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I also posted in the GM advice thread, but you guys might have a bit more insight: Hey there. So I'll be running Madness at Gardmore Abbey in like... Probably a little over a year, thanks to our groups cycling GM schedule. But before that, I'll be updating and running The Great Modron March in 4e. I'm thinking they'll receive the card they start Gardmore with during one of the sidequest for the March, from the Paladin order you help for a couple chapters, because the card, being intelligent and having a desire to go with the PCs, is probably from their home plane, and can possibly help them find it. So my question is, should I let them manifest the card power as it does in the Gardmore Abbey module, as they get closer to the end of the March? I'll be able to do the math to balance it to the PCs level (it's weaker from being so far from the rest of the deck.) Or should I just wait until Gardmore, because the card would be on an entirely different plane from the rest of the deck. For what it's worth, the players (but not the characters... Probably...) Are aware of what the deck is, and are bought into the idea of running Gardmore Abbey.
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Aug 6, 2017 17:59
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What a coincidence, I just finished my Gardmore Abbey run yesterday (a lot of fun, none of the cowards drew any cards, but we're doing an epilogue where they try to destroy the deck... by tracking down the beholder they let escape for his disintegration ray). I don't think any one card is going to majorly unbalance things even if left at original strength/stats. We had a few fights where everyone left the random card entirely alone because the power just wasn't handy for that fight, and you could easily pick one that's only situationally useful. It depends on how you want to portray the Deck - the way I did it was I figured the deck was lying dormant and the card's power only manifested near the abbey because of proximity to the others, but if it manifested anywhere in the universe it would strongly sell the idea of the deck as a very powerful force. e: if you pick one based on usefulness, make it one that any creature can use so it becomes a terrain feature rather than a straight bonus for the party. Also make it their choice to bring it into play, like a regular magic item. Once you start on Gardmore Abbey, start playing it by the book and having it come out automatically. The Vizier or the Fates are strong contenders, since their effects scale easily with level and the token moves to an advantageous position for the target, but they're each just useful enough that you'd want them in play, neither benchwarmers like the Jester nor showstoppers like the Donjon or Euryale. e2: also one's more defensive and one more offensive, so you can watch the party for a while and give them a boost in the area they're lacking in. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 20:55 on Aug 6, 2017 |
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Aug 6, 2017 19:31
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This is gonna sound like an idiotic question, but has anyone played with the completed homebrew classes on the wiki? Arachnomancer looks funny to pop into a campaign without breaking it from a glance.
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Aug 7, 2017 08:39
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Talk with your GM, use your best judgement, and if the table starts complaining, you'll have to tone down the power level (and if you hate it, then you need to UP your power level.)
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Aug 7, 2017 13:24
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My Lovely Horse posted:What a coincidence, I just finished my Gardmore Abbey run yesterday (a lot of fun, none of the cowards drew any cards, but we're doing an epilogue where they try to destroy the deck... by tracking down the beholder they let escape for his disintegration ray). This is good news, it also means I only have to macro the thing once. I was going to just have them draw one, since I really like that aspect of the module (it reminds me of Ravenloft, which, is the next module if all goes according to plan) so that's good. I will definitely give them the choice, as the card is going to be described as intelligent and seeking it's home, which is the PC's home, so they might turn it down for story reasons for a while. We'll see. This definitely does hype up it's power though, I agree.
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Aug 7, 2017 16:03
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What would be some good classes for a Minotaur to pick? I've got someone who isn't sure what to be.
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Aug 8, 2017 06:05
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Fighter is always good, minotaurs have the stats for it and have some good racial support. Str and Con/Wis also makes for a good warden, or some forms of barbarian, paladin, ranger, cleric, warlord or seeker. Their support tends to favor melee builds. What's the party lay-out and level look like so far?
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Aug 8, 2017 06:27
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Hengeyokai druid, a monk that is some sort of werewolf? (They're still figuring out if it's a shifter or not), a Fighter, Half Orc Barb, and a Battle Cleric. Since this is homebrew, I'm playing a klodged together Pathfinder Oracle (kitbashed sorcerer/cleric spells) and there's a Gunslinger(basically a ranger reskin) who are stealing theme appropriate skills for spirit things and shotgun respectively. Yeah, I know the Pathfinder dudes is a bit sketchy in concept but we will find out how well it will work when we play this week. Nomadic Scholar fucked around with this message at 07:33 on Aug 8, 2017 |
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Aug 8, 2017 07:28
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Nomadic Scholar posted:What would be some good classes for a Minotaur to pick? I've got someone who isn't sure what to be. It's a minotaur. Charge kit Slayer is for once the only good option. 
