Legends and Lore - The Temperature of the Rules

[LurkAway]

If the game is any kind of sandbox (which it can and should be even if the DM is trying to tell a specific story, as the players can always ignore her and go somewhere else) then there's gonna be stuff out ther you can handle and there's gonna be stuff out there you can't.

Agreed. When I wrote that it "feels too safe" to me, I was referring to 4E specifically IMO in the sense that there are definite limits on danger and challenge levels. I don't think that pre-4E felt too safe. Some early modules are notoriously deadly, after all.

And that's what the DM-as-storyteller is for*. Legends. Local chatter. Setting history. Etc. Couple that with the game at the PH level clearly warning players that there will be times when running is the best (or only) option; and they can't say they haven't been warned.

I still think it could be done better, I mean built into game design itself, which is beyond the province of the DM.

In real-life, it's usually easy to size up opponents physically (bigger, taller, muscular) and by equipment (unarmed, knife, special ops). You can't do that in D&D often.

In D&D, to get a proper 'spidey-sense', the world itself should have similar coherence. And it doesn't. You can 3 humanoid human-sized monsters, and one has 1 HD level, and one has 5 HD and one has 10 HD with no obvious cues. You can have monstrous giants that are 10 HD and medium sized creatures that are 15 HD. It's OK to have the rare opponent who turns out to be surprisingly more dangerous that it looks, but D&D has almost no correlation between HD and fiction. This makes it rather more difficult for the DM to use the story to signal the level of challenge.

 

[Hussar]

Yeah, Encounters seems to be about demonstrating the combat rules of the current system so that people who haven't played, or haven't played much, can jump into a fast game and learn a bit about what the system has to offer. It also tends to attract folks who play regularly but mostly enjoy the combat aspects of the game. I have seen other regular groups at our FLGS, though, that basically play their games in this manner as a matter of course, so if the plan is for a new player to eventually get involved with a group like that, Encounters might be all the training they need.

Yeah it might be picking the low fruit from the tree, but, I think it's fair to say that picking up a bunch of dice and kicking the crap out of pretend monsters is fun for a lot of people. It's quickly engaging and exciting.

Trying to go the other route might be more of an uphill battle. Say you want to go even a more balanced route of social encounters and combat with equal time given to each. That's a bit more difficult to swallow, I think, for a lot of new gamers. Give the newbie some time to get accustomed to the basics of how an RPG works - even stuff like when you can talk and table etiquette - and then try to hook him with the more cerebral stuff later on down the road.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

So 4E recognizes what's obvious to most and explicitly takes out of the picture anything that the PCs probably wouldn't encounter anyway pre-4E. It creates a different feel though. It's like standing on a raised platform beyond which are Big Bad Things -- in 3E you see them from the platform, but they rarely come to you until you're ready, in 4E, there are soft padded walls so you can't see them at all. It's definitely not exploration based, and it feels too safe to me.

Agreed. When I wrote that it "feels too safe" to me, I was referring to 4E specifically IMO in the sense that there are definite limits on danger and challenge levels. I don't think that pre-4E felt too safe. Some early modules are notoriously deadly, after all.

This phenomenom is not dictated by the system. I've seen campaigns in every edition that only challange the characters with level-appropriate challenges. And I've seen sandbox campaigns in every edition where the characters are not guaranteed to meet level-appropriate challenges. I've run both styles in every edition except OD&D for my group. We agree upon the style up front so the players know what to expect. Nothing inherent to any edition has dictated or even strongly suggested that this can't be done.

4E can definitely be exploration-based. My current 4E campaign is just such a thing. And the only limits on danger and challenge levels are those imposed by the DM himself.

Yeah, Encounters seems to be about demonstrating the combat rules of the current system.

I haven't played it yet, nor received any feedback from the two guys in my group who do, but the new season of Encounters is supposed to features more roleplaying opportunities.

 

[S'mon]

Enworld threads make me realize that if D&D ever goes the true sandboxy route, the game system need to provide a sort of 'spidey-sense' to the players to communicate dangers that could/should be obvious in-game but which the players cannot sense due to lack of signals.

Agreed - some rules on threat assessment might be nice; although knowledge-skill checks can partially substitute. The hardest thing for me is not wanting to use 'level' as an in-game term; so how do I explain in-game how the 8th level PC feels about the threat posed by the 13th level solo monster?

 

[Balesir]

Agreed - some rules on threat assessment might be nice; although knowledge-skill checks can partially substitute. The hardest thing for me is not wanting to use 'level' as an in-game term; so how do I explain in-game how the 8th level PC feels about the threat posed by the 13th level solo monster?

