Misuse of the save mechanics in the MM to reintroduce save or die effects

[Plane Sailing]

The above notwithstanding, here's a suggested "scarier" petrification mechanism:
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Isn't this basically what Mustrum Ridcully suggested?

 

[JiffyPopTart]

*engages in a bit of thread necromancy*

Just dredged this up looking for peoples opinions on the what-seems-to-me-to-be-unfair medusa petrification power.

I can state with much certainty it isn't "almost impossible" to be petrified by a medusa, as we lost 2/5 to one, and it only used its power once. The human cleric who died even had the +2 to all saves feat.

I vote for "needs redesigned because my character shouldn't die because of two totally random die rolls".

DS

 

[AngryPurpleCyclops]

In addition, powers that grant saves to the affected party members trigger the progressive mechanic as well. If the cleric tries to help an immobilized fighter out, he may end up killing them because he fails a save.

I think they really need to look at other ways to design this mechanic, as it really doesn't make sense for an action that aids a character to push them closer to death's door.

Right, as many people have agreed in this thread only the save at the end of the characters round of action should be able to progress the effect. This is a pretty straight forward change that most people will house rule I imagine.

It would give a nice opportunity for a medusa to spread the love around by slowing lots of people, or focussing on people one at a time to turn them to stone - although the medusa wouldn't be able to just look at someone and then leave them to turn to stone.

This would make the power pretty small with regard to chance to turn someone to stone. How often does a monster get three hits in a row on you AND you fail two saves in a row.

Incidentally, the existing mechanics mean that someone a medusa gazes at has to fail two saves to be petrified. That is .45 * .45 or only a 20% chance!

20% is a statistically gigantic number over the career of a party. 2-3 hits by the creature mean it's more than 50% likely someone is dead.

How about treating it a bit like Death Saving Throws:

At the end of each round you make a "Petrification Saving Throw" after saving vs. slow, immobilized or any other detrimental condition. A failure automatically makes you slowed (if you weren't already), two consecutive failed saving throws makes you immobilized and a third failed save in a row makes you petrified. A success could perhaps alleviate the current condition (immobilized>slowed>normal), and 20+ would counter it completely.

this only exacerbates the situation.

Heh. We lost two PCs and a NPC when we fought one.

Which seems pretty mathematically probable. It's the most likely expected outcome from 4-6 hits.

In greek mythology, I don't think the gorgons had anything less than a 100% success rate...

But monsters utilizing this save-or-die mechanic are still fairly rare, so you shouldn't be facing them that often.

Fairly often? It only takes once.

Most of the great legends are based on TRUE solo's, not the ones we have in our D&D books... is the reason 1st Ed was so awesome. When some guy ran into you at a convention and said he bested Orcus' Avatar, it was a matter of WOW! That had to be a hard fight! Now, when somebody says they beat Orcus on his home plane, it is more like, "Really? So who was the boss mob then?" The mobs just seem to lack the punch they used to have...

DnD has gotten progressively less dangerous and mindset has changed some with regard to what is fun and good for the game. The video game generation also spawned a large number of players who wouldn't be that tolerant of a system that completely eliminates their pc. I would say the players expectation of living forever has gone up and many DM's have met that expection (as well as more thought going into the design to mitigate the effects of a single die roll).

I love 4th Ed btw, but that is my major gripe, the monsters just do not have any true ability to make PC's cringe at the thought of fighting them... well, except for kobolds hehe...

that's your dm's fault. We worry about everything from goblins and skeletons to ghouls, gnolls, gricks and grells. We've lost pc's to orcs, skeletons, hobgoblins, gnolls, and goblins. Yet we're even more scared by ghouls, kruthiks and grells because stun and ongoing damage are brutal and those encounters with stun are ALWAYS potentially dangerous. If you're not feeling challenged ask your dm to make a n+3 encounter relative to your party and include creatures with repeated stunning attacks.

Just dredged this up looking for peoples opinions on the what-seems-to-me-to-be-unfair medusa petrification power.

I can state with much certainty it isn't "almost impossible" to be petrified by a medusa, as we lost 2/5 to one, and it only used its power once. The human cleric who died even had the +2 to all saves feat.

I vote for "needs redesigned because my character shouldn't die because of two totally random die rolls".

DS

you're right. It's not at all difficult to get killed by a medusa and a different machanic would be very desirable. I didn't see any presented here that really grab me as the right way to go but I don't have a better one so I can't really point you in the right direction.

