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*Pathfinder & Starfinder
Rule of Three: March 13
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<blockquote data-quote="DEFCON 1" data-source="post: 5850547" data-attributes="member: 7006"><p>As far as the speed of combat is concerned... don't forget the <em>other</em> reason why 2E and earlier combats are much faster than 3E/4E combat.</p><p></p><p>Most fights do not start with all PCs back up at full hit points.</p><p></p><p>With the ease and low cost of making Cure Light Wounds wands in 3E, and the Healing Surge mechanics of 4E... after every battle, the party could spend a few minutes and get everybody practically back to full hit points at minimum cost. In earlier editions that didn't happen, because for the most part the only healing a party had was just the healing spells of the cleric or druid. So <em>maybe</em> one or two PCs might get a healing spell tossed their way between fights... but not always, and especially not as more encounters went on in the day. Thus all the PCs were usually down from full in hit points, sometimes by quite a margin.</p><p></p><p>What this did was that it did not require as much for the DM to throw at the party to create a challenge (either in monster power or monster numbers). With fewer monsters at less power, each fight could be gotten through faster. Whereas in 3E/4E... DMs are still forced to use higher numbers of more powerful monsters in most encounters just to give the impression to the PCs that they are being presented with a challenge-- since they usually will start at full HP.</p><p></p><p>If you reduce the amount of times PCs can get back to full HP after a fight, the more likely the DM won't need to keep "throwing the kitchen sink" at the party to make subsequent fights <em>appear</em> challenging.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="DEFCON 1, post: 5850547, member: 7006"] As far as the speed of combat is concerned... don't forget the [I]other[/I] reason why 2E and earlier combats are much faster than 3E/4E combat. Most fights do not start with all PCs back up at full hit points. With the ease and low cost of making Cure Light Wounds wands in 3E, and the Healing Surge mechanics of 4E... after every battle, the party could spend a few minutes and get everybody practically back to full hit points at minimum cost. In earlier editions that didn't happen, because for the most part the only healing a party had was just the healing spells of the cleric or druid. So [I]maybe[/I] one or two PCs might get a healing spell tossed their way between fights... but not always, and especially not as more encounters went on in the day. Thus all the PCs were usually down from full in hit points, sometimes by quite a margin. What this did was that it did not require as much for the DM to throw at the party to create a challenge (either in monster power or monster numbers). With fewer monsters at less power, each fight could be gotten through faster. Whereas in 3E/4E... DMs are still forced to use higher numbers of more powerful monsters in most encounters just to give the impression to the PCs that they are being presented with a challenge-- since they usually will start at full HP. If you reduce the amount of times PCs can get back to full HP after a fight, the more likely the DM won't need to keep "throwing the kitchen sink" at the party to make subsequent fights [I]appear[/I] challenging. [/QUOTE]
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Rule of Three: March 13
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