I've read various posts where people have brought up the possibility that it is difficult for characters to die using the 4.0 ruleset. If that is true, shouldn't it also be tough for NPC's of equal encounter level (or whatever it is called in 4.0) be difficult to kill as well? What are the implications on combat? Will it take longer to resolve a combat because the particpants are tough to kill? If that's not the case, is the 4.0 ruleset scewed so that player characters are considerably more powerful or hardy then NPC's and monsters so that PC's always have the advantage?
I always thought that the 3.5 rules set encounter level, when calculated properly and terrain or outside influences were taken into account was an accurate tool that put PC's on par to their adversaries in combat. How is the 4.0 situation any better if the encounter balancing act is either scewed or worse - broken? The worst case is that combats are drawn out giving PC's plenty of "second chances" in combat so that every combat becomes a war or attrition similar to combats in video games with end bosses on each level. Instead of outsmarting or overpowering the end boss, the task is always to kill the end bosses annoying minions first while avoiding heavy damage from the end boss and then just gang up on it till everyone in the party uses up all their resources. During the combat, PC's won't worry about dieing since every now and then the cleric will score a ciritcal hit and heal someone while some other character class can mass heal the party. The wizard will run out of big spells, but will case 1s6 magic missles until the boss drops. Meanwhile the fighter doesn't have to worry about DR so he just keeps whacking away. The boss just sits there and takes a beating since he has fewer options and fewer defenses. While he/she/it takes the beating it thinks "boy, I miss 3.5 when I had a fighting chance." For that matter so will the DM/GM/judge/WoTC Savant or whatever a Dungeon Master is called in 4.0.
Thoughts?
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I remember that somewhere it has been stated that the rules are somehow different for PCs and creatures (and NPCs, by extension).
So it's quite possible that all the options for the heroes are not available for all the rest of the baddies, antagonists, collaborators and allies, and the DM has a larger than usual degree of freedom in managing deaths and survival of them.
Obviously it has to be seen in hard evidence how all this works out on the game table, but the "unbalance" in favor of players is just not my cup of tea, even if just on pure theory level.
I prefer a game where big baddies can be brought down by a lucky or carefully planned combination of spells and attacks, and the same holds true for PCs. While I understand that this can bring forth some strange situations and frustrating moments for both the DM and the players, I also think that it gives the whole game a more solid atmosphere.
Also, blatantly unbalanced or overpowered feats/combos/spells can be easily banned from play, depending on personal tastes about gritty/heroic styles of game, while a hard-wired mechanical discrepancy is more difficult to change or adapt.
It's just a gut feeling, but it's there.
As far as I remember that is a correct (but colourfully worded) impression from the information we have been given.
Players will have random (side effect) healing, go to negative hps out the wazoo and never run out of resources.
The Bad guys die at 0 (unless DM fiats it otherwise), combat is made for multiple attackers (or factors) and the enemies (non PCs) do not get access to the same abilities as PCs.
But I'm sure that there is more they are not telling us yet (or just haven't figured out yet).
Edit: I think they idea was to make the world less magic saturated by leaching some of it out of the NPC's and pouring that into the PCs. Thus making the PCs heroes above (the potential) of all others.
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4.0 is definitely going to be heavily skewed in the PC's favor. NPC's and mosters die at 0 hp, while PC's can go negative half of their hit points before they die. They also have several chances to stabilize or recover, and almost everyone can heal themsleves and others. They really want to make it difficult to die in 4.0 because dying isn't fun for most people (expecially the target audience).
According to their Death and Dying article, a Player Character who drops below zero gets to roll to get up every round, and as soon as they roll a 20 or a friend throws a healing effect on them, they pop up with 1/4 hit points (regardless of how negative they were). And when a Non Player Character drops below zero you remove them from the battlemap.
This does not sit well with me for a number of reasons.
-Frank
4.0 is definitely going to be heavily skewed in the PC's favor. NPC's and mosters die at 0 hp, while PC's can go negative half of their hit points before they die. They also have several chances to stabilize or recover, and almost everyone can heal themsleves and others. They really want to make it difficult to die in 4.0 because dying isn't fun for most people (expecially the target audience).
The game is being dummied down for dummies so as not to offend their sensibilities toward dying. Is it a game anymore if you always win?
