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palecur posted:I'd make this a skill challenge based on Insight, Bluff, Intimidate, and Diplomacy as primaries. Skill challenges work best when you deviate from the prescribed framework -- for instance, I had a skill challenge in my Eberron game where the parties' enemies had gimmicked a magical sky elevator the party was in so it was just free falling down Sharn. I put a tower of poker chips in front of the GM screen and each time a PC did something in the skill challenge, I took some chips away to mark the decreasing distance-to-ground. A critical failure made the chips start decreasing two at a time as the botched repair brought up the magic fields -- in the wrong direction, making the car accelerate downwards. Surges were lost as another failure induced a tumble in the elevator car and folks got knocked about (Acrobatics or Athletics to mitigate). Alternatively: Jenga!
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Jun 11, 2013 22:18
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Bad Munki posted:Thanks for this. I signed up and am watching the tutorial, and so far I'm really liking what I see. It's like MapTool Web Lite, this might be just the ticket. I think I'll take the same little test adventure I made up and put it into Roll20, and then we can do the pepsi challenge. Thanks! They're planning to add that soon.
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Jun 12, 2013 00:47
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Oh man, that's neat! Rolling dice in MapTool is as easy as [XdY+Z]. I think there are ways to do exploding dice too; if not, it's extremely easy to write scripts for them. However, I totally understand people that want something a little more "pick up and play" - there are lots of settings and options, but that can get confusing quickly. I'm willing to run a demo session to showcase some of its features if anyone is interested though.
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Jun 12, 2013 00:57
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Bad Munki posted:e: The only thing I feel like it's really missing is the automatic line of sight/lighting stuff that MapTool does, that one feature really turns my crank. You can kind of accomplish this with dynamic lighting, but that means giving up light sources in favor of using light as line of sight.
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Jun 12, 2013 01:04
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DarkHorse posted:Oh man, that's neat! Yeah, rolling is always the easiest part.  Of course, there's still so much value in physically rolling dice that I think for most things, I'll just trust my people to roll them irl and report the results. If I get the impression they're cheating, I'll just cheat back. Which, imho, is a critical aspect of a real, in-person game, as well.  I'd love to hop in on a game run by someone who knows the tool (either of them!) I don't care what game system as long as you don't mind if I'm clueless. I like what I'm seeing in Roll20 because it takes the stuff I like about MapTool and just trims it down to a simple, clean iRPG experience. On the other hand, I see these campaign frameworks for MapTool which look like it's basically converting the entire system into a massive set of macros and poo poo, and while that's awesome and I love it, it gets waaaaay too complicated waaaaay too fast. That turns me off from those extra features, at which point I have MapTool Basic vs. Roll20. Since Roll20 is apparently designed to operate at that level (although there is support for some more advanced features like macros) it's starting to look like it might be a winner. If they got that line of sight stuff in, it'd be a shoe-in, at last for now. Bad Munki fucked around with this message at 01:16 on Jun 12, 2013 |
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Jun 12, 2013 01:13
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I was thinking of running a Fallout-themed game. Does anyone have any ideas for a system?
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Jun 12, 2013 17:38
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StashAugustine posted:I was thinking of running a Fallout-themed game. Does anyone have any ideas for a system?
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Jun 12, 2013 18:35
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StashAugustine posted:I was thinking of running a Fallout-themed game. Does anyone have any ideas for a system? GURPS is fantastic because of the vast supply of resources available. I also adore tech levels for including primitive weapons and alien tech. It was even going to be the basis for the original Fallout. Another great option would be Fate or one of its variants. You may have to hack it a bit if you want gear to mean more, might not, depends on how you want to run it. Fate Core is out now and free. Hard to beat that. The D6 system that WEG Star Wars used might be fun also.
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Jun 12, 2013 19:51
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Bad Munki posted:MapTool Basic vs. Roll20 My university friends and I play a weekly game over Google Hangout, and I have used both of these for campaigns. Maptools is an amazing program, provided that you put the time in to prepare stuff for it. Some of the system modules are really mind-blowing, and even if you don't go through the trouble of coding your entire system, you can make a really enjoyable experience just by tinkering with maps and things. For a Dark Heresy game I used it to build a crawl through an abandoned space station with lighting and line of sight and everything and my players really enjoyed it. The flip side is that it also requires that your players actually download and install it and you set up a host. You wouldn't think that 'install this simple program' would be a burden, but oh boy can it ever be. It's also true that if your players get off-track you can suddenly find yourself with lots of carefully created stuff that you aren't going to use, and scrambling to put together something useable on the fly. We ended up using Roll20 for the most part because it is so simple and easy to use; a pure browser interface is great. I will note, though, that when we did get carried away and throw tons of stuff into it, the interface seems to bog down a little. Like if you have dozens of structures and tokens and whatever, it really starts to show compared to Maptools, where I have played out big maps with upward of 50 active tokens without any issues.
