New Design Paradigms - What are they and are they good or bad?

[Doghead Thirteen]

Combat takes a bit longer sometimes (especially when the rules are new), but it's much more interesting - feels like an action movie.

That's the feeling I'm after. I seem to have managed it in something that moves real fast; when we cut loose, the pyrotechnics are stunning.

Now, there's nothing wrong with leaving open the remote possibility of a catastrophic failure. You know, just to keep magic from being too reliable...

Yah, that's the idea. How's this sound...

"Magic: The art of blowing things up while trying to avoid frying your brain in the process. Fairy dust optional."

 

[ruleslawyer]

Basically, that would mean NOT running site-based adventures, unless XP awards were altered from "per challenge" to "per session."

As someone who uses site-based adventures with Iron Heroes, I have to disagree with this based on experience.

I don't think anyone's suggested a system wherein *everything* resets after each encounter. IH, for instance, doesn't reset hp, and I don't see any future version of D&D doing so either. However, it does mean that cool abilities get balanced around three factors which, IMHO, I prefer to per-day usage:

1) Risk of use.

2) Time/number of actions in combat required to use.

3) Ability to use ability again in same combat if you've used it once.

These are, I think, perfectly sufficient to keep combats within a D&D scale, including for site-based adventures.

The principal effect of a per-day mechanic is to hold everyone to the caster's schedule. Once the spells are done for the day, it's time to rest. Period. Doing anything else unless the DM has stuck you with a time constraint is poor tactics.

I'll also point out that D&D's magical healing makes site-based adventures often easier to blow through than is the case in other D20 variants. IMHO, the healing rules (clerics as combat medics) could simply be ditched if one were going with a per-encounter mechanic.

 

[Nifft]

The principal effect of a per-day mechanic is to hold everyone to the caster's schedule. Once the spells are done for the day, it's time to rest. Period. Doing anything else unless the DM has stuck you with a time constraint is poor tactics.

Yes, and this is the most annoying thing IMHO -- one spellcaster sets the pace for the whole party.

This is why I adore Warlocks, Binders and their ilk.

Cheers, -- N

 

[iwatt]

Yes, and this is the most annoying thing IMHO -- one spellcaster sets the pace for the whole party.

This is why I adore Warlocks, Binders and their ilk.

Cheers, -- N

The core sorceror isn't that afr behind, specially if you include staffs and wands in the treasure.

 

[hong]

Problem with that is the speed our sessions take place at. We generally cram at least 20 encounters into a single in-game day.

And why would you not be able to have 20, or 200, or 2000 encounters in a single in-game day under a per-encounter balancing setup...?

Henry's complaint was that per-encounter balancing leads to MORE encounters per day in the game world, akin to PCs being like the Energizer bunny (going and going and going). Or by in-game days, do you mean real-world days?

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I hate dead levels. Take the Rogue class as a prime example. 20th level to me should be a crowning of achievement. You should feel good to have finally made it that far. What "special" abilities do the rogue characters get for this?

+1 BAB, +1d6 HP's, +1 Reflex save and 8 Skill Points.

Wow! Break out the champagne. [/sarcasm]

You may as well take a level of another class since the only thing you get that you can't get elsewhere is a few extra skill points that won't make all that big a difference.

Some other classes can be just as bad. When a Sorcerer goes from 4th to 5th level he gets +1d4 HP's, a few skill points and learns an extra 1st and 2nd level spell. No saves increase, nor BAB. The same thing happens at levels 6-7, 10-11, 12-13, 16-17 and 18-19.

I know that some people say that learning new spells is getting a new ability. In general I agree. However I don't think that learning a grand total of 2 spells, a couple of HP's and a couple of skill points should be all that you get when you go up a level. This happens 6 times to the Sorcerer.

Olaf the Stout

 

[jasin]

Yes, and this is the most annoying thing IMHO -- one spellcaster sets the pace for the whole party.

This is why I adore Warlocks, Binders and their ilk.

You know, I just realized that Vancian magic doesn't at all necessitate the per-day approach. In fact, spellcasting in Vance seems to work similarly to per-encounter powers: you can only memorize so many spells, and when you use them they're gone, but no mention of not being able to just rememorize them right after the deodand is dead and the pelgrane is scared away.

I'm not longer torn about this.

Bring on 4E with it's martial-maneuver-using fighters and per-encounter Vancian wizards!

 

[blargney the second]

Bring on 4E with it's martial-maneuver-using fighters and per-encounter Vancian wizards!

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Edit: I should mention that I've done this for a game with a single player. It's fun.

 

[Roman]

Everybody in this thread is discussing the two new design paradigms I identified as being increasingly 'trendy' in D&D design and likely to significantly impact the design of the 4th edition and this is fine, as that is one of the purposes of this thread. I also sought, however, to identify other such paradigms that are in increasing use by D&D designers or are in planning stages. Hence, I am adding a third paradigm to the discussion, which, although it has not seen as much use as the other two, appears to be at least in the planning stages. I will update my original starting post, but am also presenting it here:

New Design Paradigm 3: Monsters will be designed in such a way as to eliminate the dissonance between their respective Challenge Ratings and their Hit Dice. If combined with per encounter balancing of monsters... and it will likely be thus combined... this will also eliminate the discrepancy between the usefulness of abilities to monsters and PCs and thus unify Challenge Ratings, Hit Dice, Level Adjustments and Effective Character Levels into one number: Hit Dice

Evidence: My evidence for this is weaker than for the previous two new design guidelines and consists essentially of the articles on monster design published by Mike Mearls several months ago on the WotC website. (As a sidenote, what happened to more of this series of articles? I think I ever only saw two or three.)

My position: I have mixed feelings. On the one hand having hit dice deal with everything four numbers used to cover previously seems like a good idea, as it appears to be more streamlining than the elimination of any important mechanisms. Conversely, however, I feel this may restrict monster design choice/freedom by bundling abilities into hit dice. Personally, I would give this change a tentative heads up, as I suspect that monster design freedom/choice might not be too adversely affected and if done right, it might also simplify the creation of new monsters by DMs. I guess it depends on implementation, but it does sound promising.

Note: Per encounter balancing, although it will surely be used, is not actually necessary to achieve this - it is merely necessary to design monsters in such a way that their abilities equivalent to PC abilities of the same hit dice are not useable more frequently than those of the PCs unless there is some equivalent tradeoff.

 

[M.L. Martin]

FWIW, Mike Mearls recently noted on Bruce Baugh's weblog that some of the design paradigms used in 3E--the 'encouraging system mastery' and 'ivory tower design' ones called out by Monte Cook--were no longer in play at WotC R&D.