Is 4th edition getting soft? - edited for friendly content :)

[Cbas_10]

I knew my post would garner negative responses, but I didn't expect them to be so... ridiculous.

Lets review. Its an encounter with a lich...

Sorry. Did not mean to attack your specific example or idea. I was just illustrating that a recent trend in gamers that i've met (as well as some WotC products) have gone towards more of a hack-slash-wandering-monsters-can-be-anything angle. That and the point that just because a lich or any other NPC/antagonist CAN have a maxed-out attribute with all the buffs should not mean that it is the norm.

More to the specific example of the lich and the topic of insta-kill effects: there are so many opportunities/defenses/situational issues that would allow PCs to survive the Wail that it is unfair to look at the rules and say, "Because I can drop the monster and PCs into a single room, like a D&D Minis match, and have the Lich drop the PCs with a couple of prepared spells...the rule surely must be broken."

 

[Korgoth]

And also, save-or-dies are a problem when used by the players, too, since they can turn a carefully planned battle that the players might have been looking forward to for a long time into a colossal anticlimax.

Note: Underlining added by Korgoth for emphasis.

See, this may be part of the problem right here. "Anticlimax"? What's that? Something out of the 1E DMG disease tables?

From my perspective, "anticlimax" is a theatrical/literary term, not a gaming term. The term "anticlimax" basically assumes a story structure. I consider story structure foriegn to gaming. The 'story' is what you tell after the game is over. There's no climax or anticlimax. It's an "After Action Report".

Some AAR's tell of lengthy battles, nail-biters until the tide finally turns. Other AAR's are tales of a righteous (or unrighteous, as the case may be) stomping. Some sound like Wacht am Rhein, some sound like Fall Rot.

@MerricB:

There's no doubt that meeting a "new monster" can be a harrowing experience. If you see a monster and don't have any intelligence on it, it's probably best to avoid it. From your story, you couldn't avoid it. I can guess at one of two reasons for this:
1) You didn't have adequate recon and got hosed through your own incaution
2) You did have adequate recon but your DM hosed you anyway

(1) is just a "live and learn" situation. (2) is bad DMing.

 

[Baby Samurai]

"We have to get out of here before someone kills Guy!"

'Did you guys ever watch the show?!'

 

[Lurks-no-More]

See, this may be part of the problem right here. "Anticlimax"? What's that? Something out of the 1E DMG disease tables?

From my perspective, "anticlimax" is a theatrical/literary term, not a gaming term. The term "anticlimax" basically assumes a story structure. I consider story structure foriegn to gaming. The 'story' is what you tell after the game is over. There's no climax or anticlimax. It's an "After Action Report".

Really?

I agree that a RPG session or a campaign is not a story, not even a collaboratively told one; there is the game element, which leads (hopefully) to unexpected outcomes that will blow up any predetermined storyline.

But if anticlimax is not a word you think should be applied to gaming discussions, how about "letdown"? If you have built up tension and prepared for the big fight with the BBEG, then someone ending the fight on the first round because of a failed save, I think, going to be a letdown for everybody: the other players don't get to shine and do their stuff, the GM doesn't get to use the BBEG she'd designed, and everybody at the table knows that the fight was ended not because of the heroism of the characters, but because of dumb dice luck.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Let me try again, since I obviosuly put words in your mouth, which I don't intend to do: the suggestion that there may be powerful spellcasters capable of eliminating a PC in round 1 because of some mechanism, which is what you were saying, is no different to me if that mechanism is save-or-die or some form of blasting type damage spell, all things being equal regarding probability. the difference is one of playstyle and tone and therefore, there's no reason to eliminate save-or-die from the game because it is, theoretically, mechanically the same (at any given level, whether we are talking about Bob or BBEG) and will only reduce the number of options available in the game by removing it. Therefore, there's no benefit, and likely some harm, to its exclusion.

If, as you say, save-or-die is functionally equivalent to damage-dealing spells, then there is no reason not to take save-or-die out, since it is redundant. Damage-dealing already covers that effect, and so duplicating it in a different mechanic is pointless.

 

[BryonD]

I agree the Merric and Cadfan's examples represent very bad gaming experiences. However, I disagree that the save or die mechanic was resposible.

Both examples provide no context. As presented each story presents a group of characters blindly bumbling into the lair of an extremely deadly monster. There is something really wrong well before the D20s were every picked up.

It is possible that the party stupidly charged into a deadly situation. In which case there is nothing wrong with unheroic results to unheroic actions.

More likely bad DMing is the root of the problem.

 

[Henry]

If, as you say, save-or-die is functionally equivalent to damage-dealing spells, then there is no reason not to take save-or-die out, since it is redundant. Damage-dealing already covers that effect, and so duplicating it in a different mechanic is pointless.

