Getting off the treadmill [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

ad_hoc

2017-12-25, 03:29 PM

5e is designed without a treadmill. 3.x was based around the treadmill, many gamers started with it so it is probably ingrained in how they play.

A major factor of why I have taken so well to 5e is that it abandons the treadmill. Challenges are not altered to compensate for party make up or magic items. If the party find +2 weapons, enemies don't gain 2 AC.

Here are 2 examples of how to run campaigns without the treadmill. Minor spoilers for RoT, OotA, and CoS.

There is risk to the party and as such there is also reward.

Example 1: The epic storyline

This is the campaign that follows one storyline. The party completes objectives and gains experience, treasure, and allies for doing so. Failing to meet those objectives (or finding the treasure along the way) weakens them for the final confrontation (or leading up to it)

RoT - Characters have the chance to complete objectives to weaken Tiamat when she is summoned. Complete all of them (while doing well in the campaign up to that point) and the party is likely to have an easier time with the final showdown. They get to be great heroes and get a well deserved crushing victory. Fail to complete those objectives and Tiamat will likely crush them.

OotA - The Drow are chasing the party. The party must complete adventures along the way while staying ahead of the Drow. If they take too long or abandon too many adventures they won't have the levels, allies, or treasure needed to survive. If they do well in the adventures, finding the treasure, saving the allies, and completing them quickly, they will have a much easier time evading and/or defeating the Drow.

CoS - The party must solve the Tarokka readings. This will take them all over, they can gain allies, solve problems to gain other treasure and experience, and find out clues about where the readings may lead as well as how to stop Strahd. The more they succeed and the more time they take the less patient Strahd will be. If they don't confront him on their terms he will eventually confront them. If they have the items and can pin him down by solving the Tarokka readings they can make short work of him. Otherwise the battle will be tough as he can attack with surprise from all directions and cast devastating spells.

Example 2 - The Sandbox

In this campaign there are numerous plot hooks available to the party. Some may open up by completing quests, some by completing downtime activities. Downtime activities may also be used to find out more about some hooks so the party will be better prepared.

Some adventures will be easy, some hard. Eventually a bigger storyline may develop, or it may not. If the party does the research and goes on an adventure that they can crush then they can get through it quickly and reap the well earned rewards. If they are outmatched on an adventure they will need to decide how far to push it, or perhaps abandon the quest. Thereby setting them back while the world moves forward.

A level limit to end the campaign is the default. Get to a certain level and then have an epic quest to show off their powers and bring closure to their story ~ much like in the storyline style. While it is not necessary, it could be fun to put a time limit on the campaign, see how far the party can get in that time.

djreynolds

2017-12-25, 04:49 PM

Yes, good points.

A gang of my favorite hobgoblins is still very dangerous.

I think the whole idea was that enemies were not trivialized once you passed a level. An army of orcs is something to fear.

Grod_The_Giant

2017-12-25, 05:02 PM

Tanarii

2017-12-25, 05:44 PM

Dimers

2017-12-25, 06:22 PM

Although my experience is that what actually happens is parties will often totally overextend themselves / get in over their heads, and get ROLFStomped. Or run away singing Brave Sir Robin. :smallamused:

True dat, yo.

furby076

2017-12-26, 12:50 AM

I think the point is, if you design an adventure where the adventure is power X, if the party finds magic items, boons, etc or NOT, will not change the power X.

In an open sandbox world, this means the kobold den will not instantly get more powerful because the adventures managed to recruit 25 mercenaries to help them. Now if the PCs spent 6 months doing this recruitment, it is natural to say the kobolds evolved in some way. They may have gotten more powerful, or been wiped out by other adventurers, or something else.

Point of reference: this thread spawned from another thread. A group found a ring of 3 wishes, and used it to gain resistance to blunt, piercing and slashing weapons. Some DMs said this was game breaking and required the DM to increase the power level of the npcs vs the (lvl 16) adventurers. The author is saying that upping the NPC ante just because the pcs got a new magic "item", is the same as not giving it. I agree. Now hopefully, the pcs will decide to attack more powerful NPCs

ad_hoc

2017-12-26, 01:47 AM

His argument is that 5e isn't designed for you to customize adventures and encounters to the power level of the party (edit: of their magic items in particular.). If they find more powerful magic items, you shouldn't just up the difficulty of encounters to compensate.

Yeah. But also see below.

The counter-argument is: doesn't that just mean the party will ROFLStomp encounters, making the game boring?

Yeah, though my retort to this is that if the campaign is being fine tuned to the party such that the party is expected to win each fight with the appearance of difficulty, then they're really just stomping the encounters anyway. It's just that they're adding some narrative flavour on it.

I like having challenges in the game that are thought to be too powerful for the PCs. HotDQ was criticized heavily for being too hard because it contained high CR creatures compared to the party. There were many ways of dealing with those creatures utilizing all 3 pillars of play. If the party felt up to it they could challenge these creatures to fights, or they could do something else.

Point of reference: this thread spawned from another thread. A group found a ring of 3 wishes, and used it to gain resistance to blunt, piercing and slashing weapons. Some DMs said this was game breaking and required the DM to increase the power level of the npcs vs the (lvl 16) adventurers. The author is saying that upping the NPC ante just because the pcs got a new magic "item", is the same as not giving it. I agree. Now hopefully, the pcs will decide to attack more powerful NPCs

Yeah. I would add that something I see often is the directive to change the campaign and adventures themselves to cater to the party (for or against).

Have a Rogue who likes to disarm traps? Put more traps in the adventure. Have a Cleric that is great against undead? Decide that the undead are immune to Turning and have Resistance to Radiant because it is too easy otherwise.

Altering the campaign like that robs the players of their choices.

I am also against having the players pick out magic items. Even if it is done in a roundabout way where the player says that their concept involves certain items and then the DM has those items appear in the adventure. Just because a character is a Pole-Arm Master doesn't mean they can manifest magical pole-arms.

Xetheral

2017-12-26, 02:08 AM

Have a Rogue who likes to disarm traps? Put more traps in the adventure. Have a Cleric that is great against undead? Decide that the undead are immune to Turning and have Resistance to Radiant because it is too easy otherwise.

Altering the campaign like that robs the players of their choices.

Can you please elaborate on how (e.g.) adding more traps to please a Rogue who likes to disarm traps robs the Rogue of their choices? That doesn't make any sense to me. It would like saying that a DM shouldn't include more potential combat encounters for a group that likes combat encounters, or shouldn't include more intetesting NPCs for a group that likes interacting with interesting NPCs.

I understand that some groups don't want combat difficulty tailored to their characters. That's fine. But I don't understand the argument you appear to be making that player preferences shouldn't be taken into account at all.

ad_hoc

2017-12-26, 02:27 AM

Can you please elaborate on how (e.g.) adding more traps to please a Rogue who likes to disarm traps robs the Rogue of their choices?

Because if there was no Rogue (or Rogue who cared about traps) the traps wouldn't be there.

The result of creating a character who can save the party from traps is that now there are traps. So they're not really saving the party from the traps at all.

Hrugner

2017-12-26, 02:40 AM

I'm not really sure this is tied to game edition. Either you alter the abilities of the encounter to match the player's ability, or you don't.

ad_hoc

2017-12-26, 02:48 AM

Xetheral

2017-12-26, 03:36 AM

Because if there was no Rogue (or Rogue who cared about traps) the traps wouldn't be there.

The result of creating a character who can save the party from traps is that now there are traps. So they're not really saving the party from the traps at all.

Sure they are! They're saving the party from the traps that the DM included in the game world. So long as the traps make sense in the game world, it doesn't matter to me as a player why the DM decided to include the traps. Indeed, as a player, if there is a dearth of a type of content I enjoy, I'll ask the DM to include more of it--I don't then have less fun if the DM obliges.

Are you arguing that the trap-focused Rogue player would have more fun if there weren't any traps to disarm than they would if the DM added traps for them?

The treadmill is an integral part of the design of 3.x.

It is perhaps its most defining feature.

I disagree. If one ignores both the WBL chart and CR/EL, the treadmill basically disappears from 3.5, and the edition continues to work fine. It can't be integral when it's so easy to remove.

Ignimortis

2017-12-26, 04:00 AM

ORione

2017-12-26, 04:42 AM

Have a Rogue who likes to disarm traps? Put more traps in the adventure. Have a Cleric that is great against undead? Decide that the undead are immune to Turning and have Resistance to Radiant because it is too easy otherwise.

You give these two cases like they're examples of the same thing. But in one case the DM is giving the player an opportunity to use their character's abilities, and in the other, the DM is preventing the player from using their character's abilities.

ad_hoc

2017-12-26, 05:08 AM

You give these two cases like they're examples of the same thing. But in one case the DM is giving the player an opportunity to use their character's abilities, and in the other, the DM is preventing the player from using their character's abilities.

They are the same thing.

They are both examples of denying the character use of their abilities.

If there was no Rogue there would be no extra traps so the Rogue isn't really using their ability, the DM is just maintaining the status quo. The party is better off without the Rogue because then there would be fewer traps.

Same with the Cleric, don't have the Cleric and the undead are weaker.

Hrugner

2017-12-26, 05:18 AM

The treadmill is an integral part of the design of 3.x.

It is perhaps its most defining feature.

Are you saying that a DM can't modify the difficulty of encounters to match player ability in 5e?

Talamare

2017-12-26, 05:31 AM

I'm not sure what your point here is. At first it sounds like you're pointing out that 5e monsters aren't designed with the expectation of magic items (which is great, because I hate that part of 3.5). But then it kind of seems like you're talking about "enemies don't level to the player" sandbox play, which is kind of standard procedure for most good sandbox games (and non-sandbox ones too, generally speaking), so... What, exactly, is your argument?

Monsters are absolutely designed with the expectations of Magic Items

Altho, It is true it is to a significantly smaller degree than in previous editions.

However, (and yea I'm going extreme to prove a point)... Tarrasque has +19 to hit and 25 AC
You're not hitting that reliably with your +11 from proficiency + stat, and it will absolutely hit you despite your 21 AC from Heavy Armor, Shield, and Defense Fighting Style

If I remember correctly the standard +Attack Bonus for monsters is 4 + Half CR
Since the game expects that you avoid roughly 60% of the attacks from a similar CR monster and a CR 20 monster should have around +14 to hit (4 + 20/2)
(Oh look, all the CR 20 monsters have exactly +14 to hit... Pit Fiend, Ancient White/Brass Dragon)

Then you're looking at ... 27 AC to be hit 60% of the time
Which means that the game is expecting you to probably have a +3 Armor and probably another +2-3 AC from items.

