[Very Long] Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War: a Key Difference in D&D Play Styles...

[Tovec]

So, why do you think the 'CAW' preference shapes the rule system?

"It insitutes a way the rules are made and what their goal should be."
That is what I said then, and it is what my reply shall be. Also, CAS does the same, but that line only makes sense in relation to the rest of the paragraph and to the two lines before it.

A balanced system is not the same thing as a balanced encounter. Why would class balance, for instance, get in the way of running combats that had that 'war' feel to them? Why would a system for balancing encounters get in the way - wouldn't it just make the process of constructing extremely challenging (imbalanced) encounters more consistent?

How many times do I have to say this, I care not for the "balance" issue you have having with other posters. Since you have twice drawn me in however I will now respond to it - see below.

What's patently false? That D&D is a game? That a game should at least try to be balanced?

This really is sounding like rationalizing a preference, again.

Isn't all back and forth trying to rationalize a preference?

I may have been unclear. It is patently false that "it is just a game and therefore it will work itself out". That there is no need to look after other types of preferred play because they'll fall in line. It is false because we didn't. It is false because after 3 years they are having to make a new edition to reclaim their old membership.

I /really/ don't see that, at all. I think what you're getting at is that 4e has rules - including things like damage types, conditions, and keywords that are used consistently, even though there can be any number of exceptions to add in yet more possibilities. That makes the rules fairly precise and easy to adjudicate, it doesn't leave a lot of 'wiggle' room for, well, 'cheating.' (I wish I could think of a better word to express that than 'cheating' - getting around the social contract of the rules somehow. Oh: Meta-gaming?)

Those keywords weren't used in previous editions? What about Types, subtypes, weaknesses, abilities, etc.?
My problem, one that I was trying to avoid raising, has to do with the implied limitations or expectations associated with those keywords or with ability descriptions at all. That the Fireball doesn't touch paper because it targets only creatures. Things like that. I'm not going to get into it over and over so I'll leave it at that.

I do think that previous editions did a better job of setting the expectations at: "does this happen in the real world? Yes? Okay then it happens in the game." Whereas in 4th it is set at: "does this happen in video games? No? Then it doesn't happen in the game."

I think D&D, though doing so slowly, had been improving over it's various editions. AD&D was more ambitious than 0D&D, 2e refined AD&D and improved production values, 3e made a real stab at modernizing the game, roughly balanced it at single-digit levels, and took the bold step of going open source. 4e further improved over 3e.

Seemingly, a perfectly desireable state of afairs...

There's that word again - balance. I didn't realize that all editions of DnD had been working to improve balance. I thought they had been working to improve the game, all aspects not just balance. I think that 4th edition went too far, as do many, into the balance-direction. It balanced many things at the sake of too many other things. It is a trait many of us dislike about 4e.

I do know that. And I am totally OK with it. Indeed, I'm an older gamer myself, and have my first loves from the olden days. I adore 1st ed Gamma World, even though I recognize that it's a terrible game by modern standards, and a pretty marginal one even by the standards of 1978 (that did have it competing with RuneQuest, afterall).

I don't go around trying to tell people that it's /better/ than later, more refined, better executed versions of the game. (Though, nothing could be quite as bad as the 3rd ed...)

When you say things like "modernizing" I just have to shudder and remember that clip from How I Met Your Mother - where Barney says "Newer is always better" and sticks to it even when provided grape scotch.

The OP just made up 'CaW' a little bit ago.

So? Does the term work, are we satisfied with it and understand its implication? We don't have to agree with the term, or think it is ancient to use it.

Kudos to you for admiting an actual dislike of balance. That actually heads off a lot of back-and-forth we might otherwise have.

That is ALMOST what he (I assume he, may be she) is saying. What he did say was "Many of us dislike the "modern" redesign goals of 4e" and gave the example of balance. Balance by itself isn't a bad thing. It becomes bad when it cuts away at many of the elements we enjoy. It becomes an issue when it reduces the fun of a sizable segment of the playing population.

Here's were we get into the problem areas. There's opinion, and there's misrepresentation.

This is the first time I've needed (in this post) to break up what you have said, but you state many things which are opinion and misrepresentation as well and it would be a jumble if I left it all to the end.

