Why is it so important?

[IanArgent]

I'd be more worried about per-encounter resource balancing if, even if 3.5, most non-spellcasting abilities weren't essentially at-will. The game already has to deal with such things as Flurry of Blows, Whirlwind attack, and so so being at-will. It is only with organic spellcasting that this model is broken; and even so, if you cannot guarantee that there will be more than one encounter, spellcasting can be per-encounter ANYWAY.

That's been my stance from the beginning, and I think it's been at least one other person's stance. The only encounter guaranteed to happen is the one that is being run now. There is nothing the DM can do mechanically to prevent the 9-9:15 adventuring day. He can do so by storyline (wandering monsters, no place to rest, etc), but short of obviously railroading, he cannot prevent the party from retreating; at least not every time they want to retreat. So what, short of killing the player or the party, can the DM do when the spellcasting players go nova in each encounter, and then say "we're done, time to rest?" Say the party has been fighting their way through the defenses and minions of the Ultimate Villain, and are approaching his Throne Room. When the adventure was laid down, the adventure designer was anticipating the party would still have a decent supply of per-day abilities left; but though either bad judgement or bad luck, the prior fights ended up requiring more per-day resources than the designer anticipated. The party is at the door of the Throne Room; and they're not in a state to fight the opponent. The previous fights, individually, only sapped a little more than expected from the party, but the chain of them tacken together put the party in an unwinnable fight at the end. Do you kill the party, or do you let them wait 8 hours in front of the door to the throne room? And if you did structure the adventure such that they would have a chance to rest before the final fight, what was the point, operationally, of the previous encounters? (Ignore, for the moment, that they may have been required by story - we're doing a purely mechanical anaysis here). Either they were set up to attrit resources, in which case allowing the party to catch a breather invalidates them, or they were not, in which case the party could have used more spell resources in the previous fights.

Contrariwise, all of the previous encounters were bypassed by player cunning and guile, and adventure design assumed that only a handful of the "warm-up" encounters would be bypassed this way (the players got lucky). They arrive at the Throne Room able to kick ass and chew bubblegum. The Ultimate Villain ecounter is set such that the party was expected to be nearly out of bubblegum. It's a walkover or the DM has to adjust the encounter "on the fly".

Every encounter in the current system is a DM balancing act; since the designer can only dimly grasp what resources the party will have available to them at any point in the adventure. He can guess, he can attempt to force the pace, but in the end, rate of organic resource expenditure in purely in the hands of the players.

Hit points, by the way, are a per-day resource that is not in the same boat. Firstly, the DM determines the rate at which hit points are expended, and can very easily fudge the expenditure of them (unlike spells, the loss of hitpoints is almost entirely controlled on the far side fo the screen). Secondly, everyone uses the same basic mechanic to control expenditure and recovery - so it's already balanced (more or less) across all the parties. (side guess - there will be no d4 hit die for PC classes, or there will be some other mechanic to prevent the wizard from having rather less than half of the fighter's hit points or from it mattering - dying from one hit because the fighter screwed up is Not Fun). And from a metagame POV, it's easier to put in a few extra healing potions than it is to explain why the party can rest at story-inappropriate times.

And that's the choice - at some point with the artillery being almost exclusively per-day, you end up having to either kill the party or allow them to rest at story-inappropriate times. Yes, experienced DMs and players can mitigate this to a lesser or greater extent; but D&D has to cater to the inexperienced DMs and players. It is better for the game and hobby that the design of D&D be such that, if the characters are at 80% after expending all their per-day resources, the balance-point for an encounter be "party is at 90% of resources". If they are low, it's a slightly harder fight, if they are high and choose to expend daily resources, it's a slightly easier fight. but you don't have to guess where the party (particularly the spellcasters) are on their power curve.

Right now, the various classes are all playing different games WRT operational-level play. This brings everyone into the same game.

 

[gizmo33]

Since I was speaking purely about my game, all I can tell you is what "just" right means for me. It means designing an encounter which has a significant likelihood of giving the PCs a good knock-down drag-out fight.

