My group of 5 has just entered Deadhold in this adventure; however we only just hit 14th level about three fights ago and the DM does not scale anything since he incorrectly thinks that since P2 says it's supposed to take us from 14th to 17th level that it means it's designed for characters of 14th through 17th level. A friend who has the adventure (not someone in our group) has warned me that the final encounter is a massive EL21, which is pretty much a guaranteed TPK for any group lower than 17th level (it's off the charts and classified as "too hard" according to the Encounter Builder). This friend has also said that every fight we have left is at least EL 17, which would mean that everything left is going to be at the least "hard" and at the most nigh unbeatable. Since the next adventure, P3, expects us to be 17th level at the start it seems as though our group is headed for failure since at this point we should be 16th level headed towards 17th, and instead we are only 14th level with roughly 12th or 13th level gear.
I've raised these concerns with the DM and he ignores it, in fact he said prior to my girlfriend joining our group (at which point we only had 4 PCs) that 4 PCs could handle the published adventures just fine; he was actually still dividing our fights by 5 PCs instead of 4 at this time, yet not scaling the encounters down - so we were fighting encounters designed for 5 PCs with only 4, and having 1/5 of the XP just go into limbo.
What can I do in a situation like this? My fun and interest in the game is starting to wane since I know that we're basically fighting encounters that are on the cusp of being too high for our level and nothing is done to even it out; the DM basically follows the encounters verbatim as printed in the adventure, without understanding how the EL system works in 4e and that he should be scaling the fights down or making sure that we're high enough level to deal with it.
The encounter system in 4E is not perfect. It is better than previous efforts. There have been DMs posting on these forums saying that it doesn't work for them at higher levels, and they need to up the difficulty to make things challenging within their own groups.
So, if your group is heavily optimised, and plays solid tactics, it *might* be winnable. I'm sorry to say I don't know the adventure though, so cannot really give any more insight.
How about: Ask your DM to play out one of the tougher upcoming fights himself, playing monsters and PCs as he think it might pan out, and making all dice rolls himself.
It's asking a lot though, when he is not interested enough in the balance issues to know the guidelines.
As said earlier a group of optimized characters, who fight tactically can handle encouters well above their level. However, if you aren't made of pure power gamers such a situation can be difficult even impossible. I would be surprised if your DM hadn't put some effort into making the storyline work, having the entire party die usually ruins things; if you really think you're just headed for a quick end I might suggest trying to swich in a new DM, someone who seems generally uninterested in the game they shouldn't be playing, especially in the role of DM.
We aren't powergamers at all, that's what has me worried. The DM has been doing this since we started with H1; not scaling encounters (at the time we had 4 PCs), not modifying treasure but basically just reading the adventure exactly how it's written.
Ask him if hes really enjoying the game, it sounds as if hes just going through the motions. DMing is not an easy job, if requires an investment of time and energy, if a person isn't that into the job, its not going to work.
I'm curious how you are such lower level than the adventure (you think) believes you to be at that point.
I do tend to believe that any DM who runs printed adventures exactly as written is either incredibly new and afraid of screwing up, or doesn't give a darn about being a DM at all and would rather not be one.
I'm curious how you are such lower level than the adventure (you think) believes you to be at that point.
I do tend to believe that any DM who runs printed adventures exactly as written is either incredibly new and afraid of screwing up, or doesn't give a darn about being a DM at all and would rather not be one.
The adventure is designed to take us from 14th through 17th level; we started it at 13th and just hit 14th a couple encounters ago. We are, from what I've read and seen, roughly 3/4 of the way through the adventure. The final encounter is EL 21, which according to the Encounter Builder is "hard" for a 17th level party and "too hard" for 14th, 15th, and 16th level. It sems to me that we should be 16th level right now, going on 17th level (which we would need to be at prior to the final EL21 encounter).
We're at this level because for the longest time our DM was not scaling encounters but still dividing XP by 5, or removing fights from the adventure or skipping parts entirely. We started the previous adventure (Trollhaunt Warrens, P1) before we were even Paragon tier. I think that we have been "behind the expected curve" since midway through H3 Pyramid of Shadows, as that's the adventure where the DM basically ignored and changed a few things in the adventure, and on purpose made sure that we wouldn't hit Paragon level until we were a fight or two in to P1 (and when I raised this issue, basically saying that P1 expected us to be 11th at the start, he basically said "Be glad I'm not making you have to train to level up like you had to in older editions"). Although we haven't had a PC death yet, we've come dangerously close several times and basically since the end of H3 every single fight has been a total grind for us.
(and when I raised this issue, basically saying that P1 expected us to be 11th at the start, he basically said "Be glad I'm not making you have to train to level up like you had to in older editions"). Although we haven't had a PC death yet, we've come dangerously close several times and basically since the end of H3 every single fight has been a total grind for us.
So he's a stubborn jerk too you're saying?
Well, he has repeatedly said that we don't need to fight everything in the adventure, and that we don't have to treat 4e like Diablo where we explore every single room; he used to get a little agitated with us because we would do just that: hit a fork, go right, clear out some rooms, then double back and go left to clear out those rooms. So there have been several situations where we've bypassed rooms because he was saying that we shouldn't just be going around killing things.
The situation now is that he hasn't balanced this out with random encounters or side treks or similar things, so we haven't gotten as much XP as we should because we've avoided some encounters entirely in previous adventures (as well as in this one; we avoided probably 3 or so encounters).
but you haven't had a character death?
maybe you feel incredibly challenged by all the fighing, but there has been no death. or perhaps you didn't mention.
i'd say that your party is up to the challanges being placed in front of them. the encounters ought not be designed to kill a party, but the challenge level is still warranted if a PC drops. there are ways to make sure everyone lives and often get back up from dropped.
but, being challenging at this degree doesn't mean the DM doesn't care about your complaints. being heroic should be challenging, both physically and mentally.
i don't mean to downplay your experience, sounds like some more DM to player discussion needs to happen. maybe ensure that he's pulling in appropriate treasure, giving time for a bit of gear shopping, balancing RP elements [and giving appropriate XP for RP elements and skill challanges]. all these things could help to boost the XP value and grow the party.
but, ultimately, i might sound like the unresponsive DM when i say, if there hasn't been a TPK, you might be getting heavily challenged, but living to tell some amazing tales of how tough it was. probably got fantastic scars to show for it too.
I guess my first question in a case like this would be: why aren't people having fun? It may be true that the encounters are technically rated at a higher difficulty, but those are benchmarks designed to help provide some sort of guidelines for player enjoyment, not a guarantee that things will be enjoyable if and only if the proper values are met. I'm sure we've all been in fights that were technically above or below the ideally recommended guidelines. But when I think back, the best and worst fights weren't really determined by the challenge rating of an encounter.
So the root of this problem should lie in determining exactly why things are less enjoyable now. If raw challenge is the trouble, I'm assuming that the fights are consisting of completely overwhelming challenges that the dm must subsequently rescue the party from under dubious circumstances. If this is not the case, and you seem to be winning the fights on your own steam, the problem may lie in something more than just raw challenge ratings. Does it feel like the dm is basically going through the motions with nary a care for player interest? Have the combats become boring through poor description or orchestration? Or is it perhaps more that, knowing what's ahead, you've begun to transfer apathy from your sense of impending doom onto your current combats?
Or it could be something else entirely; it's very difficult to offer quality analysis in any of these situations. What I can tell you from my own experiences is that any game is a social contract of sorts between a group of players and a dungeon master. There are expectations to be met on both sides, and these expectations must rest on a foundation of trust. If you trust that the dm has the best interests and enjoyment of the game at heart, and if he has given you no reason to distrust his abilities outside of the fact that your encounters do not match a proscribed challenge rating, my advice would be to continue trusting him. Your best bet as a player is to enjoy yourself by contributing to the campaign as a player. Make the most of your interactions, character development, and teamwork in the face of interesting obstacles. Let the dm worry about crunching the numbers on his side of the screen.
There's no guarantee that the dm won't mess it up. But if you spend all your time worrying about it, it is guaranteed that you'll never have much fun.
My issue lies mainly with the fact he doesn't understand how to balance encounters or give out treasure properly. At 14th level we are consistently fighting encounters 3-4 levels higher than us, and except for my character and my girlfriend's PC (who was built at 13th level and so could cherry pick items) nobody has higher than a +2 weapon. Every fight we've had since the end of H3 Pyramid of Shadows has been a near total grind, because we skipped a few encounters in H3 (after the DM berated us for wanting to explore the whole thing, saying that we don't have to go to every room like we're playing Diablo) but there was nothing put in place to get us back on the curve (like side treks or random encounters or anything), so when we started P1 we weren't even at 11th level, and now we're almost done with P2 and are nowhere near the level expected for the final encounter, let alone the expected level to start P3.
I was in a similar game. Just to give you an idea, we got a level every 2 to 4 encounters, all combat. Now, we did managed to get through them on our own, with only one chatacter death, but it wasnt fun. Just because we were able to beat the encounter does not mean that surviving by the skin of our teeth is fun. It just made us feel insignificant, like we were extremley weak. And these victories didnt make us feel any better. In the end by the time my character died I really didnt care about him, as i wanted to play the hero and he was not one. But the difficulty was so high that any character made by the rules would be too weak to really feel "heroic".
I guess the whole point is that you are suppoed to be the heroes, but the encounters are so difficult that you just lose that feeling. I would talk to your DM about it, just tell him that just because you are winning doesnt make the game fun.
... At 14th level we are consistently fighting encounters 3-4 levels higher than us, ...
i can't say anything about treasure parcels becuase i am overly generous as DM, but a friend at my table is DMing a game that i'm a part of and he's less generous. honestly that depends on DM feelings and other factors. too bad you haven't got powerful weapons to back up your level.
as for fighting encounters higher than you, is that because you're looking at the total XP budget by reading thru the DMG and getting a feel for what you believe is balanced, or because you are looking at the monster level and thinking that at lvl 14 the monsters ought to be lvl 14 as well?
initially, i was trying to match the monster level with the PC level, but found that didn't fill the XP budget without huges numbers of too weak monsters. i've even put together fights with monsters of the PC lvl x 4 and still kept the encounter within XP budget. they did just fine in that encounter.
you haven't mentioned what you're getting in feedback from the DM about why things are going this way. does he have anything to say about it? is he really being tight-lipped baout everything up ahead?
sorry he thinks you don't have to clear every room. i can understand that, but without knowing a room is clear, how cna you be sure that a beastie isn't going to come from behind?
sorry also to hear that he was dividing XP by 5 because the module described itself as written for five PCs. i'd force him to go back and re-divide all that XP for the 4 PCs that were playing at the time and use that to see if it gets the level-ups that are more appropriate. that is dealing with RAW, not with DM style. the XP divides by the players, not the module description.
you ouhgt to call for some XP for difficulty, low level gear, and just generally trashing all his monsters too. a good place to start [since you are reading through the modules to check his work] would be to serve up a touch of rules lawyering over the RAW elements and the seeking-for-fun elements. tell him that you'd like to have an open discussion between players and DM, not PCs and the all powerful DM-god.
anyway, i sound a bit angry, cause i can't stand the way some of my players put in a touch of metagaming now and then. the younger ones are worst [always asking what level a monster is or how many hit points, "is it not dead already, it should be dead!", "when will it be bloodied?"]
your DM might be feeling some of the bite from you coming through with checking his work by reading through the module. regardless, it sounds as though the party ought to take some time away from the game to say what they are feeling about their progress so far and that they feel behind the curve. find appropriate and creative ways to get back on track, or maybe let someone else serve up DM for a time and give him a chance to PC and watch another DM style.
