|
Hi,
We have all heard combat grind that can occur, last night however was the first real "grind" that I have encountered. It was awful, I had time to go out for pizza (and a quick beer) and not really miss anything of interest. So later in the evening we sat down to think about the cause of the grind and what perhaps we could to avoid it. The first was some of the suggestions posted here in the forum about adjusting hp's of creatures. We decided that doing that was a little arbitutary and we gave credit to the designers that the hp's of creatures were not a istake but were that way for a reason. Next we thought about the composition as has been suggested, less brutes, that kind of thing. However, we felt that it almost locked the DM in having a set mix of creatures removing some of the encounter design freedom. It was a d20 Star Wars player who said why not use the Wounds/Vatility idea?
So we basically went with the hp = vatility and con = wounds idea from d20 Star Wars and replayed the battle. Very different, criticals become a thing of "high-fives". Just that little change made the battle faster and I would say a little more intense.
WotC already owns the idea and it is a little bit of the shame they didn't think to include in the DMG as an optional method of handling hp's and criticals. The thought that no matter how high level you are that somewhere, some day, that lucky roll and its all over perhaps injects a little bit of humility into PC's also...
2 cents,
S.
Just a question. If using this system a PC takes a wound, how do they heal from it based on these rules? Does a healing surge heal wound points or only vitality points?
Hi,
We have all heard combat grind that can occur, last night however was the first real "grind" that I have encountered. It was awful, I had time to go out for pizza (and a quick beer) and not really miss anything of interest. So later in the evening we sat down to think about the cause of the grind and what perhaps we could to avoid it. The first was some of the suggestions posted here in the forum about adjusting hp's of creatures. We decided that doing that was a little arbitutary and we gave credit to the designers that the hp's of creatures were not a istake but were that way for a reason.
My recollection is that they multiply the hps of certain types of creature roles to allow the creature to get off an interesting set of actions/use a wide range of his powers before he croaks under the weight of a superior number of PC actions. If the monster can achieve enough of that that by muliplying his hit points by a lower factor, mission accomplished, grind reduced.
Keep in mind that in paragon levels and higher, critical hits can do a substantial amount of damage - maxed main power dice + extra dice from magic weapons and miscellaneous bits here and there. Unless vitality increases accordingly, you'll see one-hit encounters reappearing in your game, defeating 4e's purpose for increasing hit points in the first place. Personally, I wouldn't consider this bad because, as a DM, I have no vested interest in getting all my monster's powers fired off. I have a vested interest in making a fun game whether my monsters use all their powers or not. But it would go counter to 4e's monster design method.
Hi,
We have all heard combat grind that can occur, last night however was the first real "grind" that I have encountered. It was awful, I had time to go out for pizza (and a quick beer) and not really miss anything of interest. So later in the evening we sat down to think about the cause of the grind and what perhaps we could to avoid it. The first was some of the suggestions posted here in the forum about adjusting hp's of creatures. We decided that doing that was a little arbitutary and we gave credit to the designers that the hp's of creatures were not a istake but were that way for a reason. Next we thought about the composition as has been suggested, less brutes, that kind of thing. However, we felt that it almost locked the DM in having a set mix of creatures removing some of the encounter design freedom. It was a d20 Star Wars player who said why not use the Wounds/Vatility idea?
So we basically went with the hp = vatility and con = wounds idea from d20 Star Wars and replayed the battle. Very different, criticals become a thing of "high-fives". Just that little change made the battle faster and I would say a little more intense.
WotC already owns the idea and it is a little bit of the shame they didn't think to include in the DMG as an optional method of handling hp's and criticals. The thought that no matter how high level you are that somewhere, some day, that lucky roll and its all over perhaps injects a little bit of humility into PC's also...
2 cents,
S.
I wonder if this will really solve the problem. I mean you've added some impact to rolling 20s but I don't really see how that will interact with Grind much of the time.
