Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition: Looks like we're the grognards, now.

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition: Looks like we're the grognards, now.

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Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

bathroom sounds posted:

I still don't understand why a demon would enter into a pact with a warlock. It's not like they're Lucifer trying to corrupt one of God's Children as part of some existential war between Good and Evil.

I always liked the idea of a warlock as a seeker of eldritch knowledge who maybe stared into the abyss a little too long. The whole pact thing just seems off to me.

Think about how many adventurers die before they become phenomenal godlike beings, or just stop adventuring before they get to the point where they could kill their patron and tear up the contract with sheer force of will. In a meta sense, think about all the games that end before 30.
That's a whole bunch of magical murder-slingin' soul bros to get serving you for all eternity, fighting Blood Wars, maybe just making gross faces at people you don't like, whatever. All for the low low investment of giving them a little background story.

Though the seeker of knowledge gone off the deep end works just as well, I've been playing a 1-30 weekly game since launch as one of those.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2014 23:32

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 15:35

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

I like that mechanically every pact probably benefits from going Dual into Sorc-King, and that Sorc-King is the clearest outline of the warlock pact relationship: Somebody crazy-strong gives you some strength as long you don't mind being a little crazy.

ALSO it has Ka-Li-Ma and Commander's Strike 2: don't disappoint me.

# ¿ Jan 31, 2014 00:21

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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jimcunningham posted:

Advice needed: my group is about to get in the middle of a war. Theyll have a week or so before the enemies are at the city. I need some side quests they can do to make sure tje battle is won.

One is killing a clan of lizardfolk who are going to end up flanking.
Another is to destroy a magical bridge so thaat the enemy cant bring their secret weapons (4 giant beasts).

Any ideas?

If the enemies are attacking a set location, there's a whole bunch of sidequests they can try, grouped loosely:
-Surveying the surroundings. Fight some brigands and various road-banditry, convince them to fight on the PCs' side, talk them into just providing good intel to you / bad intel to the enemy / helping the PCs' side set up traps and ambushes in the countryside/along main roads into the city; going out into the woods and doing so yourself and driving local murder-fauna in the direction of the enemy so they have to fight off wolves and displacer beasts and poo poo before they get to the city.
-Gaining local support. Punch out a crooked local tax collector; convince some pacifist cleric/monks to help defend the city; get an eccentric local sage to agree to give the local army some potions/scry on the enemy/ward up the city walls; talk some veterans of a past conflict/old adventurers into One Last Fight on your side.
-Miscellaneous 'make us stronger fast' stuff: Descend into a crypt beneath the city to reclaim an ancient treasure to use in the conflict; look for a rumored lost enclave of elves in the woods/goblins in the desert/gnolls in the swamp who guard a magical spring that invests the drinker with great, if fleeting, power; sharpen your blades on the hide of an immortal beast rumored to be roaming nearby.

Stuff like that! Small goal-oriented sidequests in the service of a greater cause (than "give us xp and gp") own.

# ¿ Mar 19, 2014 18:58

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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Glagha posted:

I'm not super familiar with the essentials classes. What's wrong with hexblade and binder?

I have no idea what Myriad Truths is talking about with the hexblade, but the binder's problems amount to:
-You're a controller forking off of a class with single-target, moderate-status-effect powers, so your power selection is whatever you've got in the Binder write-up or else crap. And half of the good stuff you have, a regular warlock could take.
-The riders on your powers imply that you can't get rider effects from regular pact powers (since yours say Fey Pact (Binder) and theirs just say Fey Pact); in the other direction this means your powers are more-or-less arbitrarily poo poo-garbage, TO YOU, if you choose off-pact because they're balanced against losing most of their utility if a non-binder-of-your-pact (read: warlock) chooses them, so when a binder-of-not-your-pact chooses them they're bad.
-Your pact boon feature is core to your utility/survivability, but is weaker or worse than the baseline warlock equivalents, AND harder to trigger (no cursing, just proximity...on a controller. Or dealing the killing blow...on a controller). You work twice as hard for half as much reward.
-You don't have controller area damage or striker single-target damage. What do you even do?