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Aug 8, 2017 07:44
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Well, he bit for warden as he wants to be the Big Beef and just soak all the hits.
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Aug 8, 2017 08:09
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Some more thoughts on the Gardmore Abbey card: one balance factor for the party starting with a strong or weak card is that they're likely to find more cards within one or two sessions, after which they're randomly selected and it costs actions to pull out your favourite card. If you introduce a card and its power in another adventure, that goes out the window. I'd suggest only letting them draw their card from the whole deck if you're okay with the fact that they might end up with access to a "target is removed from play (save ends)" power every encounter. e: I guess drawing from the deck is risky no matter the context. My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 14:16 on Aug 8, 2017 |
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Aug 8, 2017 08:19
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My Lovely Horse posted:Some more thoughts on the Gardmore Abbey card: one balance factor for the party starting with a strong or weak card is that they're likely to find more cards within one or two sessions, after which they're randomly selected and it costs actions to pull out your favourite card. If you introduce a card and its power in another adventure, that goes out the window. I'd suggest only letting them draw their card from the whole deck if you're okay with the fact that they might end up with access to a "target is removed from play (save ends)" power every encounter. Yeah, also I'll be able to rebalance the encounters from that point too, so if they get a powerful card, they'll have 1-2 easy encounters and then they'll have more dudes.
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Aug 9, 2017 16:55
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Hello mighty warriors. I'm working on a 4th Edition conversion for X-Crawl (modern pro-wrestling meets dungeon crawling, basically; considering how important teamwork is in X-Crawl, it's pretty much perfect for 4e) for an upcoming PBP, but I am mediocre about rules stuff. So I would appreciate some feedback about the changes I've been considering. Mainly A) is it reasonable and B) is it cool? I'm still a little unsure about how to handle Signature Moves, as well.quote:-Mojo Orbs fucked around with this message at 17:48 on Aug 9, 2017 |
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Aug 9, 2017 17:44
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So encounter building: I am still getting used to how insanely powerful 4e characters are, but here's an encounter breakdown: 2x kobold skirmishers (lvl 1) 2x kobold artillery (lvl 2) 1x kobold brute (lvl 3) against 5 level 2 PC's. I thought the artillery and brute would be dangerous, and the skirmishers would use their hit reaction to shift away, letting them bounce between players far away, triggering their bonus damage. The PC's wiped the goddamn floor with these guys. The paladin, by himself, bloodied the brute on the opening round of combat. I'm concerned about going past 5 or 6 non-minion enemies, but right now they are streamrolling baddies.
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Aug 9, 2017 21:28
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Low-level paladins are kind of terrifying with their 3[W] and 4[W] attacks. HP scaling stops them from chunking your guys quite so effortlessly before long, though.
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Aug 9, 2017 22:54
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Well, looks like the final addition to our merry bad of misfits is gonna be a bard. I feel we will have some great times til a player bites it due to overconfidence. Im pretty excited to be playing 4th again after all this time.
