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<blockquote data-quote="Aenghus" data-source="post: 5631578" data-attributes="member: 2656">4e deliberately slowed down the pace of combat compared to previous editions by reducing the relative rate of dealing and receiving damage, and removing Save or Die spells. They reduced swinginess by reducing the effect of criticals.&nbsp; These design choices risk grind when the players are learning the game or don't use teamwork or have poorly chosen powers.As a consequence, combat is more predictable and encounters are easier to design. When the PCs are outclassed, its possible for them to realise this and retreat/ surrender/ change tactics, where in previous editions they would probably learn they were outclassed by incurring casualties. The threat of suffering one shot kills in previous editions distorted combat tactics a lot, making initiative king and a lot of anticlimactic combats that were over almost before they were started.How dangerous low level 4e combat is depends on how tough the DM wants it to be. 4e combats have more monsters in them than 3e ones, and if all the monsters focus on one PC its very bad news for them (normally I don't do this, it's for special occasions)</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Aenghus, post: 5631578, member: 2656"] 4e deliberately slowed down the pace of combat compared to previous editions by reducing the relative rate of dealing and receiving damage, and removing Save or Die spells. They reduced swinginess by reducing the effect of criticals. These design choices risk grind when the players are learning the game or don't use teamwork or have poorly chosen powers. As a consequence, combat is more predictable and encounters are easier to design. When the PCs are outclassed, its possible for them to realise this and retreat/ surrender/ change tactics, where in previous editions they would probably learn they were outclassed by incurring casualties. The threat of suffering one shot kills in previous editions distorted combat tactics a lot, making initiative king and a lot of anticlimactic combats that were over almost before they were started. How dangerous low level 4e combat is depends on how tough the DM wants it to be. 4e combats have more monsters in them than 3e ones, and if all the monsters focus on one PC its very bad news for them (normally I don't do this, it's for special occasions) [/QUOTE]

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