# ¿ Mar 19, 2014 22:23

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thespaceinvader posted:

Hexblades would be fine if it weren't for the fact that the writers gave their powers both the weapon and implement keyword which makes them a mess in terms of how they interact with the rest of the game.

Plus, they have almost no native access to striker support. They can charge, and they can get Quickened Spellcasting at Epic, but that's about it.

Not to mention, IIRC their weapons count as categories (like, Light Blade) and not name-type(like, Rapier or Longsword) so you don't even get that much out of a martial splash for feat support. And they reap the whirlwind of the problem that most of the buffing of Warlock damage across sourcebooks was more curse-buffing feats: they don't have curse damage, so most of their base-class damage feats don't apply, and they don't have a curse mechanic or shadow walk, so most of their utility stuff from the base class doesn't apply.

On the other hand, hexblades ARE a ton of fun and still deal competitive damage, just not "late epic tier warlock with every possible curse-damage-buffing feat" damage.

Myriad Truths posted:

The way that the pact blade works isn't supported at all mechanically. It's not a big deal if you don't look too deep, but the rules get really awkward. The problem is how the pact weapon inherits the properties of the implement used to summon it. The rules aren't equipped to handle powers that are both weapon powers and implement powers. In addition, this allows you to apply enchantments to weapons that really should not have them at all because they were intended for non-weapon implements, which also causes some problems.

I'm not really equipped myself to go into detail, but one thing I remember consistently causing problems is whether a pact weapon functioned with Dual Implement Spellcaster.

I mean, if you squint at it a lot of the weapon/implement stuff is just "take the better number, whatever," but the properties do get it really weird-style, and the wording concerns means DIS is either incredibly easy to achieve (if the implement in your off-hand makes your hex weapon count as an implement for the enhancement bonus add), or impossible (if the implement in your off-hand is an implement and the hex weapon in your main hand is just a weapon and not a weapon implement).

OneThousandMonkeys posted:

I really loving hate all warlocks anyway, their mechanics are always grossly over-complicated and by the end of making one I'm always like "Why didn't I just make a wizard or a sorcerer?"

Because nothing says Fun like popping a minion and Rod of Corruptioning a room, then action-pointing Cursegrind and just laaaughing. Also nothing says "crash MapTool" like having a macro for this.

# ¿ Mar 19, 2014 22:39

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

Another dumb fact about Hexblades: You can get Shadow Walk, but you have to multiclass into Assassin first.

# ¿ Mar 19, 2014 22:45

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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OmanyteJackson posted:

So I kinda working on a Class and I'd like some feedback.
Not sure where to post it, because the old home-brew thread is dead,

because 4e is dead.

Post it here! This is the thread for 4e stuff, so you're home now.

# ¿ Apr 19, 2014 08:02

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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And, added bonus, since you've got a player using the Battlemind as opposed to BEING that player, you won't have to worry about the psionic problem in general and the battlemind problem specifically that once they've picked their two good at-wills, they're effectively out of power selection beyond dailies.

# ¿ May 9, 2014 16:26

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On the other hand, missing wastes your turn on most things short of Dailies (in which case, golly, you just downgraded a great power to an encounter power impact-wise). The extra +2 or whatever to your secondary stat (with maybe another +1/2 to a tertiary stat) is going to help with the riders on your powers (which hit less often with a lower attack stat) and the automatic damage/effect stuff from your, for example, defender features (which over a battle still won't add up to the damage you'd have gotten from hitting with one attack, unless you're the world's first dagger-and-buckler Fighter).

