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Sure, that works - I'd probably just make the initial fire a burst 1, though, and place a new burst 1 centered on the square that comes up on the d8. Then repeat the process for each burst each round. That should make a fire that stays relatively confined to one location, but spreads with exponential speed. One or two of those fires are enough to keep track of, too.Moriatti posted:Edit 2: Or just have him make trails of flame that follow the players and make the fight Light Cycles. Hah, just realized: for unrelated story reasons this guy carries a Dimensional Anchor, so no teleporting away from the fire, buster!
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Nov 12, 2016 17:28
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My Lovely Horse posted:Hah, just realized: for unrelated story reasons this guy carries a Dimensional Anchor, so no teleporting away from the fire, buster! But what about flying away from it? Does a trail of fire just stay up in the sky as potential flaming arrow shenanigan fodder?
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Nov 12, 2016 19:08
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Unknown Quantity posted:But what about flying away from it? Does a trail of fire just stay up in the sky as potential flaming arrow shenanigan fodder? Hell yes it does. Because that would be awesome.
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Nov 12, 2016 20:17
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Australian eculptyus trees explode when they get hot which is an effect you could incorporate
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Nov 12, 2016 20:52
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Moriatti posted:If goal is HP = 0 and he knows the party is coming, make him set up the battlefield with a bunch of flammable objects and tinder. I like this idea, but slightly modified: Draw out the battle mat, with a bunch of pieces of potential cover strewn about : crates, barrels, boxes, overturned tables, etc. Whenever a player moves behind a piece of cover, look at their passive perception score. No matter what, they will notice that the "cover" they are up against is rigged to explode. If they have a decent passive perception score, pass them a note that says they realize all of the cover is rigged to explode. The "cover" is essentially traps that the boss can attack and have an explosive radius, so they actually have to stand as far away from the "cover" as possible.
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Nov 12, 2016 21:20
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Dick Burglar posted:I like this idea, but slightly modified: Draw out the battle mat, with a bunch of pieces of potential cover strewn about : crates, barrels, boxes, overturned tables, etc. That's a better way of handling it then I was originally envisioning.
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Nov 12, 2016 21:30
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Is there any reasonable character builder now that the official one is dead? A friend might be running a game but holy crap is combing through every book a chore.
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Nov 13, 2016 07:52
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The unofficially updated offline builder is
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Nov 13, 2016 07:54
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Ever wanted to play in an epic level game? Now's your chance! Looking for a leader to tear up levels 20 all the way to the top.
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Nov 14, 2016 06:21
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Cthulhu Dreams posted:Australian eculptyus trees explode when they get hot which is an effect you could incorporate Dick Burglar posted:The "cover" is essentially traps that the boss can attack and have an explosive radius, so they actually have to stand as far away from the "cover" as possible. I found this article on three-stage boss fights: http://theangrygm.com/the-dd-boss-fight-part-4/ Might just steal liberally from the example dragon. The way I envision the fight going is roughly: Human form: the dragon is still confident and believes he can easily squash the party. Damage to him is refluffed as him dodging with some effort (as opposed to miss = effortlessly). We use Masterplan and the players can watch his HP bar go down, so not too much to worry about miscommunication. At the point he becomes bloodied, the first hit connects, and the second when he hits 0 HP. That's when he gets mad, uses his breath weapon for the first time and transforms. His big thing is supposed to be mastery of all the elements (i.e. damage types). Maybe in this phase he can take on elemental aspects, giving him resistance and access to an encounter power, but only one aspect at a time. Dragon form: Dragon fight! We know how this goes. His breath weapon, which he now uses liberally based on recharge rolls, is supposed to be Prismatic, and that means three attacks in one, against Fort, Reflex and Will separately - maybe one deals direct damage, another imposes a condition, and the third creates a zone? That's his main gimmick for this stage, although I might also steal an expanding aura/attack from an MM3 dragon. At 0 HP he is lethally wounded and pulls out the last stop. Astral Breath. This is so powerful it literally knocks the party's spirits out of their bodies into stage 3 of the fight. Astral form: not sure yet! I always imagined the last stage as one of those multitarget Final Fantasy bosses where they interact in a certain way. One part is the vital part, the other protects it, the third heals the protector. To target the vital part, you first have to take down the protector. Either overcome the healing factor, or take down the healer first - just know the vital part can revive the healer. That's a bit of work in balancing the details though since protector and healer shouldn't be regular enemies with tons of HP.