Grind happens when the players no longer really feel threatened, At this point its no longer all that interesting if the PCs pull off a crit on the bad guys and its vaguely interesting if the monsters happen to crit them but thats just not going to be common enough to keep the players interested. This house rule might be worth while in the sense that it makes all combat more exciting and interesting but I don't think its a solution to Grind per se.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
|
Have you had a chance to look at the long post about grind on ENWorld? There was a link to it floating around here somewhere (but, I almost think you might have been the one who posted it). The basic advice in the post was to stick with foes close to the level of the PCs.
|
|
Grind happens when the players no longer really feel threatened,
Exactly, using the d20 Star Wars system players always feel threatened. If a monster rolls a "20" then chances are you are going to get "one shoted" so we found the game became even more tactical as wading in the "out hp-ing" the critters was no longer such a smart move.
As to how we handled healing it was quite striaght forward. When you used a healing surge in combat it still ONLY effected your vatality which works in well with the descriptors of hp's in 4e and a healing surge. However you required a rest and the use of the healing surge to regain a healing surge worth of Wounds. Meaning that you can't really regain true physical wounds during combat. They are the real cuts and bruises of the combat not the decrease in luck or what that hp's (Vitality). It must be said however we are only talking the "base" damage and extra damage from scoring a "crit" still is only ducted from you hp's (Vitality). Rather than scoring "max damage" you still roll of but of course subtract from Wounds (CON).
Well this is how we have started, as time progresses I'm sure cracks will appear and we will need to address them. Basically combat has much dire consquences in our games now.
We have read the articles on "anti-grind" but again they in some ways say an encounter "must" contain X and Y type critters to avoid possible grind, and we felt that somewhat limits the encounter design process. We adhere to the idea that ANY critter of the appropriate level should be able to be choosen in any number allowable to make an encounter that doesn't take all evening to play out. The encounter we did last night took longer than a full game of Warhammer Fantasy Battle!
Oh and we all my group does agree the hp bloat of 2e --> 3e --> 4e of both PC's and monsters hasn't hugely improved D&D in our opinion.
S.
I was just listening to the Tome Show about the Monster Manual II, and they were discussing how various monster roles had modified their hit points and damage output so that a lot of monsters have less hit points, but more damage output.
I'm not sure, however, if the exact modification of hit points and damage potential per monster role has been spelled out explicitly (i.e. if its something that can just be applied to existing monsters across the board), or if its just an internal tinkering that the designers have worked out.
|
|
I was just listening to the Tome Show about the Monster Manual II, and they were discussing how various monster roles had modified their hit points and damage output so that a lot of monsters have less hit points, but more damage output.
I'm not sure, however, if the exact modification of hit points and damage potential per monster role has been spelled out explicitly (i.e. if its something that can just be applied to existing monsters across the board), or if its just an internal tinkering that the designers have worked out.
That sounds really interesting, please keep us informed of anything else you hear on the matter. It would seem that the "hp issue" of 4e is a topic, in that it's been noted more than a few times. Our DM isn't quite so keen to House-Rule the hp's of critters so we have been thinking of other ways to address the problem of overly long battles - not just those which would be described as a "grind" but in general. We play in the evening during the week an a hour long single battle is just really too long. We have been playing long enough that the issue is not we don't know the rules, just it's how long it seems to take. We would be please about any advice from the authors on shortening fights to say 15-30 mins for a standard encounter. Likely?
S.
Closest thing I can find to a codified change is a quote from WOTC from this article:
In your own version of this challenge, you might play these two as originally presented, or you might reconfigure Orcus closer to the newer solo monster design tenets: give him 20% fewer hit points, -2 defenses, but also increase his damage output by 50% when bloodied.
Basically it sounds like they applied this design philosophy to both solo and elite monsters.
|
|
Closest thing I can find to a codified change is a quote from WOTC from this article:
In your own version of this challenge, you might play these two as originally presented, or you might reconfigure Orcus closer to the newer solo monster design tenets: give him 20% fewer hit points, -2 defenses, but also increase his damage output by 50% when bloodied.Basically it sounds like they applied this design philosophy to both solo and elite monsters.
That sounds like a good idea 10% easier to hit, less hp's but still dangerous!
S.
|
The designers may have increased monster hit points to let them live long enough to use their abilities and make encounters less "swingy", but I think they went too far. I would say reduce hit points of monsters by 25-50%. A combat that is somewhat swingy is fun and dramatic (unless one side obliterates the other in one round), whereas a combat that is just about grinding through the enemies huge store of hit points is incredibly boring.
