|
MonsterEnvy posted:They don't actually take Int damage from the 2nd part there is just a 2nd roll to see if the die roll is higher then the Int of the target. If the roll is higher Int is reduced to 0 and the target is stunned. So the target's Int is not "damaged", it's just reduced to zero? If something reduces my hit points to zero is that also not damage? What about the stuff that reduces my max hp? Is that damage? MonsterEnvy posted:I don't have an answer here. I don't know. I don't think it will get that much better on that front other then using some sense. I was just saying I hope the building encounters thing improves with the DMG and remarked that it was noted that it was still under work. Then I pointed out a problem I have with it, but I made a mistake with my post and forgot to incurred the thing that made my point. So you have no idea how it works or how to fix it or any hope that it will get better, but you're prepared to argue that it's fine. OK, no problem. Now do the other part of my post you didn't respond to. Here it is again. AlphaDog posted:Tell me, what can they do with multipliers and so on that will make the hosed CR/XP system they already published actually work? Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 05:27 on Oct 7, 2014 |
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:23
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 31, 2024 11:45 |
|
|
30.5 Days posted:An even-level CR should not have a 50% chance of ending the adventure, that's idiotic. It can't end the adventure it can kill a character. An Ogre can do that too. AlphaDog posted:So the target's Int is not "damaged", it's just reduced to zero? If something reduces my hit points to zero is that also not damage? What about the stuff that reduces my max hp? Is that damage? Because you don't have to do any calculating or anything like that if it was reduced to anything more then that, it just brings it to zero. If something says your hp becomes zero I don't consider it damage ether, It is just setting your stat to a point. It could say you are stunned until Greater Restoration is cast on you and the effect would be the same. With the max hp thing. All of that is a result of the damage. MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 05:28 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:23
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:It can't end the adventure it can kill a character. An Ogre can do that too. ah yes, because having your character that you spent time and energy building and setting up just to die is totally not a game ender when it happens at level two and there's nothing they can do to stop it
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:26
|
|
|
Grimpond posted:ah yes, because having your character that you spent time and energy building and setting up just to die is totally not a game ender when it happens at level two and there's nothing they can do to stop it I never said it was a good thing. Just it's not as deadly as everyone makes it out to be. The thing I would complain about is that it remains a much larger threat then other CR 2 monsters in all levels after.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:30
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:It can't end the adventure it can kill a character. An Ogre can do that too. Does it kill the character? The stun until int is regained line made me think it doesn't, but honestly I'm not interested in running 5E so I'm sure as hell not going to sit down and figure out how a terrible encounter I'd never use works. I got that impression that you essentially had to drag the character out of the dungeon and go get them healed or rested up somewhere. Which if you're running the sort of game that an intellect devourer would EVER appear in is actually worse than death because it stops the action, so great job 5E. But even if it does kill the character, obviously that shouldn't happen half the time either?!
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:32
|
|
|
Reminds me of one instance where I had a player in a 3E game who's Paladin kept dying in really stupid ways almost every adventure. He never made a new character, he just changed the first letter of the character's name and just kept going with this "new" character when he'd rejoin the party. Oh, PC death revolving door, how I missed you... Thank you 5E for bringing back meaningless PC death to the table because that doesn't make investing time into your character a complete waste, no siree.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:34
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:I never said it was a good thing. Just it's not as deadly as everyone makes it out to be. The thing I would complain about is that it remains a much larger threat then other CR 2 monsters in all levels after. It is absolutely as deadly as it seems because the swingy nature of dice means that every round this thing is alive and in combat is a round where someone has a high chance of instantly leaving the fight, which for all intents and purposes is the same as death if it happens to the other party members as well.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:35
