NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 7036471" data-attributes="member: 82106">Well, the 'issue' such as it was, was the (often IMHO deliberate) misconstruction of DCs as simply divorced from the fiction entirely such that the same basic wooden door would have a different DC if it was placed in a different level adventure context. Nevermind that DMG1 instantly disabuses this notion! In fact even Pemerton's statements about varying DC by table are only true if you take a certain amount of license with 4e (not a lot, and I totally think its appropriate, but still). If you play by RAW then an a wooden door is DC16 to force, if its barred its DC20, and if its an iron door its DC25. A frost giant is a level 17 Brute with an AC of 29 (MV p124). These are every bit as objectively specified values as they are in any edition of D&D, period. Just as in any other edition, you'd have level 1 PCs find wooden doors in the dungeon level 1, and iron doors in the dungeon level 18. This is all quite clearly spelled out on DMG1 p64, along with a number of other environmental DCs. Further, perusal of the PHB or RC will show you that the skill descriptions spell out exact DCs for a wide range of general situations. Later on it became fashionable, and its good solid application of RPG theory and GMing technique, to consider DCs to be a way to input variation in theme into a game, more on that below.This is where 'variation on theme' comes into play. NW compresses themes that normally fall into paragon tier into the heroic tier in order to achieve a certain style of play and perhaps for other reasons as well. This is NOT SLOPPINESS!!!! This was a deliberate calculated use of the technique [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] discussed! They wanted a more rapid advancement and to avoid additional options and complexities of Paragon tier rules, but they also wanted to address themes that rightly belong in paragon tier under the expected 4e tier structure. So they simply 'compressed' those elements, making them lower in level. This is like taking the iron door and deciding you want it to appear, thematically on level 3 of the dungon, so you give it a DC of 19 instead of 25. Now you can run a 10 level dungeon that has trappings that run the gamut from simple flimsy wooden doors to magically reinforced adamantium portals without needing to engage any of the paragon or epic rules (maybe you don't like those rules, or its just more convenient not to use them in an abbreviated game). Likewise you could level-scale a powerful demon down to being a level 10 solo and make it the ultimate boss monster in this little exercise. You could go further and rescale skill check DCs so that level 10 PCs can make mighty leaps across 200' wide chasms too if you want that element to appear.This is a FEATURE of 4e. Its not one that was, I suspect, really considered when the game was first written, but it clearly occurred to many people, myself, [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION], whomever designed Neverwinter, etc.</blockquote>

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