4e did not take resource management out of the game. Far from it, there are still dailies, more broadly in fact, and in addition to hps and healing there are surges to manage, there are still one-shot items like potions, and there's an extra layer of resource management in encounter powers.

Alrighty, excuse any minor discrepancies as I do not play 4e and do not wish to scour through the books to find examples.

Do you need to keep track of; food (rations, apples), ammo (bolts, arrows, sling bullets), basic equipment (candles, chalk, flour), spell components, pages in a spellbook?

Because if not then haakon1's point is valid.
The resource management you list are dailies, surges, and encounter powers. How are these different than the same abilities used in different editions? Cleric still needed to know how many turn undead they had left, barbarians raged, wizards had their spell-lists. I fail to see the point you are trying to make.

(Caveat: If your point was only to say that 4e still has things you need to track, please disregard this section.)

Consistent mechanics do not take away flavor. Again, far from it, they allow the game to cover a much broader range of possible flavors without unecessary complexity. Your claim of similar mechanics robbing flavor is doubly bogus, because common mechanics have always been in use. In 1e, shocking grasp, for instance, did 1d8+n damage. So did a scimitar. They were not the same, even though they shared that mechanic.

Yes, they are both 1d8+n. Do they both shunt the enemy back 2 squares (not 10 feet, 2 effing squares)? Do they both have the keyword of, let's say, acid therefore we know to have it deal 1d6+k continual for 1d3+l rounds? No? Sharing the mechanic for shocking grasp and a scimitar isn't really the same as sharing a mechanic across (nearly) all powers across (nearly) classes - at the same level of course.

The wizard still uses recognizeably Vancian magic. In fact, the wizard's dailies are a bit closer to the magic of the Dying Earth than they ever have been, since they don't memorize rediculous numbers of them at high level.

Warriors are not spellcasters - 'essentially' or otherwise. They are merely no longer inferior to casters. Martial characters use expoits. Wizards use spells. Attack exploits are virtually always weapon powers - and /never/ implement powers. Attack spells are virtually always implement power. Attack exploits typicaly do untyped damage, or damage based on the weapon. Attack spells do a whole range of typed damages. The mechanical difference, alone are significant. The similarities are only significant in terms of balance. In terms of flavor/fluff or concept, they're meaningless.

If by Vancian, do you mean fire and forget? Then what do you count encounter and at wills? How is it "Vancian magic" for the wizard but different for the fighter?

Warriors are as much spellcasters as wizards are spellcasters. Both have X dallies, Y encounters, Z at wills per day. They differ ONLY in the power source. But as many 4e'rs have admitted, power sources are pretty much still just magic. I think a lot of us (on the non-4e side) find it puzzling why fighters NEED a power source.

By all means, feel free to express your opinions about 4e class balance and your preferences and opinions. But do not say that 4e classes are the same, that fighters cast spells, or that wizard's don't prepare spells. Because those statements are false.

We mean they are built the same, at level 6 how many of W (surges), X (dallies), Y (encounters), Z (at wills) do you get to use? Is there variation there?

Sure, part of balance, which you don't like. No problem.

Please refer to above comments about disliking balance.

Actually, with all the racial feats and powers 4e introduced, the differences among races were probably a little greater than in 4e. PC races. Not LA races, that is.

Actually, with all the racial stuff in 4e, the differences in races are rather bland. Rather "balanced" to suit one another and to no longer have a perceived unbalanced effect.

(Caveat: I don't know what point haakon1 was trying to make about races.)

Yep, and once again, feel free to go on in that vein all you like. You'll get no argument from me. 4e takes a very different direction in what it's trying to model or simulate. 3e modeled an internally consistent world in which the elements of fantasy stories might exist (and, once in a blue moon, the story of a PC party might even end up resembling one, slightly, if the dice were being really crazy). 4e modeled the story rather than the world. In most fantasy stories, most of the heroes don't die meaningless deaths at 1st level (whatever '1st level' would be in a narrative...). Different aproach, different results, different preferences. No bearing on how good a game either one is (was).

Why are all characters in 4e meant to be the main protagonist? The one who never dies? Imagine if comics worked that way, where (super)heroes never had the chance of dying, they never got sick, never lost a fight. Once upon a time, that was true but we have changed, evolved into something more closely resembling reality.

Characters should die, no scratch that. They should have the chance of dying. They shouldn't go out every day knowing that the world is designed for them to win. They should leave knowing that their actions will have an impact. They should leave knowing that if they die they die for a reason.