Which also means that a CR6 monster for example, with +7 to hit, will literally only hit on Crits... So yea even with Bounded Accuracy, an Orc Army isn't a threat for an expected level 20 Tank.
(Oh look, every CR6 monster has +6 or +7 to hit... Except the Mammoth... Mammoth has +10... Mammoth doesn't care about your rules)

Willie the Duck

2017-12-26, 09:32 AM

I'm not really sure this is tied to game edition. Either you alter the abilities of the encounter to match the player's ability, or you don't.

The treadmill is an integral part of the design of 3.x.
It is perhaps its most defining feature.

I disagree that the treadmill is an integral or defining feature of 3.x. It is, however, part of the expectations many have for it, in no small part supported by many of the design choices, as well as the 'measuring stick' features it has such as WBL and CR (which, as has been pointed out, can be jettisoned without disrupting the rest of the 3.x game engine). It also is supported by the game math--as you level up, monsters (the ones that don't use weapons) increase in to-hit rapidly. Even those that don't advance at fighter-like BAB tend to increase in Str to effect the same bonus. Likewise, creatures with game-stopping abilities tend to come online right around the time that the countermeasure comes online for a non-dipping-out spellcaster (ex. neigh-unbeatable grapples around the time Freedom of Movement becomes a cast-able spell, at-will teleporting outsiders around when dimensional anchor comes online) and/or items with similar effects come online based upon WBL.

So Hrugner is right. Either you alter the abilities of the encounter to match the player's ability, or you don't. But... 3e makes it very convenient to do so, and the WBL/CR system and higher level monster design assumes it.

Can you please elaborate on how (e.g.) adding more traps to please a Rogue who likes to disarm traps robs the Rogue of their choices? That doesn't make any sense to me. It would like saying that a DM shouldn't include more potential combat encounters for a group that likes combat encounters, or shouldn't include more intetesting NPCs for a group that likes interacting with interesting NPCs.

I understand that some groups don't want combat difficulty tailored to their characters. That's fine. But I don't understand the argument you appear to be making that player preferences shouldn't be taken into account at all.

You give these two cases like they're examples of the same thing. But in one case the DM is giving the player an opportunity to use their character's abilities, and in the other, the DM is preventing the player from using their character's abilities.

They are the same thing.
They are both examples of denying the character use of their abilities.
If there was no Rogue there would be no extra traps so the Rogue isn't really using their ability, the DM is just maintaining the status quo. The party is better off without the Rogue because then there would be fewer traps.
Same with the Cleric, don't have the Cleric and the undead are weaker.

They are very clearly not the same thing. One it stopping a character from doing their schtick, while the other is having them do their schtick quite often. One is preventing the party's success or failure from hinging on the presence of character with threat-specific talents, while the other is facilitating the party's success or failure from hinging on the presence of character with threat-specific talents. Ad_hoc is right, however, in that adding traps because there is a rogue in the party can be in its own way punitive. That's because -- with any skill system where you should bother rolling, having to roll time and time again is a recipe to fail. And with rogues, failure is often 'you botched the roll, so you set off the trap. Now you (/your party) suffer damage/poison/pit trap/etc.' whereas failure for a wizard or cleric usually looks like 'you don't have another knock available, so you won't get through this door. Find another way around or a place to rest.' Adding traps to a dungeon because there is a rogue in the party often means that the party's success or failure hinges on the presence of the rogue... and that it will in fact be a failure, since no rogue can succeed indefinitely. This is not an inherent to the game thing, just a matter of psychology-- no DM will deliberately make a dungeon with one more blindness-inducing effects than the cleric can successful cast remedies simply because they know the party has a cleric, but they will line a dungeon with one more trap than (the law of averages indicates that) a rogue can successfully defeat.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 09:33 AM

Monsters are absolutely designed with the expectations of Magic Items

Altho, It is true it is to a significantly smaller degree than in previous editions.

However, (and yea I'm going extreme to prove a point)... Tarrasque has +19 to hit and 25 AC
You're not hitting that reliably with your +11 from proficiency + stat, and it will absolutely hit you despite your 21 AC from Heavy Armor, Shield, and Defense Fighting Style

If I remember correctly the standard +Attack Bonus for monsters is 4 + Half CR
Since the game expects that you avoid roughly 60% of the attacks from a similar CR monster and a CR 20 monster should have around +14 to hit (4 + 20/2)
(Oh look, all the CR 20 monsters have exactly +14 to hit... Pit Fiend, Ancient White/Brass Dragon)

Then you're looking at ... 27 AC to be hit 60% of the time
Which means that the game is expecting you to probably have a +3 Armor and probably another +2-3 AC from items.

Which also means that a CR6 monster for example, with +7 to hit, will literally only hit on Crits... So yea even with Bounded Accuracy, an Orc Army isn't a threat for an expected level 20 Tank.
(Oh look, every CR6 monster has +6 or +7 to hit... Except the Mammoth... Mammoth has +10... Mammoth doesn't care about your rules)

A false assumption and bad math lead you to the wrong conclusion--

With ATK +14, you hit 60% of the time against AC 23, not 27. AC 27 means you miss 60% of the time with +14 ATK.

Assuming that the game expects you to get hit 60% of the time against CR = APL foes is a bad (and non-textual) assumption. It's not only no-where stated, it contradicts the encounter building math in the DMG (and repeated in Xanthar's). Against high-level solo monsters, you're supposed to get hit most of the time. Against the Tarrasque--that's what makes him difficult (although he's poorly designed). There's no "game expects 60% hits against equivalent foes" thing in this edition. Not at all. Nowhere.

Using the encounter building guidelines from Xanthar's, you have two choices:

Solo encounter: CR = APL + 2 (or 3 past level 17). Should be a legendary creature. These should be hard fights--the thing will hit you the majority of the time. You have to have abilities to soak that damage, rather than avoiding it. As a result, SoD's don't happen here. You're supposed to get hit, especially in a low-magic game where such challenges are even more difficult.

Group encounter: Weighted average CR for a level 20 party: ~10 (assuming 1 monster per PC). Lower if you allow hordes.

I actually simulated an encounter between an adult red dragon and a castle of 150 veterans (with 4 ballista). If the castle sees it coming (and so can fire from max range), the dragon dies after only inflicting light damage to the defenders. That's a good thing. Having high-level creatures as invulnerable against lower-level threats makes for a screwy setting. Allowing numbers to counteract individual power allows for at least somewhat of a balanced world where mortal demigods don't simply walk over everything in their way.

Willie the Duck

2017-12-26, 09:44 AM

Having high-level creatures as invulnerable against lower-level threats makes for a screwy setting. Allowing numbers to counteract individual power allows for at least somewhat of a balanced world where mortal demigods don't simply walk over everything in their way.

Agree for D&D. In broad theory, you can have a setting where mortal-but-highly-powerful individuals are immune to the effects of anyone but their peers. But only if there's a real balance-of-power thing going on and all of them are rational actors (or those few that aren't are kept in check by the rest).

ad_hoc

2017-12-26, 09:55 AM

I disagree that the treadmill is an integral or defining feature of 3.x.

As the PC's numbers go up so do the other numbers in the game. It's not just to hit, it's AC, skill DCs, saving throws, etc. Magic Items are not bonuses, they are just part of the treadmill, as is everything else.

They are very clearly not the same thing. One it stopping a character from doing their schtick, while the other is having them do their schtick quite often. One is preventing the party's success or failure from hinging on the presence of character with threat-specific talents, while the other is facilitating the party's success or failure from hinging on the presence of character with threat-specific talents.

This

Adding traps to a dungeon because there is a rogue in the party often means that the party's success or failure hinges on the presence of the rogue... and that it will in fact be a failure, since no rogue can succeed indefinitely.

Is in conflict with this.

In this scenario the Rogue actually increases (dramatically) the party's harm from traps. This is the opposite of the intent of the Rogue. The Rogue is supposed to be there to eliminate the traps, instead, they make the traps much worse. This is negation.

SiCK_Boy

2017-12-26, 10:18 AM

Would the OP also suggest that the DM refrain from adapting encounters and adventures based on the number of players?

As an example, I'm running a group of players through Lost Mine of Phandelver. The initial ambush is supposed to be with 4 goblins, which is a deadly encounter for 4 Lvl 1 players.

As a DM, knowing the party would have 6 players, I deliberately upped the number of goblins in that encounter to 7 in order to keep it at the "deadly" encounter difficulty.

Should I, as a DM, refrain from this kind of adaptation just because the writers of the adventure did not include instructions on how to tailor the module for more players?

(Note: I've done the same for subsequent encounters, and I even went so far as to add even more monsters in the Cragmaw Hideout once I learned that a seventh player would join us for the next session.)

Willie the Duck

2017-12-26, 10:33 AM

This

Is in conflict with this.

The aren't in conflict. The latter is a nuance of the former. You stated, "They are both examples of denying the character use of their abilities," and that is clearly not the case. The rogue is not being denied the use of their abilities. They are instead being hoisted on the law of averages and the addition of traps because of the presence of their talents can become a liability. But it is still a very different animal from the situation of the cleric not being allowed to turn the turn-proof undead.

In this scenario the Rogue actually increases (dramatically) the party's harm from traps. This is the opposite of the intent of the Rogue. The Rogue is supposed to be there to eliminate the traps, instead, they make the traps much worse. This is negation.

Depends on your definition of negation. Using "1. the contradiction or denial of something. 2.the absence or opposite of something actual or positive." <straight google search for negation definition> the cleric situation is an absence or denial, while this is denial or opposite.

Naanomi

2017-12-26, 10:33 AM

I disagree. If one ignores both the WBL chart and CR/EL, the treadmill basically disappears from 3.5, and the edition continues to work fine. It can't be integral when it's so easy to remove.
WBL was just a symptom of the larger problem the ‘magic mart’, everything with a price tag, magic items as an expected part of character development design. As long as someone can turn wealth -> direct power, it will be expected they do so (and any other use of wealth will be handicapping yourself compared to your peers). That is the core of the treadmill, where gold coins are just another type of experience point, and WBL is just how the system attempts to address it

Put a late 10ths level fighter-type character in a gorge and tell them that they're the only thing that can stop a hobgoblin horde?
What 10th level martial build is stopping the horde from just walking past them and taking a small number of casualties on their way to their main target?

Ignimortis

2017-12-26, 11:11 AM

What 10th level martial build is stopping the horde from just walking past them and taking a small number of casualties on their way to their main target?

