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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 2:28PM
#141
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Date Joined:
May 31, 2009
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"Cinematic Combat" is stupid, so a game mechanically forcing you to do it would also be fairly dumb.
Now, to preface this, by "Cinematic Combat" I mean trying to make characters start encounters with their weak powers, then blow their encounter powerss or especially dailies to finish powerful villains off. I do not mean saving your dailies for the boss fight of a group of encounters (this just makes good tactical sense - people who do 2 enounter days and blow all their dailies every other fight make me feel C minus).
Why "Cinematic Combat" is stupid: it's inefficient - boss creatures have lots of hit points, and you'll be guessing when they're nearly dead (i.e. maybe you blew that 9[W] daily when the boss had 10 hit points left; also, many dailies (the best ones, generally) have effects that last for an entire enounter, or can be sustained for the entire encounter, so you lose a lot of mileage out of something like Wall of Fire if you don't lead with it.
The only time you should see "Cinematic Combat" is when players underestimate an encounter and hold back their dailies, only to be surprised/on the ropes and use them out of desperation. It can be cool, but high risk behaviour for a DM - no one likes regularly being TPK'ed.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 2:31PM
#142
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no one likes regularly being TPK'ed.
Which is why I think it should be more difficult to kill PCs while still defeating them (aka unconsciousness). If your PCs screw up, or the dice just crap out one session, the PCs just get KOd and left on the battlefield or captured, instead of 'keep rolling death saves until someone wakes up or everybody dies'.
When the only outcome to the PCs losing a battle is 'everybody dies', the players have no incentive to be anything other than efficient.
Another day, another three or four entries to my Ignore List.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 3:07PM
#143
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I think that they will keep the stuff they've done in 4E to fix existing problems, like keeping some form of magic item rarity, having character classes with differing levels of complexity.
I also think they will try to build mechanics that have generally been viewed as successful e.g. Minions.
Then i think 5E will be about fixing the big problems that 4E is perceived to have by the developers and gamers generally. So, for example, they will try to streamline combat, but without going back to 1E over simplification e.g maybe they will expand the 1-hit minion mechanic. Why bother tracking HPs when you can just track hits? PCs could have several hits, and monsters could vsry from 1 hit minions up to multiple hit monsters like PCs. I also think they will try to do more on out of combat options to encourage roleplaying. Although powers technically have out of combat uses, most of them are so explicitly linked to combat they don't really have a meaningful non-combat use. I think they will try to design a system that works better at epic level (or get rid of epic all together!), and maybe they will simplify the powers. If we had fewer powers then they could each be mre impressive, and it might be easier for them to balane the system, reducing the amount of errata.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 3:15PM
#144
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Date Joined:
Nov 19, 2006
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Keep:
* the balance between players.
* some type of healing each player can manage for themselves (with the healer to maxamize
that.
* an arcane basic atack. casters should beable to spam an arcane attack & should beable to
ignore weapons complety if they chose.
New to 5th ed:
* 3 failed death saves & you are unable to be revied untill the end of combat. You should only
beabe to kill a PC by actully taking them down past their negitive hp value. A PC should not die
because their dice hate them.
* Make skill choices more open with in the classes. Give them 1 or 2 that are static (Like arcana &
history for a wizard or stealth & acrobatics for a rouge) than let the player chose an additional
number based on class from the entire list (ex: +2 for the classes that got 4 skills). This will alow
someone who wants their barbarian to have knolwdege of histoy with out burning a feet. This
will also make up for the fact that perception is not a free choice for all classes (srrsly.... we're
adventures, with out perception we'd have died along time ago)
For the people complaining about XP:
Just don't use it in your home game. Tell the players when they level up. XP makes orginized play work.
For the people complaing about HP:
HP works & works well. the alteratives tend to add to the math required to play as they impose conditions (negitives to hit, damage, defenses ect). Do you have to equate that to a damage counter? No. But the mechanic works.