Reading things written in absolute terms always sets off alarm bells to me. If you were speaking "purely" about your game, then what reason would you have to make universal statements? For example:

Challenging PCs via resource attrition means the individual encounters don't have to be challenging on their own merits, but can simply soak up some resources and weaken the PCs for the next encounter, which can soak up some more resources, and so on.

Now I don't see anything about "your game" in this statement. Since it's about resource attrition, which you supposedly don't use in your game, then it actually cannot be about your game. In fact, your statements above seemed to ping-pong back and forth between your personal experiences and universal ones.

It's like saying this:
"Dwarves are boring. Since my players and I don't enjoy a boring game, I personally don't use dwarves. I guess if you like boring games you can use dwarves."

There are personal statements here, and universal statements. I guess it isn't always clear which is which. I took my best guess at what parts of your posts had relevance to the thread. If none of what you posted has any sense of a universal statement or relevance to the thread then I agree that I shouldn't have much of an opinion on it, as you seem to be advising.

Most of the time, except in rare cases like ambush situations, the players do get to decide how they approach the encounter. Nothing better or worse about it for me.

I interpreted "just right" to mean "just right" in terms of *something* because without that *something* the phrase means nothing to me. "Worse" was meant in that context. Now apparently "just right" doesn't mean anything comprehensible to any individual who is not you or your players.

Odds are they have a much better chance of an easy win in the first case and are likely to be in a lot more trouble in the second.

What does "trouble" mean in a game without death? Wedgies for all? Action points loss?

Who knows? Personally, I run a game which is very heavily player/PC-driven, with the players having very significant control over what they do, who they fight, what is the plotline for the game, etc. But I also like the idea of a mix of per-day and per-encounter abilities for PCs.

What does it mean to use "per-day" resources and not have resource attrition? Are the per-day powers insignificant in terms of the PCs over-all power? For example, is a character's per-day resource something like "5d6 fireball" and their per-encounter resources is "5d6 fireball" ?

Since what "challenging on it's own merits" means to you is irrelevant to me and my players, assuming that I am treating it as an established fact is more than a trifle presumptive.

I was presuming that the statement was relevant to the thread. I'm usually that presumptive. Your statements above were often universal in the way they were worded.

 

[Raven Crowking]

That's been my stance from the beginning, and I think it's been at least one other person's stance. The only encounter guaranteed to happen is the one that is being run now. There is nothing the DM can do mechanically to prevent the 9-9:15 adventuring day.

This is true. I think that what is essential is to make resting/not resting an interesting choice, because it is a choice with consequences both good and not-so-good. IMHO, More Relevant Player Choices + Wider Range of Player Choices + Context + Consequence = Better Game.

And that's the choice - at some point with the artillery being almost exclusively per-day, you end up having to either kill the party or allow them to rest at story-inappropriate times.

Well, there is this difference, too. I believe that the story is what happens as a result of player choices and their consequences. I don't believe that it is generally appropriate for the DM to try to "force" a plan of "what will happen".


RC

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I am not saying that having a mix cannot be desireable (I've said repeatedly that it depends on the mix); I am saying that changing this mix will not solve the 9-9:15 adventuring day problem for those who are prone to have it.

And I think it will with my group. They are prone to having the problem. They wouldn't rest after every encounter if they regained most of their resources after every battle without rest.

Therefore, it will fix the problem.

It's a simple matter of the party losing 50% of their "resources" at the end of the first battle in the day:
"50% of our resources gone. We won't survive another battle, let's rest, it's our only choice."
vs.
"We went back up to 95% of our resources at the end of that encounter, we can survive another no problem."

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

This is true. It is a direct result of mechanically narrowing the window of opponents that are challenging without being overwhelming (in the case of 3e, as a function mostly of power curve).

This is one of the (many) reasons why narrowing that window even further is a colossally bad idea.