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:I never said it was a good thing. Just it's not as deadly as everyone makes it out to be. The thing I would complain about is that it remains a much larger threat then other CR 2 monsters in all levels after. But as everyone has just made clear, it is as deadly as everyone makes it out to be. Two rounds on an int 10 character is a 62% chance of death which makes it the most deadly thing in the game. The 3.5-era Dungeon Magazine submission guidelines stated that no even-level encounter should even have a 5% chance of death because one level's worth of encounters would have a 50/50 chance of player death in that case. Even a single 62% death encounter is astounding and the issue is not that people are misunderstanding the deadliness of an intellect devourer, the problem is that you don't think a 62% chance of death in an even-level encounter is a big deal for some reason.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:35
|
|
|
AlphaDog posted:So the target's Int is not "damaged", it's just reduced to zero? If something reduces my hit points to zero is that also not damage? What about the stuff that reduces my max hp? Is that damage? I never said any of that. I just said that I don't know how to fix it, But I do hope it will get better. As for the 2nd point I don't think it's hosed I think it has flaws, but you guys are making a mountain out of molehill it's not nearly as bad as you think it is. It works decently well. My problem is that it under powers deadly encounters with a high CR creature and a low CR creature. 30.5 Days posted:But as everyone has just made clear, it is as deadly as everyone makes it out to be. Two rounds on an int 10 character is a 62% chance of death which makes it the most deadly thing in the game. The 3.5-era Dungeon Magazine submission guidelines stated that no even-level encounter should even have a 5% chance of death because one level's worth of encounters would have a 50/50 chance of player death in that case. Even a single 62% death encounter is astounding and the issue is not that people are misunderstanding the deadliness of an intellect devourer, the problem is that you don't think a 62% chance of death in an even-level encounter is a big deal for some reason. Well this edition stats that they have a decent chance be able to take an equal cr creature with no casualties. Decent chance being the Keyword they can take casualties. However the Int devourer is unlikely to live to it's 2nd turn unless it rolled really well on initiative. So its not a 62% chance of might as well be death because it requires a spell of equal level to raise dead to fix. MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 05:42 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:36
|
|
|
Also the 62% chance of death doesn't include the average of 6.6 damage per round on an int 10 character with values as high as 20 DPR. So you know take the fighter's HP and factor that into his death odds because 62% chance isn't high ENOUGH.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:39
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:I never said any of that. MonsterEnvy posted:They don't actually take Int damage
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:39
|
|
|
Was talking about this part quote:So you have no idea how it works or how to fix it or any hope that it will get better, but you're prepared to argue that it's fine. OK, no problem. Now do the other part of my post you didn't respond to. Here it is again. I already answered about the int damage. Anyway going to bed so anymore arguments are going to have to wait or end.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:44
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:As for the 2nd point I don't think it's hosed I think it has flaws, but you guys are making a mountain out of molehill it's not nearly as bad as you think it is. It works decently well. My problem is that it under powers deadly encounters with a high CR creature and a low CR creature. No it doesn't "have flaws", it's hosed. No, it doesn't "work decently well", it's hosed. Yes, it's exactly as bad as I think it is, which is "hosed". No, we're not "making a mountain out of a molehill", we're pointing out every way in which the system is hosed. If you want to argue otherwise, provide some loving evidence. You asked me for evidence about what I said about CR 2 creatures, and I provided it to you. Of course you haven't responded to that, because you were dead loving wrong, as usual. You want to tell me it's not hosed? Show me how it's not hosed. Show me the way that a Centaur and an Ogre are equivalent challenges. Show me how to make balanced encounters using the CR and XP that are already in the published monster manual. Show me how an Intellect Devourer isn't really a serious threat and is in fact the same kind of challenge as a Centaur or an Ogre. edit: You have demonstrated that you have no loving idea how this game works multiple times. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 05:48 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:45
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:As for the 2nd point I don't think it's hosed I think it has flaws, but you guys are making a mountain out of molehill it's not nearly as bad as you think it is. It works decently well. My problem is that it under powers deadly encounters with a high CR creature and a low CR creature.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:46
|
|
|
The Intellect Devourer is a perfect example of what's wrong with 5E btw. In 4E it'd be a monster that attacked against your Will defense and did psychic damage and stuns, and the tactics would be it goes after the party member with the lowest intellect. And rather than relying on DM fiat to not turn it into a shitshow, it'd be players ganging up to protect the defenders for once, and it'd be an incredible flavor encounter that inverted expectations. In 5E it's this save or die horseshit where we're all supposed to pretend that lions don't attack sick antelopes because how can a lion detect sickness?
