I have not played the game or seen the full rules, but I still fail to see how that is the case...
Can you elaborate on how 4e will do the following?
1. How are the NPCs easier to create?
NPCs, unless you specifically want a PC-ish NPC, follow the same rules as monsters. That is, they don't have powers to track, they have few unique abilities, there are easy templates to use, and so on; they're much more modular than PCs.
2. Make the BBEG easier to stat out...
Since PCs in general have fewer powers known, fewer necessary items, and more uniform abilities, it will be as easy to stat out BBEGs as it is to stat PCs...if you want to go that route instead of using the monster rules.
3. What makes it easier to calculate the treasure?
That, I don't know
No. Please expound.
Are you using a digital system to do this? Does it require the online subscription?
Can it be done in 3 minutes offline?
Before the DDI was up and running, without any online stuff at all, one of the devs created an encounter during a podcast while, they were recording, with just the MM open.
It sounds like you just did....
Figuring EL involves messing with CR; calculating XP requires the tables. 4e monsters are much more standardized and have XP right in the stat blocks.
BTW, do the NPC's not get to choose their abilities and feats? Do they not to get to pick daily powers?
Do they not require stats? Are the pre-generated in the books?
Nope, nope, sorta, and sometimes. Again, NPCs don't follow the same rules as PCs. You might want to look at the "Humans as monsters" thread on the Monsters board, where some human NPC stats are up.
I highly doubt there'll be a sustainable splinter-culture of 3.5 development. Maybe a hiccup here and there, but nothing steady. 3.5 ain't gonna see a revival any more than 2e did. 4.x will grab you in one way or another, so I'd recommend making the switch on your own terms (with a +attitude and dignity) instead of kicking and screaming like I did in 2000. Don't do what I did. Catching up after a 5year hiatus suuucks.
Change. It ain't always good. But it always wins.
Besides, WOTC will have it debugged by, oh, say 4.3.
I am curious by what you mean? Someone else said 4e is a DM wet dream. I mostly DM, and I honestly don't see how 4e is good for me at all. It is a more complicated mechanics than 3.5e. It has each player with complicated and unusual mechanics (like the Ranger's DEX+DEX to hit with no DEX damage Careful Shot; inconsistent.)
That's not on your end but the players', and careful shot does add dex damage to damage (or at least, that's what the D&D xp character sheets provided by WotC said, and I'm inclined to believe them).
I think what you're missing is that there's a lot less to set up - monsters are much more self-contained and less hard to use. Their stat blocks are simpler and you don't need to worry about skill point distribution and the like. What you need to run a monster is less in this edition than it used to be, but more importantly, I think spellcasters are much easier to set up.
Also, from the monsters we've SEEN so far (I don't know if this always holds true) and the abilities we've seen so far, you have to worry a lot less about whether or not encounter X is going to be trivial or wipe the party like you do in 3.x. I have to run test encounters with some monstesrs to make sure in 3.x, but the monsters I've tested so far in 4th really ARE at the right level. Throwing 600 xp of monsters at the 6 level 1 PCs worked, pretty much regardless of the distribution.
As for balance, 4e may be more balanced (it isn't proved yet since Rangers i'd say are considerably more powerful than Wizards and Clerics for instance.) But 3.5e was not that badly balanced in my humble opinion. I know I may be a minority in that opinion. But from the groups I've seen the most powerful characters are the Bard, the Warmage and the Crusader not the Cleric or Druid.
Then you've never seen a well-played cleric or druid in terms of optimization; they're horrifically powerful. Druids in particular are game-breaking, particularly because of their "wild shape and full casting" stuff; you'd be amazed how many encounters are just completely circumventable with burrow speed.
1. How are the NPCs easier to create?
2. Make the BBEG easier to stat out...
These I can comment on. Right now, I'm working on an adventure which involves a lot of NPCs - shadowdancer/rogues, shadowdancer/rangers, shadowcasters of various specialities, shadowdancer/rogue/assassins, and shadowdancer/fighters. This takes ENORMOUS amounts of time to calculate; I have to figure out their saves, AC, ect. based on a huge variety of factors. 4e, from the description, streamlines it considerably as you have the setup for the roles - they'll do so much damage with such and such an attack roll, ect. Right now I have to spend ages tweaking these guys around so they will be a challenge for the fighter without stabbing down the wizard, but so that Mr. I memorize 12 fireballs a day can't just beat every encounter with a single well-placed fireball and let the other characters actually do something meaningful. It is a mess.