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Jun 12, 2013 20:51
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It doesn't help that MapTool shows on its download page EVERY VERSION EVER COMPILED INCLUDING V1.3.b88_BROKEN_DO_NOT_USE.ZIP (seriously). It would be nice if they just had a "download latest version" link and the rest were hidden behind a "download old releases" link. Half the time of getting a friend up and running is the extended conversation of which version they should be using, do I need to update, will this module support version X, etc. Someone mentioned that the line of sight thing (not just lighting) was coming for Roll20, is there a thread on their forum about that or something? If they had that, or if it was coming in the near future, I'd gladly pay for their upgraded services. If it's one of those "yes, we'll add that some day, in the mysterious future, hopefully before the robots attack" type situations, though, that's less enticing.
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Jun 12, 2013 21:21
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Bad Munki posted:It doesn't help that MapTool shows on its download page EVERY VERSION EVER COMPILED INCLUDING V1.3.b88_BROKEN_DO_NOT_USE.ZIP (seriously). It would be nice if they just had a "download latest version" link and the rest were hidden behind a "download old releases" link. Half the time of getting a friend up and running is the extended conversation of which version they should be using, do I need to update, will this module support version X, etc. Use the MapTool "Launch" page, not the "Download" one.
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Jun 12, 2013 21:39
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I used to, but it didn't work so well, it kept re-asking if I wanted to authorize the app (for running as a server), etc. Downloading it fixed that problem. Web launch is great in some cases, less so in others.
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Jun 12, 2013 21:53
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I'm looking for some DM'ing advice for 4e; the correct answer might be "you're a horrible person  " so I'll preface by saying that.Generally speaking, I hate prepping for fights; they always end up feeling really boring, and that may have everything to do with how I do it, so I'll expand on that. As a DM, I don't like having to do fights with lots of at-level or below-level monsters who are just punching bags for the players; their defenses suck so they always get hit and tend to die too easily (which feels unsatisfying for me) and I hate having to track a dozen monster HPs. I much prefer keeping the fights to roughly "5 on 5" but with stronger monsters. The problem with that is these monsters have like double the HP of the players, so the mop-up phase bullshit becomes even more magnified. e: An answer might be to homebrew monsters with high attack and defenses but lower their HP to more reasonable levels, but then I need to know how to correctly assign XP values to them. Minions seem basically only useful if they're spread all across the map and generally only ranged attackers, since the party includes a Psion who goes Static Mote-happy all day errry day. 2-hit minions as a rule rather than the exception might help, but I guess I rarely find minions fun or helpful. That's another thing I should touch on; I hate drawing maps. It seems like no matter what I draw, the terrain ends up being fairly irrelevant (or else the players use forced movement to somehow trivialize the fight), to the point where I'm ready to just say gently caress it and do TotM. I can also usually run 3 combats per session (if all we're doing is combat) and I don't want to erase and draw 3 maps per session. I always write down monster powers in short form, either in excel or just on paper+clipboard, yet I consistently forget to use That Special Thing they have that makes them interesting/challenging (even though I've written it down) so the fights become even more dull. Adding a more varied Team Monster would probably only worsen this problem for me (even more special things to try and track). I think the style of fight I want, is one that takes a long time to resolve (most of the session), but is always interesting and doesn't devolve into trading at-wills or hoping a power recharges; something I can make dramatically important or work story/character considerations and villain-banter into, rather than just an exercise in level-grinding. This might be a case of "tough poo poo" but I hate adding in more enemies mid-fight or toughening them up when the PCs are having too easy a go of it. I also need fights to be quicker to compile on the fly and still be interesting. That's another question I have: what's a good way to do "recurring villains?" I have 1 so far and am thinking of adding others, but how can I do a guy who always gets away, without it feeling like bullshit to the players? Is this even possible to simulate in 4e? tl;dr Basically I'm just really frustrated with the combat system. At this point the only idea I have to deal with it is to get someone else be the "Combat DM" and just focus my efforts on character/story/plot considerations (which is what I really care about.) P.d0t fucked around with this message at 23:08 on Jun 12, 2013 |
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Jun 12, 2013 22:39
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StashAugustine posted:I was thinking of running a Fallout-themed game. Does anyone have any ideas for a system? Lizard from rpg.net has an excellent WIP Gamma World conversion for 4e D&D, though that skews wackier than Fallout.