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:47
|
|
|
30.5 Days posted:The Intellect Devourer is a perfect example of what's wrong with 5E btw. In 4E it'd be a monster that attacked against your Will defense and did psychic damage and stuns, and the tactics would be it goes after the party member with the lowest intellect. And rather than relying on DM fiat to not turn it into a shitshow, it'd be players ganging up to protect the defenders for once, and it'd be an incredible flavor encounter that inverted expectations. In 5E it's this save or die horseshit where we're all supposed to pretend that lions don't attack sick antelopes because how can a lion detect sickness? It must be a spellcaster
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:48
|
|
|
One thing that 5E has made clear to me is how different other people's games must be from mine. The fact that some people look at a monster with a one-in-five chance of killing an int 12 character if it gets to act twice, and think "meh, acceptable level of risk" is mind-boggling to me for anything besides a Tomb-of-Horrors style one-shot. (And to be clear, I don't mean just MonsterEnvy - Intellect Devourers are actually rather popular in other corners of the internet.)MonsterEnvy posted:As for the 2nd point I don't think it's hosed I think it has flaws, but you guys are making a mountain out of molehill it's not nearly as bad as you think it is. I actually think that the encounter-building/CR math being awful is a pretty serious problem. One of the major challenges D&D has is attracting new people to the hobby, and in particular new DMs. The fact that the math doesn't make much sense means that a DM who tries to use the default rules for his first few experiences is likely to end up with encounters that bore his players or kill them. The rules of the game should be geared towards giving first-time DMs not just good experiences, but excellent experiences. It's much more important for a new DM to have a good experience running this game than it is for, say, you or me to have a good experience running this game. If you or I run 5E and have a lovely time, we are likely to spend some time analyzing what went wrong and then attempting to address it. For me personally, I've DMed a lot of games and so I'll probably be able to identify something I can change in the rules or how I built encounters, or something I personally screwed up in running the game, that'll at least make things better next time. OTOH if a newbie DM runs a game and has a lovely time, they're probably going to think either "this game sucks" or "I'm just not cut out for this DM thing". Losing potential DMs is really, really bad. And personally, as an RPG gamer, even if 5E isn't my favorite RPG I'm pretty invested in D&D being a good gateway to new people joining the game - it's the most prominent brand and I'd love to see the hobby grow. The fact that this edition isn't really shaping up to be new-DM-friendly is bad whether you like 5E or not. If you like 5E it's especially bad. branar fucked around with this message at 06:03 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 05:54
|
|
|
30.5 Days posted:The Intellect Devourer is a perfect example of what's wrong with 5E btw. In 4E it'd be a monster that attacked against your Will defense and did psychic damage and stuns, and the tactics would be it goes after the party member with the lowest intellect. And rather than relying on DM fiat to not turn it into a shitshow, it'd be players ganging up to protect the defenders for once, and it'd be an incredible flavor encounter that inverted expectations. In 5E it's this save or die horseshit where we're all supposed to pretend that lions don't attack sick antelopes because how can a lion detect sickness? This really is the best reflection of the mentality that goes into 5E encounter building. Much like 3E, encounters aren't meant to be EXCITING or EPIC. They're meant to be player punishment for loving up. In 4E every encounter is a set piece and all kinds of exciting because the whole thing turns out very cinematic and intricate. I literally, just tonight, ran my weekly Dark Sun game and the players ran into an Ambush Spider encounter. The PCs only had a 25 ft radius torch in a 30 foot radius room full of boxes cleverly designed to block line of sight and provide cover. Every time the spiders attacked, they'd lunge in, make an attack, then skitter away to a blind spot in the room using Stealth checks on the following turn. There were spiderwebs everywhere and they had discovered earlier that the things were highly flammable so it gave the PCs the possibility of causing ongoing fire damage to any spider that was actually using one of the webs to hide in. It was very "Alien" in execution, with the PCs not so much fighting the spiders but waiting for them to pounce with nervous anticipation and then going full war mode when they finally did attack again. It was exciting, but not once did it feel unfair or lethal.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 06:07
|
|
|
30.5 Days posted:An even-level CR should not have a 50% chance of ending the adventure, that's idiotic. It gets even better- if you have a party of level 20s you can throw dozens of these little fuckers at the party and they'll still have similar odds of ending the adventure. Rogues, Wizards and Druids have a higher save bonus thanks to proficiency scaling and the Monk and Paladin have their own methods, but the 10 Int fighter with no proficiency probably still has 10 Int and no proficiency because the only way for those numbers to go up is for you to spend feat/ability score/attunement slots on things that boost your Intelligence rather than spending those same resources on things that are actually fun. Then you've got the problem where you can't actually kill them in one attack apiece because damage doesn't scale up that well. A 20 in your Attack stat and a +3 weapon mean that you're doing 1[W]+8 damage per hit compared to maybe 1[W]+3 damage per hit at level 1 with a 16 in your attack stat. Now, the "-5 to hit, +10 to damage" feats can actually push this up into one-shot levels if you have a magical weapon, but if you don't then a fighter or even a ranger with horde breaker and volley/whirlwind attack will have trouble killing more than one per two attacks, which leaves several rounds of this poo poo. Of course, spending a magic item attunement slot on a generic save booster helps somewhat, but the sheer number of saves you're going to have to make means that every round is a gamble. It's worse at mid-levels if you don't have a ton of magical weapons, because then not only do you have to deal with multiples of these guys to spread out your attacks (not as many monsters, but you don't get multiple attacks until level 6 or so), but your weapon users have to deal with the 1/2 damage effectively doubling their HP. You basically need something that does 21 average damage or greater in an AoE to sweep the trash off the board in only one round, which is pretty much magical AoE. Since these things can basically bypass the scaling defenses of many classes they're a threat at every level, and their threat only grows as higher level fights support more of them. It's ridiculous.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 06:15