Late 10ths, doubt a 10th level can do it easily, but my OP-fu isn't that good, so maybe something along the lines of a high-reach, multiple-AoO fighter. Thicket of Blades-focused crusader? If there's a thousand enemies, for example, the hero can probably mow them down at a rate of ten or so each round. Incidentally, that's what Great Cleave is for, which is normally suboptimal.
Actually, now that I think of it, if we assume that the enemies move in formation and thus each occupies a 5-ft square, a warblade can do that quite well too - Mithral Tornado with a polearm (or in the Dancing Blade Form stance), Great Cleave off that (tbh warblade can afford that feat, if you're not high-op), and just start cutting the army in two parts. Toss a potion of Enlarge Person on top of that, some other means of increasing reach or some strikes that can strike distant targets for normal melee attack damage - and that should do it. Note that I mentioned a gorge - if the enemies are in a wide-open field, that reduces the effectiveness of such a defense - but that's true for any single character, I'd say, unless you're a minionmaster who brings their own army with them.

Tanarii

2017-12-26, 11:21 AM

Monsters are absolutely designed with the expectations of Magic ItemsThe designers have told us it's not the case, many different times, when discussing both magic items and bounded accuracy.

If I remember correctly the standard +Attack Bonus for monsters is 4 + Half CR.
Since the game expects that you avoid roughly 60% of the attacks from a similar CR monster and a CR 20 monster should have around +14 to hit (4 + 20/2)The former is provably not right by looking at the DMG tables for offensive CR and attack bonuses. For attack bonuses that high for the CR at higher CRs, something else is reduced to compensate.

For the latter, designers comments on bounded accuracy have again told us it's not the case. There's no assumption player AC will increase due to magic items. Instead they get hit more often, but have more hit points. (Same thing that happens with players attacking monsters, but the other way around.)

Naanomi

2017-12-26, 11:28 AM

For the latter, designers comments on bounded accuracy have again told us it's not the case. There's no assumption player AC will increase due to magic items. Instead they get hit more often, but have more hit points. (Same thing that happens with players attacking monsters, but the other way around.)
From experience this is fairly true, people get hit and hit others more at higher levels... this includes saves, especially if you have the ability to target a variety of them and can guess/know a monster's strengths and weaknesses well

Xetheral

2017-12-26, 12:33 PM

WBL was just a symptom of the larger problem the ‘magic mart’, everything with a price tag, magic items as an expected part of character development design. As long as someone can turn wealth -> direct power, it will be expected they do so (and any other use of wealth will be handicapping yourself compared to your peers). That is the core of the treadmill, where gold coins are just another type of experience point, and WBL is just how the system attempts to address it

That's why I mentioned also ignoring CR and EL. Doing so removes the expectation that characters will advance in items at the rate codified by the WBL table.

Jamesps

2017-12-26, 12:35 PM

Would the OP also suggest that the DM refrain from adapting encounters and adventures based on the number of players?

As an example, I'm running a group of players through Lost Mine of Phandelver. The initial ambush is supposed to be with 4 goblins, which is a deadly encounter for 4 Lvl 1 players.

As a DM, knowing the party would have 6 players, I deliberately upped the number of goblins in that encounter to 7 in order to keep it at the "deadly" encounter difficulty.

I think this is different because of who has the agency here. The DM chooses how many players are in a game. The players chose what those character are and do.

All DMs should adapt modules according to their own choices about the world.

Tanarii

2017-12-26, 12:44 PM

That's why I mentioned also ignoring CR and EL. Doing so removes the expectation that characters will advance in items at the rate codified by the WBL table.
That's the problem with WBL (3e, but also hidden in 5e via expected Hoards), CR, encounter difficulty, adventuring days, etc. They create the expectation that these guidelines are codified standards that must be met, and are not to be exceeded.

From things the 5e devs have said, especially JC, this is not necessarily the case in 5e. They are guidelines for what the part can reasonably handle. If they do less than the guidelines, they'll likely have a cakewalk. If they do more, they may get deaths or even TPKs. But that doesn't mean a DM has to force them to. Besides, as I've said quite a lot recently, my experience is: generally, if you hand the players a rope with an obvious noose, they'll still happily hang themselves. :smallamused:

(I can't recall what 3e devs stated back in the day in regards to various guidelines being guidelines, as opposed to hard coded formula.)

Edit: I do use the "formula" when planning an adventuring site. I pick a level for the site, a difficulty, and build my encounters for it. Then I tweak it a bit. But the level I pick has no relatin to the mix of PC levels in any given party that eventually explores the area and encounter it, except for being in the same Tier. Also often I steal content form old edition modules and adapt it, usually keeping a rough eye on the difficulty, but not always. Some stuff will be much easier or harder in that case.

Kish

2017-12-26, 12:46 PM

I remember hearing that Old Bonegrinder in Curse of Strahd is practically guaranteed to slaughter the party without house ruling or seriously crippling the enemies.

If that's accurate, does it affect your calculations here in any way?

Talamare

2017-12-26, 03:06 PM

A false assumption and bad math lead you to the wrong conclusion--

With ATK +14, you hit 60% of the time against AC 23, not 27. AC 27 means you miss 60% of the time with +14 ATK.

Assuming that the game expects you to get hit 60% of the time against CR = APL foes is a bad (and non-textual) assumption. It's not only no-where stated, it contradicts the encounter building math in the DMG (and repeated in Xanthar's). Against high-level solo monsters, you're supposed to get hit most of the time. Against the Tarrasque--that's what makes him difficult (although he's poorly designed). There's no "game expects 60% hits against equivalent foes" thing in this edition. Not at all. Nowhere.

Using the encounter building guidelines from Xanthar's, you have two choices:

Solo encounter: CR = APL + 2 (or 3 past level 17). Should be a legendary creature. These should be hard fights--the thing will hit you the majority of the time. You have to have abilities to soak that damage, rather than avoiding it. As a result, SoD's don't happen here. You're supposed to get hit, especially in a low-magic game where such challenges are even more difficult.

Group encounter: Weighted average CR for a level 20 party: ~10 (assuming 1 monster per PC). Lower if you allow hordes.

I actually simulated an encounter between an adult red dragon and a castle of 150 veterans (with 4 ballista). If the castle sees it coming (and so can fire from max range), the dragon dies after only inflicting light damage to the defenders. That's a good thing. Having high-level creatures as invulnerable against lower-level threats makes for a screwy setting. Allowing numbers to counteract individual power allows for at least somewhat of a balanced world where mortal demigods don't simply walk over everything in their way.

No bad math there, perhaps at worst; bad grammar.

Your assumption is worse that a Tank should be hit 100% of the time just like everyone else in the party.
Then what was the point of trying to build AC?

Before you say, "That's not what I'm trying to say"
If you don't hyper focus AC, you will get hit 100% of the time. You need to go out of your way and invest into AC to for it to be able to protect you.

If Epic and Legendary Creatures are going to hit you regardless, then your AC is weak.

Your Dragon vs Veteran example establishes what I already said +19 to hit but only 25 AC
Bounded Accuracy is much softer for Monsters Defenses than Monsters Attack.

There is like a CR1 monster with 18~20 AC (I don't recall the exact value, but its pretty high), yet the highest natural AC on a Monster caps out at around 25.
That's at very slim progression for Monster Defenses, but at the same time there is only 1 real way to increase your Accuracy and that is a +3 Weapon

While Monster Accuracy shoots up, and there are about 2-5 ways to increase your AC, +3 Armor, +3 Shield, Various Rings & Capes of +1 AC.

So even if what I said is never explicit in text, it's an unwritten design rule. You need to look beyond the Stats, and try to discover the code and methodology behind the stats.

The designers have told us it's not the case, many different times, when discussing both magic items and bounded accuracy.

The former is provably not right by looking at the DMG tables for offensive CR and attack bonuses. For attack bonuses that high for the CR at higher CRs, something else is reduced to compensate.

For the latter, designers comments on bounded accuracy have again told us it's not the case. There's no assumption player AC will increase due to magic items. Instead they get hit more often, but have more hit points. (Same thing that happens with players attacking monsters, but the other way around.)
They can say what they want, it doesn't matter. These are clear design choices that anyone can extrapolate from it.
These values are essentially proven by 1000 examples of more or less every monster in the Monster Manual.
You don't 'accidentally' end up with hundreds and hundreds of monsters that follow the same rules.

So even if what I said is never explicit in text, it's an unwritten design rule. You need to look beyond the Stats, and try to discover the code and methodology behind the stats.

Naanomi

2017-12-26, 03:25 PM

Or... at higher levels things are expected to hit more often than at lower levels?

Incidentally, (not including any new stuff in XGtE)... a PC can have at most 71 AC, but have +119 to Hit...

Tanarii

2017-12-26, 03:33 PM

The designers have told us how it works. If you're going to ignore that in favor of your pet theory that conflicts with that, knock yourself out. But don't expect the rest of us to pay attention to it.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 03:41 PM

No bad math there, perhaps at worst; bad grammar.

Your assumption is worse that a Tank should be hit 100% of the time just like everyone else in the party.
Then what was the point of trying to build AC?

No, that's not the right assumption. And your math was wrong--With a +14 you hit 40% of the time vs AC 27, not 60% like you said.

Before you say, "That's not what I'm trying to say"
If you don't hyper focus AC, you will get hit 100% of the time. You need to go out of your way and invest into AC to for it to be able to protect you.

If Epic and Legendary Creatures are going to hit you regardless, then your AC is weak.

No. At best you'll get hit 95% (pedantry), but let's run some numbers. A "normal" AC for a heavy armor type without magic items is 19-20 (Plate + shield or Plate + Defensive Style). Against a CR 17 Adult Red Dragon (+14 to hit), they're getting hit 75% of the time. In general, accuracy scales faster than defenses for everyone. That's a good thing. Miss-fests are obnoxious. Instead, survivability goes up because HP scales. The earliest you can have a hard difficulty solo adult red dragon encounter is about level 12 (going by Xanthar's guidance). Let's calculate the average rounds for the dragon to kill you at a range of levels, using normal numbers for damage and health. These are averages. Note that the breath hits 95% or 100% of the time (assuming you don't have dex save proficiency). I'm rounding down due to the other pieces not calculated (such as legendary actions and crits).

Levels 12-15: ~2-3 rounds
Levels 16-20: ~3-4 rounds

Conveniently, that's what the MM tells us to assume for calculating DPR. 3 rounds.