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Jun 12, 2013 23:34
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P.d0t posted:I'm looking for some DM'ing advice for 4e; the correct answer might be "you're a horrible person My standard answer is FLOODS AND FLOODS OF MINIONS NO SERIOUSLY I MEAN LIKE DOZENS, but you don't like those. And you've sort of pre-emptively ruled out a lot of the possible fixes. I hate to say it, but maybe the system is just not for you? If that's not an option, maybe make sure there's always something happening as well as the fight - a time limit, or changing conditions (easier crits on bloodied enemies?), a device that has to be shut down, a prisoner that has to be rescued. And have monsters/villains surrender occasionally, or run away. You can also pump up the damage and cut down the hit points - monsters that are loving terrifying but drop easily work very well with 4e. More broadly - consider ditching xp. While you can still use the encounter guidelines, just have your dudes level up every few sessions. You should never feel you have to throw in a combat to give the players xp. As for recurring villains, just make sure you don't cheat. If they die they die! You can always make another, who will be strongly motivated to not die in the same way. I had what was intended to be a recurring villain, he was all sinister and mysterious and threatening and the party tracked him down and bushwhacked him mercilessly. So his replacement was genial, and jolly, and still accomplished exactly the same things including tricking trapping and ambushing them. But they liked him so it was ok! Assuming you want a villain get out of jail free card, I'd do it as a very visible item that he expends when he escapes. So next time they see him they can either see he doesn't have it (which means they achieved something) or know that they have to take it off him if they want to stop him running away (knowledge is power!) sebmojo fucked around with this message at 23:50 on Jun 12, 2013 |
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Jun 12, 2013 23:45
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sebmojo posted:I hate to say it, but maybe the system is just not for you? This is the logjam I'm having; as a player I love 4e. But as a DM, I'm finding I just want to throw this poo poo out the window. Like, is my idea of "the DM should have fun in combat, too" just wrong? Or am I having fun wrong, or something? I get that the players are supposed to win all the time unless they're jacking around and not trying, so that's not the problem I'm having. But, is there any way to make it interesting on my end without it being unfair/impossible for the players? e: sebmojo posted:More broadly - consider ditching xp. While you can still use the encounter guidelines, just have your dudes level up every few sessions. You should never feel you have to throw in a combat to give the players xp. I actually find building encounters around the XP budget, they come out far too easy. I often go a little overbudget (or use the much-maligned DMG encounter-building guidelines) in order to have things be at all challenging. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 00:08 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 12, 2013 23:58
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P.d0t posted:This is the logjam I'm having; as a player I love 4e. Interesting problem. I'd put it to your players, maybe? As the DM in 4e combat you're sort of the hyperplayer, and are in the position of trying to outwit them all which can be stressful - but if you're not having fun then it's not going to work long term. Giving the more algorithmic monsters to your players to run is a definite possibility (charge nearest, use encounter, use atwills). As a preliminary though I'd try for some fights that are briefer and scarier for your players. Double the addon damage for all attacks (so 3d8+7 becomes 3d8+14) and turn the hitpoints down to 75% should do that without breaking too much. Also, don't forget how resilient 4e characters actually are. How often do your players go down to 0? When I was DMing it was a rare fight I didn't get the fighter on the ground at least once, sometimes multiple times. Having at least one death save being rolled is an excellent aim for a fight - but no one died in the course of the campaign. Edit: Yeah, the encounter/xp guidelines are built around modest player skill/optimisation and a bunch of fights in a single day. You can go +2 or +3 comfortably if you make sure not to let the monster defences get too high. Also vvv Dark Horse advice is good advice vvv sebmojo fucked around with this message at 00:38 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 00:15
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Personally "winning" as a DM means they used all their encounter stuff and at least half the party got bloodied. I'm also a fan of putting two or even three big monsters in a big setpiece. Give the players the option of prioritizing between the Dragon that will breathe on the whole party every turn+ initiative pass or the evil swordsman that can bloody the Defender on a high damage roll. I also prefer to add one to a lot of monster defences while clipping their hp to make the combat pace a little more my speed. And if you hate minions there's a general swarm/horde idea that gets kicked around here that I like to change up with occasionally. Give a horde X up to represent how many monsters are in it. Give it bonus initiative passes tied to how big the crowd is. As it takes damage the monsters in the mob start dying. Remove an Initiative pass when it's bloodied or loses a quarter of its hp but up its damage to represent desperation. Add some properties like does not provoke with ranged or can charge with one square of movement. Play with the formula until you find something you like. Also you should be having fun as a DM. No game or group should ever claim otherwise.