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Aug 9, 2017 23:26
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Klingon w Bowl Cut posted:Hello mighty warriors. I'm working on a 4th Edition conversion for X-Crawl (modern pro-wrestling meets dungeon crawling, basically; considering how important teamwork is in X-Crawl, it's pretty much perfect for 4e) for an upcoming PBP, but I am mediocre about rules stuff. So I would appreciate some feedback about the changes I've been considering. Mainly A) is it reasonable and B) is it cool? I'm still a little unsure about how to handle Signature Moves, as well. 4E already has enough combat gribblies. Have you considered going a little bit more... orthogonal? So, like, everybody gets Hype and they're trying to turn it into Audience. Fitting team costumes? You all get Hype. Narrate a team intro? You all get Hype. Interrupt a short rest with a cutaway scene they filmed in the pre-show? You personally get Hype, once per broadcast/session. As the DM you should make up, like, four-five generic dungeoneer behaviors that a babyface or a heel might do, which are basically just burning a standard action on aid another kind of things, and if you play to type you get Hype, once per session. Write down some ways the party can set you up, like talking about treasure near the rogue, or giving the cleric something obscure to sermonize about. Just RP stuff. If you set your teammate up you get Hype, once per teammate per session. Setting up your signature move, regardless of whether you pull it off, is also worth Hype once per session. Your signature move: - consists of at least two actions - including at least one encounter or daily power - and some amount of small-h hype, including talking as a free action - counts 3-pop for each standard action, 2-pop for each move, and 1-pop for each minor you put into it (dailies count double) - each full 3-pop gets you Hype, up to 3. You can have multiple signature moves, but later ones must use all unique actions and are worth 1 less Hype, cumulatively. So a total of 6 Hype from signature moves during a session. You get Audience by burning off Hype during skill challenges. You've got some skill challenges planned, right? Not just, like, navigating Crazy Al-Fierno's House Of Flame Jets, but little one-off things like when it becomes obvious the party's going to win in a fight, start up a skill challenge to finish the enemy off before they hit the alarm or convince them to surrender or run away or whatever. But you can only burn off Hype during dungeon skill challenges, promotional events, or times when you are otherwise kaying fabe. To burn Hype, wait for somebody else's skill challenge roll to fail, then roll a d6 into it as a bonus. You can only do it if the roll was actually failing - X-Crawl isn't fake! If the d6 hits the d20, the new face counts. You can burn one Hype per teammate's roll, and as long as the roll ultimately succeeds, each Hype turns into 1 Audience for whoever rolled it. ...and then Audience is worth bonus prizes or other consideration at the end of a dungeon, even if you burned some Hype during a promo you were cutting two weeks prior. Glazius fucked around with this message at 04:04 on Aug 10, 2017 |
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Aug 10, 2017 04:01
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With enough hype your audience should be throwing chairs and poo poo into the ring. Like, blessed Chairs of orc slaying.
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Aug 10, 2017 04:09
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User0015 posted:So encounter building: I am still getting used to how insanely powerful 4e characters are, but here's an encounter breakdown: When doing encounters, ask yourself: * did my monsters get to attack? * did my monsters get to hit and deal damage? If the answers to both those questions is "yes", then, for all intents and purposes, you're doing fine. This is especially true if you maintain tight control of Extended Rests, where the party might have a dozen or more encounters before they can take one. It's tempting to make individual fights harder, but adding enough monsters to do that also increases the administrative overhead by a lot. For the most part, it's better to have a lot of middling-to-medium difficulty fights where the party maybe only loses one or two Healing Surges worth of HP, and then saving the big, bruising, difficult fights for important milestones in the story. What is important is that when an attack does hit, that it actually deals enough damage to eat up a Healing Surge, and that's why I recommend the updated damage math, if not Nightmare mode altogether. Easy shortcut: add the monster's level to whatever the published damage expression is. By the book, a level 5 Tigerclaw Fang-Wielder hits for [2d8+7] damage with their Heavy War Pick. Instead, make them deal [2d8+12] damage.
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Aug 10, 2017 08:28
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Glazius posted:4E already has enough combat gribblies. Have you considered going a little bit more... orthogonal? I am absolutely planning lots of skill challenges. They are one of my favorite things in 4th edition, and I am eternally frustrated that they were done away with completely instead of fixed and tweaked for 5th edition. Some cursory googling has shown that lots of fanwork has been done to improve them, so I will probably go with one of those. Turtlicious posted:With enough hype your audience should be throwing chairs and poo poo into the ring. Like, blessed Chairs of orc slaying. Orbs fucked around with this message at 16:12 on Aug 10, 2017 |
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Aug 10, 2017 16:09
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gradenko_2000 posted:When doing encounters, ask yourself: Yep, the entire party took a small amount of damage. In this case, about a healing surge worth of damage. Partly it was because of my own rolls. I literally rolled minimum damage on most attacks, and a critical hit ended up doing all of 6 damage, where if I had rolled max it would have been 20. So my players got away a little easy. Combat also took about an hour and a half, since there was roughly 200 HP worth of monsters to get through. I had the final kobold attempt to surrender, just to end it faster and because it was getting late, so I might see about cutting HP and upping damage even at this level, and maybe using more minions. Then again, the players seemed to enjoy everything so far as far as combat goes. So far, so good.
