D&D 4E Keith Baker on 4E! (The Hellcow responds!)

[Hellcow]

See, I'm an old Champions/Hero player.

I'm an oldschool Champions/HERO System GM myself

Hey, me too! Maybe we should get a game together.

 

[The_Gneech]

Hey, me too! Maybe we should get a game together.

Anytime you're in the D.C. area, look me up!

-The Gneech

 

[wgreen]

See, that's just the impression I get. I'm one of those 'laws of physics' people, and when I see 'Kobold minions die if they take any damage', I immediately wonder how they survived toe-stubbing as a child...

Something that may be valuable to point out: The rules do not exist to provide us with "laws of physics." Common sense can do that. A given rule set may be able to double as a set of physical laws for the game world, but that is not why they exist. They exist to tell us, as players, how to play -- how to interact with the system, in order to create a shared imagined space.

And that's it, really. If the players aren't involved, the rules need not be applied. And it seems to me that, while 3e may have tried to be both a rule set and a set of physical laws for the game world, 4e is sticking to just the former.

To each his own, of course. Personally, I'm 150% down with it.

-Will!

 

[Mouseferatu]

Sorry, I was being unclear. I was referring to situations where something intended to be a disposable speedbump gets a name and a personality. If we go by the Dramatic Effect paradigm, he needs to become bigger, badder, better -- he has to be a Real Live Boy. In TV show terms, this is when the character written for a one-off guest appearance or as Background Thug #1 becomes a series regular. He was minion in his first appearence; when you see him again, he's fully statted out.

IOW, if I'm going to use Dramatic Importance==Power Level, I'm going to go all the way.

Well, I don't know how Keith would address that, but for me there are two options:

1) Training. Unless the second meeting is soon after the first, assume he had time to level up a bunch.

2) If the minion survives the first encounter with the PCs, it means by definition the PCs didn't hit him. And if that's the case, there's no need for him to have been a minion. I'm a big believer in the notion that the only stats that are locked in stone are the ones the PCs have interacted with. If there was one kobold out of five who ran away rather than being slaughtered, the PCs might assume he was a minion like the others, and you may even have intended that to be the case at the time. But if the PCs never interacted with him, there's no reason you can't decide you were using the "wrong" stat block at the time.

 

[Psion]

Hey, me too! Maybe we should get a game together.

GenCon?

 

[Psion]

Anytime you're in the D.C. area, look me up!

-The Gneech

Well, that's two of us.

Er... did you make it to DC Gameday, Gneech?

 

[Hellcow]

In TV show terms, this is when the character written for a one-off guest appearance or as Background Thug #1 becomes a series regular. He was minion in his first appearence; when you see him again, he's fully statted out.

Although using the minion example, this still isn't actually that hard. If he's a minion at first level, it means he's expected to go down with a single hit from a first level character. In the case of the 30 hp kobold being used as a minion at higher levels, you'd have his pre-minion stats around; if not, you can still calculate it from "Expected to drop from a single attack from a character of his level". As for powers, minions actually do have powers. If you check the DDXP stats, you'll see the kobold minions are all shifty. All being a minion does is means that the DM doesn't have to worry about tracking your hit points. Essentially, you COULD give every minion 1d4 hit points; the principle (IMO) is "we assume all 1st level players can inflict 4 hit points on an average attack - why spend the time tracking all those hit points for the trivial characters?"

Now, I can certainly understand the "OK, we love Meepo. He's our mascot. We've switched him back to 30 hit points - but he still doesn't have as many abilities as a human rogue would at that level. I'm going to stat him out as if he was a 6th level PC kobold rogue." But I've found myself in the same situation in 3E... or for that matter Hero, Over the Edge, Feng Shui, etc.

 

[Lizard]

2) If the minion survives the first encounter with the PCs, it means by definition the PCs didn't hit him. And if that's the case, there's no need for him to have been a minion. I'm a big believer in the notion that the only stats that are locked in stone are the ones the PCs have interacted with.

Scroedinger's Kobold.

Not that I don't do this in 3e. One of the PCs challenged the arrogant fay nobleman to a music contest; presto, he had Perform +10, enough to make it a challenge. I just dropped other skills he hadn't used; since they'd never been rolled for, they didn't "count".

Like someone else said, the important thing is having the tools, not necessarily using them.

 

[Hellcow]

Well, that's two of us.

Funny. I have relatives in DC, so I actually do show up there on occasion (though I missed DDXP). So who knows? (Now one could derail things with a huge side conversation on prefer Hero system... but I'll save that until I'm actually making a trip to DC!)

 

[Psion]

Sorry, I was being unclear. I was referring to situations where something intended to be a disposable speedbump gets a name and a personality. If we go by the Dramatic Effect paradigm, he needs to become bigger, badder, better -- he has to be a Real Live Boy. In TV show terms, this is when the character written for a one-off guest appearance or as Background Thug #1 becomes a series regular. He was minion in his first appearence; when you see him again, he's fully statted out.

I used to be that way.

Somewhere around late 2e, I developed a "Schroedinger's Cat" philosophy of NPCs. If it's not tested in play, it's mutable. Guy dies in one sword stroke, he obviously wasn't the hidden kobold prince. If he doesn't, maybe he was.

I'm annoyingly a consistency stickler once something shows up in play.

Edit: Dammit, Lizard! I was trying to show how brilliant my gaming principle is, not it'll just look like I copied you.