What's the Problem with Save-or-Die?

[ExploderWizard]

This I don't agree with. It's not a good test of player skill because the player doesn't get an opportunity to make a decision. Decision-making points, opportunities to make the right or wrong choice, the more the better, are precisely what you want for gamist (ie player skill testing) play. In the 1e DMG, Gary argues against critical hits for precisely this reason. Imo any argument against critical hits applies equally to SoD.

It all depends on where you define the decision making process to begin. If you are referring to the time after initiative is rolled, then the excrement has already hit the fan and its time to act. I agree that critical hits should be dumped. While I like swingy combat, criticals shouldn't be needed if hit point bloat is kept under control.

 

[Hussar]

I guess my question would be, do we need monsters/challenges that should only be used if telegraphed? Isn't that kinda limited? I don't have to telegraph most creatures after all - it can be assumed that there are dangerous critters in yon abandoned dwarf mine, but, I don't specifically need to tell the PC's, "Hey, be careful of orcs".

IMO, having "telegraph monsters" is sort of like having "good" monsters - yeah, it fills up the monster manual, but, I'm not entirely convinced that it's good game design. OTOH, it might be interesting to have a specific Monster Manual full of these kinds of monsters - the Aha Gotcha Monster, the Will Likely Talk to You Monster, and the Should Be Signposted Monster.

I'd rather the critters in the core books were more broadly applicable.

 

[Libramarian]

There's some tension between the gotcha monster and player skill testing, but the idea of testing player skill doesn't necessarily preclude the first test as being unfair.

That is to say, a newbie couldn't be expected to prepare for a random or seemingly random medusa encounter the first time, but thereafter you can expect them to learn something from it.

I certainly prefer SoD type punishments to be used judiciously and almost never without some kind of warning that someone completely new to D&D could be expected to be able to parse.

But the idea of requiring game experience to be able to interpret certain warnings is not entirely incompatible with player skill-testing gamism as such. It's just a step removed.

*I feel an analogy forming*

It's like ice hockey vs. soccer.

Anybody can play soccer.

Hockey requires a player to have a certain skill for them to be at all effective whatsoever. Namely, how to skate. If you toss random people into an ice rink with sticks and pucks, it's not a fair competition until they learn how to skate in there.

The soccer field is the sane dungeon, the ice rink is the more gotcha/arbitrary dungeon.

 

[Hussar]

That is to say, a newbie couldn't be expected to prepare for a random or seemingly random medusa encounter the first time, but thereafter you can expect them to learn something from it.

That, however, gets back to a playstyle thing. Sure, the player knows how to deal with a medusa after the first time, but, the new character shouldn't. Some people get very antsy about mixing player knowledge that the character realistically couldn't have. It breaks immersion for some play styles.

Of course, there's the flip side as well. Why wouldn't my character know how to recognize the signs of a medusa in the neighbourhood, even if I, the player, don't? How much knowledge should the character be assumed to have?