D&D General New Interview with Rob Heinsoo About 4E

[Staffan]

This is pure legacy. In T&T, for instance, wizards both heal and use Take That, You Fiend.

OK, I have to know. I get that "Take That, You Fiend" is the T&T equivalent of Magic Missile. But did anyone ever make a spell that teleported or moved a potion or something similar to an ally and call it "Take That, You Friend"?

 

[SteveC]

"I want to be a Dex based Fighter"
"You are better off as a rogue"
"But I want to be a fighter!"
"But the fighter lacks any synergy with the rapier"
"But it's the fighter! It's a weapon"

It has been a long time, but remember that the Slayer class (from the books near the end of the line) has a Dexertity option. So it did happen, just late

 

[dbolack]

nods vigorously in Traveller

Which... time?

 

[Cordwainer Fish]

Which... time?

You'd better sit down for this.

 

[Undrave]

It's not hard due to how roles are defined.

Defenders got a Mark
Strikers for a Xd6 damage bonus or +STAT damage bonus
Leaders got Xing Word
Controllers got...well controllers were weird.

The only Traps in 4e were classes that broke the mold.

So a fighter choosing between Mark or +1d6 damage would not likely lead to a trap.

I think you underestimate the impact of powers and class features like HP and proficiencies.

Sometimes I wonder if Wizards actually does want my money.

Wonder that too. I only own the PHB and Tasha's from 5e...

None of this prevented you from drifting roles. My Feylock might have officially been a striker but in reality was a hardcore controller doing mediocre damage but causing the DM to tear his hair out. Meanwhile my friend's Invoker of Wrath at the same table was officially a controller but in practice easily topped the damage charts for the party and did very little control.

The roles were simply design notes for classes with no direct mechanical weight. And said "if you play the class in the orthodox way here is what they should be good at".

Exactly! It just made it much easier to have a baseline competency without even trying.

As DM, I want to play my antagonists as believably as I can, and in most cases that means they will definitely try to get at the wizard in the back and it is up to the party to figure out how to handle that.

Yeah and that's what the punshiment mechanics were for? Trying to stop them from doing that!

I do not force the party in my games to take certain roles or have certain abilities. I craft the campaign to suit the party that I have on hand.

We did that in 4e too? Nobody was out there forcing people to play one of the four roles?

Smart enemies will focus on the person they feel is the top threat to them. A taunt mechanic does not make a ton of sense in an RPG unless you are playing it for the tactical combat.

Marking is not a taunt mechanic, it is a warning

Which is why having too high an AC was considered a textbook mistake made by 4e defenders. If you were too hard to hit enemies frequently simply ate the mark penalty and attacked the soft target.

The thing is, it's actually good that sometimes enemy ignore the mark because triggering the punishment is FUN for the Defender. Defenders would actually be super boring if enemies ALWAYS respected the mark. The point of the Defender is to ONLY offer losing scenario to the enemy. Either outcomes of a mark should be in your favor and using your abilities to make it so is part of the appeal.

 

[pemerton]

The thing is, it's actually good that sometimes enemy ignore the mark because triggering the punishment is FUN for the Defender. Defenders would actually be super boring if enemies ALWAYS respected the mark. The point of the Defender is to ONLY offer losing scenario to the enemy. Either outcomes of a mark should be in your favor and using your abilities to make it so is part of the appeal.

My method of doing this as a GM was often via failures of memory - as in, I would be running a large number of NPCs/creatures on a pretty complex battlefield, and so would forget who was marked, and/or would forget all the bells and whistles that the PC had attached to their mark (via feats, powers etc). And so then I would declare some action for my NPC/creature, and discover myself being hammered by the defender!

It seemed to work as well as anything else for simulating the chaos of combat, the uncertainty of the decision-situation the marked opponents are in, etc.

 

[Staffan]

The thing is, it's actually good that sometimes enemy ignore the mark because triggering the punishment is FUN for the Defender. Defenders would actually be super boring if enemies ALWAYS respected the mark. The point of the Defender is to ONLY offer losing scenario to the enemy. Either outcomes of a mark should be in your favor and using your abilities to make it so is part of the appeal.

This reminds me of something I heard a military Youtuber of some variety mention: You don't want to give your enemy problems. Problems can be solved. You want to give them dilemmas, where they can either do A or B but both suck.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

It's not hard due to how roles are defined.

Defenders got a Mark
Strikers for a Xd6 damage bonus or +STAT damage bonus
Leaders got Xing Word
Controllers got...well controllers were weird.

The only Traps in 4e were classes that broke the mold.

So a fighter choosing between Mark or +1d6 damage would not likely lead to a trap.

Personally, I think this fundamentally misunderstands what is involved, but I don't think this thread is the appropriate place for that discussion.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

It makes no sense that a bunch of bandits are going to focus on the guy none of them can hit while the other folks slaughter them.

I ran a game with a high damage ranger and a HIGH like felt like he was cheating HIGH AC swordmage... and I would have to decied, do I hit the ranger who is killing me for half damage (the sword mage mark shielded for 1/2 damage) when even with that -2 I could hit 40ish% of the time... or do I go crit fishing on the swordmage for that nat 20?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

This reminds me of something I heard a military Youtuber of some variety mention: You don't want to give your enemy problems. Problems can be solved. You want to give them dilemmas, where they can either do A or B but both suck.

PRECISELY! And that's what made a lot of 4e so fun. Marking is NOT an MMO mechanic, and cannot be, because (unlike what damn near every detractor ever says...even though it's dead wrong...) it is NOT a taunt, it is NOT mind control. It is "choose to cross me and suffer the consequences, or choose to attack me and possibly waste your effort."

In other words: either way, an actual person has to CHOOSE what to do.

You can't implement a mark purely in code, that would be a mere taunt, mind control crap. It requires an actual person to weigh the choices (or, as noted above, to be forgetful and eat the punishment by accident).