Aparently, if done often enough, stridently enough, viciously enough, and combined with a veritable boycott, it can kill a 3-year-old edition of D&D for the first time in the history of the game.

Good.

I still have faith that 5e can be designed to support both styles of play very well. For that to be true, it has to have balanced combat mechanics that CAS groups can use, but it also has to offer a lot of interesting mechanics and resources that CAW groups can use to "unbalance" encounters within their game.

My faith is waning that they can build a game to cater to all crowds. I clearly want different things than you do Hassassin. We want to build very different games.

But going forward I really don't want them to make a crappy product which is a mutant of 4e (or 3e or 2 or 1) with other editions thrown in. I DO want them to make a new game. A game which is its own, but incorporates elements from all prior editions. This is a FAR preferable idea to me, and one it seems like they are already doing - if you pay attention to the playtests reviews.

HP attrition from encounter to encounter is the most difficult part. CAS style without resetting HP or CAW style with are both problematic. This is where I think there must be an optional choice that groups will have to make. Probably from attrition to resetting, because adding a reset mechanic seems, to me, to be easier than removing one. But that's just my view, maybe they'll surprise me.

Just a general question, both for you Hassassin and to anyone else who wants to answer it. When in history, literature, myths, legends, etc. have we ever had stories where the heroes were good to go ALL THE TIME. Where they fight 1000 battles and end up as fresh as they start.

For me, this is a problem bigger than 4e but exacerbated by 4e's (healing surges and encounters). It seems like there SHOULD (looking at those sources) be a large amount of downtime, for prep, research and healing. I don't really want a video game mentality where you wait 2 minutes out of combat and suddenly you are 100% ready again. I would love to see a system where you fight, get tired (winded), need to surge into battle again (second wind) but then end up sore, fatigued and in need of extended downtime to recoup. Not just 5 more minutes and then good to go.

I digress, not the point of this post or this thread.

I don't like Combat as War.

I think it leads to overly-cautious, non-heroic play. If the entire point is to stack the deck in your favor, then conversely you avoid all situations where the deck is not stacked in your favor.

Croaker and the Black Company are not heros. They're barely better than rapist scum. And they're not really people I would like my game to emulate. In Combat as War, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one. I find that attitude to be anathema to the heroic play I like.

Combat as Sport is much better support for playing heroes in a traditional style.

I'd rather have King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table than Croaker and the Black Company.

I do like Combat as War, cannot stand Combat as Sport. Let me break it down.

Overly cautions? Good. Non-Heroic? I don't see how.
The point is to come out of the fight alive, the point is to defeat the enemy and for them to need to be defeated. I can't imagine anything more heroic, even if you have to be cautions and to overcome great odds.

Why does Combat as Sport support heroes more traditionally - to you?

Being King Arthur vs Croaker has nothing to do with the CAW/CAS debate. It does have to do with the outlook and playstyle of the characters but it has nothing to do with the rules of the game themselves. If anything I've found CAS people to be more interested in money, greed and shiny things than people playing for CAW where the goal and outcome matter more.

As far as your Black Company remark - I don't agree with your characterization but I do understand it - I want you to look again at my former post, I've quoted it here for your easy reference.

They are adventurers living a hard lifestyle, they get paid the big bucks not only because they are strong and courageous but because they have the knack for defeating the enemy where all others have failed. Because they risk their lives, and have a chance of not returning to their homes at the end of an adventure. They shouldn't simply win because they tried. They should win because they prepared. That is the point I was trying to make, the point which you glossed over in favour of the "it is a game" comment.

 

[Tony Vargas]

In any case, regardless of rules, I do expect a roleplaying game to offer opportunities for both 'combat as sport' and 'combat as war.' Sometimes I want a duel on a rolling quarterdeck, and sometimes I want to send a fireship at my enemy's flagship while it's at anchor.

Regardless of rules, you probably can take either aproach, RPGs being open or 'infinite games' by their nature. The only question is if the game is neutral to that style choice or supports one over another.

