D&D 5E So 5th edition is coming soon

[AbdulAlhazred]

Sorry, but are you kidding? Almost every non-leader class has at least one:

Assassin: Claim the Dead
Avenger: Renewing Strike
Barbarian: Life Thane Rage
Battlemind: Aspect of Elevated Harmony
Druid: Form of the Primeval Boar (pre-Essentials turning Druids into Leaders)
Fighter: Comeback Strike
Invoker: Death's Denial
Monk: Internal Power
Paladin: Paladins Judgment
Ranger: Wounded Beast
Sorcerer: Moon and the Stars
Swordmage: Rejuvenating Strike
Warden: Bear's Endurance
Warlock: Red Leeches of Nihal (I put this down as an example because it's temporary hit points which amount to the same thing, warlocks actually have several other actual healing powers)

Granted, many such powers are Dailies, but not all of them. And some of these classes have a dozen or more such powers.

All of which are MUCH more limited than any kind of healing your leader will provide. Look at Red Leeches of Nihal since you seem to like it... The power requires a standard action and occupies a daily slot to provide a bare HS worth of personal healing. The temp nature of the healing aside, it is a terrible power. Fighters have some similar powers, one of which actually allows to heal another PC, but again this is a bare HS worth of healing and requires a standard action. It is to put it bluntly a basically worthless power.

Now, if you are talking healing powers that heal others, then yeah, that might be 10% of the 150 to 200 or so non-leader healing powers in the game. But, a lot of them still exist. Remember, a PC only has to have one of them in order to heal.

Except pretty much invariably they require standard actions, take up slots better used for other things, etc. You're not going to get anything but the very most basic healing without being a leader and frankly it is almost never actually worth using 95% of these powers.

But compared to previous editions of the game, 4E is probably the most egregious about letting non-healers heal. There is a lot more role bleed over.

It is really not roll bleed over at all. Any 4e PC has Second Wind already. Most of the powers you can use which provide some form of healing are considerably WORSE than Second Wind. I hardly think this is stepping on the toes of the leader.

And the reason it happens in 4E is because everyone has powers. Everyone is a superhero. In previous editions, not everyone had spells.

And yet all the literature, myth, and other types of fiction from which D&D principally draws is rife with 'martial' heroes doing exactly these things. I find it to be entirely appropriate and 4e is vastly better at portraying these things than other editions have been (in 3.x there were options, but the costs were high or they required rather elaborate class poaching etc). I'm sorry, but your notion of some kind of divide between different types of 'magical' and 'non-magical' heroes simply doesn't hold up against the source material, nor do most players IME wish to be permanently consigned to "I hit it harder" just because they want to use a sword.

I'm after things like Artifacts or (expensive) Rituals that restore Healing Surges and/or possibly Daily powers (possibly with penalties associated with them such as cannot regain healing surges for a week or some such). The game allows someone to be brought back from the dead, but has no mechanisms for getting past 4 encounters per day. Huh?

I'm looking for MMMAAAGGGIIICCC!!!

BOOM, not wimper.

First of all, there's no hard and fast limitation of 4 encounters per day. This is entirely within the control of the DM. You want more encounters? Make them a bit weaker. You want restoration of daily resources, there are all kinds of options. DMG2 most certainly talks about possibilities like a 'fountain of healing' or whatnot. Artifacts are a totally blank slate, you can do ANYTHING with them. Make one up! What is WRONG with people these days that they can't simply drop what they want into their game? These things aren't covered in the PLAYER CHARACTER rules because they are simply not things that the players are supposed to be building around. They CAN get them, but that acquisition is strictly in the purview of the DM, where it really should be.

Honestly, where in AD&D were these kinds of things? I haven't read much of 3.x stuff, so I won't comment on that, but this kind of thing was ENTIRELY a DM resource in AD&D. I don't understand what you're complaining about. BOOM is "here's the DM's responsibility", so STEP UP!!!!

The Fountain of Youth

In Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, drinking from the Holy Grail

In "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe" (1950), Father Christmas gave Lucy a cordial

In "The Slithering Shadow" (Conan, 1933), there was a golden wine that restored vigor and repaired wounds, bringing Conan back from the brink of death to full health.

Granted, they aren't "drinking healing potions in the middle of combat", but then again, that doesn't happen too often in 4E either.

Exactly, it doesn't happen often in 4e BY DESIGN because they actually looked at the rules and the sources for the game and said "gosh, this doesn't fit in well with the genre" and reduced its importance in the game.

The issue with "the hero's own resolve" is that it's overplayed here. It's allowed to be "every single encounter" or in the case of Warlords (and even Bards), it is every single encounter.

Until the PC exhausts his reserves, yes. Honestly, go back to the source material again. It is REPLETE with heroes getting back up and going on with nothing but grit. Heck, REAL LIFE is replete with these kinds of stories. Sorry, I don't even consider this kind of thing terribly unrealistic within the basic context of the game and its abstractions. It certainly fits in quite well with the action adventure genre.

It's the concept that wounds don't exist. We fight and fight, but we don't get wounded. We just get tired and then overcome being tired with personal resolve and cheerleader cheering up. Woo hoo! That concept is really over used in 4E and is not what I consider magical fantasy.

Except of course that hit points are abstract, so that is a rather dubious interpretation to start with. Secondly I see wounded heroes going on with nary a wince all over the place. Bruce Willis and Jackie Chan run around with bandages in practically every movie either of them ever made. Slap a bandage on it when you get a chance and off you go, good as new.

The one thing about 4E that I hope that they restore with 5E is the magic.

In 4E, most every PC has superpowers. Most every PC can heal. Most every PC has supernatural or magical ways to shrug off or avoid damage.

Every PC is a Jedi (i.e. with respect to displaying supernatural abilities).

It's not a matter of balancing the powers. It's a matter of segregating them.


One of the few things I like about Essentials is that some of the PCs now have most abilities that merely increase the umph of a melee basic attack without delving into supernatural effects.


Don't get me wrong. I enjoy playing 4E. I just find the roles and classes to be very overlapping, partially because most powers have supernatural or magical riders or effects. We can't just hit for damage, we have to also move foes or add bonuses and penalties to future rolls or yadda yadda yadda with almost every single power. There is also a ton of bookkeeping associated with all of these effects from most every single power / class feature / item / feat.