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Jun 13, 2013 00:20
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To anyone that wants to see a MapTool demo, PM me or post in the thread and we'll try to work something out. I'll be free tonight (Wednesday) at least, and possibly Friday night through Saturday as well.P.d0t posted:This is the logjam I'm having; as a player I love 4e. First off, make sure your monster math makes sense. I use MM3 rules as a sanity check, which reduces AC and HP and increases damage from base rules to make combat a little shorter and "swingier" to make it interesting. I think it also goes a little into the philosophy of the numbers, that monsters should go down in about four rounds or so. As a general rule you can take 75-80% of non-MM3 monsters' HP, drop their AC a point or two, and be in the right ballpark. http://blogofholding.com/?p=512 Also check out these tools for setting up encounters: http://www.asmor.com/scripts/4eMonsterMathCruncher/ http://www.asmor.com/scripts/4eMonsterMathCruncher/ To make terrain applicable, it should be an inconvenience to the players or serve as a potential awesome benefit. I like throwing in a high wall for archers to shoot down from, or a deep crevasse that sorcerers can launch fireballs from in safety, or a zone of healing that monsters and PCs will fight over to control. Make both groups fight for positioning - in the former two cases, nimble characters can bypass the obstacles and eviscerate the ranged attackers, or at least keep them distracted from doing what they want. Don't forget that the terrain can move and change too, and be sure to let players create their own terrain with their actions. Maybe an oil slick that forces ability checks or you slide in a straight line or go prone, or a zone of random teleportation caused by malfunctioning magical equipment. Players should be using forced movement to break that advantage - but monsters should be, too! Shove them off ledges, into pits, over pots of boiling stew, into spikes, through portals, all over the place. And have them maneuver their allies too. Countdowns are another way to make battles exciting. The BBEG is completing a ritual, and you only have three rounds to stop him before he a) comes and kicks your rear end b) unleashes an unspeakable horror (which will kick your rear end) c) destroys the town, etc. They tend to work well mixed in with a skill challenge of some sort. Status effects, used wisely, can make a battle exciting. In my last battle the party was pitted against a purple worm and a bunch of useless minions. However, they started the battle separated, and the minion worms applied Immobilized. It just so happened that the Invoker (a controller) was pitted against the Purple Worm while all the strikers and defenders were locked down by the minions. It was tense for them trying to fix their disadvantageous positioning (I still don't know how it ends - we quit just as the Invoker got swallowed  ).I know you don't like minions, but you should really give them a shot. They should be minimal maintenance - some to-hit numbers, an attack bonus, and a static amount of damage. Use them to harry, block, and annoy the players, and order them around by the more powerful monsters so PCs have to decide between taking out the leadership or taking out the easy (but more effective because of the leader) grunts. Mix up the composition of fights to keep things interesting for you and the players. You stated that you tend to forget that special thing monsters do that makes them awesome. As someone with the same affliction, I'll tell you what I do: try to imagine the battle ahead of time, and make their behavior mesh with their fighting style. Like with kobolds and their "Shifty" trait (can shift as an immediate reaction to an enemy moving adjacent, or whatever) I act them out as being jumpy and flighty. Them jumping away from PCs is part of who they are, and it helps me remember that they should do that when swords are drawn. Alternatively, I use big bolded notes (in MapTool for me, but you can make it a cover card or the first thing listed) so I can review right before the battle. Or, you can do what I often resort to, which is just wing it. Your goal is to make things fun for the players and yourself, and playing fast and loose with the rules can let you do that. I've found players are amenable to bending the rules if you explain why you're doing it (hey guys do you think it'd be fun/cool if...) and you're not trying to screw them over. DarkHorse fucked around with this message at 00:38 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 00:30
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If you're not big on minions, I prefer lesser monsters all day. More durable, less explode-y, less cheesy than two-hits, and generally just more design room to play with in my experience. Honestly, if you've got time to sink into it, I actually suggest homebrewing monsters. Like, entirely from scratch. The expression sheets give you all of the math you need, and looking at what other monsters do provides a solid baseline for what kind of effects you can stick in there. In my experience it's much harder to forget Cool Monster Power X when you spent some time contemplating what Cool Monster Power X should be and how it will work with Cool Monster Power Y and Z.
