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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 8:44PM
#1
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Date Joined:
Jun 29, 2004
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I get up front with my opinion. I don't like Encounter Powers. They seem like an opportunity to add a lot to the game that was missed. Here's why.
1) Encounter powers are more or less better that at will powers, so you are going to use them every encounter regardless of the special effects they have since you can use them every encounter.
2) Since you use your encounter powers every encounter, you need to select them with the mindset that you will use them every encounter. This means that encounter powers that have high situational value need to be passed over for consistently useful ones if you are looking to make a "good" character. Which is a shamed because situational powers are often fun and would help create new strategic paths and more tactical options.
3) Because you are generally going to use every encounter power you have during every encounter your in anyway, the only tactical decision making to speak of when deciding to use your encounter values is if you will be able to set up a situation to milk the power in particular with the specifics of the encounter. You can't "do something different".
4) Daily powers may help break the repetitiveness of you power usage, but since they are more powerful they often "need" to be saved for "important" encounters rather then used when their situational value is high or during a long, but easy fight to add some variety.
My Solution?
Have a pool of encounter powers. Every time you select an encounter power, select two instead. When use you an encounter power, you choose between them. This would help solve the problem I have with the side effect of making PCs more powerful. So, you can raise encounter budgets if things get easy.
Your thoughts? Would you use this option if presented? Does it have some major problems that destroy the game?
Heavy Rocks
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 8:48PM
#2
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??
You've successfully summed up the point of encounter powers. This is exactly how they're intended to operate. You're not supposed to be picking powers you won't get a lot of use out of - that's what utility powers are, in part, for. I'm willing to entertain an argument that utility powers don't fulfill their purpose, but that's their problem, it's not an issue with encounters.
If you want a game with more "thinking outside the box", then as DM be more generous with enabling non-power actions by your players. You'll sacrifice some combat balance to gain some creativity and action, which is exactly what you seem to want.
Not sure I see your problem.
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 8:55PM
#3
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Date Joined:
Jun 29, 2004
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??
You've successfully summed up the point of encounter powers. This is exactly how they're intended to operate. You're not supposed to be picking powers you won't get a lot of use out of - that's what utility powers are, in part, for. I'm willing to entertain an argument that utility powers don't fulfill their purpose, but that's their problem, it's not an issue with encounters.
If you want a game with more "thinking outside the box", then as DM be more generous with enabling non-power actions by your players. You'll sacrifice some combat balance to gain some creativity and action, which is exactly what you seem to want.
Not sure I see your problem.
As you can clearly see, I understand the game and the nature of encounter powers. My problem is, the game isn't fulfilling my tactical sensibilities. Daily Powers are too limited in number and too focused "powerful" to be used situationally. Rather then inventing a new power type, I think changing the "point" of encounter powers will make the game more fun.
Handling it with "non-power actions" misses the point of this. The tactical decision making should be in the players hands, not subject to negotiation with the DM. It isn't about improv, its about improving actual gameplay.
Actually, many months ago I had a big discussion about improvised stunts using the environment because I thought page 42 was too limited for the same reason (puts decision in DM's hands, doesn't give the player a concrete sense about things).
Heavy Rocks
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 9:04PM
#4
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As you can clearly see, I understand the game and the nature of encounter powers. My problem is, the game isn't fulfilling my tactical sensibilities. Daily Powers are too limited in number and too focused "powerful" to be used situationally. Rather then inventing a new power type, I think changing the "point" of encounter powers will make the game more fun.
Handling it with "non-power actions" misses the point of this. The tactical decision making should be in the players hands, not subject to negotiation with the DM. It isn't about improv, its about improving actual gameplay.
Actually, many months ago I had a big discussion about improvised stunts using the environment because I thought page 42 was too limited for the same reason (puts decision in DM's hands, doesn't give the player a concrete sense about things).
I still don't get your problem. If you enjoy the rules-bound tactical gameplay then what's your issue? Players will pick encounter powers, monsters will act to avoid players getting optimum use from them, players will have to both pick powers that they'll get use out of and make tactical decisions to allow them to be used effectively.
Possibly you can give an example of exactly what isn't working for you?
I mean, look, I play a melee cleric in one game I'm in, around level 5. So just looking at his encounter powers, he's got only a couple of choices, and six rounds of combat, so he needs to choose when he's going to use those encounters (which rounds). He needs to choose who he's going to attack with them - Healing Strike, for instance, does some damage, so you'd want to hit the big guy, but if you miss you don't get the heal effect, so there's a trade-off between "easy to hit" and "guy I actually want to damage". And through all this he's got Righteous Brand, which is one of the biggest potential to-hit buffs in the early game, so your allies want you buffing up the strikers as often as possible. And all the time you're thinking, "Do I need to use my dailies or can we survive without them?" - because a lot of cleric dailies (Bless, Weapon of the Gods) are really only at maximum effectiveness if you use them early rather than late. And during all this I'm trying to get cover, trying to give flanking while avoiding flanking, staying in heal range of my buddies - there's a huge amount going on, tactically.