PCing gives the best perspective on DM style; DMing gives the best perspective on PC style.
I only know the difficulty of the encounter because I asked him what it was, and later was talking to a friend who has the adventure; I told him we were having a difficult time with all of the encounters so far in P2 and he asked what level we were - I said we just hit 14th and then he started telling me that we're too low for it, and the final fight (the EL21 one) is going to pretty much kill us. So I started thinking and it seems to me that our DM has been like this since the end of H2; since around that time every battle we've had has been a grind and I would consider as "hard" difficulty. I like a challenge as much as the next guy, but I don't want every battle to be a nerve-wracking, "are we going to win or lose?" type of encounter.
"near total grind" - this reminds me of another thread to which my answer was stop reading the DMG and have fun.
One question: has there been a TPK, or a contrived "rescue" from TPK?
edited to add: as a secondary question - is it necessary to take an extended rest after EACH combat encounter?
I sometimes don't scale adventures down if we are short a player. But then again some of my players are running very optimized builds, and I feel its a fun challenge to have them run things at higher levels a man down (and this last week without the party leader). I reminded them of Potions of Vitality though and gave them access to buy some.
I believe that GM's are better served giving the proper amount of XP and loot. Players like to level and get nice items. I understand though that many GM's might want to keep things a controlable level which may mean less magic items.
Also I've seen you on the character optimization boards so I am assuming your character is at least moderately optimized.
Communication is the key and I think my group enjoys a challenge from time to time. Also not to ruin anything for you. Encounter lvls are sometime overly high because of minions.
SPOILER ALERT:Final encounter P2 (highlight to read)
The last encounter has several minions and many of the monsters come from different rooms and you don't face them all at once.
If you DM wants to run in a fairly open manner, in which completing an adventure doesn't mean clearling levels, he needs to run some additional adventures of his own to bring together the module series. Things that'll get the PC caught up to where they need to be to start the next module. Either that, or not use modules which assume PCs start at a given level, clear the module, and end at a certain level.
I would advise simply accepting the inevitable TPK. DMing is like anything else, you get better at it as you do more of it, and it'd be a learning experience. If he doesn't care to listen to the advice in the DMG or concerns of his players, then maybe a disaster like that will drive home to him that he does need to exercise some judgement, even when running modules.
Also, DMs can burn out. He may just be sick of running, and thus not putting much into it.
I'm with the DM on this one. This is a player issue.
If the players feel like they're in over their heads they might want to have a get together refine their tactics, break down those weak magic items and make new ones, and bring their A game when they show up. If you're not seeing character deaths it's too early to call foul and even then a heroic death every once in awhile is good for the game.
Sorry, I'm just not feeling any sympathy for you.
You seem to want bland, no-challenge, fights, "proper" gear (as in always better than whatever you've got), and an assured win. All without any effort beyond just rolling a d20 & adding your modifier.
And to top it off you're essentially reading the adventure your trying to play through. Gee, if you allready know what's coming & the solutions, then what's it matter if it's "too hard" (by the book anyways), or that you've only got x items.... You'd think you could at least be cheating more effectively...
You also seem to be one of those people who thinks the world should be automagicly scaling around your character. Guess what? There's people who disagree with that (like your DM). We don't see any reason why just because your of x lv, or "only" have certain gear, that the monsters devolve when you come near them. Another thing to consider is that the DM has to have fun with the encounters as well. It could be that he's found 4e really boring when everythings "balanced". I know I did as a 4e DM. And I still do as a 4e player.
The only "error" I see? Splitting the xp 5 ways when there were only 4 players. But...if the goal was to slow progression down in the 1st place to make some of those fights more challenging....
I'm with the DM on this one. This is a player issue.
You are probabilly the only one (other then the DM himeself), and having the best tactics will not help you if you are worfully outclassed. That and unless the OP is lying the DM is obviously doing things wrong, as they are two low level for that part in the adventure, and from what the OP is saying the DM has taken steps to slow their advancement over the past several adventurers.
break down those weak magic items and make new ones, and bring their A game when they show up.
You don't know much about this do you. It takes a minimum of 9 +2 items to make a single +3 item, and that is using lv. 10 items with top effects to make a lv. 11 with no real enchantment benefit.
If you're not seeing character deaths it's too early to call foul
No it is not to early, as there are other potential indicators. Mostly how many times you are making death saves, how many encounters have multiple down at one time, or other things that means you are getting to close to a TPK.A death every now and then is not unexpected, but constantly being close to a TPK is not something that a DM is supose ot let happen.
One thing to remember is if you are under equiped with all your items being 1 + lower then they should for your level and you are facing threats 3 levels higher then you every encounter, you chance to hit is effectively cut by 20%, and your odds to be hit are increased by another 20%, constantly being hit ~65-70% of the time and only hitting ~30-40% of the time are not good odds for a party, unless the DM is incompotent in running the encounters.
I haven't played the P1 module so I don't know. But if the module says 14-17 that means you should start at 14 and end at 17. Now if I understand you correctly you were level 13 at the start of this module? That's only 1 level behind so not a huge deal. But at the same time you make it sound like your approaching the end of the module and your still level 14?!?! This makes no sense at all you should be 15 if not 16 by now.
Given that the encounters are higher level then you that means fewer of them would level up faster. Now I understand you mention your DM is "House ruling" that your party of 4 each gets XP as if it were a party of 5. Which is really short changing you right there. But I have to wonder if he is short changing you in other ways. You mentioned he didn't like you playing all "Diablo" style trying to get more XP.
Well I knew a DM like that once and when a party would do what he considered to be XP griding by checking every room systematically he would put a huge XP penalty down and give little to no XP for those battles to discourage that kind of behaviour. Though he was very up front about it because he wanted us to know he was doing it so we would stop. This was mainly a concern because item creation back in 3.x cost XP so you often had to XP grind like a MMORPG to make anything and maintain your level.
But if your in danager of hitting the last encounter and only gained 1 level while starting at a lower level then recommended in an module designed to raise you 3 levels you gotta cry foul. Something is not right there. Either the module doesn't raise you as fast as it should or your DM is doing somehting wrong. Even with you getting XP as if you were a 5 player group you still should have gained more then 1 level being 3/4 of the way through it. That means you've earned 3/4 of the total XP for the module or at least there about. So let's see 3/4 of 3 levels is 9/4 or 2.25 levels worth.
The other issue of items I think is a major problem. By level 14 an no one has higher then a +2 weapon?!? That's just well insain. Maybe fine in a custom game where the DM is adjusting the monster for low magic but not for out of the box modules. Level 14 you should have all +3 stuff by now. And should be getting a few +4 items in the mix since items 1-4 levels higher then players drop. If your DM is simply using the listed drops in the module and following standard selling rules then yes that could be a major problem.
You don't really go into detail as the source of your poor gear other then brief mention like the DM is stingy and that's it.
If the TPK comes then it's probably best at that point to suggest someone else try DMing. Though over the years I've found that often times people like this tend to become DM for 1 of 2 reasons. First of is no one else wants to do it and they are the best suited in terms of organizition and planning which are key to a successful DM. Or Second they are control freaks who like to do things their way and in some cases get a kick out of hold the players at the edge of death constantly.
EDIT: Also doubling back to explore every room isn't just for XP grinding Diablo style. My group likes to explore every corner because we are explorers. We like to look around and discover new things that might give us more of the story. Like for example in our game with the H1 module we happen to come down the stairs fight the goblins, go through the door on the west side into the undead area and find the stairs down to level 2. Needless to say we weren't confident of our abilites so we decided to check out the rest of level 1 first.
If we hadn't doubled back to search the other areas we wouldn't of found the one guy's Tomb, The goblin boss guy who fled through his secrat passage, or the big slime monster with the note from the slave traders. And best of all we would of missed out on the little entertaining goblin who was locked in the cell. I could go on with other such examples but I think you get my point. D&D isn't just a game with a bunch of rooms full of monsters for XP grinding. Most of the actually serve a purpose and have some story behind them that helps drive the overall story forward.
I know since this DM is running a module he might not feel the same but most DMs I know actually like it when players check all the rooms. Because DMs put a lot of time and effort into creating their worlds for the players. And they often feel bad when the players simply run by a room where they had something interesting setup but the players never went down that fork in the road. Because all that time and effort they put into it feels wasted. Which is why many DMs then simply reuse those items in a new place since the players never saw it the first time around.
EDIT: Shrinking wall of text and rehashing quotes.
I'm with the DM on this one. This is a player issue.
You are probabilly the only one (other then the DM himeself), and having the best tactics will not help you if you are worfully outclassed. That and unless the OP is lying the DM is obviously nging things wrong, as they are two low level for that part in the adventure, and from what the OP is saying the DM has taken steps to slow their advancement over the past several adventurers
I don't want to bicker about the specifics of every word I decided to type but I think if you read this full thread you'll see that there are people other than myself who feel that it's not unreasonable for the players to be challenged or to rise to the level of the challenge.
As for magic items we don't know the full extant of their gear. I know a GM out there who never rolls magic weapons on parcels. As a result the players at the table break down weak high level items (like wonderous items) and make their weapons. Furthermore a +1 is just that. I doubt the OP's group actually needs to break down items.
The intent of my original post is to highlight that problems like this can be solved with in game solutions, at the game, and in a way that is appropriate to being a gamer. I read the forums a lot and one of the most common answers is "talk to the GM". It's great to talk to have a dialogue with your GM but it seems odd to me that the solution to in game problems is usually handled on the meta level. We're playing role playing games, right?
This is it in character as a player. The GM could spell it out just like this.
The road has been gettin rough. You've only barely made it through a few fights by the skin of your teeth. You're poorly equipped and you know it's going to get more difficult ahead- WHAT DO YOU DO?
I would not have an issue if the DM was making his own adventures for us, since I would hope that he was crafting the encounters to be appropriate for our level. Instead, what's happening is that he is running us through a published module, and running it as-is despite the fact we're not at a high enough level for the encounters we are facing. In fact, in previous adventures he would have us skip entire sections of the dungeon (claiming that "this isn't Diablo where you have to explore every room") but provided nothing to even out the lost XP and treasure from not having those encounters, which is what resulted in us being lower level in the first place.
The main reasons we haven't had a death or TPK yet is because the DM has a habit of forgetting creature's special abilities and terrain features until midway through the fight. Also we tend to be slightly luckier than normal on our rolls, although the last fight we had the creatures were hitting us on ridiculously low rolls while we needed to roll roughly 12+ to hit them back.