Syndrome (to Mr. Incredible): "And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so that everyone can be superheroes. Everyone can be super. And when everyone's super, no one will be."

This is how I view 4E's magic. Everyone has it. Nearly every single monster (except minions for the most part). Every single PC. And they all have it in spades.

Yeah, we'll never agree. The last thing on earth I want to see is the return to the days where if you picked up a sword you were instantly turned into a second-rate lackey. 4e is far more true to its source material and fantasy tradition IMHO than any previous edition. I think they did a rather brilliant job of this actually. It is a magical fantasy world, magic is part of everything, and the personal 'magic' of the bad-assed sword wielding warrior is a welcome and LONG overdue addition to the game.

All I can really say is some 5e retro game where we have to go back to the old days because hey Gygax didn't do it the 4e way is NOT something I'd touch with a 10' pole.

I'd be OK with some way of organizing the rules so that there ARE a set of plausible mundane mechanics that can provide a core set that you can access easily. Forcing players to be limited to nothing but that simply because they picked the 'wrong' character concept is completely uninteresting to me.

 

[KarinsDad]

All of which are MUCH more limited than any kind of healing your leader will provide. Look at Red Leeches of Nihal since you seem to like it... The power requires a standard action and occupies a daily slot to provide a bare HS worth of personal healing. The temp nature of the healing aside, it is a terrible power. Fighters have some similar powers, one of which actually allows to heal another PC, but again this is a bare HS worth of healing and requires a standard action. It is to put it bluntly a basically worthless power.

Gaining your healing surge in temporary hit points with an Immediate Interrupt is worthless?

It's not a standard action, so you must have been looking at something else.

Except pretty much invariably they require standard actions, take up slots better used for other things, etc. You're not going to get anything but the very most basic healing without being a leader and frankly it is almost never actually worth using 95% of these powers.

Claim the Dead is a per encounter healing surge +15 temp hit points free action. That's worthless?

Victory Hymn is a per encounter standard action attack which allows a healing surge and a free saving throw.

Psychic Feast is a per encounter healing surge worth of temporary hit points free action without spending a surge.

Inspired Resurgence is a per encounter free action healing surge plus shift 3.

Earth Hold's Rebuke is a per encounter standard action attack which allows a healing surge.

Rejuvenating Strike is a per encounter standard action attack which allows a healing surge.

These are worthless?

It is really not roll bleed over at all. Any 4e PC has Second Wind already. Most of the powers you can use which provide some form of healing are considerably WORSE than Second Wind. I hardly think this is stepping on the toes of the leader.

Believe that if you want. The ones I listed above don't require Standard Actions unless they also get an attack.

It's not as potent of healing as a Leader, but it's still healing. It's still role bleed over.

No matter how you cut it, most 1E through 3.5 PCs couldn't heal themselves and having the ability to heal yourself is always a useful thing, and with most of the non-leader healing powers, stronger than Second Wind.

And yet all the literature, myth, and other types of fiction from which D&D principally draws is rife with 'martial' heroes doing exactly these things. I find it to be entirely appropriate and 4e is vastly better at portraying these things than other editions have been (in 3.x there were options, but the costs were high or they required rather elaborate class poaching etc). I'm sorry, but your notion of some kind of divide between different types of 'magical' and 'non-magical' heroes simply doesn't hold up against the source material, nor do most players IME wish to be permanently consigned to "I hit it harder" just because they want to use a sword.

Examples? And please don't use Sorcerer Kings or demi-deities like Elric. That's magic.

What supernatural things did Conan or Fafhrd or Kull or the Three Musketeers do on their own? Yes, they had a ton of stamina. But isn't that why the martial PCs tend to get more hit points? That's not a reason for healing powers.

And, I didn't say anything about players being consigned to hitting harder. That's your spin on what I said.

I'm merely opposed to non-Leaders getting a lot of healing powers and martial PCs getting powers that are "supernatural non-martial-like" like teleport or darkvision or even Come and Get It.

First of all, there's no hard and fast limitation of 4 encounters per day. This is entirely within the control of the DM. You want more encounters? Make them a bit weaker. You want restoration of daily resources, there are all kinds of options. DMG2 most certainly talks about possibilities like a 'fountain of healing' or whatnot. Artifacts are a totally blank slate, you can do ANYTHING with them. Make one up! What is WRONG with people these days that they can't simply drop what they want into their game? These things aren't covered in the PLAYER CHARACTER rules because they are simply not things that the players are supposed to be building around. They CAN get them, but that acquisition is strictly in the purview of the DM, where it really should be.

I'm a player in my main game. I don't get to add Fountains to the DM's world.

What is WRONG with people these days that they can't simply understand that some players don't want to go into a large dungeon and be forced to take an extended rest after 20 minutes?

Sorry, but your way of playing (x encounters per day where x is typically < 7) isn't the only desired way and if someone disagrees with you, that's ok and there is nothing wrong with that person. It's ok to want to go into a dungeon and have a dozen encounters without resting for the day.

Exactly, it doesn't happen often in 4e BY DESIGN because they actually looked at the rules and the sources for the game and said "gosh, this doesn't fit in well with the genre" and reduced its importance in the game.

Horse hockey.

Just because the design of the game came out a certain way doesn't mean that other ideas do not fit within the genre. It means that the designers came up with their own idea of the game. It's not the only possible good design.

Until the PC exhausts his reserves, yes. Honestly, go back to the source material again. It is REPLETE with heroes getting back up and going on with nothing but grit.

Replete? Examples? You seem to make a lot of claims without good examples. That's called generalizing or even stereotyping.

Except of course that hit points are abstract, so that is a rather dubious interpretation to start with. Secondly I see wounded heroes going on with nary a wince all over the place. Bruce Willis and Jackie Chan run around with bandages in practically every movie either of them ever made. Slap a bandage on it when you get a chance and off you go, good as new.

I'm playing D&D. Not watching a non-fantasy action film. Not the same genre IMO. In fact, I have a bit of an issue with every genre and it's brother being shoe horned into D&D.