BTW - a rule set allows for PC dominance may hurt sales more then help. One of the great things about splat books was that it created an arms war between DM's and players and allow for each to temporarily get an advantage. If the PC's never have to worry about dying the only thing books are good for is variants on the same theme. If roleplaying is no longer empahsized a bugbear barbarian will be similar to a dwarf barbarian. The onl difference is how the PC's looks. They will both have the same feel.
There should always be a fear of losing or else its not a game. Its just an excercise.
Has out society become so sensitive that even games allows everyone to be a winner?
I also don't think being a judge will be much fun with 4.0. There would be little incentive to take on this role. The judge becomes more of a spectator in this sense then a judge or story teller or for lack of a better word, guide.
The game is being dummied down for dummies so as not to offend their sensibilities toward dying. Is it a game anymore if you always win?
First off: Nice Troll.
Secondly:
I'm not in complete disagreement for the reasoning behind those changes. But combined together all the changes seem to be heavily in favour of the PCs. I haven't seen what changes lie in wait for raise dead yet...
Well, this has been skewed just slightly towards the negative... so, a few points on the other side of things, if I might.
In 4th edition, when you're brought below 0 hit points you have a very long time to die. You can go down into the negatives equal to 1/2 of your total hit points. So if a monster is pummeling your whimpering soon to be corpse, suffice it to say it'll be awhile. In combination with an increase in hit points overall (it seems, uncertain about that one so far) you will have a much longer time to die in theory.
However each round you roll a d20 for stablization. If you roll a 1-9 then your condition worsens. If your condition worsens three times, your PC expires and you are dead. If you roll a 10-19 nothing happens. If you roll a 20 you regain consciousness and recover 1/4th of your total hit points.
When healing an unconscious and dying character, you no longer need to heal through the threshold of negative HPs. Instead negative hit points are ignored and you begin healing from 0 upwards.
Monsters and Player Characters are no longer designed along the same template, so we will be seeing something much closer to 2nd edition AD&D where monsters could do things the Players couldn't. While people have listed this as being strongly negative and very limiting for monsters, it also means they can pull of tricks that the PCs may have no defense against, things that will surprise the players and other such shenanigans. While it might seem off-hand like the DM will have less to do and will be bored, the DM will likely still have plenty of tricks up his sleeve since the new combat encounter system is designed to feature one monster per player character in an encounter - or one hazard per player character - or one elite monster per two player characters - or two minion monsters per player character. Thus, it creates a lot of potential options and mixability in encounters: if a group of four players is moving into a cavern and see two Grell, they'll know something is up. Will they be carefully scouting out for traps and pitfalls? Will they brace themselves in preparation for two elite grells who are tougher than normal? Or do they try to back pedal out of the room into the four Grimlock minions who were hiding in the shadows and spring at them when they least suspect?
The reason for the shrinking of enemy abilities is to try to make things easier for a DM to put together and also require less preparation time to churn out a memorable and exciting encounter for the players.
Also, it's still a Dungeon Master - this is still Dungeons and Dragons, after all.
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Disclaimer: I am a big critic what I have seen of 4th edition so far. I think that 4th will not match my playstyle. But I also think that the mechanics will be sleek.
After what I have seen and read of 4th edition so far, it will be gearded even more towards encounters than 3rd edition.
I therefore believe that encounters will be still challenging for the players and easier for the DMs.
But playing the game will be different from 3rd edition. PCs will be Heroes from start on. I think you can compare it to the "encounters" in the star wars movies. Luke & Co. slaughter dozens of enemies without getting so much as scratched until the come upon a real challenge like Darth Vader.
All the mechanics are geared towards this style of play. Per encounter abilities/spells let the PCs get going through a lot of minor fights without worries. The dying rules let the PCs survive encounters that would prove utterly deadly in 3rd.
But again, this is NOT 3rd edition but a new edition with a new encounter philosophy.
My playstyle is more like Die Hard (the first film only) where the Heroes fight against overwhelming odds. Every encounter can be deadly and the players have to think hard if they conserve resources or spend them. But they get battered around a lot but in the end survive with single digit hp.
My playstyle is more like Die Hard (the first film only) where the Heroes fight against overwhelming odds. Every encounter can be deadly and the players have to think hard if they conserve resources or spend them. But they get battered around a lot but in the end survive with single digit hp.
Oh, sounds like fun.