|
|
|
Agent Boogeyman posted:This really is the best reflection of the mentality that goes into 5E encounter building. Much like 3E, encounters aren't meant to be EXCITING or EPIC. They're meant to be player punishment for loving up. In 4E every encounter is a set piece and all kinds of exciting because the whole thing turns out very cinematic and intricate. I literally, just tonight, ran my weekly Dark Sun game and the players ran into an Ambush Spider encounter. The PCs only had a 25 ft radius torch in a 30 foot radius room full of boxes cleverly designed to block line of sight and provide cover. Every time the spiders attacked, they'd lunge in, make an attack, then skitter away to a blind spot in the room using Stealth checks on the following turn. There were spiderwebs everywhere and they had discovered earlier that the things were highly flammable so it gave the PCs the possibility of causing ongoing fire damage to any spider that was actually using one of the webs to hide in. It was very "Alien" in execution, with the PCs not so much fighting the spiders but waiting for them to pounce with nervous anticipation and then going full war mode when they finally did attack again. It was exciting, but not once did it feel unfair or lethal. Meanwhile an intellect devourer receiving a surprise round increases chance of player death to 76%.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 06:15
|
|
|
Bhaal posted:So we've gone from "it's not a save or die, it's not that dangerous" to "it only has about 2 rounds to live". ID 1 stuns Brosef. ID 2 eats Brosef's brains. Rinse, repeat. Attack from ambush (like the ambush predators with good stealth that they are) and the party doesn't even get to react. It's just slurp city.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 06:27
|
|
|
Boy, I sure hope I randomly roll enough high ability scores that I can afford to put a decent one into a stat of tertiary-or-less importance so I don't get instantly loving killed by a level 2 monster. (Is it weird that out of everything wrong with this game, I'm still the most mad about the pointless and lovely return of randomly rolled ability scores? It's just so indefensibly terrible.)
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 06:27
|
|
|
30.5 Days posted:Does it kill the character? The stun until int is regained line made me think it doesn't, but honestly I'm not interested in running 5E so I'm sure as hell not going to sit down and figure out how a terrible encounter I'd never use works. I got that impression that you essentially had to drag the character out of the dungeon and go get them healed or rested up somewhere. Which if you're running the sort of game that an intellect devourer would EVER appear in is actually worse than death because it stops the action, so great job 5E. It stuns the character until their intelligence is restored, with takes Greater Restoration, a 5th level (character level 9) spell. It can also, for realsie reals, actually eat their brain if it int drops one character and is still around the next round. That takes Wish, a 9th level spell, to fix.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 06:41
|
|
|
Solid Jake posted:Boy, I sure hope I randomly roll enough high ability scores that I can afford to put a decent one into a stat of tertiary-or-less importance so I don't get instantly loving killed by a level 2 monster. This was in 4e as well. It been it every edition. It's just an option you don't have to use it. It's still by far the stupidest complaint. Some people like to roll for it. The book even says "if you don't like it do this instead" RPZip posted:It stuns the character until their intelligence is restored, with takes Greater Restoration, a 5th level (character level 9) spell. It can also, for realsie reals, actually eat their brain if it int drops one character and is still around the next round. That takes Wish, a 9th level spell, to fix. Not quite correct. Resurrection the 7th level spell can fix the brain getting eaten issue. Just have to make sure the person who's brain was eaten dies.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 07:22
|
|
|
Re: exp awards for killing monsters/encounters and how to assign exp to custom minons types. Don't. Seriously drop the whole idea of giving out exp as a reward for doing anything. Give out levels as rewards for meeting specific goals - it's one less fiddly thing to track, you can have as many or as few encounters as you want for a specific part of the adventure, the players going off on a tangent and killing a bunch of stuff and levelling up doesn't mean they suddenly outlevel your planned climactic event. Use the exp values for monsters to create encounters (if the system ever makes sense) but that is it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 07:27
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:This was in 4e as well. It been it every edition. It's just an option you don't have to use it. It's still by far the stupidest complaint. Some people like to roll for it. The book even says "if you don't like it do this instead" The PHB starts that paragraph with the sentence "You generate your character's 6 ability scores randomly". At the end of the paragraph is the sentence "If you want to save time or don't like the idea of randomly determining ability scores, use the scores instead..." What information is given to the player in that paragraph to indicate what might be good and bad about the options presented? Which option will the new player think of as the "usual" way to generate ability scores? Which option will they regard as not for them because they want to do it "right" the first time? Where is my point-buy system described in this section? Why, in your opinion, is this a well-phrased section of rules that provides good information to players?