Yeah, we'll never agree. The last thing on earth I want to see is the return to the days where if you picked up a sword you were instantly turned into a second-rate lackey. 4e is far more true to its source material and fantasy tradition IMHO than any previous edition. I think they did a rather brilliant job of this actually. It is a magical fantasy world, magic is part of everything, and the personal 'magic' of the bad-assed sword wielding warrior is a welcome and LONG overdue addition to the game.

Yes. And magic is no longer special when every PC can heal themselves and do a lot of supernatural things. It's mundane. It's pedestrian, ordinary, natural. It becomes the main laws of physics intead of "MAGIC". This is my main issue with Eberron. Magic becomes mundane there.

I don't have a problem with martial PCs doing extra-ordinary things with their bodies. Jump far. Dodge attacks. Flip over a foe and land in the square behind him. It's a bit much when they become Wuxia experts, but even that's acceptable to some level.

I mind when they can affect foes at range with things like Come and Get It (straight out of video games and nowhere near any original source material, pulling mobs to get aggro). Taunting or mind affecting or telekinesis or whatever you want to call it.

All I can really say is some 5e retro game where we have to go back to the old days because hey Gygax didn't do it the 4e way is NOT something I'd touch with a 10' pole.

Except that I didn't talk about that. Again, your spin on the direction I am going in with this.

 

[mneme]

As a non-fan of Warlords ( "GET UP!!! I don't care if you are unconscious." ) and a non-fan of Battleragers ( "I'm invincible!" ), I really dislike the martial power source being used for things like Teleports, Healing (or temporary hit points which is quasi-healing), Invisibility, Flight, etc.

Er, say what?

Healing--sure, 4e defined healing such that everyone got to play; quite deliberately. And temp hp are the same category, except that they can make even more sense for martial powers.

But there is -one- purely martial power that lets someone teleport -- Mountebank's Flight, a 22nd level utility (and one that plays into the Rogue's theme, and is conditional on someone teleporting). There are two Eladrin/Martial PPs that let them teleport -- but for Eladrin, teleporting -is- martial. And some fighter/Eladrin powers that let them teleport, but see last sentence. And...that's it.

Invisiblity? Flight? Ok, you've got me on invisible, as Hoard Raider's e12 definitely shouldn't make you invisible; that's just silly. Of course, 3e rogues could become invisible too (Hide in Plain Sight), so maybe not so much.

OTOH, I see all of two "martial" powers that grant flight, and both are really racial (Teifling and Dragonborn) powers--and ones that require spending your PP on a quasi-racial PP! So, um, no.

 

[triqui]

What is WRONG with people these days that they can't simply understand that some players don't want to go into a large dungeon and be forced to take an extended rest after 20 minutes?

Sorry, but your way of playing (x encounters per day where x is typically < 7) isn't the only desired way and if someone disagrees with you, that's ok and there is nothing wrong with that person. It's ok to want to go into a dungeon and have a dozen encounters without resting for the day.

Those two bolded sentences explain why everybody has access to healing (mostly self-healing, but also healing others). Some players want to be able to go into a large dungeon and do several encounters in a row. No "way of playing" should be "bad-wrong-fun". And some people like "conan-style" adventures (or LotR for that matter), where there is no magic, or no "divine magic".

No single power source, role, or class should be a "must have". Groups shouldn't be shoehorned to "let's roll who is the healbot this time". If nobody want's to be a cleric, or nobody wants to be a leader of any kind, they shouldn't be forced to. If a group wants to play a "martial only" (or arcane only, or divine only) campaign, they should be able to. No player, DM or group should be forced by the rules to play a character they don´t like just becouse it's implicitly required by the rules

AND those players and groups should be able to play the game just fine. Including doing more than one encounter in a row.

EDIT: on the other hand, I really agree with you with the healing surges/dailies being refreshed "each game day" instead of "game sessions", or "plot milestones" is a game design flaw. It's an issue for lots of groups that dont play the standard "X encounters per day", whatever "x" is the design goal. It's for your group, that don't want to go back to sleep before the 5th encounter in the dungeon, and it's for my group, as we often only have 1 combat per session (and thus dailies become broken, becouse they are effectively just souped up encounters). Game resources (like powers and healing surges) should be independent of in-game time. They should be related to encounters, plots, and levels. Since Halo, most videogames had already made the transition to "per encounter" resources. Dragon Age videogame has a good starting point for it imo. That would make groups able to play as many encounters per day as they find fun (from my group 1 to some other people 8 or 10 in a row).

 

[KarinsDad]

Of course, 3e rogues could become invisible too (Hide in Plain Sight), so maybe not so much.

I didn't like it for 3E either. In fact, two of the most annoying campaigns we played in was when we had a Rogue with Hide in Plain Sight. It just felt off when a PC is so immune to something (in HiPS case, vision which is critically important).

I do have to say "good riddance" to that in 4E.

 

[KarinsDad]

Those two bolded sentences explain why everybody has access to healing (mostly self-healing, but also healing others). Some players want to be able to go into a large dungeon and do several encounters in a row. No "way of playing" should be "bad-wrong-fun". And some people like "conan-style" adventures (or LotR for that matter), where there is no magic, or no "divine magic".

No single power source, role, or class should be a "must have". Groups shouldn't be shoehorned to "let's roll who is the healbot this time". If nobody want's to be a cleric, or nobody wants to be a leader of any kind, they shouldn't be forced to. If a group wants to play a "martial only" (or arcane only, or divine only) campaign, they should be able to. No player, DM or group should be forced by the rules to play a character they don´t like just becouse it's implicitly required by the rules

AND those players and groups should be able to play the game just fine. Including doing more than one encounter in a row.

EDIT: on the other hand, I really agree with you with the healing surges/dailies being refreshed "each game day" instead of "game sessions", or "plot milestones". It's an issue for lots of groups that dont play the standard "X encounters per day". It's for your group, that don't want to go back to sleep before the 5th encounter in the dungeon, and it's for my group, as we often only have 1 combat per session (and thus dailies become broken, becouse they are effectively just souped up encounters). Game resources (like powers and healing surges) should be independent of in-game time. They should be related to encounters, plots, and levels.

I agree with everything that you wrote here.

But, it's the fact that Healing Potions are so lame that really forces groups to have a Leader in them since most of the non-Leader healing powers don't start until level 7 or higher. Allowing non-Leaders to have healing powers doesn't really address the issue of playing with any group makeup that you bring up because it does show up so late in the game.