Contributor
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My personal impression is that the new system will be no less deadly. It will simply be less arbitrarilly deadly at high level. It will also be more cinematic, with people taking nasty hits, then visibly shaking off the damage to jump back into the fight. Whether or not this style suits you is up to you. But it doesn't mean that the game will be more or less challenging.
Actually, I find I have to rebalance 3.5 anyways. My players are all very tactically minded, and I like every fight to mean something, so as it is I have to crank the CR on evey encounter. I imagine I'll have to do the same in 4E (if i play it).
As for the monsters dying at zero (Except for important villains) and the PCs being able to go negative and come back, I don't think this is really different from how most people actually play D&D. I know I don't really track monster HP once they are down, unless I have a specific reason to.
I also think that one of the reasosns for the damage changes is a design one. Encounter design is tricky, but even the most balanced encounter can go south if the PCs have pushed one room further than they should have. You cna't account for the party's condition when designing an encounter, unless the system allows them to essentially start every encounter fresh. The revisions to magic more or less work this way, and I think the damage revisions are another part of it.
Personally, I hope the design works, as I think it will help keep players in the action, which is where they should be when there's a fight going down.
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Oh, sounds like fun.
My playstyle is more like Die Hard (the first film only) where the Heroes fight against overwhelming odds. Every encounter can be deadly and the players have to think hard if they conserve resources or spend them. But they get battered around a lot but in the end survive with single digit hp.
It is for me and my group.
Other tastes may vary.
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Probably belongs in the "Death and Dying Post"...but whatever:
I don't think negative HPs should be thought of as "negative health". Once you hit zero HPs the abstraction of health as HPs ends and a new abstraction begins. Essentially, negative HPs are a timer of sorts. In this abstraction, you determine whether or not your body can respond to the trauma you've faced. In older editions we had "System Shock" rolls...this is a similar abstraction.
I think what will be very telling is the "Heal" Skill and "Natural" healing and how they interact with the negative HPs abstraction.
I gather that a person at negative HPs but not dead will continue to make their system shock check (stabiliaztion) check until they receive healing. That is, left to their own, they will eventually fail 3 times. Thus, foes won't waste time trying to "kill" a fallen character...they are effectively dead. Even when the battle is over, foes may not coup degrace because for all intents and purposes the character is dead. Throw the corpse into a hole and cover it up.
Healing starts from 0 simply because you aren't at negative hps, you are at 0 hps and the negative HP is "tracker" that tells you when you go from MOSTLY DEAD to FULLY DEAD, lol.
In 4th edition, when you're brought below 0 hit points you have a very long time to die. You can go down into the negatives equal to 1/2 of your total hit points. So if a monster is pummeling your whimpering soon to be corpse, suffice it to say it'll be awhile. In combination with an increase in hit points overall (it seems, uncertain about that one so far) you will have a much longer time to die in theory.
However each round you roll a d20 for stablization. If you roll a 1-9 then your condition worsens. If your condition worsens three times, your PC expires and you are dead. If you roll a 10-19 nothing happens. If you roll a 20 you regain consciousness and recover 1/4th of your total hit points.
When healing an unconscious and dying character, you no longer need to heal through the threshold of negative HPs. Instead negative hit points are ignored and you begin healing from 0 upwards.
Let's do the math on the chances of dying while taking a massive beating under the 4.0 rule set. Once a PC is below 0 hit points they drop and can roll to see if one of three things happens:
1. on a 1-9 conditions worsen (45% chance on a roll)
2. on a 10-19 no change (50% chance on a roll)
3. on a 20 the PC is restored to one quarter HP's (5% chance)
It takes three 1-9 rolls to die which means you will get at least 3 chances to roll the dice. The roller has a 9.11% chance of rolling a 1-9 consecutively on the first three rolls. There are pretty good odds the PC is still alive after 3 rounds. At the same time the roller only needs to score a 20 on one of the three rolls to miraculously be rejuvinated to 1/4 of his hp. The roller has a 15% chance to accomplish this. This means that given three rolls the PC has a 9.11% chance or dieing, a 20% chance of being healed to 1/4 of its hp, and 70% chance of getting at least one more roll to remain in the land of the living. Those are incredibly good odds. During this whole entire time the monster can mash away at the helpless PC and has no chance of killing him. Imagine what happens when the whole party has been disabled. The monster simply has to sit and wait until all the PC's have rolled a 1-9 three times until they die. It can't even eliminate a threat if it wants. The more times the PC has to roll, the higher the odds that they will roll a 20.