Balanced games, like 4e, are more style neutral. You'd have to come up with a few things to run a shipboard or ship battle in 4e, since there aren't specific rules for it, but once you do, either of those scenarios could be done. I'd think the fireship would require some real thought by the DM, the equivalent of designing an encounter from scratch (since it introduces this major environmental factor (a ship full of burning pitch and gunpowder- yipes!). Of course, designing an encounter from scratch is something you can do in minutes. In 3.5 you at least have the Seawrack suplement (4e might've gotten a suplement like that, if it hadn't been killed prematurely), and you could try for either, but most likely the fellow you were going to duel with will get Held, Power-Worded or otherwised insta-ganked (after the DM spent hours statting him up and equipping him), and fireballs will toast the flag ship (or your ship) while you're still loading barrells of pitch.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't understand what the point of criticizing a game you patently haven't played and appear not to have even read is. Leave it to others with more experience?

4e BTW lets you track all the same things you could track in any other edition. There are rules for starvation, thirst, ammunition, etc. I think a more legitimate complaint would be about healing actually, which could be a real issue.

Beyond that you have all the same options in any edition of D&D. Like what you want of course, but lets kill the nonsense or what is the point of a discussion?

 

[Aenghus]

I prefer Combat as Sport to Combat as War, so I'm trying to articulate my preference. This is a matter of taste and everyone is entitled to their opinion. The issue of concern is that systems are often biased in favour of particular game styles, so everyone wants the new game to address their preferred style. The nasty part is people wanting the new game to neglect styles they don't like - that isn't a good business decision, the new edition is coming because D&D needs a wider audience and this means it has to address 4e player concerns as well as everybody elses.

Issues with Combat as War: It tends to be, or wants to be seen as being, a high lethaliy rate style. It's often predicated on a "rules-as-physics" view of the game, when the game wasn't designed in a coherent fashion to support this view, so the gameplay that emerges isn't necessarily fun for everyone. It's often wedded to the exact details of how things work in a particular campaign, details that are not all provided in the rules so they have to be extrapolated - this means no two campaigns make exactly the same set of assumptions, reducing the usefulness of subsequent content. It privileges system mastery above other qualities, and a utilitarian playstyle above other styles. It seriously raises the learning curve for new players, and makes it much more likely new players will lose multiple PCs while learning the game, which can scare players off. It promotes an elitist attitude, which I think is silly in a game involving pretending to be pointy eared elves who fight oversized firebreathing lizards.

I think Combat as Sport throws up a lot less barriers to new players, being more lenient and allowing them to survive their initial mistakes rather than rolling lots of new characters. It's easier to learn, and allows a wider range of character concepts to flourish. It's more transparent with regard to mechanics and their interactions, and makes it more obvious what mechanics support or don't support particular styles . It makes it easier to run long campaigns. It typically doesn't assume a strong connection between flavour text and mechanics, making reskinning easier and allowing a wider range of game worlds (rather than just the ones that agree with the systems default flavour assumptions).

 

[Tony Vargas]

"It insitutes a way the rules are made and what their goal should be."
That is what I said then, and it is what my reply shall be.

Well, OK, if you can't elaborate on that so it makes sense, I won't pester you further about it.

As I see it, rules can (and should) be neutral to the choice of aproaching any given encounter as 'sport' (fair) or war (anything goes). It's an RPG, if your players decide to challenge the enemy to a stand-up fight, you're going to have to react to that, if they choose to sneak in and murder the enemy in their sleep, you resolve that attempt. Either way, you're using the same system, so the system should be able to handle either.

I may have been unclear. It is patently false that "it is just a game and therefore it will work itself out". That there is no need to look after other types of preferred play because they'll fall in line. It is false because we didn't. It is false because after 3 years they are having to make a new edition to reclaim their old membership.

OK, true. Making a better game that supports more play styles is not enough. You also have to sell it. And, we nerds can be a very tough, unpredictable audience.

In the past, there's always been some knee-jerk resistance to new eds, and it's always passed as shiny new stuff came out for /just/ the new ed.

The d20 OGL, however, made it possible for new shinies to come out for the old ed.

That's the difference.

I do think that previous editions did a better job of setting the expectations at: "does this happen in the real world? Yes? Okay then it happens in the game."

Well, when dealing with what a fighter does, sure. When dealing with magic and dragons, not so much. Dragons don't climb tall cliffs and ride thermals, they leap into the air and fly. If you reality-checked how many times per day a brilliant old man could make deadly lightning fly from his fingertips by reciting a spell, you'd get 0.