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Jun 13, 2013 00:48
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Yeah... The biggest problem for me, I think, is that I don't have the time (or honestly, the inclination) to do a whole lot of prep. I understand and have used MM3-on-a-business-card, though lately I just stick to picking things from the Monster Vault. I hate deleveling monsters. It is such a chore. I would like it if there were some guidelines on what level a Special Ability is, rather than just a guidline on how to crunch the math. I'm a bit averse to slapping on "whatever I think is cool or would come in handy" on my monsters in case it turns out to be unfair or overpowered, but those abilities aren't assigned a "cost" or "XP value" in 4e, which is the most frustrating part for me. DarkHorse posted:First off, make sure your monster math makes sense. I use MM3 rules as a sanity check, which reduces AC and HP and increases damage from base rules to make combat a little shorter and "swingier" to make it interesting. I think it also goes a little into the philosophy of the numbers, that monsters should go down in about four rounds or so. As a general rule you can take 75-80% of non-MM3 monsters' HP, drop their AC a point or two, and be in the right ballpark. THIS might be the problem. This is exactly the type of fight I don't want. So, reading this, I really feel like I should just throw that math out. Oftentimes I go into a session with 1 map and 1 corresponding fight, prepped and ready to go. Then I find out my fight+story/RP stuff isn't gonna fill a whole session, and I have to slap something together quick. Probably the answer is "prep 4 fights just in case" but I would much rather make fights that don't suck and take time to complete, without being a deathtrap.
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Jun 13, 2013 01:14
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You have a very precise set of requirements - longer, but not grindy, but without requiring prep or managing complicated abilities. These are kind of contradictory. Bluntly, if you want to stick with 4e while accomplishing these things then you'll need to be more in tune with the system. Failing that, maybe make monsters more the environment rather than the goal? So the interest comes from achieving goals in a hostile environment rather than murdering the whole map to death. If you want to add a new ability without needing to crunch numbers then just look through similar levelled monsters and grab an ability then reskin it. You mentioned you are worried about being overpowered for your party - how close to the wind do you sail? How often do you put PCs down into death save territory? sebmojo fucked around with this message at 01:31 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 01:28
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It tends to fluctuate, but I'd say I get 1 PC into death saves every fight, as a rough average. I guess my checklist would be:
* fights that don't end in trading at-wills * fights that last most of a session and reward XP accordingly; I'd rather have 1 "grindy" fight every session than grind through a handful of smaller ones, so maybe 4e is a bust, since it is encounter-based? * Fights that will push the players to the brink EVERY time * accomplish this with SMALL numbers of monsters I'm veering this way: - low-ish defenses, high HP, high damage - 2 sets of monsters in each fight, each with a special ability that combos off the other group Part of the problem, is that I find I tend to play "sub-optimally" when running monsters just because it is tiring and I have so much poo poo to juggle as it is. Like, if I am a player, I often ready or delay to set up combos where 2 people get combat advantage and stuff, but as the DM I feel like this is being dickish or else ends up taking up too much time and being boring for the players. Should I just bite the bullet? I also tend towards simple monsters; the "Magic-Mans who has minor action spells" just gives me too much poo poo to juggle, so I often balk at that, even though I know they would make for more challenging/interesting enemies. e: Another thing is, if I want to have enemies with high +hit and damage, but without giving them absurd AC which will just frustrate the players, how do I work that? How do I determine monster level and therefore XP and therefore how many of these monsters I should use in an encounter? MM3 math doesn't give me any of this info. ugh... e2: As an example, here's an encounter I slapped together: I had 2 archers with level-appropriate everything, and a recharge-6 power that created a 3x3 "fire hazard" that did "Page42" damage if you started your turn in it (half for passing through) In addition, I had 1 melee boss guy with roughly level-appropriate defenses, but attack and damage of [party level + 7]. He had an encounter whirlwind ability where he could shift 3 squares and hit everything adjacent to his path; his regular ability did damage + push 3 + prone. How much XP should I give out for that? gently caress knows. Is it a balanced encounter? Does it fit within the XP budget? I have no idea. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 02:15 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 01:47
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Yes, if you can get CA you should. It puts pressure on the players and elevates the smaller enemies from Wizard fodder to tactical, legitimate threat. Also some stuff that you could try that's not tied to an ability to track. For instance if my party's Cleric leaves herself open to something the Warden marked I see hitting her as win/win. The Warden gets his bonus attack, speeding up combat. At the same time nothing turns up the heat on a party like stabbing the leader with a 3d6 damage attack.
