|
I am looking to build a difficult set-piece encounter that involves a combat skill challenge (obsidian system) on top of six defending creatures on the Astral Plane, each an exemplar of the six 4e "power sources" (martial, divine, shadow, psionic, primal, arcane). This is all at level 21. I have the skill challenge pretty well established, and obviously the basic stats for the six creatures are going to be from MM3 on a Business Card... but I'm really not sure where to start with the combat abilities and powers. How should I mechanically go about making them really FEEL like they each are a different power source. Not just fluff... I can do fluff... but something about how they behave with movement and dice should strongly suggest their power sources. If it helps, these six creatures are automatons built by Modrons (or perhaps are a type of Modron themselves purpose built by Primus or other high-order Modron, same difference) to enforce a decree onto the prime material plane, each making sure that their assigned power source does not violate the decree in question. The players are attempting to unravel and cancel said decree... a suitably epic-level task to introduce them to the tier, I think. Any advice?
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 02:19
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 09:33 |
|
|
Iunnrais posted:I am looking to build a difficult set-piece encounter that involves a combat skill challenge (obsidian system) on top of six defending creatures on the Astral Plane, each an exemplar of the six 4e "power sources" (martial, divine, shadow, psionic, primal, arcane). This is all at level 21. I would avoid dice tricks - the players won't see them, and it will slow down the encounter. Instead, I'd go with something simple that allows players to interact with it: Martial does physical damage, and has reactions (parry-riposte, counterstrike) Divine does radiant damage, and buffs its allies Shadow does necrotic damage, and teleports Psionic does psychic damage, and dazes Primal creates hindering terrains a la druid's nature growth, and charges like a barbarian Arcane does various elemental damage, and creates zones of such However, my campaign has been Heroic tier so far, so take this with a grain of salt.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 09:14
|
|
|
Iunnrais posted:I am looking to build a difficult set-piece encounter that involves a combat skill challenge (obsidian system) on top of six defending creatures on the Astral Plane, each an exemplar of the six 4e "power sources" (martial, divine, shadow, psionic, primal, arcane). This is all at level 21. Okay, brainstorming because i love making 4e monsters: Martial-bot should have a bunch of arms with all different weapons. Each turn have it bring a pair of weapons to be the focus and cycle to a new stance. Large defender aura, a charging stance (maybe hit those along the path of the charge), and a reach/multiattack stance. Give it an opportunity action when it gets hit by a weapon attack it can make an attack roll and use that in place of its AC. You either need to hit it with spells or get extra attacks to negate the defense of whirling steel. Divine-bot protects its allies. Give it a mark and the paladin punish, and a reaction that either shields damage or takes it for its allies. Its action can just be blessing martial-bot's weapons to give it extra dice of radiant damage. Shadow-bot can start the encounter off placing a half-dozen pools of shadow on the ground. It can teleport between these pools freely and make attacks out of them! Maybe slide one around as a minor action and put a debuff on a PC if the pool slides over them? Psionic-bot is a little trickier since the psionic classes are so varied. Best to focus on the psion and use telekenetic attacks and dazes. Do that Living Missile lvl 1 daily for psion where you can pick up a PC and just THROW it into another one. Psionics is really hard to be iconic because it's all invisible mind bullshit or just monks. Primal-bot should absolutely drop difficult/dangerous terrain, totems, spirit animals, etc. Just summon something every turn to make the battlefield more and more dangerous. Maybe when it's bloodied it shapeshifts into a big ol' beast and just turns into a brute. Arcane-bot is easy, just elements elements elements. Fire attack dealing ongoing, Ice attack that knocks prone and slows. Close blast of air that pushes and gives it a big shift. Wall/Line attacks are also cool and very wizardy! The biggest thing for a set-piece encounter is to control the pace of combat! Maybe give each bot something that happens as another one falls. The shadow-bot could get extra pools of shadow where his allies fall and make an immediate attack out of it, when shadow-bot falls, arcane-bot turns them into pillars of flame that just deal damage for the rest of the fight. Martial-bot just pulls out more and more weapons every turn and just gets tons of extra attacks (even if they just deal 1W just start going down the list and rolling a TON of dice). Keep the pressure on so the moment of relief only comes at the end instead of that inevitable tides-have-turned moment halfway through.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 12:55
