Unintended(?) Consequence of No More X-Mas Tree?

[Njall]

Characters enter a cavern 60 ft x 60 ft, with a number of 5-foot natural caverns coming out from all sides, ceiling height averages 20 feet. The tunnel that the PCs have come out of has many small side-tunnels.

As the PCs cross this tunnel, they are attacked by a horde of goblins. There are 60 goblins in total, 20 with short bows, 20 with short swords, and 20 with reach weapons (spears).

There is a simple example of an encounter that can both affect the PCs, and that the PCs can easily defeat without needing to rest.

Uhm...Polymorph (anything with high AC will do ) + Protection from non-magical arrows means the wizard will probably breeze through the encounter unscathed.
Conversely, if the goblin focus-fire one of the rogues, (+3 to hit, 1d6 damage) they'll hit his average 18 magic-less AC 30% of the time.
3.5x20x30%= 21 damage.
Assuming he has 14 con, that's about 90 HP he has. If 10 more attack him ( reach weapon ) he'll take another 5x10x25%= 12.5 damage.
He took 33.5 damage on average, and half the goblins didn't act yet.
Unless they clean the cave very quickly, one rogue may be dead in 3 rounds.
2 rounds, and he's severly wounded, to the point that if he enters combat again without resting, he'll hardly make it alive.

The encounter is trivial for the wizard ( in fact, if it weren't for the rest of the party he could probably clear the cave alone by virtue of his high AC and AB, or he could just resort to fireballing the crap out of the goblins ) yet it is significant and risky for 1 character.
And it awards 0 xp.

That's every rpg, then. In high magic settings, for example, you need to metagame to explain why the BBEG didn't just teleport into the PC's bedroom and kill him in his sleep. You need to metagame to explain why the 1st level PCs weren't encountering high-CR monsters early in their career, or why some dragon didn't swoop down and eat them. For that matter, if these PCs were destined to be heroes, why didn't some BBEG use divination magic to discover that earlier, and kill them as babies?

Well, maybe because using a divination spell everytime someone is born might be a little hard?
As for the rest, it depends. For example, because not all BBEG are spellcasters
Or because they took proper precautions?
To give you an idea, for example, in my old 2.5 campaign you'd hardly find high CR monsters around: my PCs generally avoided places that were known for being dangerous in the first place.
One of them, for example, was after his father's sword; he did some research and eventually found out where the sword was. He also discovered that the sword was held in a very dangerous place; he chose to go alone in a place where the average opponent was level 7. He was Level 3.
Obviously, he died.
However, he knew he'd probably die if he tried.
No metagaming on my part to keep him alive: I just made sure he'd know what he would have faced if he chose to go.

There is no such thing as a rpg in which metagaming doesn't play an important part (as authorial intent plays in important part in all stories, with players & DM together taking the part of "authors"). Metagaming is normal, and necessary. Saying otherwise is.....simply wrong. If you think you game without metagaming, you're fooling yourself.


RC

Oh, I know some level of metagaming is necessary; I just think that you ( and the party ) should do all you can to avoid it as much as possible.
Having to rely on metagaming to make a system work, though, means the system doesn't work, as I said.

 

[LostSoul]

I don't buy that. Counter-measures to magic are extremely common in our own (presumably low- or no-magic!) world. They are certainly common enough in low magic fantasy works.

I felt like my old campaign ceased to be low-magic when the bad guys started using Dispel Magic.

Also, may I point out, putting XP into scrolls can be a liability when you already effectively need twice the XP of the other characters to gain a level. When the wizard or cleric is 5th level, the fighter and rogue are 10th level, and can probably hold their own.

Obscuring Mist will run you 1 XP, and Protection From Arrows at 5th (10th) level is 20 XP (edit: actually 10). Not much in the grand scheme of things.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I don't buy that. Counter-measures to magic are extremely common in our own (presumably low- or no-magic!) world. They are certainly common enough in low magic fantasy works.

There are scrolls of dispel magic in the real world? And people are constantly on the lookout for invisible people in the real world? Plus they spread out by default to avoid fireballs?

The idea is that in a low magic world people don't know much about magic because of how rare it is. So they don't prepare countermeasures since they never expect to run into it. Plus, most of the counter measures are ALSO magic so they are rare and hard to get.

