Why I don't play D&D anymore

[marune]

Breaking point as far as what? Did you try running a "politics" oriented game with the 13th level psion, or were the problems just about balanced encounters? What are some examples of encounters that you tried, and what were your expectations? IME a single encounter/day has to be about a CR = party level +4 to make a dent.

There's still no guarrantee that 3E is the right game, but it would be interesting to see if there are some tweaks that you could use with encounters that would make it more palatable. My own experience has shown me that minor tweaks can sometimes have a big effect on how an encounter goes, and they don't always have to change the fundemental nature of the encounter.

The psion was a breaking point because she was always augmenting her powers* and doing so, she was over shining many of the other characters, not only the wizard. In fact, for the wizard, is was not the better DCs of anything, but the fact that a Psion can repeat the same power over and over, but that's not related to the topic.

Problem is, outside "dungeon controled environment", there isn't many place to face 4 encounters a day, that's what my OP is all about.

*Because she knows that there was in general only one big encounter during a given day.

 

[DestroyYouAlot]

You mention dungeon crawls... actually I do not think that dungeon crawls and 4/day goes well together at all!!!! Have you ever seen a movie where the characters explore 2 rooms, then retreat, come back next day, two more rooms, retreat again, etc....? That's a terribly tedious and unrealistic way to run a dungeon crawl.

If I want to run a dungeon crawl, the characters need to be able to start and finish it in the same day, just as would real characters do. Hence it's either gonna have lots of low-EL combats or be quite a scarcely populated dungeon.

This is a very interesting and well-thought out design point. I'm going to have to think on this one.

 

[Mark CMG]

Combat or not, it's the abilities (including stats, skills, magic items, etc.) that give options to characters. And these abilities are "distributed" according to an average enc. day

And? I don't see this as problematic in regard to the goal you expressed in your original post. Also, this advancement regimen is not irreversibly tied to the idea of game balance. You could make some adjustments to the advancement regimen if it were so. You can certainly have any number of advancement systems in games with no real grasp or adherence to game balance. Psionics, too, is a separate issue.

Personally, I have run adventures and campaigns with the same type of flavor and encounters you suggest in the first post as being the ones on which you wish your games to hinge. Honestly, I do not think you have actually identified the problem and are only pointing at symptoms of it. You do seem to have some other issues with the game system as it is written but none of them are an actual hindrance to the type of game you espouse as your goal.

 

[Mark CMG]

The psion was a breaking point because she was always augmenting her powers* and doing so, she was over shining many of the other characters, not only the wizard. In fact, for the wizard, is was not the better DCs of anything, but the fact that a Psion can repeat the same power over and over, but that's not related to the topic.

Problem is, outside "dungeon controled environment", there isn't many place to face 4 encounters a day, that's what my OP is all about.

*Because she knows that there was in general only one big encounter during a given day.

You mean one big combat encounter, here, right? You're real problem might be one of how you pace your games and what you point up as worthwhile to explore.

 

[marune]

You mean one big combat encounter, here, right? You're real problem might be one of how you pace your games and what you point up as worthwhile to explore.

I define Encounter as every interactions that is not purely "color" like chatting with NPCs or acting some discussions between the PCs.

So Bluffing past a guard, dealing with a natural hazard or a trap, doing some Diplomacy with the local lord and of course fighting are all encounters.

 

[Mark CMG]

Encounter = every interactions that is not purely "color", like chatting with NPCs or acting some discussions between the PCs.

Then it is very likely that the problem stems from the pacing of the game and how the environment is presented. As an example, if the PCs wake up in the morning and know that there are five NPCs to which they have to talk to "gather information" or "retrieve items" for some purpose, and all of those NPCs are leaving town for foreign parts in various directions before sundown, that's five encounters right there, no matter what form that interaction takes.

 

[marune]

Then it is very likely that the problem stems from the pacing of the game and how the environment is presented. As an example, if the PCs wake up in the morning and know that there are five NPCs to which they have to talk to "gather information" or "retrieve items" for some purpose, and all of those NPCs are leaving town for foreign parts in various directions before sundown, that's five encounters right there, no matter what form that interaction takes.

To summerize it, no dice rolled means no encounter. (In some cases, take 10-20 can replace dices).

You can act all the night a chat with the local innkeeper, that is not a encounter in game terms.

 

[Mark CMG]

To summerize it, no dice rolled means no encounter. (In some cases, take 10-20 can replace dices).

You can act all the night a chat with the local innkeeper, that is not a encounter in game terms.

It can be. Depends on the outcome.

 

[marune]

It can be. Depends on the outcome.

There is no challenge overcame, no ressources used, what outcome has to do with it ? (I'm not saying that acting some chat with the innkeeper isn't a interesting thing to do!)

 

[Henry]

In this particular case, it would actually be justified in house-ruling Psions to only 50% of their power points in-game, and spellcasters to fewer spells per level, if only one big encounter is expected per day. It would definitely make players think about their resource allocations. If I were a spellcaster in such a game, I'd be throwing out my 7th level spells first, followed by the 6th levels, followed by the 5th levels, etc. because there's no need to conserve anyway, regardless of your class.

On the other hand, if you change it up every now again with those urgent "five encounter" days, then it gives them reason to think -- "SHOULD I conserve? Am I screwing myself by not conserving?"