For the people complaining about roles:
They are esental to any game. They help deifine your job in the party. In every game I have ever played there has been a frontline figters, artilary, healing/suport & skill monkies. Just because a system like WoD lets you create the balance with in your own character does not mean the roles are not there.
If you want your wizard to ignore control & just do damage, the options are there..... just make sure the party knows that & someone else takes powers that fill that hole. AKA: put the foccoes on the secondary role.
“The opposite of WAR isn't PEACE. It's CREATION” ~ J. Larson's Rent
Looking for an LFR game in the Eastern PA & Western NJ area? Check out ABE RPGA at http://community.wizards.com/abe-rpga.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 3:23PM
#145
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Date Joined:
Nov 19, 2006
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Opps.... one more new to 5e
the ability to cast certin rituals in combat.
Ex: a teleportation circle can take 10 min outside of combat with a lower dc or it can take 2 to 4 rounds in combat with a higher dc (or it can be a cumlitive dc needs a total of 60 to go off) & that is all the caster is doing during combat. If they get hit and fail a save or they chosse to stop the ritual fizzals with out lossing the components (or only partly lossing the components or loosing them, witch ever works beter).
Than givie feats, backgrounds or class features to boost that.
“The opposite of WAR isn't PEACE. It's CREATION” ~ J. Larson's Rent
Looking for an LFR game in the Eastern PA & Western NJ area? Check out ABE RPGA at http://community.wizards.com/abe-rpga.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 3:26PM
#146
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Date Joined:
Sep 25, 2007
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I think you meant to say " A PC should not die because the rest of the guys at the table don't feel like lending a hand."
It's really hard to die from death saving throws if your fellow players can stand to take just one standard action to help you out.
I say this having had 6 characters die in a single campaign... and not one in a situation where no one could have saved me before I failed the 3rd save, even if I failed them all back to back.
But yes, PC death without deliberate effort (such as the DM having a monster attack an unconscious character, or a Player continually making terrible choices like staying adjacent to a heavy hitting monster even though they only have a handful of HP left) should be exceedingly rare
Careful, man. That much logic might be illegal on the internet. - Salla
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 4:02PM
#147
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What should they axe?
The heavy focus on crunch. I want crunch, but I also want fluff that inspires stories. I pull out my 2nd and 3rd Ed Forgotten Realms material way more than I pull out my 4th ed FR Book. For the first year and a half I purchased almost every 4th ed book. I honstly have not opened most of them in a LONG time. There is no reason. All of the material is in the OCB and there is little fluff to reference so why would I use them? Besides, it seems like a lot of the material is errated and changed anyway.
so for 5th ED.....WAY WAY WAY more focus on fluff. Give us more reasons to BUY a book AND subscribe to a suite of online tools. Put the crunch in the tools and the fluff in the books. Now I am not advocating that the books be mainly fluff, just increase the fluffy bits by about 300%. Some key areas in the FR book get a paragraph or two....and that is just sad.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 4:19PM
#148
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Date Joined:
Dec 14, 2010
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I am not a big fan of the +half level mechanic. Just adding level would be nice, like in Gamma World, although that only encompasses 10 levels so I can't really say how well that would work outside of Heroic.
Would 5th ED even have a tier like Epic? It seems to be hit or miss in 4th ED depending on the group.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 4:28PM
#149
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Date Joined:
Feb 27, 2008
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If anything a return to its roots and what made the game such a huge success in the first place would be the direction i would take. But i don't own the IP so who knows.
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2 years ago ::
Jun 14, 2011 - 4:31PM
#150
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XunValDorl_of_HouseKilsek
Date Joined:
May 31, 2003
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no one likes regularly being TPK'ed.
Which is why I think it should be more difficult to kill PCs while still defeating them (aka unconsciousness). If your PCs screw up, or the dice just crap out one session, the PCs just get KOd and left on the battlefield or captured, instead of 'keep rolling death saves until someone wakes up or everybody dies'.
When the only outcome to the PCs losing a battle is 'everybody dies', the players have no incentive to be anything other than efficient.
How much harder do you need the rules to be in order to die? Do you need six death saves and you die at negative triple your total hit points?
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