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Novas and Workdays, Big Fights and Little Fights
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<blockquote data-quote="ComradeGnull" data-source="post: 6001493" data-attributes="member: 6685694"><p>I can definitely understand that feeling, and the idea of wanting your character to be 'consistent' through all areas of play- some people really dislike the idea of any area feeling like a 'mini-game' rather than part of a coherent system.</p><p></p><p>I think the idea of not being able to use powers- particularly as they were defined in 4e- in a skill challenge (or other resources) is silly, and counter to the traditional way the game has been played. It sounds, to be honest, like poorly educated DM'ing as much as anything else (my biggest complaint against 4e, I would say, has as much to do with its presentation as anything about its specific rules- some people got the impression that a certain playstyle was 'required' or 'official' and that deviations from it- particularly ones that were clearly supported by the rules but not made explicit- was 'wrong'). To be clear, in what I am proposing, all your abilities would be available everywhere, except for a small set of specifically combat-oriented tactical abilities that would come out only in particularly significant fights.</p><p></p><p>There is something irreducibly gamist about having a specific set of powers that apply only in Big Fights. Definitely. There are ways to justify it in-world that I think work better than the 4e justifications- that the Big Fight represents a slowed-down, 'bullet time' version of a regular fight, that Big Fights are typically fights that PCs are specifically preparing for, that they are higher-stakes than ordinary fights, and the characters access untapped reserves of power- whatever. However, I also know that those explanations will not ever be sufficient to certain players.</p><p></p><p>The game is at the end of the day a game, and everyone has their own threshold for where things becoming insufficiently 'realistic' for it to be a barrier to their enjoying play. To me, this solution is appealing because I actually like both 4e and pre-4e styles of play and I can accept a certain amount of 'gaminess' if it achieves the end of giving me options that encompass both. I also am struggling, as the discussions about 5e move forward, to figure out other ways to reconcile the advantages of both styles of play into one game. Maybe the truth is that they don't both fit. </p><p></p><p>l liked the detail level, in general, provided by 4e, but found it exhausting having to break it out for every combat. Combats got too long as DMs tried to make every encounter utilize terrain and battlemap features that kept powers interesting, and this lead to the feeling that focus was being drug disproportionately to combat. Some of this, just like your skill challenge problem, stems either from bad DM'ing or poor presentation of the rules (i.e., you don't have to make every encounter use the full XP values worth of creatures for that encounter level- you can spread them out into multiple smaller fights).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="ComradeGnull, post: 6001493, member: 6685694"] I can definitely understand that feeling, and the idea of wanting your character to be 'consistent' through all areas of play- some people really dislike the idea of any area feeling like a 'mini-game' rather than part of a coherent system. I think the idea of not being able to use powers- particularly as they were defined in 4e- in a skill challenge (or other resources) is silly, and counter to the traditional way the game has been played. It sounds, to be honest, like poorly educated DM'ing as much as anything else (my biggest complaint against 4e, I would say, has as much to do with its presentation as anything about its specific rules- some people got the impression that a certain playstyle was 'required' or 'official' and that deviations from it- particularly ones that were clearly supported by the rules but not made explicit- was 'wrong'). To be clear, in what I am proposing, all your abilities would be available everywhere, except for a small set of specifically combat-oriented tactical abilities that would come out only in particularly significant fights. There is something irreducibly gamist about having a specific set of powers that apply only in Big Fights. Definitely. There are ways to justify it in-world that I think work better than the 4e justifications- that the Big Fight represents a slowed-down, 'bullet time' version of a regular fight, that Big Fights are typically fights that PCs are specifically preparing for, that they are higher-stakes than ordinary fights, and the characters access untapped reserves of power- whatever. However, I also know that those explanations will not ever be sufficient to certain players. The game is at the end of the day a game, and everyone has their own threshold for where things becoming insufficiently 'realistic' for it to be a barrier to their enjoying play. To me, this solution is appealing because I actually like both 4e and pre-4e styles of play and I can accept a certain amount of 'gaminess' if it achieves the end of giving me options that encompass both. I also am struggling, as the discussions about 5e move forward, to figure out other ways to reconcile the advantages of both styles of play into one game. Maybe the truth is that they don't both fit. l liked the detail level, in general, provided by 4e, but found it exhausting having to break it out for every combat. Combats got too long as DMs tried to make every encounter utilize terrain and battlemap features that kept powers interesting, and this lead to the feeling that focus was being drug disproportionately to combat. Some of this, just like your skill challenge problem, stems either from bad DM'ing or poor presentation of the rules (i.e., you don't have to make every encounter use the full XP values worth of creatures for that encounter level- you can spread them out into multiple smaller fights). [/QUOTE]
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