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May 29, 2012 -- 6:38PM, greatfrito wrote:

"The Kobold hits you, and deals *rolls* 12.5 gold of damage."

Ouch!

Hey guys, I'm down into electrum.  Another hit and I'll be in debt! 

May 29, 2012 -- 6:44PM, greatfrito wrote:

Roll a Loan Save!

Edit: Just in case anyone was wondering, I did actually look it up to make an accurate Kobold-damaging-your-money joke.  At level 3, someone with the Healer theme will heal 8 hit points per 25 gold (crafted healing potions).  So, at and beyond level 3, hp are generally worth ~3.125 gold each.

It's funny because it's true!

May 29, 2012 -- 12:31PM, Soulliard wrote:

HP = GP
Every edition of D&D except 4e has suffered from out-of-combat healing becoming meaningless after the first few levels. There's nothing stopping players from buying a barrel full of healing potions, and healing to full after each and every combat. Once healing potions become cheap enough, hp is no longer a daily resource.

The DM and RP can stop this from happening.  Where do you buy potions in the middle of the wilderness anyway? 

Tracking Spell Durations
Tracking the duration of each spell in effect is just one more thing that slows down combat. 1 minute is usually long enough to last for an entire encounter, so why not just make it explicitly last for the whole encounter and do away with some bookkeeping?

Yeah, this is certainly annoying.

Complex Areas of Effect
Next is supposedly a miniatures-optional game. I like my toys, but I can respect this decision. But if that's the case, why are some of the areas of effect so complicated? Without minis, it's difficult enough to determine what is targetted by a square blast or burst. It's even harder to determine what would be targetted by a cone or cylinder.

We didn't start using a mat and minis until 3.5 was almost over.  I have never needed a board to tell me what a cone or line or column or whatever would look like.  Personal issue, I guess.

Spell Effects Based on HP Remaining
Some spells, such as sleep, are stronger if the target has few hp remaining. Determining if the targets fall under that hp threshold is only possible through heavy metagaming. There's no internal logic behind this mechanic (lost hp doesn't weaken a character in any other way), so all it does is break immersion when the player asks which enemies have low enough hp and need to make a save. If a spell effect is too powerful, there are other ways to balance it. Make it higher level, or easier to save against, for example.

This I don't understand.  There's no need to metagame.  The player isn't supposed to know when the baddy is under that threshold.  It's part of the game.  It adds risk to casting that particular spell because the reward can be great.  I understand that a lot of people like yourself don't appreciate that sort of 'balancing' technique but that's a wholly different argument.  There's no metagaming required and there's no DM responsibility to communicate the HP total the baddy is at. 

HP Rolls
Rolling for hp is the most important roll you will ever make for a character, unless they reintroduce save-or-die spells (which would be another item for this list). The results of that roll will stay with the character forever, punishing or rewarding a player for the results of a single random die roll. The die roll doesn't even represent anything in particular, and there's no way to influence it. There's no reason for this important stat to be randomly-generated.

I'm sort of torn on this one.  I mean, I like the randomosity HP rolls bring.  Then again, I don't play heroes - I play people.  That said, it's pretty impossible to argue your point.  HP is the most important roll a player will make.  So why make it?  I say 'cuz it's fun' but that's ... well, it's not enough, is it?  What we used to do was allow people to roll who chose to but also allow those that didn't to take the average.  Seemed to work ok.  But yeah, the only reason to make this roll random is 'fun' and since it's not fun for everyone, well, it's not a good enough reason to make it the way things are done.

May 29, 2012 -- 12:31PM, Soulliard wrote:

Vancian Spellcasting
I can understand wanting to make spells a daily resource once again. But why return to Vancian, one of the most unnecesarilly complex spellcasting systems? You could accomplish the same thing with Spell Points or Spellcasting Checks, without having to spend 20 minutes after each rest for the spellcasters to select their spells for the day. Vancian spellcasting is slow and restrictive, and it bogs down the game for everyone.

I was sort of glad when I knew 4th edition would not use vancian magig. After seeing what wizards was in 4th edition I wanted vancian again. And there are just a loats of people that wish for it. One of the main objectives of dnd next is to make all the grognard and the ones who did not play 4th play again, so they could not avoid vancian. Yet I belive with time and with future playtest we will see option for less vancian spellcasters or completely vancian spellcasters. I belive thise week rule of three said something about it.

HP = GP
Every edition of D&D except 4e has suffered from out-of-combat healing becoming meaningless after the first few levels. There's nothing stopping players from buying a barrel full of healing potions, and healing to full after each and every combat. Once healing potions become cheap enough, hp is no longer a daily resource.

This is again a reason of many complaints against 4th edition. Martial healing made no sense for many people, so now they nerfed it. Yet non magical, natural, healing gives a loat of hp, and it's far easy to houserule. And sleeping gives back full hp... 

Tracking Spell Durations
Tracking the duration of each spell in effect is just one more thing that slows down combat. 1 minute is usually long enough to last for an entire encounter, so why not just make it explicitly last for the whole encounter and do away with some bookkeeping?[/qute]
Because i eoncounter lenth gave way too much mmorpg feeling. And that was again a big problem for 4th edition haters.

Complex Areas of Effect
Next is supposedly a miniatures-optional game. I like my toys, but I can respect this decision. But if that's the case, why are some of the areas of effect so complicated? Without minis, it's difficult enough to determine what is targetted by a square blast or burst. It's even harder to determine what would be targetted by a cone or cylinder.

Yet it helps those who play without grids and miniatures in my opinion. I mean, square shaped fireball? Really?

HP Rolls
Rolling for hp is the most important roll you will ever make for a character, unless they reintroduce save-or-die spells (which would be another item for this list). The results of that roll will stay with the character forever, punishing or rewarding a player for the results of a single random die roll. The die roll doesn't even represent anything in particular, and there's no way to influence it. There's no reason for this important stat to be randomly-generated.

Save or diie are beck. And I'm really happy about it (just to point that not everyone hates them).
But still you can not roll it. Just say you gain half your hit dice, or half that value. Playtest characters work that way.