My take.

[Steely Dan]

4E may allow role-playing, but there are other systems out there better suited for it.

Yep, like amateur dramatics clubs/workshops.

If you really, really want to get into role-playing/acting, no game system is going to serve you properly.

D&D has always been a combat focused game with a bit of acting sprinkled on top.

 

[Derren]

So when you are reduced to 0 HP in combat you just loose your interest in fighting and sit down like a civilian in a german censored Half Life game? And when you really die, you die from boredom or neglect and not from sword wounds?

 

[AllisterH]

In any event, there is nothing wrong with wanting to play a superheroic game where no one is really inept at anything. However, insisting that that is the only way to play flies in the face of my own experience.

Superheroic???

Why is it considered superheroic that your skills increase so that at 20th level, AT BEST, you're going to be as good as a 1ST level expert? Yet the fact that a wizard buck naked with a dagger in all previous editions could demolish a 1st level fighter just using basic attacks isn't considered superheroic?

What about that 20th level Ropgue that is a gentleman thief/diplomat that has never raised a hand in violence (considers it beneath him) , even blindfolded wielding a greatsword is going to smash a 1st level fighter into the ground.

How is it not superheroic that somehow, characters get better at dodging/avoiding breath weapons/Reflex saves instinctively (yet their balance skill doesn't rise) so that even a 20th level cleric weighed down in plate armour is as good as the 1st level rogue?

Yet because ADVENTURING SKILLS increase, (which I might add, is more in common with actual fiction) this makes the game superheroic?

 

[Incenjucar]

The poster who made the analogy said that 4E heroic fights are like boxing matches between professional fighters, and that's why 4E heroes can go from "1 HP from death" to "completely fine" in six hours. I pointed out that professional fighters are not completely fine in six hours.

It was MY analogy, and I didn't say professional I said serious. Perhaps a bit vague on my part, but if you get into a five minute sparring match you can, in fact, do it again after a six hour rest. You won't be QUITE as fresh as 4E characters, but the point of the whole thing is that a fight in D&D does not leave you with gouges and broken bones, it leaves you looking like this:

http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/12_01/hattonMS0112_468x509.jpg

 

[smetzger]

I suspect that, in play, if a Minion ever survives an encounter and interacts with the PCs, I will deftly swap his stat block with a more viable breed...

Reminds me of the time I was DMing RttToEE. There are a bunch of 1st lvl guards in the dungeon in several locations. Practically they are just cannon fodder, but they each have a potion of cure light wounds. On one occasion one of the guards survived an attack by a 7th level Rogue and a charge from a dire bear. He was the only one of probably 10 encounters and 50 guards who ever was able to drink his potion. In fact he drank his dead comrades potion also. About half-way through the fight the PCs start rooting for him even though he was on the other side.

 

[smetzger]

The problem with your argument is that the 'edge case' is generally more common than the non-edge case. That is its generally more likely that from 1st to 20th level, in most DM's campaigns, the player character would not have used the skills that are mysteriously improving than it is that they would have made alot of use of them. In particular, skills like 'use rope' and 'appraisal' that you are using as examples, most proponents of 4E would also say are 'useless' skills that almost never came up in play. How many swim checks are the characters really making between 1st and 20th level in most DM's campaigns if you play 3.X according to the style assumed by the core books?

I also do not like the auto-skill advancement. In 3/3.5 I enjoyed picking a skill or two that were unusual to help define my character.

 

[Colmarr]

It's also worth noting that a great many challenges you might throw at a group don't lend themselves to group solutions. Only one guy can attempt to disarm the trap. If he fails, the trap is sprung. Only one guy gets the initial attempt to convince the mountain giant to let them pass unmolested. If he fails miserably and the giant becomes actively hostile, the oppurtunity for anyone else to succeed has probably passed (unless there is someone in the party much more skilled than the first character to attempt diplomacy). Only one guy needs climb the ice wall. Everyone else need only climb a rope ladder or knotted rope. Only one guy needs to recognize the painting is a valuable antique... or a fraud. Only one guy needs to securely tie the prisoners, while the rest stand around looking intimidating, or grapple the foe, or whatever. Only one guy actually steers the runaway mine cart through the old mine. Everyone else is busy fighting off the pursuers. Only one guy really needs to jump on the horses and bring the run away stage coach to a halt. You only need one guy to craft whatever it is you needed crafted. And so forth. Even when you present a skill challenge rarely is it the case that anyone but the most skillful player's skill is at stake.

I'm not sure I agree with this.

What if the trap disarmer (disable device) is unconscious or otherwise out of action?

What if there's no time to fix a rope ladder or secure a knotted rope (climb)?

What if the guy steering the cart (profession: miner) gets taken out by archers or is knocked overboard?

What if the guy chasing the stagecoach (ride) gets attacked by bandits?

Under 3e rules, in each case it's unlikely anyone else can undertake the task. The party "fails" the challenge.

It is possible to craft challenges that target one specific character. In fact, you provided a good list of examples. However, those challenges provide a game design problem: if they are too important (plot-wise) or too long (play-wise), the other players feel that they're no longer contributing.

I would be surprised if a majority of players would choose (1) "being a star in 1 out of 4 encounters and not being a substanital contributor in the others" over (2) "being able to meaningfully contribute to all encounters, but being more likely to succeed in encounters involving your special field".

From what I've heard, 4e goes some way towards ensuring the challenges remain group activities, and IMO that's a good thing.

If 4e is anything like saga, the "realists" can probably take some solace from the fact that skills will have trained uses and untrained uses (perhaps like the old DC thresholds on Disable Device and tracking using Survival).