The game as designed is the issue, not the bleed over of healing. The game is designed to almost require a Leader in it. If the team doesn't have one, the DM really has to ratchet down his encounters (or hide his rolls and fudge) or they'll eventually walk into a TPK via strong DM dice rolls, and lousy player dice rolls. Leaders are the great "swinginess of encounters" equalizer.

This deficiency could be handled if there were a way to make Healing Potions stronger (e.g. the lowest level ones do a healing surge worth of healing instead of just 10 hit points, but only one healing potion could be used per PC per encounter).

I personally don't like the "wounds don't exist" rational for the concept of Warlords or Battleragers, but that's ok. I don't have to play them or allow them in any groups that I run.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I agree with everything that you wrote here.

But, it's the fact that Healing Potions are so lame that really forces groups to have a Leader in them since most of the non-Leader healing powers don't start until level 7 or higher. Allowing non-Leaders to have healing powers doesn't really address the issue of playing with any group makeup that you bring up because it does show up so late in the game.

The game as designed is the issue, not the bleed over of healing. The game is designed to almost require a Leader in it. If the team doesn't have one, the DM really has to ratchet down his encounters (or hide his rolls and fudge) or they'll eventually walk into a TPK via strong DM dice rolls, and lousy player dice rolls. Leaders are the great "swinginess of encounters" equalizer.

This deficiency could be handled if there were a way to make Healing Potions stronger (e.g. the lowest level ones do a healing surge worth of healing instead of just 10 hit points, but only one healing potion could be used per PC per encounter).

I personally don't like the "wounds don't exist" rational for the concept of Warlords or Battleragers, but that's ok. I don't have to play them or allow them in any groups that I run.

So, what you're really saying is that a group DOES need a leader to provide healing, so in actual practice there's little or no issue.

I think as far as encounters per day goes there is ALWAYS some limit. Unless you want to eliminate all daily resources entirely from the game there will be SOME point at which the characters have expended critical resources and need to recover them in some way. This has been an element of every version of D&D, a significant element. 4e was designed around making that break point be at about 5 encounters. A DM can tweak that. The 5 encounter set point is created by having encounters typically be a specific difficulty, the amount of resources granted at the start of the day to the characters, etc. Any of those 'knobs' can be dialed up or down somewhat to reach a different set point. That point can be somewhat different in different adventures, or the DM could pretty much consistently set it higher or lower overall. The point is that there will be SOME point where the party needs to rest.

Given the rather inescapable logic of all this I just can't understand how the way 4e organizes things matters from a game design perspective. Any hypothetical 5e that anyone designs is going to have the same issue to face. There will always be some sequence of potential encounters out there that any given party cannot take in a single sitting. If the DM wants a particular area to be run through without a long rest, then the DM will ALWAYS have to design that part of the adventure such that the desired pacing is achievable. This was as true in OD&D in 1974 as it is in 4e D&D right now today and would be in 5e D&D someday.

 

[KarinsDad]

So, what you're really saying is that a group DOES need a leader to provide healing, so in actual practice there's little or no issue.

That's true for 4E. It wasn't necessarily as true for 3.5 and earlier. Items could take the place of Leaders in those versions of the game.

I think as far as encounters per day goes there is ALWAYS some limit. Unless you want to eliminate all daily resources entirely from the game there will be SOME point at which the characters have expended critical resources and need to recover them in some way. This has been an element of every version of D&D, a significant element.

Yes, I agree. There is always a maximum limit. But, that limit increased as one went up in levels in earlier versions, it didn't stay the same (which I consider one of 4E's warts). In earlier versions, when my PC was traveling the planes, I wasn't forced to hole up in them as often (or necessarily at all).

Especially in 3E and 3.5 with Prestige Classes, it was pretty easy to save resources. The healer types could have Wand of Cure X Wounds and the spell slingers, especially Wizards, could have charged items as well.

Heck, I just played a Pathfinder game last fall where I ran a Mystic Theurge who had zero charged items, but never once ran out of spells. And we had some lengthier days (8 or 9 encounters on multiple days).

The 4E concept of "ohh, it's bad wrong fun" to play a game with Wands of Cure Light Wounds, so we will get rid of the concept is erroneous.

It was a ton of fun to play in 3.5 and earlier versions of the game with those. They freed up the Clerics and Druids to branch out more. Now, the number one thing I see in 4E is pacifist clerics and/or clerics taking powers like Healer's Mercy because nobody wants to use up a Standard for Second Wind or use up a Healing Surge for a Potion of Healing. I see it over and over again, it doesn't matter which Leader class.

There is almost an expectation that the Leader will handle almost all of the healing, so the other players don't have to worry about it (as per crappy potions and as per your comments that the non-Leader healing sucks). It's endemic in our 4E gaming community culture.

I do see some slight effort by players to throw around some temporary hit points and/or debuff foes a bit, but that doesn't really make up for true healing. If the foe is at -2 to hit, a 16 on the die is typically still going to hit.

4e was designed around making that break point be at about 5 encounters. A DM can tweak that. The 5 encounter set point is created by having encounters typically be a specific difficulty, the amount of resources granted at the start of the day to the characters, etc. Any of those 'knobs' can be dialed up or down somewhat to reach a different set point. That point can be somewhat different in different adventures, or the DM could pretty much consistently set it higher or lower overall. The point is that there will be SOME point where the party needs to rest.

Sure there will be a point where PCs have to rest. You and I do not disagree on that.

But the difference is that the players have little input in the process now.

The players can no longer really decide to save resources and spend their gold on healing items in order have 15 encounters in a day. Buying an item in 4E for +1 item bonus to a healing surge is pretty darn weak.

Now, only the DM can set up the game for 15 encounters and in order to do it, he has to bend over backwards to dial down the encounters and/or have ways to renew resources.

As a player, I like the option to decide the destiny of my own PC. Part of that is the option to decide to craft/purchase 10 items and stuff them in my bag of holding so that I am always prepared for any scenario, including a large dungeon with many encounters in it.

