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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9180040" data-attributes="member: 42582">This seems to be similar to how hp attrition combat feels to someone who, in the 80s or 90s, decided that RM or RQ is a more serious game than D&amp;D. &quot;Level one dudes&quot;, &quot;hit points&quot;, &quot;armour class&quot;, all just seem like set dressing and the GM or the game designer putzing around with numbers.The fantasy lives in imagination.When I was GMing 4e, how did I assist my players to imagine their mid-paragon PCs as Conan-esque in their power? By statting up hobgoblin swarms that could heal themselves by &quot;absorbing&quot; adjacent hobgoblin minions. When the shared fiction is of (eg) a Dwarven warpriest of Moradin carving his way through a hobgoblin phalanx, the fantasy is not in doubt.The game solved the problems with AD&amp;D that I described just above (as reasons for playing RM and RQ instead), and one non-accidental aspect of that was providing a working model of a high level but &quot;mundane&quot; fighter.Why is it arbitrary? It's deliberate - deliberate on the part of the GM, to represent the power dynamic of the fantasy world as that pertains to this creature and these protagonists.&nbsp;[USER=6696971]@Manbearcat[/USER] gave a full post about the &quot;win&quot; - that depends entirely on the GM's ability to use the encounter building rules. When the mid-paragon PCs in my 4e game tackled the hobgoblin phalanxes, <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/wizard-pc-dies-returns-as-invoker.324018/" target="_blank">one of them died</a>. The point of the minions, and the swarms (phalanxes), is not to &quot;give the players a win&quot;. It is to accurately represent the fantastic fiction.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 9180040, member: 42582"] This seems to be similar to how hp attrition combat feels to someone who, in the 80s or 90s, decided that RM or RQ is a more serious game than D&D. "Level one dudes", "hit points", "armour class", all just seem like set dressing and the GM or the game designer putzing around with numbers. The fantasy lives in imagination. When I was GMing 4e, how did I assist my players to imagine their mid-paragon PCs as Conan-esque in their power? By statting up hobgoblin swarms that could heal themselves by "absorbing" adjacent hobgoblin minions. When the shared fiction is of (eg) a Dwarven warpriest of Moradin carving his way through a hobgoblin phalanx, the fantasy is not in doubt. The game solved the problems with AD&D that I described just above (as reasons for playing RM and RQ instead), and one non-accidental aspect of that was providing a working model of a high level but "mundane" fighter. Why is it arbitrary? It's deliberate - deliberate on the part of the GM, to represent the power dynamic of the fantasy world as that pertains to this creature and these protagonists. [USER=6696971]@Manbearcat[/USER] gave a full post about the "win" - that depends entirely on the GM's ability to use the encounter building rules. When the mid-paragon PCs in my 4e game tackled the hobgoblin phalanxes, [url=https://www.enworld.org/threads/wizard-pc-dies-returns-as-invoker.324018/]one of them died[/url]. The point of the minions, and the swarms (phalanxes), is not to "give the players a win". It is to accurately represent the fantastic fiction. [/QUOTE]

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