Why is it so important?

[Raven Crowking]

Could you possibly link to that? I'm approaching exam block crunch-time and admittedly haven't managed to read through the whole thread. I'd be interested in what you have to say.

I'll have to go back and find it.

Re: "Shine", it is interesting (to me at least) that several of the 4e design blogs include the idea of "shine" re: 3.x. As in "This seemed like a good idea, but in play we eventually realized that it was not." Enthusiasm can gloss over a multitude of faults.

RC


EDIT: Here you go: http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=3759744&postcount=502

 

[Jackelope King]

I'll have to go back and find it.

Re: "Shine", it is interesting (to me at least) that several of the 4e design blogs include the idea of "shine" re: 3.x. As in "This seemed like a good idea, but in play we eventually realized that it was not." Enthusiasm can gloss over a multitude of faults.

RC


EDIT: Here you go: http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=3759744&postcount=502

Thanks! I'll read it over.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Thanks! I'll read it over.

Thanks! Because, if my reasoning breaks down, I'd like to know where.

(Seriously, not snark; I'd prefer that my conclusions be wrong in this case.)

 

[gizmo33]

The per-day time-frame is easy to escape, even in D&D (rope trick, the mansion/house spells, teleport, plane shift, etc. etc.), and in my experience, roughly on par (if maybe slightly more difficult) with running away from a fight.

You can't escape the per day time frame any spell short of temporal stasis. What you're talking about is not escaping the time frame, but instead avoiding conflict. The significant difference here is that enemies can move around, sacrifice captives, etc. significantly easier than in a time frame that is dictated substantially by player actions.

Deciding how to spend your action is probably the most essential bit of resource management in the game.

That's like saying avoiding AoOs is an issue of resource management. I don't think we're using the terms in the same way now.

So if you can only pitch 1 fireball in a fight, the decision still remains of when you're going to do it in the fight.

This is hardly a decision IME most monsters are vulnerable to most spells - and when they're not their immunities don't change from round to round (a devil is just as immune to fire on round 1 than on round 100). So consequently, IME spells typically get cast in order of most powerful to least powerful, this is not a very difficult assessment to make, and the only mitigating factor is the consequence that this will have later in the day when the spell is no longer available.

You said it yourself. The CR system predicts 4/day.

I must have forgot the rest of the statement. In any case CR is an approximation of monster level and I don't see anything fundemental that mandates that you match CR with party level. Nor have you provided any.

Yes, you can increase the EL of an encounter and it becomes a 2-encounter day, but what if I wanted it to still be a 4-encounter day?

You could invent a new branch of mathematics and logic? Seriously - if CR means what it means then how are you going to get around this? If you design a system where the PCs can fight 6 encounters a day, then clearly 18 encounters of the same strength is going to kill them right? Unless you remove all daily resource issues, in which case there is no difference between 2 and 2,000 encounters.

Or what if I just want to have a string of tiny fights? And the way that resources are spread, any deviation from the predicted 4/day (adjusted for difficulty) tends to favor one group over another, and risk overwhelming the PCs.

If you want a string of tiny fights then run them. I really don't see what the problem is. You can get many EL 1 fights in if the party is 4th level. There you go.

"What if I want to have 4 tougher-than-average encounters in a day?"

Well then "average" becomes meaningless. Average what? In 3E it mean an average utilization of daily resources (25%). In your case what would it mean? An average chance of PC death? What IS the average change? Define all this and I think it makes more sense than it currently does. Otherwise I just don't follow you.

Why would I design an adversary for the PCs who wasn't tough enough? This is something of a straw-man.

You asked the mirror image question of what happens if a dungeon doesn't contain enough encounters (in a resource managment sense) to challenge the PCs? Why isn't this equally a strawman? How is a premise a strawman anyway? A strawman is a situation with misleading connotations, but a clear statement of the premise without misleading connotations is not a strawman if it doesn't purport to establish anything other than what it is clearly intended to.

That's fine. I like to add more to my games in terms of character development and worldbuilding. The rules should always facilitate that and shouldn't get in the way.