I have not read the adventure, nor am I trying to "cheat". I only know about the final encounter and just the barest detail about a few upcoming ones because I was talking to a friend who has the adventure in question and saying how we were having a difficult time, and when I mentioned our levels he was basically like "That's too low, dude. You're gonna have a really difficult time with the rest of it."
OP, I bring to you the one thing that will surely prevent this DM's style not meshing with yours from continuing to spoil your fun - Become a DM.
I know, I know... no fair to say "hey, don't like how he does it; go do it yourself," but that is a way that has 100% effectiveness.
If you don't want to be a DM - talk with your other players, and if they agree it's not fun the way things are going: bring that to the DM as a unified whole. If he tries to ignore that, or berates you or belittles you in any way... refuse to play with him as the DM until he changes his ways. (which is honestly just saying "I'm getting a different DM then, adios muchacho.")
I had a DM for a while that sounds very much like the same guy you are dealing with - handing out constant beat-downs to the party, making encounters get harder at a faster rate than the characters gain levels - that would always say "well it must not be too bad since you keep playing," as a response to any comments or complaints.
After I was fed up with "the party gets captured by horrible creatures, you die trying to escape" sort of plotlines (we had 3 that were literally that plotline disguised as different things) I stopped playing and start running a game of my own on the same day of the week as his - his group of players now consists only of people that have been kicked out of mine... because one person showing the willingness to walk away is all it usually takes for the rest to stand up against the spoiling of their fun.
Unfortunately, apart from myself and my girlfriend the other 3 players are relatives of the DM, and are "casual" type players who don't really care, and don't realize that we're in over our heads. I was going to DM a second game but two players basically approached me outside of the game and said that D&D isn't really for them (despite the fact both of them seem to enjoy themselves while playing), and they probably won't be playing after we wrap up this campaign. The DM doesn't care about this either, saying how "all you need to play D&D is two people"
Unfortunately, apart from myself and my girlfriend the other 3 players are relatives of the DM, and are "casual" type players who don't really care, and don't realize that we're in over our heads. I was going to DM a second game but two players basically approached me outside of the game and said that D&D isn't really for them (despite the fact both of them seem to enjoy themselves while playing), and they probably won't be playing after we wrap up this campaign. The DM doesn't care about this either, saying how "all you need to play D&D is two people"
...with the population of our planet, it really isn't as hard as most people make it out to be to find 3-5 people around that want to play D&D.
I think what this really is is a case of the Old Schoolitis. I had a DM in 3.5 who was used to older editions, so he basically began barring feats we had taken from being used "because we were level 1".
Then he has me roll to hit with burning hands. Which really, I'd play along with his little game here, but he wouldn't tell me what to roll. So i just grabbed and rolled a d20 and wondered how he was going to interpit it.
OP, I bring to you the one thing that will surely prevent this DM's style not meshing with yours from continuing to spoil your fun - Become a DM.
I know, I know... no fair to say "hey, don't like how he does it; go do it yourself," but that is a way that has 100% effectiveness.
Actually it's 0% effective. Because you are a PLAYER and you want someone to DM for YOU the way you like to play. So sure by becoming the DM you can do everything the way you want but at the same time you don't get to then be the on the player side having to figure things out, wonder what's around every challenge, and etc. Sure you could have a DM Player Character in your campaign but players tend to frown on that and it's still not the same thing since you know everything that's going on behind the scenes.
Also not everyone has the time to DM. They might also lack the ability to be a good DM when it comes to story, organization, making things up on the fly, and so on. They might simply have issues like the OP does with the mechanics of how the DM is handling things. I know I've had this problem many times over the years. Where someone is DM of the group mainly cause they are best at coming up with creative stories and such but their mechanics and balancing abilities were horrible. When we tried other DMs everything was by the book and balanced but very bland. So it might not be as simple as "Do it yourself" which again doesn't address the issue of maybe they like to be on the player side of the table.
So... After this campaign is up, use meetup or other sites to fill in your numbers with people who want to run D&D the way you like it, with balanced encounters and the proper parcels.
I seem to have no trouble getting players for D&D. Use Meetup.com, post at your local hobby shop. I got a group together in less than a week, and added 4 players after 4 had scheduling problems, and I seem to always have people wanting to join my campaign, which btw is lvl 18 atm starting from lvl 1 over a year ago.
Going to Dreadhold at 14 is... scary. P2, while I consider it to be the best of the published scenarios, can be downright deadly for an unprepared party or one that, as you are, is too low level for what you're going to face. My advice is to fall back to Phaervorul and make some deals with the drow there. You're storming a major stronghold so the best thing to do in the situation is to have an army. Spend a few sessions working on RPing. Gain allies in the surrounding areas of the Underdark. After all, no-one wants an unchecked Abyssal Breach. Have a few combats, gain more XP and RP xp. Fight off a few more waves of demons that Varimathras sends through. When you feel you're reasy to head them off at the scource, go for it.
The DM can only control the game if the players let him. Even if the path is set down on rails, the players still choose to follow it. The choice to break away from what's written is always there.
Going to Dreadhold at 14 is... scary. P2, while I consider it to be the best of the published scenarios, can be downright deadly for an unprepared party or one that, as you are, is too low level for what you're going to face. My advice is to fall back to Phaervorul and make some deals with the drow there. You're storming a major stronghold so the best thing to do in the situation is to have an army. Spend a few sessions working on RPing. Gain allies in the surrounding areas of the Underdark. After all, no-one wants an unchecked Abyssal Breach. Have a few combats, gain more XP and RP xp. Fight off a few more waves of demons that Varimathras sends through. When you feel you're reasy to head them off at the scource, go for it.
The DM can only control the game if the players let him. Even if the path is set down on rails, the players still choose to follow it. The choice to break away from what's written is always there.
This is all excellent advice for handling the situation in character. :D
This isn't that hard of a case. Either you're having fun consistently to the point you can handle some frustration, or the frustration outweighs what fun there is. You seem to not be having fun, and the DM is not receptive to your concerns.
Three main options:
1) Stay in the game, and scrape through the dungeon or TPK. It will illustrate the issue of character level to the DM.
2) Leave the game, and explain why. It will illustrate the issue of player contentment. "Vanishing" doesn't solve much.
3) Continue playing, and barely scrape by the last fight again. Continue with the campaign assuming this is just how it's going to be.
I'll try the in-character suggestion above, but I believe that the DM said there's no exit; we used a portal or something in the drow vampire's home to get to a pit with four corners, with spiderweb bridges and a portal that leads further into Deadhold, but the one we used vanished.
I just raised my concern to him again on messenger and his response was "Well that's for me to worry about, not you guys. it wont be an issue at all the encounters have always been too easy and now you have 5 people, it will balance itself out. its supposed to be hard your invading a realm of orcus"
But if the module says 14-17 that means you should start at 14 and end at 17. Now if I understand you correctly you were level 13 at the start of this module? That's only 1 level behind so not a huge deal. But at the same time you make it sound like your approaching the end of the module and your still level 14?!?! This makes no sense at all you should be 15 if not 16 by now.Given that the encounters are higher level then you that means fewer of them would level up faster. Now I understand you mention your DM is "House ruling" that your party of 4 each gets XP as if it were a party of 5. Which is really short changing you right there.
(snip)
But if your in danager of hitting the last encounter and only gained 1 level while starting at a lower level then recommended in an module designed to raise you 3 levels you gotta cry foul. Something is not right there. Either the module doesn't raise you as fast as it should or your DM is doing somehting wrong. Even with you getting XP as if you were a 5 player group you still should have gained more then 1 level being 3/4 of the way through it. That means you've earned 3/4 of the total XP for the module or at least there about. So let's see 3/4 of 3 levels is 9/4 or 2.25 levels worth.
Setting aside the question of whether or not the players are "bringing their A game," this post right here makes some outstanding points that need to be explored.
My group of 5 has just entered Deadhold in this adventure; however we only just hit 14th level about three fights ago and the DM does not scale anything since he incorrectly thinks that since P2 says it's supposed to take us from 14th to 17th level that it means it's designed for characters of 14th through 17th level. A friend who has the adventure (not someone in our group) has warned me that the final encounter is a massive EL21, which is pretty much a guaranteed TPK for any group lower than 17th level (it's off the charts and classified as "too hard" according to the Encounter Builder). This friend has also said that every fight we have left is at least EL 17, which would mean that everything left is going to be at the least "hard" and at the most nigh unbeatable. Since the next adventure, P3, expects us to be 17th level at the start it seems as though our group is headed for failure since at this point we should be 16th level headed towards 17th, and instead we are only 14th level with roughly 12th or 13th level gear.
I've raised these concerns with the DM and he ignores it, in fact he said prior to my girlfriend joining our group (at which point we only had 4 PCs) that 4 PCs could handle the published adventures just fine; he was actually still dividing our fights by 5 PCs instead of 4 at this time, yet not scaling the encounters down - so we were fighting encounters designed for 5 PCs with only 4, and having 1/5 of the XP just go into limbo.
What can I do in a situation like this? My fun and interest in the game is starting to wane since I know that we're basically fighting encounters that are on the cusp of being too high for our level and nothing is done to even it out; the DM basically follows the encounters verbatim as printed in the adventure, without understanding how the EL system works in 4e and that he should be scaling the fights down or making sure that we're high enough level to deal with it.
A party played well can handle encounters of two levels above their own quite easily. I don't mean to slam your DM, but since he doesn't understand the issue you are raising, he can't be too focused on the game. Because of this, he probably won't be to focused on running the opposition to the maximum. Nothing wrong with having a life outside of DD, of course. I would like to comfort you by saying that my lvl 4 party just beat a "credo" lvl 9 solo which is five levels above them, obviously.
Just relax. If he wipes you, join another group ;)
To sum it up, here's my issues with my DM so far:
- He doesn't scale encounters, using them exactly as written in the modules with no deviation whatsoever. He firmly believes that the encounters are properly balanced for four PCs and that our group is actually more powerful now that we've added a 5th member; he actually said he should be increasing the difficulty now that we have a 5th person.
- He will repeatedly point out that we don't have to fight everything and explore every room in a "dungeon", but when we don't (either through DM coercion or because we don't bother to backtrack) he doesn't do anything to balance out the lost XP and treasure by not having those encounters (thus, we've been at least a level or two behind the expected level in every adventure so far - this wouldn't be a problem if he was creating his own adventures, but see point 1 above). He also rarely if ever throws any random encounters our way.
- He thinks that an adventure to take us from 14th through 17th level means that we should be somewhere within those level ranges (as the old 1st and 2nd edition modules were; for a party of Xth through Yth level) in addition to point one above, so thinks that we're absolutely fine facing encounters 3-4 levels higher than us since we have a 5th person now. We started P2 at 13th level (and started P1 before even hitting Paragon tier) and have only just hit 14th level as we're approaching the final area (the main subject of the thread). This is troublesome because he will run P3 exactly as it's written, but we won't be at the expected level range, which means we won't hit epic by it's close, which means we won't be epic when we start E1, and so on up to meaning that by the time we're in E3 we will be facing Orcus at possibly level 27/28 (level assumed based on past experiences).