And then it gets even moreso at paragon tier. There's a lot more powers going on and monsters get more complex. I don't know if you've tried paragon tier - if not, give it a go, see how it feels.
Really, I can't see how it's not tactically interesting enough for you, in a way that messing with encounter powers is going to fix.
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 9:26PM
#5
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Date Joined:
Jun 29, 2004
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Really, I can't see how it's not tactically interesting enough for you, in a way that messing with encounter powers is going to fix.
Maybe its not, but at the very least I'll get to use more my PHB!
Seriously, I do find D&D pretty tactically light. The decisions are usually completely obvious or the difference between them so minuscule its irrelevant. Anything to add a little tactical spice or diversity would be good. When tactical gameplay was stated to be a design goal in 4e I was pumped, but then sad when it didn't show up.
Heavy Rocks
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 9:30PM
#6
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Date Joined:
Jun 18, 2006
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I'm not sure I understand your solution, could you explain it better?
However, I will say that I don't think there's a point to altering the way encounter powers work. Yes, everyone is going to pick the least situational power but I don't see a reasonable way to fix that. Personally, I think that doing some like giving players access to more at-will powers, like gaining an additional at-will every 5 or 10 levels to help cover "situational" situations would work. Players would still use the same 1 or 2 at-wills 90% of the time anyway. I think WotC would have to redo a good number of at-will powers to make it interesting though but frankly some classes are in desperate need of having their at-will's scraped and redesigned anyway.
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 10:09PM
#7
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Date Joined:
Jul 27, 2002
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Ongorth's point is well taken and his solution is sound - if his premise holds.
His premise:
a) some Encounter powers are only useful in very specific situations and thus may not get used in every encounter.
b) Since encounter powers are better than At-Wills, a good character should choose Encounter powers that will get used every encounter.
c) Therefore, situational Encounter powers are often not chosen, therefore not used at all.
His solution:
a) For each level at which you would choose an Encounter power, chose two.
b) each encounter you can only choose one of those two powers to use.
It works - I do not know that it would change the balance of power all that much.
But that is only the case if Encounter powers are not weighted to account for their situational usefulness. If they are, then you will change the power level of characters as they will have still have the always useful (but weaker) Encounter powers AND the stronger (but situational) powers when the situation calls for it.
I have no desire to do an exhaustive evaluation of the Encounter powers to see if this is the case or not.
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 10:21PM
#8
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Date Joined:
Jun 29, 2004
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Ongorth's point is well taken and his solution is sound - if his premise holds.
His premise:
a) some Encounter powers are only useful in very specific situations and thus may not get used in every encounter.
b) Since encounter powers are better than At-Wills, a good character should choose Encounter powers that will get used every encounter.
c) Therefore, situational Encounter powers are often not chosen, therefore not used at all.
His solution:
a) For each level at which you would choose an Encounter power, chose two.
b) each encounter you can only choose one of those two powers to use.
It works - I do not know that it would change the balance of power all that much.
But that is only the case if Encounter powers are not weighted to account for their situational usefulness. If they are, then you will change the power level of characters as they will have still have the always useful (but weaker) Encounter powers AND the stronger (but situational) powers when the situation calls for it.
I have no desire to do an exhaustive evaluation of the Encounter powers to see if this is the case or not.
Well, unless either
a) every encounter power is equally useful in all situations.
or
b) one encounter power at each level is more powerful then all other choices in all situations.
the characters will be more powerful. I'm pretty sure neither of these things is true (and this entire aspect of the game would be tactically and strategically devoid if it were), so, yes, the character will be more powerful, though the amount they are is up for debate. To me, that's not a big issue. Encounters aren't balanced on some extremely precise scale, so if the characters are marginally more powerful, no big deal and if they are more then marginally more powerful, raise the encounter budget accordingly, no big deal.
Heavy Rocks
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 10:24PM
#9
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Personally, I think encounter powers are awesome. I have a bit of beef with daily powers though. It seems to encourage 10 minute workday, in my opinion. I would actually prefer it if they toned down dailies juuust a little bit, but made them "per milestone" instead.
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4 years ago ::
Jul 19, 2009 - 11:09PM
#10
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Date Joined:
Jun 20, 2008
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I think one of the bigger issues is the milestone idea. Frankly, the action point itself is a bit poor. Destiny points seems a better way to go (1/level unless you fulfill some major aspect of your destiny) and perhaps an action point day (none extra for milestones).
I would also say that encounter powers seem fair enough, as do utilities. Which also may be a part to the problem: over balanced classes. The Dailies should be big and flashy if you can only do it once a day.
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