Whereas in 4th it is set at: "does this happen in video games? No? Then it doesn't happen in the game."

Try 'does this happen in the heroic fanstays genre?'

There's that word again - balance. I didn't realize that all editions of DnD had been working to improve balance. I thought they had been working to improve the game

Yep, and balance makes games better. So does better editing, interior art, and a host of other things. 4e didn't fail to be better game than 3e, just as 3e improved over 2e and so forth. It just failed to remain bad enough in specific, familiar ways, to 'feel like D&D,' and did so with the OGL hanging over it's head.

I think that 4th edition went too far, as do many, into the balance-direction. It balanced many things at the sake of too many other things. It is a trait many of us dislike about 4e.

If you just don't like balance, I certainly can accept that. 4e is a better-balanced game, if having to sit at the table without your system mastery or choice of character or roll of 18 at chargen making you better than the next guy ruins the game for you, then it's a worse game for you, and I heartily agree that you shouldn't play it. (I'd wish you leave it alive for me to play, but that's moot at this point).

I'd probably have to disagree with what was 'sacrificed' to get there, though. Most of those arguments lead to gross misinformation about 4e.

Do you need to keep track of; food (rations, apples), ammo (bolts, arrows, sling bullets), basic equipment (candles, chalk, flour), spell components, pages in a spellbook?

Because if not then haakon1's point is valid.

The DM explicitly has the option of not bothering to track ammo. Rations (iron or waybread) are sold in days or sets of 10 days. There are still rules for how long a torch, candle, sunrod or the like will burn and how much light it gives off. I do not recall there ever being rules for how quickly chalk wears down or how much flour you might use (rations are more generic than that) in any ed. Wizards still use up a number of pages in their spellbook to record spells and rituals. Spells no longer use components, but rituals do, ritual components, however, are more generic and tracked by gp value rather than in any itemized form. Of course, in 3e, a wizard just needed 'spell component pouch' on his character sheet, and didn't otherwise track components.

Yes, they are both 1d8+n. Do they both shunt the enemy back 2 squares (not 10 feet, 2 effing squares)? Do they both have the keyword of, let's say, acid therefore we know to have it deal 1d6+k continual for 1d3+l rounds? No? Sharing the mechanic for shocking grasp and a scimitar isn't really the same as sharing a mechanic across (nearly) all powers across (nearly) classes - at the same level of course.

It really is. In older D&D, poison required a save, spells required a save. Same mechanic. One was magic, one wasn't. Consistent use of mechanics is a technical strength in an RPG. A

If by Vancian, do you mean fire and forget? Then what do you count encounter and at wills? How is it "Vancian magic" for the wizard but different for the fighter?

The wizard's /daily/ is vancian, he can prep a different spell in the morning. The Fighter's isn't, he'd have to retrain his daily when he levels. Also, the wizard throws effing balls of fire, while the fighter, even with a daily, still hits stuff with a weapon.

Seriously, this 'samey' business is the lamest of the spurious objects raised to 4e. And, it's aparently going to outlive 4e. Tragic.

Warriors are as much spellcasters as wizards are spellcasters. Both have X dallies, Y encounters, Z at wills per day. They differ ONLY in the power source.

That's like saying humans and orcs are the same because they both have 6 stats and the same base move.

Why are all characters in 4e meant to be the main protagonist? The one who never dies?

Because the role of the guy that dies looking for the treasure is that of skelleton when the hero comes looking for the treasure. No one writes a novel that stops 12 pages in because the protagonist failed a saving throw.

Heck, D&D has saving throws, hit points, and resurection to /try/ to put PCs in the running for that sort of story. It just hasn't ever modeled heroic fantasy quite as well at all levels.

My faith is waning that they can build a game to cater to all crowds.

See, we can agree on something!

Seriously, I think the 4e/Pathfinder split was good for the community. Not only did each side of the divide have their own game, they didn't have to play it was those 'morons' who prefered the other.

When in history, literature, myths, legends, etc. have we ever had stories where the heroes were good to go ALL THE TIME. Where they fight 1000 battles and end up as fresh as they start.

Well, probably in some myths, but generally never. That's one of many things D&D has consistently managed to model poorly. Though maybe not as badly as it looks.