|
|
|
In terms of pacing, how would you feel about having six themed encounters rather than creatures? I feel like the idea of fighting the power sources themselves deserves that scale. Martial could take place on an open battlefield and have soldiers protecting artillery, Primal in a dense jungle with lurkers and skirmishers and brutes, and so on.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 13:14
|
|
|
My Lovely Horse posted:In terms of pacing, how would you feel about having six themed encounters rather than creatures? I feel like the idea of fighting the power sources themselves deserves that scale. While this would be cool, I'm really not sure I can get away with stringing this out longer... this isn't the end of the campaign, just a stepping stone to the next part of their epic quest, almost qualifying as a side quest. I know it sounds like end-of-campaign stuff, but that's just because this is epic tier. Things should get out of hand at this power level, I think. SynthesisAlpha posted:Okay, brainstorming because i love making 4e monsters: This is great stuff! Very epic level... the biggest challenge will be making this fight hard, but not impossible. To that end, I'm going to keep all your various defensive options, especially the martial's defense of whirling steel, but the divine healing and defending as well, the primal pushing and making walls... but I'm also going to drop their damage to the lower end of what MM3 suggests. These things will be VERY hard to kill, but they'll be slightly less lethal. Not non-lethal, just less than what I've been using recently (dishing out 50+ damage per turn is fine when the party has a highly optimized healer character in it). The key to the encounter is that their success is less "kill the players" and more "be sufficiently distracting so the players can't do the skill challenge". More context on said skill challenge: there's a barrier surrounding the machinery of the "Decree" in the Astral Plane-- when they breach it, it'll be a new encounter with the Lich King who made the decree in the first place, probably aided by an Angel of Death, but that's for later. Anyway, the barrier. It's rapidly shifting how it functions, so every initiative count... not turn, but literal count... it changes what skill check it's vulnerable to. They need 8 successes of 8 different skills... not sure whether to require a standard action or a minor action to make an attempt. Probably minor, as they first have to figure out how the barrier works at all, so that's going to make it even more difficult. So they'll need to work out who in the party can manage each of the needed 8 skills, have them delay to the correct initiative count, get to the proper location, and then actually succeed at the DC 30 when it's time, all while being harassed by the automatons. Since success of the encounter is tied to the skill challenge, not destroying the monsters, I think making the monsters beefy, hard to hit, and nigh-unkillable will be fine.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 14:46
|
|
|
In that case I'd instinctively say Martial is a Soldier, Divine is a Leader, Shadow is a Lurker, Primal is a Brute. Arcane could be Controller, then Psionic could also be a Lurker (one of those that enters PC's heads), and maybe shift Shadow to a Skirmisher. Or make Arcane an AoE Artillery and Psionic the Controller.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 15:00
|
|
|
Psionic should be artillery then, since their shtick is supercharging their powers by loading them with power points, and Arcane's sub-role is control anyways. You could give them some moves that conditionally generate charge (per target hit in an area burst?), and some that guarantee it, and when it's finally charged it fires its psychic laser? Better yet, start it fully charged and have it open by firing the big gun, and then let the PCs decide how urgent a priority it is to stop a second shot.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 15:16
|
|
|
Oh yeah, I barely use lurkers but definitely have the shadow guy either disappear or go insubstantial every other turn. The great thing about lurkers is that it gives player defensive powers a huge boost in value. Blocking that mega damage lurker attack with shield or timely dodge is a great moment for players. There's a lot of room to play around with depending on your group composition. It's tough to balance longer fights if your group is light on heals or defenses so adjust damage accordingly. Definitely tone down damage and add more status effects if you have to keep the party alive longer.
|
|
#
?
