D&D General Why is D&D 4E a "tactical" game?

[Mordhau]

It's only really even feasible with Feats. I cannot imagine trying it without things like Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter. Even a Barb's resistance would start to run into problems when you are likely get hit 3-4 times a turn.

Yeah. But it's noticeable even in situations where you're only outnumbered 2 to 1. At that point it's already starting to become obvious that the casters have a lot more to contribute than you do.

 

[Yora]

I refer to 4th edition as a tactical skirmish game because I believe that doesn't sound as insulting to people who actually like it, while still expressing that it has zero appeal to me and does not provide what I want from an RPG.

 

[pemerton]

what kind of ladders does paragon-city use? Or doors? Or locks? Are they glowing magicky alloys with interdimensional qualities because the folks are all of a certain level?

To me, this question suggests a radical failure to understand the tiers of play in 4e D&D, and how these relate to the action resolution system.

From the PHB (pp 28-29; there is similar text in the DMG, p 146):

In the paragon tier, your character is a shining example of heroism, set well apart from the masses. Your class still largely determines your capabilities. In addition, you gain extra abilities in your specialty: your paragon path. When you reach 11th level, you choose a path of specialization, a course that defines who you are within a certain narrow range of criteria. You are able to travel more quickly from place to place, perhaps on a hippogriff mount or using a spell to grant your party flight. In combat, you might fly or even teleport short distances. Death becomes a surmountable obstacle, and the fate of a nation or even the world might hang in the balance as you undertake momentous quests. You navigate uncharted regions and explore long-forgotten dungeons, where you can expect to fight sneaky drow, savage giants, ferocious hydras, fearless golems, rampaging barbarian hordes, bloodthirsty vampires, and crafty mind flayers. When you face a dragon, it is a powerful adult who has established a lair and found its place in the world.​

There is no such thing as a "paragon city" that uses ladders that are an obstacle to anyone. There are cities of drow and mind flayers: in AD&D these NPCs frequently relied on levitation, in 4e not so much, but I still don't think climbing ladders is going to be a big thing in one of these cities. Drow locks can be expected to be Lolth/web-inspired puzzles, while mind flayer locks would (I imagine) be psionic devices of some sort.

 

[pemerton]

I always felt like the escalation approach is a bit of a crutch, game-design-wise at least, lol.

I used it once, when the PCs fought Torog after having destroyed his Soul Abattoir. In the fiction, it represented his decline in power as his soul energy ebbed. In system terms, it gave the players a chance against a solo about 8 levels higher than their PCs. Though in the end it was mostly zone/auto-damage that won the encounter for them.

As with all other 4e monsters, but Solos doubly so, MM3-grade redesigns are a HUGE improvement overall.

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So, for instance, the MV Young Black Dragon gets Shroud of Gloom instead of the darkness.

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Its still a fairly potent AoE, but not a showstopper in terms of slowing the action down too much.

I used a young black dragon when the PCs were around 4th level - original MM version. It wasn't the horror show some have described it as. Admittedly one the PC wizard was using his Arcana combined with a statue of the Summer Queen he had taken from some gnomes that had stolen it from some elves to dispel the dragon's darkness! (Cue someone posting how rigid 4e is, and how my group was playing it wrong!)

 

[Jacob Lewis]

To me, this question suggests a radical failure to understand the tiers of play in 4e D&D, and how these relate to the action resolution system.

And here we come to the crux of this entire debacle of a thread.

Someone suggests the ladder theory as a legitimate reason why they can't handle 4e's philosophy of play. I think it's a weak argument, but I suggest another way to look at things just to see if anyone is either open to solutions or just resolute in their stance of opposition.

Lo and behold, it is the defenders of 4e who are now justifying the argument for them by exhibiting the same rigid adherence and linear thinking that stifles independent thinking. Kudos.

I have the same books and play the same games as everyone else. Or at least I thought I did until I learned that everyone seems more interested in making sure that everyone else is playing the exact same game, the exact same way as they are. Ya'll enjoy going through the motions of engaging your fellow gamers with the same tired arguments and quoting people who have never sat at your game table.

