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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 7:05AM
#1
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So after the third session, we're pretty much used to the rules and flow of the game, and the theater of the mind takes too long.
Mainly, people spend more time asking "how far away am i from X", and "can i do Y", "can i stand adjacent to Z", and "can i see Ω", then they asking similar questions in 4e. Though 4e had alot more interesting things to do.
It's also confusing, as sometime someone will say "i move back 30'" and 2 people will think "back is corridior A" and 2 other's will think "back is corridor B". In fact, a few times the DM had to draw a map and using dice as mini's just to get everyone on the same page. Which we then took to using.
Now for some smaller skirmishes, it's faster. For the "hey there's an oger, i use icy ray's, everyone else throws stuff" roll off there's little reason to have a map (batch dice rollers, yes). But generally speaking, a map is worth about 10-20 words (or about 30 seconds per turn).
Edit: for the record, there are 2 4e only players, and 3 that played from 1 or 2e. The 4e player's probably ask twice as many questions, but there's still plenty of clarification talk from the 2e ones.
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F-111 Interdictor Long (200+ squares) distance ally teleporter. With some warlord stuff. Broken in a plot way, not a power way.
Thought Switch Higher level build that grants upto 14 attacks on turn 1. If your allies play along, it's broken.
Elven Critters Crit op with crit generation. 5 of these will end anything. Broken.
King Fisher Does an excellent job at keeping an enemy disabled in a few ways. Strong.
Boominator Fun catch-22 booming blade build with either strong or completely broken damage depending on your reading.
Very Distracting Warlock Lot's of dazing and major penalties to hit. Overpowered.
Pocket Protector Pixie Stealth Knight. Maximizing the defender's aura by being in an ally's/enemy's square.
Yakuza NinjIntimiAdin: Perma-stealth Striker that offers a little protection for ally's, and can intimidate bloodied enemies. Very Strong.
Chargeburgler with cheese Ranged attacks at the end of a charge along with perma-stealth. Solid, could be overpowered if tweaked.
Void Defender Defends giving a penalty to hit anyone but him, then removing himself from play. Can get somewhat broken in epic.
Scry and Die Attacking from around corners, while staying hidden. Moderate to broken, depending on the situation.
Skimisher Fly in, attack, and fly away. Also prevents enemies from coming close. Moderate to Broken depending on the enemy, but shouldn't make the game un-fun, as the rest of your team is at risk, and you have enough weaknesses.
Indestructible Simply won't die, even if you sleep though combat.
Sir Robin (Bravely Charge Away) He automatically slows and pushes an enemy (5 squares), while charging away. Hard to rate it's power level, since it's terrain dependent.
Death's Gatekeeper A fun twist on a healic, making your party "unkillable". Overpowered to Broken, but shouldn't actually make the game un-fun, just TPK proof.
Death's Gatekeeper mk2, (Stealth Edition) Make your party "unkillable", and you hidden, while doing solid damage. Stronger then the above, but also easier for a DM to shut down. Broken, until your DM get's enough of it.
Domination and Death Dominate everything then kill them quickly. Only works @ 30, but is broken multiple ways.
Battlemind Mc Prone-Daze Protecting your allies by keeping enemies away. Quite powerful.
The Retaliator Getting hit deals more damage to the enemy then you receive yourself, and you can take plenty of hits. Heavy item dependency, Broken.
Dead Kobold Transit Teleports 98 squares a turn, and can bring someone along for the ride. Not fully built, so i can't judge the power
Psilent Guardian Protect your allies, while being invisible. Overpowered, possibly broken
Unnamed Avenger|Runepriest/Hammer of Vengance Do lot's of damage while boosting your teams. Strong to slightly overpowered.
Charedent BarrageA charging ardent. Fine in a normal team, overpowered if there are 2 together, and easily broken in teams of 5.
Super Knight A tough, sticky, high damage knight. Strong.
Super Duper Knight Basically the same as super knight, only far more broken.
Mora, the unkillable avenger Solid damage, while being neigh indestuctable. Overpowered, but not broken.
Swordburst Maximus At-Will Close Burst 3 that slide and prones. Protects allies with off actions. Strong, possibly over powered with the right party.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 7:34AM
#2
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I agree. There are times where TotM is faster and others when it is slower.
Complex combat setups benefit from at least some kind of graphic representation. It doesn't need to be a combat grid, though. A hand-drawn sketch or map is often sufficient enough to clear up the Corridor A/Corridor B type issues.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 7:42AM
#3
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Date Joined:
Aug 31, 2008
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I agree with you both, and I think that is the point of the system. You use the method that works best for you, and this can change depending on the situation.
Playing without any visual aid does require players to have a good visual imagination, and they must give plenty of detail when describing their actions. It isn't enough to say, "I move back 30 ft." You have to say, for example, "I move back 30 ft, away from the fighter and the orcs over to the table by the west door."
