Musings on the "I Win" Button

[Quantarum]

There is no "I win" button. Using spells or other unusual abilities creatively is a tactical and imaginative challenge as much, if not more so, than battlefield maneuvering.

No experience with Maze eh? It's not particularly creative to use a spell exactly as it's described.

While forcecage is powerful, and probably should have some sort of defense available, trapping your foe in an impenetrable, immobile cube for 2 hours/level is a far cry from defeating them, particularly if they have friends.

Forcecage has two versions, one of which allows spells to pass right through.

-Q.

 

[Ourph]

The party works together to come up with certain tactics and gain bonuses if they set up the encounter where they can use those tactics.

You have just described the 4e combat system to a T.

 

[Stalker0]

I like the arguments presented here, but I will disagree that 4e has any win buttons, especially for the wizard.

I properly optimized wizard casting sleep is a death sentence for anything in the area.

 

[Nifft]

I like the arguments presented here, but I will disagree that 4e has any win buttons, especially for the wizard.

I properly optimized wizard casting sleep is a death sentence for anything in the area.

Yep, Sleep is a problem spell. It's either almost useless (for most Wizards) or ZOMG TEH BROKENZ for a "properly" optimized Orb-Wizard.

It wasn't the only broken power in the PHB (i.e. the original Blade Cascade), but it's still there, and Orb-Wizards are still there.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Garthanos]

That may be anti-climactic for you. (Shrug)

I find that the occasional surprisingly easy win works just fine. Of course, I'm not running a game where combats take 30+ minutes each, so I suspect that the metric is very different between your experience and mine.

I find a 30 minute battle with actual options with mechanic impact for fighters much more fun than 10 minutes with none.

 

[Doom]

The premise does seem to be a bit off...4e has a few 'I win' buttons; they might be slower (still takes many rounds to kill a Sleeped opponent), but mathematically the effect is the same.

In addition to the Orbizard, "Boundless Endurance" is essentially an I Win button for fighters, at least until level 4 (monsters below this level can't, in terms of expectation, kill a fighter with regeneration), and a few healing spells similarly fit this description.

Even if the player doesn't know it's an 'I win' button, it still is...

 

[Garthanos]

I like the we win button and the narrative goal.

And I think 4e does a good job at doing this.

Both things can easily be modeled by rituals.

Improving the rogues skills: summon the magic picklock.

umm what magic picklock?
Alter knock so that i now boosts thievery or arcana....and change it to 1 minute if that helps somebody. See in the movies this never takes that long... in fact in the movies regular lock picking is just a few seconds.

Killing the BBEG: finding his true name, getting a bit of his blood (Only bloody or crit him and then retreat.) Beginning the ritual and lure him into the trap. Done
Maybe use forced movement powers to bring him into the disguised circle of power. Done.

well the escape component was hidden by the word retreat.

 

[Votan]

As I understand it, the complaint about the I Win Button is that it leads to frequently easy wins, not occasional suprisingly easy wins.

It's also an issue when opponents use it as it makes some classes and options less fun to play. If the fighter is constantly being dominated (worse then killed given the duration of the effect) then it's not fun to be a fighter. But it makes the opposition look silly of the immediate response of the party to a fighter is "dominate person" and the enemy wizard isn't up to the same tricks.

 

[Nifft]

It's also an issue when opponents use it as it makes some classes and options less fun to play. If the fighter is constantly being dominated (worse then killed given the duration of the effect) then it's not fun to be a fighter. But it makes the opposition look silly of the immediate response of the party to a fighter is "dominate person" and the enemy wizard isn't up to the same tricks.

Cross-screen mechanical symmetry was a 3.x experiment.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Garthanos]

Cross-screen mechanical symmetry was a 3.x experiment.

Cheers, -- N

Runequest did it first .... maybe more successfully. But then again everybody had save or die effects... and a touch of magic.