Given the rather inescapable logic of all this I just can't understand how the way 4e organizes things matters from a game design perspective. Any hypothetical 5e that anyone designs is going to have the same issue to face. There will always be some sequence of potential encounters out there that any given party cannot take in a single sitting. If the DM wants a particular area to be run through without a long rest, then the DM will ALWAYS have to design that part of the adventure such that the desired pacing is achievable. This was as true in OD&D in 1974 as it is in 4e D&D right now today and would be in 5e D&D someday.

Except that this was not as true for earlier versions of the game. One of the elements of the game that I greatly enjoyed as a player was that I could prepare ahead of time with "go to the well" options. I could craft scrolls, and wands, and potions that allowed me as a player to shore up our resources as needed.

4E does not have this (it has potions, but they are pretty lame) and I consider it to be a game design weakness.

Instead of making the consumable items so weak for the vast majority of levels that they are hardly ever used in the game, they needed to design them to have good utility at the levels for which they are crafted and weaker utility as the PCs advance in level in order to balance out their cost vs. utility.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

That's true for 4E. It wasn't necessarily as true for 3.5 and earlier. Items could take the place of Leaders in those versions of the game.

Unless, of course, you needed in-combat healing. The CLW wand isn't going to help in-combat past about 5th level or so. It also imposes its own version of the short rest as you use up charges, each d8+1 taking a round.

You could get potions of up to Cure Serious Wounds, IIRC, but that's 3d8+5, which is on average 18 points. And remember that you can roll low, too. It might be best to make the potion at full caster level, since that's the only serious in-combat healing you're going to get, though that also triples the price, and found potions come in at minimal caster level unless otherwise specified.

If you want something with more oomph in a potion, you have to find a Master Alchemist from Magic of Faerun, which may not even be allowed, or if it is, requires a PC to take it just to keep you in potions of Cure Critical Wounds and Heal, since the DM doesn't necessarily need to have an NPC available for this.

Scrolls require that either the spell be on your spell list, or that you have Use Magic Device, so they're only open to characters who're built to use them.


Personally, I didn't really like the "healer in a stick" mentality of 3rd edition. I do like the current 4e paradigm, where you have some limited self-healing available, and much more healing from a leader-type, who's actually having fun by beating things over the head with a hammer and healing at the same time.

Now, if you wanted to seriously have 15 encounters in a row* in 4e, and wanted to have healing in a can, what I'd propose is making a surgeless version of the healing potions available...but at significantly higher item level than the surge-requiring versions. Like, have the item level match the next highest surge-requiring potion. So, the cordial of healing is 15th level, and the cordial of vitality is 25th level. This is so you can have the cheaper stuff still use your surges, but if you want to preserve those, you can buy or use the expensive stuff.

* - Which wasn't going to happen in 3e because your resources aren't just healing-limited. Primary casters will run out of useful spells, barbarians will run out of rages, and so on. I suppose if you re-defined "encounter" to be "something that goes down with the slightest amount of effort," it could work. But you certainly aren't going to get 15 encounters' worth of full-on fights in a day.

Brad

 

[Reigan]

Don't forget to replace the fighter with a bag of holding and the rogue with a wand of knock while your at it.

Let us all bow down before the mighty god-wizard.

 

[KarinsDad]

Unless, of course, you needed in-combat healing.

Agreed.

In combat healing was definitely the purview of the Leader spell casters since activating non-use activated items like drinking a potion or reading a scroll required a Standard Action (and few non-Leader players were willing to do that often).

The main difference in 4E is that a party of non-Leaders is probably limited to 3 or 4 encounters per day max whereas in 3.5, that could be extended with more serious out of combat wand healing (the party still needed someone who could activate the wand). It did use up wands at a fairly high rate though.

To me, the 3E wand healing and charged item usage was not an everyday thing due to expense. It was a "go to the well" type thing where the players could decide to continue on, even when low on other spell resources. I miss the ability to "go to the well". The most go to the well that I have in 4E is to swap out my high level boots with a Daily item power with my old low level boots with a Daily item power.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Except that this was not as true for earlier versions of the game. One of the elements of the game that I greatly enjoyed as a player was that I could prepare ahead of time with "go to the well" options. I could craft scrolls, and wands, and potions that allowed me as a player to shore up our resources as needed.

Hmmm, isn't this just saying there was an optimum way to play 3.5? (I'd say 'earlier editions', but even potion/scroll construction in AD&D was prohibitively expensive and time-consuming, and only available at moderately higher levels, wands of CLW didn't exist in AD&D). I mean unless there was some meaningful trade-off this was just an example of the players understanding the optimum way to play, and the DM would have to account for that, etc. I don't think you really CAN put that kind of control in the hands of the players because 'being tougher' will always be more optimum and the DM will always have to account for it in his planning.

4E does not have this (it has potions, but they are pretty lame) and I consider it to be a game design weakness.

Instead of making the consumable items so weak for the vast majority of levels that they are hardly ever used in the game, they needed to design them to have good utility at the levels for which they are crafted and weaker utility as the PCs advance in level in order to balance out their cost vs. utility.

Which actually WAS what the 4e devs aimed for with the Healing Potion. It is a level 4 item (so shows up at basically level 1 and up). It heals 10 hit points for a surge, which is better than the surge value of ANY level 1 PC, and better than the surge value of the lower hit point PCs even up into higher heroic. Its utility naturally gets weaker as the PCs surge values exceed 10. The only flaw I see in the design of 4e healing potions is that they only exist at 3 tiers, thus many of the higher hit point PCs run into blocks of levels where the next tier potion is not available yet, but the previous tier one is almost useless. This could easily be fixed by simply having a potion with an arbitrary level and heals something like 2 hp/potion level (that would I think work OK, 10 HP at level 5, 30 at level 15, 50 at level 25, so a level 10 version doing 20 HP healing is good).

I think that would fix healing potions in the way you'd like. A character can spend a reasonable amount of money on level appropriate potions at any level if they want. A party lacking a leader can then achieve decent healing. Drop them a few over-level potions and they have a way to really ramp up in a tight situation too. Personally I think leader healing is more thematic and lack of potion options doesn't really bother me that much.

As for other non-healing potions, there are some which are actually exceedingly effective. There are others that are meh. Same with ammo, whetstones, etc.