It's a matter of priorities. Remove all random number generation from your game. Making a series of bad rolls that lead to character death or the destruction of a campaign element that the DM doesn't want destroyed is "getting in the way" of the things you described. Random resolution of events is/was a core part of the basic DnD game, and turning into a story telling game should at least be made explicit.

if the players think it would be more fun to storm the dungeon after they stumble upon it while clearing out a goblin camp, they may be forced to decide that, nah, they'd better rest first.

This is a matter of play-style. My players might stumble upon an armory full of weapons and think about how much fun it would be to sprout 4 extra arms and weild all the weapons that they find. My players might wake up one morning and decide how much fun it would be to have their novice characters challenge and kill Thor. This migrating, player-centric definition of "fun" is one that my players have not been clamoring for. If the rule system establishes limited daily resources then it's simply a matter of managing those things. It may be fun to do whatever you feel like whenever you feel like, but that ultimately becomes meaningless if it's the only criteria for deciding what happens in the game.

Under a per-encounter system, they might be tired and a little hurt, but there's no artificial "But the wizard already wasted his fireball!"

That's no artificial, it's a clearly established part of the game. It's not artificial to not be able to climb Mount Everest because some dragon bit your leg off - no matter how much you *want* to.

So getting back to the original point, how does a per-encounter system better enable this? Because at the end of a long, brutal mission, if the PCs were to discover something that really spurs them on, a hook that they absolutely want to pursue right now, how lame is it for one of them to pipe up and say, "Yeah, I know saving the princess has been your dream and all, but can we wait a day? I don't have any fireballs left."

Then there's no such thing as a "long and brutal" mission. There is no tangible reason to use those words if the PCs current operating state is *indistinguishable* one minute after the so-called "long and brutal mission" from that of a cakewalk. Though I suppose you might wear down the *players*, but that's a different situation entirely.

I do when I play in True20.

Oh! Those fatigue rules. I don't know anything about them, I assumed you were talking about 3.5E.

Works pretty well, all things considered.

Perhaps, but I would be loathe to mix and match True20 fatigue rules with 4E casting rules. Such a thing IMO has virtually no chance of being correctly balanced in such a complicated situation as RPG spell casting.

 

[Merlion]

Well then tell wizard's that they can shoot their crossbow 3 times/encounter. That, presumably, will solve the problem then. Parties won't camp because the wizard still has 3 shots with his crossbow ready for next encounter? As I've said often, I don't think simply saying there will be per-encounter resources is enough to say that 4E won't have this problem. The nature of the per-encounter resources, their relative power to the daily resources, will have an effect on the 9:00-9:15 problem.

For those who are bothered by it, the 9-915 is more of a conceptual problem, brought about by the mechanics. Its not just having something to do, its having something remotely wizard like to do.

Also, I correct myself...the combination of per encounter and at will abilities is what will solve that, for wizards. I cant say much about other classes, since I have less of a feel for what their abilities will be like.

 

[WhimsyTheFae]

OK, I will try this one more time, because obviously I am not being very clear in what I am trying to say.

Imagine that you have a power A. Doesn't matter what it is. It could be any combination of things, or a single thing, or whathaveyou. What it means, though, is that there is a class of encounters that you can always win, and you can always use power A in those encounters.

Let's call that class of encounters Class 4 encounters, for the sake of the analogy.

There are other types of encounters. In those encounters, your power A can help you, but it doesn't mean that you will automatically succeed.

You also have power B. Power B can be used only once, but using it will mean that you will automatically succeed in one Class 5 encounter. If you run into a Class 5 encounter without power B available, there is a 50% chance of success. If you run into a Class 6 encounter without power B available, there is only a 25% chance of success.

Now, you have two adventures. The first consists of several Class 4 encounters, at least 2 Class 5 encounters, and at least one Class 6 encounter. The second consists of 30 Class 4 encounters. You have been told the general makeup of these adventures upfront.

Here are the questions:

(1) On the first adventure, after a series of Class 4 encounters, you run into a Class 5 encounter and are forced to use your power B. You can rest without penalty. Resting will recharge power B. Do you do so? Why?

