Legends & Lore: Combat and Other Forms of Violence

[Raith5]

This article is interesting for all sorts of reasons, but to me these two statements stand out:





Not only was 4.0 very solidly designed around a particular focus, that focus was also what Mearls here calls "not my favourite part of the game".

I'd be interested in a follow up article where he not only references which parts of the game he likes best, but also how to effectively design around various levels of rules complexity and focus variety. Both constitute significant departures from the 4.0 philosophy, so I expect that going forward (if Mearls will have anything to do with it) 5e may be a very, very different game. Certainly the idea for D&D to be a wide tent game that accomodates all sorts of play preferences seems to be back on the menu.

Yeah I was really surprised by this. It also seemed a like a deliberate tell

Could this mean radical different thinking leading into 5th edition? I think there are limits because fighting is obviously central to most D and D table. In real life I make enough diplomacy checks (and few bluff checks
- but I can only smite monsters in game...

Combat is my favorite aspect of the game - I think 4th ed does a good job of enabling tactical fights. (That said the roleplaying is crucial for setting up why and how my PC fights - so I am not happy with the roleplaying vs roll play divide).

 

[Jhaelen]

HeroQuest has two different resolution systems - simple contests, and extended contests. Neither is tactical in the D&D sense, but extended contests involve lots of dice rolling and the ebb and flow of fortune. Whereas simple contests are based on a single die roll (like most D&D skill checks).

Ars Magica has something similar. Basically, the simple version is used when no Magi are involved.

I think such a separation could work well in D&D, too. Use the simplified combat rules for random encounters and the standard rules for the big set-piece encounters.