I highly recommend that anyone having trouble with 4E grind check out Stalker0's amazing Anti-grind guide over at ENWorld.
|
|
I highly recommend that anyone having trouble with 4E grind check out Stalker0's amazing Anti-grind guide over at ENWorld.
Is it a really great article for sure, but I find that it implies that the current method of forming an encounter from the DMG is in error or at very least fails to give proper advice on encounter design in 4e. The article has good advice but comes across as fitting a square peg to a round hole (with a hammer) to make the system work (i.e. justification after the fact). I have read -10%, -25%, -50% hp's should be used. But really these are just opinions - nothing from WotC except as pointed out earlier. It would seem the answer is a DM should basically ignore monster hp's and have them die when dramatically appropriate OR when players start looking like they are about to have a nap. From what I have read it seems like monsters are designed to use all their cool powers once then they are allowed to die but not before - is this vital?
I have also read about how a party should be constructed to shorten encounter times, but I thought that 4e was meant to get us away from people "having" to play X or Y. Now it seems like not only do you need to optimise you character but we need to optimise our party make-up. Something like "I don't want to be a striker", "you HAVE to be", "but why?", "because if you don't we all need to bring sleeping bags and pillows to the next major encounter", "Oh, right." Or alternatively every encounter is going to need advice on how to run it based on party composition. "If your party has 2 x striker, 1 x defender, 2 x controller turn to page X - If your party has 1 x striker, 2 x defender, 2 x controller turn to page Y..."
Is the damage verses hp's out of whack in 4e or are we just doing something fundamentally wrong? WotC need to publish at very least an article in Dragon, at best an errata? I think 4e will be a much better game once WotC sits down and either writes a "howto" or addresses the issue in some other way. Too many people have noted this problem (not feature) for it to be not real.
S.
I have also read about how a party should be constructed to shorten encounter times, but I thought that 4e was meant to get us away from people "having" to play X or Y. Now it seems like not only do you need to optimise you character but we need to optimise our party make-up. Something like "I don't want to be a striker", "you HAVE to be", "but why?", "because if you don't we all need to bring sleeping bags and pillows to the next major encounter", "Oh, right." Or alternatively every encounter is going to need advice on how to run it based on party composition. "If your party has 2 x striker, 1 x defender, 2 x controller turn to page X - If your party has 1 x striker, 2 x defender, 2 x controller turn to page Y..."
You should generally be fine as long as you're filling the roles. There's always been a certain level of necessity in having particular elements of a party present - you have always needed a character capable of healing, for instance. As long as you have a defender, striker, leader, and maybe a controller (and then a fifth party member of any role) you should be just fine, though combats will be more "grindy" if you stack your party with defenders and leaders, and less "grindy" if you stack them with strikers and controllers.
And this is just a nitpick, but I've never encountered anyone who has complained about needing to fill the striker role. It seems like everyone loves dealing damage. ;P
|
|
though combats will be more "grindy" if you stack your party with defenders and leaders, and less "grindy" if you stack them with strikers and controllers.
And this is just a nitpick, but I've never encountered anyone who has complained about needing to fill the striker role. It seems like everyone loves dealing damage. ;P
That's what we have found, we need to stack the party with strikers which is fine from a purely mechanical point of view but less satisfying from a roleplaying one. Meaning it can lock in what some people need play - limited their choices as it were.
We just wish WotC would post some standard guidelines on speeding up encounters in a way that doesn't unbalance the whole encounter. Not saying make them easier so the players kill the critters faster, something so the probability of the outcome remains the same just the time frame is shorter.
Striker was just an example... Mr Cheeky.
S.
It would seem the answer is a DM should basically ignore monster hp's and have them die when dramatically appropriate OR when players start looking like they are about to have a nap.
This is exactly what I tend to do, about 30 to 40% of the time and particularly with key enemies. Sometimes, I actually have to keep them alive another round or so to make them seem like a real threat.
I definitely wouldn't do this all the time, otherwise I'd probably be inserting a bias towards things ending the same way all of the time. But, I will do it pretty often.
But, I am also interested in the idea you guys used Stefan. So, tell me if I get this right. When the attack roll is not a critical, you remove damage from regular hit points, but when the attack roll is a critical, you remove the base weapon damage from constitution? The "actual" constitution value (i.e. does the character's Fort defense go down?). Or from a Wounds value equal to his constitution.
