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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 6:36PM
#271
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Date Joined:
Aug 18, 2007
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I think the difficulty is acceptable, I think as people have said though more damage less "control" would be a good thing and would make the tension higher. Being hit for peanuts while stunned doesn't make me tense, it makes me annoyed that I have to wait forever for my turn to come, being hit for 1/3 of my hp per hit makes me tense.
This is it. Stunned etc is frustrating not tense.
It is the frequency of authors using such monsters to build nominally challenging encounters that was a major concern back in the original thread where this started.
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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 6:47PM
#272
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Date Joined:
Aug 18, 2007
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The admins are always looking for "new blood" (Pieter's words).
You know I hear this said often, but the fact is enquiries are met with silence or "sorry already allocated all our mods for this year" in my experience. So sure they want new blood, but the fact is they don't have the module allocations available, and the desire to have a campaign arc work for the region means they are planning in advance and allocating in advance to known authors.
4 mods a year for a region simply isn't enough to really embrace new authors, so (aside from the silence) I don't blame the WD's or admin for this.
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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 8:47PM
#273
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Date Joined:
Apr 11, 2008
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Please remember to use spoiler sblocks, folks! Lots of DALE1-7 stuff that those of us not yet playing it must be careful with.
On the other hand, I tremble to think how the guys I nearly TPKed in East 1-1 do in these kinds of mods.
EAST1-1:
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That one has a lot of damage potential and can cause parties to lose track of what they should do. A party that divides up their damage and gets lost with movement without purpose can really get hammered. It can be a very hard adventure. Also, it is the kind where DMs can run aspects of the combat wrong and really hammer a group. I played it online once and had to be afk (as I had said I would at that time) and came back to a near TPK. It was rough because my invoker would have made a big difference, plus they failed the last part which a ritual would have assured. And, to add insult, the final combat had been run incorrectly. So it goes, sometimes. Even run correctly, it can be tough due to tactics and, always, the dice.
I was one of the other players in that EAST 1-1 game. I still remember it, which leaves something to be said for it. At least it makes an impact. I'll never forget now that you can choose to knock a PC unconscious with an attack just as easily as a monster. 
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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 10:44PM
#274
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- Senior Volunteer Community Lead
Date Joined:
Aug 19, 2007
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I'm going to go ahead and add Umber Hulks on my list of not fun. In the hands of an overly nice DM, maybe, but in the hands of a more brutal DM they can be a lot of frustration without a lot of return.
Keith Richmond
Living Forgotten Realms Epic Writing Director
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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 10:45PM
#275
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- Dragon Slayer
- If only he would apply himself
- Dammit Jim, this is Star Trek, not D&D!
Date Joined:
Jan 31, 2006
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I played DALE1-6 Vesperin Initiative today and loved the challenge. DALE1-6 spoiler
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I am starting to see auras as trend towards difficulty that works. The monster doesn't have to hit, and the damage is meaningful as pressure.
I also thought Stun was great. Now, full disclosure, my PC was not stunned, but having three of us stunned (including striker and leader) meant we had a significant drop in damage for a round and the other two had to work hard to keep things going. On the round they came back, the striker was taken away for a round. This kept us from totally obliterating the combat (I rolled poorly and still did about 110 dmg each round, a bit more if I include the swarm AoE vulnerability). It was a four-round combat, with the battle being obviously in hand in the 4th round. It didn't take very long, despite the control. Our leader, for example, is a flying swordmage with a burst power, which he used when pushed and dazed. Our flexibility meant we could do a lot. Plus, our cleric and striker roared into action with serious damage (and healing from the cleric) once they came online. The warlord added a number of options and bonuses and had a fair amount in reserve. I suspect we could have had more challenge and still be fine, but it was absolutely great as it was.
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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 11:00PM
#276
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By the time you get to paragon tier, you can start getting some solid expectations of adventures. If you like CORM 1-1, 1-2, 1-3....you'll probably like CORM 1-6. If you liked the low level EAST mods...etc.
And if you like DKay mods, you'll probably keep liking the higher ones. If you didn't...you can just avoid playing the future ones.
And you can always ask on the forums. I think if you read the forums here enough, you can get a sense of who thinks what, so if you hear certain things from certain people, that can also give you decent expectations.
Again, LFR varies, some adventures will be harder than others. For P1 for those looking for the less challenging adventures, I'd recommend AGLA 1-6, MOON 1-6, and EAST 1-6. The more challenging adventures are probably WATE 1-6, DALE 1-6, and definitely SPEC 1-3 P1 (which is almost definitely the hardest adventure to date.)
I do want to remind people of power creep as well. When IMPI 1-3 first came out, it was terrifying. A year later, the additional options/splat out there made it significantly less so for the average party (though its still pretty tough.) I think a year from now, players will have less trouble with SPEC 1-3 P1, both due to greater optimization from more options, and from players being more experienced with the game to have better builds/better tactics.