- Before we had 5 people, he would do point one above and still divide our XP by 5, stating that if he didn't we would level too quickly (which is correct, but also why the encounters are supposed to be reduced slightly for 4 PCs, so dividing XP by 4 results in an appropriate amount). In other words, we were fighting encounters designed for 5 PCs, and losing out on XP for them.
- He often refuses to allow the RAW to work as it should, based on a belief that it "doesn't make sense". For instance, he won't let Push powers work on certain creatures (unless the effect comes from magical means), he denies Combat Superiority if he feels a creature wouldn't stop when hit, and the like. He also frowns on using tactics at the table, going so far as to claim it's metagaming to refer to a martial power (e.g. Griffon's Wrath) by name, since "to everyone else the Fighter is just swinging his sword." This is balanced somewhat by the fact he usually forgets a monster's special abilities until mid/end of a battle (also the reason why, while every fight since midway through H3 has been a grind, we have yet to have a PC death).
- He doesn't dole out treasure as he should. We are now 14th level and most of us still have +2 weapons and I think the last time we found tangible magic items (as opposed to gold) was at the end of P1, and it wasn't even items that we could use so we ended up just turning them into residuum). Going from memory (and I'm missing some items; just mentioning relevant things here) we have:
- Dwarf Cleric: +2 Flaming Maul (found early in H2), +3 Scale Armor
- Eladrin Ranger: +2 Feyslaughter Bow, +3 (?) Leather (possibly Hide)
- Eladrin Wizard: +2 Staff of Storms (found early in H3), +3 Cloth
- Dragonborn Fighter (me): +3 Mordant Bastard Sword (found midway through P1), +3 Black Iron Scale
- Dragonborn Sorcerer (my girlfriend; joined us later so has appropriate L13 gear): +3 Staff of Ruin, +2 Dagger (Dual Implement), +3 Leather
He doesn't scale encounters, using them exactly as written in the modules with no deviation whatsoever. He firmly believes that the encounters are properly balanced for four PCs and that our group is actually more powerful now that we've added a 5th member; he actually said he should be increasing the difficulty now that we have a 5th person.
Your DM is wrong. Or, at least, he's not reading the module - the part where it says it's balanced for 5 players. Book 1, page 3, for the record.
Of course, most of the modules appear to be "balanced" around the kind of characters who show up in the podcast: Not just "non-optimised", but "don't use 3/4 of their class features and forget 90% of their bonuses, all the time".
Before we had 5 people, he would do point one above and still divide our XP by 5, stating that if he didn't we would level too quickly (which is correct, but also why the encounters are supposed to be reduced slightly for 4 PCs, so dividing XP by 4 results in an appropriate amount). In other words, we were fighting encounters designed for 5 PCs, and losing out on XP for them.
Again, your GM is wrong. He should look at the DMG.
He often refuses to allow the RAW to work as it should, based on a belief that it "doesn't make sense". For instance, he won't let Push powers work on certain creatures (unless the effect comes from magical means), he denies Combat Superiority if he feels a creature wouldn't stop when hit, and the like.
He's gone from "wrong" into "actively stupid"
(Snip magic items list)
I note a couple of Adventurer's Vault items in the list. You also say you've trashed a couple of items - why aren't you using Transfer Enchantment to make those items into something you can use? It's an L4 ritual. As well, you're L14. Even if you haven't seen a pile of +4 item drops (which you should have) you should have had enough cash for everyone to pick up L11 "Weapon +3" items with Enchant Magic Weapon.
- He often refuses to allow the RAW to work as it should, based on a belief that it "doesn't make sense". For instance, he won't let Push powers work on certain creatures (unless the effect comes from magical means), he denies Combat Superiority if he feels a creature wouldn't stop when hit, and the like. He also frowns on using tactics at the table, going so far as to claim it's metagaming to refer to a martial power (e.g. Griffon's Wrath) by name, since "to everyone else the Fighter is just swinging his sword." This is balanced somewhat by the fact he usually forgets a monster's special abilities until mid/end of a battle (also the reason why, while every fight since midway through H3 has been a grind, we have yet to have a PC death).
Man this should have been the heart of your argument from the beginning! I'd be very frank and say "I'm playing a fighter for my class features. If I can't use combat superiority I'd like you to tell me which defender I can play that DOES get to use ALL it's class features."
Also you can probably get around the so-called meta gaming to have your character teach your party the names of your special techniques. You can cite the reason for this being that it's gettin tough ahead and that the five of you need to learn what each other can do in order to survive the coming challenges.
My party went through this adventure at the same level you are. We skipped several encounters and houses in the drow city so didn't advance very much. I assume the same happened to you guys.
We had no trouble at all with the adventure, and certainly nothing close to a death.
I think until you are actually losing fights then enjoy the challenge. I often wish that adventures were more challenging.
The lack of loot is a problem with the adventure path. If any DMs are running it liberally add magic items to it please. We have the exact same problem and it doesn't get better anytime soon.
My party was heavily optimized with around the same number of players as you, depending who showed up. Our cleric didn't show up for the final battle and we cleaned it out without using a single heal (3 level 15 strikers and a level 15 defender).
I would relax, play your best, and enjoy the challenge.
> based on a belief that it "doesn't make sense". For
> instance,
(snip)
The rest could be chalked up to a combination of sloppiness/laziness/not knowing the rules, but when this enters the picture it's hammergun time.
Get out of the game, and to those other players who feel that D&D isn't for them, make it very clear that what this guy has been presenting them with isn't what the game is actually like.
The DM has Editionitis and has refused treatment.
His entire gaming philosophy seems to be stuck in the 70s.
The DM has Editionitis and has refused treatment.
His entire gaming philosophy seems to be stuck in the 70s.
Ohgawd. That has to suck.
Being the DM in question here I must say this has been a very interesting read. I am going to touch on a few points, but most of this I'm not going to really dignify with an answer for serveral reasons.
1. I wish I had time to customize more things more but I don't.
2. This particular adventure is set up where it is possible to side step much of the adventure, you guys did.
3. I've done xp the way I have to keep you on track. In the herioc teir you guys were always too far ahead even when dividing the xp by 5 for 4 people. Now your a little behind, and like I said, that is for me to worry about fixing, which I will.
4. The fights haven't been that hard, even when we had four players, you guys just rush into every room the same way everytime and start the slaughter without even looking for another solution.
5. I have given out magic items according to the adventure, except I have often switched out items no one could use with something better. I also wrote a shopping trip to Sigil into the P1 to P2 crossover and gave everyone access to every item in the game.
6. There has not been a single character death in the over a year this campaign has been going. And, a tpk has never even been a concern since Kalarel in H1.
7. Having a player verbally start complaining that an encounter that the party is easily winning is to hard / unbalanced and needs to have errata during the middle of the encounter does indeed make the encounter feel like a grind for everyone involved.
8. The beholder and magma brutes you fought three encounters ago was a random encounter. I knew you were behind the curve and I have been working to fix it.
9. This is my first time DMing.
The DM has Editionitis and has refused treatment.
His entire gaming philosophy seems to be stuck in the 70s.
That isn't really true. I just don't like playing table top Diablo ;) It isn't the rules that flavor the game, its what you do with them.
Ooooohhh...the DM just showed up....
The DM has Editionitis and has refused treatment.
His entire gaming philosophy seems to be stuck in the 70s.
That isn't really true. I just don't like playing table top Diablo ;) It isn't the rules that flavor the game, its what you do with them.
Right... and "ignoring them situationally because the DM says it makes sense," is what you do with them - just like Gygax in the 70s... since then, generally accepted game philosophy has moved on more to a "use the rules that are written in the book all the time, or none of the time, making a formal decision before the gaming session has even begun."
So yes, that is really true - even if you have never played another edition before, you have Editionitis.
Right... and "ignoring them situationally because the DM says it makes sense," is what you do with them - just like Gygax in the 70s... since then, generally accepted game philosophy has moved on more to a "use the rules that are written in the book all the time, or none of the time, making a formal decision before the gaming session has even begun."So yes, that is really true - even if you have never played another edition before, you have Editionitis.
You say that like it's a bad thing. What's wrong with altering the rules to cover situations?
The DM has Editionitis and has refused treatment.
His entire gaming philosophy seems to be stuck in the 70s.
That isn't really true. I just don't like playing table top Diablo ;) It isn't the rules that flavor the game, its what you do with them.
Right... and "ignoring them situationally because the DM says it makes sense," is what you do with them - just like Gygax in the 70s... since then, generally accepted game philosophy has moved on more to a "use the rules that are written in the book all the time, or none of the time, making a formal decision before the gaming session has even begun."So yes, that is really true - even if you have never played another edition before, you have Editionitis.
And a fighter stopping a green dragon mid flight is stupid in any edition. That was the one and only time I didn't let a power fully work, so don't read the posts like I have done it frequently. There have been plenty of other times that I thought the fighter powers were completely stupid where I let them work as written, ie. stopping a swarm from moving.
Always nice to have the GM chiming in on these things, otherwise they can get somewhat one-sided. Having both sides of something makes it much easier to adjudicate.
2. This particular adventure is set up where it is possible to side step much of the adventure, you guys did.
I suspected this might have been the case. It's the problem with open layout adventurers such as this. Less linearity means players can go somewhere even if they're not ready. It's one of the reasons I enjoy them so much.
4. The fights haven't been that hard, even when we had four players, you guys just rush into every room the same way everytime and start the slaughter without even looking for another solution.
Are they able to run away again when it becomes necessary?
6. There has not been a single character death in the over a year this campaign has been going. And, a tpk has never even been a concern since Kalarel in H1.
Doing better than my group. We lost four in Thunderspire Labyrinth (Two died fighting Duegar, two died attempting to rescue the previous two from the Duegar with another two getting KO'd and hauled away by the BBEG's goons after the party had asked him to send help) and another two in the Pyramid of Shadows. And there are 6-8 of us for most sessions.
7. Having a player verbally start complaining that an encounter that the party is easily winning is to hard / unbalanced and needs to have errata during the middle of the encounter does indeed make the encounter feel like a grind for everyone involved.
I like to see comments like this. They make everything seem much more sensible. Best thing to do when something is too hard is to run away and come back better prepared I find. Hence why I suggested it earlier in the thread.
9. This is my first time DMing.
How are you enjoying it?
Are they able to run away again when it becomes necessary?
Yes.
I like to see comments like this. They make everything seem much more sensible. Best thing to do when something is too hard is to run away and come back better prepared I find. Hence why I suggested it earlier in the thread.
They were actually doing perfectly fine when the complaining started. Only two of five PCs had actually even been bloodied. Heck only three had even taken a hit.
How are you enjoying it?
I enjoy it, I just wish I had more time to put into it, but I like to play other games to, and work & wife always take up time as well.
In all honesty what he said about me blowing off some* of his complaints is completely true, because some of the things being complained about a player has no business knowing in the first place in my opinion. A player knowing the encounter level of the encounters or about the loot drops or what level you are at a certain point in the adventure? All of that is way to much meta gaming for me. As a player I would be thinking wow these fights are getting tough, we better start planning our attacks better, or hey we must be near Insertname's lair. It wouldn't even cross my mind to complain, let alone interupt the game for everyone else at the table by complaining out loud.