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 07:52
|
|
|
Compare to 4E: "You can use one of three methods to generate ability scores." For point buy: "This method is a little more complicated than the standard array, but it gives comparable results. With this method, you can build a character who's really good in one ability score, but at the cost of having average scores in the other five." For rolling: "Some players like the idea of generating ability scores randomly. THe result of this method can be really good, or it can be really bad. On average, you'll come out a little worse tahn if you had used the standard array. If you roll well, you can come out way ahead, but if you roll poorly, you might generate a character who's virtually unplayable. Use this method with caution." It also arranges the three methods from most to least appropriate for a new player. It is a really well-written section, which isn't even that common in 4E, to be honest.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 08:06
|
|
|
So either the Intellect Devourer knows how much intellect there is to be devoured in its prey, in which case it should go for the 10 (or less) INT Fighter because it's the easiest target, or it doesn't know in which case it's going to go for the Fighter anyway because the Fighter is the one in melee range. Alternatively, you could put your Wizard up in front so that the Intellect Devourer will attack him first as the nearest target, or that the Devourer will attack him because he's got the "tastiest" brain despite the brain being more difficult to eat, but even then, with [12 AC, 21 HP and 2d4+2 damage] the Devourer could just straight-up melee the Wizard instead. MonsterEnvy posted:This was in 4e as well. It been it every edition. It's just an option you don't have to use it. It's still by far the stupidest complaint. Some people like to roll for it. The book even says "if you don't like it do this instead" The book doesn't present the different options as being on the same level as each other, though. Mr Beens posted:Re: exp awards for killing monsters/encounters and how to assign exp to custom minons types. I agree with this wholeheartedly for most systems. You're going to end up doing all sorts of fudgey bullshit anyway like trying to justify the party hitting level 2 because encounter balance is so hosed that you need to level them up right now, or throwing MMO-grind-esque encounters at a party just to get them to earn enough to level up or arbitrarily increasing the arbitrary amounts of "quest reward" experience to achieve the same effect.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 08:07
|
|
|
Just the idea that you get the same XP for fighting four encounters of one orc each gives the same XP as one encounter of four orcs is incredibly hosed up.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 09:11
|
|
|
Why? Does one Orc not give a standard amount of XP? If I tie my shoelaces one-handed while suspended upside-down over a volcano... do I get a massive XP bonus? Not trying to be argumentative for its own sake, but I really don't see a problem with 1 monster = 100XP, regardless of numbers. The CR multiplier I am not crazy about, but XP should be per monster/trap/quest and not based on the supposed encounter difficulty. Otherwise you might as well just do a gut check per encounter to determine how much XP was gained based on encounter difficulty. And what an insane system that would be.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 09:28
|
|
|
Even if there was no resting or any kind of post-combat recovery between 4 encounters of 1 Orc each, those 4 encounters are still very different in terms of difficulty compared to a single encounter of 4 Orcs.Malcolm posted:Otherwise you might as well just do a gut check per encounter to determine how much XP was gained based on encounter difficulty. And what an insane system that would be. Not really. Awarding an extra amount of exp in the form of a multiplier to account for the fact that 4 Orcs can focus fire, or overwhelm the party's tanks/defenses, or force more abilities to be blown through overkill, etc etc is not arbitrary. Or at least, no more arbitrary than awarding exp based on a skill check or a roleplaying/quest reward.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 09:36
|
|
|
ProfessorCirno posted:For me, the champion of 3.x's CR system is either the neigh unkillable CR3 Shadow that flies and phases through walls, attacks your strength, and spawns more shadows with each kill... These are all just elaborate "Did you bring a cleric?" binary checks. D&D has a long history of monsters that are situationally brutal, the situation being "you don't have a caster" with a tiny minority of "gently caress this caster in particular" that usually has an easy out if the caster knows what he's doing. I am running a 3.5e game and I actually took it upon myself to build a chart of monsters from levels 1-24 that creates a challenging medium-sized monster at each level by baseline replicating a very well-equipped sword & board fighter with magical enhancements appropriate to level. If I want to make the monster more interesting, I add caster levels, apply templates (which by the way are also not that reliable