I'm also guessing that MM3 will have tougher monsters than MM 1/2. (I think for the most part MM2 critters are tougher than MM1, especially in terms of paragon damage output.) So I think the adventure difficulties should creep too, but we'll see how that is relative to PCs.
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3 years ago ::
Jan 15, 2010 - 11:05PM
#277
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I am not whining about a Special being too hard; I thought the combats were poorly designed. I have played it one time and have seen it run three times. Of those four times, there was a TPK in the second encouter three times, including mine. The successful party had heavy radient damage and played before their characters got nerfed in the November and December updates. The dead parties did their best with what they had, but the combat enounter did not offer enough ways to succeed beyond bringing the "right" characters.
I'm going to severely disagree here. The combats all have monsters that synergize well together combined with terrain advantageous to themselves, often elegantly so. It was difficult for these reasons. I think you're arguing that it was too hard, which is a much more valid statement.
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3 years ago ::
Jan 16, 2010 - 4:29AM
#278
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I admit...I only read several pages of this thread as it is 6 am and I havent slept in two days, but that being said, I figured I'd weigh in with a mostly impartial opinion.
I will point out I don't know Dave (I dont think), I dont have a sister and I apologize now if my opinion offends anyone lol. I appreciate all the work people put into the mods they write. That being said, just because someone worked hard, it doesn't mean everyone is going to love everything they produce. Reminds me of this ugly woman I know...had ugly kids....but I digress.
I have DM'd a TPK one time in heroic (forgot the mod lol, lots of rats involved) which ended up being the party's fault and the tactics they used. It is one of only 2 that I have seen in heroic. The other was Luru 1-6 and I chalk up to poor party composition. No healer = a long day.
I have only played one LFR mod in paragon. However, it was Core 1-11 lol. We had a great party, we had a great DM, we had a mediocre time. We had 2 strikers, a controller, a leader and a defender. I won't go into too many details (as I've yet to figure out the spolier function) but 3/5 players did indeed have the RPGA cards suggested and they used every one of them. One striker died flat out (but was a double crit right after getting bloodied, not really the mods fault) and a couple others fell. I think at the end, we had the defender, leader and a controller still standing.
There really was no point in telling all that other than to point out my basis of my opinion.
I like LFR. I primarily play LFR like 97% of the time. I won't list my likes as they aren't beneficial to this discussion, but I will point out the things I've disliked. Maybe someone is listening!
1. Condition upon condition upon condition. This is not fun. Multiattack stuns added in with other condition dropping monsters is not fun. Conditions + recharges + etc. I fully understand play varies by table/group/DM etc but at the same time, some general things carry over.
2. Multiple solos in a row. These generally turn into grinds. Multiple grinds are not that fun. It's always cool trying to figure out your initial tactics, but after the newness wears off...it IS a grind.
Other than these things, I've been fairly happy overall.
The only suggestions I have would be:
1. Wider variety of monsters over a solo with 1000 HP. Gives others something to focus on and doesn't turn into rounds of speed rolling at wills trying to win a war of attricion (sp?).
2. Give minions a little more punch and toss some extras in. They go down when hit, but you would at least have a threat from them as opposed to "ah ignore the minions for now...".
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3 years ago ::
Jan 16, 2010 - 6:44AM
#279
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Date Joined:
May 29, 2004
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The admins are always looking for "new blood" (Pieter's words).
You know I hear this said often, but the fact is enquiries are met with silence or "sorry already allocated all our mods for this year" in my experience. So sure they want new blood, but the fact is they don't have the module allocations available, and the desire to have a campaign arc work for the region means they are planning in advance and allocating in advance to known authors.
4 mods a year for a region simply isn't enough to really embrace new authors, so (aside from the silence) I don't blame the WD's or admin for this.
Perhaps you aren't talking to the right people? I know that in the past three months, I have (in sequence) turned an opportunity to write down based on the required completion timeframe, asked to brainstorm a proposal for a different adventure, and been solicited for one adventure proposal based on my previous expression of interest to the writing director. While I'm not exactly "new blood" as far as the RPGA is concerned, I've never written for LFR and never written under the supervision of the people I'm currently talking to, so I'm not sure why they wouldn't have the same response to other people who submit a proposal using the established guidelines.
John du Bois
Living Forgotten Realms Writing Director, Netheril story area
Follow me on The Twitter: @JohnduBois
Follow my presence on The Intertubes: johncdubois.wordpress.com
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3 years ago ::
Jan 16, 2010 - 10:01AM
#280
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Date Joined:
Aug 19, 2007
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Perhaps you aren't talking to the right people?
I've seen the silence too, both to offers to write and offers to run playtests. And I ain't even a noob - I've written 4 non-LFR RPGA adventures in my day, and even playtested a LG mod for Mr. Merwin once.
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