My Rant Apology & Sell Me Flat Math

[ren1999]

Wow, I really got burned ranting about the two play-tests I conducted. I just want you to know that I'm not really angry about the play-tests. I just wanted to spark a little debate and ended-up starting a fire and getting a warning by an admin to stop insulting the developers, behave or be suspended. Oh, that was close. Sorry to any developers. I want to kick you in the pants a little and know as a developer in the past just how hurtful too harsh criticism can be. You're work is cut out for you. Good luck and make a great game.

I am a very poor play-tester as I only read what I want to read. I don't think my comments will be very useful as a result. Just like my 4th edition play-testing. But I can give comments based on comments here on EN World.

I like the idea of simple only necessary math. I love the idea of flat math. If 2 factors cancel each other out, then delete the factors.

However, I'm still not sold on the idea that leveling-up is only applied to higher hit points and higher damage. I do want there to be some kind of To-Hit improvement when leveling up. Now if that improvement amounts to very low bonuses, I'm o.k. with it.

How can we have lower bonuses to attacks but still make level-up to hit improvements meaningful?

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

It's entirely possible there will be increases to stats or "to hit", but that they don't come into play in the first three levels.

 

[n00bdragon]

But it's a BETA! They'll patch something in I'm sure. You can't make any judgements until the final product is released!

 

[Kinak]

Personally I think no level up hit improvements is a feature. Just like no level up skill improvements is a feature.

With those in place, you can use static target numbers (whether AC or DC) throughout the campaign.

Jumping across a "challenging" pit doesn't become more difficult as you level up. I don't mean that as a dig on 4e. I've done it myself in a range of systems without realizing it. Only to have the players go "wait, that was DC 20? It was DC 15 last time"

And not scaling attack/defense just means that you keep access to a larger pool of monsters. They don't have to scale just for the sake of being able to hit the PCs or not get hit on a 2.

You can still have an actual fight with a larger number of low-level enemies, which is awesome. And the damage scaling makes them scale naturally, in 4e terms, from solo to elite to normal to minion without any additional work behind the screen.

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[Minigiant]

DCs should be static

Bonus to skills, contests, and "to hit" rolls should increase by level.

Just feels right.
Just feels... D%D... you know?

 

[pneumatik]

Flat math? Okay.

For environmental hazards flat math makes sense because those things are pretty static. A lock has a pick DC that doesn't change as you level. Flat math also means that as you level up you don't turn into superman, able to leap 50 feet just because you're high level. Done right DnD Next will let you focus on a skill like jumping if you want, but then the ability to jump really far will be your thing.

Flat math for monsters is great because it make leveling easier, for one thing. No longer do all your numbers have to go up every level just to fight monsters with numbers that are also one higher. Rate of number increase isn't a problem with flat math. In 3.5 at high levels the difference between a good and a bad save was huge. High level fighters could hit anything while high level wizards always missed, even though at low levels they were much more equal.

Flat math means you can use the weaker monsters at pretty much any level. When your high level you don't card about the weaker monsters as much because even though they can hit you sometimes they do so little damage you don't really care. And you do so much damage that you kill one every round. But in a large horde they're still a threat, whereas in 3.5 and 4e they weren't because they'd never even hit you.

I'm actually pretty excited about flat math. Now when I design and adventure I won't have such a narrow range of monsters to choose from.

 

[Steely_Dan]

I too am digging the flatter math (scaling), in 4th Ed stripping away the 1/2 level bonus from all character's and monster's attacks, defences and skills helps a bit.

And it looks magic +X weapons are in, but a +1 sword might be huge.

 

[Transformer]

Sell Me Flat Math

Totally sounds like a drug deal.

 

[Reaper Steve]

I think we will see the the combat math ('to hit' numbers) scale, but in an indirect fashion.
Rather than gaining +X to hit per level, which only affects one aspect of game play, I think we will see ability increases. A +2 to STR yields a +1 to hit, as well as a +1 to everything STR related. I think we'll see an ability bump every so many levels, hopefully very often, even every level (since each bump is only a +0.5 bonus, rounded down, it takes two increases to have an effect.)

The play test already states a max character ability is 20. I think we could actually have an ability increase every level, yielding total of +10 spread across 6 Abilities over 20 levels. Imagine a character whose top abilities are 17, 14, 13, 12 (like most of the pregens). After 20 levels, they could be 20, 20, 20, 16 (assuming they didn't use advancements to shore up weak abilities... which is unlikely since their are no dump stats anymore.) The abilities would reflect that the PCs have become paragons of humanity and their stat bonus would increase their to hit, AC, saves, and skills without having to hand out +X per level.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

If the game runs 20 levels, and every 4 levels you get 2 or 3 pts to stats (no more then 1 pt per stat, and 20 max) then all the main combat classes gain+ 1 to hit with weapons every 10 levels, and spell casters gain +1 to magic attacks and saveing throw dcs.

Then assuming you start with a 16 attack stat then at 16th level you you have a 20 stat (+5) and +2 class and +2 prof and most likeky +2 or3 maagic.

That would make a +11 or +12 that seams kike still geting bsetter but flater