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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6210094" data-attributes="member: 2067">I feel like he's almost getting it. He approaches getting it, but then gets a little wrapped up in his own particular style considerations. I'm basically totally with him until he starts talking about "exploration encounters." I see what he's getting at -- exploration can sort of be thought of the interesting events that happen between point A and point B -- but I feel like thinking about it that way minimizes some of the really interesting things about exploration as a part of gameplay.It might be worth thinking about the exploration itself as an encounter. That is, the players spend resources as they engage the environment, which depletes their resources, until either the party dies or gets what they need from the environment. Much like the arc of combat, only tracked over hours and days rather than rounds and turns. At the end, rather than beating the enemy, the PC's wind up finding what they're looking for or getting where they're going. It's less about the specific scene with the fountain, and more like "Mysterious Fountain" is a power used by the Ancient Ruins environment which is an attack vs. Will that depletes 1d4 survival days as the party sits around and puzzles out its mystery. Thinking of it that way, things like searching for the dungeon entrance and save-or-die traps become more about the equivalent of HP depletion: not finding the dungeon entrance is like missing on an attack. Getting hit with a trap that kills you is like getting walloped with a powerful monster ability. The challenge here is can you survive the dangerous environment, overall, not simply about puzzling out individual rooms and scenes. If you never find the dungeon and have to go back to town because traps nearby kill you, it's like running from a dragon. It's not about dealing with a particular trap any more than it's about one particular blow from a sword. In exploration, individual scenes are my attack rolls and hits, not the whole show. In fact, I personally kind of conceive of entire adventures in this way. It's not kobolds with special powers, it's The Mithral Mines of Malglum that have a special Hoarde of Kobolds power that wears down the resources of the party. And this is part of why 4e's more detailed focus on individual scenes really chafes. I don't want to spend an hour dealing with one mysterious fountain any more than I want to spend an hour wading through a group of kobolds. Give me 5 minutes and a result, and lets move on to the next interesting feature, because the game isn't about the kobolds or the fountain, it's about the entire arc of the adventure.  That said, I think he's mostly on the right path, here. His list is a good one, and his scratching the surface to see where the exploration fun lies is smart. He should just really be willing to abandon the idea that a game is a chain of encounter scenes, and embrace the idea that encounter scenes are just moments of slightly tighter focus within a bigger context (the adventure). Get with that, and you've got a chance to get a D&D game designed to capture the feel I'm looking for.</blockquote>

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