It's not necessarily that having a lower primary stat is a huge boner-killer or anything; it's just that the trade-off isn't getting you anything that outweighs what you're losing. A miss is a miss is a miss is a miss, and working around it by having your team flank the enemy or defensively debuff them (because otherwise they weren't going to do that...?) is like saying it's okay for your leader to never use their heal features because potions exist. And if you were thinking tactically you wouldn't be taking damage anyway, would you.

# ¿ May 20, 2014 23:13

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killstealing posted:

My WF Avenger had a main stat of 16 at 1 because the DM rolled stats and I got hosed (at least I had alright con and str...?) so am I hosed or can I compensate with the whole double-roll thing?

You might not be mechanically boned as badly (on account of Avengers getting two attack rolls against their Oath target) but the fact that your DM rolled stats (and down the line, it sounds like? or didn't let you assign?) puts you in the hosed place for different reasons.

# ¿ May 21, 2014 00:26

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Herr Tog posted:

Hey. I wanna make an invoker who swings a sword around and throws holy bolts of holy fury while preaching.

any tips on how to accomplish this?

Make a Preserver Invoker (Wis primary, Int secondary), take the Blade Initiate (swordmage multiclass) feat. Having Int as your secondary stat means you should have the prereq for Blade Initiate already. Done! Congrats, you now use swords as implements, and just by being an Invoker you're preaching while throwing holy bolts of holy fury.
"Preserver" is a bit of a misnomer, too---you smite poo poo just fine by being you.

# ¿ Jul 11, 2014 07:49

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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Scavanna posted:

I only ever played AD&D2e, is there any way of needlessly complicating 4e for my own smug satisfaction as DM?

Replace skills with non-weapon proficiencies and say anything that gives you a +1 to a skill gives you like, +3% or +5% to it. Boom, now you're already using a whole different kinda die.

Also if you want you could probably repurpose like bash door % / carry weight and stuff from the old ability score tables and charts. Which could get hilarious at epic tier when a fighter is riding on high-20s Strength. In fact: please do this.

# ¿ Aug 9, 2014 21:55

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

If he wants to take more Skill Powers as feats, just let him---most of them are just utility powers or the kind of stuff a better skill system would let you do anyway. Or let him trade out utility powers, there's no real harm in it, since for a ton of classes their specific benefits from utility powers have more combat impact than given skill powers, and outside of combat's already so ill-supported by the rules that it never hurts to have more options.
The LAST thing I'd suggest is letting someone replace attack powers with skill powers, because burning out the (already limited) number of attack options a character has in favor of giving them more utility/edge case bonus options is just going to lead to a player getting bored when they run out of all their "good" attacks that much sooner.

# ¿ Sep 16, 2014 06:32

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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The assassin also suffers from lacking feat support, not just in terms of lots of feats, but in terms of good feats.

Like, consider. At Paragon, any Warlock's going to take Twofold Pact, which lets you curse two enemies/turn. The closest comparison for the Assassin is Killer's Insight (a Heroic feat), which lets you put two shrouds on one guy...once per encounter. And then half their Paragon feats are dumb fiddly concealment poo poo or buffing racial powers for more "1/encounter, get something useful out of this feat" stuff.

If they either added shrouds to targets per attack, or could spend additional actions for more shrouds (hell, make it a feature called Studying the Target, letting you spend a minor for a shroud in addition to the free action 1/turn or a move for 2, then bump those numbers up by one at either Paragon or Epic or with a feat or something), and suddenly they'd start looking a lot more competitive.

And all that, without having to rely on the most disingenuously Charoppy interpretation of the relatively straightforward language of

quote:

If you invoke your shrouds, the attack deals 1d6 damage per shroud, minus one shroud if the attack misses, and all your shrouds then vanish from the target. This damage roll never benefits from bonuses to damage rolls, and is in addition to the attack�s damage, if any.

# ¿ Sep 18, 2014 17:07

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

Madmarker posted:

Firewind blade is the most busted thing. I swear whoever designed that item either was 1) An idiot or 2)A powergamer from hell.