I feel really bad for the monsters in this situation. I feel even worse for the judge. How do you defeat a party with your monsters when the PC's have a chance to return from the dead every round? This mechanic is flat out broken if you ask me.
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... that tells you when you go from MOSTLY DEAD to FULLY DEAD, lol.
Dying Man: I am not dead yet!
Collector of the Dead: What was that?Dying Man: I said I am not dead yet!
Collector of Dead: I can't take him like that, it's against regulations.
Dying Man's Friend: Can't you wait? He will be dead in a moment.
Dying Man: I don't want to go on the cart!
Dying Man's Friend: Don't be such a baby!
Collector of Dead: No, I need to get 'round to the Robinsons, they lost 7 since Thursday.
Dying Man: I think I am getting better...
Dying Man's Friend: No you aren't, you'll be stone dead in a moment. Look, isn't there something you can do?
Dying Man: I feel happy! I feel happy! I feel...
*thunk*
After what I have seen and read of 4th edition so far, it will be gearded even more towards encounters than 3rd edition.
I think your right but my concern with that is that I thought they said it would be 10 encounters per level instead of the 13 in 3.5. Leveling for my group is already on the verge of too fast and I know a lot of folks on this board say that it's already too fast.
According to their Death and Dying article, a Player Character who drops below zero gets to roll to get up every round, and as soon as they roll a 20 or a friend throws a healing effect on them, they pop up with 1/4 hit points (regardless of how negative they were). And when a Non Player Character drops below zero you remove them from the battlemap.
This does not sit well with me for a number of reasons.
-Frank
No, you don't remove them from the battlemap. You loot them and they fade on their own.
Wait... Wrong game. For some odd reason I'm thinking of WoW... [/sarcasm]
No, you don't remove them from the battlemap. You loot them and they fade on their own.
*Rolls eyes* Silly goblin. Every kobold knows that his buddies get respawned in the last town that you saved the game in. Shesh.
No, you don't remove them from the battlemap. You loot them and they fade on their own.*Rolls eyes* Silly goblin. Every kobold knows that his buddies get respawned in the last town that you saved the game in. Shesh.
No, you're the silly one. Don't you know that you don't get to "Save" unless you pay the DDI monthly fee? Sure, you can say you looted every last goblin you killed, but that kind of the only happens in your... what's that called... oh yeah, "imagination". We have no room for that in our digital interface!
[/surly_from_work_commenting][/threadjack]
To attempt to get this back on the subject (not that I couldn't go on griping about computer game imagery being poorly fit into other milieus), your chances of dying when you fall below zero hit points is 72.7%, your chances of waking up with 1/4 hit points is 17.3%. The amount of time it will take you to reach one of those two states is, on average, six rounds.
-Frank
To attempt to get this back on the subject (not that I couldn't go on griping about computer game imagery being poorly fit into other milieus), your chances of dying when you fall below zero hit points is 72.7%, your chances of waking up with 1/4 hit points is 17.3%. The amount of time it will take you to reach one of those two states is, on average, six rounds.
-Frank
Thanks for doing the math. It never occured to me that unaided, there are only two eventual outcomes. Even so, six rounds is alot of time in which to heal a PC. It reminds me of video game where you were given 30 seconds to put in another quarter to continue the game after you died.
Even with a 72.7% chance of dying, I am still skeptical that most PC's will reach that point given that you have at least two rounds in which you can b healed, a monster can beat you into oblivion and it can't get any worse for you during that time, and on average it takes 6 rounds to die which is more then enough time to heal a PC.
I think what is even more important is that with a party of at least 4 PC's, it is unlikely any will actually die as there will be plenty of opporunity to heal PC's below 0 hit points. And all too often PC's will roll a 20, and get a second chance.
4.0 will play like a video game or movie. Combat will go like this.
Judge: "PC1 the Pit Fiend attacks with his claw and does 30 points of damage - how many hit points do you have left?"
PC1 "I had 10, now I have zero."
Judge: "OK, your down. Thats the last attack for the Pit Fiend this round. PC1, it's your turn. Roll to see what your down status is."
PC1: "I roll a 20. Wow, I get 1/4 my hit points back which is 50. I get up and attack the Pit Fiend. I roll a 15. That plus my modifier is 36. Do I hit."
Judge: "You hit."