(2) Which adventure is liable to be more interesting? Why?

If you can answer those questions honestly, perhaps I can explain the difference between what I am thinking and what you are thinking.


RC

(1) I believe that most of my players would rest, because they would prefer to get power B back in their arsenal.

(2) Out of the two options provided, I believe that first one has the better chance of being more interesting.


I would like to see a third option, where you may have per-encounter or per-day abilities that will increase the odds of victory, but none that will guarantee victory. I don't know if that will be done...

 

[Jackelope King]

Thanks! Because, if my reasoning breaks down, I'd like to know where.

(Seriously, not snark; I'd prefer that my conclusions be wrong in this case.)

No snark detected, so no worries.

The only place where I see fault with your reasoning is that 1a doesn't necessarily follow 1.

To use a more concrete analogy, let's say our party is building a house. Each particular job (drawing the plans, errecting the frame, hanging drywall, wiring the house, insalling plumbing) is an encounter.

As you describe it, the contractor with the hammer and saw only utilizes "at-will" abilities (ignoring, as D&D does, little things like muscle fatigue). If he uses his hammer to hammer in one nail, he's still going to be able to do it again and again and again all day long, no matter how many nails there are.

Meanwhile, the contractor with the cordless power drill has more of a "per-day" ability. If he needs to hang drywall, he can put the screws in with ease with his cordless power drill, then just pop the drill into the recharger so he can use it the next day too. Once he's drained the battery, however, he can't use it for the rest of the day.

So let's give them an encounter. Let's say they have to build the kitchen (gross oversimplification, but for the purpose of this discussion, it works). The contractor with the old-fashioned tools goes ahead and tries to build the kitchen, and succeed or fail, at the end of the encounter, he can just carry his tools to the next room and build that room. Meanwhile, if the other contractor uses his power drill to build the kitchen, he won't be able to use it later when he has to build the master bedroom. Maybe the drill gets it done faster or easier, but the point is that after building the kitchen, he can't use it again until he pops it in the recharger overnight.

Now, you would argue that, were this a game, the system would do better to model itself based on the contractor with the power drill, because were it to instead model itself based on the other contractor, it would be less fun. Without the concept of attrition, there's no "risk" except for a binary "win=live OR lose=die" scenario. Attrition does allow you to have "win=live OR win1=live-25%resources OR win2=live-50% resources...winN=live-N%resources OR lose=die". I will not argue that, because it's very well supported.

What I will argue though, is something which I feel is being lost in this discussion. I believe that 1a does not necessarily follow 1. Look back at the encounter I described. Sure, there's no real chance that the contractors will die building the kitchen (they could, but it'd take an awful lot of natural 1s . They're going to walk out of the kitchen and onto the master bedroom, and then maybe the living room, etc. etc. The guy with the drill can only use it once, and he has to manage that resource well so that he can continue on building the house. But I believe you're missing the forest for the trees:

A kitchen still got built.

Prior to that encounter, the status of the "world" for these contractors was:
"2 Contractors
1 Cordless Power Drill
0 Kitchens"

After that encounter, it is:
"2 Contractors
1 or 0 Cordless Power Drills
1 or 0 Kitchens"

That's the goal of the encounter, isn't it? To build the kitchen? It's part of the overall goal to build the house. By engaging in this encounter to build the kitchen, they either succeed or fail, whether or not they suffer resource attrition. They attempt to change the state of their world as part of an overall goal (to build a house, in this case). More is changing than just the resources they have access to.

This is why I think it's inappropriate to simply handwave away "plot/story/in-character/etc. resources" as inconsequential to the discussion. The idea of a challenge is that it stands between you and your goal, and just overcoming it serves to change the game.

Even in a relatively simple dungeon-only world, this is an important element to consider. Even if I wasted no attrition-based resources killing the monsters in a room, if I took too long and was too loud, I might alert other monsters and compromise the goal. Or if I was smart and cleared out a "safe zone" in the dungeon, I'd have a staging ground that I could launch new sorties from. The context of an encounter changes based on how the PCs approach it, how they attempt to overcome it, and how successful they are. And this isn't necessarily about story-telling: it's about the world which the PCs are a part of going on logically.