AC is a secondary tanking function. HP is a bigger one. Yes, you're supposed to get hit most of the time by foes. Even low level ones. At AC 20, orcs (+5 ATK) are still hitting you 30% of the time. The system design is that AC isn't required to scale, pretty much at all. Compare this to 3.5, where even a normal AC would be in the high 20s by the mid teens. You had to have high +X to even hit the enemy--even crits had to be confirmed. Those days are over. For good.

Your Dragon vs Veteran example establishes what I already said +19 to hit but only 25 AC
Bounded Accuracy is much softer for Monsters Defenses than Monsters Attack.

Der what? An Adult RD (what I tested against) has AC 19 and +14 to hit.

So even if what I said is never explicit in text, it's an unwritten design rule. You need to look beyond the Stats, and try to discover the code and methodology behind the stats.

No. It's not at all. There is no magic "60% hit rate" number in any assumption, anywhere. You're extrapolating from a screwy sense of what's level appropriate (no, CR = level is not what's supposed to happen, nor is CR = level - fixed number). Using Xanthar's guidance, we see that 1 PC of level X is matched by 1 monster of level X/2 (roughly), assuming that there are an equal number of monsters as players. Lower if there are more monsters. Solos are legendaries of CR = level + 2 (ish).

The hit chance assuming no magic items sits between 65 and 75% on level appropriate foes (and vice versa). But it's strongly variable.

Willie the Duck

2017-12-26, 03:51 PM

These values are essentially proven by 1000 examples of more or less every monster in the Monster Manual.
You don't 'accidentally' end up with hundreds and hundreds of monsters that follow the same rules.

I'm sure the number is simple to look up, but suffice to say there are approximately 350 monsters in the MM (~350 pp, ~1/page). There can't be 1000 examples.

If you have a pet theory, I think we're going to have to place the burden upon you to provide the argument and the evidence. I'd love to hear it, love to see it, but you have to make the argument. And in good faith. You've thrown around enough "proven"s (certainly not) and "So even if what I said is never explicit in text, it's an unwritten design rule"s (note, you have to show this to be the case) and "If Epic and Legendary Creatures are going to hit you regardless, then your AC is weak." (that is not a definition anyone else has reason the hew to) to make us a little skeptical. Beyond that, statements like "You need to look beyond the Stats, and try to discover the code and methodology behind the stats" make it sound like you believe that you are bringing enlightenment to the masses. And I think we're all pretty inured to posts like that here at this point.

Again, I am not saying that you are wrong, simply that you really have to bring your A game and prove your case if you're going to convince a skeptical audience.

I look forward to hearing it.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 04:50 PM

I'm sure the number is simple to look up, but suffice to say there are approximately 350 monsters in the MM (~350 pp, ~1/page). There can't be 1000 examples.

If you have a pet theory, I think we're going to have to place the burden upon you to provide the argument and the evidence. I'd love to hear it, love to see it, but you have to make the argument. And in good faith. You've thrown around enough "proven"s (certainly not) and "So even if what I said is never explicit in text, it's an unwritten design rule"s (note, you have to show this to be the case) and "If Epic and Legendary Creatures are going to hit you regardless, then your AC is weak." (that is not a definition anyone else has reason the hew to) to make us a little skeptical. Beyond that, statements like "You need to look beyond the Stats, and try to discover the code and methodology behind the stats" make it sound like you believe that you are bringing enlightenment to the masses. And I think we're all pretty inured to posts like that here at this point.

Again, I am not saying that you are wrong, simply that you really have to bring your A game and prove your case if you're going to convince a skeptical audience.

I look forward to hearing it.

Because I'm bored, I went through and entered the AC and CR of every one of the 429 (not 1000+) entries in the MM into a spreadsheet.

As one would expect, there is a (weak) correlation between CR and AC: R^2 of 0.55. This drops to 0.47 (ie crap) if you remove the ancient dragons. The slope of the best-fit line is 0.42, so for an increase of 2.4 CR you'd expect to see an increase of +1 AC.

When averaged against level-appropriate foes, you end up with the following hit rates (for no magic items and no advantage and assuming maxing attack stat first or no feats):

Level
CR
+Hit
AC
%

1
0.5
+5
12.48
67.6%

5
3
+7
14.3
68.5%

9
5
+9
15.2
74%

13
8
+10
15.6
77%

17
9
+11
16.8
76%

20
10
+11
17.25
73.8%

17+
20+
+11
20.73
56.4%

Note that these average AC numbers track the DMG guidance pretty well (with the only that's not within rounding being CR 3, where it's about 1 point high). Also note that without magic items, the average level appropriate creature is hit between 68% and 77% of the time. The row labeled "CR 20+" is what you get if you average over all creatures with CR >= 20. Those creatures are very dangerous to a party without magic items. That's by design. Using them as a baseline for the rest of the game is a very bad idea.

Using Xanthar's guidance for Solos, we get the following (assuming 5 players):

Level
CR
% Hit

1
2
64%

5
8
62%

9
12
67%

13
17
60%

17
21
59%

20
23
55%

For all of these, I assumed the following attack bonuses:

Level
Bonus

1
+5 (16 Stat, 2 proficiency)

5
+7 (18 stat, 3 proficiency)

9
9 (20 stat, 4 proficiency)

13
10 (20 stat, 5 proficiency)

17
11 (20 stat, 6 proficiency)

20
11 (no change)

Talamare

2017-12-26, 04:50 PM

Snip

So many pedantry arguments. You still didn't even let go that there was no bad math. Only bad grammar...
A player needs 27 AC to avoid being hit 60% of the time against that +Attack. (Are you going to do another pedantic statement about potentially ignoring crit chance again?)

19/25 are the stats for a Tarrasque, the point was that even a CR30 monster would probably be killable by an army
However a player outfitted to Tank against a CR20 monster would have AC too high to be threatened too heavily by an Army
(Altho of course Crits...)

I'm sure the number is simple to look up, but suffice to say there are approximately 350 monsters in the MM (~350 pp, ~1/page). There can't be 1000 examples.

If you have a pet theory, I think we're going to have to place the burden upon you to provide the argument and the evidence. I'd love to hear it, love to see it, but you have to make the argument. And in good faith. You've thrown around enough "proven"s (certainly not) and "So even if what I said is never explicit in text, it's an unwritten design rule"s (note, you have to show this to be the case) and "If Epic and Legendary Creatures are going to hit you regardless, then your AC is weak." (that is not a definition anyone else has reason the hew to) to make us a little skeptical. Beyond that, statements like "You need to look beyond the Stats, and try to discover the code and methodology behind the stats" make it sound like you believe that you are bringing enlightenment to the masses. And I think we're all pretty inured to posts like that here at this point.

Again, I am not saying that you are wrong, simply that you really have to bring your A game and prove your case if you're going to convince a skeptical audience.

I look forward to hearing it.

Forgive the minor exaggeration on the 1000, with a little variation at low CRs. As well as a few rare examples, the +300 monsters in the MM follow the formula for a +accuracy of 4+Half CR.
However all my statements have been in fairly good faith, and I haven't tried to deceive anyone.

Anyone can open their Monster Manual and find random examples, and find that they will fit the assumption. Classic method of Science, that anyone can use their own data to prove something if they don't believe it.

There is no 'Enlightenment' delusion here.

Think about it from a player perspective.
A player wants to build a Tanky character.
He has a certain expectation that if he focuses his resource on survivability that he should be able to be more survivable against stronger monsters.
-- Now this is just a random player and a random example, feel free to point out any fallacies but let's keep going.
If this player finds that, despite all his efforts to survivability he is borderline equally as survivable as the player who focused his growth on dealing damage.
Then it is likely this player will feel that his efforts were wasted.
-- Again, I acknowledge I'm saying loose statements, and probably creating a few fallacies.

However we can clearly see that it is perfectly possible for that player who focuses his growth and resources on survivability to maintain a roughly 60% AVOIDANCE (To Mr Pedantic, not you Willie) against Monster his own CR

However this only really happens when you factor in AC Bonuses from Magic Items.

Now Designers may publicly state that you don't need Magic Items to fight High CR Monsters. Which is perfectly true.
(Hell, there is an occasional optimization thread about killing high CR mobs at lowest CR possible.)
However it is pretty clear that to passively avoid being hit 60% of the time, you will need some Magic Item support

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 04:52 PM

An avoidance of 60% is absurd. Frankly, I've never seen it that high, even in a high-magic item game. And it's certainly not a design assumption. You've shown no data--you've only stated it and relied on that fact for your calculations.

Talamare

2017-12-26, 04:53 PM

Because I'm bored, I went through and entered the AC and CR of every one of the 429 (not 1000+) entries in the MM into a spreadsheet.

As one would expect, there is a (weak) correlation between CR and AC: R^2 of 0.55. This drops to 0.47 (ie crap) if you remove the ancient dragons. The slope of the best-fit line is 0.42, so for an increase of 2.4 CR you'd expect to see an increase of +1 AC.

When averaged against level-appropriate foes, you end up with the following hit rates (for no magic items and no advantage and assuming maxing attack stat first or no feats):

Since you already have them all on a spreadsheet

What is the +Hit bonus of the Monsters?
Is it 4 + Half CR?
Well?

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 05:07 PM

Since you already have them all on a spreadsheet

What is the +Hit bonus of the Monsters?
Is it 4 + Half CR?
Well?

I'm working on that currently. I was doing the inverse problem: player chance to hit vs monster AC. When I have those data, I will post them.

Talamare

2017-12-26, 05:22 PM

I'm working on that currently. I was doing the inverse problem: player chance to hit vs monster AC. When I have those data, I will post them.

Thank you for the work~!

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 05:57 PM

Here's the trend in ATK bonus (with a bunch of caveats)

There were a bunch of data points that had highly anomalous ATK bonuses--those creatures that rely almost entirely on their save-based abilities.

Some creatures have multiple ATK numbers (for different weapons). I've averaged those over an attack routine--this shouldn't change things much at all since (with a couple exceptions) they were similar numbers.

The data is super noisy, especially toward the lower end. CR 0 creatures vary from 0 - 5, CR 5 from 3 - 9.

CR 12 creatures have anomalously low ATK bonuses: 6 - 9.

The is (as is expected) much more correlation here. R^2 = 0.8, best fit line equation ATK = 0.52 CR + 3.5.

So yes, you can roughly (understanding that this will vary wildly even within the same CR) set ATK = 0.5 CR + 4.

But that doesn't explain why you think that the target avoidance is 60%. That's the number we want you to justify, not the ATK bonus number.