Sep 7, 2022 16:30
|
|
|
Thought I'd show you guys what I've got. Still have a day to tweak things if need be before the session tomorrow if need be, and I always adjust things on the fly based on how the encounter is going as well. If anything is unclear... well... I understand what I mean, and I'm not exactly publishing these guys, but feel free to ask me to clarify. I really liked the idea of the Primal one being a controller more than a Brute, which does leave out the Brute role entirely, but I don't think there's going to be any lack of fear. I did say I was going to decrease the damage output... but I always start leaning high again when I remember how overly optimized the party healer it. The martial guy here is definitely going to be a key feature of the encounter, with it being able to fly across the battle field EVERY turn, making driveby attacks on the way if possible. But I think all of these guys will be memorable for one reason or another. quote:Martial Guardian Modron Level 21 Elite Soldier; XP 6400 quote:Primal Guardian Modron Level 21 Elite Controller; XP 6400 quote:Psionic Guardian Modron Level 21 Elite Artillery; XP 6400 quote:Shadow Guardian Modron Level 21 Elite Lurker; XP 6400 quote:Divine Guardian Modron Level 21 Elite Leader; XP 6400 quote:Arcane Guardian Modron Level 21 Elite Controller; XP 6400 quote:Axiomatic Maelstrom Node; Hazard Things I'm considering: halving the HP and thus dropping the "elite" status... but then again, I don't want them killing these things, I want them harrassed by them incessantly while they solve the skill challenge hazard thingy. When they solve the skill challenge, the modrons are all "defeated" instantly. I could also hand out more vulnerabilities, targeted to specific abilities my players have, to encourage them to focus on the modron they can best fight, while organizing who is managing the skill this turn. Anything else to think about? Iunnrais fucked around with this message at 05:04 on Sep 10, 2022 |
|
#
?
Sep 10, 2022 04:32
|
|
|
Klungar posted:It’s an interesting concept, you could do something like a Mega Man boss system where they unlock a hammer that’s related to the dungeon boss and it could be used to give them an elemental advantage in future dungeons. It's been a long time since I DMd but I tried to do this as often as I could get away with it - if a dungeon had a gimmick, it should contain an item or items that alter how the party interacts with that gimmick. Usually not to the extent that a Zelda dungeon would, but enough that the flooding / fire / etc goes from being a hindrance to a slight advantage.
|
|
#
?
Sep 10, 2022 14:18
|
|
|
Very cool monster concepts, here's some feedback! I would suggest the Martial Modron's parry and defensive abilities only apply to attacks with the weapon keyword, rather than basing them on the targeted defense. You don't really have to specify 1/turn or 1/round, as those concepts already have keywords as Immediate actions and Opportunity actions. Since the Martial Modron is a soldier, I would say his parry should be an immediate (1/round), and the dive to protect allies should be the punish on his mark (an opportunity action). No reason to limit the marks to one target, and make his standard action a close burst 1. Primal - Wall of thorns is a little confusing. Most effects last one turn so a 2 turn timer gets really hard to track. You can simplify it by making it a Sustain Standard, and when you sustain you repeat the attack on the wall squares AND all adjacent. Thornwhip pushing seems weird? Like there's already a Druid At-Will called Thorn Whip and it pulls, rather than push. Maybe just rename it? Psionic: Seems a little barebones? The Psionic blast is really vague. Is the minor action to gain power points just intended to be daze-bait for the players? Really should codify what status effects it can apply. My suggestion would be to let him build up power points multiple times, and give the psionic blast different levels of power based on total PP. Something like: 2: Adds 2d6 damage 4: Changes it to Area Burst 1 within 10 6: Adds Dazed (Save ends) to the hit line 8: Adds Knocked Prone to the hit line, increase burst to 2 10: Adds another 2d6 damage and changes the Daze to a Stun Let him charge multiple times per turn so if he doesn't have to move he can charge twice, or even 3 times and then action point. Also let Flurry of blows spend 1 PP to attack again