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Jun 13, 2013 02:17
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P.d0t posted:It tends to fluctuate, but I'd say I get 1 PC into death saves every fight, as a rough average. I should mention that when I feel a fight start to get grindy and trading at-wills I'll usually find an excuse to end the combat, whether it's through surrender or escape or just dropping their HP or AC, but you've already mentioned wanting longer and interesting battles. As an alternative to minors you could try using various Auras. I have a harder time remembering them than minor actions, but it might work well for you. EDIT: As for statting things out, you may have to play it by ear at first. I've played enough where I can sort of get an intuition for how a battle will go, but I always include a provision to adjust things if necessary: a leader calls down a buff for the enemies, or a benefit they had expires, or I just let things die earlier than perhaps they would have otherwise. This is of course just to adjust the tension in the game because of failures on my part, a lever or accelerator pedal; if the players are exceptionally clever or stupid they still deal with the consequences. DarkHorse fucked around with this message at 02:42 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 02:39
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P.d0t posted:I had 2 archers with level-appropriate everything, and a recharge-6 power that created a 3x3 "fire hazard" that did "Page42" damage if you started your turn in it (half for passing through) I think you're overthinking it. They'll never know. If you think they should get more xp, give them some more (or ditch xp completely and level up every few sessions, seriously it's the best). And if your PCs aren't constantly dying, you're not being too harsh.
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Jun 13, 2013 02:42
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I'm thinking of running my players through The Tomb of Horrors, but I'm not sure which version. We play D&D 4th Ed. The plan is that next extended rest the players will find themselves in a shared dream inside the famous tomb. I've already asked them (without telling them why) to bring updated and current character sheets of every character they've ever played in this campaign or any other as well as any build they ever threw together in the character builder and wanted to test out. I made it clear to them that more is more. I want to run them through The Tomb because it's iconic and it'll be fun to let off a bit of steam in a dreamworld with no consequences. I'm hoping for something really, really deadly so players will be swapping characters in and out, Paranoia style. In our main campaign they're always far too careful, but here dying will be rewarded with restored dailies, action points, etc, as well as the opportunity to swiss-army in the perfect character for a given situation, so goofball suicidal attitudes will hopefully be encouraged. Apparently there's something like 4 versions? Which one do you folks suggest I use?
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Jun 13, 2013 03:23
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I want a way to cost out monster abilities; it seems like XP would be an excellent way to do this. Like, monster templates that include iconic special abilities, that you could layer onto anything, and has an XP value assigned to it (preferably with level-scaling included) Is this outlined somewhere? The reason for bringing up that encounter was that I found out that 4/5 of the players would die if the boss had 200 HP and the archers each had 80. Granted, this isn't scientific playtesting by any stretch. My point is MM3 math doesn't really give me guidelines to run the kind of fights I want to do, and all I learned was "whoops I shoulda just said the badguys died a few rounds ago" while I still have no idea how appropriate the fight I made was in terms of XP budget or other encounter-building guidelines, specifically because: A) the abilities I assigned are not costed out anywhere, as far as I can tell B) I used a monster that had defenses of one level and other stats from a much higher level, which MM3 math gives absolutely no level or XP guidelines for doing So yeah, I can just wing it and do everything on the fly, but then it becomes a constant "learning" (hopefully?) exercise and feels more and more arbitrary to the players (because really it's all bullshit). This is the type of thing that is causing me to get so frustrated; the monster math and encounter building "rules" don't support running the types of fights I want, and I don't want to homebrew a bunch of modifications to the combat/encounter system. EDIT: Or hell, gently caress XP. Cost abilities out in "damage per round" and give a list of "average party hitpoints, by level" and then I can start to figure out how long it will take me to kill the party. Not that that's my goal, but if i know how much is too much then I'd be on the right track. P.d0t fucked around with this message at 03:36 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 03:27
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Tomero_the_Great posted:I'm thinking of running my players through The Tomb of Horrors, but I'm not sure which version. We play D&D 4th Ed. The OG 1e version is surprisingly rules free, tbh. You'll just need to stat out a few fights. I ran it a couple of months back and it's fun as hell. There's a lot of design smarts encoded into it that you don't see until you play it. Still a horrifying meat grinder, don't get me wrong, but there are ways around all the traps, particularly once you've grokked the Tomb's gleefully unfair internal logic. If you want to be nice you could make the save or die poison on all the spikes in all the traps just take off 1d8 healing surges, but I say go for broke.