Edit: Further calculations

Assuming that you've got an AC tank that starts at AC 19 (Chain + Shield + Defense Style) and upgrades to plate at level 5, here are the avoidance numbers for solo encounters of CRs as given by Xanthars (roughly Level + 3 above level 1). The ATK bonuses were averaged across adjacent CRs (to reduce noise).

Level
Mean CR
Mean ATK
Avoidance %

1
2
4.69
66.6%

5
8
7.97
60%

9
12
6.8*
66%

13
17
9.29
54%

17
21
14.3
28.5%

20
23
16.4
18%

*CR 12, as mentioned is weirdly low, in part due to lots of primary spell-casters at those CRs.

So I have to take back part of what I said. At low levels, you do sit around 60% avoidance for a pure AC tank. This drops off a cliff when fighting solo epic legendaries (CR 20+ creatures). Since those are an infinitesimal fraction of all fights, as most games never get to those levels, and even the ones that do are fighting CR 10-ish creatures mostly (since solo fights are rare), this is not indicative of a need for magic items. At those levels you have defensive abilities that compensate significantly for a greater hit chance, and, as I said, miss-fests are boring for everyone.

Mostly DM

2017-12-26, 06:18 PM

IMO, 5e got off the 3.5e treadmill and built its' own, different but not necessarily better.
Late 3.5 was, perhaps unintentionally, an interesting game progression-wise, because you could feel the mechanical growth of your character - some things were just not a threat anymore. At all. Put a late 10ths level fighter-type character in a gorge and tell them that they're the only thing that can stop a hobgoblin horde? Absolutely doable, it's not even worth getting dice rolled except to simulate a few first seconds of the fight - hobgoblins are so below your level that you can wipe out an army, if you can just mitigate random 20s that could happen - fast healing or DR or even that one Crusader stance. Most people complain that it's bad, but personally, I always felt that it's the right way to go - at some point, you have to outclass your old enemies so badly that quantity can't catch up to quality. And with some splats you can even build for that to work without magic items - making a "Horde-slayer" is rather simple in 3.5e.
5e downsizes and instead of making high-level challenges insurmountable without magic items and magic support, just makes high level enemies into slightly more buff and higher-damage punchbags than whatever you were fighting 5 levels ago, with one or two schticks if they're lucky/iconic enough. It's E6 stretched over 20 levels, and that's why you presumably don't need magic anything - if there's not a lot of magic going around your enemies, why would you need any? Lots of magic items could make to-hit vs. AC combat run off the RNG, and 5e can't have that - if you've got +3 full plate, a +3 shield, and a defensive fighting style, then perhaps some enemies can't even hit you except on a 20 - which is going against the design goals for the system. Add more magic items into the mix, and the bounded accuracy falls apart, because it's just designed to work with rather low amounts of magic items.
Sorry about going on a rant, just thought it's rather appropriate to the topic.

I think you're 100% correct that 5e is essentially E6 stretched over 20 levels. That was my analysis the moment I picked up a 5e book, and the entire reason I became a big fan overnight.

It's precisely why 5e is so good, and why it absolutely is a repudiation of the treadmill.

You say 5e built it's own treadmill, but I don't see that. How do you figure? The beauty of 5e is that low level characters have a chance of dealing with any threat, and high level adventurers can never be totally safe from low level threats.

Where's the treadmill? Rather, to me it looks like a much better system in which to engage in literary-style storytelling... In 5e, if a lone man holds a canyon against an army, it's because he was imbued with some powerful divine grace or, better yet, because he used superior tactics and planning to do so. Not because his numbers were high enough.

Naanomi

2017-12-26, 06:25 PM

I think you're 100% correct that 5e is essentially E6 stretched over 20 levels.
To a degree, though unlike E6 you still get access to things like long range teleport and the like; which has a warping effect on adventures available in a way E6 didn’t

Talamare

2017-12-26, 07:20 PM

Final Snip

So I have to take back part of what I said. At low levels, you do sit around 60% avoidance for a pure AC tank. This drops off a cliff when fighting solo epic legendaries (CR 20+ creatures). Since those are an infinitesimal fraction of all fights, as most games never get to those levels, and even the ones that do are fighting CR 10-ish creatures mostly (since solo fights are rare), this is not indicative of a need for magic items. At those levels you have defensive abilities that compensate significantly for a greater hit chance, and, as I said, miss-fests are boring for everyone.

Great Data, and Excellent Presentation!

Do... I still need to prove anything? Cause it feels like you pretty much covered everything I would say...?

CircleOfTheRock

2017-12-26, 08:13 PM

Because if there was no Rogue (or Rogue who cared about traps) the traps wouldn't be there.

The result of creating a character who can save the party from traps is that now there are traps. So they're not really saving the party from the traps at all.
And so....? Seriously, so what? Games are generally supposed to be fun, and if a player designs a rogue who can save the party from traps, and he does what his character is supposed to do, the game will be better for him.

And the same for a Cleric who is good at turning undead; if he does, and trivializes an encounter, he's doing what his character is meant for.

Your logic is true, but your thought behind the logic is just silly, to me. And if you block the rogue from doing what he's supposed to do, why don't you just make him be another class?

It seems to me that you're just saying "Goodness forbid they use their class features."

I'm sorry if this came off abrasive, or rough, or if I inadvertently personally attacked you; it was supposed to be a rational and well-thought-out argument in a debate of sorts.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 08:17 PM

Great Data, and Excellent Presentation!

Do... I still need to prove anything? Cause it feels like you pretty much covered everything I would say...?

Other than that your premise was wrong (despite the data being normal)? That is, the system does not require +X AC/ATK magic items. For the vast majority of the relevant encounters, having a weapon that counts as magical (which may even be a common weapon!) is enough to overcome resistance/immunity. Beyond that, only when hunting the super-deadlies (which are unlikely to make a major portion of a campaign, and even then are unlikely to show up in low-magic campaigns) would you need any +AC items to maintain a relevant % avoidance.

That is, bounded accuracy works. Beautifully. Optimizing +hit/+AC is not really worth it, although being able to cast shield occasionally is a big boon.

Talamare

2017-12-26, 09:41 PM

Other than that your premise was wrong (despite the data being normal)? That is, the system does not require +X AC/ATK magic items. For the vast majority of the relevant encounters, having a weapon that counts as magical (which may even be a common weapon!) is enough to overcome resistance/immunity. Beyond that, only when hunting the super-deadlies (which are unlikely to make a major portion of a campaign, and even then are unlikely to show up in low-magic campaigns) would you need any +AC items to maintain a relevant % avoidance.

That is, bounded accuracy works. Beautifully. Optimizing +hit/+AC is not really worth it, although being able to cast shield occasionally is a big boon.

Weird
By your own data, it seems that basically everything I said was essentially accurate

1 - Monsters have roughly 4 + Half CR Attack
2 - You have roughly 60% not to be hit by Monsters when you're roughly expected to have no Magic Items
3 - That slowly trends down as the game starts expecting you to have Magic Items

Oh, should I explain 3 a bit?

The DMG explains that there are basically 4 Level 'Tiers' Pg133
0-4, 5-10, 11-16, and 17+

Then goes on to explain that it is typical to find certain items in those brackets Pg135
5+ Rare
11+ Very Rare
17+ Legendary

From a different Approach we are also given rarity tables
+1 Shield is found on F
+2 Shield and +1 Armor (Tier 3) is found on G
+3 Shield and +2 Armor (Tier 3), +1 Armor (Tier 2) is found on H
+3 Armor (Tier 3), +2 Armor (Tier 2), +1 Armor (Tier 3) is found on I
+3 Armor of Tier 2, and +3 Armor of Tier 3 is also found on I, but at a reduced chance

Tier 1 Armor - Leather, Chain Mail, Scale Mail, Chain Shirt
Tier 2 Armor - Breastplate, Splint, Studded Leather
Tier 3 Armor - Half Plate, Full Plate

Tier 0, has 14 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on F, 3 chances of getting 1 roll on G
Tier 5, has 14 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on F, 7 chances of getting 1d4 roll on G, 2 chances of getting 1 roll on H
Tier 11, has 8 chances of getting 1 rolls on F + 1d4 roll on G, 10 chances of 1d4 rolls on H, 8 chances of getting 1 roll on I
Tier 17, has 4 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on G, 8 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on H, 20 chances of 1d4 rolls on I

Tier 0, has 14 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on F, 3 chances of getting 1 roll on G
-- So you're given a fairly decent chance of getting a +1 Shield around this level.
Also notice that the game doesn't expect you to wear Full/Half Plate at this Tier.
A +1 Shield is an Uncommon Item, worth around 100-500g. Plate is considerably more expensive.
A Tank is expected to be wearing Chain Mail or Splint, and a +1 Shield, or around 19-20 AC. Non Tanks wouldn't use a Shield granting them 3 Less AC for 15-17 AC.

Tier 5, has 14 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on F, 7 chances of getting 1d4 roll on G, 2 chances of getting 1 roll on H
-- A key thing to note here is that AC at this point is still incredibly Bounded.
You should only find +1 Armor for Armors that are inherently less AC. So a +1 Chain Mail (17 AC) or just wear a Non Magical Splint Mail (17 AC).
Tho at this Tier Tanks are capable of being in Full Plate, As well as you do have a decent chance of getting +2 Shields.
So the game expects that Tanks have 20-22 AC. Non Tanks about 3-4 Less, or 16-18 AC.

Tier 11, has 8 chances of getting 1 rolls on F + 1d4 roll on G, 10 chances of 1d4 rolls on H, 8 chances of getting 1 roll on I
-- At this point Rolls on F become rare, It's too weak to keep really bothering to roll on.
We see that it is possible to find +1 Plate, but very common. So there is an expectation of around a Tank having +3 Shield.
While everyone else will still be basically in a Bounded Progression. A +1 Armor that provides 17, or a +2 Armor that provides 16. Either way it's 18 AC.
That places Non Tanks at 17-19 AC, and Tanks at 5 Higher or 22-24 AC, with a decent, but low chance of getting +1 Tier 1 or +2 Tier 2 Armor for 23-25 AC.

Tier 17, has 4 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on G, 8 chances of getting 1d4 rolls on H, 20 chances of 1d4 rolls on I
-- Holy 20 rolls on Table I! Batman!
A +3 Shield is already a standard, and +3 Tier 2 or 3 Armor should be pretty standard too. There is also a fairly small chance of finding that Legendary +3 Full/Half Plate, The Ultimate Tank Armor.
That means the standard AC for Non Tanks is at 18-20 AC. Tanks are again at +5 Higher, 24-26... With small chance of 25-27 AC.