So were I to revise your arguments, I would do them as follows:

(1) Every challenge in some way alters the resources which the PCs have access to.

(1a) Some challenges will force PCs to consume mechanical, personal resources.

(1ai) These challenges will cause the PCs to suffer attrition to their mechanical, personal resources in relation to how challenging they are between instances when the PCs can replenish their resources.

(1aii) These challenges will cause the PCs to suffer attrition to their mechanical, personal resources in relation to how numerous they are between instances when the PCs can replenish their resources.

(1aiii) The more challenges the PCs meet between instances when they can replenish their mechanical, personal resources tend to become more challenging based on how these resources were used prior.

(1b) Some challenges will enable PCs to gain or lose non-personal resources (position, clout, the element of surprise, etc.) which the PCs have no ability to replenish if lost other than to engage in a challenge to regain them.

(1bi) These challenges which cause the PCs to lose non-personal resources cause the PCs to face increased difficulties in subsequent challenges due to decreased access to non-personal resources.

(1bii) These challenges which cause the PCs to gain non-personal resources cause the PCs to face decreased difficulties in subsequent challenges due to increased access to non-personal resources.

(1biii) In general, non-personal resources are introduced by a party independent of the rules which govern the gain/loss/replenishing of personal resources.

Which leads me to conclude:

1. Except when taken in total isolation from every single other challenge, every challenge has the potential to positively or negatively affect the outcomes of subsequent encounters.

 

[Raven Crowking]

(2) Out of the two options provided, I believe that first one has the better chance of being more interesting.

You forgot to say why.

I would like to see a third option, where you may have per-encounter or per-day abilities that will increase the odds of victory, but none that will guarantee victory. I don't know if that will be done...

The more complex the example, the harder it is to get across the point. And, apparently, it is a hard point to get across. Better to start with a simple example, and then extrapolate from there to the more complex example.

RC

 

[Jackelope King]

You can't escape the per day time frame any spell short of temporal stasis. What you're talking about is not escaping the time frame, but instead avoiding conflict. The significant difference here is that enemies can move around, sacrifice captives, etc. significantly easier than in a time frame that is dictated substantially by player actions.

So you agree with me when I argue that there's more to an encounter than a binary "attrition?yes/no" setup, that the context of the encounter matters?

This is hardly a decision IME most monsters are vulnerable to most spells - and when they're not their immunities don't change from round to round (a devil is just as immune to fire on round 1 than on round 100). So consequently, IME spells typically get cast in order of most powerful to least powerful, this is not a very difficult assessment to make, and the only mitigating factor is the consequence that this will have later in the day when the spell is no longer available.

What about, as I described, fireballing the enemy when they're clustered together or spread apart?

I must have forgot the rest of the statement. In any case CR is an approximation of monster level and I don't see anything fundemental that mandates that you match CR with party level. Nor have you provided any.

You could invent a new branch of mathematics and logic? Seriously - if CR means what it means then how are you going to get around this? If you design a system where the PCs can fight 6 encounters a day, then clearly 18 encounters of the same strength is going to kill them right? Unless you remove all daily resource issues, in which case there is no difference between 2 and 2,000 encounters.

If you want a string of tiny fights then run them. I really don't see what the problem is. You can get many EL 1 fights in if the party is 4th level. There you go.

Well then "average" becomes meaningless. Average what? In 3E it mean an average utilization of daily resources (25%). In your case what would it mean? An average chance of PC death? What IS the average change? Define all this and I think it makes more sense than it currently does. Otherwise I just don't follow you.

How about this then:

An average encounter has a EL = the PCs' level. Simple definition.

The current system assumes 4 average encounters in one day.

If I send 5 average encounters against the PCs, this is considered to be tough.

If I send 4 challenging encounters (meaning, encounters where the EL > the PCs' level), this is considered to be tough. The game no longer supports 4 challenging encounters as well as it does 4 average encounters. The risk of TPK increases exponentially with each subsequent encounter, to the point where it's no longer to my tastes.