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Nov 14, 2016 08:02
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My Lovely Horse posted:although I might also steal an expanding aura/attack from an MM3 dragon. Might nothing, definitely steal it. Those auras conceptually own. Just don't make them as... auto-hit as the Cataclysm Dragon auras are. By that, I mean the auras begin at iirc 5, then increase by 5 per turn into it hits 15. There's practically no way to actually avoid it in advance, and I've never found that fun at all.
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Nov 14, 2016 11:28
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I've gained a new appreciation for the 3.5 style "any special ability is a spell." After making six or seven major caster enemies from scratch, it would have been so much easier if I could have just looked at a universal spell list and picked an appropriate one. All the baggage about "well this spell is that level so the caster must be this level and class which means these are his weak points" is best left on the trash heap of history but the basic idea, I feel, is one earlier editions had right after all. I mean, I can still say "the fire sorcerer obviously has something like Fireball so let's look at how that worked in 3.5 and translate it to 4E mechanics, presto, area burst attack vs. reflex and half damage on a miss and just pop in the level-appropriate values" but  and also why should I need to refer to a different game's list of elements.
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Nov 20, 2016 18:45
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My Lovely Horse posted:I've gained a new appreciation for the 3.5 style "any special ability is a spell." After making six or seven major caster enemies from scratch, it would have been so much easier if I could have just looked at a universal spell list and picked an appropriate one. All the baggage about "well this spell is that level so the caster must be this level and class which means these are his weak points" is best left on the trash heap of history but the basic idea, I feel, is one earlier editions had right after all. I'm not quite sure what you're complaining about here? It's not like 4e monster maths are difficult, you can fit all the calculations on a business card. That IS the universal spell list.
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Nov 20, 2016 18:55
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Legos are really hard because they're not model kits.
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Nov 20, 2016 19:03
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The idea is fine, you pick and choose from a premade table, but all the finagling you have to do when balancing out for levels, amount of players etc in 3.5 just makes it a wash. Whats wrong with 'fire, burst 5, reflex 10, XdY+W, save halves' though.
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Nov 20, 2016 19:06
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My guess is they're talking about mechanical and fictional effects. Spells in earlier editions had a lot more variety and weird finicky one-off bits that made them seem more arcane and magical. 4e powers are pretty cookie cutter and might have 1 line of fluff in italics.
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Nov 20, 2016 19:12
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It's like this. I can sit here and come up with finicky effects until the cows come home, but it's anyone's guess whether they're an appropriate challenge. What I'd really like in those situations is a list of stuff I can refer to that has mechanics that are tested for different level ranges. Something like "Fireball: area burst 2 in heroic, increase size by 1 per tier, in paragon add Miss: half damage, in epic add ongoing damage." As it is I often find myself looking through the Monster books for enemies with the right theme that are about the right level so I can pilfer their power mechanics (plugging in the proper attack/damage values). That just feels like it's going against one of 4e's greatest strengths: being made out of building blocks. I want more building blocks for enemies and less ready-made enemies with highly specific themes. To stick with the Lego analogy (which is very apt!): I want generic blocks with a few specialized, but versatile ones mixed in so I can put together a monster face and not a bunch of blocks that fit a build in exactly one configuration and have a very specific monster face printed on. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 19:28 on Nov 20, 2016 |
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Nov 20, 2016 19:24
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My Lovely Horse posted:To stick with the Lego analogy (which is very apt!): I want generic blocks with a few specialized, but versatile ones mixed in so I can put together a monster face and not a bunch of blocks that fit a build in exactly one configuration and have a very specific monster face printed on. Have you looked at the creating and customizing monsters sections in the Dungeon Master's Guides? That's the kind of stuff they provide as themes and templates.
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Nov 20, 2016 19:34
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My Lovely Horse posted:It's like this. I can sit here and come up with finicky effects until the cows come home, but it's anyone's guess whether they're an appropriate challenge. What I'd really like in those situations is a list of stuff I can refer to that has mechanics that are tested for different level ranges. Something like "Fireball: area burst 2 in heroic, increase size by 1 per tier, in paragon add Miss: half damage, in epic add ongoing damage." As it is I often find myself looking through the Monster books for enemies with the right theme that are about the right level so I can pilfer their power mechanics (plugging in the proper attack/damage values). That just feels like it's going against one of 4e's greatest strengths: being made out of building blocks. I want more building blocks for enemies and less ready-made enemies with highly specific themes. It doesn't stop being anyone's guess as to whether something's balanced when you have spell lists though. Like, at all. One of 4'e biggest strengths is that you CAN just grab a monster whose abilities you like, reskin it, if need be relevel it, and throw it at the PCs as something completely different.