on a second target, and give him an immediate reaction to push by spending 1 PP. (or let him spend 2 PP to shake off a status effect so it incentivizes aiming statuses at him to weaken his super saiyan power up animation) Shadow - Just let him go invisible, use the stealth roll and let players know on their turn where he is if their passive perception beats the stealth. If they ask then let them spend a minor to roll perception. Otherwise no notes, basic bitch lurker is fine when everyone else is super complex Divine - Ongoing is typically 5 per tier, make it 15! As for the healing... some notes afterwards. Arcane - Magic missile is incredibly weak, 15 damage at lvl 21 is nothing for a standard action. Just let him do it every turn to keep pressure up. Up the onoing to 15, Up the daze to a stun on hit, swap weaken for restrained. On the miss apply ongoing 5, daze, or slow to all targets, not just center. So healing. You said the real goal of the fight is the skill challenge and the modrons will cease fighting when it's completed, so here's what I'd suggest. When a modron is bloodied, it powers down. On the divine modron's turn any powered down modron, itself included, gains temporary hp equal to its bloodied value and vulnerable 15 all (no action required). At the start of the divine modron's next turn, these temporary hit points are converted into actual HP and the modrons re-activate. This means that wearing them down can ease the pressure and give the PCs room to do the skill challenge, and it offers an interesting choice: they can keep piling damage on a couple enemies to more efficiently disable them, or use the turn of breathing room to try to knock another enemy down or work on the skill challenge. You could also set the healing mechanic to only activate once 3 modrons are downed if it seems like too much to track having it go off multiple times.
|
|
#
?
Sep 11, 2022 03:47
|
|
|
Is there a reason you're not using established charge mechanics for the martial's movement & attack gimmick? Defining "a straight line" on the grid gets a bit murky once it's not a cardinal direction. Plus, if you've been playing with regular charge mechanics for 20 levels, it's gonna be tough to convey to your players how this enemy uses almost-but-not-quite the same ones; they might try countermeasures that work on a charge but not this and be annoyed, or they might preemptively assume they can't avoid the "charge" when they really could.
|
|
#
?
Sep 11, 2022 10:44
|
|
|
I've been working on automating as much as I can on Foundry and have made pretty big strides. So long as players are properly targeting characters who receive effects, spells and abilities will add an effect to a token that expires appropriately, and most of the time applies its numerical effect to the token so we don't have to futz with bonuses or penalties. Also recently learned that animations do in fact work with the 4e module so I've been adding animations to everyone's powers! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pi68LJN9g4s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqTUM5UZTWA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbQdtQcBe_o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oRxqueAIWw
|
|
#
?
Oct 7, 2022 21:44
|
|
|
You're doing the Lord's work. When can we expect your module to release? 
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2022 11:36
|
|
|
One Legged Ninja posted:You're doing the Lord's work. When can we expect your module to release? I am a software engineer but I will never develop for foundry. This is just automated animations with the paid version of jb2a animations.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2022 15:26
|
|
|
For those interested, I started making really rambly, stream-of-consciousness videos for running Dnd4e in Foundry VTT. The topics I cover are effects, conditions and auras, animations, and using character tokens to make things easier on the DM. You can see the playlist here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEAlvzLhF2-iQsjepsdz1Ww I highly recommend watching them at 1.5/2x speed.
|
|
#
?
Nov 2, 2022 02:28
|
|
|
Wait, Active Auras works with 4e? How did you manage that? Whenever I've tried enabling it, the canvas stops loading.
|
|
#
?
Nov 3, 2022 04:28
|
|
|
Auras always bug me in games. Is there any type of power that's easier to forget? You have to check on them whenever anyone moves.
|
|
#
?
