Whoa. 4e is hard on PC mortality rates.

[Nifft]

I don't know, Nifft... I've run the three or four preliminary encounters of KotS for three different groups. With all three groups, thus far, I've had at least one moment in which half or more of the group was knocked out and dying all at once, and had two deaths. Irontooth wasn't th cause of any of them... In fact, Irontooth never lasted more than two or three rounds, once he showed his face.

Wow, exactly the opposite of my experiences! I guess different groups have different strengths. (There should be at least one other Irontooth TPK thread around here... maybe a poll even...)

Cheers, -- N

 

[Scribble]

I've said it before, but the Irontooth scenario is nasty because it's effectively 2 encounters in one.

Take my group: They foight the outside Kobolds, and hen said, "That was a LOT of kobolds... can't be THAT many left in there right?" at which point they ran through the waterfall and found a group waiting for them. (the slinger managed to get into the cave and sound the alarm...)

They didn't ahbve the 5 minute break benefit, so they were down a few powers.

They ended up slugging it out into what would have been a TPK, but Imade the executive descision, since it was an early fight and we were all still learning the new rules, to basically drop all tactics for the kobolds, and have Irontooth run away at the last moment.

They ended up pulling through with only 1 player standing, the rest trying to stay alive with saves.

I didn't give them as much XP as they would have gotten in a fair fight, and let them know they got lucky, but they better start thinking more about their actions.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

The worst part is, these are problems that would have been relatively easy to fix. There are a lot of good ideas in 4e; it is the execution of those ideas that is problematic. In that same thread, for example, Mustrum_Ridicully (sp?) offered some great ideas on how WotC could approach the material to much better effect. If he (and several others on EN World) had been the driving force behind 4e, the odds are I'd be playing it right now.

RC

Funny, I've just brought up our long per-encounter discussion in another thread. Do you still remember the name? I tried searching for it, but couldn't find it, but my memory is sketchy on the name...

Wow, I had some good ideas there? I wonder if they could still be applied...

(For spelling, see the left of this post or my signature It's also funny that I accidentally misspelled your name in the other thread as Raven Crowkring - I knew better, but my keyboard didn't agree)

 

[Wisdom Penalty]

Just give the minions a 'save vs. death'. You'll get some that last two or three rounds and avoid having to track the hit points.

I actually think that's a fantastic idea. Not all minions, certainly, but it couldn't hurt to make a couple minions into super-minions per this advice. Would it change the encounter much? Probably not.

But it would, I dare say, help combat player metagaming when it comes to minion vs. non-minion.

Injecting super-minions into an encounter: $3.00
Having said super-minions survive a blast: $5.00
Seeing looks on metagamey players' faces: Priceless.

Take this with a grain of salt, as I already seed a couple non-minions in with their minion counterparts (if the monster descriptions are relatively similar, including equipment carried). I know some DMs are against this, per an earlier thread on the topic.

Wis

 

[hamishspence]

Elite template

minion Always Destroyed bit is only in back of book. In monster statblock it simply says 1 hp. Fisrt rule that Always Destroyed only applies when minion has 1 hp.

Then apply an elite template from DMG: result: one descidedly scarier minion. Add in the fact that it still ignores damage from powers with have missed and have a Miss tag, and the minion becomes very nasty.

 

[Pbartender]

Wow, exactly the opposite of my experiences! I guess different groups have different strengths. (There should be at least one other Irontooth TPK thread around here... maybe a poll even...)

I think what might have made the difference was that Irontooth was obviously a big bad guy and the leader. For the groups I was running, at least, it was clear that he was a big treat threat the moment he stepped into the room, and especially so after he made his first attack... So, the they always ended up ganging up on him, and taking him down as fast as possible.

What was more difficult for the players was differentiating between the minions and the other bad guys who weren't BBEGs, but also weren't minions. Very often, players would end up over-killing a minion with an encounter power, when it would have better used on a non-minion.

It's just something they need to relearn... the whole monster system has their threat evaluation parameters thrown off kilter.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

But it would, I dare say, help combat player metagaming when it comes to minion vs. non-minion.

Yeah, one of the downsides to the new monster-style (which I generally like a lot) is that it reverts back to the old school 'memorize the MM' tactic in some ways.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Funny, I've just brought up our long per-encounter discussion in another thread. Do you still remember the name? I tried searching for it, but couldn't find it, but my memory is sketchy on the name...

I'm sure it's still in my subscriptions, and will try to locate it in a day or two when I have more time.

Wow, I had some good ideas there? I wonder if they could still be applied...

You had some great ideas.....Unfortunately, not only did I thinkt then that there was no evidence that WotC was leaning toward your ideas, but the release proved it to be so.

You weren't alone in having some fantastic ideas, either.

And, even using your (and others') ideas on that thread, it doesn't eliminate the idea that because you have resources X on almost any encounter, an encounter must be balanced to resources X or be a pushover (X-Y) or very deadly (X+Y). When the range of X is greater, so too is the range of encounters that can challenge without being too deadly. Moreover, the attrition-based model of all previous editions allows any encounter that can cause attrition to X to pose a challenge, even if it is unlikely in itself to be a deadly encounter.

I am not sure how one would fix this problem within the framework of 4e, without massively rewriting it. It seems clear to me that the designers of 4e failed to understand the root causes of the problems they sought to fix, whereas you (and others) did not. I tend to think that the "shiny" will wear off of 4e sooner than previous editions as a result, and 5e will appear much sooner than some might expect.

Of course, I could be wrong. (Shrug) Time will tell.

(For spelling, see the left of this post or my signature It's also funny that I accidentally misspelled your name in the other thread as Raven Crowkring - I knew better, but my keyboard didn't agree)

I've seen worse.

RC

 

[frankthedm]

IIRC wotc said the 4E HP system was designed so a losing side can realize they are losing and have enough time to retreat rather than 3.5's

Round One: "Finally a worthy foe!"
Round Two: "Man Down!"
Round Three: TPK!

 

[Kesh]

Irontooth was a rough encounter for my group. We did rest after cleaning up the kobolds outside, but once we moved behind the waterfall my wizard flubbed his burning hands roll. Completely missed four kobolds. We were still mopping up the first group when Irontooth came out, so we had to deal with more than just his two support kobolds.

We finally took him down with two PCs dying and the rest of us bloodied.