 

[Garthanos]

Thus you have to dig into the mid tier monsters and NPCs, and there lies the problem: most of these creatures are designed to be run as solo or pair enemies, with the complexity to match. Multiattack, auras, lots of spells, more complex special abilities; they get too much to function as easy-to-run mooks. The promise of simplicity falls apart, as I found out in my first high level 5e game (I was absolutely disappointed).

reminds me of my hope for 5e multiclassing the idea is so clean and allows transitioning in a fits the story elegant way but progression is crazy bumpy and a few levels in what seems a cool class can easily to be a nerf bat (and you can repeat that nerf in many places) it has a trap feel to me. The idea had promise and things like spell casting was actually not bad.

In addition, weaker enemies often don’t really provide a threat even in numbers because spells in 5e, and both spells and strikes in PF2 thanks to its crit rules, demolish masses of weaker creatures almost automatically.

There was a promise I read that martial types would be able to do some of that demolishing.. but the hoard breaking role was a fighter element no more.

4e minions work better in practice because they have attacks and defenses relative to the PCs’ capabilities; you can’t automatically wipe out seven minions with fireball, and the minions’ attacks can very much deal a bit of damage. Both approaches have pros and cons, but the 4e version does provide the best gameplay results.

Paying attention to the purpose and role of story and actual effect of game elements has that benefit.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I do like the relative simplicity of how 5e and PF2 handle minions or mooks, in that you use creatures of a much lower CR/level, no need to find or create minions. In practice though this seems to only work from lowish to mid levels. Goblins and wolves and cultists are simple enemies in 5e and PF2, so if you add them in bulk to an encounter, they’re fairly easy and quick to run. However, when you want minions in a higher level game, these weak monsters no longer provide any threat at all, especially in PF2 where AC and saves go up with level. Thus you have to dig into the mid tier monsters and NPCs, and there lies the problem: most of these creatures are designed to be run as solo or pair enemies, with the complexity to match. Multiattack, auras, lots of spells, more complex special abilities; they get too much to function as easy-to-run mooks. The promise of simplicity falls apart, as I found out in my first high level 5e game (I was absolutely disappointed).

In addition, weaker enemies often don’t really provide a threat even in numbers because spells in 5e, and both spells and strikes in PF2 thanks to its crit rules, demolish masses of weaker creatures almost automatically. 4e minions work better in practice because they have attacks and defenses relative to the PCs’ capabilities; you can’t automatically wipe out seven minions with fireball, and the minions’ attacks can very much deal a bit of damage. Both approaches have pros and cons, but the 4e version does provide the best gameplay results.

Agreed. Just using lots of weak creatures as mooks sounds 'simple' in principle, but in practice it isn't nearly as simple as minions. I can literally just drop a spare d6 here and there on the battlemat and that's all the info there is to know about a minion, it has no state at all (unless it gets some condition, but that's pretty rare). You can certainly ignore the hit points of very weak creatures and just think of them as 'alive' or 'dead' in any edition, but then you've got minions! That's all they are folks! Just an official acknowledgement of what is obvious, that a weak enough monster will be instaganked if it gets hit solidly. Think no more of it than that, now what exactly was it you were objecting to?

 

[Mannahnin]

Agreed. Just using lots of weak creatures as mooks sounds 'simple' in principle, but in practice it isn't nearly as simple as minions. I can literally just drop a spare d6 here and there on the battlemat and that's all the info there is to know about a minion, it has no state at all (unless it gets some condition, but that's pretty rare). You can certainly ignore the hit points of very weak creatures and just think of them as 'alive' or 'dead' in any edition, but then you've got minions! That's all they are folks! Just an official acknowledgement of what is obvious, that a weak enough monster will be instaganked if it gets hit solidly. Think no more of it than that, now what exactly was it you were objecting to?

I remember one of our 3.x DMs running a big battle with a horde of lesser undead, when we were playing relatively high level characters. The HP tracking just sucked. Zombies, sometimes even skeletons weren't necessarily one hit kills, depending on who was attacking with what. When 4E came out and had Minions our group collectively slapped ourselves on the foreheads.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It's only really even feasible with Feats. I cannot imagine trying it without things like Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter. Even a Barb's resistance would start to run into problems when you are likely get hit 3-4 times a turn.