PC1: "Sweet, I do 35 points of damage."
Judge: "You drop the Pit Fiend."
PC1: "Cool, that was a close one. I really though we we're dead there for a minute. Lucky I rolled that 20."
PC2: "What do you mean lucky, me and PC4 rolled 20's during the combat too after the Pit Fiend dropped us and softened him up for you. The odds that one of us would roll after being dropped is 40%. PC3 has two strikes, and has been hanging on since 4 rounds ago."
Judge: "Yeah, you guys have been down and up the whole combat. The Pit Fiend would have finished you all off, but the rules don't allow it. Heck PC4 would have been 100 points below zero because of all the fireballs he was dropping on you, but when your down it has no effect."
BTW: I can see parties using the status of being down as a resource saving tool against area effect spells that do damage as well as extending a parties healing resources. I believe the new death machanic has been employed to extend combat and avoid PC death more then anything else. Pity.
I think you're missing the fact, troll, that at -1/2 your total HP, you're dead. No stabilization roll, no healing magic (that we know of) to save ya. A big ass crit or some kind of damage over time affect could easily drop you low enough, and thats not even addressing whether CdG remains in game.
In some ways, I think 4E will actually be deadlier than in 3E, at least once a person is dropped. In 3rd you'd know how long you had to reach them before they were offed (assuming they didn't keep taking damage). In 4th they always have at least 3 rounds, but sometimes thats it ... (anyone with better static-fu than me want to crunch the numbers on % dead on round 3?)
When you look @ the 4.0 rules, overall you can say that there is a chance that you could die quicker than in 3.5, but that would depend on total damage done and @ what negative your player is @ after the last attack that brought the character below 0. As with anything that involves numbers you can manipulate them for or against your own personal argument.
When you get into the various numbers that have been calculated in some above posts, they show exactly what I am talking about. You see the 1-9 (45%) chance of slipping closer to death are the only numbers that are accumulative whereas neither the 10-19 (50%) nor the 20 (5%) chances are. So when someone states that there is only a 9.11% accumulative chance that someone will roll 1-9 three times in a row, that is a fair number, but it is not the true overall % chance that the character will slip closer to death. The true chance of them slipping closer to death is the same as stated above though the chances of them rolling 1-9 three times in a row so that they end up dead is 9.11%.
With that said I still think that these rules for dying & death are weak.
Judge: "Yeah, you guys have been down and up the whole combat. The Pit Fiend would have finished you all off, but the rules don't allow it. Heck PC4 would have been 100 points below zero because of all the fireballs he was dropping on you, but when your down it has no effect."
Where did yo get this information from? I don't remember anything saying that monsters can't kick player's when they are down.
While monsters can attack down people, it won't do any good. The Pit Fiend, for example, has been released. He does like 45 points of damage a round. Which is fine and all, but the death margin is really huge. As soon as he rolls a 20 to recover or gets some healing, then all of the negative hit points are canceled and it no longer matters if he was 1 below zero or 1 above -half.
As for getting Healing, we've already seen preview abilities where characters can hand out healing simultaneously with attacking. That means that if you go down and the Pit Fiend starts beating on you, that the Paladin can stand around doing other stuff for a while and then in a couple of rounds spring into action by letting off a healing smite (I wish I was making that up) against the Pit Fiend. The Pit Fiend will take a lot of damage if it hits, but in any case all the damage that the Pit Fiend inflicted on your downed friend is erased and then the healing from your smite's secondary effect is applied.
The only way characters can actually die is to take a big hit of burst damage when they are already very low on hit points. 4th edition designers are very keen to remind us that Save or Die effects are gone because there aren't any saves in the new edition. But that does not mean that you aren't blowing things away in one hit hither and yon. It's still one die roll to determine whether enemies are still in the combat - the preview first level Paladin Smite does 30+ damage when wielded by a 6th level character with no feats and starting attributes. The preview 6th level Spine Devil only has 47 hit points - it seems pretty clear that with a little min/maxing (or possibly without) you'll be removing models from the field with a single die roll. The new acronym is "SaW" (Succeed and Win) rather than SoD (Save or Die) because the die is rolled by the attacker rather than the defender - but the basic setup has not changed.
Except that when a player character gets hit by a SaW they go deep into negative and that does not even matter as they will be back on their feet in a few rounds from natural recovery or a compatriot using a healing effect. Unless of course, they had already taken a bunch of damage and then they take a SaW effect right in the chest - then they take enough damage to straight knock them out on top of enough damage to nearly knock them out and they are dead.