RC

Either I didn't write it clear enough,or by snipping parts of the post, you changed the intented meaning, but to rephrase:

The margin of error I speak of the error on "how much will the party actually use to beat the encounter" and "how much is the party expected to use". In D&D 3.x, they can use a lot more than 25 %, making the encounter pretty easy. Unfortunately, if they do that, they can't take as many encounters per day as expected. Which can screw up time-constrained adventurers. Sure, the players might have been stupid for doing so, and thus made an error. But making this error is too easy. You don't always know if an encounter is EL = PL, especially if you happen to be unfamiliar with the monsters or NPCs encountered.

In D&D 4, you cannot spend more than 20% the expected resources for an encounter. In the next encounter, you will still be at 80 %. So, the adventure designer/DM can very easily kepe this margin in mind when designing his next encounters, and they will still feel challening and interesting if the players didn't waste the daily resources to early, because there is only a 20 % margin instead of a 300 %...

 

[Raven Crowking]

And I think it will with my group. They are prone to having the problem. They wouldn't rest after every encounter if they regained most of their resources after every battle without rest.

Therefore, it will fix the problem.

It's a simple matter of the party losing 50% of their "resources" at the end of the first battle in the day:
"50% of our resources gone. We won't survive another battle, let's rest, it's our only choice."
vs.
"We went back up to 95% of our resources at the end of that encounter, we can survive another no problem."

Won't that depend very much on what % of resources your party feels is necessary to overcome a "challenging" encounter?

In my home brew, one of the things I used was Wound Points/Vitality. Every encounter has the potential of dealing important damage, but most deal only inconsequential damage. This means that you can often press on (though in my varient, you gain LVL Vitality back/minute of rest, so that if really pressed, you might suffer from Vitality attrition), but there are no "fluff" encounters.

The problem that I am seeing in the WotC playtest reports is that every encounter becomes, essentially, "fluff" or "win/lose", with "win/lose" being defined as designed for 80%+ resources. If this is the case, any non-fluff encounter will automatically require resting to prevent running into another non-fluff encounter at less than full strength.

There might be some as-yet-unrevealed mechanic to get around this problem. I just haven't seen any evidence that they've considered this problem yet. Moreover, if not considered, this is the type of problem that hides behind the "shine" of a new system (because it requires players to gain an intuitive handle on the mathematics of the new system), and thus is unlikely to become obvious in a month's playtest. And the print deadline for the PHB is looming.


RC

 

[Mallus]

Reading things written in absolute terms always sets off alarm bells to me.

Fixed it for you.

What does "trouble" mean in a game without death? Wedgies for all? Action points loss?

It means the same thing as it does in a game w/death. To wit; the threat of losing something the players are invested in.

In the case of a game where death is an option, players are typically most heavily invested in their own character's survival. In games without death, they're invested in other things, usually relating to the in-game narrative, things like 'finding the Grail' or 'overthrowing the evil king'.

Note that I'm not saying that in games with death, players don't have other goals, just that it's possible to removal 'survival' as the principle goal and still have an interesting/exciting campaign.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Either I didn't write it clear enough,or by snipping parts of the post, you changed the intented meaning, but to rephrase:

I'll accept the blame. My younger daughter just turned 1, and she's had a cold for weeks now, preventing me from gaining a real night's sleep. It is therefore probable that I am far from my mental peak.

In any event, I think that this is more complicated than you do, but I've already stated why. We'll have to agree to disagree, until (if) 4e proves one of us wrong.

RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

It means the same thing as it does in a game w/death. To wit; the threat of losing something the players are invested in.

In the case of a game where death is an option, players are typically most heavily invested in their own character's survival. In games without death, they're invested in other things, usually relating to the in-game narrative, things like 'finding the Grail' or 'overthrowing the evil king'.

Is there any absolute loss, though, or do you just get to try to find the Grail and overthrow the king another time?

If, once you've failed the Grail Quest, you don't get another shot at it, then I'd agree that the game without death has equal (or perhaps greater) stakes than the game with death. Of course, if death is easily undone, then the game with death doesn't have very high stakes either.