My 5e dual-weapon battlemaster was not too bad here. He drank a potion of growth and then waded into a whole slew of gnolls. I think he managed to kill a good number of them in a couple rounds by carefully selecting maneuvers that gave extra attacks (Riposte I think is the goto there). That got me up to 5 or 6 attacks per round. It took a LONG time to play out though!

What 4e is aimed at is PACING. Its monster design makes sense if you think of it more in terms of 'dramatic weight' than anything else. That elite is the guy most of the scene is spent on. That's the big muscly guy that Jackie has to keep dodging and feinting against, that finally knocks him around a bit, and THEN goes down, after he gets his full 2 minutes. Solo is the end boss of course, the one that WAVES AWAY all his minions and comes for you, lol. That one gets a full 5 minutes!

Read DMG1, it TELLS YOU THIS if you read all the different parts and look at it holistically. Skip to the fun part, say yes and..., its all meant to generate drama and all the combat rules do that. The monsters get to unleash their one shtick on turn 1, the PCs are on the ropes! Round 2, the cleric heals the fighter, the Rogue leaps into the fray and unleashes Blinding Barrage, action point! Stabby stabby all the enemies around him that are now BLIND (I forget the power, its an Encounter power). The wizard lets off his encounter power, and the ranger unleashes his too. Round 3 its a grubby fight, but the PCs have fought back, the monsters try ploy #2, but they just cannot get over the hump, PCs bring in more healing, finish off half the monsters, and now its Round 4. Now the monsters try whatever it is they have left, but it is too little, too late, and by round 5 its all over. AND IT WORKS!

The most common problem is simply GMs that haven't really read the books and think they're playing AD&D and drop 5 orcs in a 20x40 room and think this will be a good stiff fight. Then they are all bored because everyone clusters around the door and nothing happens.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

To me, this question suggests a radical failure to understand the tiers of play in 4e D&D, and how these relate to the action resolution system.

From the PHB (pp 28-29; there is similar text in the DMG, p 146):

In the paragon tier, your character is a shining example of heroism, set well apart from the masses. Your class still largely determines your capabilities. In addition, you gain extra abilities in your specialty: your paragon path. When you reach 11th level, you choose a path of specialization, a course that defines who you are within a certain narrow range of criteria. You are able to travel more quickly from place to place, perhaps on a hippogriff mount or using a spell to grant your party flight. In combat, you might fly or even teleport short distances. Death becomes a surmountable obstacle, and the fate of a nation or even the world might hang in the balance as you undertake momentous quests. You navigate uncharted regions and explore long-forgotten dungeons, where you can expect to fight sneaky drow, savage giants, ferocious hydras, fearless golems, rampaging barbarian hordes, bloodthirsty vampires, and crafty mind flayers. When you face a dragon, it is a powerful adult who has established a lair and found its place in the world.​

There is no such thing as a "paragon city" that uses ladders that are an obstacle to anyone. There are cities of drow and mind flayers: in AD&D these NPCs frequently relied on levitation, in 4e not so much, but I still don't think climbing ladders is going to be a big thing in one of these cities. Drow locks can be expected to be Lolth/web-inspired puzzles, while mind flayer locks would (I imagine) be psionic devices of some sort.

I would say that the most 'mundane' paragon tier 'city' is probably Sigil, or maybe Gloomwrought. The City of Brass never got a really detailed workup in 4e, but I think you could consider it to also be a paragon tier urban location. I suppose something like Hestavar might also count, along with other various locations in the God's astral domains. Some of these places certainly have elements similar to what you're responding to, but they are still QUITE fantastic and lack much mundane character. Certainly, in play, the PCs will spend basically almost zero time dawdling about the less interesting areas. If there are mundane doors there is certainly nothing behind them to attract a paragon PC, they're mere incidental terrain at best. You're in SIGIL, you MIGHT hang out in a bar or something for a scene or two, but by scene 3 latest you're headed for a portal.