As this conversation demonstrates, 1) = 2)

# ¿ Sep 18, 2014 22:04

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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I conclude Ferrinus is correct! Ten points to Hufflepuff.

For real though, RIP Assassins, your shrouds are gimmicky poo poo for RP Reasons and should be reskinned Hunter's Quarry dice.

# ¿ Sep 18, 2014 23:21

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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Prison Warden posted:

If you, mechanically, had to sum up what a class is good at in a few sentences (stuff like "sorcerers are good at area blast damage" and "fighters are good at keeping your opponents in one place" and "vampires are bad and such (hoho)), what would you write?

I'm thinking of just using 4e as a tactical combat engine, stripping out all flavor and such before houseruling a bunch of stuff.

Warlocks (original recipe) are good at: Dealing damage from medium/long-rage while imposing moderate status effect penalties and gaining moderate status bonuses.
Warlocks (hexblade) are good at: Dealing very consistent damage from short/melee range while gaining moderate status bonuses and occasionally imposing mild status effect penalties.
Monks are good at: Dealing moderate damage to one target or a cluster of targets in melee range, and repositioning themselves and enemies throughout combat.

As examples of the classes I've played the most, that spring to mind.

However! Our very own Jimbozig is doing something kinda-like-this, in his game, Strike! http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3656713 which owns.

# ¿ Sep 18, 2014 23:55

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

OneThousandMonkeys posted:

"Hmm your primary stat and your rider are now the same score? Seems fair and balanced"

The only people for whom that would be a relevant concern (that is, [W]-power users who aren't already Dex primary and have Dex rider builds) would be, what? Tempest and Brawler Fighters, and White Well Hexblades (because their pact weapon is light and their rider's Dex)?

Then again in the spirit of DTAS just saying "you can use your Dex for the attack roll on any light blade using weapon power; if that power would normally derive a secondary effect from your Dex mod, subtract 2 from the final bonus to that effect" would basically get you where you'd normally be mathematically anyway.

# ¿ Oct 27, 2014 08:09

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Mordiceius posted:

Are there any classes I can suggest that are used to using ranged weapons at melee range?

I have a player that keeps trying to turn his character into a character that uses crossbows. His first attempt was with a fighter, his second was with a rogue. I don't know what I should tell him.

Ranger has a build (Marauder, I think?) that's all about throwing weapons and then charging at guys, if throwing weapons count. Also, Sorcerer's really good for this if he doesn't mind reskinning spells as like, special Green Arrow variant crossbow bolts, because one of the first feats you can pick up is Sorcerous Blade Channeling, which lets you turn your ranged powers into melee attacks without drawing any penalties.

# ¿ Feb 22, 2015 21:54

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

Monks are definitely mislabeled controllers, but in the best way. Like being an epic tier Centered Breath monk with bard MC to take the feat where you can teleport anyone you would otherwise slide, and rearranging every fight to make a convenient 3x3 for everyone else's bursts and blasts. The best way.

# ¿ Feb 27, 2015 20:38

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Paolomania posted:

The most concise thought I ever heard from a friend was "when engaging in identity-play I don't like having my character reduced to combat mechanics." Although somewhat hypebolic, I think it captures the idea that, although 4E excelled at what it focused on, some people did not like that focus (arguments about 3.5 being a the best fit for some other purpose aside).

I think Attorney at Funk said it best in another thread, that the problem with 4e (that led to statements like the above) is that 4e is the first D&D to most transparently express the truth that's been present in all D&Ds prior: your character, as far an RPG rules set is concerned, is a collection of mechanics. When they're well-designed, or presented within a consistent system, it peels aware the layer of self-deception that lets a person think that roleplaying is something inherent to the sheet or system to begin with. Which understandably rustles some jimmies when you're a lot more used to, and comfortable with, being lied to.

