Your Group is Missing a Role

[Fkewl]

I dm a 4 player team (2 strikers (thief and slayer), defender (fighter) and leader (bard)) and it works fine

I've thrown heavy-hitters, alot of minions, mix of brutes and solders and they just mow through them like a scythe.

The defender has a "mark all adjacent attacks", the leader heals and gives them attacks then the 2 strikers just concentrate their attacks and enemies go down fast.

Last session, 2 level 8 encounters and the strikers did over 300pts of damage each (we keep dps) while the fighter absorbed 150pts of dmg and the leader healed over 100pts.

So yeah, controller can go.. but missing a striker will make for long battles. No defender/leader and the team will risk easy tpk if their rolls go wrong.

good luck!

 

[Trolls]

I don't think any of the roles are essential. The leader is probably hardest to get by without, and the controller the easiest, but it only takes a little shift in encounter design to make any party composition work.

I DMed quite a long game for a party without a defender (4 strikers, 1 leader, 1 controller). The squishiness of the party was generally offset by their ability to kill things quickly, so I didn't need to adjust much.

 

[Aegeri]

I find that defenders and leaders are the two things I won't allow a campaign to start without. Defenderless parties end up being hammered, because when monsters get a choice to eat the wizard they are always going to take it. I ran a campaign for a long time without a defender and it just got exponentially frustrating (for me). Simple fights would threaten them far more than they should.

My other in real life game that had no defender had the same issue. This lead to me declaring a "Who dies first makes the defender" race, which the Avenger promptly won when he was digested alive by an ocher jelly. Ultimately due to the tactics and difficult encounters I make on a routine basis, a defenderless party just doesn't function in my game. A leaderless one would be an absolute nightmare.

I do believe the controller role is probably the most dispensable. Probably.

 

[Mentat55]

I agree that leader is the role you don't want to have missing, and controller is the role you don't mind missing.

For defenders vs. strikers, it really depends on which defender or striker you are talking about. I'd rather have a high damage melee striker than a low damage and low "stickiness" defender, e.g., a barbarian over a shielding swordmage. On the other hand, I'd drop the warlock or monk for a fighter any day, if I had to choose one to make the party better. On the balance I think the defender role is more important, but which particular defender or striker you pick really makes a difference.

 

[Herschel]

Controllers are the stuff very often in games I play in, where strikers are just a convenience rather than a necessity. A lot will depend on the DM though. A very tactical DM makes contollers necessary, while others make them have a lesser effect.

 

[Cerebral Paladin]

A lot depends on what you're trying to achieve. It's probably true that a striker-less party can take on a lot of challenges very successfully, but it will be much more grindy without the high damage dealing of the strikers. Conversely, leader-less parties are squishy and vulnerable, but they can be lots of fun to play, because they reduce grind.

Controllers are really dependent on situation. If you face lots of minions with decent damage production, lacking a controller can really hurt. Which gets to the other question--what the best party combination is depends on the sort of game the DM runs. Does the DM cater to the party composition? Run the same mix of encounters they would see with a different party? Attack the weak points of the party?

Because I find that 4e combat often drags, I'd rather give up the defender or the leader than a striker, or even than a controller if the DM uses substantial numbers of minions. I would then probably adjust the builds of the characters that are present to patch the hole--if you don't have a defender, a defender-y striker (barbarian, slayer-build fighter, etc.) becomes more valuable. If you don't have a leader, leader-y characters (paladins, etc.) move up in priority. But I think that a party that can implode messily but that has less grind will be more fun to play in than a tougher party. (At the extreme, I could imagine having a lot of fun with an all striker and controller party. It would be dangerous, for sure, but they would cut through the opposition in no time flat.)

 

[Mapache]

I'd say Leaders are completely indispensable. Not only are they the safety net that keeps people up, they're a powerful force multiplier for the rest of party when played well.

Controllers are mostly extraneous. Actual control effects don't seem to be as effective in practice as simply killing things, and other roles can get multi-target powers.

Defenders are nice, but not crucial. Their ability to control the flow of most battles isn't as strong as you'd like, and their value is directly dependent on how much worse the rest of the party's defenses are.

Strikers I used to think were less important, until I started playing. They "just" bring damage to the table, but damage is what wins battles. Without them, everyone else has to work harder for longer, and that starts depleting longer-term resources. It also makes the fights longer in real time.

I've have very good experiences with "thug squad" parties consisting of four Strikers and two Leaders that just steamroll the opposition. I've lately become enamored of hybrid Striker|Leaders, which if built correctly can operate as nearly a full Striker and about 3/4 of a Leader. I think the nuclear option of party composition is a gang of optimized Striker|Leaders with maybe a defender or two, and maybe some hybrid Controller somewhere in there for a bit more AoE punch. Distributing your Leadership around via hybrid is smart both because it enables the party as a whole to nova harder by stacking available buffs ("I'll boost accuracy at the same time as you boost damage!") and because you have redundancy to get around "Oh, no, the Leader's down and is the only one with minor action heals!"

 

[Lancelot]

My players generally go without a controller, but is that the smart choice? I don't know.

It's perhaps telling that our group has gone through 96 permanently dead characters (yes, I keep a record) since 4e began, plus several dozen more killed-and-raised. The main problem is they like really like Strikers, to the point that we've had all-Striker parties before. Defender is their #2 choice, and Leader is narrowly behind at the #3 choice.

Personally, I think a well-crafted Controller is at least as valuable as a Striker, and maybe more so. However, I also have no doubt that Leaders and Defenders are more valuable than either.

 

[Lancelot]

...what the HECK?!?

My profile says I'm a Carbuncle now? I used to be a Harpy, dammit! Carbuncles suck! Somebody give me some pity XP and help me become a Trilloch, at least...

[p.s. Congrats to all you lvl. 4 members who are Flumphs! ...Flumphs are the new Drow...]

 

[BobTheNob]

Hmmm. There has been a few responses like "If the party has no controllers, I dont use as many minions" and "if the party has no strikers, reduce monster hit points a little".

Gotta say, I would not alter my adventure/encounter design in the slightest to cope with party design, most specifically "ill-composed parties". To me, being able to cope with and adapt to situations is part of the game. If the party has left a hole in their composition, and they hit an encounter that is difficult as a result, well, let it be difficult.

Let the party understand that the absence of a certain role needs to be accounted for. Feat picks, gear, whatever. The absence of a controller means get some AOE capability, the absence of a leader means get some healing, the absence of a striker means up your damage e.t.c. e.t.c.

A the end of the day, they party made a decision to omit the role. It was their decision, and (to a degree) they must wear the consequences of that decision. We are their DM's, not their nannies.