I mean, it might be possible for guards to hear the move silently on the rogue/wizard with invisibility when he rolls 40 if all of the guards in your campaign are high level. But when you add role playing and such to the game, such a character can essentially sneak into anywhere without ever being detected, allowing him to own anything, anywhere.

A moderately powerful fireball tends to kill ALL level 1 and 2 characters in the area of effect even when they make their saves.

It may be possible to overpower Protection from Arrows, however, it is unlikely for enough damage to get through that a 16th level character (who gets back 16 hitpoints per day) couldn't regain it back with one or two nights rest. Or one cure critical wounds.

 

[DreamChaser]

And certainly a change like "I don't like fighters having powers, I just want them to do normal attacks instead" causes a large part of the system to fall apart.

Well, that would depend entirely upon what "powers" we are talking about. If a fighter's powers are equivalent to cleave, sunder, whirlwind, shield bash, improved shield bash, overrun, improved grapple, improved trip, improved disarm, and then an assortment of dramatic (but clearly not magical) effects then removing them would not be a genre issue it would be a metagame nostalgia issue. It would be essentially saying, "I want fighters to work the way they always have (which I must add has been how they have always been derided as one of the weakest core classes, after the bard) rather than saying I want fighters to be a purely marital force with only mundane and / or easily explained abilities.

If a person says, "I want wizards to have nothing but spells, no other supernatural effects," they are fundamentally altering the class. IE, they should create a new class to fit the image they want. If a person decides that they want a fighting class with nothing but a sword and a base attack bonus, then again they should design a new class.

With a more cohesive system, creating a new class should be easier, not harder.

Again, because such design will be possible, and possibly easier, adapting 4e to different genres and styles of play should be as easy as (or even easier than) ever before.

DC

 

[Imp]

There are scrolls of dispel magic in the real world? And people are constantly on the lookout for invisible people in the real world? Plus they spread out by default to avoid fireballs?

There are loads of folkloric countermeasures to "dark magic" or "evil eyes" or whatever in the real world – tipping the balance in favor of anti-magical measures is not inconsistent with a sort-of-closer-to-real-world approach.

 

[LostSoul]

The problem is that Dispel Magic comes with a whole host of other abilities - like the ability to cast Fireball, for example.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Uhm...Polymorph (anything with high AC will do ) + Protection from non-magical arrows means the wizard will probably breeze through the encounter unscathed.

Perhaps, but the group as a whole will have used up resources. Nor is the wizard's ability to get off those two spells assured. Of course, you are also assuming the ability of all those goblins to attack immediately, which isn't feasable.

Oh, I know some level of metagaming is necessary; I just think that you ( and the party ) should do all you can to avoid it as much as possible.

There is no difference between "We heal the fighter so he can travel with us" and "We wait for the fighter to heal so he can travel with us" from a metagame standpoint. None.

RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

There are scrolls of dispel magic in the real world?

Quite literally, yes. And there are still people today who believe in, and are on the lookout for, invisible people in the real world. People are killed for being witches right now, quite possibly even while you are reading this. Whether or not real magic exists, the belief in real magic exists.

However, so far as I know no one spreads out by default to avoid fireballs (only to avoid enemy fire).

The idea is that in a low magic world people don't know much about magic because of how rare it is. So they don't prepare countermeasures since they never expect to run into it. Plus, most of the counter measures are ALSO magic so they are rare and hard to get.

If we go so far as to claim that the real world is low/no magic, then I will point out that for most of human history, the vast majority of people knew something about magic, and specifically knew counter-measures. Some of them are even subsumed into our culture, such as when a person says "Bless you" when you sneeze. It is quite easy to find people in Toronto who know signs to ward off ill luck. We like to think that we are enlightened, but we still use medicines that have no more proven effect than placebos.

Take a look at this: http://harlcazz.bravepages.com/library/Paganism/Pagan History and Facts/Witchhunts in Africa.htm

http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/...h-Ask_Scholar/FatwaE/FatwaE&cid=1119503543818

http://www.spellsandmagic.com/

Still sure that charms and countercharms don't belong in a low/no magic world?

RC

 

[LostSoul]

Still sure that charms and countercharms don't belong in a low/no magic world?

Only if they are as effective as in our own world.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Only if they are as effective as in our own world.

Until you test the countermeasures of our own world against magic, how can you say with any certainty that they are not effective?