I find it gets worse with NPCs - there's no real "world" sense for a 14th level one looking that much different from an 8th level one.

 

[S'mon]

I find it gets worse with NPCs - there's no real "world" sense for a 14th level one looking that much different from an 8th level one.

Well, a PC might know that eg Zhentarim mercs are a bit tougher than the average town guard (5th instead of 3rd), or that the legendary Sun Guard of the Malgedan Emperors are ultimate paragon warriors (20th). Or that orcs are nearly always ca 3rd-10th level. They might even know an individual by reputation. But in general yes, they can't tell for sure.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I nearly always run some form of sandbox, where there are definitely encounters that are cakewalks and killers, and 4E is no exception. Accurately scaling DCs to the party power in no way encourages or presents this compared to other options. (The parts of 4E that encourage this bad impression are: 1. Some advice in the DMG that is good advice but poorly written. 2. Internet rumors that are not backed by the text.) Knowing the challenge levels simply means that if the DM does decide to use a cakewalk or killer challenge, he can't pretend that it was an accident.

As far as the players picking up on what their characters are getting into, I think there are limits on what you can do with mechanics. At some point, no matter what else you do, the players have got to decide to go after X or run from it or try to work around it somehow. (And gee, haven't we had that discussion about eleventy different ways lately? )

So I prefer to give the players plenty of information (overkill, really), in character, and it is up to them to decide when something appears too threatening to risk. If that means that they occasionally run from a cakewalk, hey, sometimes the threat is more fun than the execution.

Mechanically, a better help than providing such information directly is a system that lets the characters have a decent shot at running when they get in over their heads, and/or limited resources (killer spells, action points, etc.) to save until needed but burn when desperate. Of course, that requires players willing to save some such resources until such need, and a DM willing to not push them to the max every time. Works for us.

I really do think that maximum overall tension in a roleplaying campaign is best achieved by the DM pulling back on the throttle a bit on challenge, but then not backing away from whatever challenges the players choose to go after. You'll have dull minutes at times, but those aren't an unwelcome break from the stark terror at others.

 

[Hussar]

Agreed - some rules on threat assessment might be nice; although knowledge-skill checks can partially substitute. The hardest thing for me is not wanting to use 'level' as an in-game term; so how do I explain in-game how the 8th level PC feels about the threat posed by the 13th level solo monster?

Oh god, could you imagine the hue and cry from people about how video gamey THAT would be? "Is the bad guy showing red to me?"

Gack.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Oh god, could you imagine the hue and cry from people about how video gamey THAT would be? "Is the bad guy showing red to me?"

Gack.

Probably. I creating an "Assess" skill that lets you judge DCs, bonuses to attack or saves, AC, etc. It's easier to do if you are directly engaging it (casting a spell against Reflex; attacking the creature's AC; trying to climb the mountain), and harder to do based on interactions at three different levels (watching a creature make a Reflex save is easier to judge than watching it brace for combat against a wizard, which is easier to judge than someone describing "he tried to dodge by doing this).

While you gain the mechanical number (the orc attacks at +5), the description explicitly states that the character doesn't gain the number, he gains an idea of what that means to him. In a particular setting, "+5 to attack" could mean "average for small town guards" or it could mean "worse than small town guards" or it could mean "about as good as I am." It just depends.

I think it's a neat skill, and while it's been picked a few times, it doesn't seem mandatory at all. Failing by 1-4 gives you an idea (you think the bonus/DC is a little higher or lower than it is), while failing by 5 or more means you aren't sure. This means that characters that can reliable succeed at a +5 bonus to attack DC Assess check but fail against an enemy might suspect that "he's too good for me to read," or they might think "hmm, I don't have a good read on him... maybe if I get him to defend again, I can see better" (which, in fact, entitles the character to a reroll).

I think there's definitely a way to institute something akin to this skill in a way that'll please more people than my group. However, I do suspect you're right on some level, and that people might say, "wait, so, that guy is this much better (or worse) than I am? Glad I can see the color of the nameplate above his head."

Oh well. At least it's nice to have a system for it, at least where I'm coming from. As always, play what you like

 

[Hussar]

Oh, hey, I've got no real problem with it. Even if they went straight up WOW and put halo's over things heads it probably wouldn't really bother me. It's a meta-game construct anyway and not all that much different than say, "Detect Evil" really.

But, while it might not bother me at all, I'm just imagining the gnashing of teeth that would come from having "Detect Level" as a paladin power.