as CR modifiers, though more reliable than base monster CR), or increase or decrease size, changing CR by 1 for each growth in size. So basically there's a complete spreadsheet that I can draw from to make either planned or spontaneous encounters. I'm the first person I know of to try to install math or anything resembling a real quick reference NPC chart into the 3E encounter math. 3E is so outdated in design principles that I'm quickly losing patience with the entire thing, of course. gradenko_2000 posted:So either the Intellect Devourer knows how much intellect there is to be devoured in its prey, in which case it should go for the 10 (or less) INT Fighter because it's the easiest target, or it doesn't know in which case it's going to go for the Fighter anyway because the Fighter is the one in melee range. As far as I remember Int 20 wizards are actually immune to the intellect devourer's save-or-die because it's so shoddily constructed. In 5.5 you might get a straight save instead of a uniquely broken subsystem to run the intellect devourer's attack that doesn't require a unique subsystem at all.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 09:36
|
|
|
I just think it's kind of backwards to reward a party for the difficulty of the encounter, as opposed to the actual XP of the foe/trap they vanquished. 400 goblins = 10,000 XP 4 goblins = 100 XP Why complicate things? Just because arbitrary outside factors happen to influence the battle, I don't think player characters should gain extra experience because it was raining (potentially causing concentration checks or what have you). Even the most trivial task can become daunting if outside conditions factor in, and not everything should be reward-worthy. Probably just personal preference as a DM though.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 09:54
|
|
|
Malcolm posted:I just think it's kind of backwards to reward a party for the difficulty of the encounter, as opposed to the actual XP of the foe/trap they vanquished. ??? What on earth about risk/reward is 'backwards'?
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:07
|
|
|
If you extrapolate it into mundane tasks, it becomes absurd. Playing rock-paper-scissors with a hapless inn-keeper, and winning - how much experience? Now play the same game, but with a demon that will kill you if you lose. How much experience is that worth? The difficulty hasn't really changed... or has it? edit: My point is that any task can be made arbitrarily difficult, and awarding experience based merely on "chance of death" seems misplaced. I prefer a system where overcoming an obstacle results in a defined amount of experience gained. It shouldn't matter if the pit trap is located in the dragon's inner sanctum, or in the level 1 gnolls' filthy warren. Malcolm fucked around with this message at 10:17 on Oct 7, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:11
|
|
|
If it were any other system, I'd be more inclined to agree with you, but the system already acknowledges that some encounters are more "deadly" than others and already has a multiplier in place to describe it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:17
|
|
|
That is true, but the CR multiplier only exists for gauging the difficulty of encounters, and not the awarded XP, correct? I've only read through it once, I could be misconstruing things.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:18
|
|
|
Playing rock paper scissors with some random guy for no stakes is downtime activity, doing some devil went down to Georgia rock paper scissors is going to be a memorable accomplishment, or a substantial experience if you will. Bean counting XP is poo poo anyway, because sometimes you want to stay at an appropriate level for the challenges you face and sometimes you need a montage.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:21
|
|
|
I agree with you that it is a memorable experience, but the level of effort isn't any different. I think this is heading towards a philosophical argument of whether XP should be awarded based on danger, or based on the mechanics based situation. In my game, a clever bard would get 100 experience for swindling the innkeeper out of his meager saddle and shoes. The innkeeper is a savvy, CHA heavy character and is nobody's fool, thus tricking him is at least as difficult as fooling the local lord into letting the bard "borrow" the ancestral weapon of his house. Same difficulty rolls, different amount of risk, different reward? I'm calling it a night and can't post until after work tomorrow, but this is an interesting thread and I am enjoying the different viewpoints.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:42
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 31, 2024 11:45 |
|
|
A situation with no narrative conflict isn't an encounter of any sort, so no XP award is appropriate. I guess I don't disagree that awarding more XP for more difficult encounters is arbitrary, but it's just as arbitrary to award twice as much XP for twice as many monsters. Not sure why you draw the line at three times as much XP for twice as many monsters, especially when the encounter is three times as difficult.
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2014 10:43
|
|