Nov 3, 2022 13:30
|
|
|
That's why you build the encounter around the aura. So it's the central gimmick everybody needs to work around and thus, everybody remembers.
|
|
#
?
Nov 23, 2022 01:12
|
|
|
Give all the enemies the same aura so everyone is always in it I see no way this could backfire
|
|
#
?
Nov 23, 2022 16:41
|
|
|
Hey all, I'm going to be running a beefy 4th edition campaign and haven't played it since it was the current edition, so I wanted to ask for helpt on a few questions: What are any major mechanical issues that I might want to home rule? For example, Sly Flourish thought critical hit builds were too good? Is there any major power creep I should be aware of in the major splat books? What are some of the really wild "game breaking" non combat powers (rituals?) That show up at high level, and what are some in-world counters that I might bake into the setting. I want to run a "Dark Souls" style setting and having players fly, teleport, or enter the astral plane is all something I want to, not ban but to account for. Can anyone break down the "tiers" of levels into more details? I want to make an Elden Ring sized game world that goes from level 1 to level 20 (30?) and let the players loose to explore as they choose, so I'm wondering if the starting zone should be be like 1-3, or maybe 1-2, etc?
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 15:44
|
|
|
Jack B Nimble posted:What are any major mechanical issues that I might want to home rule? On my return to running 4e, one thing I found out very quickly is that it's easy for a player to make a given skill really high. Like to the point where I realized that the level 2 warlock in the party would succeed on at level hard bluff checks on a 1. I ended up house ruling that a nat 1 was always a failure so that there was at least technically a risk. I'd talk to your players about not going too nuts on maxing out skills if you want skill challenges to mean anything.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 18:01
|
|
|
Gao posted:On my return to running 4e, one thing I found out very quickly is that it's easy for a player to make a given skill really high. Like to the point where I realized that the level 2 warlock in the party would succeed on at level hard bluff checks on a 1. I ended up house ruling that a nat 1 was always a failure so that there was at least technically a risk. I'd talk to your players about not going too nuts on maxing out skills if you want skill challenges to mean anything. IMO I try to take the opposite approach. If a player gets a +12 to arcana at level 2 I figure they'll just get different degrees of success depending on what they roll, because they want their character to be the Arcana guy. But at the same time I try to get them to roll skills that they wouldn't normally be good at (and still have a moderate chance of failure)
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 18:13
|
|
|
A few random thoughts off the top of my head: Don't worry about skill challenges, just do normal skill checks. Don't let people play hybrids. They either: 1) don't know what they are doing; 2) they are trying to build an obscene character; or 3) arguably the worst case, they try to build an obscene character but don't know what they are doing. Optional: Don't let people take Improved Defenses line of feats, or Weapon Expertise variants, which are really math fixes. Either give them out manually at specific levels, or integrate it into the story - for example, if the heroes rescue an old weapons master, he may teach them a Weapons Expertise feat for free. Optional: Consider switching the rest mechanic so that the players can only rest (recover healing surges and daily powers) at home base. That way, they can head out, explore, have 3-5 fights, then head back. Maybe even make it be a prolonged rest in game time (say, several weeks), to get a feel of exploration? Later in the game, perhaps a new home base can be established, closer to the higher-level locations.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 18:18
|
|
|
Right, I was specifically going to tie short rests and long rests to "small sites of grace" and "big sites of grace" (working titles), and the 4th edition mechanic of healing dice (wasn't that a thing??) was going to explicitly exist as some item that diminishes, like maybe a flask, or maybe a prayer bead where the beads dim out one by one. The whole framing device of "you're in a dark souls" lets me get a lot more explicit with the gamey aspect. That's one reason I'm going with fourth, it gives you a very granular hack and slash. I saw what the OP said about various feats and I was going to make them something explicitly obtainable within the game world, yeah. Edit: Oh, yeah, when I ran a 4th game from 1 to 20 back in the day, I just said you get a rest every 5 fights IIRC. This time I intend to sort of set the sites of grace out so that there's roughly 3-5 fights between them.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 18:26
|
|
|
Jack B Nimble posted:Right, I was specifically going to tie short rests and long rests to "small sites of grace" and "big sites of grace" (working titles), and the 4th edition mechanic of healing dice (wasn't that a thing??) was going to explicitly exist as some item that diminishes, like maybe a flask, or maybe a prayer bead where the beads dim out one by one. The whole framing device of "you're in a dark souls" lets me get a lot more explicit with the gamey aspect. That's one reason I'm going with fourth, it gives you a very granular hack and slash. Characters get a number of healing surges based on their class and other features. These are spent to allow a character to heal. Very few items allow them to heal without a healing surge (the potion of cure light wounds for example, which lets them not spend a healing surge if they're already out of healing surges).