Why am I adding a -1/+1 variability to all these values? You might have a Ring of Protection... You might not find exactly the best Armor.

So let's circle back to the beginning...

Tier 0 - 16 / 19
Tier 5 - 17 / 21
Tier 11 - 18 / 24
Tier 17 - 19 / 25

Let's take our Generic Monster, 4 + Half CR, and see roughly what our expected Avoidance is...
Tier 0, Level 4 Monster - 45% / 60%
Tier 5, Level 8 Monster - 40% / 55%
Tier 11, Level 14 Monster - 30% / 60%
Tier 17, Level 18 Monster - 25% / 55%

It's almost as if this game was really carefully designed...

Ignimortis

2017-12-26, 10:17 PM

I think you're 100% correct that 5e is essentially E6 stretched over 20 levels. That was my analysis the moment I picked up a 5e book, and the entire reason I became a big fan overnight.

It's precisely why 5e is so good, and why it absolutely is a repudiation of the treadmill.

You say 5e built it's own treadmill, but I don't see that. How do you figure? The beauty of 5e is that low level characters have a chance of dealing with any threat, and high level adventurers can never be totally safe from low level threats.

Where's the treadmill? Rather, to me it looks like a much better system in which to engage in literary-style storytelling... In 5e, if a lone man holds a canyon against an army, it's because he was imbued with some powerful divine grace or, better yet, because he used superior tactics and planning to do so. Not because his numbers were high enough.
No accounting for taste, I suppose, because I have a thing for one-man armies who can do those things on their own, without divine blessings or something to "even the odds" besides their own skill. I dislike E6 for the same reasons - it's too limiting for me.
Then again, I'm usually playing or running campaigns that assume that the PCs are special not only because they're at the right place at the right time, but also because there's no one exactly like them in their age, they have an unmatched raw potential for becoming anything they want to become, and eventually they eclipse everyone in the setting besides deities and their equivalents - there are no bands of roving adventurers just like them, and if there are any, they're not exactly on their level. If I ever wanted to run something more akin to LotR or classic fantasy tales - I'd definitely choose 5e, sure, it lends itself well to such stories.

The treadmill in 3.5e is actually a "you must be this tall to ride" sign, where you can't deal with certain things unless you're close enough in power, and you have to run just to catch up. The treadmill in 5e is "we're doing the same stuff with more attacks/slightly bigger numbers", and actual progression can only be measured by what spells casters can cast (just like 3.5e core, which is why splatbooks are a godsend), because Fighter 20 just swings his sword 3 times for slightly more damage each swing compared to Fighter 1. It is less noticeable, because the treadmill isn't outpacing you naturally - it just speeds up at the same rate you do, but you can't outpace it, either. Everything is a level-appropriate challenge if there's enough of it.

Naanomi

2017-12-26, 10:18 PM

Strange how none of the published adventure paths that take you across all tiers have items like that for the party to find methodically into high tiers... almost like one of the assumptions of the system is to not expect specific magic items to ‘drop’

Sception

2017-12-26, 10:21 PM

Yeah, the game math may not 'require' magic items, but once you get into the higher levels it very clearly does 'expect' them.

And, honestly, this is exactly why i always thought magic items with a flat bonus to hit or to ac were a mistake from day one, at least in a game basing itself off the idea of 'bounded accuracy' and trying to pretend incremental boosts from gear were optional. the swing of up to three points is bad enough for hit rolls, but there is absolutely nothing 'bounded' or 'optional' about a swing of up to nine points on ac. You can't design monsters to work remotely well against party tanks with AC that might be 21 or might be 30 at the same level.

Regardless of what they say, simple observation of the numbers makes clear that, as you get into the higher teens, the game math absolutely assumes parties are going to be carrying not just one magic item that improves ac, but several, more than one on party tanks even. If you're running a high level campaign where the players don't have such items, you're probably going to want to make some adjustments to compensate.

Because as much as whiff-fests are unpleasant, so to is building a character you think should be tough, with the best armor and shields your dm allows you access to, even burning class features like fighting style on it, only to find you might as well be running around naked with a great sword because you hit level 17 and suddenly every enemy worth taking note of is hitting you on a four anyway.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 10:36 PM

Weird
By your own data, it seems that basically everything I said was essentially accurate

Or a simpler assumption that fits with what's been said by the developers--HIGH-LEVEL SOLO FIGHTS AREN'T WHAT THEY BALANCED AGAINST. Entire campaigns come and go without ever facing such things. I'd say many if not most of them, in fact.

Using the more accurate CRs you're likely to face on a daily basis gives the following (without magic items at all, all attack bonuses averaged over three adjacent CRs to reduce noise):

Level 1: CR 0.5 = 71% avoidance
Level 5: CR 3 = 75% avoidance (the boost due to getting plate here)
Level 9: CR 5 = 67.5% avoidance
Level 13: CR 8 = 60% avoidance
Level 17: CR 9 = 57.5% avoidance
Level 20: CR 10 = 53% avoidance

Even a single +1 AC item (for a sustained AC of 22) at level 17 keeps the avoidance up to 60% (your threshold) through level 20. Even dropping one AC (due to not taking protection style, for example) keeps you above 50% for the whole game against relevant foes. Your assumption of CR ~ Level being how they balanced it is flawed. And explicitly so--they've said it isn't so. They said that they balanced around larger groups of weaker creatures.

As an additional note, since HP scales faster than damage intake the AC buffer in T1 makes sense--you have higher avoidance so you don't get one-shot as much. Above level 5, you've got enough HP to directly tank quite a few hits, especially with resistance, healing or some combination of the two. If the avoidance doesn't drop, you end up with padded sumo combat (takes forever to kill anyone) or you have the problem that anyone who's not a specialized tank gets blown up instantly by a hard foe (MMO-style). 5e does not require, nor does it expect that you have a specialized tank in a party. None of the math assumes it. None of the encounter guidelines assume it. Sure, it makes things easier, against some foes, but just like having a dedicated healer is unnecessary, so is having a dedicated tank.

Note that barbarians (who can't pump AC like that) are considered some of the best tanks. AC is one of the more minor features defensively, as long as it's not super low.

Edit:

Because as much as whiff-fests are unpleasant, so to is building a character you think should be tough, with the best armor and shields your dm allows you access to, even burning class features like fighting style on it, only to find you might as well be running around naked with a great sword because you hit level 17 and suddenly every enemy worth taking note of is hitting you on a four anyway.

This is a flawed assumption that's causing you to conclude that. Stop balancing campaigns or characters or theorycraft around high-level solo fights. Those are a particular weakness of this system. Most of the most dangerous encounters in my experience are the ones with multiple, lower level creatures. Against level-appropriate foes (as shown above), even no-magic tanking is perfectly viable. And the game math does not expect anything--a bunch of veterans can take an adult dragon with 20% casualties. That's bounded accuracy. Assuming that the only fights that matter are the high-cr ones is old-edition thinking and causes all sorts of problems in this edition.

Sception

2017-12-26, 10:42 PM

Dimers

2017-12-26, 11:02 PM

You can't design monsters to work remotely well against party tanks with AC that might be 21 or might be 30 at the same level.

Saving throws don't exist?

Unoriginal

2017-12-26, 11:04 PM

Talamare

2017-12-26, 11:04 PM

Or a simpler assumption that fits with what's been said by the developers--HIGH-LEVEL SOLO FIGHTS AREN'T WHAT THEY BALANCED AGAINST. Entire campaigns come and go without ever facing such things. I'd say many if not most of them, in fact.

Using the more accurate CRs you're likely to face on a daily basis gives the following (without magic items at all, all attack bonuses averaged over three adjacent CRs to reduce noise):

Level 1: CR 0.5 = 71% avoidance
Level 5: CR 3 = 75% avoidance (the boost due to getting plate here)
Level 9: CR 5 = 67.5% avoidance
Level 13: CR 8 = 60% avoidance
Level 17: CR 9 = 57.5% avoidance
Level 20: CR 10 = 53% avoidance

Even a single +1 AC item (for a sustained AC of 22) at level 17 keeps the avoidance up to 60% (your threshold) through level 20. Even dropping one AC (due to not taking protection style, for example) keeps you above 50% for the whole game against relevant foes. Your assumption of CR ~ Level being how they balanced it is flawed. And explicitly so--they've said it isn't so. They said that they balanced around larger groups of weaker creatures.

As an additional note, since HP scales faster than damage intake the AC buffer in T1 makes sense--you have higher avoidance so you don't get one-shot as much. Above level 5, you've got enough HP to directly tank quite a few hits, especially with resistance, healing or some combination of the two. If the avoidance doesn't drop, you end up with padded sumo combat (takes forever to kill anyone) or you have the problem that anyone who's not a specialized tank gets blown up instantly by a hard foe (MMO-style). 5e does not require, nor does it expect that you have a specialized tank in a party. None of the math assumes it. None of the encounter guidelines assume it. Sure, it makes things easier, against some foes, but just like having a dedicated healer is unnecessary, so is having a dedicated tank.

Note that barbarians (who can't pump AC like that) are considered some of the best tanks. AC is one of the more minor features defensively, as long as it's not super low.

Edit:

This is a flawed assumption that's causing you to conclude that. Stop balancing campaigns or characters or theorycraft around high-level solo fights. Those are a particular weakness of this system. Most of the most dangerous encounters in my experience are the ones with multiple, lower level creatures. Against level-appropriate foes (as shown above), even no-magic tanking is perfectly viable. And the game math does not expect anything--a bunch of veterans can take an adult dragon with 20% casualties. That's bounded accuracy. Assuming that the only fights that matter are the high-cr ones is old-edition thinking and causes all sorts of problems in this edition.

There has yet to be any solo fight expectations/assumption or any other words in that line.
This has just been about 1 Member of a Party being able to survive when he has been built to be able to Survive.
He still expects his party to deal damage, to cast buffs and debuffs, to heal, to do skills, and a myriad of other things.

Now, you may make a case about the variety of CR that a party might face.
They might face a Monster who is a couple of CR higher, Maybe one that is around same CR, maybe 2 that is slightly lower, or a few that are even lower, or a large mob that is significantly lower... Who knows there is a decent amount of variation.