 

[KarinsDad]

Hmmm, isn't this just saying there was an optimum way to play 3.5? (I'd say 'earlier editions', but even potion/scroll construction in AD&D was prohibitively expensive and time-consuming, and only available at moderately higher levels, wands of CLW didn't exist in AD&D). I mean unless there was some meaningful trade-off this was just an example of the players understanding the optimum way to play, and the DM would have to account for that, etc. I don't think you really CAN put that kind of control in the hands of the players because 'being tougher' will always be more optimum and the DM will always have to account for it in his planning.

It's not just a way to find an optimum way to play the game. In fact, that's not the primary motivating factor.

It's a way for the player to decide how to spend his gold. Some players in 3.5 will buy the nastiest weapon around. Another player such as myself will have a Scroll of Knock and a Potion of Water Breathing so that I don't get trapped in a situation.

It's about choice. And for many players, choice = fun. Lack of choice, still can be fun, but not as much.

As a player, I want more than the 5 options that 4E gives me at a low level and 20+ options that 4E gives me at the highest levels. Why? Because the vast majority of those options are "attack foe, do damage".

I want other combat options, many of which were stripped out of 4E as miscellaneous spells got made into rituals. Tensor's Floating Disk to carry the unconscious Rogue out of combat (which I have done on numerous occasions in 3.5 and earlier).

The real down side of 4E is that many of the miscellaneous options such as using spells for non-combat stuff in combat and using charged items mostly went out the window.

It would be great if 5E brought them back in. They don't have to be identical in mechanics to 3.5 and earlier, it would be just great to have the options. Those options could also have a balance cost associated with them.

For example, a spell to cast a 10 minute or fewer casting time lower than the spell level ritual (the vast majority of rituals that are relatively non-potent) that you know as a standard action in combat.

Players are somewhat limited in their combat options in 4E. It's mostly, use a power. The designers went overboard in their attempt to simplify the game, throwing the baby out with the bath water.

Which actually WAS what the 4e devs aimed for with the Healing Potion. It is a level 4 item (so shows up at basically level 1 and up). It heals 10 hit points for a surge, which is better than the surge value of ANY level 1 PC,

1st level Warden with CON 18 plus Toughness = 40 hit points. Not quite any 1st level PC.

and better than the surge value of the lower hit point PCs even up into higher heroic.

True. It takes a wimpy hit point PC level 7 to get to 44 hit points (level 8 with a starting Con of 8 or 9), but most PCs get there by level 4 or 5 at the latest. Course, most healing potions should be used by PCs that get more bang for the buck, so level 5 Potions of Healing start losing their luster around level 4 to 6 or so. The 5th level Wizard might still like a Potion of Healing, but the 5th level Fighter could more or less care less.

Just yesterday, we had an encounter where the minions were doing 12 points of damage (the PCs were 5th level). Minions. A Potion of Healing is pretty lame compared to that.

As written, a Potion of Healing doesn't really serve it's purpose of helping the PC for a few rounds. It's lucky to help out for half of a round. The real sad thing about it is that it helps out some classes more than others due to it's fixed value nature.

Its utility naturally gets weaker as the PCs surge values exceed 10. The only flaw I see in the design of 4e healing potions is that they only exist at 3 tiers, thus many of the higher hit point PCs run into blocks of levels where the next tier potion is not available yet, but the previous tier one is almost useless. This could easily be fixed by simply having a potion with an arbitrary level and heals something like 2 hp/potion level (that would I think work OK, 10 HP at level 5, 30 at level 15, 50 at level 25, so a level 10 version doing 20 HP healing is good).

I think that would fix healing potions in the way you'd like.

We already have too many flavors of each type of item as is. To me, the flaw in 4E healing potions is not the number of different ones, it's that they heal a fixed amount.

I think the way to fix healing potions is:

1) Limit their use to once per encounter per PC (it doesn't matter the type of potion, the magic doesn't work frequently enough to suck down more than one per encounter). Note: this is more of a balance rule that some DMs might not find necessary, but I think it is a good rule for when the DM is planning only one to three encounters for a given day and healing surges aren't at a premium.

2) Change them to Potion of Healing = 1 healing surge heals 25%, Potion of Vitality as currently written except it heals 35%, Potion of Recovery as currently written except it heals 50%.

Note: I've liked this type of healing concept for decades now and often introduced it into some of my 3.5 and earlier campaigns. It doesn't matter if one is a King or a pauper. The healing of the potion (or a spell for that matter) is the same. All versions of 4E healing that require a healing surge should work this way. It should be percentage based.


Sure, high level PCs could carry around a hundred Potions of Healing in their bag of holdings at high level and suck one down every encounter, but it still uses up a healing surge. It still has that cost, even if the monetary one is negligible. Is 25% of hit points really worth that when the party Leader can typically heal 50% for a single healing surge (often out of combat)?

Even the Potions of Vitality would eventually start to cut into the party funds and players would have to decide whether to use the cheap Potion of Healing, the moderately priced Potion of Vitality, the pretty expensive Potion of Recovery, or none at all.

And of course, with healing potions working like this, it would incentivize monsters to have them as well. This opens up a lot of good combat possibilities when a (typically humanoid) monster is able to heal itself reasonably mid-encounter (hence, another reason for the once per encounter limitation since Paragon and higher creatures get more than one healing surge). A slightly challenging encounter just became more challenging. Plus, it creates stronger reasons for healing potions to be found in monster lairs.

Course, this healing is all peanuts compared to powers like Cloak of Courage anyway at high Paragon and Epic. But at least this type of modification to Healing Potions would make them a viable option again.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It's not just a way to find an optimum way to play the game. In fact, that's not the primary motivating factor.

It's a way for the player to decide how to spend his gold. Some players in 3.5 will buy the nastiest weapon around. Another player such as myself will have a Scroll of Knock and a Potion of Water Breathing so that I don't get trapped in a situation.

It's about choice. And for many players, choice = fun. Lack of choice, still can be fun, but not as much.

As a player, I want more than the 5 options that 4E gives me at a low level and 20+ options that 4E gives me at the highest levels. Why? Because the vast majority of those options are "attack foe, do damage".

I want other combat options, many of which were stripped out of 4E as miscellaneous spells got made into rituals. Tensor's Floating Disk to carry the unconscious Rogue out of combat (which I have done on numerous occasions in 3.5 and earlier).

The real down side of 4E is that many of the miscellaneous options such as using spells for non-combat stuff in combat and using charged items mostly went out the window.