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 18:31
|
|
|
Jack B Nimble posted:and the 4th edition mechanic of healing dice (wasn't that a thing??) 1. In 4e, there's a concept called Healing Surges, which behaves similarly to 5e's hitdice. Players don't roll dice for it, but instead has a set "surge value" equal to half their bloodied value (which is usually equal to half their HP total.) 2. Each Leader class has a healing ability, and depending on the class, they may or may not get bonus dice to that heal.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 18:48
|
|
|
I guess the main one is "let people be cool," because level 1 characters are surprisingly competent since basically all their passive class features are online. The other one is "remind people to pick a theme," or alternatively, ask that they don't; a theme is like a background or a side-class that gives everyone an extra encounter power, with the option to buy more in; it's like a Paragon Path, but for levels 1-10. Speaking of, tiers split the game into big 10-level chunks; heroic from 1-10 is your normal base-class only game, Paragon from 11-20 is analogous to entering a Prestige Class to specialize further, and Epic from 21-30 is Epic bullshit, same as before. Personally, I'm a big fan of starting at level 4, since everyone should have two encounter attacks and their first ability bump, to round off their odd scores, and enough feats to do something interesting. "[something]" Expertise feats are all mandatory math fixes, and way too good to ignore, so it's not a bad idea to hand those out for free, if you want players to have an actual feat choice at level 1. Healing is with healing surges, which I guess map nicely to Estus charges; the only slightly weird part is that healing surges are accessed in combat primarily through a leader's intervention (i.e. healing power), which is kind of thematically different from digging through your pockets and uncorking a flask. A long rest every 3-5 fights sounds right, and I think it's good to be transparent about this expectation with your players. Besides that, as far as balance things go, the wheels don't seriously come off until entering paragon (i.e. level 11) at the earliest. Common advice is to use MM3 math which fixed older monsters having too many hit points and too little damage, which is generally an issue that grows with level (and is basically a non-issue at low levels), but you can also use the handy MM3 On A Business Card, as a reference to either verify that monster stats are on-par, or make up your own, which can be fun, simple, and rewarding if you're into it. The other general issue is that making many small attacks will always seriously outpace large, single hits, but that also doesn't become too apparent for a while, once good multi-attacks and non-attribute damage modifiers become more available. Again, it's nothing to really worry about for a long time. I thin the main thing I'd say about builds is that 4e is a very rewarding game to get very deep in the weeds, but relatively easy to function at baseline. There's only a few really major pitfalls to avoid, the main ones being "have at least a +4 mod in your main stat," "use a +3 proficiency weapon (instead of a +2)," and "play a normal class with normal AEDU powers (i.e. not an Essentials class)." Hybrid classes aren't too bad or broken, as long as their classes have overlapping stats and their AC is normal, and in some ways easier to play since they have fewer passive class features. I guess it does create more room to screw things up if a player doesn't know what they're doing, in a way that normal single classes don't, but a player that does know can create a broken monstrosity regardless, so the real solution is to be open and honest about expected optimization levels. In conclusion: talk things out, have fun, and be excited when players have their moments.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 19:10
|
|
|
There are extremely few, if any, hybrids that are broken in terms of sheer power. There's sort of an argument that being nearly as good as a pure class but in two different roles is broken in a different kind of way -- they're competing for the same niche with twice as many players -- but at the same time, playing a hybrid is a good way to deliberately handicap yourself while still getting your charop jollies and not having to sandbag during actual play. The best argument against hybrids is simply that it's really easy to make an awful one, in a way that is not true of (almost) any pure class.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 19:24
|
|
|