Taking Grassland Encounters 17-20 from Xanathars, note I chose Grasslands randomly, and I don't know if it will support or destroy my point...
2d6 Triceratops (7 x CR5)
1d10 Gorgons (5 x CR5)
3d6 Bulettes (10 x CR5)
1d3 Young Gold Dragons (2 x CR10)
2d4 Cyclops (5 x CR6)
2d10 Bugbear + 4d6 Goblins + 2d10 Wolves (10 x CR1, 22 x CR 1/4)
1d12 Chimera (6 x CR6)
1d6+2 T-Rex (5x CR8)
1 Adult Gold Dragon (CR17)
1 Ancient Gold Dragon (CR24)

I forgot my point...

Well, the interesting thing is that with Bounded Accuracy
While 3d6 CR5 Bulettes isn't really a Threat to our well geared AC26
They are still a danger to our fairly well geared Magic Armored AC~20 back row with its ... (4+Half CR = +7?... Survey says...) +7!

and when you have potentially... 18! of them your Tank won't be able to hold them all.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-26, 11:08 PM

Barbarians (and rogues, for that matter) being widely acknowleged as equal if not better tanks than fighters and paladins strikes me as a /bug/, rather than a /feature/, one highlighting serious flaws in the game's AC math, at least in item-less campaigns.

Why? Is it out of a desire for niche protection? A la "must have a rogue to disable traps"? Or Vanilla-WoW-style "must have a certain number of tanks, warriors only except for that one fight you need a warlock to tank due to special mechanics"? That seems overly restrictive. The idea that you need a "tank" at all is overly restrictive.

I have 3 parties going currently.

One has 3 players: A moon druid, a bard, and a wizard.
One has 4 players: A SnB fighter, a SnB paladin, and two rogues.
The last also has 4 players: A monk, a warlock, a rogue, and a land druid.

In 5e, all can be equally successful. No dedicated healer, no dedicated tank, no dedicated arcane specialist, no dedicated anything needed. That's a prime feature for me. No more "oh, well, someone has to play healbot" or "someone has to tank." Play what you want, how you want. All can be effective, just in different ways. Some party compositions will struggle more with some scenarios, but no party composition is optimal or required.

Even in 4e (where "defender" was a role), you could get by with some sticky controllers or strikers (who had defender as secondary roles). And there was a wide range of possible tanks--some that were more offensively oriented, some that were more damage sponges, others that were evasive.

2D8HP

2017-12-27, 09:01 AM

IMO, 5e got off the 3.5e treadmill and built its' own, different but not necessarily better.
Late 3.5 was, perhaps unintentionally, an interesting game progression-wise, because you could feel the mechanical growth of your character - some things were just not a threat anymore. At all. Put a late 10ths level fighter-type character in a gorge and tell them that they're the only thing that can stop a hobgoblin horde? Absolutely doable, it's not even worth getting dice rolled except to simulate a few first seconds of the fight - hobgoblins are so below your level that you can wipe out an army, if you can just mitigate random 20s that could happen - fast healing or DR or even that one Crusader stance. Most people complain that it's bad, but personally, I always felt that it's the right way to go - at some point, you have to outclass your old enemies so badly that quantity can't catch up to quality. And with some splats you can even build for that to work without magic items - making a "Horde-slayer" is rather simple in 3.5e.
5e downsizes and instead of making high-level challenges insurmountable without magic items and magic support, just makes high level enemies into slightly more buff and higher-damage punchbags than whatever you were fighting 5 levels ago, with one or two schticks if they're lucky/iconic enough. It's E6 stretched over 20 levels, and that's why you presumably don't need magic anything - if there's not a lot of magic going around your enemies, why would you need any? Lots of magic items could make to-hit vs. AC combat run off the RNG, and 5e can't have that - if you've got +3 full plate, a +3 shield, and a defensive fighting style, then perhaps some enemies can't even hit you except on a 20 - which is going against the design goals for the system. Add more magic items into the mix, and the bounded accuracy falls apart, because it's just designed to work with rather low amounts of magic items.
Sorry about going on a rant, just thought it's rather appropriate to the topic.

:sigh:

I usually don't quote a post that long in full, and after I was alerted to it's existence I thought that I should stay away from this thread as it just sounded like something that will make me grumpy, but this grinds my gears!

A single 10th's level Fighter defeating a whole Hobgoblin army, not whole army of what, kittens?

That just sounds ridiculous.

For the record, I played D&D from 1978 to the mid 1980's, and then again with 5e, but if what you describe is typical of 3.5, my immediate reaction is:

That's not Dungeons & Dragons that's Champions!

Yes I know DC did Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, and Marvel did Conan in the 1970's (I have some of those issues!), but in general, please keep "four color" comic-book superheroics away from my Swords & Sorcery game settings, please!

I've seen some of the Naruto cartoons that my son watched, and yeah we're supposed to be inclusive and not say something is badwrongfun, yadda, yadda, yadda. .. oh just damn it, what in the name of Crom's backside sweat is an any level Fighter doing defeating a whole Hobgoblin army?!

Did PC's rocket up to high levels in 3.5 like they do in 5e? If so just Nope!

:annoyed:

Willie the Duck

2017-12-27, 09:35 AM

I've seen some of the Naruto cartoons that my son watched, and yeah we're supposed to be inclusive and not say something is badwrongfun, yadda, yadda, yadda. .. oh just damn it, what in the name of Crom's backside sweat is an any level Fighter doing defeating a whole Hobgoblin army?!

As long as everyone recognizes that we are discussing what we want for our own gaming, there's nothing wrong with complaining about something.

Did PC's rocket up to high levels in 3.5 like they do in 5e? If so just Nope!

It's going to be hard to answer that one. My observations are:
1)Defeating an army of low-powered monsters actually isn't something that most 3.5 fighters would be particularly good at. They would probably get 4+ attacks (presuming there were at least that many hobgoblins within ~5 feet of them each round), each of which would miss on only a 1, each do enough to kill a hobgoblin apiece, and the hobgoblins would presumably only be able to hit on a 20. If you specifically made a "low-level opponent killer" specialized build, you might have a character with a reach weapon, combat reflexes, great cleave feat, etc. who basically could presume to kill all the hobgoblins within 10-15' of them each round, excluding the ones where you rolled a natural 1 on your attack (and even those you might be able to get a second try against). However, as a general rule, 3.5 fighters are not specifically better at fighting an army than a 1e AD&D fighter, where at level 20 you could get 20 attacks against any hobgoblins within a round's movement.
2) The more prevalent trend is simply that in 3.0/3.5/PF, a monster you fight at level 1 is pretty much a non-event for high level characters--they can't hit you except on a 20, you can't miss except on a 1, and you can probably dispatch them without expending any resources.
3) PCs in 3e and 5e both 'rocket up to high levels' compared to TSR-era A/D&D in that you do not have to double your xp every level, and there are enough high-level challenges in the books that at levels 11-20 you can actually find xp-granting foes. But (and this I think is where the references to 'E6' come in), the difference is that in 3e, high-level looks vaguely Naruto-ish (or 4-color comics, DragonBall-Z, Adventures of Heracles or Gilgamesh, movie Legolas, whatever over-the-top characters you want), while in 5e high-level feels significantly... less distant from levels 3-4. The 'what level you are after X gaming sessions' is similar in 3e and 5e, but 5e is much more muted in high-level power (in relation to low-to-mid-level power).
4) As I've said many times, there's no purity in anything, and you can find the thing you complain the most about in disliked thing X in your most liked thing Y. For every complaint about the power level of WotC-era gaming one might level, one can bring up OD&D/AD&D-era insanity like PCs riding around on restrained-captured dragons, golf bags full of magic swords which granted X/day spells as well, earliest era items such as artifacts and Arduin Grimoire that broke all the rules, and players with so many wishes that EGG had to make rules like 'to raise stats over 16, you'll need 10.' Some people played TSR-era D&D more constrained than WotC-era, and some people (sometimes the same people at different times, and sometimes even the designers) played it more epic than anything modern gamers would ever conceive.

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 09:56 AM

I've done the calculations, a lvl 20 Champion Fighter, sword-and-shield, with only a +2 armor as magic item, can technically defeat 500 hobgoblins.

If the hobgoblins are using reasonable tactics, but not the best ones.

By my hestimation, that champion could defeat maybe 150-200 hobgoblins if they did use the best tactics at their disposal.

Which is honestly more a testament of how tough the hobgoblin soldiers are than anything else.

Willie the Duck

2017-12-27, 10:10 AM

Which is honestly more a testament of how tough the hobgoblin soldiers are than anything else.

Honestly, I don't know what it is a testament to. Weird edge cases where things that really aren't meant to interact with each other all that often, what do they prove? One 20th-level fighter vs. army of low-level speed bumps? That seems right up there with 3e Pun-Pun or TSR-era 0th-level commoner vs. housecat in the 'well the answer might be vaguely interesting, but doesn't prove all that much about the game in general.'

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 10:14 AM

Honestly, I don't know what it is a testament to. Weird edge cases where things that really aren't meant to interact with each other all that often, what do they prove? One 20th-level fighter vs. army of low-level speed bumps? That seems right up there with 0th-level commoner vs. housecat in the 'well the answer might be vaguely interesting, but doesn't prove all that much about the game in general.'

Ah, yes, I forgot about 5e's "mooks are worthless against high-level characters, in fact they become irrelevant past level 10" design intent. Silly me.

Ignimortis

2017-12-27, 10:20 AM

:sigh:
-snip-
:annoyed:

First of all, hi! I recognize your name on sight, and I have to say this:
I always look forward to your posts in some threads, actually, precisely because you possess a diametrically different perspective on what an ideal D&D game looks like.
I do not dislike the classic fantasy characters - Fafhrd, Conan, and the innumerable others. However, it's just not what I want to play when I'm playing D&D. To me, 3.5 is special precisely because, as the following post has noted...

...in 3e, high-level looks vaguely Naruto-ish (or 4-color comics, DragonBall-Z, Adventures of Heracles or Gilgamesh, movie Legolas, whatever over-the-top characters you want)...

It's a progression where a normal, if heroic, person changes into a demigod. You're a nobody at level 1, you're Aragorn or Fafhrd at level 5-6, you're Achilles or Hercules at level 10-12, and after that you're even more - maybe Gilgamesh or Cuchulain (sp?) (depending on the class, 3.5e being what it is, it requires some amount of system mastery to bring a concept to life). It's a hero's journey taken to its' extreme. I love 3.5e for this and don't begrudge anyone who doesn't. It's not a typical build, as, again, Willie has noted, but it's something I can strive for when playing 3.5e, without having to be a mage who just bombs the army with fireballs and cones of cold.

I don't feel that way about any other edition of D&D - even though I play in a 5e game right now, which is very much on the level of LotR or the Witcher or, indeed, Conan, and will never become anything greater than that.