Besides, WOTC will have it debugged by, oh, say 4.3.
Well, they've gotten better at game balance, so I suspect that it will be more balanced out of the box than previous editions, much as the last four years or so of Magic blocks have been MUCH more balanced than their predecessors.
Careful Strike. As far as I remember, it is not 2x Dex to hit, but a plain +4 to hit. In that specific character, it ends up being the same, but I believe it was in a playtest report that a WizO said he was ****** off because Careful strike got changed from "roll two dice, choose the best" to "roll with +4". Also, it adds Dex to damage (1d10+4, in the DDXP example).
In any event, I would still like to know how you manage to handle 3.5 without keeping tabs on your players' powers, if that's indeed what you meant before.
Careful Strike was changed after DDXP in the official published character sheets. It used to be +10 vs AC for 1d10+4 damage. It is now +10 vs AC for 1d10 damage.
I know everything the character can do in 3.5e, since they have less abilities. I have the most trouble with the Crusader and the Trunamer (where both of their abilities are unusual and inconsistent.) I have no trouble understanding all the other characters (Cleric, Druid, Bard, Warmage, Rogue) where their abilities are simple and trivial to understand.
Keenath wrote:
But do you need to know that your Ranger is capable of "Careful Attack" to build an encounter? Does that ability, in fact, need to impinge on your consciousness in any way?
No, but I need to understand (intimately) each character's abilities to make sure they are applying them correctly. None of this has anything to do with me making the encounter. It only has to do with me preventing them from playing incorrectly (like casting fireball and dealing 99d6 damage.)
Careful Strike was changed after DDXP in the official published character sheets. It used to be +10 vs AC for 1d10+4 damage. It is now +10 vs AC for 1d10 damage.
So it has! Thanks for pointing it out. I guess they changed it for balance reasons? You trade damage for accuracy, kinda like Power Attack reversed.
I know everything the character can do in 3.5e, since they have less abilities. I have the most trouble with the Crusader and the Trunamer (where both of their abilities are unusual and inconsistent.) I have no trouble understanding all the other characters (Cleric, Druid, Bard, Warmage, Rogue) where their abilities are simple and trivial to understand.
I take it you don't use any splatbooks (other than ToB and ToM). My group uses the Spell Compendium, and that alone adds hundreds of spells. Then the "dedicated spellcasters" (the ones who always play spellcasters) always show up with new spells from new books they want to use. There is nothing of "simple and trivial to understand" on spellcasters, at least in my game.
No, but I need to understand (intimately) each character's abilities to make sure they are applying them correctly. None of this has anything to do with me making the encounter. It only has to do with me preventing them from playing incorrectly (like casting fireball and dealing 99d6 damage.)
Hmmm... I think now I'm beginning to understand your point. As I said, I kinda relate to that in the sense that I too like to know how each and every characters' powers work. But I tend to do that more to be able to help them out (like reminding absent-minded players that they have this and that abilities left to use) rather than keeping tabs on them.
At your specific example, I'd say that if one of my players suddenly threw around fireballs dealing 100+ points of damage I'd stop the action and catch the cheater. Other than that, I don't really care if a player really made that roll against DC 21, or if he winged it up a point because he thought a 20 wouldn't cut it.
Edit: @ Titanium Dragon
Double posted with a half-hour interval?! That's got to be a record! :P
Unless they made changes, the Corvette still sucks at gas mileage to be a viable car.
A friend just picked up a new Z06. He's getting 20/30mpg (cty/hwy), which averages is a shade better than my Jaguar, though I could seat 5 and have a bigger trunk.
Depending on your application, you could argue that a hyundai is too slow to be a viable car, or too - well many things.
Can you elaborate on how 4e will do the following?