RC

 

[gizmo33]

My response to his argument was to contend - without success in convincing him - that the introduction of per-encounter resources actually increases the scope for a type of mechanical interest that is independent of resource attrition.

I have never understood, though this is a long standing issue, how an encounter that poses no risk to a PC (of either resource loss or loss of life) is of any mechanical interest. (I realize that an earlier example about your students attempted to show this, but I didn't quite get it.)

Maybe try with this extreme example. 4 20th level characters against 4 standard kobolds. The 20th level characters are at full power, and so they have a huge range of abilities to exercise. There's no chance of PC death. And we'll say there's no resource expenditure issues since it's the only encounter that day (and it probably doesn't even require that). My question is: how can you make this an encounter of "mechanical interest"? If this is a bad example, then why? What fundemental difference is there with any other encounter where PCs know they're going to win and know that there is no impact on their daily resources?

Your response (as I understood it) was to say that, if complex tactical decisions are required, there is a good chance (over time) of error, and therefore the deadliness increases.

Yes, because I make a lot of the word "required" here to mean "required to stay alive". If that's not what you mean then I don't know what you're saying.

My response was to agree with this, but suggest that deadliness due to poor tactical play is different from the probabilistic/numerical concerns that RC had. Perhaps I'm wrong in this suggestion, but at the moment I don't think that I am.

Any two things are similar and different so it would help for me to be more precise. A game design/paradigm that produces an X% of PC death per encounter is going to mean (perhaps obviously) a certain frequency of character deaths, new characters joining the party, etc. In these cases the difference of whether this death comes about from player choice or from dice rolling doesn't matter AFAICT. When you say it's "different", I don't know in what relevant ways you mean that it's different. Getting killed by an orc is different than being killed by an ogre, for example.

I then went on to suggest that, in resource-attrition play, poor decisions can also increase the risk of death. You responded by agreeing, I think, but pointing out that this may not happen until enconter N+X. I agreed, but noted that the great the value of X, the greater the number of encounters that are interesting only for their resource-management implications, and for certain play styles at least this is not all that interesting.

I think this is where play-style really has a hidden influence on our opinions. My players are far more likely to take resource attrition, and therefore all encounters, seriously because they know that the effects can actually kill them. My informal assessment here is that many per-encounter folks don't kill PCs, and the players know this, and it diminishes the significance that less-than-deadly encounters have. After all, the PCs want to get to the BBEG, the DM wants them to get there, and everything else really just becomes a formality and a nuisance.

Recall, too, that encounters are interesting for reasons other than resource-management implications. AFAICT this is actually one of the basic assumptions in support for per-encounter. So all those story based and tactical issues that make per-encounter interesting are also available for per-day. I can have rope bridges over lava, NPC captives with plot-relevant information, McGuffins needed to defeat the BBEG, and all the rest in a per-day situation as well, enhancing the meaning of an encounter which also has resource implications. I know we sometimes remove all of these things because they're not unique to a given paradigm, but then it seems misleading to then remove attrition and say that the result is boring - of course, removing all elements of an encounter that are interesting results in a boring encounter.

I asked only becase per-encounter resources are likely to make combat more complex, and thus take longer, and therefore the number of encounters per unit of playing time is likely to drop, and thus the increase in poor-play deadliness per encounter, which I agree is there, will probably be greater than the increase in deadliness per unit of playing time.

I really hope not - 3E combat takes too long as it is. I don't know why exactly, but based on what I've seen on this board I'm not the only one.

Btw, I don't think that plot-driven play is linear in the way you describe. You seem to be talking about rail-roading. I'm talking about player-driven play. But that's really a side issue - what is important is that (as far as I can tell) we seem largely to be on the same page about the relationship between resource-management rules and play style.

AFAICT, it is at the root of a statement than "resource management interferes with the game plot". I don't know what everyone means when they say "plot". When I say that, I mean two things - one is "the overall structure of likely events" and the other is "the story about what transpired in the game". Resource management, and unanticipated situations in general, do not interfere with either one of these.