Take hps, for instance. A high level character has tons of 'em, and uses them to survive things that no normal person should - being shot with 12 arrows, then falling 80' onto poisoned spikes, for instance. While he has even 1 hp left, though, he's fighting at full potential. Wildly unrealistic. Also seemingly counter to genre, where wounded heroes are always gasping for breath and staggering about. But, y'know, between the gasping and the staggering they still manage to save the day - and they wouldn't be able to do that if they'd accumulated a -20 everything in oh-so-realistic wound penalties.

Hps have long been criticised, but they're actually a brilliant little abstraction that lets a D&D character behave a bit like a fantasy hero, by surviving improbable dangers and coming back to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. It takes some imagination to get from "I killed the xorn while I still had 10 hps left" to that, but it's closer than "Then this thing morphed out of the ground and bit my leg off, so of course I bled to death."

Healing surges actually captures a little more of that heroic get beat down/come back at the last moment trope that's so common. It's a bit of extra detail, but it works pretty nicely. Certainly better than leaning on the poor cleric.

It seems like there SHOULD (looking at those sources) be a large amount of downtime, for prep, research and healing.

That's the kind of thing that could vary widely from one sort of campaign to another. Some find bookkeeping tiresome. And the difference, at the table, between one day of down time and one month of downtime is the DM says 'day' instead of 'month' after the word 'Next' and then gets on to the intro to the next adventure.

Ironically, pacing can be a thorny issue for the DM, because downtime could be used for a lot of things besides healing. In AD&D, you'd use downtime to level up, which is nice, but, hey, you deserve to level up. Occassionally that'd be a problem if the DM wanted something faster-paced. You could use it to do spell research or make items, but the DM had so much veto power over those activities a /lot/ of time shoudn't make a big difference. In 3e it got out of hand. Downtime could be used to make money from skills or by systematic spellcasting (or both: Fabricate), or to make magic items. In 4e, downtime doesn't really matter. The DM is free to set the pacing he wants, but he'll also have to inject any drama he wants into it, himself.

I digress, not the point of this post or this thread.

Interesting side-line though.

Overly cautions? Good. Non-Heroic? I don't see how.

You cautiously aproach the castle where the princess is being held. You observe guard rotations. You bide your time and infiltrate when the opportunity presents itself. You find the princess's sacrificed remains on an altar. The demon so summoned has been wreaking havoc in another part of the kingdom for two days, having teleported away with the necromancer who summoned it.

Why does Combat as Sport support heroes more traditionally - to you?

I can't say I see a strong distinction between modeling a 'fair' contest with a game and modeling an 'anything goes' contest with a game (when not /anything/ goes to win the game - no loaded dice, for instance). Just a stylistic one. And, yes, it seems a bit less heroic to murder helpless foes cleverly than to stupidly go in swinging and slaughter them. But, really /just/ a bit, and only if done quite cynically. Odysseus was a hero, too, afterall.

I do like planning and cunning to be rewarded, most of the time (sometimes you just dig yourself in deeper, though). But, I'd prefer it be in-game planning and cunning rather than metagame planning and cunning. In 4e, for instance, if the party wanted to infiltrate a castle to assassinate the Big Bad rather than just charge the gates try and kill everything, I'd run it as a complex, difficult skill challenge, punctuated by small battels to silence guards on the first two failures, an overwhelming combat on the third, or a more reasonable 'boss' fight upon success if they do well. OTOH, charging the gates would be a series of overwhelmingly tough combats, and good luck with that without Earthquake or Rock to Mud or Mass Fly/Invisibilty or anything on that scale...

 

[Gentlegamer]

I prefer "Combat as War" in D&D because in a role-playing game, 'rules should fade into the background,' giving the 'spotlight time' to player imagination, spontaneity, resourcefulness, and ingenuity in overcoming obstacles in an imagined environment.

It is desirable that participants conceptualize their in-game actions in reference to the imagined environment and situation rather than to written rules.

The Dungeon Master and participants interacting on a level 'above the rules' is the heart of what a role-playing game is. "Combat as War" speaks to this integral part of the game-form.

 

[JamesonCourage]

You cautiously aproach the castle where the princess is being held. You observe guard rotations. You bide your time and infiltrate when the opportunity presents itself. You find the princess's sacrificed remains on an altar. The demon so summoned has been wreaking havoc in another part of the kingdom for two days, having teleported away with the necromancer who summoned it.