# ¿ Mar 26, 2015 17:45

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JonBolds posted:

Okay, so, goofy gimmick 4th Edition classes. I remember the Vampire - but which others were that strange or approached being that strange? Warden was always weird because of the thing where you'd like, turn half into a mountain goat.

Assault Swordmage always feels like cheating --- your entire thing is hoping people gently caress off and run away so you can blink across the battlefield and stab them.
Fey Warlock, pre- the Slashing Wake nerf, was hilariously stupid in any fight with enough minions past level 11/12.
Centered Breath Monk with a Bard multiclass and the feat to let you turn any slide into a teleport became "hit a guy and reshuffle everything nearby into a handy 3x3 killing box for your team".

Teleports: Never not fun.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2015 21:35

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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alcharagia posted:

Here's a question that actually applies to reality: what are the weaknesses of the Psion class?

The most effective way to play them, like the other power-point-using classes, is to pick two or three powers ever to spam the hell out of while burning all your power points. Plus the lack of actual-encounter-powers means your decent area abilities (which controllers should be known for) are either shifted to dailies, or generally anemic compared to other classes in your role.

For Psion, at least one of those "take and keep forever"s is at level 1 (Dishearten, I think?) and will also make your DM want to smack you for debuffing his monster's accuracy straight to hell.

# ¿ Nov 28, 2015 06:33

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thespaceinvader posted:

Nah, if they thought that they would have done it two years ago.

Probably the IT guy is being let go in the xmas layoffs and they won't be able to keep it running any more.

Yeah, it's probably the same thing with how they just shuttered the forums because any resource cost is > no resource cost

# ¿ Dec 13, 2015 18:58

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Free Triangle posted:

We're starting up a new game of D&D but my DM won't do 4e unless I can find a free fill-able character sheet, apparently WOTC requires a sub, and I don't want to pay the $30 for hero lab.

The first Google search result for "4e character sheet fillable PDF" yields this gem: https://www.theagencystar.com/.../Interactive_DnD_4.0_Character_Sheet.pdf

# ¿ Jan 13, 2016 03:33

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spectralent posted:

I may actually be playing 4e again soon, and for campaign reasons the character would make most sense as a Drow. What classes match up well to them, particularly ones with a mystical/eldritch feel?

Warlock's got you covered right out of the gate, and even has a kinda-more-drow-than-other-folks flavored pact option in the FR book to boot!

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 22:43

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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And even then, a bunch of the FR drow pact is great for nocturnal ruins-folk. It's even called the Dark Pact!

If you wanted ruins-as-in-lost-empires folk, you could also go with my personal favorite, the Sorcerer-King Pact from the Dark Sun setting book. One of the paragon tier powers lets you Ka-Li-Ma fuckers straight outta Indy.

# ¿ Feb 16, 2016 02:55

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spectralent posted:

The issue is Exalted 3e has provided us with a case study in what happens when you try and make everything as involved as combat.

The rules definitely aren't the thing Ex3 is a case study in.

# ¿ Feb 26, 2016 14:24

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
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If it's a smaller fire elemental, it could be subdued by clapping a jar over it and only poking teeeeny tiny holes in the lid. But maybe that's torture.

# ¿ Mar 15, 2016 22:39

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Yukari posted:

Is that literally it? I was somewhat hoping for a more universal way, since I'm using a heavy blade as a weaponment, don't really have the option of holding a staff.

The Shimmering affix for Cloth armor gives you "Property: You do not provoke opportunity attacks when you make ranged or area attacks." which would get it done if you don't mind wearing cloth.

# ¿ Apr 15, 2016 18:17

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pookel posted:

Sorry to just jump into the thread, but ...

I've played D&D a bit here and there since 1e as a kid. I was a big fan of 2e, didn't mind 3e and 3.5, and am now in a 4e campaign with a group of Millennials who mostly haven't played anything before 3.5, if they've played at all.

