personal with the characters. No teeth, claws, wings or tail. And it runs off when hurt rather than getting even.
That sounds like pulling punches to me.

 

[Joe Liker]

As the first full official published campaign of a new edition, HotDQ puts an awfully big burden on the DM to finesse some very complicated, highly variable situations and keep the story moving within some rather strict parameters.

Any DM with little or no experience is bound to do what my (experienced, if slightly rusty) DM did and basically tell the characters how to proceed. He tried to couch his direction as hints ("Your characters know that course of action would probably get them killed," or "The honorable thing to do would be such and such," or "Here is an unrealistic option that seems totally logical to your characters because reasons!"); however, we as players felt constantly frustrated and railroaded at every turn.

(Basically, if you have to tell me what my character thinks or believes -- as opposed to what he sees or objectively knows -- something has gone terribly wrong.)

I think the main problem is that in trying to make the story seem epic, they've created a module that's very linear and heavy-handed. A good published adventure gives a thorough background and description of the setting, but only a broad sketch of how the plot will likely advance. This one is just the opposite -- it gives a sketchy background and a vague setting, but a detailed, rigid sequence of events that must be followed or the whole thing falls apart.

At least, that's my impression as a player who has neither completed the adventure nor actually read the material.