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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 9:47AM
#11
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Date Joined:
Mar 12, 2002
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(Quote removed) This is 4th Edition, the assumption is that there will be a fair amount of combat.
Moderated by
ORC_Chaos
on Jun 21, 2011 - 06:20PM
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 10:12AM
#12
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- Senior Volunteer Community Lead
Date Joined:
Aug 19, 2007
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Why? There's no particular need for there to be more combat than in any other edition of D&D, or for those participating in the combats to be more or less optimized.
Especially in a game about divine characters, maybe the combats will end up being mostly smashing through tons of minions, showing off your godliness, and "whee" to all the damage bonuses then.
Keith Richmond
Living Forgotten Realms Epic Writing Director
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 10:35AM
#13
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- Hero Artisan Gold Medalist
Date Joined:
Jun 14, 2007
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Why? There's no particular need for there to be more combat than in any other edition of D&D, or for those participating in the combats to be more or less optimized.
Especially in a game about divine characters, maybe the combats will end up being mostly smashing through tons of minions, showing off your godliness, and "whee" to all the damage bonuses then.
1) This is the Character Optimization forum. We're darn well gonna optimize something, and combat has been the most suitable target for optimization since D&D was first created.
2) Any modules created for use by a large number of different groups in a standardized system (such as the Living groups) inevitably has quite a bit of combat, simply because it's a lot easier to predict what people are going to do in combat than out of it. In combat? They'll probably try to kill the enemies. Out of combat? Who knows, so hopefully you put in enough different ways to accomplish the main goal that the local DM doesn't have to go completely overboard with the railroading.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 10:38AM
#14
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Date Joined:
Feb 26, 2006
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Why? There's no particular need for there to be more combat than in any other edition of D&D, or for those participating in the combats to be more or less optimized.
Especially in a game about divine characters, maybe the combats will end up being mostly smashing through tons of minions, showing off your godliness, and "whee" to all the damage bonuses then.
Considering the vast majority of game mechanics revolve around combat, the less combat there is, the less it matters that it is 4e at all.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 11:06AM
#15
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(Quote Removed) New game rules available = new stuff to crunch on for us CO folks.
Moderated by
ORC_Chaos
on Jun 21, 2011 - 06:22PM
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 12:15PM
#16
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Date Joined:
Nov 23, 2003
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*smirk* Ok, two possibilities here:
- You're right about combat optimization being silly for this campaign.
- You're wrong about same.
If you're right, then people doing combat optimization don't matter any. No need to track the thread to mock them. You could justify that position by giving average combat/scenario numbers, or just say "by design, there will never be a mandatory combat in this campaign" or so on. Or you can not bother justifying anything and just ignore it. If you're wrong, Shaka may have pointed out some things you might want to change. Either way, I'm not quite sure what is served by digging up a 3 week old, well of the front page post so that you could mock those silly optimizers. But ... I decided not to play after talking briefly with a DM at SynDCon. So either way, best of luck.
"Nice assumptions. Completely wrong assumptions, but by jove if being incorrect stopped people from making idiotic statements, we wouldn't have modern internet subculture." Kerrus
Practical gameplay runs by neither RAW or RAI, but rather "A Compromise Between The Gist Of The Rule As I Recall Getting The Impression Of It That One Time I Read It And What Jerry Says He Remembers, Whatever, We'll Look It Up Later If Any Of Us Still Give A Damn." Erachima
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 12:29PM
#17
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- Senior Volunteer Community Lead
Date Joined:
Aug 19, 2007
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Yeah, outside whether optimizing for combat is a good or bad idea in the campaign... the balance of choices are mighty peculiar.
Separate from Living Divine, I do think it's very possible for a campaign to have skill bonuses or non-combat abilities represent things at least as potent as combat options, but it's pretty rare.
Keith Richmond
Living Forgotten Realms Epic Writing Director
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 12:31PM
#18
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*smirk*
Ok, two possibilities here:
- You're right about combat optimization being silly for this campaign.
- You're wrong about same.
If you're right, then people doing combat optimization don't matter any. No need to track the thread to mock them. You could justify that position by giving average combat/scenario numbers, or just say "by design, there will never be a mandatory combat in this campaign" or so on. Or you can not bother justifying anything and just ignore it.