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Aug 10, 2017 19:10
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User0015 posted:a critical hit ended up doing all of 6 damage, where if I had rolled max it would have been 20. Are you maximizing the normal damage before adding the crit dice (if any)? 6 damage on a crit seems too low, unless there were pc's using powers to reduce that or something.
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Aug 10, 2017 19:19
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You sure you're doing critical hits right? They're supposed to deal damage as if you had rolled max, that's pretty much the alpha and omega of them. Other than that yeah if you notice you're rolling way below average, don't take that as a metric for how fights go. The party got off easy, it happens. I had a combat recently where the big scary dragon kept rolling 1s and 2s (on the other hand, it still was a bit touch-and-go cause when he did hit, he hit like a truck). For what it's worth that kobold encounter should be pretty much appropriate for your party, but remember it's not one appropriate encounter that taxes the party, it's four or five of them in a row. Did they use their daily powers? That's an advantage they won't have for the next few fights.
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Aug 10, 2017 19:20
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I think some people get confused about critical hits, because you both max out your normal damage die (so an attack that does 1d6+5 will automatically deal 11 damage) AND roll an additional critical damage die (typically 1d6 per [W], so you'd add +1d6 to your 11 damage roll for anywhere from 12 to 17 damage as the final amount). So you're both not-rolling and rolling for damage on a crit. Edit: actually, do non-PCs get critical damage dice, or is that a PC-only mechanic? I can't remember. I don't think they do. Dick Burglar fucked around with this message at 19:34 on Aug 10, 2017 |
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Aug 10, 2017 19:31
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Usually that's PCs only, and it's a function of magic weapons/implements. There are some monsters that get maximized damage + crit die on a crit, but they're fairly rare and tend to be higher level. A Balor does 6d10+11 damage and 3d10+71 on a crit but he's also level 27. e: it's also generally one die per plus of enhancement bonus (so 3d_ for a +3 item), not [W]. Christ, Barbarians would be even more terrifying.
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Aug 10, 2017 19:36
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Klingon w Bowl Cut posted:These are all really neat ideas. I kinda like Audience even more than Fame in particular. Have you run this before? Nah, but most of it's how you get XP in Dungeon World and/or Inspectres (the Ghostbusters reality show RPG) and I've run those plenty.
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Aug 10, 2017 23:53
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My Lovely Horse posted:Usually that's PCs only, and it's a function of magic weapons/implements. There are some monsters that get maximized damage + crit die on a crit, but they're fairly rare and tend to be higher level. A Balor does 6d10+11 damage and 3d10+71 on a crit but he's also level 27. Barbarians are more terrifying; they're probably using "high crit" weapons, which are the "max damage and roll again" property.
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Aug 11, 2017 00:00
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Generic Octopus posted:Are you maximizing the normal damage before adding the crit dice (if any)? 6 damage on a crit seems too low, unless there were pc's using powers to reduce that or something. ....nope! Seems I did crits wrong then.
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Aug 11, 2017 16:10
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Trip report on session 3: I built a large map for my level 2 party that consisted of 2x Goblin skirmishers 2x Goblin archers/artillery 1x Goblin on a wolf 2x goblin guards 1x goblin Hexer 1x special unit (a slightly nerfed goblin leader reskinned) I was a little worried since the paladin didn't make this game, and I was down to 4 players. They proceeded to Metal Gear Solid some of the outer goblins and by the time the camp noticed them, they had killed about half the camp. The hexer, the leader, wolfrider and two guards were all that's left and they mopped them up pretty handily. Our psionicist dropped to 5 hp, but my players started to realize healing word + second wind are Good Things and he came back to over half pretty easily. I still can't believe how flat out TOUGH 4e characters are at such low level. But it's also kind of nice that I can throw some of these bigger fights at them and not watch them instantly fold from a lucky hit or two. They were pretty happy over-all, and are starting to get used to combat. So follow up: I think next encounter is going to involve a boss monster with minions. They are level 3 now, so should I use revised solo encounter stats, or are the numbers flat enough that I don't need to do any conversions for now? Also, how tough should my solo encounter be given they managed to pull through this?