I kind of feel like a jerk for complaining, but the current DM - we've been rotating every few levels - absolutely insists that he doesn't want to "cheat" on the dice rolls and treating the whole thing as him vs. us. So he complains when he misses, complains when we hit him, and whines about the party being too strong and how it's no fun for him.

Am I crazy to say he's going about this all wrong? I keep telling him to fudge the numbers and he huffs about how he wants to be "honest." I'm at wits' end.

If he's the DM and he thinks the party's too strong (and is complaining about it and viewing it as him v you), I'm honestly a little impressed at his restraint in not throwing unfairly hard encounters at y'all to "even things out."

You can try asking him WHY he feels you guys are too strong---are fights resolving too quickly for his monsters to wear people down? Are you just getting really lucky hits in? Is the adventuring day not long enough to encourage pacing out daily powers? Is he building the monsters based on bad math / using them from pre-MM3 (where the math is wonky and sometimes things are unfairly hard and sometimes you're fighting pinatas made of damp tissue paper). It might all be his perception, but if it is, just walking through that kinda "find and fix" conversation might be all it takes to get him thinking that no, it's all in his head.

Or maybe he does suck. Only time will tell.

# ¿ Apr 17, 2016 04:56

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Another thing to keep in mind with the monk's player's quarterbacking is that even if his character is in another room entirely, having the player who's best at tactics lending a hand at the meta level with other people does a decent job of simulating how seasoned adventurers would be behaving (since if they're alive for any length of time and working together, the whole group of characters-not-players probably have a decent grasp on how to comport themselves in fights). Like, maybe the rogue's yelling HELP HELP OWW OWW HURRY and the healer knows/decides that's code for "drop everything to go keep the rogue alive, sounds like he's in a bunch of trouble."

Now, if the rest of the table just wants to do them and not hear tactics dictated to them, that's another conversation, but if it's more your concerns of realism, then...isn't it more realistic that competent adventurers know what to do to keep on adventuring, together?

# ¿ Apr 18, 2016 17:06

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kaynorr posted:

I'd like some help brainstorming about solos.

I'm running War of the Burning Sky for some brave goons and as others have mentioned, the solos in that are pretty much complete poo poo. I know that at a baseline, all solos should generally have

A way of resisting action denial, either having extra actions or throwing off status effects.

Some sort of additional twist when they hit bloodied

The second one seems easier than the first - I'd love to solicit some additional ideas for keeping the action economy intact so I can sprinkle them across the solo encounters. Right now I've got:

Superior Will, same as the player version

Close Burst damage or teleport on a daze/stun as an immediate interrupt

Immune to daze/stun unless first hit by radiant/fire/etc.

Reflect dominate, or dominate someone else in response to being dominated

I'm curious how many of my players will chime in, knowing exactly what they are in for.

Depending on the flavor of the monsters, you could do something like:

Focused Fury - When this creature only takes one action during their round, roll any related attack rolls from that action twice, keeping the better result.
Untethered Will - When this creature is dominated, create a (dazed?) minion with access to its basic abilities and its attack/defense stats in an adjacent square, with initiative that acts immediately before the creature.
Enervating Presence - Whenever this creature is stunned, it gains an aura that slows all creatures within X squares and deals damage to anyone starting or ending their turn in the aura.
Always Moving - Whenever this creature hits with an attack, it can shift X squares as a free action.

Any of these will help with some of this stuff, whether it's making dazed attacks more likely to hit, giving you something to do even if it's dominated, discouraging dogpiles on stuns, or letting you circumvent some movement limitations. Basically the things you want to think of are "how can I let my players use the attacks they want, and how do I make the combat still feel like it's escalating instead of slowing down when they compromise my sole combatant?"

# ¿ Apr 18, 2016 18:20

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fatherdog posted:

I don't know if this is in the book or a specific innovation of the DM I had that used it, but one mechanic I saw a lot with solos in the last high-level campaign I was in was the ability to shrug off daze/dominates and if they WEREN'T shrugging off a daze/dominate, to use a particularly nasty special attack. So they still got full actions on turns they were dominated or dazed or stunned, but there was still incentive to try to apply those statuses because on turns they weren't dominated or dazed or stunned they got full actions AND a special attack.