 

[Imp]

Which is kind of why I dislike the 3.x skill mechanics. For example, if I sent an average CR 10 monster against a Level 10 party, the basic assumption is that EVERYONE can contribute in the battle. You have to specifically choose monsters to screw over classes (golems vs mages, undead vs rogues etc). Furthermore, nobody thinks that you should send a CR 1 monster versus the party. Hell, even a CR 5 monster sent against the party would leave many heads scratching

Why is it then that this same design paradigm isn't accepted for skills?

I don't really care? That's consistency for consistency's sake and nothing else. Mind you I don't value the CR system super terribly much. But, in a game where DCs don't scale so much that max ranks are required to be useful, the rogue, bard, whatever gets a chance to spread things around too, take their own cross-class skills, ride horses or something.

Focusing on Balance for example, it does seem that the designers wanted skill challenges to be tied to level otherwise there's no reason to have so many variable increasing DCs.

Sure, somewhat, but it's quite unnecessary to only confront an experienced rogue with greased ropes to climb on or even totally level-appropriate locks all the time. But you do want the classes to be able to do some of their own things.

What you're talking about (separating rogues and other high skill classes) is the AFTEREFFECT of the 3.x system. At levels 1-3, you can have most skill challenges that involve the entire party (due to the low DCs and the effect of attribute mods) but afterwards, thanks to how the system works, skill challenges become a singular endeavour.

Ok, what I'm arguing here is against the assertion that in 3e skills are useless except maxed. That is in the hands of the DM. It is not necessarily how the system works. I'm not particularly arguing against the 4e skill system, which I don't have many huge problems with, and in fact I already do house-rule things to get the whole party in on disarming a trap for example, and provide different things for the Appraise skill to do at higher levels, and divorce monster HD from Knowledge and Animal Handling checks where it makes sense.

Er, Bluff vs sense Motive in combat is tied directly to level. You add your BAB to your sense motive check to oppose Feinting in combat. How is this NOT a clear example of the designers saying "skill challenges are supposed to scale with level"?

You're right about this and I'm tired. But I simply don't care about designer intent in this case if something else works better.

 

[Celebrim]

I'm not sure I agree with this.

What if the trap disarmer (disable device) is unconscious or otherwise out of action?

What if there's no time to fix a rope ladder or secure a knotted rope (climb)?

What if the guy steering the cart (profession: miner) gets taken out by archers or is knocked overboard?

What if the guy chasing the stagecoach (ride) gets attacked by bandits?

Under 3e rules, in each case it's unlikely anyone else can undertake the task. The party "fails" the challenge.

Ok. Probably so. What exactly are you trying to say?

It is possible to craft challenges that target one specific character. In fact, you provided a good list of examples.

Quite the contrary, it is easy to craft challenges that target one specific character. I wasn't coming up with examples, I was simply listing the most obvious way such skills usually work. Without much work at all, I could list dozens of similar cases. On the other hand, coming up with challenges that must be attempted by every member of the party is hard. It's so hard, that you have to make a special creative effort to do it.

However, those challenges provide a game design problem: if they are too important (plot-wise) or too long (play-wise), the other players feel that they're no longer contributing.

Any individual challenge is unlikely to be either, or to produce the feeling that the player is extraneous. It only becomes a problem if you string a whole series of challenges together of the same type. That's why a good designer will seek some variaty in the challenges. For example, if you are going to throw alot of undead at the party, 'Trap Filled Tomb' is a good choice of setting because it boosts the rogue's player's sense of importance - which might otherwise be hurt by his inability to contribute as much as he would like in combat.

I would be surprised if a majority of players would choose (1) "being a star in 1 out of 4 encounters and not being a substanital contributor in the others" over (2) "being able to meaningfully contribute to all encounters, but being more likely to succeed in encounters involving your special field".

I wouldn't be terribly surprised either, but then neither of those options is really on the table. Third edition doesn't really resemble option one unless you go out of your way to make it so, and fourth edition won't resemble option two unless you confine encounters to mean 'fight monsters'. Fourth edition doesn't reward or encourage skill monkeys and the difficulty (perhaps even impossiblity) of ensuring skill challenges require substantial contribution from all characters precludes ever obtaining the goal of 100% involvement 100% of the time.

 

[Hussar]

I don't think people who play differently than me do mindless hack-n-slash. Heck, I don't even denigrate hack-n-slash. Monte does very thoughtful hack-n-slash. But as long as I'm going to be accused of looking down on other people anyway, I might as well risk people thinking that and telling you what I do think.

Please reread Kamikaze Midget's post a little ways back. That is what I was referring to. He specifically uses the words hack and slash to characterize other campaigns. Was not referring to you at all.

I find the idea that environmental skill challenges that do not scale with level to be very strange. I would have thought that it would be fairly obvious that they do.

Take the scenario of sneaking into a camp/stronghold of the enemy. At low levels, it's an orc camp and the guards, such as they are, are drunk. At mid levels (say 6-12), you're sneaking into a yuan-ti stronghold. At high levels, it's a Githyanki fortress on the plane of Limbo. The skills required to do that would almost have to scale in order to be even remotely believable.

Or, take a scenario where the party is defending their ship from attackers. At low levels, the seas are fairly calm, maybe some of the attackers climb into the rigging allowing some of the PC's to climb up after them. At mid levels, the enemies have spell casters dropping Ice Storm, the seas are rough, it's raining, visibility is reduced. At high levels you are fighting a kracken in a hurricane.

But, realistically, with 3e mechanics, I can't do any of that. Because the skill DC's for the mid and high level scenarios become auto fails for too many PC's.

There is a vast difference between zero skill and maxed skills. The new system, purportedly since we haven't seen it yet, gives higher level characters a chance to succeed, but, does not give them automatic success. At the same time, they do not auto-fail either.

Would you still say that scaling DC's are bad DMing Celebrim?