GMing 4E

[SirAxealot]

I'm getting ready to run 4E. I've only run it online before, and I was wondering what tips and tricks you guys use to keep things moving on the table.

Few issues that come to mind:
Modifiers and bonuses - by late heroic, PCs can start stacking quite a few situational mods. People trying to remember them all and use them seems like it might really slow things down

Rolling lots of dice: again, just time counting up 6d8 or whatever. In theory this shouldn't be an issue, but in practice it chews up a crazy amount of game time.

squares vs hexes: I have a fondness for hexes, and it seems like conversion would be simple. Any hidden pitfalls here?

[TurboGhast]

For rolling lots of adding dice, I usually use a calculator and add each roll into the calculator as I roll it.

[Kimera757]

On the DM side, I just average the monster damage.

You can only encourage players to speed up, rolling to hit and damage at the same time. Also try to avoid d4 weapons. I've got a chain-wielder at my table (the PC, that is) and groan when he needs to roll 6d4. The average is 15, can't you just do it. Players also need to learn dice averages (like the times tables) so they don't have to manually calculate everything after dumping the dice.

What really takes up time is talking in combat. Players need to RP a bit more. IMO players should only get to talk a lot on their turn, instead of asking "where do you want me to slide this guy?"

[Kurald Galain]

Some suggestions,

(1) Every player must have either a well-written character sheet, or power cards. By "well-written" I mean that they really do have all the necessary numbers at a glance, with all the additions pre-made, so that they don't have to look up their attack bonus every. single. time. That also means writing out separate bonuses for when they're raging and when they're not, etc. I find that the standard power cards that the character builder prints are not very good for beginners.

(2) educate your players. If a player has to look up his to-hit bonus every turn, or be reminded which dice to roll, then it'll go much faster once s/he has this memorized.

(3) have all monsters with an initiative between the players delay until they are below the players. This means that during combat, all the monsters go (in whatever order the DM likes), and then all the players go (in whatever order they like). This doesn't work for every single combat, but it does for most of them, and is faster.

(4) in many combats, after 2-4 rounds, it is clear that the PCs have won, but they need to spend more time just wrapping up. As the DM, declare player victory at that point, and move on.

(5) my rule is that if you hesitate too much, so does your character, and you lose your turn. This is psychology: once I bring up that this rule exists, I never actually have to enforce this.

(6) Certain powers or feats are just a waste of time. I'm talking about e.g. feats that give +1 to hit in some semi-rare circumstances, that players tend to forget. This is where the "I hit AC 24, oh no 25, oh oops I meant 26" syndrome comes from. Convince your players to pick something else when making their character; this is just as annoying in the game as 3E's "oh yeah, I forgot to declare my dodge". Houserule that a feat that gives +2 sometimes instead gives +1 all the time - much faster.

(7) And most importantly, remind your players that the game is about having fun, not min-maxing every single thing, and thus taking an action now that does 20 points of damage is preferable to thinking for a minute and then doing 23 points of damage.


And yes, 4E plays fine on hexes.

[Fumble Jack]

Some suggestions,

(1) Every player must have either a well-written character sheet, or power cards. By "well-written" I mean that they really do have all the necessary numbers at a glance, with all the additions pre-made, so that they don't have to look up their attack bonus every. single. time. That also means writing out separate bonuses for when they're raging and when they're not, etc. I find that the standard power cards that the character builder prints are not very good for beginners.

(2) educate your players. If a player has to look up his to-hit bonus every turn, or be reminded which dice to roll, then it'll go much faster once s/he has this memorized.

(3) have all monsters with an initiative between the players delay until they are below the players. This means that during combat, all the monsters go (in whatever order the DM likes), and then all the players go (in whatever order they like). This doesn't work for every single combat, but it does for most of them, and is faster.

(4) in many combats, after 2-4 rounds, it is clear that the PCs have won, but they need to spend more time just wrapping up. As the DM, declare player victory at that point, and move on.

(5) my rule is that if you hesitate too much, so does your character, and you lose your turn. This is psychology: once I bring up that this rule exists, I never actually have to enforce this.

(6) Certain powers or feats are just a waste of time. I'm talking about e.g. feats that give +1 to hit in some semi-rare circumstances, that players tend to forget. This is where the "I hit AC 24, oh no 25, oh oops I meant 26" syndrome comes from. Convince your players to pick something else when making their character; this is just as annoying in the game as 3E's "oh yeah, I forgot to declare my dodge". Houserule that a feat that gives +2 sometimes instead gives +1 all the time - much faster.

(7) And most importantly, remind your players that the game is about having fun, not min-maxing every single thing, and thus taking an action now that does 20 points of damage is preferable to thinking for a minute and then doing 23 points of damage.


And yes, 4E plays fine on hexes.

Pretty much this. However on number (5), allow some leeway for first time players, still trying to figure out their powers. After a few sessions,they should be able to jump right into the action, with little hesitation.

[Laserlight]

Roll your damage dice when you roll your to-hit, not as two separate rolls.

Insist that people have enough dice so they can roll their damage without saying "I need two more d8".

Use legible dice, not "red ink on black-speckled-with-red-plus-decorations"

Roll your dice in a pen, instead of all over the table and off the table and "I think it's by your foot". The box your cell phone came in is perfect for a dicepen. Or a small box with partitions from a hobby/craft store--get the transparent kind, not the more common translucent sort. Use the compartments for your extra d20s for area attacks, and your various damage dice combinations.

Keep a cheap calculator handy for adding damage. Or just mentally divide by five; as a DM, you're receiving damage for lots of monsters and it's easier to add 8+3+4 instead of 41+16+19. Instead of a monster having 40 hp and having to write down 32, 27, 12, etc, you can just give the monster "health boxes" OOOO OOOO // OOOO OOOO and mark them off.

If you know your players, encourage the slow ones not to play a class that uses a lot of minor actions.

Deal with the end of the combat by narration ("the last few drow flee" or "you finish them off, although it will cost you another surge worth of damage--who wants to take the hit?") instead of going through the combat.

"Tom, your action. Bob, you're up next. Tom, five, four, three, two, one, pass."

[INDYSTAR188]

All of the advice Kurald laid out I would also recommend. I wanted to share some things I do to help myself, the first is that I write out index cards (I use the big ones). I list player info on their cards (AC & DEF, class, race and resistances) and the important parts of the monster stat blocks I'm using, it's pretty easy to modify these numbers and just fluff new monsters when appropriate. We also use the colored plasting rings (milk jugs, soda, water, and juice bottles) to indicate effects and conditions. So red is bloodied, blue is dazed, etc.

The game can be a lot to manage, especially at higher levels! Hope that helps!

[its_all_ogre]

I think kurald gulain covered the most points actually.
the only issue with hexes is that flanking becomes harder I think, this may make some classes harder to play (rogue/thief)
another way is essentials character use: they are simpler and easier to play, if everyone is happy to play one then this will speed game up.

the only thing I differ on is the 3rd point
"have all monsters with an initiative between the players delay until they are below the players. This means that during combat, all the monsters go (in whatever order the DM likes), and then all the players go (in whatever order they like). This doesn't work for every single combat, but it does for most of them, and is faster."
I actually suggested this to the players, so they delay, as an opportunity.

this way in some fights it is clearly beneficial for them to do this, enemies with interrupts and stuff like that, but in other fights it can be actively detrimental and they can avoid it.
puts the option in their hands and not so much the monsters.