So, for a creature that does, say, 3d8+9 damage on a hit, would you remove 3d8 points from the Wounds value? 3d8+9?
And a creature dies when it's wounds are 0 or negative? And what about a character? They're just dying as usual?
I really do like this idea, but I'm worried that when monster base damages get high, there could be a lot of one-shotting of characters.
|
|
But, I am also interested in the idea you guys used Stefan. So, tell me if I get this right. When the attack roll is not a critical, you remove damage from regular hit points, but when the attack roll is a critical, you remove the base weapon damage from constitution? The "actual" constitution value (i.e. does the character's Fort defense go down?). Or from a Wounds value equal to his constitution.
So, for a creature that does, say, 3d8+9 damage on a hit, would you remove 3d8 points from the Wounds value? 3d8+9?
And a creature dies when it's wounds are 0 or negative? And what about a character? They're just dying as usual?
I really do like this idea, but I'm worried that when monster base damages get high, there could be a lot of one-shotting of characters.
The CON value is actually a new number called WOUNDS, your hp's you would call VITALITY. So the wound damage isn't actual CON damage so there is no effect on FORT and other related CON things. Your CON just lets you know how many wounds your character has. Once you lose all your Vitality the normal damage comes off you Wounds, you stay alive until you wounds get to -CON (or -10 I think if better for you) but of course you are down at 0 Wounds.
Of course without crits occuring you have now added even more "hp's" to your PC making the battles even longer...
We are quite low level so the one shot thing isn't happening... yet. That was one of the things we have yet to see. Now in the d20 Star Wars this happened also as blasters could do damage that could exceed any PC's CON without too much trouble. Any suggestions most appreciated.
Right now you are right we are on a crit rolling normal damage (as you give as an example 3d8+9) and subtracting from Wounds. Meaning most PC's would be dropped by this hit. Mind you makes combat something you think twice about enagaging in... :)
Not an ideal solution, but something we are working on and very interested to hear of what others are doing to stop the "wargame" length combats that can ensue in 4e.
I think our group really thinks that WotC need to address this issue to have some standard across 4e. It could be argued equally they intended it this way, or they cocked up. End result is the same however, some are finding 4e combats a chore. A funny statement to make but, I really like 4e except for the combats...
S.
One suggestion I've found that I think works well is the sort of "pan the camera away for the mop-up" action you see in some movies or TV series. When the PCs are clearly going to come out on top of the fight without any serious losses, and you are certain that the remainder of the fight will drag on uselessly, give the PCs the option of "mopping up" the remaining foes. If they do so, each of them loses a healing surge to represent the attrition suffered during the mop-up, but they don't have to actually play it out (nor do they lose any other potentially useful resources, like daily powers or magic item uses).
|
|
One suggestion I've found that I think works well is the sort of "pan the camera away for the mop-up" action you see in some movies or TV series. When the PCs are clearly going to come out on top of the fight without any serious losses, and you are certain that the remainder of the fight will drag on uselessly, give the PCs the option of "mopping up" the remaining foes. If they do so, each of them loses a healing surge to represent the attrition suffered during the mop-up, but they don't have to actually play it out (nor do they lose any other potentially useful resources, like daily powers or magic item uses).
Any suggestions on a "trigger" point for this? When do you know you have reached this point?
Cheers for the suggestion,
S.
One suggestion I've found that I think works well is the sort of "pan the camera away for the mop-up" action you see in some movies or TV series. When the PCs are clearly going to come out on top of the fight without any serious losses, and you are certain that the remainder of the fight will drag on uselessly, give the PCs the option of "mopping up" the remaining foes. If they do so, each of them loses a healing surge to represent the attrition suffered during the mop-up, but they don't have to actually play it out (nor do they lose any other potentially useful resources, like daily powers or magic item uses).Any suggestions on a "trigger" point for this? When do you know you have reached this point?
Cheers for the suggestion,
S.
Mechanically? No idea. It probably has to be a "know it when you see it" sort of thing. But if every enemy is bloodied (or worse) and none of the PCs is bloodied, unless you have something incredible up your DM sleeve the PCs are going to come out on top.
