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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ComradeGnull" data-source="post: 6002035" data-attributes="member: 6685694">'Resources' is maybe a bad term; I've never really thought of D&D as 'resource management', but the phrase seems to be common with people.  A better way of explaining it might be: I want to introduce a set of situational combat options that make combat more detailed, more tactical, but more time consuming.  And while I originally phrased it as being DM fiat which type of fight it was, I think I like [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]'s observation from Burning Wheel that it is equally valid to let the players decide they want to spend more time on the resolution of any particular fight.That's one of the reasons I like the idea of players being involved in choosing the type of fight now- most players, given the choice on fighting two hobgoblins, would probably say 'not a big deal, lets just play through quickly'.  You don't need to spec out complex maneuvers and powers for the opponents.Again, 'Little' and 'Big' is not about threat or lethality; fatal or risky Little Fights are expected.  It's about the level of tactical detail for their resolution.I'm thinking of this in terms of 4e's stuff still being available.  I don't see any reason why the 4e model can't be 'incorporated' as an option.  Space in the book is a realistic economic concern, so I think it would probably be best to have the simple/small method as the 5e default and make the 4e stuff a module- but it would at least provide a framework to make it possible to use the 4e stuff as a module that could live side-by-side with non-4e, which I haven't really seen a coherent suggestion for yet.Sorry, was trying to interpret what you meant by 'found or purchased' combat options- wasn't sure what you meant.  In my ideal, things like Fireball would be available in either Little or Big fights, as would caltrops and gear.  The added 'resources' for Big Fights are more about mechanical, tactical options (forced movement, move-attack-move powers, attack & heal powers) and probably would make a bigger difference in the play of non-spell casters than for Fireball casters.  The only difference between little and big is added tactical options in a big fight (for opponents and players) and maybe a healing mechanic that doesn't rely entirely on cleric's having Cure spells left when the fight starts.Yeah, the whole point of this was drawing upon an idea from the other thread: some people like the very detailed, tactical style of 4e for big boss fights (particularly after the math for Solo monsters was revised and improved in the post-essentials world), but dislike the added time that it takes to resolve every fight using that system.  Full stop.  It was to give people the option of doing a quick, rules-light resolution for some fights, and a more detailed and tactical resolution style for others.  That is really the only thrust of it.  If you don't ever want 4e-style fights, just say 'All fights are Little', and you're playing 3e.  If you don't ever want 3e-style fights, just say 'All fights are Big' and you're playing 4e.  If you like both styles for different scenarios (I do), then you use something like this.The reason it seems like I am making 'grid' and 'big' related is because that was part of the point; Big Fights are not 'MORE POWER!' fights, they are 'more detail' fights.  The grid adds detail, no?  You are not trying to roughly theater of the mind estimate relative positions; you have direct, measurable distances from one character to another, and exact ranges for ranged and AOE powers.  Smaller movements- 5' steps, slides, forced movements- that are either not particularly meaningful in a grid-less fight or are very hard to keep track of if you aren't a chess grand master can be played out on the board.  It means slowing down resolution to count squares and apply conditional complex effects like forced moves and reactive powers, but it provides people who want it with extra detail.Not at all.  If you want to resolve Eowyn fighting the King of the Nazgul as a Little Fight, that is fine.  If you wanted to make the fight with the guards a Big Fight (but using unarmed combat only), that's fine too.  It's about the level of detail on tactical options, not the presence or absence of a particular scale of power.Due to a combination of the way the rules were presented and the complexities of some of the effects of many powers (forced movement, slides, move-and-attack, reaction powers, immediate powers, etc.), 4e tended to move the game toward a style of combat where most fights involved a larger number of participants, each of which had a lot of fairly complex combat options.  This slowed down the game for a lot of people.  If you never ran a 4e game, you may not have seen it first hand.  Not everyone experienced it.  But I've talked to a fair number of people who said 'I liked the options and detail of 4e combat, but using them for every encounter was overkill and slowed the game down too much.'  So the thread I linked in the first post was about ways to incorporate the nice benefits of the 4e-style of encounter in an on-demand way, while preserving a faster mode of resolution as well.</blockquote>

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