Jack B Nimble posted:Right, I was specifically going to tie short rests and long rests to "small sites of grace" and "big sites of grace" (working titles), and the 4th edition mechanic of healing dice (wasn't that a thing??) was going to explicitly exist as some item that diminishes, like maybe a flask, or maybe a prayer bead where the beads dim out one by one. The whole framing device of "you're in a dark souls" lets me get a lot more explicit with the gamey aspect. That's one reason I'm going with fourth, it gives you a very granular hack and slash. I would suggest not doing "small sites of grace" - these only allow you to spend healing surges and refresh encounter powers, and the game assumes you can do this between combats. It's not fun starting the next combat without encounter powers. As for "big sites of grace", where a full rest (replenish daily powers, restore all healing surges to maximum), this feels like a good idea. May I be cheeky and suggest "Points of Light" for the name?
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 20:03
|
|
|
I think dim/bright points of light would be a good way to ration out long rest resources. That is, you can always short rest, but there's a baby long rest (restore all daily powers and 1 healing surge or something like that*) and a big long rest (restore everything) or something like that. * To make this work, such that players can't just reuse the same rest site until it amounts to a full refresh anyway, you might have to either make dim points of light go dark after use (they, themselves return when you use a bright point of light) OR do some extra tracking like "once you drop to X healing surges, you can never go above X+1 healing surges through any combination of effects until you've had a real long rest (with a bunch of provisos for vampires or whatever)".
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 22:33
|
|
|
My group has been essentially saying that you can only do an extended rest in a bed, and treating extended multi-day adventures as one long day, except when the characters sleep they can spend a healing surge to recover a daily power - either one of their own or from a magic item. Sometimes the DM allows us to recover multiple dailies at a time at increasing cost (second costs 2 surges, third costs 3, etc).
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2023 22:44
|
|
|
Seconding the notion that restricting short rests is bad, and also maybe you should rethink having healing be represented by some kind of Estus/crimson flask, HP in 4e is not a 1-to-1 for wounds, its an abstraction of your ability to stay upright and can include ideas like your luck running out, getting exhausted after extended dodging/blocking/minor hits, etc. I guess it would be true to Soulsborne for you to take a few hits and then magically heal it away with a little drink but like... is that the part of Souls games you are trying to emulate? I feel like focusing on near misses and staggering blocks is going to get you closer to that gritty feel, and narratively have one big hit be the thing that sends a player sprawling onto the floor after a lapse in defense leaves them open.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 03:47
|
|
|
Sure, yeah. This is a more "gamey" setting in that there will be very few NPCs and no real society, economy, etc; but that doesn't mean I need to emulate absolutely everything in a souls borne and you're completely right that HP is an abstraction, good point.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 04:06
|
|
|
Jack B Nimble posted:Sure, yeah. This is a more "gamey" setting in that there will be very few NPCs and no real society, economy, etc; but that doesn't mean I need to emulate absolutely everything in a souls borne and you're completely right that HP is an abstraction, good point. Ah I see. So yeah, I'd say lean into the menace of things. Give the monsters room to be spooky and threatening, lean into creatures that ambush to get that Darksouls feel of "oh god I am fighting more creatures than I though, I need to get this under control ASAP or im gonna die", traps are also a must as well as hidden items or rooms. You might even want to approach how describe things through the cinematic lens of a video game, I know in a lot of games I'll talk about like, the camera angle of a certain "shot" to make it easier to imagine, if the players find a boss, give it an intro 'cut-scene' to sell it as a threat. Consider even there being items in precarious positions a character might exploit, but dont punish a failure on a jump roll with death, make it a near miss that drains precious surges, simulating the desperate attempt to