One suggestion I've found that I think works well is the sort of "pan the camera away for the mop-up" action you see in some movies or TV series. When the PCs are clearly going to come out on top of the fight without any serious losses, and you are certain that the remainder of the fight will drag on uselessly, give the PCs the option of "mopping up" the remaining foes. If they do so, each of them loses a healing surge to represent the attrition suffered during the mop-up, but they don't have to actually play it out (nor do they lose any other potentially useful resources, like daily powers or magic item uses).Any suggestions on a "trigger" point for this? When do you know you have reached this point?
Cheers for the suggestion,
S.
I've only had to use this tactic once since I decided to keep it in mind as a way to speed things up. When it came up in my game, there was one untouched bad guy left but he had high AC and HP,low damage output and a lot of his special abilities were based around giving bonuses to allies, so it was pretty obvious to me that it wasn't worth letting the fight grind on.
I think it's something your DM has to judge based on the situation and status of the party's foes, but I would probably never use it while the BBEG is still standing. I usually have the BBEG try to escape once the fight has reached the stage where it's obvious that it's just a matter of time till the party wins, and this is a tactic that can be used occasionally for regular foes.
Oddly enough, my 4 player group consists of 2 defenders, 1 leader, and 1 striker and, apart from the fight previously mentioned, we haven't really experienced any grind. There was one exception early on where they were pitted against a group containing 2 controllers that were throwing out a lot of debuffs onto the PCs, but I used that as a learning experience and it helped me understand monster roles more than just reading the books ever did.
In some ways, 4E's clarification of monster roles is one of the highlights of the system for me. Having a "language" to describe a foe's strengths and weaknesses helps me to build balanced encounters for my group. While doing this can impose some limitations on the foes I can use, it doesn't stop me using a certain foe but rather makes me aware that having large numbers of that foe could cause problems.
That's what we have found, we need to stack the party with strikers which is fine from a purely mechanical point of view but less satisfying from a roleplaying one. Meaning it can lock in what some people need play - limited their choices as it were.
Are you really finding this that much of a problem? Strikers are the most common role out there, more classes fall into the striker role then any other by a fairly significant margin and this is a party role that generally appeals to many players. They come with a good verity of flavours as well be it hand to hand specialists or maniacs (Like the Barbarian) through range weapon builds (rangers, various spell users), sneaky types like Rogues or fast and loose builds like Monks.
Were I could see more issues cropping up is with my suggestion of keeping the party down to only 1 defender. Its possible for the DM to play around this issue as well but its tricky because the issue with the defenders is essentially their marking ability. They are just so good at locking down combatants that the game becomes much less dynamic if the players can force to many bad guys into a situation where the monsters must stand there and engage in a head butting contest.
Head butting contests are boring if its happening all over the place. Where as its interesting and exciting if marking is a limited resource in the party that needs to be used tactically to try and shut down the most dangerous threat.
Anyway there are other ways of handling things DM side if the players really are keen on having fewer strikers and lots of defenders but I at least suggest seeing if the players are willing to take care of this issue player side since I think a lot of the time the restrictions will actually be a none issue. My bet is you'll find that this is resolved fairly often with little more then one of the players having this be a factor when trying to choose between three classes that interest him.
|
|
One suggestion I've found that I think works well is the sort of "pan the camera away for the mop-up" action you see in some movies or TV series. When the PCs are clearly going to come out on top of the fight without any serious losses, and you are certain that the remainder of the fight will drag on uselessly, give the PCs the option of "mopping up" the remaining foes. If they do so, each of them loses a healing surge to represent the attrition suffered during the mop-up, but they don't have to actually play it out (nor do they lose any other potentially useful resources, like daily powers or magic item uses).
this is something I use allot in all my games to sped up combat, in fact if there is a situation where the PCs out class thier opponents it is far gone conclusion they will win I just narrate the combat at that time and skip the rolling. I find it also add to the Role Playing feeling. Like Scott says it is a you know when you see it kind of feeling.
|
I have also read about how a party should be constructed to shorten encounter times, but I thought that 4e was meant to get us away from people "having" to play X or Y. Now it seems like not only do you need to optimise you character but we need to optimise our party make-up. Something like "I don't want to be a striker", "you HAVE to be", "but why?", "because if you don't we all need to bring sleeping bags and pillows to the next major encounter", "Oh, right." Or alternatively every encounter is going to need advice on how to run it based on party composition. "If your party has 2 x striker, 1 x defender, 2 x controller turn to page X - If your party has 1 x striker, 2 x defender, 2 x controller turn to page Y..."You should generally be fine as long as you're filling the roles. There's always been a certain level of necessity in having particular elements of a party present - you have always needed a character capable of healing, for instance. As long as you have a defender, striker, leader, and maybe a controller (and then a fifth party member of any role) you should be just fine, though combats will be more "grindy" if you stack your party with defenders and leaders, and less "grindy" if you stack them with strikers and controllers.