I make mistakes and screw up a lot, it is my first time trying to DM. I constantly forget moster powers (especially auras) and terrain effects. I play to have a good time, but some people seem to play like they are actually going to win something.
From what I can tell, there is something bothering this group of players. I have no idea what it is, of course. All I can see is, they argue, but they don't try to find a solution. They don't try to share a common perspective. It's like this sometimes- players who have never been DM sometimes have a hard time understanding their DM, and its sometimes the other way around, too. Maybe they should try finding some common ground, like, "how do we have fun playing?" At least that's a start.
From what I can tell, there is something bothering this group of players. I have no idea what it is, of course. All I can see is, they argue, but they don't try to find a solution. They don't try to share a common perspective. It's like this sometimes- players who have never been DM sometimes have a hard time understanding their DM, and its sometimes the other way around, too. Maybe they should try finding some common ground, like, "how do we have fun playing?" At least that's a start.
I am more than happy to address some of his concerns like the treasure drops, and some I was already working on fixing like there current level in relation to the adventure. But honestly this isn't a group issue. All the other players are new and enjoying themselves. This is more of a power gamer in a none power gamer game issue. Maybe I shouldn't say power gamer, but a player that knows the rules better than the DM. I am a n00b DM for sure, and I make lots of mistakes, but I fix them as we go to the best of my ability.
He is a great player / friend and an asset to our group, but he needs to let me DM, and let me worry about the groups ability to handle the encounters that I throw at them. If he wants to DM, I am ready and waiting (with character already made) for his Eberron campaign.
With all that said, I am done with this thread. See you at the next game Mr. Kanobi it'll all work out fine.
I am a n00b DM for sure, and I make lots of mistakes, but I fix them as we go to the best of my ability.
Do you *actually* refuse to let people's powers and class features work as written?
Do you warn them *before* they try to use them that you're going to ignore what the book says the power they chose actually does?
(These are, by the way, the biggest "mistakes" I've heard on this thread. And I'm wondering if you're going to correct 'em.)
I am a n00b DM for sure, and I make lots of mistakes, but I fix them as we go to the best of my ability.Do you *actually* refuse to let people's powers and class features work as written?
Do you warn them *before* they try to use them that you're going to ignore what the book says the power they chose actually does?
(These are, by the way, the biggest "mistakes" I've heard on this thread. And I'm wondering if you're going to correct 'em.)
One time vs a flying green dragon, I didn't let a fighters power stop it's movement, and that was a couple adventures ago.
One time vs a flying green dragon, I didn't let a fighters power stop it's movement, and that was a couple adventures ago.
And do you agree (with me) that this was a mistake, and you're not going to have it happen again?
Or do you think that was a good decision?
(Seriously, the Green Dragon in the Well Of Demons? How the hell did the Fighter even *get* a movement-triggered OA against that? If it was dumb enough to trigger it and he was smart enough to take it, he *should* have stopped it, but it should never have come up in that encounter. movement-stopping OAs against the dragon should require *three* Fighters to set up, on that map.)
One time vs a flying green dragon, I didn't let a fighters power stop it's movement, and that was a couple adventures ago.
And do you agree (with me) that this was a mistake, and you're not going to have it happen again?
Or do you think that was a good decision?
(Seriously, the Green Dragon in the Well Of Demons? How the hell did the Fighter even *get* a movement-triggered OA against that? If it was dumb enough to trigger it and he was smart enough to take it, he *should* have stopped it, but it should never have come up in that encounter. movement-stopping OAs against the dragon should require *three* Fighters to set up, on that map.)
Yup that was the one, they played it smart and got back into a group before the dragon could get much going. Would I do it again? I am not sure, I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness (like the cleric +2 minor to sustain buff power). The only other time I have wanted to actually deny that power though is with swarms.
Yup that was the one, they played it smart and got back into a group before the dragon could get much going. Would I do it again? I am not sure, I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness (like the cleric +2 minor to sustain buff power). The only other time I have wanted to actually deny that power though is with swarms
I love that Encounter. Seriously, the Dragon kind of *wants* them up together. It moves in, Luring Glares, breathes, then retreats using Luring Glare, Flyby Attack, and moves. It waits until both powers have recharged and all the PCs have saved against the ongoing damage, then repeats.
The PCs are stuck charging after it and splitting up to try to cut it off, and they're stuck either going after it through all the traps, or letting it recharge it's powers and come back in on it's own schedule. For bonus points, it stops just *barely* within range of the PCs move+attack, and when they do it, it Flyby Attacks away and then moves. Again.
(Swarms: Fighters both can and SHOULD stop swarms. It's all about how yo9u can't afford to ignore the fighter, regardless of how small you are.)
Yup that was the one, they played it smart and got back into a group before the dragon could get much going. Would I do it again? I am not sure, I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness (like the cleric +2 minor to sustain buff power). The only other time I have wanted to actually deny that power though is with swarmsI love that Encounter. Seriously, the Dragon kind of *wants* them up together. It moves in, Luring Glares, breathes, then retreats using Luring Glare, Flyby Attack, and moves. It waits until both powers have recharged and all the PCs have saved against the ongoing damage, then repeats.
The PCs are stuck charging after it and splitting up to try to cut it off, and they're stuck either going after it through all the traps, or letting it recharge it's powers and come back in on it's own schedule. For bonus points, it stops just *barely* within range of the PCs move+attack, and when they do it, it Flyby Attacks away and then moves. Again.
(Swarms: Fighters both can and SHOULD stop swarms. It's all about how yo9u can't afford to ignore the fighter, regardless of how small you are.)
Fighters stopping swarms is stupid no matter how you argue it.
As far as how I played the green dragon, did you miss where I said I was both a new and bad DM?
I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness
Also: Are you applying the Combat Superiority move-stopper to the Combat Challenge attacks?
As in, are you letting the Fighter stop *Shifts*?
That's not supposed to happen. Combat Challenge gives you Immediates, and Combat Superiority only applies to Opportunities.
And, importantly, AT WORST, a monster can Move to provoke an OA (and maybe get stopped) and then MOVE AGAIN with no fear of stoppage (since Fighters get only one OA per person's turn) to definitely get away. Given that most Swarms have Auras and they can move into the square of a person and auto-attack 'em, a Swarm can *take* two Move Actions, accept the OA, get possibly stopped once, and still be scary.
As far as how I played the green dragon, did you miss where I said I was both a new and bad DM?
I don't think you're bad, I think you're new.
*Most* GMs do that Encounter badly. The fact that I love it doesn't mean I've ever *played* it done well. Part of the problem is that the Green Dragon's defenses are a little low - it's a little too easy for it to get ground-and-pounded by Grab or Immobilise effects from Controllers.
I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness
Also: Are you applying the Combat Superiority move-stopper to the Combat Challenge attacks?As in, are you letting the Fighter stop *Shifts*?
That's not supposed to happen. Combat Challenge gives you Immediates, and Combat Superiority only applies to Opportunities.
And, importantly, AT WORST, a monster can Move to provoke an OA (and maybe get stopped) and then MOVE AGAIN with no fear of stoppage (since Fighters get only one OA per person's turn) to definitely get away. Given that most Swarms have Auras and they can move into the square of a person and auto-attack 'em, a Swarm can *take* two Move Actions, accept the OA, get possibly stopped once, and still be scary.
Yes, the fighter is stopping shifts.
Yes, the fighter is stopping shifts.
Okay! That's a REALLY COMMON mistake (I made it myself, and so has almost everyone else I've ever played with. Seriously. Don't feel bad.)
Fighters get +WIS to hit on OPPORTUNITY attacks, and stop movement if the OPPORTUNITY attack was provoked by the move
Fighters get to attack adjacent marked enemies who Shift or attack without hitting them as an IMMEDIATE.
Opportunities and Immediates are similar, but totally not the same. And it's a really critical difference.
Fighters *cannot* stop Shifts.
This makes a world of difference.
The other thing that makes a giant difference is that you get ONE AND ONLY ONE OA PER ENEMY'S TURN. So if the enemy uses a Ranged Attack and you take the OA for it, you can't OA and end his movement when he Moves away in the same turn.
I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness
Also: Are you applying the Combat Superiority move-stopper to the Combat Challenge attacks?As in, are you letting the Fighter stop *Shifts*?
That's not supposed to happen. Combat Challenge gives you Immediates, and Combat Superiority only applies to Opportunities.
And, importantly, AT WORST, a monster can Move to provoke an OA (and maybe get stopped) and then MOVE AGAIN with no fear of stoppage (since Fighters get only one OA per person's turn) to definitely get away. Given that most Swarms have Auras and they can move into the square of a person and auto-attack 'em, a Swarm can *take* two Move Actions, accept the OA, get possibly stopped once, and still be scary.
Yes, the fighter is stopping shifts.
I don't stop shifts, I get my immediate reaction once per turn if I choose against shifts if I have somebody marked (I've also never taken more than 1 OA per turn); that's not the same as an OA against them. I also have Shield Push so I push them 1 square when I hit with that. My getting the attack on shifts isn't the same thing as stopping; I don't recall ever stopping something that shifted with my Combat Superiority, but yes I've taken Combat Challenge against them if they shift or attack an ally and I choose to take it then.
Oh, you also didn't like that I was using Tide of Iron against that Fomorian in P1 because he was like 15 feet tall (or more?). Never mind the whole "it's metagaming to say the name of powers" thing, which I really don't agree with.
I don't stop shifts, I get my immediate reaction once per turn if I choose against shifts if I have somebody marked (I've also never taken more than 1 OA per turn); that's not the same as an OA against them. I also have Shield Push so I push them 1 square when I hit with that. My getting the attack on shifts isn't the same thing as stopping; I don't recall ever stopping something that shifted with my Combat Superiority, but yes I've taken Combat Challenge against them.
You *appear* to be doing this exactly right. That doesn't mean it's actually happening that way, or that the GM is planning based around the correct rules. Clarifying this for *both* of you is important.
Oh, you also didn't like that I was using Tide of Iron against that Fomorian in P1 because he was like 15 feet tall (or more?). Never mind the whole "it's metagaming to say the name of powers" thing, which I really don't agree with.
Tide Of Iron only works on things one size above you, at most. I don't *think* any of the Fomorians in P1 are Huge, but, if they are, they're immune to the Push from Tide Of Iron.
Saying the name of powers: Yeah, characters should know what they can do and combine tactics based on what they can do as a team, seriously.
I do feel that power is way over powered almost to the point of sillyness
Also: Are you applying the Combat Superiority move-stopper to the Combat Challenge attacks?As in, are you letting the Fighter stop *Shifts*?
That's not supposed to happen. Combat Challenge gives you Immediates, and Combat Superiority only applies to Opportunities.
And, importantly, AT WORST, a monster can Move to provoke an OA (and maybe get stopped) and then MOVE AGAIN with no fear of stoppage (since Fighters get only one OA per person's turn) to definitely get away. Given that most Swarms have Auras and they can move into the square of a person and auto-attack 'em, a Swarm can *take* two Move Actions, accept the OA, get possibly stopped once, and still be scary.