My initial thoughts would be to definitely house rule that saves granted by sacred flame do not progress the effect and maybe add a round of stun in between immobilize and dead. This gives 3 saves instead of 2 and gives a decent opportunity the party can make an impact in the mean time, through the heal skill, sacred flame, warlord powers etc. No matter what the percentage there's a very real possibility that people are going to get killed by this but 23% is way to high and the RAW eliminating the ability of the party to help out is bad for the game. If you assume the party will get you one bonus save on average and add the "slow" level in the middle, you get 4 saves instead of 2 you drop down to 4%. Without the bonus save from help it's 8%. maybe that's too small.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

How about giving the players a hefty modifier to their save (-5 just for sake of argument) to make it very difficult to save against...until they can take a short rest.

Then tack on....you only get worse if the medusa hits you with another attack roll.

And further tack on....if the medusa that petrified you is slain you revert back to flesh again.

DS

 

[AngryPurpleCyclops]

How about giving the players a hefty modifier to their save (-5 just for sake of argument) to make it very difficult to save against...until they can take a short rest.

Then tack on....you only get worse if the medusa hits you with another attack roll.

And further tack on....if the medusa that petrified you is slain you revert back to flesh again.

DS

I like that last one though it effectively eliminates most of the threat value since the pc's will win the encounter 99 percent of the time.

 

[jorrit]

4E already encourages the 1-fight-a-day with daily powers, daily magic and action point refreshing. 4E rewards resting, gives next to nothing for fighting on, and losing a fight is penalized.

The ONLY reason to not go into every fight with as many HPs and heailng surges possible is because you're so confidant the next fight will be trivial and so non-threatening that it doesn't matter. In practice it's unlikely anyone will be going into a fight they can prepare for with less than 80% HP as they can just spend a healing surge with a short rest. A mechanic where the gaze does HP damage that will petrify at some threshold could work well.

That's not the only reason. There are also story reasons not to be able to do a full rest. For example, at the end of KotS I didn't allow my players to do an extended rest between the two last encounters because I felt that story-wise there was no time left before Kalarel would finish the ritual. Allowing an extended rest at that point would not be fitting in the story sense.

Also there are cases where there simply is no safe place to rest. Monsters may be on the patrol in the dungeon where you are and you can only afford a short rest or risk being detected.

Greetings,

 

[DracoSuave]

An interesting aside.... are these monsters as huge a threat when many characters at their level allow players to auto-succeed saves or outright remove conditions?


Who cares if it takes three saves to die when your cleric just removes it as an afterthought just because he can?

 

[Mercule]

I like the multi-save use. Sure, you could argue that saves are now just duration, but it also has the (positive, IMO, for this circumstance) effect that a 30th level fighter can't just stare down a medusa -- he's no more resistant than the 1st level fighter. Petrification/death effects are formidable, regardless of tier, but they are not instantly debilitating.

 

[Pyrex]

It might be more interesting if the effect were progressive in both ways.

An Gaze attack inflicts Slowed, Save Ends.

If they are already Slowed, the effect becomes Immobilized, Saved Ends with Aftereffect(Slowed, Save Ends).

If they're already Immobilized, the effect becomes Petrified.

 

[Alex319]

This is an interesting discussion, and in some ways related to the discussion in the thread linked to on the first page about "4e monsters: not scary?"

I think that a lot of discussion about save or die effects (not necessarily in this thread, but in general) centers around the idea that monsters need save or die effects to be threatening, and that their removal in 4e decreases the effective threat level of the monsters.

However, relative monster power level isn't the issue here. If the monsters aren't powerful enough, you can always use tougher monsters. And if they're too powerful, you can just use weaker monsters. This applies regardless of how save-or-die effects (or lack thereof) are handled, so you can always adjust the power/threat level appropriately.

The main difference between 3.5e and 4e here is the source of the threat. In 3.5e, high-powered monsters were threatening because of save-or-die abilities that can kill you in one hit. In 4e, high-powered monsters are threatening because of their ability to withstand lots of damage, deal damage over a long period of time, and work with their teammates to pull off combos on the players.

If I may offer an analogy which seems appropriate (and AFAIK has not been brought up before):

4e combat is like medieval warfare, with a simpler "vulnerability matrix" between different unit types, and emphasis on mass combat, numerical superiority, large-scale maneuvering, and attrition-based tactics.

3.5e combat is more like modern warfare, with an emphasis on targeted, high-powered strikes, specific "counters", asymmetrical warfare, surprise attacks, and pre-battle intelligence and preparation.