That sounds like it would be fun to play against for about half of one fight, and like DM-punching agony to face multiple times.

"So get this guys...it can ignore your status effects, but if you don't use your now-neutered powers on it, it gets a free extra strong attack!" *everyone wonders what they did to make Gary this upset*

# ¿ Apr 18, 2016 23:16

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No Luck Needed posted:

not everyone wants to optimize, definition: make the best or most effective use of (a situation, opportunity, or resource)

my PCs enjoy roleplaying more, definition: the acting out or performance of a particular role, either consciously (as a technique in psychotherapy or training) or unconsciously, in accordance with the perceived expectations of society with regard to a person's behavior in a particular context.

Cliffs Notes are optimized, picking up and reading a 5 lb. Norton Shakespeare is not

"Optimized stats" vs "roleplaying" is a false dichotomy. One of them is how the dice and mechanisms of their interactions with game systems work to adjudicate the success or failure of a pursuit. The other is how you choose to act and pursue your goals in the first place. Your roleplaying decisions aren't informed by Beep Boop, This Is What Is Best Number, and your numerical decisions shouldn't be pre-decided in order to nudge the dice towards RPing failure. If that's how you want to roll, an actually well-designed system like 4e may not be for you.

A wizard moving between the enemy and a low-HP fighter because the player thinks the character should protect his friend may be Strategically suboptimal, but it's a roleplaying decision. A wizard picking an 11 Int and 18 Con, then wearing full plate and jumping in between the fighter and an enemy in every fight? At that point you're someone slapping a soccer ball at midfield and saying today you're RPing the goalie.

quote:

One of my players works at a factory and ever few weeks has a different set of days off. That doesn't always line up with the PC that has children. I probably have the easiest schedule only working 45-50 hours a week. We are not in high school anymore and can't meet up 3 times a week for 7 hour game sessions. We meet once a week for 3 hours. I do not think I have a problem with people skipping games, I think we all have the problem of not have as much free time as when we started these hobbies.

Then at that point you shouldn't be punishing people for being busy! When they show up later to play someone noticeably weaker than other people who showed up every week, they are being punished in game for behavior outside of it. You should not make hobbies an obligation or chore for your friends.

# ¿ Jun 2, 2016 23:04

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

No Luck Needed posted:

oh D&D is fair now? All classes all balanced? People only have so much free time and playing games is part of that. Why is it so hard to have different levels in 4e? Why can't players be in different tiers? Do players each have to a roll like leader/striker/controller or could players just have fun playing and figure out what role works best for them?

Fairer; better balanced, or at least attempts are actual made; different levels don't work well with the assumed math for the game; different tiers exacerbate this, plus getting into Paragon tier gives you a bunch of stuff right away that further widens the ability gap between say a 9th and 11th level pair. You can play whatever roles you want and indeed there is a wealth of advice available out there for how to make, say, a party of all strikers, or no defender or leader, or whatever, work. And mostly they work, because: game is fairer and better balanced than it has been historically.

quote:

Have you ever played a session without combat? I know I have as a player and as a DM. No swinging swords, no tossing arcane energy around, no rolling to get past traps. Just good old roleplaying. No? The only way to play 4e is a combat slog? Sorry I shat up your 4e thread then.