Yes, the fighter is stopping shifts.I don't stop shifts, I get my immediate reaction once per turn if I choose against shifts if I have somebody marked (I've also never taken more than 1 OA per turn); that's not the same as an OA against them. I also have Shield Push so I push them 1 square when I hit with that. My getting the attack on shifts isn't the same thing as stopping; I don't recall ever stopping something that shifted with my Combat Superiority, but yes I've taken Combat Challenge against them if they shift or attack an ally and I choose to take it then.
Oh, you also didn't like that I was using Tide of Iron against that Fomorian in P1 because he was like 15 feet tall (or more?). Never mind the whole "it's metagaming to say the name of powers" thing, which I really don't agree with.
I forgot that we fixed the attacks stopping shifs a while ago. But the green dragon was the only time I can recall saying 'no that power doesn't work'. I meant to play the Formerian as huge because that was the mini size, I don't recall how it even came up that it wasn't huge.
Right... and "ignoring them situationally because the DM says it makes sense," is what you do with them - just like Gygax in the 70s... since then, generally accepted game philosophy has moved on more to a "use the rules that are written in the book all the time, or none of the time, making a formal decision before the gaming session has even begun."So yes, that is really true - even if you have never played another edition before, you have Editionitis.
You say that like it's a bad thing. What's wrong with altering the rules to cover situations?
Nothing is wrong with it... if you do it in a way the doesn't undermine the rules randomly or without the player knowing how their powers work all the time.
Basically, the problem is not that the DM changed a rule - it's that he did so in a way that removed an expected function of the character when that function was called into play.
Even when not done in spite, that method can leave players thinking "My DM just gimped my character because I was doing better than he wanted me to."
I also have a personal hatred of that method because "I changed it because it didn't make sense," is very often synonymous with "I refused to open my mind to any description that fit the rules."
I want to clarify something I mentioned earlier, because I said it incorrectly. I had mentioned using Tide of Iron on a Fomorian and my DM ruled that I was not able to push him; in fact, I used Frontline Surge (Iron Vanguard encounter); Tide of Iron does have a size restriction on what you can push, while Frontline Surge does not.
I want to clarify something I mentioned earlier, because I said it incorrectly. I had mentioned using Tide of Iron on a Fomorian and my DM ruled that I was not able to push him; in fact, I used Frontline Surge (Iron Vanguard encounter); Tide of Iron does have a size restriction on what you can push, while Frontline Surge does not.
I don't really remember your probably right.
Full marks to the DM for coming forward and taking it on the chin. It's nice to hear both sides!
Also, full marks for being willing to take on the DM's role. It's not for everyone, but everyone wants a good one... and for a first attempt, I'm personally glad to see you're not afraid to put your own spin on things.
While I agree that any functional alterations should be set out ahead of time, I understand the reasoning behind your decisions... and although I wouldn't have ruled as you did, I would probably have mentioned how ridiculous it was, while trying to come up with a colourful way of making it feasible. I would never inform them that they're not supposed to expore... because that's metagame talk, and frankly, the players should do what they enjoy, if it's reasonable. Exploring rooms is eminently reasonable, if the rooms exist. If you want to slow them down, put some traps around. It'll make them think twice. XP and treasure, or HP? They should still have the choice, though, and have a chance to bypass or conquer any hazards you place.
I know that can be tedious, as DM. You have your agenda, and sometimes you wish they'd just get on with it. But that's the joy of DM'ing.
One thing that consistently irritates me is the idea (fortunately absent from my group, but occasionally very present and thriving on these boards) that the players have just as much right to tell the DM how they want things to work as the DM does. This is not the case. Sometimes the DM makes decisions on the fly, and that's his prerogative. If using a certain mechanic trivializes an encounter, the DM reserves the right to render a monster immune. This should never be overused or abused, but sometimes predictability is the enemy of fun.
If you decide you can't trust the DM's judgement and it's ruining your fun, speak on it, but do so after the game, and in private. Nothing kills a good game vibe faster than OOC complaining at the table.
Just my two cents. To the DM, don't be afraid to mess up. It's a learning experience. To the player - be cool. Only the DM knows how well you're doing. That's what he's there for. Do your job, let him do his.
And yeah, I tend to come down more on the DM's side, because it's a heck of a lot harder to be a good DM than it is to be a good PC.
Sometimes the DM makes decisions on the fly, and that's his prerogative. If using a certain mechanic trivializes an encounter, the DM reserves the right to render a monster immune. This should never be overused or abused, but sometimes predictability is the enemy of fun.
There is a lot to cover in those few statements. First of which the DM does have the right to make decisions on the fly. But he shouldn't alter the rules or the way the player's powers work. No matter the reason this will almost never sit well with the players. And is a very selfish way to play as their putting their own feelings of how things should work above that of both the players, which out number the DM, and the established rules.
Second I think failure is the quickest teacher. I've played many games over the years not just D&D and seen many play styles. One thing I noticed is when you keep giving people leeway on forgetting how things work or over looking to do something and then have to turn back the clock as it were then they seem to keep doing it over and over. They seem to fail to learn their lesson so they repeat the same mistake over and over. While in games where we simply say they missed out on it or bad things happens because they forgot the other side could do some nasty trick. Those players tend to catch on pretty quick and remember things a lot better.
The point is the applies to the DM as well. They should keep in mind some of the players most common and powerful powers that could have major impact on the encounter. They should also plan their tactics with those powers in mind as well as when they are creating the encounter. In the case of Modules though they DM can skim through them ahead of time and make changes to the encounter as they see fit since modules are simply a baseline for an adventure and not set in stone. The DM just like a player is more likely to remember getting smacked around by a character's power and thus keep it in mind for later then they would be if they simply negate it on the fly.
I've studied a little bit of psychology and studies have shown that negative reinforcement (aka punishment) is a better motivator/teacher then positive reinforcement (aka rewards). On a side note though behavior often returns to original when the negative reinforcement is removed though where as it remains changed even after positive reinforcement is removed. Which goes to show rewards have better longterm impact ;).
Predictability is NOT the enemy of fun. Predictability IS fun. I think you are confusing predictability with monotony, which is simple repetitive task. Again back to psychology and the study of the human mind. Our minds love patterns and predictability. It's why humans are so good at finding patterns in things. It's also why every game ever made has a set of predictable rules which all players learn, understand, and usually follow. Those who don't follow the rules are called "cheaters". Just like in real life curtain actions have curtain expected outcomes (aka predictable) which people find jarring and disconcerting when those expectations are not met. This sense of breaking from the norm is NOT fun for most people and often unpleasant.
Sure in a game of D&D many things are unpredictable from the player's point of view. Things like how a NPC might react to them, what's behind the next door, and etc. These kind of things are expected though so they are predictably unpredictable 
. But even then the players often know many of the possible outcomes and often make an educated guess at what could happen given their past experiences thus far. But that is also part of the game which follows it's own kind of pattern.
Over the years I've found that in games where the DM changes rules on the fly have been the least enjoyable not only for myself but also for most of the other players. Often times the groups don't last beyond a dozen or so sessions. Many times they last as long as they do cause there is no other group available at the time or they simply think they can change the DM's attitude. In one extreme case the DM thought it would be "cool" to have Loki the god of mischief constantly interfering with the players. This didn't go over well cause he would appear randomly when we in the middle of doing stuff, be it talking to NPCs, fighting monsters, or exploring dungeons, and randomly do stuff or often teleport us to some new location because he wanted us to do something there. And of course he got very mad when we didn't do as he wanted doing nasty things to our chars. Needless to say the complete loss of predictability of what to expect from one moment to the next in that campaigned caused it to quickly fall apart. Because every time we thought we were getting a sense of the area we were thrown into another location. Just to give you an idea Loki showed up about every other session to teleport us someplace new but always showed up every session to at least mess with us.
EDIT: I'd like to point out that I'm talking about changing rules on the fly. The DM can change rules a head of time and notify the players of these changes. This way even though the player might not like some of the changes at least they know what the rules are and what to expect thus they know how their powers will behavior in a predictable manner before using them.
Because the DM changing things on the fly by saying, "Oh I forgot you could do that. Well that doesn't make 'sense' in this case so you can't do that." in any other type of game would have the other players crying fouling and calling them a cheat. And frankly I'm amazed at times how people give the coup out answer of they are the DM they can do "anything". Which is not true because they are bound by the same rules as the players. They only difference is they get to control what is in the world.
There is a lot to cover in those few statements. First of which the DM does have the right to make decisions on the fly. But he shouldn't alter the rules or the way the player's powers work. No matter the reason this will almost never sit well with the players. And is a very selfish way to play as their putting their own feelings of how things should work above that of both the players, which out number the DM, and the established rules...
...[snip]...
...Because the DM changing things on the fly by saying, "Oh I forgot you could do that. Well that doesn't make 'sense' in this case so you can't do that." in any other type of game would have the other players crying fouling and calling them a cheat. And frankly I'm amazed at times how people give the coup out answer of they are the DM they can do "anything". Which is not true because they are bound by the same rules as the players. They only difference is they get to control what is in the world.
You make some very good points, Pyro, and thanks for taking the time to write all that out! Some excellent advice there.
Firstly, I think you may have misunderstood my intent... which is fair enough, I summed up an awful lot in a couple of brief sentences. The important qualifiers, as far as I'm concerned, are "not to be overused or abused" and "SOMETIMES predictability is the enemy of fun."
I'm not talking about rendering every bad guy immune to a player's favourite move. I'm not talking about neutering half the bonus effects of each player's powers without warning.
I'm talking about once in a while, that fireball HEALS the fire construct. Once in a while, that slashing weapon isn't going to cut it (pun intended). Once in a while, that critical hit DOESN'T do max damage, although it does hit automatically. And perhaps most importantly, I'm talking about this being planned for ahead of time, not a "Oh, well, um, that didn't work."
As far as players outnumbering the DM, that has exactly NOTHING to do with anything. The DM has the right to do what he pleases, and the responsibility not to ruin everyone's fun. Simple as. Both are important.
If someone is using a broadsword to stop a dragon in mid-flight, I may allow it to work the first time, but I'll come out and say that it won't work again, unless there's a damn good reason for it to work. If you're not careful, the rules-as-written can be the enemy of immersion.
I read an awesome article on the Wizards D'n'D site quite recently about the role of rules in a game, and the dev writer himself said that the rules are there to give you a framework, and in no way do they supercede a conscious decision by a DM. That's where my "do not overuse or abuse" rule comes into play, because it's real easy to wreck things if you start messing about too much.
You may not agree, and you may think that the best way to run things is purely RAW, complete with the DM rolling in the open. I'm sure many would agree with that. I don't, though, and at least one dev doesn't either. The DM is NOT bound by the same rules. I don't throw the rulebook out the window, but I also don't let it restrict me. Always give your players a fighting chance, by all means, but don't feel you have to hold slavishly to the rules as written. They were never meant to be the be-all and end-all of the game. If you don't OVERUSE it, and make the rules utterly irrelevant, or ABUSE it, and make the game no fun at all, it's a wonderful tool to have.
