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Jun 16, 2010 -- 10:57PM, Dreamdarwin wrote:

So far the Thri-kreen has been kicking but in my game, and loving it.  Not sure what the problem is...

The problem is twofold, I think:

One is that way too many of the Optimize Or Die crowd build characters that somehow exist in a world where the only possible measure of effectiveness is how they perform in isolation from the 4-5 other PCs they're presumably adventuring with. All the complaints about how lousy the Ranger supposedly is are a prime example. If play him like an Avenger, running out front and getting in the face of enemies, then yeah, it's not a great build. If you play him as a MEMBER OF A GROUP, waiting to hack on Marked targets, working for combat advantage, and effectively using the nice suite of buffs and debuffs available, he's a fine PC, fun to play with a modicum of strategy. The group of PCs hold up pretty well as a PARTY, and if the players talk to each other for 5 minutes and play them that way, they do fine and everyone has fun and feels effective. A character that appears to not be 'optimized' can do just fine if other members of your party can help fill those gaps, but don't tell that to these guys.

The other is that they're just missing the point of the exercise. The idea behind Encounters is to create a program where ANYONE can walk into the store, on ANY Wednesday, and pick up a PC, get 5 minutes of quick basic instruction, and play. Season 1 demonstarted to my satisfaction that the easiest way to do that was to use a fixed suite of characters. At the end of the day, if what they want is to make their own PCs and play a full-length game on a Friday, they're talking about something that's...  NOT ENCOUNTERS! Much of this griping (from people who knew exactly what the program involved going in) is akin to someone who buys a ticket to a baseball game and then spends the entire game complaining it isn't football, and that's why "it sucks".

-JC/MM

Fiendish:

Optimizing characters... that's particularly newbie friendly either.  Characters are supposed to be playable without being optimized, and these characters are definitely playable.

As for them not being optimized.... being mentored in the game has almost always been a part of D&D.  As a DM for the game I have at my table:

One player from last season who came halfway through... she's a teenager (I'd guess on the younger side of that range) and plays the Mul grappling fighter.  It's not as friendly a character for her as I'd like, but she chose and I'm trying as DM to support that with suggestions for actions that I would not give an experienced player.

One player who is clearly an experienced player that came for the dark sun preview aspect.  He's playing the thrikreen battlemind by preference, and his play clearly shows that in the hands of an experienced player the character as built is NOT gimped.

One player who didn't share his experience level playing Castri.  His first week was this past week.  He's got 4e down and plays the character well.  In the first session Castri was also played by an experienced player... again, the players showing that the character COULD be played well.  Doubtless a new player would have needed guidance... isn't that what the table (it's a social team game) and the DM (who carries responsibility for making the experience fun) are for?

One older player who is an experienced player from earlier editions but new to 4th (ie. target audience).  He's playing the tiefling psion and from all appearances having a blast.  His character, despite being a little unclear at times on the rules (he sits next to the player playing the Thrikreen, who has been modeling mentoring by offering suggestions to both the tiefling and the fighter).  While not a 4e player, he's been fairly effectively using his powers to help defeat the monsters, and with an eye to strategy.

Two players (I'm guessing bf-gf) who are experienced in 3e, but not 4th.  They are playing the brother sister team and the caring between them gets mirrored in their role playing, which makes it effective.  The ardent and the sorcerer are probably the easiest characters to provide guidance for for me as DM, and these players sit next to me, where I offer suggestions if the group doesn't have any.  I don't have to speak up much.

I don't think ModernMyths was saying that making good characters was only something non-team players do.  That's not what I heard at all.  I heard him say that the folks criticizing the characters are acting as if all characters should be playable solo and judged as individuals, when they are actually a team that can help each other.  Yes, Castri is squishy, which is why the psion used a power that made the ranger invisible to the enemy he had sidled up to... causing the beast to trigger an AoO rushing at a character it COULD see.  And allowing the striker to do his job, causing additional massive damage to the bug when it did.  The defenders did their job too.  And the ardent, appropritatly, used her powers to give them temp hit points to buffer the damage they took, and to heal them as necessary.  I hear people complaining about useless at-will powers, but I saw bull rush used very effectively last game. 

Do I think the characters are perfect?  No.  I think the characters are built differently than I would build them... AND THAT'S OKAY.  Because people build characters in different ways for different reasons.  And there isn't a right or only way to build a good character.

Jun 21, 2010 -- 1:48PM, Lucian_Ravenclaw wrote:

Koldoon, most of us are just pointing out that the characters are designed to fail.

Really... I thought I just said the character's played fine.  I suppose my thirty plus years of experience playing the game haven't adequately prepared me to make that judgement.

Jun 21, 2010 -- 1:48PM, Lucian_Ravenclaw wrote:

Castri was designed to be killed in encounter 1

I would agree the design of encounter 1 was suboptimal.  But you are assuming choices that you don't actually know.  The author is on the forums... why don't you just ask him if that was his intent?

Jun 21, 2010 -- 1:48PM, Lucian_Ravenclaw wrote:

Shakkir was stat'ed to be a Resiliant Battlemind, read the PH3, but they made it a Quick Battlemind. And failed to take any advantage of the high Wis.

Again, you are assuming that there's only one way to build a battlemind.  I didn't see that he played badly.  Indeed, I watched an experienced player excel in playing him and have fun.  Wasn't that piece... the fun... wasn't that the point?  Yes, I've read PH3, and it doesn't say that there is ONLY one way to build any character.

Jun 21, 2010 -- 1:48PM, Lucian_Ravenclaw wrote:

My worry is that the players will look at the characters and decide the game sucks. Add to that the overkill in the first few encounters, and you have a high probability to turning off most of the new players that the encounters program is meant to entice.

Really.  How will they know?  You are claiming that the characters are unplayable based on the encounters being overly difficult.  The game does not ASSUME optimized characters.  I'll be the first to agree the encounters were poorly thought out for the target audience (sorry Nick, that's my view).  But the problem there is not the characters.  It's the damage output of the encounters and a design that singles out a single character for punishment.  The characters are NOT optimized, but that doesn't make them bad.

Jun 21, 2010 -- 1:48PM, Lucian_Ravenclaw wrote:

Castri was designed to be killed in encounter 1

So how do you explain the 2 tables we ran here in Ottawa in which Castri lived? Does that mean the players played Castri wrong?