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 7:47AM
#4
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Date Joined:
May 29, 2012
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Keep in mind as well, most players at this juncture are used to playing on a table top mat, or other visual device, so they ask questions that would matter in that situation, but not in one without a mat. Eventually, instead of asking: Mainly, "how far away am i from X", and "can i do Y" and waiting for answers, they will start saying, "I move to the edge of my range for Y, and target X".
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 7:53AM
#5
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We played TotM in our 1st session and with the mat in our 2nd, and it is faster with mat. It's exactly like you say, with TotM everyturn is punctuated with the need to validate your position and your planned action with the DM, where with mat, players just spell out what they're going to do directly.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 9:00AM
#6
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Date Joined:
Sep 11, 2007
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We played TotM in our 1st session and with the mat in our 2nd, and it is faster with mat. It's exactly like you say, with TotM everyturn is punctuated with the need to validate your position and your planned action with the DM, where with mat, players just spell out what they're going to do directly.
this is true - but i still feel that the battlemat robs you of some imagination by absolutely nailing everything down to exact positions. But that's just my own preference, and even i confess that the battlemat can be a real boon to complex encounters.
But the way my group plays, we don't go in for 'how many yards away am i from x' we just ask - can i reach x? and the gm makes a call, there's no need to know the exact plositions of everything and everyone, just have a rough idea. I personally prefer 'zones' of proximity - engaged, close, mid, long to explicit ranges. Keep it fuzzy and the need to know exactly where everything is, is replaced by a knowledge of roughly what's in reach and you can tell the DM what you want to do narratively (and it makes it easier for the DM to fudge positions to allow cool stuff).
but that's just me - neither way is the wrong way to play. it's all down to preference. I have a feeling TOTM is going to be the default assumption in next, which i am obviously happy about. But they won't leave out the battlemat option - it will be there as a modular option - which I'm also happy about. Because that caters to 2 major ways of envisioning the game - the imagination/narrative style - and the mapped/tactical style.
Both are fun for different reasons. But the edition warriors defend their preferences with far too much Zeal. and that gets everyone wound up.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 9:24AM
#7
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Date Joined:
Dec 21, 2011
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It depends on the group. We playtested both ways. For my group, I used the grid for the Hobgoblin prison (only 2 hobgoblin torturers in the prison area). As soon as I placed the grid down and the minis on it, my game slowed to a crawl. My players completely pulled out of character and started to talk strategy, count squares, process different optional moves, etc. With such a small combat, I should have kept to the ToTM, but I wanted to see how grid would work.
I'm sure the grid will be useful for "Boss" fight or larger battle, but I really like the way ToTM keeps my players in character and the action flowing.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 10:38AM
#8
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@barefootwanderer
The biggest area it came up for us was the P-clerics Channel divinity which is party unfriendly. So when we got friendly fired with it by the cleric, it wasn't on the DM ('are sure I was only 20' away from him?'). Also when sleep was used the DM was guestimating the impact where with map the mage could just point to a spot and it was those enemies affected. But I agree it's a group choice, and in the future, I'm pretty sure we'll use a combination depending on encounter complexity.
@rhenny
In our group which was 3 4e'ers one grognard (myself) and one novice Pathfinder, the only change in pace was measuring AoE spells, otherwise it was just as fast and furious. It may help that our personality is more Charge of the Light Brigade and less Seal Team Seven. Just may depend on the group.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 11:12AM
#9
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Date Joined:
Dec 10, 2008
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I would also submit that ToTM can make the game more difficult for melee characters as opposed to ranged/spellcaster characters. It was easier to just guesstimate or assume that a target is in range for a ranged attack, since in most cases I played so far in Next, it's been less common to be out of range of a target due to the fact that ranged attacks are ... well, ranged. But melee characters not only have to be sure they have enough movement to close the distance, but keep track of who they are in melee with and who they are not and know their position more exactly so they can know whether they are in position to gain advantage or not.
Because of what I experienced with that, I actually found that the games slowed down for the melee characters as they try to figure out who they are next to. For the ranged characters and spellcasters they were able in most cases to just stand where they started and say "I shoot him," because they know they're within range and there's no way they can't be due to the size of the encounter area.
IOW, ToTM actually resulted in another instance of "Fighters Can't Have Nice Things" for our group.
YMMV.
OD&D, 1E and 2E challenged the player.
3E challenged the character, not the player.
Now 4E takes it a step further by challenging a GROUP OF PLAYERS to work together as a TEAM.
That's why I love 4E.
"Your ability to summon a horde of celestial superbeings at will is making my ... BMX skills look a bit redundant."
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12 months ago ::
Jun 13, 2012 - 12:33PM
#10
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Date Joined:
Jul 19, 2008
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My experience was that TotM works best when the map is pretty much irrelevant. An example of this is a fight against one guy. Fighting just the ogre in his cave works fine without a map because there are basically two states a player is in: either, next to the ogre, or not next to the ogre. In a fight against a whole bunch of enemies ends up being simpler with the map, because everyone then knows where they are in reference to everyone else.
Corriver's Lantern - a D&D blog featuring the Frozen Over Campaign Setting. I am not anonymous. I am Colin B. Schaeffer.
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