And this is just a nitpick, but I've never encountered anyone who has complained about needing to fill the striker role. It seems like everyone loves dealing damage. ;P
While it's advisable to fill the roles in 4e, one of the things I like about it is the way any class that fills the role will work. In 3.5, you almost "need" a cleric - sure other casses can heal, but not as well. 4e gives a lot of options for the various roles (especially as more books come out.)
It's funny, I am finding myself in this exact situation. I'm joining a new campaign, and feel somewhat compelled to make a striker, since that seems to be the existing parties biggest gap. Like you said, Scott, it's not much of a chore ;) I get to try out my sorcerer tomorrow...
Rather than "panning away" when the outcome of the fight seems obvious, I just have the remaining enemies gain Vulnerable 5 (or 10) All (representing the fact they're demoralized because they know they're losing). Most of the players don't seem to realize I'm doing it, and it keeps fights from dragging.
We still have long, drawn-out fights, but I think our main problem is people not paying attention, and not knowing what they want to do when their turn comes. Sigh.
Oddly enough, my 4 player group consists of 2 defenders, 1 leader, and 1 striker and, apart from the fight previously mentioned, we haven't really experienced any grind. There was one exception early on where they were pitted against a group containing 2 controllers that were throwing out a lot of debuffs onto the PCs, but I used that as a learning experience and it helped me understand monster roles more than just reading the books ever did.
Well there could be various explanations for why your not experiencing Grind, for example I'v seen very specific defender builds where the damage out put was very high which, in some sense, turns the defender into a striker.
There are other explanations as well but by far the most likely answer is simply personal taste. One of th big difficulties with making a mechanical rule to eliminate Grind is that Grind itself comes into effect at a different moment for everyone. Its going to be about the individuals involved and their patience when dealing with this circumstance and how the group deals with mopping up might play a huge factor. The group that all intuitively senses that the combat is getting to the point where it just needs to be finished might all react by going into hyperdrive mode where everyone stops really deliberating they just announce their at wills name while the d20 and damage dice are tumbling through the air. d20 lands and either hit X damage or miss. The sentence is barely out of the players mouth when the next person in line announces a powers name and the dice are falling.
Its hard to notice grind when ones turn takes less then 10 seconds and the whole round flies by in under 60 seconds. In this case even three or four rounds of mopping up is barely noticed.
|
|
I have found that I haven't really run into any "grinds" with my group despite several solo fights with stuff that would cause a grind I thought going in. The part composition is 2 defenders, 2 strikers, 1 leader. The strikers are a sorcerer and an avenger, the defenders are a fighter and a paladin, and the leader is a bard. They are level 22 and recently fought an ancient white dragon (level 24 solo) and the fight lasted only about 35 minutes. The sorcerer is a Storm Sorcerer, Lightning Fury, Archlich build and drops a sick amount of damage every round with the combo of his lightning daggers (free action attack every round once cast), quickened casting feat (one at will as a minor action once per encounter), and the two sorcerer feats that maximize critical damage dice and allow a critical with implements on 19-20. He is a dual implement wielder with a staff of ruin +5 and a +5 dagger and routinely drops 50-60 damage per spell he hits with and with lightning daggers routinely gets off 100+ damage a round. On critical hits it isn't uncommon to see him drop over 200 damage in one round. The Bard has a power that also comes in handy that lets the entire party use an at will or basic attack as a free action on her turn (it's called final chorus or something like that).
Anyway, my thing is that in the 4 solo battles they fought, none of them went more than 45 minutes including additional monsters in some of them. Maybe I just haven't run into the grind myself, but it seems to me that the party is doing just fine on damage output and they aren't particularly stacked with strikers and have no controllers.