1. How are the NPCs easier to create? 2. Make the BBEG easier to stat out...
Because you don't have to follow the PC rules. The DM is provided with a chart that gives you appropriate attack bonuses, damage outputs, HP totals, and so on, based on the cross-reference of level and role, and then adjusted for minion, elite, or solo work.
Nothing but PCs use the PCs' rules -- so a DM only has to decide what he wants the NPC to do, pull numbers in the appropriate range, and give them maybe a special ability or two. Stats don't really matter, and you don't roll dice to create them; all you care about is the end result numbers like total attack bonus and HP total.
Furthermore, each type of monster, including things like "orc" and "goblin", have several variants provided (such as "orc berserker" or "goblin shaman"), which operate differently in battle and have powers that support their role. A berserker isn't just an orc with two levels of barbarian; he's an orc who has been designed to fulfill a roll at a given level. These can be used as pregenerated NPCs, or modified to fill a slot. (For example, nobody'll notice if the royal guard are actually hobgoblin shieldbearers -- you can pull off darkvision or some other goblinoid elements if you really have to, of course.)
3. What makes it easier to calculate the treasure?
Shall I quote myself? "It sounds like they've been streamlined so you don't have to flip lots of pages to get them worked out." I don't really have details on it, just going by the last podcast.
No. Please expound.
Are you using a digital system to do this? Does it require the online subscription?
Can it be done in 3 minutes offline?
No online, just the index in the back of the monster manual.
Again, listen to a few of the podcasts, the most recent goes over this pretty thoroughly -- each monster has an XP value, and you essentially just get an XP pool for each encounter, based on the party level, and you try to get the XP of your encounter as close to that value as possible. And because of the way the math has been adjusted, it will all work out right when you do that (within reason, I don't think you can throw a dozen level 1 monsters at a level 7 party and expect much of a fight). You can go up or down a few levels and still have viable monsters, instead of them going stale (or TPK-worthy) within just a few levels, as it is in 3rd edition.
"You don't have to figure out ELs and calculate XP totals and all that garbage." It sounds like you just did....
But that's the nice thing: I can do most of this in my head or with a scratch pad. I don't have to use arcane CR-calculation rules about "two monsters of CR X are an encounter of CR X+2" or whatever it was -- I just know the party level, look up the desired XP total, and put together monsters of near the right level that add up to that value.
BTW, do the NPC's not get to choose their abilities and feats? Do they not to get to pick daily powers?
Monsters (of which NPCs are a special type) don't normally have daily as such -- they get "limited", which are per-encounter use, or "at-will", which are freely available. There's not much point in giving a vampire a daily power over here and an encounter-power over there, since they're essentially the same thing as far as combat is concerned.
Do they not require stats? Are the pre-generated in the books?
They don't require *as many* stats. Is it really valuable to know the exact wisdom score of a particular NPC? Or how much of his attack bonus is BAB and how much is Strength? NPCs and Monsters have the minimum number of values they need to operate, rather than a big list of derived values like they have in 3.x. This is back to that idea of making DMing more D&D and less Accounting & Actuaries.
Because you don't have to follow the PC rules. The DM is provided with a chart that gives you appropriate attack bonuses, damage outputs, HP totals, and so on, based on the cross-reference of level and role, and then adjusted for minion, elite, or solo work.
I was under the impression you could do pretty much the same thing by turning to the section of the 3E DMG which had stats for premade NPCs.
I'm both orderly and selfish. I act mostly for my own benefit, but I respect and help my community - Specially when it helps me. At best, I'm loyal and dedicated; at worst, I'm elitist and shrewd.
No, but I need to understand (intimately) each character's abilities to make sure they are applying them correctly. None of this has anything to do with me making the encounter. It only has to do with me preventing them from playing incorrectly (like casting fireball and dealing 99d6 damage.)
Really? Your BS alert doesn't go off if you see stupid numbers of dice on the table? You can't just say, "Sleep? Lemme see your charsheet, I don't recall how that works"? Or perhaps, "Prismatic Cloud? I don't know that one, let me read it real quick..."
You don't have to have all the powers memorized unless there's a reason to memorize it.
