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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Neonchameleon" data-source="post: 8269279" data-attributes="member: 87792">Not in the slightest. Unless you think reacting to a living breathing world as if it was a living breathing world where people aren't always alert is moving the goalposts.That depends on the makeup of the bad guys and the level to which you don't get surprise. If the room is mostly full of archers then rush them down.And there's a difference between strategic surprise and tactical surprise. The artificial environments in dungeons normally only cater to one of these. Someone can be caught flat footed with their sword in hand and their shield on their arm. And they can fail to be caught flat footed, able to act and draw their belt knife to fight with when their halberd is in the corner of the room because it's a bloody nuisance and they are playing cards.That depends on how they are armed. If all the enemies are armed with javelins or other missile weapons no you don't. 100% of them can shoot you - and your melee line can't fire back. There is absolutely nothing that forces enemies to follow you when you retreat into a choke. There are occasional times when it's appropriate - but you are saying it's SOP. If it's SOP you are inherently deskilling the game by taking away the judgement call as to which the best approach is.Indeed. As they do in 4e. But 4e tactics involve countering a range of enemies rather than just dropping back into your own formation. It's not just "as you go up in level" but based on what the enemies do.On this path lies Order of the Stick. Seriously there are two basic paradigms - the rules of the game are the reality of the world and the rules of the game are the user interface to the world. If the rules are the reality the world is a highly artificial one.Any two planets are always in alignment with each other. I'd say that it is commonly true that either (a) people are not actively carrying a full warrior's load of equipment under normal circumstances (in which case attack before they do is sensible) or (b) that in D&D style play there are at least backup ranged and/or thrown weapons in play from most of the intelligent enemies.And in 4e we had a nickname for grouping up at a choke point or even not at one. "Fireball formation". "Scorching Burst formation" when we were being pedantic. This didn't mean it was never appropriate - but it's another reason (other than the neutralising the enemy's strengths and that it's more chaotic and more interesting) for 4e characters to press in. Tight packed groups in 4e are asking for trouble. So for that matter are spread out groups letting the individuals get surrounded - you have to work out a balance.I was specifically responding to you when you talked about people who "just want to shine as their characters without necessarily putting in a lot of effort in terms of playing skill". If you did mean OSR-style skill then (a) you expressed it very badly especially when you referred to the effort put in or the specific skills and (b) you implied that people should by default want OSR-style skill, making it the one true way.I apologise for responding in anger, using your own words which I knew to be offensive to denigrate your play style in the way you denigrated the playstyles of all other than you. I would therefore request that in the interest of politeness that if you talk about the skill of others you do so precisely rather than in general terms and that you don't criticise the effort of others.</blockquote>

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