It would be great if 5E brought them back in. They don't have to be identical in mechanics to 3.5 and earlier, it would be just great to have the options. Those options could also have a balance cost associated with them.

For example, a spell to cast a 10 minute or fewer casting time lower than the spell level ritual (the vast majority of rituals that are relatively non-potent) that you know as a standard action in combat.

Players are somewhat limited in their combat options in 4E. It's mostly, use a power. The designers went overboard in their attempt to simplify the game, throwing the baby out with the bath water.

Just yesterday, we had an encounter where the minions were doing 12 points of damage (the PCs were 5th level). Minions. A Potion of Healing is pretty lame compared to that.

So, you have level 5 PCs facing level 16+ minions (that is level 16 BRUTE minions, non-brutes should do 12 damage around level 21)? Can't help you there, but I'd observe that the game is calibrated to certain assumptions. If you run it that far outside those values then sure, things will get odd...

As written, a Potion of Healing doesn't really serve it's purpose of helping the PC for a few rounds. It's lucky to help out for half of a round. The real sad thing about it is that it helps out some classes more than others due to it's fixed value nature.

Well, given that your average garden variety party probably has a total of 3 or 4 heals, max, plus Second Winds I suspect that in general they're enjoying more than a half round of benefit per surge that is actually used. Yup, they're slightly more useful for some classes. The whole POINT is they are a backup option that you are wise to have access to but will want to try not to rely on very much.

We already have too many flavors of each type of item as is. To me, the flaw in 4E healing potions is not the number of different ones, it's that they heal a fixed amount.

I think the way to fix healing potions is:

1) Limit their use to once per encounter per PC (it doesn't matter the type of potion, the magic doesn't work frequently enough to suck down more than one per encounter). Note: this is more of a balance rule that some DMs might not find necessary, but I think it is a good rule for when the DM is planning only one to three encounters for a given day and healing surges aren't at a premium.

2) Change them to Potion of Healing = 1 healing surge heals 25%, Potion of Vitality as currently written except it heals 35%, Potion of Recovery as currently written except it heals 50%.

Note: I've liked this type of healing concept for decades now and often introduced it into some of my 3.5 and earlier campaigns. It doesn't matter if one is a King or a pauper. The healing of the potion (or a spell for that matter) is the same. All versions of 4E healing that require a healing surge should work this way. It should be percentage based.


Sure, high level PCs could carry around a hundred Potions of Healing in their bag of holdings at high level and suck one down every encounter, but it still uses up a healing surge. It still has that cost, even if the monetary one is negligible. Is 25% of hit points really worth that when the party Leader can typically heal 50% for a single healing surge (often out of combat)?

Even the Potions of Vitality would eventually start to cut into the party funds and players would have to decide whether to use the cheap Potion of Healing, the moderately priced Potion of Vitality, the pretty expensive Potion of Recovery, or none at all.

And of course, with healing potions working like this, it would incentivize monsters to have them as well. This opens up a lot of good combat possibilities when a (typically humanoid) monster is able to heal itself reasonably mid-encounter (hence, another reason for the once per encounter limitation since Paragon and higher creatures get more than one healing surge). A slightly challenging encounter just became more challenging. Plus, it creates stronger reasons for healing potions to be found in monster lairs.

Course, this healing is all peanuts compared to powers like Cloak of Courage anyway at high Paragon and Epic. But at least this type of modification to Healing Potions would make them a viable option again.

Yeah, well, I have no desire for more book keeping. I suggested a mechanism which works and is simple to implement and deals with the most salient issue. You don't like it. OK. Fair enough, but the underlying point was that the 4e healing potion actually achieved its basic design goal, to provide players with an option to access extra healing in an emergency.

As for other potions I think you're writing them off far too easily. Many of them are QUITE useful. As I see it, and I've said this before, many of them COULD be made more useful as long as they're listed as uncommon items, or they could have somewhat reduced costs (like healing surges). I'd venture to say that you could make a healing potion along the lines you suggest as an uncommon as well. I wouldn't personally want it to be craftable in bulk.

Why is it that magic is the only thing that provides options in combat such that you have to have insta-cast rituals to make things interesting? I don't get it. Players are clever, they can come up with all kinds of ways to do things already. They DO find all kinds of ways to use rituals already (for that matter as anything but a very low level wizard there's no reason not to have a Tenser's Disc going all day every day).

 

[pemerton]

In the 4e designer blogs, the designers talked about how cool it was in B2 that creatures in the caves would flow out of one area and into the encounter where the PCs were at (but only when it was appropriate). Being able to do so is one of the promises of 4e that the Delve works against.

In the Delve you have two discrete encounter locations, each of which tell you where everyone is starting. If you flow one encounter into another, not only do you upset the careful balance, but you need to flip between two-page spreads. And, of course, the next encounter area is empty.

Doing this frequently in a setting that had been fluid (like B2 as originally written) and you end up with a lot of wasted design work. You also end up with a lot of page-flipping. You end up strongly encouraged, IMHO and AFAICT, to simply not do it.

I agree with this. It's why, when I ran the Well of Demons from H2 Thunderspire Labyrinth, I redrew the maps for the first bunch of encounters (all the gnoll stuff, before you get to the various rooms where demons guard the magical items needed to unlock the door to the ritual) and bundled all the monster stats together, so I could run a dynamic encounter with circular paths and the like (as per the advice in DMG2 that H2, as written disregards).

A brief description of how it went is on this old post.

 

[pemerton]

Healing potions

The party in my game has 5 PCs:

A polearm melee-controller fighter multi-class cleric - a dwarf with a cloak of the walking wounded and a Defensive weapon, and who also has Comeback Strike.

A tiefling charisma paladin.

A drow chaos sorcerer.

A human wizard multi-class invoker.

An elf hybrid ranger-cleric mulit-class paladin (for Religion skill and the LoH variant that removes a condition).

Needless to say, this party uses healing potions from time to time - the dwarf fighter would be the only exception - as they quite frequently run out of in-combat healing powers. They've never bought or made a potion - they've all been received as treasure - so the question of monetary value has not come up on the player side of the issue.

As for second wind - the dwarf uses it every encounter, obviously, and in recent session I can remember the paladin and the wizard both using it. The ranger-cleric uses it only rarely (not being in melee, he tends to take less damage). Likewise for the sorcerer.