I played in the same weekly campaign for the entirety of the edition and we had weeks at a time of no combat, your argument is bad and false and you should reconsider what it says about the strength of your position that you felt it necessary to deploy such bullshit.

quote:

All I wanted to do today was 1) comment that someone had a good idea that I am going to steal
2) that level 5 elite monsters can be a challenge to level 8+ PCs
3) that my PCs earning their rewards is more important then keeping them all even and artificially balanced

I do not think I can find any fantasy example of an adventuring party being all the same level. One of my favorite D&D books is Against the Giants, and a lowly village boy has to travel to the big city to recruit adventures. And the adventures he ends up with are mixed bag from seasoned veterans to green peas. Think Drizzt and Wulfgar are the same level? Think that Aragorn and Fordo are the same level? Sometimes having that differences in level is what can make an adventuring exciting. Sure the level 10 might to the heavy lifting on the boss, but a level 8 can still take out minions, help flank, heal, aid other, or so many more options than swing a sword. Ok so I understand that the low level guy doesn't have as high as an attack value, but if rolling to hit is all 4e is about, then I suppose you are right and this is not the game for me.

Rolling to hit is not "all 4e is about," but engaging with a system on its merits (here, tight combat math and attempts at character balance) is one of many valid reasons to play within that system. If it doesn't fit for you, it is no moral failing on your part to concede and move on to a better fit for you and your group. Not everyone has to like everything, and not everything works for everyone.

If you're interested in emulating narrative fiction, consider game systems built around doing that; I'd say Dungeon World (but it still has some DNDisms baked in), maybe try FATE or Savage Worlds?
If you're interested in wild power disparities and people having to fight the system itself to accomplish tasks, try Hackmaster---it does that on purpose!
You can play many things in many ways. Playing 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons and ignoring the system's mechanical assumptions is one of those ways, but not one you will probably be able to get a lot of advice about.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2016 01:54

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

No Luck Needed posted:

Dude read my last post, where I offered you sincere advice.

Actually, after reading to the end of your post: gently caress your earn-your-fun friend-punishing bullshit attitude. Disregard any good faith advice people have given you in this thread, because it is pearls before swine. Anyone who has fun at your table is doing so through no doing of your own, and deserves better than you could ever give them. Why even are you.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2016 03:12

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

UrbanLabyrinth posted:

I think we established that it's latte art and laneway graffiti.

On-topic, what do people think is the best level window for 4E? 1st is a bit boring (not enough options/things to do), and epic always seems too far in the other direction to me (although if you've played the first 20 levels it's less of an issue, since everyone knows how their characters work already).

1st is good for a "training wheels" kind of session (call it a flashback if you need to and bump the second session up a ways), then either 7/9 (so you're rocking your full count of encounter/daily powers) through 16th-ish is pretty great. 17th-20th doesn't REALLY get you that much (other than your capstone power for your Paragon Path), but running like...9-16 in general gives you a decent power escalation (since you go pre-PP into getting all the passives and 2/3 of the powers from it), plus your encounters and dailies start to get into that range where a lot of your options are "like the lower-level version of it that you can directly replace at this level, but with another die or two."

# ¿ Jun 3, 2016 13:45

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

ImpactVector posted:

Alignment has been meaningless in every edition of D&D except where it's also been a dumb mechanic. There's very little a player can do with the knowledge of an NPC's alignment because the different alignments are so open to interpretation.

Also, 4e has basically no mechanics tied to alignment for that reason---knowing that this bandit is Unaligned while THAT bandit is Evil doesn't make your Paladin any less able to use powers named ____ Smite on one or the other. And nothing of value was lost.

# ¿ Jun 9, 2016 02:46

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 15:35

Chernobyl Peace Prize: May 7, 2007; Or later, later's fine.
But now would be good.

Kurieg posted:

That's kind of the pitfall of ocupation as class. The idea that NPCs need to interact with the world the same way players do.

On another note: I was talking with a friend about bladesingers, and we decided that probably the best thing they could have done, given the design space they had (I.E. it can't be a paragon path or a theme, and it has to fit into the essentials framework) would've been to make it a Mage School.

Bladesinger as the Essentials Swordmage would be kinda interesting. Wider-area defender aura, basic attacks with some reach / shifting, then give them some actual dailies maybe.

# ¿ Aug 28, 2016 04:22

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition: Looks like we're the grognards, now.

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