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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8598457" data-attributes="member: 42582">The generic consequence of a successful combat action declaration in 4e D&amp;D is damage + effect. Both are scaled by level - eg domination is higher level than stun is higher level than daze - and there are internal trade-offs between them - eg a power that does only damage will do more damage than one of the same level and frequency that also pushes, or slows, or dazes. At the limits of these trade-offs are some powers (typically magic ones) that do only effects.Page 42 gives tables for the damage-by-level. (We can query how well the tables match the actual experience of gameplay, how they work on player-side vs GM/NPC side given that the maths of those two sides is structured quite differently, etc, but let's put all that to one side.)Page 42 doesn't give a scale of conditions-by-level, nor any advice on the damage-effect trade-off. And that despite the actual worked example - pushing an ogre into a brazier (I think it is?) - includes an effect, namely, some forced movement. A further aspect that p 42 doesn't touch on at all is action economy - eg when is a minor action to impose an effect per p 42 reasonably balanced?The late wrecan, who was a value member of the 4e community on these boards and I believe also on the WotC boards (but I didn't use them much) wrote an article/blog that gave advice to plug this gap: it correlated various effects/conditions, and action economy costs, per level. I can't remember if it also addressed the damage/effect trade-off.Anyway, if most of the above was all obvious already I'm sorry for the tedious detail. It's just something that some of us who played a lot of 4e back in the day, and posted about it on these boards, had thought a bit about.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8598457, member: 42582"] The generic consequence of a successful combat action declaration in 4e D&D is damage + effect. Both are scaled by level - eg domination is higher level than stun is higher level than daze - and there are internal trade-offs between them - eg a power that does only damage will do more damage than one of the same level and frequency that also pushes, or slows, or dazes. At the limits of these trade-offs are some powers (typically magic ones) that do only effects. Page 42 gives tables for the damage-by-level. (We can query how well the tables match the actual experience of gameplay, how they work on player-side vs GM/NPC side given that the maths of those two sides is structured quite differently, etc, but let's put all that to one side.) Page 42 doesn't give a scale of conditions-by-level, nor any advice on the damage-effect trade-off. And that despite the actual worked example - pushing an ogre into a brazier (I think it is?) - includes an effect, namely, some forced movement. A further aspect that p 42 doesn't touch on at all is action economy - eg when is a minor action to impose an effect per p 42 reasonably balanced? The late wrecan, who was a value member of the 4e community on these boards and I believe also on the WotC boards (but I didn't use them much) wrote an article/blog that gave advice to plug this gap: it correlated various effects/conditions, and action economy costs, per level. I can't remember if it also addressed the damage/effect trade-off. Anyway, if most of the above was all obvious already I'm sorry for the tedious detail. It's just something that some of us who played a lot of 4e back in the day, and posted about it on these boards, had thought a bit about. [/QUOTE]

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