Why does it have to be this way? Why isn't it possible for the system to equally support a model that allows PCs to have a wide spectrum of challenges at different levels of difficulty numerous times each day? Why does adding one tough challenge mean that I must now have one fewer average challenges? Why doesn't the system support the possibility of multiple fights which leave the PCs drained of options and weakened at the end (moreso than they would in an average encounter)? Why does it arbitrarily limit how much the PCs can be challenged in a day to what the designers feel is appropriate?

It's a matter of priorities. Remove all random number generation from your game. Making a series of bad rolls that lead to character death or the destruction of a campaign element that the DM doesn't want destroyed is "getting in the way" of the things you described. Random resolution of events is/was a core part of the basic DnD game, and turning into a story telling game should at least be made explicit.

Where have I suggested removing random number generation?

This is a matter of play-style. My players might stumble upon an armory full of weapons and think about how much fun it would be to sprout 4 extra arms and weild all the weapons that they find. My players might wake up one morning and decide how much fun it would be to have their novice characters challenge and kill Thor. This migrating, player-centric definition of "fun" is one that my players have not been clamoring for. If the rule system establishes limited daily resources then it's simply a matter of managing those things. It may be fun to do whatever you feel like whenever you feel like, but that ultimately becomes meaningless if it's the only criteria for deciding what happens in the game.

That's no artificial, it's a clearly established part of the game. It's not artificial to not be able to climb Mount Everest because some dragon bit your leg off - no matter how much you *want* to.

You must have missed the part where I discussed the world reacting realistically to the PCs, and the players being forced to respond.

Then there's no such thing as a "long and brutal" mission. There is no tangible reason to use those words if the PCs current operating state is *indistinguishable* one minute after the so-called "long and brutal mission" from that of a cakewalk. Though I suppose you might wear down the *players*, but that's a different situation entirely.

So following your logic, so long as you're one day removed from any given encounter, then none of them were long and brutal, because the PCs current operating state is *indistinguishable* one day after the so-called "long and brutal mission" from that of a cakewalk.

Because guess what? Up until that very last round of long and brutal combat, under either encounter-based or daily-based, the PCs are going to be battered and bleeding just the same, with their options dwindling. The only difference is how long it takes before they're capable of moving on to the next part of the game. Under an encounter-based system, it takes less time, and a less-defined unit of time as well.

Oh! Those fatigue rules. I don't know anything about them, I assumed you were talking about 3.5E.

Perhaps, but I would be loathe to mix and match True20 fatigue rules with 4E casting rules. Such a thing IMO has virtually no chance of being correctly balanced in such a complicated situation as RPG spell casting.

Bah! No crunchy bits are immune to canibalization! Long live the OGL!

 

[Grog]

Now, you have two adventures. The first consists of several Class 4 encounters, at least 2 Class 5 encounters, and at least one Class 6 encounter. The second consists of 30 Class 4 encounters. You have been told the general makeup of these adventures upfront.

I have a couple of problems with your premise, here. The first is that no two encounters are exactly the same. Even if the party is facing exactly the same composition of enemies both times, and they have exactly the same resources going into the encounter, things like terrain, enemy tactics, and even sheer random luck can change things drastically from one encounter to the next.

Say you have a 5th level wizard fighting eight orcs. If the orcs simply charge toward him in a large group, he can throw a fireball and wipe them all out with one spell. It's easy.

But if four orcs are charging in from four different directions, and four more are shooting at the wizard with bows from different directions and a higher elevation, it's a very different situation. The wizard may still win, but it won't be a matter of just casting a fireball and walking away anymore.

So breaking up encounters into "classes" is not something I feel works very well. (I have the same problem with the 3E CR/EL system, actually).

And the second problem with your premise is that per-encounter powers are not auto-win powers. I haven't seen anyone anywhere claiming that per-encounter powers will allow the players to automatically win any class of encounter. Any example that uses that as a base assumption isn't a particularly useful one, in my opinion.

Outside of extreme disparities in the levels of the combatants, automatic wins are quite rare in D&D.