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Jun 13, 2013 05:00
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P.d0t posted:I'm looking for some DM'ing advice for 4e; the correct answer might be "you're a horrible person If you wanna get rid of the grind phase just have monsters surrender when the odds are firmly in favor of the players.
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Jun 13, 2013 05:29
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^^^This is a bullshit way to resolve it, always, but particularly when you run "5 on 5" encounters where each monster has twice the HP of the PCs, and usually the last one alive hasn't taken any damage.Chaotic Neutral posted:If you're not big on minions, I prefer lesser monsters all day. More durable, less explode-y, less cheesy than two-hits, and generally just more design room to play with in my experience. I took a look at this, and I'm leaning towards using 2-hit minions; the first response I got from my players was "More minions!" The main reason I would avoid lesser monsters is because I hate tracking HP for lovely monsters; that's what's supposed to be the nice thing about minions, but one-hit is just too little. So I'm thinking of doing this:
- first hit "bloodies" a minion; this can be represented on the battlemap (using the MV tokens), rather than in the initiative spreadsheet, where I track HP for normal monsters (gently caress tracking HP) - if something gives minions temporary HP, this counts as an extra "hit"; might be a pain in the rear end to track though - Dailies, Encounters, and critical hits always kill 2-hit minions One more thing I would like to ask: Should I have minions on separate initiatives? Usually I group them all as one, but maybe a compromise would be to have each group of like 3-4 minions be one initiative? Again, as long as I can keep track of who's who on the battlemap, this should be fine.
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Jun 13, 2013 06:06
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P.d0t posted:^^^This is a bullshit way to resolve it, always, but particularly when you run "5 on 5" encounters where each monster has twice the HP of the PCs, and usually the last one alive hasn't taken any damage. He might not have taken any damage, but he just witnessed his 4 companions get slaughtered. The odds aren't good... Why you think that "the fight ends because the losing side surrenders" is bullshit? We see it in fiction all the time. Unless the enemies are mindless automatons (undead, constructs, etc...) it seems perfectly reasonable that they might flee or surrender. Does D&D allow EXP rewards for defeating an encounter by other means than killing? I mean, if you knock a foe unconscious, or made it run away for various reasons, wouldn't that be considered a victory?
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Jun 13, 2013 16:33
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Rocket Ace posted:Does D&D allow EXP rewards for defeating an encounter by other means than killing? I mean, if you knock a foe unconscious, or made it run away for various reasons, wouldn't that be considered a victory? I've always gone by the rule that if an enemy escapes, it's a victory, but since he could come back if he chose, it's some percentage of full exp (ranging from 50% if the enemy is basically guaranteed to return, up to 100% if the enemy is really never coming back. I also give 100% if, of course, the enemy was supposed to escape as, say, part of the story.) Taking an enemy prisoner is full victory, so full exp. In any event, DM can award exp for whatever the heck he wants. We played on or around Halloween once, and I gave bonus exp for people that brought props relevant to their character. It was a blast, and some of those props kept appearing at every game after that. Give exp for whatever you like. 