If you're wrong, Shaka may have pointed out some things you might want to change.
Let me throw in 2 more cents, as someone who has played the intro mods. Living Divine certainly has combats.
There's four things to optimize for:
1) Some of the combats had enough gas that my character was unconscious in round 2 and would have been dead in round 3 if the party didn't have enough gas to drop the monster. So certainly things like Destruction domain ought to be very popular. Nobody likes to be eaten by a monster, and it's unclear how you could be Raised in a world with no spellcasters.
2) Some of the combats, by contrast, were for showing off in front of the rubes. Trivially easy, mass minion fights. So having lots of multi-attacks and AOE attacks would be useful here. Though they don't present much challenge.
3) Some of the combats are mass combat battles. Your stats literally don't matter - except Charisma. So that's something else to think about and optimize for. I expect Paladins and Warlocks to be popular, as all the other charisma-based classes are on the 'uncommon' list. It's not fun having a 50/50 chance for your unit to break morale every time it is hit (as when you have a 10 Charisma).
4) LD has skill challenges, just like other 4e games. So that's another thing you can optimize for.
I think Jay is trying to make the point that LD isn't going to be about meat grinder mods. But as #1 above shows, thinking about this kind of stuff is valuable.
Also, people like to make awesome characters. There's nothing wrong with that. In a world where you're getting to show off for the rubes, why wouldn't you make a character that can level entire villages? It's all part of the fun for the campaign.
We've only seen (probably) the low level divine domains. Maybe the higher level domains like Chaos II will make it worthwhile to take Chaos I (which is otherwise a suboptimal choice). But there's roleplaying flavour for being a Chaos diety, and that's not something to be discounted in a campaign that is trying to be more roleplay-ey than LFR.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 12:39PM
#19
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Date Joined:
Nov 23, 2003
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There's four things to optimize for:
1) Some of the combats had enough gas [...]
2) Some of the combats, by contrast, were for showing off in front of the rubes[...]
3) Some of the combats are mass combat battles. Your stats literally don't matter - except Charisma.[...]
4) LD has skill challenges, just like other 4e games. So that's another thing you can optimize for.
Wow. Yeah, that sounds like a Cha/Int warlock (Ritual Caster, Duelist's Panache, Arcana abuse) might be just what was called for.
"Nice assumptions. Completely wrong assumptions, but by jove if being incorrect stopped people from making idiotic statements, we wouldn't have modern internet subculture." Kerrus
Practical gameplay runs by neither RAW or RAI, but rather "A Compromise Between The Gist Of The Rule As I Recall Getting The Impression Of It That One Time I Read It And What Jerry Says He Remembers, Whatever, We'll Look It Up Later If Any Of Us Still Give A Damn." Erachima
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2 years ago ::
Jun 21, 2011 - 1:59PM
#20
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Date Joined:
Jan 24, 2010
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There's four things to optimize for:
1) Some of the combats had enough gas that my character was unconscious in round 2 and would have been dead in round 3 if the party didn't have enough gas to drop the monster. So certainly things like Destruction domain ought to be very popular. Nobody likes to be eaten by a monster, and it's unclear how you could be Raised in a world with no spellcasters.
2) Some of the combats, by contrast, were for showing off in front of the rubes. Trivially easy, mass minion fights. So having lots of multi-attacks and AOE attacks would be useful here. Though they don't present much challenge.
3) Some of the combats are mass combat battles. Your stats literally don't matter - except Charisma. So that's something else to think about and optimize for. I expect Paladins and Warlocks to be popular, as all the other charisma-based classes are on the 'uncommon' list. It's not fun having a 50/50 chance for your unit to break morale every time it is hit (as when you have a 10 Charisma).
4) LD has skill challenges, just like other 4e games. So that's another thing you can optimize for.
1) A good challenge on occasion is fun, but if these combats are gonna eat unoptimised groups, then they may be problematic and un-fun for the unprepared or players who didn't optimise / optimised for non-combat
2) Boring.
3) You're a non-cha character? Boring - have fun winning or losing by coin flip, I guess.
4) Fun if written well, tedious and/or irritating if not.
Somewhat unimpressed if this is what's on offer. Still, the odds of this awful campaign idea ever being played in my area are pretty well 5/8 of sweet FA so it doesn't bother me much.
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