It's a tough line to walk, and real easy to mess up... but if your players are having fun, you're doing just fine. And so far, mine are.
I hope that helped clarify my position somewhat, and I apologize if the post misled anyone that might be cruising for hints or tips (unlikely, but it could happen)!
I think we both having a little misunderstanding of each others position.
I'm talking about once in a while, that fireball HEALS the fire construct. Once in a while, that slashing weapon isn't going to cut it (pun intended). Once in a while, that critical hit DOESN'T do max damage, although it does hit automatically. And perhaps most importantly, I'm talking about this being planned for ahead of time, not a "Oh, well, um, that didn't work."
There is nothing wrong with this. Back in 3.x many monsters had powers such as these. Though in 4e things like attacks healing monsters and "slash" damage not doing anything seem to have been tossed aside. And it's up to the DM whatever kind of monsters he wants to put in the world.
As far as players outnumbering the DM, that has exactly NOTHING to do with anything. The DM has the right to do what he pleases, and the responsibility not to ruin everyone's fun. Simple as. Both are important.
That was actually my point. The DM is only one person and shouldn't make calls based solely on because it's what he wants to do. But rather on how it effects the group as a wholes fun. I was simply saying a lot of times changing the rules mid game frustrates the players and isn't fun for them.
If someone is using a broadsword to stop a dragon in mid-flight, I may allow it to work the first time, but I'll come out and say that it won't work again, unless there's a damn good reason for it to work. If you're not careful, the rules-as-written can be the enemy of immersion.
I recall reading a WoTC article where they actually suggested that for a DM who thinks a power breaks immersion. That they should still allow it but then tell the players it wouldn't work in future sessions. Because even they acknowledge that changing rules mid game frustrates the players and isn't fun.
But they also said be it in that article or another that players and DMs should still try to find reasons that make sense so the players can keep their powers. Such as knocking an ooze prone is perhaps a blow that causes them to get dispersed into a puddle and they have to reform(aka stand up). The same could go for stopping a swarm from moving with the fighter's power. If you've ever seen any horror movies with a swarm type monster where the good guys hit it really hard as it's coming towards them and it disperses for a few moments then reforms and gets moving again.
As for the dragon I think your thinking a bit to direct. It's not like the fighter would have to stand right in front of him and bash him with the sword head on. He could swipe at the dragon's wings which take up a huge area given they are spread out since the dragon is flying. A hit on the wings could cause the dragon to loss control so either it crashes or has to tumble in the air for a second to regain it's balance. Flight is not like with things on the ground moving where your feet help maintain a stead balance and absorb some of the directional impact.
Besides you wanna talk immersion then how about the fact that this all should be happening in real time. Thus any power that hits a dragon that in it would knock the dragon out of the sky would be while the dragon is mid flight. Say the dragon moved on it's turn and ends it's turn 1 space off the ground so it was and is 'flying somewhere'. Now the same fighter with broadsword walks over there and uses an attack that knocks prone. Well a flying creature that is knocked prone is forced out of the air. But since the dragon only ended it's movement their because it was out of movement for that turn and everything is really happening it real time. Should the fighter still really be able to knock the dragon to the ground?
The very fact that this is breaking down real time events into a turn based system kinda fractures the sense of immersion already. Because you have to keep in mind all this is happening at the same time so regardless of who's turn it is things are still playing out and things are in motion even if it's not their turn. Sure in the case of dragons you can argue they have hover so that's them stopping at the end of their turn but many other flying creatures don't and have to move each turn to stay in the air so that undermines that excuse.
I read an awesome article on the Wizards D'n'D site quite recently about the role of rules in a game, and the dev writer himself said that the rules are there to give you a framework, and in no way do they supercede a conscious decision by a DM. That's where my "do not overuse or abuse" rule comes into play, because it's real easy to wreck things if you start messing about too much.
You may not agree, and you may think that the best way to run things is purely RAW, complete with the DM rolling in the open. I'm sure many would agree with that. I don't, though, and at least one dev doesn't either.
I never really said the best way to run things is purely RAW. And you might of started typing this long reply after I went back and added the "EDIT" section of my post. But rather I was simply saying that DM shouldn't change rules mid game.
I have no problem with DMs and players who want to sit down ahead of time and go ok here are the rule changes I'm adding. "1) Oozes can't be force moved. 2).... and so on." This is perfectly fine because then players know what to expect. Even something like the fire construct heals from fire damage. Then the players know to expect that kind of thing after encountoring it the first time so they can plan ahead. The point again is that predictability IS fun. The way the DM breaks the mold is by putting in new monsters with new types of powers.
But the players should be able to rely on knowing what to expect from the monster or at least able to figure it out shortly into the fight. Like mentioned in another WoTC how some BAD DMs in previous editions would not give any indication that monsters were resistant, immune, or even regenerated from curtain types of attacks. Leading to longer more frustrating battles with the monster. And the DM maybe letting the players in on his amusement later after the game only to have the players feel even more frustrated.
Just like players know swarms are resistant to normal weapons but are vulnerable to AoE attacks. I know some DMs think of this as "Metagaming" but that kind of info should be common knowledge in the world. Just as a cleric would know that his radiant powers are extremely effective against the forces of the undead, since most undead have vulnerability to radiant. In fact the DMG even suggest with proper Lore skill check the players be told what resistances, immunities, and vulnerablities the monster has. Now it doesn't have to be specific number detail just something like, "You know from your studies that the undead creatures before you are suseptiable to radiant energies. But they suffer little to no effect from necrotic forces."
I definitely support allowing players to make a lore check (from the appropriate skill, of course) to determine a creature's vulnerabilities, and while I narrate combat, I give indications as to how effective their efforts are. For example, an ineffectual strike might prompt a grin or laugh from the target, whereas a critical strike might illicit a howl of pain. A vulnerability might take the form of shying away from a torch or frost wand-wielding mage.
I heartily decry informing your players of the monster's stats upfront, as I think utterly removes any semblance of immersion, but I don't think that's what you're suggesting at all. Some DM's actually favour this approach, though (see the thread on "how much dice-rolling you let the players in on" in the "What's a DM to do?" forum.)
Chances are, if we were playing in each other's games, we'd occasionally think, "Hmmm, I wouldn't have done it like that, but fair enough," but still have a good time. As it is, I think we're arguing against extremes that neither of us actually embrace.
I see no reason why bonking a dragon with a broadsword on the snout hard enough to make it very momentarily stunned couldn't cause said dragon to pause momentarily in flight to try and fend off future blows to the head and face. Said dragon doesn't want to lose an eye, after all, and the fighter in question is obviously capable enough to land blows on the dragon as it has its defenses down while it's moving.
Combat Superiority isn't the act of a fighter reaching out and grabbing a monster's shirt collar, it's reaching out with a weapon and saying "HEY! You there! Pincushion! Best put up your guard and focus on defending yourself so much that you have to stop moving momentarily, or else you're going to flat out -die-." Hence the reason why an attack forces the enemy to stop.
I see no reason why bonking a dragon with a broadsword on the snout hard enough to make it very momentarily stunned couldn't cause said dragon to pause momentarily in flight to try and fend off future blows to the head and face. Said dragon doesn't want to lose an eye, after all, and the fighter in question is obviously capable enough to land blows on the dragon as it has its defenses down while it's moving.
Combat Superiority isn't the act of a fighter reaching out and grabbing a monster's shirt collar, it's reaching out with a weapon and saying "HEY! You there! Pincushion! Best put up your guard and focus on defending yourself so much that you have to stop moving momentarily, or else you're going to flat out -die-." Hence the reason why an attack forces the enemy to stop.
Not a bad explanation, I suppose, but it still doesn't really satisfy me. I used to play rugby, and as a not-too-large chap I would occasionally be knocked around by the ridiculously-large chaps, once they got a bit of speed up. Sure, if I flailed at them with a fist and hit them as they hit me, they'd get their nose busted, but I just wouldn't have the bulk to slow them down. That's the scenario I envision when a Huge dragon flies by a Medium fighter. Sure, get a hit in as the dragon flies over, give him a scratch with that sword. But stop him dead in his tracks? I just don't see it.
Rugby doesn't involve four foot long knives people are trying to slice through your eye socket.
Again, to reiterate, this isn't a "small guy punching a big guy and the force of the punch causing the big guy to stop". This is a "dangerous threatening person setting things up so that if the big guy continues to move he will -die-." And if you, or Mr. Green Dragon, or anyone else has a choice between death, or stopping for a moment to fend off the death blow, which would you choose?
The ability is called "Combat Superiority". Not "Strength" or "Size" or "Pushyness" or "Weight". Combat. It means you're -good- at making yourself dangerous in combat.
I could put this another way. Lemme rewrite the rules to Combat Superiority.
Combat Superiority
You gain a bonus to opportunity attacks equal to your Wisdom modifier. An enemy struck by your opportunity attack who moves out of the space they were attacked in on the same action that triggered the opportunity attack immediately dies if the action that triggered the opportunity attack was a move. An enemy can choose to instead stop moving, losing the rest of that action. If it still has actions remaining, it can use them to resume moving.
See? Written that way, you could stop literally anything. Why? Because the choice is stop, or die. And it doesn't really functionally change the ability at all, since every single enemy in existence would choose to stop moving rather than die.
Rugby doesn't involve four foot long knives people are trying to slice through your eye socket.
Again, to reiterate, this isn't a "small guy punching a big guy and the force of the punch causing the big guy to stop". This is a "dangerous threatening person setting things up so that if the big guy continues to move he will -die-." And if you, or Mr. Green Dragon, or anyone else has a choice between death, or stopping for a moment to fend off the death blow, which would you choose?
The ability is called "Combat Superiority". Not "Strength" or "Size" or "Pushyness" or "Weight". Combat. It means you're -good- at making yourself dangerous in combat.
I could put this another way. Lemme rewrite the rules to Combat Superiority.
Combat Superiority
You gain a bonus to opportunity attacks equal to your Wisdom modifier. An enemy struck by your opportunity attack who moves out of the space they were attacked in on the same action that triggered the opportunity attack immediately dies if the action that triggered the opportunity attack was a move. An enemy can choose to instead stop moving, losing the rest of that action. If it still has actions remaining, it can use them to resume moving.
See? Written that way, you could stop literally anything. Why? Because the choice is stop, or die. And it doesn't really functionally change the ability at all, since every single enemy in existence would choose to stop moving rather than die.
+1, nice re-write, and how I imagined the ability working in any case
Edit: Also note that the fighter gets to choose to Mark the target as well, so even if the fighter missed, when the creature continues to its goal it would have problems: a -2 to attack its intended target, and if it were still adjacent to the fighter, the PC could have another hack at it. Many smart enemies might choose to engage the fighter in any case once attacked.
I appreciate what you're doing there, but all that's done is confirm my original thoughts. Your re-write DOES perfectly sum up why it would work as written.
What it DOESN'T address is the ludicrous claim that a fighter of the level described could EVER be sufficient threat to slay a dragon with a single, opportune strike as it flew by him.