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Nov 20, 2016 20:51
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My Lovely Horse posted:I've gained a new appreciation for the 3.5 style "any special ability is a spell." After making six or seven major caster enemies from scratch, it would have been so much easier if I could have just looked at a universal spell list and picked an appropriate one. All the baggage about "well this spell is that level so the caster must be this level and class which means these are his weak points" is best left on the trash heap of history but the basic idea, I feel, is one earlier editions had right after all.
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Nov 20, 2016 23:44
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thespaceinvader posted:I'm not quite sure what you're complaining about here? It's not like 4e monster maths are difficult, you can fit all the calculations on a business card. That IS the universal spell list. Stuff like attack and damage are costed pretty straightforwardly, using "MM3 on a card" it's just stuff like areas and status effects that you kinda have to look at a monster of appropriate level, and reskin ...and hope you didn't pick the level 5 Carrion Crawler that stuns people.
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Nov 21, 2016 02:34
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NachtSieger posted:Might nothing, definitely steal it. Those auras conceptually own. Just don't make them as... auto-hit as the Cataclysm Dragon auras are. By that, I mean the auras begin at iirc 5, then increase by 5 per turn into it hits 15. There's practically no way to actually avoid it in advance, and I've never found that fun at all. I think a good way to do it, imho is have it as a donut aura representing waves of fire coming out. Then you have real choices to make about where to stand! Pain in the arse to draw on a map though. Trying to come up with a better solution myself.
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Nov 21, 2016 06:39
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You could potentially create a list of effects and try to assign rough levels or point values to them. Strike! attempts to do so, though I haven't really dove into the weeds there so I don't know how effective it is. Given how many unique abilities there are though, you'd still end up needing to eyeball them. And such a system wouldn't be able to account for synergies between abilities (which is honestly a potential issue in any power ranking system -- it's just usually less pronounced when it's between different monsters instead of the wide range of effectiveness you could wind up with if you assigned individual abilities blindly by points levels).
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Nov 21, 2016 06:58
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My Lovely Horse posted:To stick with the Lego analogy (which is very apt!): I want generic blocks with a few specialized, but versatile ones mixed in so I can put together a monster face and not a bunch of blocks that fit a build in exactly one configuration and have a very specific monster face printed on.
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Nov 21, 2016 08:53
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A perfectly valid way to interact with one's toys I'll have you know.  Trying to change the topic to the thing I'm actually doing as smoothly as possible, the big climactic dragon fight, I've come up with a few ideas for elemental-themed powers he could have. (Without looking at the 3.5 spell list too much, even!) Fire: Area Burst, creates a zone of fire that expands each round Cold: Close Blast, causes Slowed progressing into Immobilized and Restrained with failed saving throws (possible alternative progression: Slowed into Restrained into Petrified/Frozen, but potentially petrifying several PCs in the first stage of the final battle is maybe a bit much) Lightning: tbd Acid: tbd Poison: causes ongoing damage; possible aftereffect/additional effect is a poison aura surrounding the target, so the effect can potentially spread Psychic: single target, remove target from play and trap it in a psychic prison until some condition is fulfilled, they basically get to play a miniature thing on the side. Though if that's too harsh then some kind of standard daze/domination effect. Death: single target, causes conditions that progress to death after two failed saves, like that one Beholder eye ray. If that's too harsh, maybe this could just sap healing surges and/or cause Weakened. On the one hand, high stakes in the final battle, on the other, an unlucky player having to sit out stage 2 and 3 entirely. Could work around that with plot stuff, like "you're good for this encounter but you're 100% marked for death afterwards" and have them work with that, maybe even find a way to still save that PC. I'm noticing these effects all stick around beyond their initial use in some way, so either I double down on that and make it a feature for Acid and Lightning too, or I tone it down for a few powers and have a mix. Lightning feels more like it should be over immediately, Acid more like something that progresses.
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Nov 21, 2016 11:57
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Fire and acid should both area burst (acid has a trailing line of effect maybe?) But fire should recede and acid spread. Lightning should arc. Or apply +/- charges, if two party member with opposite charges get too close to each other they slam into each other and get electrified.
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Nov 21, 2016 12:55
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At the start of your turn you get pushed 1 by each same charged player and pulled 1 by each oppositely charged player
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Nov 21, 2016 13:18
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Rigged Death Trap posted:Or apply +/- charges, if two party member with opposite charges get too close to each other they slam into each other and get electrified. Splicer posted:At the start of your turn you get pushed 1 by each same charged player and pulled 1 by each oppositely charged player This is making me want to trawl FF14 boss designs for mechanics to steal for 4E.