However, what's more unfair: An effect that gives you a 50/50 percentage chance of survival, or massive damage that gives you NO chance of survival, because it can't be reduced? I'd rather have the crapshoot than no chance -- and to me and a lot of other frequent gamers, that crapshoot is part of the D&D experience. That this particular "option" is increasingly phased out of the game rules over the editions means that it's no longer considered a viable option, in the same league as outright killer DMs and other stuff warned about practically since the game's inception.

Sure, I can add it back in, but that's as valid an argument as "others can take it right out."

 

[StarFyre]

For people who like save or die...

you can easily just introduce it again.

Just change spells like disintegrate, etc back to their 2e or (i believe) 3E version, and redo the save roll to the appropriate value, if needed.

Me, I have no problems killing players IF they do something stupid. Based on our non-heavy combat style (but whatever battles are there (planned ones, I mean, are VERY challenging):

1) if players don't recon/research enemy (assuming they have the chance to do so)
2) players charge at a creature that is obviously too powerful to be taken head on
3) players try something (cool or not) that is just stupid (this has happened several times)
4) players do something on purpose leading to death

however, in my experience now, I do have an issue with death due to a dice roll. I don't mean in terms of damage from a creature, but save or die in a very random form.

A loose example i would give are films with 'great endings'. 2 ones, we have discussed recently, are WAR and 6th Sense. 6th Sense, i would argue had a better ending, structuraly for the film, than WAR did...Reason; (SPOILERS AHEAD): if you watch it again, you will see that there is no point where anyone is really talking to Bruce Willis. We assume that they are, but other than the child, no one else is. I know someone who mentioned "why isn't anyone talking to Bruce"..which indicates that she realized he may be dead very early on. Most didn't (you can say what you want, but face it, most didn't until much later). This is great design with a 'trick' ending, because you COULD have noticed those clues in the film with some critical thinking/out of the box thinking.

WAR, I don't remember (maybe there was) didn't have any actual clue that hinted that Jet Li is the cop...especially since I think their heights are different. We figured it out near the end, but before it...but that was more due to watching so many films; something about the tone of it, didn't seem right; there had to be something more. But a sudden shift in the ending, with no way for the audience to figure it out ahead of time, leans more to a "dues ex machina' style of story.

The same way, a death where even if the players do the best option, seems kinda pointless; they don't learn anything from that. (my same argument goes for DMs who allow a dice roll due to proper in character roleplaying, based on their INT and WIS, to solve hard puzzles....puzzles/riddles/logic traps I say should be solved by the players, since it helps THEIR problem solving and is an exception to 'in character gameplay')

To accomodate this but still keep the risk, I've modified spells like disintegrate, and combat, to have more risk via a more detailed critical hit system, and for spells like disintegrate to cause targetted critical damage/vaporization, but with the possibility of killing the person outright (ie. if it hits the arm, it vaporizes the arm, but then the person has a new save to see if they can resist it going from arm to torso, etc). This then goes to our detailed crit hit system (we incorporated the one from 2E Combat & tactics/Spels & magic to 3.5E), and as a DM, we have changed healing spells so that they can be targetted to heal specific injuries in place of general HP if desired.

The risk is there, and no one wants to be maimed, etc BUT If it happens out of random luck, there are healing options to help. For death, it rarely happens unless they do something stupid. I have killed them due to, what I consider, random luck/bad DM'ing on my part..in which case, I supply a scroll of resurrect, etc at the first 'logical' place since that is my error; and not theirs.

As long as 4E is made in such a way that custom house rules can easily be done for it (which any system can be, so it's not a problem), I think we can get around any changes they do, without too much hassle.

Isn't the ease in the system, still modified by our respective play styles?

Sanjay

 

[Rechan]

However, what's more unfair: An effect that gives you a 50/50 percentage chance of survival, or massive damage that gives you NO chance of survival, because it can't be reduced?

There's one thing you're forgetting.

Energy resistance.

 

[Fifth Element]

Because if you take them out, there aren't rules for them. there's no spells that do it. Sure, if you are a grognard or whatever, you can do it pretty easy, but grognards will do what they damn well please, anyway (I should know, I am one of them). But removing them from the game wholly lessens the game by eliminating a possible element. Why do that at all?

So really you're upset becuase they're changing something specific in the rules, not that there's an element missing. For instance, I could suggest that they should include chain swords and light sabres in the core rules, because after all, this adds a "possible element" to the game.

The core rules need to draw a line somewhere is terms of style of play (if you want to call it that); you can't include everything. You would only miss save-or-die effects in 4E because you're used to them being there in previous editions. Someone picking up the game for the first time isn't going to say "Huhn. Where are all the things that can kill you based on the result of a single die roll? This game is incomplete without them."

Only established players will miss it, and there's the ones who have the background to develop their own rules for it anyway.