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Aug 17, 2017 20:59
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User0015 posted:So follow up: I think next encounter is going to involve a boss monster with minions. They are level 3 now, so should I use revised solo encounter stats, or are the numbers flat enough that I don't need to do any conversions for now? Also, how tough should my solo encounter be given they managed to pull through this? You will likely want some extra bodies on the field if the party has a decent amount of hard control. Solos can shake things off, but it still eats turns. Highly recommend the dragons from the Monster Vaults. They're like the gold standard solos IMO. The Young White Dragon is a level 3 solo brute, so that should be perfect. Just don't forget the triggered actions. That's where they make up a lot of their action economy. I'm also a little curious what the XP total for your last fight was and if those were all Monster Vault goblins.
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Aug 17, 2017 21:17
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What's a good way for building a Polearm Warden? Moreover, are there any cool ways to use Mark of Storm in conjunction with that?
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Aug 18, 2017 03:06
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Has anyone ever made a table of the min/average/max AC values for well-built PCs from levels 1-30? I'm debating just removing armour from the game entirely and giving PCs a flat AC value (increasing every level), since I'm fairly sure the practical difference between light and heavy armour is relatively small.
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Aug 20, 2017 16:39
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You could probably just find the Average AC for each level and then add or subtract 2. Level 1 would be something like 14 / 16 / 18 depending on class. Shields would probably still add on top of that, and you could make what would be armor proficiency feats just a straight up +1/+2 to AC as well.
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Aug 20, 2017 19:23
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Lemon-Lime posted:Has anyone ever made a table of the min/average/max AC values for well-built PCs from levels 1-30? I'm debating just removing armour from the game entirely and giving PCs a flat AC value (increasing every level), since I'm fairly sure the practical difference between light and heavy armour is relatively small. This is actually fairly difficult, because it doesn't scale uniformly pretty much anywhere and there are a lot of choices that pop in at random levels that can boost it up significantly.
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Aug 20, 2017 20:28
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dont even fink about it posted:This is actually fairly difficult, because it doesn't scale uniformly pretty much anywhere and there are a lot of choices that pop in at random levels that can boost it up significantly. Yeah, that's the main reason I asked first before trying to plot it out myself. I'll have a go at figuring it out, even if the results just have to go into a table because the curve isn't smooth enough for overarching rules.
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Aug 20, 2017 21:01
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I've only done AC values for the various base heavy armors, plus half-level bonus, plus enhancement bonus. Is that what you're looking for? I could do it for the other armor types, but I might be missing something? E:  Something like that? gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 00:54 on Aug 21, 2017 |
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Aug 21, 2017 00:49
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Lemon-Lime posted:Has anyone ever made a table of the min/average/max AC values for well-built PCs from levels 1-30? I'm debating just removing armour from the game entirely and giving PCs a flat AC value (increasing every level), since I'm fairly sure the practical difference between light and heavy armour is relatively small. How is this change going to interact with dex/int? There are a decent amount of situations out there where I end up spending points in a stat purely to boost my AC. Melee ranger, most barbarians, some warlock builds, tempest fighters, wardens, some avengers, etc. If I'm just going to get a flat AC then that's definitely going to change my build decisions in those circumstances. It's also going to have a pretty big impact on building hybrids, because you won't have to worry about where your AC is coming from. No burning Hybrid Talent on class armor profs or Armor of Faith, that kind of thing. Some hybrids may become much more viable under these rules. And if you do account for all that stuff under this change, then what's the point, really? It won't be any less complex than having armor as an item. If you want to avoid dealing with armor as a slot, just given them free generic Magic Armor+X at whatever level points you deem appropriate.
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Aug 21, 2017 03:16
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PMush Perfect posted:You could probably just find the Average AC for each level and then add or subtract 2. Level 1 would be something like 14 / 16 / 18 depending on class. Shields would probably still add on top of that, and you could make what would be armor proficiency feats just a straight up +1/+2 to AC as well. Someone just rebuild 4e from the ground up, without the dumbass way they did the numbers progression. I nominate gradenko.
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Aug 21, 2017 05:29
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P.d0t posted:Someone just rebuild 4e from the ground up, without the dumbass way they did the numbers progression.
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Aug 21, 2017 05:34
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Doesn't count
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Aug 21, 2017 05:53
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