clamber back onto safe ground or landing poorly, having a character separated out as they try to grab an item is an ideal time to have lurking enemies appear while the party is separated by a risky jump or two. Also think about how you want to handle social skills if you are going to have so few NPCs, if you plan on there just not being a lot of opportunities to talk to folks, stress to players that they wont get a lot of utility out of those skills, or find fun and clever uses to incorporate them. In general try to incorporate a variety of environmental hazards to test different skills, runes or puzzles that rely on Arcane insight or Divine lore to circumvent safely. Finally, avoid things that require players to succeed on a roll to move forward, make the fail/pass of the rule determine if the party gets through unscathed or perhaps lose equipment, or have obstacles bar the way to optional but tantalizing prizes instead of the path forward. Ash Rose fucked around with this message at 04:32 on Jan 25, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 04:27
|
|
|
I ran a campaign like this before and I find you still need the pacing and variety of talking and diplomacy and general down time, it's more that that there isn't a general population of unnamed people forming a social backdrop. Players may still want to go talk to the hermit, or spend time with the young mage studying the ruins, or negotiate with the rival adventuring band that aren't quite enemies, but every one they meet has a name, stats and levels, and a goal, there's not that general milieu of townsfolk.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 04:35
|
|
|
Namagem posted:There's a couple things you could be referring to Key point to add to that: as well as Surge Value, PCs have a total of Healing Surges that only refresh on a long rest. Almost always, the only way to heal HP is to spend a healing surge -- healing abilities let you spend them more efficiently, or more frequently per encounter, or faster, or give you extra bonuses for doing so. So you can think of hp as "how long will I stay on my feet in this fight" and surges as "how long can I keep going today". Once I got my head round that, a lot of the rest of the game's design made more sense.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 13:37
|
|
|
Your health and stamina is the total and HP and HS. HP are the "active" part, HS the "static" part. HP are the external level of this iceberg; they are not your whole health and stamina, but you risk to die if you lose all of it. HS are your emergency reserve. Your body ability to keep on and healing. You can use it to replenish the active part, but you need to do something to tap into it: magic, ki, pure willpower, or just plain resting. edit: I OBVIOUSLY reversed HP and HS, now it's fixed. YggdrasilTM fucked around with this message at 15:05 on Jan 25, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 14:50
|
|
|
The only way I've found to manage long rests is to have the players on some sort of timer, or to give a restriction on where they can perform the rest. Having sites where players can perform long rests actually is a great idea, especially if they're well placed. The nice thing about TTRPGs is that you can simply say "oh yeah the site is right here!!" when things are looking dire and your PCs are sufficiently exhausted and worried. I also would not restrict short rests. Encounter powers are expected to be done per encounter, and short rests allow your players to actually tap into their healing surges. I saw earlier someone mentioned spending healing surges to replenish daily powers and that's actually also a great idea. I'd make it 1 HS + 1 HS for every level of the power being replenished. edit: also consider that rules as written long rests can only occur once every 24 hours of game time. This way you'd prevent your players from fighting a bit, retreating to long rest, fighting some more, retreating, etc. Elden Ring prevents this by respawning enemies, but that can get fairly tedious in a 4e game where even small combats can take a bit of time. Verisimilidude fucked around with this message at 15:23 on Jan 25, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 15:19
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 09:33 |
|
|
YggdrasilTM posted:Your health and stamina is the total and HP and HS. HP are the "active" part, HS the "static" part. I mean, if they're going full dark souls/elden ring with it they could just reflavor healing surges to be their estus flask. And maybe Dragonborn get a better estus starting out
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2023 15:28
|
|