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What's really ironic is that the Death and Dying article that we are pulling this information from specifically mentioned the fact that in 3rd edition you'd rather that a monster's attack dropped you to negative 1 hit point than that it dropped you to 1 hit point. And they specifically said that was a bad thing. Although of course in 4th edition that is apparently more true than ever before.
-Frank
And the probabilities on Death and Dying are practical to work out for every round. It's best simulated as a Markov Chain with five states, and the probabilities can be established in a probability matrix quite easily. After 4 rounds you're more likely to be dead than back up. It gets worse from there.
Holy crap are you over complicating things! That is the problem with you math guys - everything has to be a multivariable whose-it what's-it on a complex number grid. Dude, you can do this math with simple combinatorial notation with two outcomes. Just reduce it to simpler problems and stack them up.
First off, it's a coin flip whether anything happens at all. Fully 50% of the time your condition is unchanged. So we can ignore that and add it back in at the end when we are asking how long things actually take. On the changes that actually happen to your condition, 9/10 of the time it's "degrade", and 1/10th of the time it's "get back up." Now you reach a relevant end-state the instant that you get 3 degradations or 1 get-back. That means that you can't go three real results without death or get back, so it always terminates there. Your chance of degrading three times before you get-back is just .9^3 or 72.9%. The rest of the time, all 27.1% of the time, you're back up with 25% health.
Now the amount of time it takes is variable. But since you get a result half the time and 3 results ends it, a simple approximation tells us that it takes an average of 6 turns to die. Now of course it takes less time to get up because you can potentially get-back on the first round. With a 10% chance of ending everything in one result and a 9% chance of ending things in two results, and an 81% chance of ending in three results, the exact average is 5.42 turns to come to a resolution of some kind. But the average time to die is still 6 turns.
-Frank
With all the people talking about how you can't do anything to a PC at negative hp, is it confirmed that coup-de-grace is no longer in the game. From one of the playtest reports I had the impression it was.
And the probabilities on Death and Dying are practical to work out for every round. It's best simulated as a Markov Chain with five states, and the probabilities can be established in a probability matrix quite easily. After 4 rounds you're more likely to be dead than back up. It gets worse from there.
I tried the Markov Chain approach and had the same findings that you had where the probability of being dead increases as more rolls take place. The problem is that the incremental increase of the chance of dying is still very low. Too low more my taste. Imagine a party of PC's where two are in combat and two are down. The odds of one of those 2 down characters rolling a 20 over 3 rounds is 30%. That is almost a one third chance that one of the 2 down PC's will suddenly be restored without assistance. This PC can then heal the other and join the combat. Of course, that's assuming that one of the 2 standing PC's doesn't heal one or both of them while they pound away at NPC's or one of the PC's doesn't lay a mass heal on the party which no matter how much damage the PC's have suffered brings them back on their feet. Too bad the NPC can't do anything to permanently remove the PC from the board.
The death mechanic described so far for 4.0 comes directly from MMPROG's. It intentionally stacks the odds in the party's favor so that they can survive each encounter. This works well for MMPORG's as the goal is to allow the players to survive most contests without difficulty to keep them engaged in the site and return for more action and reape rewards from the time spent playing.
I don't think D&D ever intended this type of risk/reward scenario. The game is meant to be both strategically and intellectually challenging. In past editions the rules are set so that there is a real danger in failing at a task whether its combat, jumping across a chasme, or disabling a trap. Without that element D&D is just an excercise in moving through a dungeon without any risk. Most of us don't give younger generations alot of credit, but I can see them becoming board with the game in this state. They may buy the game and give it a shot, but like most kids and young adults, move on because encounters will all become the same and video games or MMPORG's provide the same risk/reward without the hassle of gathering all the people and materials together to play. And since the players are not competing against each other and the judge is simpy a judge without any skin in the game with few resources to challenge the players, whats the point of playing? The only measure of success in this scenario is the lowest amount of rounds it takes to resolve a combat. "Did we end that combat in 10 rounds or 4 rounds?" You'll rarely hear "Boy, that was a tough combat 3 of the 5 members of the party died."
Is it a game anymore if you always win?
One of the great things about splat books was that it created an arms war between DM's and players and allow for each to temporarily get an advantage.
