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How would you redo 4e?
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<blockquote data-quote="James Gasik" data-source="post: 8947790" data-attributes="member: 6877472"><p>I once ran an adventure in 4e where the players entered the Feywild and had to deal with the Goblins there, the weakest of which were level 11 Minions. They were surprised to fight Goblins, and wondered why they were so tough, but what I told them was, they were in the realm of an Archfey who did not want them there, so the very land was trying to kill them with harsh weather, and sapping their strength, so it wasn't just a case of the Goblins being stronger, but they were actually weakened (without me nerfing their abilities or anything).</p><p></p><p>It turned out fairly well, though I will admit, by this point in the campaign (I'd started them at level 1, and now, a year and a half later, they were level 12) I was starting to see a problem with challenging the group.</p><p></p><p>Their abilities synergized well, and there were a few encounter and Daily powers I was starting to dread, because they tended to turn the difficulty of what I was hoping would be tough battles inside out. Having already played a level 22 character in Scales of War, I knew this wasn't going to get any better over time.</p><p></p><p>Too many high level creatures basically had to have "cheater powers" to represent a threat, such as immunity to conditions and other abilities specifically designed to counter the players. I put my game on hiatus while I tried to brainstorm a better way to handle this (daze is a common debuff on player powers. If I use an enemy immune to daze, in my mind, at least, it's basically punishing a player for not taking another power, and it's not like they can just change powers willy nilly).</p><p></p><p>Unfortunately, WotC threw in the towel and removed all the online tools before I could get back to it, so that was the end of that game. </p><p></p><p>That's a very important change that I think needs to be made to not just 4e, but every version of D&D; not enough testing is done with high level play, and the "solution" seems to always be "just let monsters ignore player abilities", either through immunities, "I just save at this time" effects, or special abilities that completely neuter characters, like debilitating auras, huge AoE's that inflict negative status effects, off turn actions, multiple actions, and even negative status effects delivered by regular old attacks.</p><p></p><p>A lot of times, it can feel like the player is actively being punished for being given new abilities, which kind of confuses me. If your game can't handle giving someone a once per fight ability to give an enemy vulnerability to damage (one of the party Cleric's big "solo killer" powers), why did you give it to them in the first place?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="James Gasik, post: 8947790, member: 6877472"] I once ran an adventure in 4e where the players entered the Feywild and had to deal with the Goblins there, the weakest of which were level 11 Minions. They were surprised to fight Goblins, and wondered why they were so tough, but what I told them was, they were in the realm of an Archfey who did not want them there, so the very land was trying to kill them with harsh weather, and sapping their strength, so it wasn't just a case of the Goblins being stronger, but they were actually weakened (without me nerfing their abilities or anything). It turned out fairly well, though I will admit, by this point in the campaign (I'd started them at level 1, and now, a year and a half later, they were level 12) I was starting to see a problem with challenging the group. Their abilities synergized well, and there were a few encounter and Daily powers I was starting to dread, because they tended to turn the difficulty of what I was hoping would be tough battles inside out. Having already played a level 22 character in Scales of War, I knew this wasn't going to get any better over time. Too many high level creatures basically had to have "cheater powers" to represent a threat, such as immunity to conditions and other abilities specifically designed to counter the players. I put my game on hiatus while I tried to brainstorm a better way to handle this (daze is a common debuff on player powers. If I use an enemy immune to daze, in my mind, at least, it's basically punishing a player for not taking another power, and it's not like they can just change powers willy nilly). Unfortunately, WotC threw in the towel and removed all the online tools before I could get back to it, so that was the end of that game. That's a very important change that I think needs to be made to not just 4e, but every version of D&D; not enough testing is done with high level play, and the "solution" seems to always be "just let monsters ignore player abilities", either through immunities, "I just save at this time" effects, or special abilities that completely neuter characters, like debilitating auras, huge AoE's that inflict negative status effects, off turn actions, multiple actions, and even negative status effects delivered by regular old attacks. A lot of times, it can feel like the player is actively being punished for being given new abilities, which kind of confuses me. If your game can't handle giving someone a once per fight ability to give an enemy vulnerability to damage (one of the party Cleric's big "solo killer" powers), why did you give it to them in the first place? [/QUOTE]
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