Bad Munki fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 16:40
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P.d0t posted:As a DM, I don't like having to do fights with lots of at-level or below-level monsters who are just punching bags for the players; their defenses suck so they always get hit and tend to die too easily (which feels unsatisfying for me) and I hate having to track a dozen monster HPs. I much prefer keeping the fights to roughly "5 on 5" but with stronger monsters. The problem with that is these monsters have like double the HP of the players, so the mop-up phase bullshit becomes even more magnified. I treat my dungeons like a Beat-Em-Up - the traps and weaker enemies aren't meant to kill players, they're meant to whittle away surges and provide 'power ups'b so when the Boss(es) show up, its more tense. IMO, this lets the players have a mix of weaker enemies they can just smash in the face and feel like badasses, and higher powered monsters that give them a memorable fight. P.d0t posted:^^^This is a bullshit way to resolve it, always, but particularly when you run "5 on 5" encounters where each monster has twice the HP of the PCs, and usually the last one alive hasn't taken any damage. It is sort of bullshit, but sometimes you need to take a little creative license to make the game fun and remove unfun, unchallenging grind. One of the things you could do is give your monsters some way to trade defense for offense when things enter the "mop-up" phase. One of the big monsters my players fought was a controller who could spawn minions at the cost of HP, and the party, minus a few pot shots, saved him for last. His stat sheet said he could only spawn 1 minion a round, but when he was the last monster up, I had him spawn 8. This turned a slow plinking at his HP into "HOLY gently caress!". edit: If a fight gets down to trading at-wills, the party has the clear upper hand, and their enemy is something that won't retreat, I'll just tell them "unless you guys do something other than hit him with weapons, you'll win". If they don't feel like negotiating or taking prisoners, I just kill the monster and we move on. quote:So I'm thinking of doing this: I never tell my players if something is a minion. They usually figure it out in short order. And I only role initiative once for enemies of the same type. It makes everything so much less confusing and battle go smoother. If you need some sort of "reason" for this, just say the minions move in formation or mob-mentality. What about instead of two hit minions, you give your minions a one-time Save-vs-Death at -2 if they're hit with an AoE at will? Chaotic Neutral posted:If you're not big on minions, I prefer lesser monsters all day. More durable, less explode-y, less cheesy than two-hits, and generally just more design room to play with in my experience. Holy poo poo, thank you for that. That is a truly awesome idea (especially the "auto-fail saves"). Guesticles fucked around with this message at 17:42 on Jun 13, 2013 |
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Jun 13, 2013 17:36
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P.S. STILL COMPLETELY DEVOID OF MERIT
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People surrender all the time in real life. A small part of this is that they don't know their own HP values, and a large part is because they know what happens if they run out of HP. EDIT: I always tell players which the minions are, because finding out you've blown valuable powers on weak things sucks.
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Jun 13, 2013 17:38
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Guesticles posted:I treat my dungeons like a Beat-Em-Up - the traps and weaker enemies aren't meant to kill players, they're meant to whittle away surges and provide 'power ups'b so when the Boss(es) show up, its more tense. IMO, this lets the players have a mix of weaker enemies they can just smash in the face and feel like badasses, and higher powered monsters that give them a memorable fight. This is what I try to do, but my players won't have any of it. They will do anything they can to prevent even using an Encounter power up until the very last room of the dungeon, when I get one round of Encounter/Action Point/Daily per player, the Dailies +4 from the Tactical Warlord right in the face of the final boss like a giant fantasy nuke. Usually they end up going into the final room barely alive, both low on HP and surges, only to one-shot whoever is in there. Any idea how to prevent that? I told them multiple times that maybe if they used a Daily two rooms back they wouldn't have been as messed up as they are right now, but since they still win in the end it doesn't really matter to them. Even went so far as to telling them that this is the whole Encounter and that does encourage them to spend an Encounter Power every now and then, but often it is At-Will after At-Will. Really trying not to pull a dick-move and have the boss have Reist 20 all for one turn or something like that, but it is quite tricky to balance out like this.
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Jun 13, 2013 18:58
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Send them the boss first. 
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Jun 13, 2013 19:26
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* Multistage bosses help a bit. A boss that turns into something else when it hits zero HP is going to be much more sustainable because the players can't just layer all their dailies at once. * Instead of using a single solo, try multiple Elites. AoE powers tend to be less damaging and players who display the sort of mentality you're describing tend to pick the sexiest single target DPS power they can find, though I can't be sure of that. * Give powerups and environmental effects a time limit so players have to consume them before they run out. * Give the boss(es) a big environmental benefit that the players have to negate in some way. I had a boss once that had resist 15 (all) at heroic but every time you killed one of it's minions, the resistance dropped by 3. Once the players figured that out I was ensured at least a round of them clearing minions. There are a tons of variations on this theme. * Make the boss more deadly the more damage it takes. This ensures that alpha-striking for less than a boss's total HP is just going to invite more pain, not less. These are just a few ideas.
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Jun 13, 2013 19:34
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Tomero_the_Great posted:Send them the boss first. Seriously, this. Send in a boss first, and then make more encounters during their "escape" or whatever. And if you think they can survive it (and only if), then send in a second boss before they can rest.
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Jun 13, 2013 19:42
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| # ? Jun 8, 2024 17:14 |
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Then again, if your players are giving each other high fives and cheering after they one-shot your boss... Then they're having fun, so mission accomplished as a GM, I guess? But yeah, if you aren't having fun with this structure, then use a different formula, as others have suggested.
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Jun 13, 2013 19:47
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