If roleplaying is no longer empahsized a bugbear barbarian will be similar to a dwarf barbarian.
There should always be a fear of losing or else its not a game. Its just an excercise.
Wow.
Are you serious?
Wow.
Wow.
Is it a game anymore if you always win?
One of the great things about splat books was that it created an arms war between DM's and players and allow for each to temporarily get an advantage.
If roleplaying is no longer empahsized a bugbear barbarian will be similar to a dwarf barbarian.
There should always be a fear of losing or else its not a game. Its just an excercise.
Wow.
Are you serious?
Wow.
Wow.
I'm not really a fan of splat books, but I had to point out that it was one thing that at least made the game interesting sometimes. I can do without them.
Do you believe that roleplaying is not important?
Do you think D&D is a game or an excercise in fantasy? Would you rather roll dice and defeat an adversary of equal or greater standing or would you rather dress up as your PC and pretend to defeat adversaries because you said so?
Do you think D&D is a game or an excercise in fantasy?
Let me make sure I understand you. On the original topic, your position is that, in general, challenges and PCs should be equally matched so the players must put forth effort in order to obtain their goals. Furthermore, they must maximize every advantage and minimize every disadvantage because every ‘inch’ will matter and death is a real and probable result. Is this correct?
According to your understanding of the new rules, PCs will be given a ‘cushion’ that will effectively remove death as a consequence for failure. Is this correct?
On the additional topics, splatbooks were good because they gave players an advantage the DM must find a way to counter.
Role playing is important to you. Would you please define what role playing means to you?
Are you implying that D&D is a game and not a theatrical production? Or are you making a distinction between D&D and LARPs?
Do you think D&D is a game or an excercise in fantasy?Let me make sure I understand you. On the original topic, your position is that, in general, challenges and PCs should be equally matched so the players must put forth effort in order to obtain their goals. Furthermore, they must maximize every advantage and minimize every disadvantage because every ‘inch’ will matter and death is a real and probable result. Is this correct?
According to your understanding of the new rules, PCs will be given a ‘cushion’ that will effectively remove death as a consequence for failure. Is this correct?
On the additional topics, splatbooks were good because they gave players an advantage the DM must find a way to counter.
Role playing is important to you. Would you please define what role playing means to you?
Are you implying that D&D is a game and not a theatrical production? Or are you making a distinction between D&D and LARPs?
I never mentioned anything about PC's max-minning. I said that every now and then a player would find something in a splat book that would tip the scales in their favor. I never stated whether it was the players intention to min-max by doing this.
Yes - I didn't use the word cushion, but I made the case that PC's have more opportunities to not die.
Role playing to me is the activity undertaken by yourself on behalf of your PC to interact with elements of the Fantasy World the either initiate an activity covered by a mechanic (intiating combat) or engaging in an activity for which no mechanic exists (like telling a joke). Role playing is not creating a character that a player believes can accomplish one or more activities, but in the game mechanics fills the role poorly or not at all. I.E. a bard being a front line fighter.
I am making both distinctions. D&D is a game and not a theatrical production. I don't believe Dungeons and Dragons rule were created to simulate action sequences in a film. I believe Dungeons and Dragons was created to simulate battles in a fantasy setting using historical wargaming rules as a base and adding a fantasy layer to it so that you have a rule set that more accurately simulates LoTR, Conan, Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, Camelot, and other fantasy genres. I'd like it to stay this way. While playing the game I never judge adversaries to give long winded speaches on their plans while combating the party.
I am also making a distinction between D&D and LARP's. D&D = role playing and rules. LARP's = pure fantasy best practiced at home with fellow LARPer's that live and operate in a fantasy world that doesn't exist. Before LARPing existed these people were usually kicked out of community theatre for overacting and demanding to play the part "their way" and wound up in looney bins.
Needless to say, there is a fine line between between what can be accomplished by role playing and what can be accomplished by rules. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 3.5 editions allowed for a balanced approach. I think the role playing benefitted to an extent by the risks inherent in combat. From what I have gathered about 4.0, role playing will fall into one of two categories depending on the group. Near LARP'ing due to a lack of respect for rules that are scewed toward a victorious outcome for the PC's or little, if not 0 role playing as the point of the game is now to defeat adversaries in as few rounds as possbile in order to loot their bodies and move on to the next staged encounter as quickly as possible.