The Princess Bride:

• Inigo Montoya versus the Man in Black: Combat as Sport.
• Inigo Montoya, Fezzik, and the Man in Black preparing to rescue Princess Buttercup: Combat as War.

It's different at different times. You can be cautious and save the princess. Even in the same system (or movie) where Combat as Sport is used. Bypassing 30 guards by intimidating and bluffing them is definitely more Combat as War than Combat as Sport, and it involved careful planning.

I love Combat as War, and I highly value Combat as Sport. I can say, however, from the perspective of a GM that highly rewards a well thought out approach in a Combat as War game, my players are no less hesitant to go in swinging when they feel they need to, or even want to. They aren't cowardly (unless their character is).

They face overwhelming odds, and try to plan to bring it down to something close to even when possible. These past few sessions, they've engaged ships by sneaking aboard, doing their best to chain all the doors up shut, and ramming it into another ship. They bypassed a lot of sailors and fight by doing so. It was very risky, and my RPG (and style) is certainly more lethal than D&D's base system assumes.

It's going to depend on group. Sure, some players will be more cautious (or, separately, cowardly) when they think they might die. That's understandable. It is by no means a universal truth, and my personal experience bucks wildly against the assertion.

Most groups play to suit their needs. If groups are most concerned with surviving, that's how they'll play. If fights are assumed to be more balanced, they'll rush in more often. If they're not, they'll be more cautious. If, however, groups are more interested in other aspects (intrigue, heroics, etc.), they'll play to fit that style, regardless of how risky it is. They'll try to reduce the risk, sure, but they'll still risk it. In my opinion, anyways. As always, play what you like

 

[KidSnide]

I want to duel the Cardinal's Guards in a convent courtyard.

And I want to push a bastion wall over on a sortie of Huguenots.

Seriously. I have to imagine that most gamers sometimes want to think outside the box and defeat the enemy with cleverness and sometimes want to just kick down the down and have a drag out fight won by some combination of luck, tactical acumen and toughness (usually on the part of the characters).

There is room for systems that are more closely focused on CoW and CoS, but D&D should handle both. I'd like to see a D&DN where you can have a tactically satisfying combat as effective as 4e and strategic CoW thinking as effective as 1-2e.

-KS

 

[FireLance]

Frankly, I think the thought of engaging in a 'balanced' encounter where I'm expected to win is about the most unheroic thing conceivable.

Now, having a swingy combat swinging against you, and taking a stand against overwhelming odds - that seems a little more heroic then scooting a target over so your ally gets a +2.

Shhh! Pay no attention to the mechanics behind the curtain!

Unfortunately, it is a fact that many people have ideas of "heroism" that do not mesh well with probability, at least in so far as it relates to having a character regularly triumph against or even survive overwhelming odds.

Any situation that has a 10% chance of survival means that nine out of ten times, you need to create a new PC. And assuming you were one of the lucky 10% that made it, the problem with D&D (unlike say, a novel) is that your career doesn't end there. You're going to keep adventuring, and the next time you get an opportunity to display heroism, 90% of the time, you're not going to make it to the third.

So, by the time a player's seventh or eighth character gets splatted by an ogre's club (courtesy of the laws of probability) he's usually quite willing to stack the odds a bit more in his favor. So you get hit points, allowing the character to survive a bit longer in the fight while all the time feeling that he could have died at any point because the ogre's club just missed him (or at least, that's how the player chose to narrate it). You get fate points/action points/hero points, again tilting the laws of probability towards victory instead of defeat.

So yeah, it's a bit of a mind trick, but it enables us to tell the story of the brave heroes who set out to face the enemy even though they only had a million to one chance of success, while ignoring the fact that the game mechanics are in the background, ensuring that million to one chances crop up nine times out of ten.

 

[SlyDoubt]

That'd be because the concept of heroism is succeeding where you're not expected to succeed.

Everyone wants to be heroic. The difference I think is whether the heroic moments occur naturally, simply because stuff doesn't go down as intended. Or because they've been framed and designed to be 'heroic'

It feels awesome when stuff goes awry and the group somehow comes back through clever decisions and good luck. It feels crappy when everything goes according to plan but it was 'tough'. As in statistically it used a lot of resources and such but tactically it wasn't exactly the most stressful.