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General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
Thing I thought 4e did better: Monsters
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<blockquote data-quote="Jester David" data-source="post: 6981037" data-attributes="member: 37579"><p>The 4e is a little cleaner, but there's very little difference in play and results. It's mostly a psychological difference. Once you get used to it, it's pretty easy to use in play. </p><p></p><p>And, really, by-the-books encounter building is really just for people getting a feel for the system. It's never more than a ballpark, and not very useful given the range of abilities available to PCs. Once most people have a feel for the system, I imagine most just eyeball encounter difficulty. </p><p></p><p></p><p>Which was fine when you were putting 5 dudes against 5 equal monsters. (Or swapping in guys that filled the slot of 1-2 monsters). </p><p>It gets funkier when you might have 5 dudes against 3 equal monsters. Or 8 equal monsters. </p><p></p><p>You can do that in both systems. It just requires you to run through the encounter budget numbers. </p><p></p><p></p><p>Sure.</p><p>If you pull the chart of monsters by CR into Excel, add a forumla based on the 1/3 CR rating=1 PC, then round things up or down based on how tough each monster is that should take you an hour or two at most.</p><p>Or you could do what Star Wars Saga did and drop the numerical CR in favour of letters. 1/8 is "A", 1/4 is "B", etc. So a group of level 5 adventures might fight a CR G to I monster. </p><p></p><p></p><p>Kinda. </p><p>There are a LOT of orcs in the Compendium. And you could have a full orc encounter at level 8 pretty easily. </p><p></p><p>(That's ignoring the weirdness of a level 9 orc minion, which should really have the xp value of a level 1 orc, but is waaay tougher in play than any level 1 orc in every metric except hp. According to the xp budget of 4e, five level 9 orcs should be a good challenge for a 1st level party. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" /> )</p><p></p><p></p><p>Some variety is nice. But it's pretty easy to just swap out weapons and armour. </p><p></p><p>Orcs have hide armour (AC 13), greataxes, and javelins. But it'd be easy to have an orc ranger with a bow and leather armour. An orc blood rager that has a greatsword and higher Strength (+1 attack & damage), or maybe an extra Hit Dice or two. </p><p>Or use the berserker NPC and just give it the Aggressive trait and darkvision. There are 19 variants in the MM that can be orcs as easily as they can be humans or elves.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jester David, post: 6981037, member: 37579"] The 4e is a little cleaner, but there's very little difference in play and results. It's mostly a psychological difference. Once you get used to it, it's pretty easy to use in play. And, really, by-the-books encounter building is really just for people getting a feel for the system. It's never more than a ballpark, and not very useful given the range of abilities available to PCs. Once most people have a feel for the system, I imagine most just eyeball encounter difficulty. Which was fine when you were putting 5 dudes against 5 equal monsters. (Or swapping in guys that filled the slot of 1-2 monsters). It gets funkier when you might have 5 dudes against 3 equal monsters. Or 8 equal monsters. You can do that in both systems. It just requires you to run through the encounter budget numbers. Sure. If you pull the chart of monsters by CR into Excel, add a forumla based on the 1/3 CR rating=1 PC, then round things up or down based on how tough each monster is that should take you an hour or two at most. Or you could do what Star Wars Saga did and drop the numerical CR in favour of letters. 1/8 is "A", 1/4 is "B", etc. So a group of level 5 adventures might fight a CR G to I monster. Kinda. There are a LOT of orcs in the Compendium. And you could have a full orc encounter at level 8 pretty easily. (That's ignoring the weirdness of a level 9 orc minion, which should really have the xp value of a level 1 orc, but is waaay tougher in play than any level 1 orc in every metric except hp. According to the xp budget of 4e, five level 9 orcs should be a good challenge for a 1st level party. ;) ) Some variety is nice. But it's pretty easy to just swap out weapons and armour. Orcs have hide armour (AC 13), greataxes, and javelins. But it'd be easy to have an orc ranger with a bow and leather armour. An orc blood rager that has a greatsword and higher Strength (+1 attack & damage), or maybe an extra Hit Dice or two. Or use the berserker NPC and just give it the Aggressive trait and darkvision. There are 19 variants in the MM that can be orcs as easily as they can be humans or elves. [/QUOTE]
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