The fighter is just not that powerful. If the dragon was on the ground, I'd give it more credibility, simply because its impetus would be drastically reduced, so it might be more inclined to wheel about in frustration and focus on the fighter. Even if we extend your scenario, though, a flying DEAD dragon would still be a big old missile of destruction as it continued past our gallant dragonslayer.
I know it's poor form to invoke basic physics in a game of imagination and magic, but a fighter stopping a flying dragon dead in its tracks is a big no-go for me, at least after the first time.
D'you see where I'm coming from?
I appreciate what you're doing there, but all that's done is confirm my original thoughts. Your re-write DOES perfectly sum up why it would work as written.
What it DOESN'T address is the ludicrous claim that a fighter of the level described could EVER be sufficient threat to slay a dragon with a single, opportune strike as it flew by him.
The fighter is just not that powerful. If the dragon was on the ground, I'd give it more credibility, simply because its impetus would be drastically reduced, so it might be more inclined to wheel about in frustration and focus on the fighter. Even if we extend your scenario, though, a flying DEAD dragon would still be a big old missile of destruction as it continued past our gallant dragonslayer.
I know it's poor form to invoke basic physics in a game of imagination and magic, but a fighter stopping a flying dragon dead in its tracks is a big no-go for me, at least after the first time.
D'you see where I'm coming from?
Can see where you are coming from . . . but still not agreeing with your interpretation. If you were my DM, I'd be fine with the ruling, but when I'm DMing myself, I see no need to limit the PC powers in this way.
Sometimes, especially with Martial powers, it takes a little effort and imagination to figure out how they could work. However, I think it is owed to players of Martial characters that either we ignore the oddities, or spend that effort. Because otherwise they lose out on many power interpretations where an Arcane character will be waved through with their "it's magic" card.
Anyway, my take is that if the fighter is capable of dispatching the dragon at all (as in striking the last blow that reduces the dragon from fully competent to dead, by rolling prehaps 15 damage), then he is capable of killing it with a blow. As a heroic fighter (unlike say a Rogue), he is capable of threatening such a strike in melee when a foe tries to move past or is distracted attacking someone else.
Some of this comes down to visualisation of hit points too. As a mechanic, they hide a lot.
What it DOESN'T address is the ludicrous claim that a fighter of the level described could EVER be sufficient threat to slay a dragon with a single, opportune strike as it flew by him.
The fighter is just not that powerful.
Then said fighter could never kill the dragon. Ever. (Explanation to follow.)
What kills *anything* in D&D? Players, monsters, it's all the same... it's a loss of hit points.
So what do hit points represent? In a -small- way, they represent health. But that's only a very generalized description. And, in my opinion, a pretty incorrect one.
Hit points are "unknown defensive moves" and "stamina" and "morale" and "the will to fight" and other such esoteric things. This is why a Warlord, a *martial* character, can restore hit points. He's inspiring, he's commanding, he's bolstering. He doesn't have magical prayers that seal up wounds, he has the heroic ability to push people into fighting on when they feel they can't.Not when they -can't- (i.e. a sword stuck through their gut), but when they -feel- they can't (beaten, brusied, possibly knocked unconscious).
Healing SURGES might be considered true "health", but even then the comparison isn't entirely a good one. Surges are spent for any of a number of things, from failed endurence checks to hold one's breath, to restoring that will to fight that hit points represent. You could, perhaps, look at surges as every heroic character's natural innate magical ability causing them to heal faster than the average person (magic is inherent to the world, magic flows stronger towards people of great influence, heroes are people of great influence, heroes have innate magical abilities, even if they are just martial), but that only goes so far.
But so far we've just talked about characters. What about monsters? What kills them? Loss of hit points. Again.
Now, what do hit points represent? Well, in the case of a green dragon with, say, 620 HP, they certainly don't represent the dragon's ability to be stabbed 60 times before dying. That's ludicrous. Or even 40 times. Again, ludicrous. A dragon might be a magical creature, but if you chop at something enough, it falls to pieces, and I would imagine being chopped at 20 or so times would severely hamper a dragon's ability to move, on the ground, or in the air. The rules say nothing about damage equaling reduced abilities. In fact, a dragon becomes MORE dangerous the more you hurt it.
So what do hit points on a monster represent? They represent the same things they represent to a character: "unknown defensive moves", "stamina", "morale", "the will to fight", etc. When the dragon becomes bloodied, you can consider it to have taken a single solitary non-lethal blow. One single blow, wounding the dragon in some unhampering way, signifying that the characters are starting to learn how to get past its defenses while it has them up, or signifying that the dragon is starting to wear down and get tired, rendering it less than able to put up a full defense. Bloodied on said dragon would be after 310 points of damage was dealt to it. That's a LOT of attacks that "hit" the dragon. So what did those other previous 309 HP worth of attacks do? They can be described as dramatically as you wish, but they represent the heroes successfully wearing the dragon out, brusing it, learning how it defends itself, and where it might have blind spots or other defensive weaknesses.
Now, all that to the side, what is a character in motion? A character who is -moving- (not shifting) permits enemies the opportunity to attack them. Why is this different from shifting? Because moving prevents the creature in question from putting up its full defense against any and all enemies near it, allowing characters or monsters to get in an opportunity attack.
The fighter is special. The fighter has been learning how exactly to make itself so deadly that other creatures MUST pay attention to it. That is the core, underlying concept of a fighter. And note that word choice: So deadly. Deadly. As in, capable to render someone dead. Either you pay attention to the fighter, or you die. You pay attention to the fighter, or you're so aware of the fact that you're NOT paying attention to the fighter that it royally screws with your fighting abilities when attacking other people. The fighter is a bad-ass whom you ignore at your own peril.
You claim a fighter can't kill a dragon with a single, solitary blow while it's in flight. Ok. What if said dragon had been worn down to 5 HP, and was offering an opportunity attack via flight to said fighter, and said fighter lands the blow, dealing 6 HP in damage? That attack, whatever attack it may be, is the attack you land when you've finally worn down the dragon enough to know exactly where and how to attack it to land a killing blow, thus changing the dragon from "Hi, I'm a flying ball of flame, scales, and claws" to "Corpse".
And one does not change a flying ball of fury into a corpse by any other method than a single, solitary killing blow. Why? Because if HP represented true health, at 620 HP you'd have a flying ball of fury. At 500 HP you'd have a bleeding ball of fury. At 300 HP you'd have a ball of angry fury that can't fly. At 150 HP you'd have a weeping, bloody mess that's merely dangerous by the nature of the fact that it's been beaten to within an inch of its life and it's a cornered, dangerous rat, and at 50 HP you've got a comatose, barely breathing, toothless dragon that the entire party is just gathered around whacking away at pinata style, blood, bones, and guts spewing about like candy, as the broken, unrecognizeable lump of flesh that used to be a dragon has its final thoughts of its now fatherless children before it finally hits 0 HP.
And that doesn't sound very heroic.
HP is not health, and a fighter can -always- kill something with a single blow, if it's not putting up a fight.
All good points, and I laud your creativity, both of you.
Nevertheless, I do think that the use of the word "bloodied" to describe a creature with half its hitpoints is indicative of at least PART of the role of hitpoints: they DO measure how many hits a creature has taken. If a creature bleeds enough, and gets hacked at enough, it'll die.
To equate a killing blow to any blow at all is a bit of an oversimplification, although I do grasp the thinking behind it.
Being as a fighter actually has less chance to strike a killing blow than the majority of other melee classes (since there are more strikers than any other role), his Combat Superiority makes even less logical sense, by this token.
Ultimately, I'm happy with Slobo's statement: "If you were my DM, I'd be fine with the ruling, but when I'm DM'ing myself, I see no need to limit PC's powers in this way." That's the core of what we're saying here: the DM CAN make those calls. In the same way, if Slobo or Moleculor were DM'ing my game, I'd be fine with them allowing Combat Superiority to work entirely RAW. The original point I was making was defending a fellow DM's right to make the call.
I appreciate the effort y'all have gone into to come with creative interpretations and concepts to allow the RAW to work within the context of the game believably! It's going the extra mile, and it's what keeps D'n'D fun. If a player came up with a creative interpretation/enactment of the concept that allowed the move, I'd certainly be far more likely to allow it, on principle! :D
It was more useful to describe that particular thing in extremes. If bloodied represents two bleeding cuts or blows or whatnot, that works too. Ditto on three. The idea here is that -every- hit is not a cut, but in fact represents something a bit more ephemeral. Some might be cuts, blows, etc, but -every- hit is not, because by the time you grind through 620 HP, if you're describing a hit for each one, by the time you reach zero, you're running out of places to describe wounds.
And if HP doesn't technically represent health, and if each hit doesn't technically represent a wound, and if each loss of HP doesn't represent a wound, then there's no reason to think that a single person, given the right opening, couldn't kill something in one blow.
Hell, give me a screwdriver and a grizzly bear who can't fight back, and I'll show you it can be done. (Not really. That seems cruel. But I'm sure you can see how if a pencil necked geek can kill a grizzly bear in one single 'attack', then a trained killer like a fighter can do so to a dragon.)
let the DM fail.
pick up the pieces.
It was more useful to describe that particular thing in extremes. If bloodied represents two bleeding cuts or blows or whatnot, that works too. Ditto on three. The idea here is that -every- hit is not a cut, but in fact represents something a bit more ephemeral. Some might be cuts, blows, etc, but -every- hit is not, because by the time you grind through 620 HP, if you're describing a hit for each one, by the time you reach zero, you're running out of places to describe wounds.
And if HP doesn't technically represent health, and if each hit doesn't technically represent a wound, and if each loss of HP doesn't represent a wound, then there's no reason to think that a single person, given the right opening, couldn't kill something in one blow.
Hell, give me a screwdriver and a grizzly bear who can't fight back, and I'll show you it can be done. (Not really. That seems cruel. But I'm sure you can see how if a pencil necked geek can kill a grizzly bear in one single 'attack', then a trained killer like a fighter can do so to a dragon.)
I understand the concept of a lucky strike, but when you consider that a critical hit is supposed to emulate a headshot or the like, it once again poses an issue to the "one-hit-kill" theory. And it DOES indicate a headshot or similar, as indicated by traits like "Zombie Weakness," playing off the popular trope of killing a zombie by destroying its head and/or critical part.
For the purposes of the game, each strike DOES count as a hit, because AC is there to show which blows are turned aside by armour, parrying, blocking, and all that jazz. Mechanically, then, blows which slip past those defenses are therefore taking a toll on you, in blood as well as morale. Jagged weapons don't just scare people, for instance. They actively do more damage, in the form of enhanced chance to crit. And we all know that a crit on a PC CAN actually one-shot them.
And at the end of the day, if you reduce it to the concept of "if he can't oneshot it then he can't kill it", then a dagger-wielder without particularly virulent poison or enchantments on the blade will NEVER be able to kill a dragon. Why? Because the blade isn't long enough to hit anything. Even in the eye, it would never reach the brain. This is exacerbated for smaller races.
That's why attrition is an assumed part of our combat model. And also because it'd be really boring if combat was down to one strike. :D