Which rules do you tend to forget or flub?

[Spenser]

Ok, my group is going to run our very first 4e session this Saturday morning. D&D and eggs and bacon... mmmm, bacon.

None of us have played much over the last three years, but we're all keenly interested in trying out the new rules. All we're going to do this first session is run a couple of straight up arena fights with the pregen PCs vs. some monsters, just to kick the tires of the combat system. I'll be the one playing the monsters. I've asked everyone to read through Verys Arkon's *outstanding* rules compilation before we begin. (WotC should give that guy a medal.) And I'll be reading and re-reading the PDF too.

But the thing is, my head is still entrenched firmly in 3.x, and I know that I will forget stuff or screw up the rules. Now that's all well and good, mistakes happen and that's the kind of the point of this test session, to work out some bugs before we start a real campaign. My question is for those of you who have already run a session -- what were the most common combat rules that *you* messed up? Or that were just general points of confusion? If any patterns start showing up, I would love to know about them so that I can study up on those particular sections. Finally, I'll take any random advice about "running your first 4e combat session" that you have to offer. Thanks!

 

[deathdonut]

Charging was probably the biggest point of confusion for my players and I. We had to reread it a couple times during the game. It's not that the rules are extremely complicated, it's just that they're very different from previous versions.

Make sure they're aware of new ranged attack rules (firing into melee, no cover from allies, etc) and the (no)tumbling/OA rules.

 

[Stalker0]

As a dm the hardest thing for me was marking. Not my players marking abilities, those were fine, it was the monsters that I had trouble remembering their marking.

 

[TheLordWinter]

I had trouble remember that Reach doesn't threaten anymore, unless it specifically states it does.

 

[DreamChaser]

I've been running a game on average once every other week for the whole of 3e and playing the other week for pretty much that whole time as well...on Tuesday, I was running a hill giant against my party and I actually had to look up Overrun...i had never in 8 years used it (or if I had, I've forgotten). Once I started reading the ability, I immediately disregarded the whole description and flubbed it.

Weird how some things just don't come up. Hopefully this is more intuitive now.

DC

 

[OchreJelly]

I've been running a game on average once every other week for the whole of 3e and playing the other week for pretty much that whole time as well...on Tuesday, I was running a hill giant against my party and I actually had to look up Overrun...i had never in 8 years used it (or if I had, I've forgotten). Once I started reading the ability, I immediately disregarded the whole description and flubbed it.

Weird how some things just don't come up. Hopefully this is more intuitive now.

DC

For the eight years I've been playing 3x, the players regularly use grapple and just about every time there's an aspect of it that requires a rules check. Just this week it was how to resolve a tie on the grapple check because no one could remember.

And I don't think we're dummies either Part of the forgetfulness comes with our inconsistent use of the rule, because sometimes we flub it to just move on. All those inconsistencies vie against any kind of rules mastery. If you have ever heard this question at a table "how did we handle it last time?" you will probably know what I'm talking about

 

[Moon-Lancer]

when a monster uses improved grab, and its still grappling on its next turn when its ready to do a full attack, my head explodes. I have never been able to find a clear rule on how many attacks a creature gets with more natural weapons then their iterative.

 

[Kordeth]

Somethink I've seen trip a lot of people up in playtest reports is the difference between the fighter's Combat Challenge and Combat Superiority.

Combat Superiority[/i] says that if the fighter makes a successful opportunity attack against a moving foe, that foe stops moving. Shifting doesn't provoke OAs.

Combat Challenge[/i] allows the fighter to make a free basic attack against an enemy who shifts. This is not an OA, so Combat Superiority doesn't apply and even if the attack hits the enemy shifts away.

 

[Ruined]

First session, I found it difficult to remember to mark monsters when they became Bloodied. It was a little easier the second time around, but I still caught myself forgetting.

 

[FadedC]

I've been running a game on average once every other week for the whole of 3e and playing the other week for pretty much that whole time as well...on Tuesday, I was running a hill giant against my party and I actually had to look up Overrun...i had never in 8 years used it (or if I had, I've forgotten). Once I started reading the ability, I immediately disregarded the whole description and flubbed it.

Weird how some things just don't come up. Hopefully this is more intuitive now.

DC

Overrun is pretty obscure but I can deal with monsters who use it. But I personally refuse to use any monster that has an ability requiring me to look up weather in the DMG.