If the party had a warlord or melee cleric in place of the paladin their healing would be noticeably improved and perhaps they probably woulnd't need the potions or non-dwarven second winds - although they would be taking more damage (the paladin has the best overall defences in the party) and would notice the reduced defence, I think, despite the dwarven fighter's capacity to do a lot of defending.

Bottom line: at least in my game, the 4e healing rules haven't produced any mechanical isssues. And I at least have no flavour issues with them - martial healing seems to me no harder to work with than hit points themselves.

 

[triqui]

I agree with everything that you wrote here.

But, it's the fact that Healing Potions are so lame that really forces groups to have a Leader in them since most of the non-Leader healing powers don't start until level 7 or higher. Allowing non-Leaders to have healing powers doesn't really address the issue of playing with any group makeup that you bring up because it does show up so late in the game.

The game as designed is the issue, not the bleed over of healing. The game is designed to almost require a Leader in it. If the team doesn't have one, the DM really has to ratchet down his encounters (or hide his rolls and fudge) or they'll eventually walk into a TPK via strong DM dice rolls, and lousy player dice rolls. Leaders are the great "swinginess of encounters" equalizer.

While this is true, my point was that giving second wind, and "comeback strikes" to everyclass, so players can rely, if they want, in self-healing was an attempt to avoid leaders (and, specifically, clerics) as "needed". I agree with you, though, that they probably failed at the task.

This deficiency could be handled if there were a way to make Healing Potions stronger (e.g. the lowest level ones do a healing surge worth of healing instead of just 10 hit points, but only one healing potion could be used per PC per encounter).

Fully agree. It's an easy solution, actually, and the 1/encounter limit avoid it to become a potion fest. I imagine they didn't went that route becouse potions would then scale with level (ie: lowest potion will heal much more at epic levels), while the cost of the potion do not (so, while significant at lvl 3-4, it's absolutelly trivial at 15-20+). That's why they went with 10hp (which is roughly a healing surge at those levels). The problem is that they should have made more versions (like a potion that heals 15, 20, 25 or so every few levels)

 

[KarinsDad]

Fully agree. It's an easy solution, actually, and the 1/encounter limit avoid it to become a potion fest. I imagine they didn't went that route becouse potions would then scale with level (ie: lowest potion will heal much more at epic levels), while the cost of the potion do not (so, while significant at lvl 3-4, it's absolutelly trivial at 15-20+). That's why they went with 10hp (which is roughly a healing surge at those levels). The problem is that they should have made more versions (like a potion that heals 15, 20, 25 or so every few levels)

The only time it would matter that a healing potion would scale with level is when the DM is only planning on one or two encounters in a given day AND the players know that. In that scenario, who cares if the Wizard chugs down a 50 GP healing potion to gain 25% of his hit points mid-combat? He has a ton of healing surges.

Course, it doesn't really change anything. By the time PCs are Paragon or Epic, who really cares if the Leader healed the Wizard mid-combat (even possibly with surgeless healing) or the Wizard gained a healing surge with a cheap potion? There are so many powerful options for all PCs at that point that this is less than a speed bump in regard to balance.

But, chugging down a 50 GP healing potion to gain 25% of your hit points when the players have no idea if there will be one encounter or seven encounters in a day (one would assume that this is the vast majority of adventuring days) is a lot more risky.

The Wizard has 6 to 9 healing surges. Using up one of them for a mere 25% of your hit points when the Cleric can heal close to 50% of your hit points out of combat (also for the mere cost of a healing surge) seems a bit wasteful.

When the game first came out, sure. It might have been an issue. But with the vast plethora of healing that came out of the splat books, it's really no longer a balance issue at all. Who would often use a Potion of Healing beyond say level 8 or so except to get an unconscious PC conscious?

Anymore, the only time I see healing potions used is if a fellow PC is unconscious. I never see a player suck one down mid-fight to just stabilize himself so that the Leader doesn't have to do anything for him. I'm sure it happens in some people's games, but the way the potions are written now, it's not worth the effort beyond say level 5 or so for most PCs/players because the healing surge loss is not worth the hit point gain.

With percentage potions, it would be worth it sometimes.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Potions are ok. Playing leaderless is ok too. You just have to use lower level monsters... (ok, seems like my universal soultion) or less monsters. They go down faster, and hit a little bit less hard. Or you face less, so an alpha strike could have a great effekt. I guess with new damage expressions, leaderless parties are indeed harder to play, because combats are over very fast or you get into troubles.

But on the other hand, imagine an all assassin party... from level 3 and up, most combats will take 1 round...

 

[TwoSix]

But the difference is that the players have little input in the process now.

The players can no longer really decide to save resources and spend their gold on healing items in order have 15 encounters in a day. Buying an item in 4E for +1 item bonus to a healing surge is pretty darn weak.

Now, only the DM can set up the game for 15 encounters and in order to do it, he has to bend over backwards to dial down the encounters and/or have ways to renew resources.

As a player, I like the option to decide the destiny of my own PC. Part of that is the option to decide to craft/purchase 10 items and stuff them in my bag of holding so that I am always prepared for any scenario, including a large dungeon with many encounters in it.

Except that this was not as true for earlier versions of the game. One of the elements of the game that I greatly enjoyed as a player was that I could prepare ahead of time with "go to the well" options. I could craft scrolls, and wands, and potions that allowed me as a player to shore up our resources as needed.

4E does not have this (it has potions, but they are pretty lame) and I consider it to be a game design weakness.

Unfortunately, those things you like are inimical to 4e's design. 4e deliberately scaled back on options for strategic planning and for player empowerment. When available, strategic planning is always the optimal solution. What you call "going to the well" is really just a synonym for optimized playing. It's just common sense to play that way. Who isn't going to buy or make Wands of Lesser Vigor if their DM allows it?

4e wanted to move the power to establish the narrative structure for the game back firmly into the DM's hands. Allowing the players to purchase items that "let them have 15 encounters in a row" is nonsensical in 4e's paradigm. If there's a need for 15 encounters in a row, the players and DM should be collaborating on a way to explain that. Being "prepared for any scenario" is another way of saying that you have the ability to bypass encounters that were meant to be challenging.