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Nov 21, 2016 13:55
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I was thinking of something to do with charges/magnetism. Would be great to keep the healers away from their buddies. X lightning damage, and you're charged. When you enter a square within Y of another charged creature, you both take Z lightning damage and are no longer charged. Save ends, with an aftereffect of 5 lightning damage? Attraction/repulsion would be neat but everything I can think of to rule it is a bookkeeping nightmare with potentially six factors to consider. Alternative: - charge them all the same and the attack creates an opposite charge that pulls them closer, setting up for future area attacks - positive charge at one end of the map, negative of the other, charge PCs differently and pull one half left, one half right
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Nov 21, 2016 14:17
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As always for 4e, steal from WoW: http://wow.gamepedia.com/Thaddius Thaddius encouraged the charged groups to stay together with a necessary damage buff, and had mixed charges explode.
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Nov 21, 2016 14:26
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Arivia posted:As always for 4e, steal from WoW: http://wow.gamepedia.com/Thaddius Also steal from FF14 because more games need to have fights like Brute Justice
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Nov 21, 2016 15:26
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There's a nice sorcerer Daily as well, Shocking Magnetism. Lightning damage to one or two enemies, pulls targets closer, and as as Effect each creature that starts its turn adjacent takes lightning damage. I might just steal that, and in a way, my irrational desire to be able to just check spell lists has been met.  Now let's see what they have in the way of acid. e: huh. Acid Mire, Lv5 Wizard Daily. Area burst acid damage, miss half, creates a zone that a) is difficult terrain, b) deals 5 acid damage when you enter/start your turn, c) deals 5 acid damage when you fall prone. Sounds like I could have that stick around through phases 1 and 2 of the fight, with things getting really nasty once the dragon gains an attack that knocks prone in phase 2, which in turn fills a gap in his abilities I've been trying to work on for a while. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 19:00 on Nov 21, 2016 |
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Nov 21, 2016 18:53
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Splicer posted:Cart before the horse. Having a spell list that all monsters pull their abilities from has terrible knock on effects (not the least of which being the whole wizard issue). Keeping things as is but having a compiled list of all monster abilities to refer to would get what you're looking for without the baggage of it being a "spell list". Not when you have monster abilities with the same name that do wildly different things (like Evil Eye). MLH is asking for an effects based system for monster design; you have a bunch of abilities, potentially with dials to fiddle with, that fit the various monster roles. The 3.5 spell thing in this case is referring to having discrete, thematically separated and listed power units.
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Nov 21, 2016 22:11
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Okay, when you put it like that, I guess that makes more sense. My bad, MLH.
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Nov 22, 2016 10:29
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I'm just still trying to figure out how you nailed my childhood Lego habits this accurately
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Nov 22, 2016 14:15
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I did it too
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Nov 22, 2016 22:51
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One thing you could do for Psychic is .. well, steal from FF14. Cloud of Darkness (and Qarn!.. and probably something else that I can't remember) have a mechanic where a zone spawns with an add in the center, and you have to kill it to prevent $badthing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvGoGZWXQaY&t=428s You could easily switch it to where it's a zone attack that blocks entry/exit/line of sight for those inside and has some kind of hallucination/projection that has to be killed to escape.
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Nov 23, 2016 02:05
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That's very close to my idea of removing the target from play and having it do a little separate fight for a while. I like the idea of making it a zone - you could go in to help your buddy, but until you defeat whatever is in there, you're not getting out. I could also just have that be the entire third stage of the fight, come to think of it. Stage two ends with the dragon's defeat, but his spirit pulls the party along with him on the road to death and they have to fight it to escape. So stages 1 and 2 would feature only fire/cold/lightning/acid/poison, then for the finale he breaks out Death and Psychic rolled into one, and there's a round limit to defeat him. And at this stage, a "you die after two failed saves" effect is okay as a high stakes thing, too. Another reason this is cool is that one PC is a Raven Queen servant, specializing in fighting undead and immortal creatures, so I can set up the dragon spirit as one of those and a) give that guy a last chance to go all out with his powers, and b) have the death guy be instrumental in saving the party from death, as it should be. e: the general setup is that he (in the first phase) gets two full turns per round, one power for each element, an Action Point, and HP like an elite - he should be able to last two rounds against six PCs so we get to see every power, right? Actually, if not, I'll just have the remaining ones carry over into phase 2... My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 11:47 on Nov 23, 2016 |
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Nov 23, 2016 11:36
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Is the DDI Character Builder down for everyone or just me? I get as far as the silverlight bit loading, and then getting an unknown exception.
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Nov 28, 2016 04:25
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Noxin of Shame posted:Is the DDI Character Builder down for everyone or just me? It has gone kaput as far as I know, too bad there is no offline character builder floating around that is a poorly kept secret.
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Nov 28, 2016 04:52
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