P.S. Didn't some old edition of AD&D have a rule for high-level fighters to auto-kill X low-level opponents per round if they were within reach?

Willie the Duck

2017-12-27, 10:22 AM

Ah, yes, I forgot about 5e's "mooks are worthless against high-level characters, in fact they become irrelevant past level 10" design intent. Silly me.

I'm sorry, what?

Now how did you get that out of what I said?

I specifically argued that that was the logic/design intent of 3e, not 5e, all of 3 posts ago.

My point is that--if the outcome of this 20th level champion vs. 500 hobgoblins matchup had come out in the hobgoblins favor, would it really change what we thought regarding 5e, the treadmill, or any of the larger questions regarding the edition? I am suggesting not, because it is a fairly edge situation.

Willie the Duck

2017-12-27, 10:30 AM

P.S. Didn't some old edition of AD&D have a rule for high-level fighters to auto-kill X low-level opponents per round if they were within reach?

Not quite. You got 1 attack per level (which may or may not be effectively an auto-kill). In OD&D is was for creature (or characters, which made fighters special with their 1+1 hd at first level) 1 HD or less. In 1e AD&D is was for less than 1 HD.

Tanarii

2017-12-27, 10:41 AM

It's a progression where a normal, if heroic, person changes into a demigod. You're a nobody at level 1, you're Aragorn or Fafhrd at level 5-6, you're Achilles or Hercules at level 10-12, and after that you're even more - maybe Gilgamesh or Cuchulain (sp?) (depending on the class, 3.5e being what it is, it requires some amount of system mastery to bring a concept to life). It's a hero's journey taken to its' extreme. I love 3.5e for this and don't begrudge anyone who doesn't. It's not a typical build, as, again, Willie has noted, but it's something I can strive for when playing 3.5e, without having to be a mage who just bombs the army with fireballs and cones of cold.

I don't feel that way about any other edition of D&D - even though I play in a 5e game right now, which is very much on the level of LotR or the Witcher or, indeed, Conan, and will never become anything greater than that.
5e is intended to be from zero to Demi-God as well. Effectively. It's just that "Demi-God" is a lot less godly than in 3e, relative to the mere peons.

Also, the designers were just very explicit that the primary range of play intended is 5-10, and the XP gains & tables were designed to make that the longest portion of the game. They also made 11-16 the second fastest, so you zip to "epic" levels of 17-20 once you break into high level (ie 10+). They also clearly delineated the kinds of play to expect, and by extension gave insight into personal power, within the Tiers of Play.

(I believe they've also given us an idea of how to run several kinds of adventure arc campaigns with published products, which are typically 1-16 kind of things, wrapping up the saving of the world. However I only know there adventure arcs by hearsay and what I've read on the forums so someone else will have to speak more to that and/or correct me.)

This is all important, because since AD&D 2e onward, the PHB printing the entire range of levels 1-20 (or 1-30 for 4e) often gives the mistaken impression that players are expected to reach high levels. That its normal to reach high levels, which is Tier 3+ in 5e. That campaigns will actually hold together that long, which can take a year with only 1-2 sessions a month.

Crusher

2017-12-27, 10:44 AM

In this scenario the Rogue actually increases (dramatically) the party's harm from traps. This is the opposite of the intent of the Rogue. The Rogue is supposed to be there to eliminate the traps, instead, they make the traps much worse. This is negation.

The players don't know this.

Sure, if you tell the players "This dungeon has no traps, but since you have a Rogue I'm going to put in so many traps they can't possibly disarm them all and you're going to take some damage." then they're going to be pissed off. But that's just you being a jerk about it (why put in so many traps the Rogue MUST fail? Why not put in like 3, but have them be really prominent and memorable?) as well as doing an awful job of setting expectations and telling the story.

If the players go into a dungeon and there are a bunch of traps which end up doing some damage, they're going to be glad the Rogue is there. They're not going to assume the traps only magically arrived because the Rogue was there, they'll assume it would have been impassible without the Rogue and that the Rogue was the star.

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 10:51 AM

I'm sorry, what?

Now how did you get that out of what I said?

I specifically argued that that was the logic/design intent of 3e, not 5e, all of 3 posts ago.

My point is that--if the outcome of this 20th level champion vs. 500 hobgoblins matchup had come out in the hobgoblins favor, would it really change what we thought regarding 5e, the treadmill, or any of the larger questions regarding the edition? I am suggesting not, because it is a fairly edge situation.

If you do agree that keeping mooks relevant was the intent, maybe not calling them "low-level speed bumps" would make that clearer.

As for the question it answers, yes, it's an edge case, but seeing the limits of something help with the understanding of said something.

The specific build I used proved the Champion, often considered weak/uninteresting, could survive a battle against a couple of hundreds, but it also demonstrated how easily level 20 characters would get rekt by mooks if not built for that.

I haven't done the calculation, but I'd guess maybe 80 goblins would rekt a large part of the builds you see in optimization threads

mephnick

2017-12-27, 10:58 AM

If the players go into a dungeon and there are a bunch of traps which end up doing some damage, they're going to be glad the Rogue is there. They're not going to assume the traps only magically arrived because the Rogue was there, they'll assume it would have been impassible without the Rogue and that the Rogue was the star.

I think it's a pretty poor DM who changes things depending on who's in the party. Why would you take traps out of the game just because there's no one to disable them?

Although I know the modern idea is to tailor campaigns to a specific party and many DMs do stuff like this. Hold on while I throw up a little.

Ignimortis

2017-12-27, 11:05 AM

The specific build I used proved the Champion, often considered weak/uninteresting, could survive a battle against a couple of hundreds, but it also demonstrated how easily level 20 characters would get rekt by mooks if not built for that.

I haven't done the calculation, but I'd guess maybe 80 goblins would rekt a large part of the builds you see in optimization threads

Actually, the champion is one of the best martial archetypes for such a battle - if the player gets lucky, champion can just go on forever, healing up a weapon attack or two per turn and having feats to blow on stuff like Heavy Armor Master and Great Weapon Master for a limited Cleave effect. Battlemaster and EK would run out of resources pretty quickly, a Barbarian doesn't have any innate healing ability, and a Paladin could do about as well as a Champion, maybe better if running the Oath of Conquest. Most optimization threads focus on getting one target down in a huge nova burst, not sustained survival and damage, and that's why Champion doesn't work for those builds and works well for a hypothetical 1-to-1000 melee.

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 11:29 AM

Ignimortis

2017-12-27, 11:46 AM

I know the Champion's awesome, I'm just talking about the common perception.

Apparently killing soldiers and dragons with your sword isn't good enough for most people.

Hell, the other day, I've made a thread about a hypothetical sidequest involving an unarmed PC fighting an unarmed Hill Giant, and a lot of people commented it would be boring. Somehow a kung-fu master battling a huge dude three time their size in a no-hold-bared struggle to victory is "boring".

Mechanically, it would be quite boring - you roll dice without any special effects. Although Monk's not as boring in 5e, most of their special attacks are still "I attack some more". That's what people mean by "boring" - you're just trading blows for some time, doing damage to each other and nothing more. The giant rolls to smash/stomp/kick/grab you, you roll to punch/kick/run up his leg and uppercut him on the nose ;)

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 11:55 AM

Mechanically, it would be quite boring - you roll dice without any special effects. Although Monk's not as boring in 5e, most of their special attacks are still "I attack some more". That's what people mean by "boring" - you're just trading blows for some time, doing damage to each other and nothing more. The giant rolls to smash/stomp/kick/grab you, you roll to punch/kick/run up his leg and uppercut him on the nose ;)

All D&D combat is boring, if you only look at it mechanically. "You roll a die/your opponent roll a die, and if you roll higher/they roll lower than a certain number you roll some other dice to diminish the number of turns the combat will last/apply a condition that makes rolling dice more efficient for you and your allies/less efficient for the opponents, or you apply such a condition/roll some other dice to diminish the number of turns the combat will last without rolling first."

What makes it interesting is the context and the visual you can imagine.

Sception

2017-12-27, 12:23 PM

Why? Is it out of a desire for niche protection?

Niche protection / build intuition. It's not that parties should 'need' a tank, but rather that if you as a player want to build a tank, natural intuition would tell you to pick the class with the heaviest armor proficiencies, not the medium armor great axe guy or the light armor guy with the shortbow or dual daggers, or the forest wizard.

So you pick one of the classes with access to the heaviest armor, and you buy the best armor that you can get, and sacrifice damage to carry a shield, and take the class features that seem to emphasize tanking (eg: defense/protection fighting style). And you think you should be the party tough guy, the party tank, because you made the overtly intuitive tank choices.

But then in game, you find that your armored up guy can't really take punishment any better than the barbarian or rogue who, intuitively, were making character choices for damage rather than defense. And if you ever get to higher levels, unless your DM has given you both +x armor AND a +x shield, you find that most of the dramatically important enemies are hitting you on something between a 2 and a 5 despite your full plate, shield, and defensive class feature choices, and all the intuitive build decisions you put into being tough just don't matter anymore, while the non-AC based defensive features that aesthetically squishier characters got to let them survive in melee despite 'not being a tank' are still mostly working ok. So now your character intuitively built to be the tough guy not only isn't any tougher than anyone else, they're now considerably /less/ tough.

With a dollop of pre-planning and some unintuitive system mastery you can see the problem coming and work around it, and many campaigns won't get to a high enough level to feel the worst effects of it, or are generous enough with +x magic items to not suffer badly under the game math for higher level monsters kind of assuming that heavy armor characters will be getting significantly more than 20 points of AC from their gear.

But still, it's a problem that obvious build choices don't translate into intuitive results without the DM stepping in to shore up character choices with boring math-patch treasure drops.

If there were no +AC magic items, or if the /only/ +AC items were armor such that AC would vary by 0 to 3 for magic items instead of 0 to 9, than I'm absolutely convinced that the attack accuracy of late game monsters would be considerably more 'bounded' than what we currently see.

Crusher

2017-12-27, 12:38 PM

I think it's a pretty poor DM who changes things depending on who's in the party. Why would you take traps out of the game just because there's no one to disable them?

Although I know the modern idea is to tailor campaigns to a specific party and many DMs do stuff like this. Hold on while I throw up a little.

I'm extremely strongly against the idea that there's a specific, best way to DM. Every DM has their own style, every group of players has their own personality, and each campaign is run in its own way. If you're running a one-off adventure with players using characters they may not play again, and the party is full of martial characters lacking magic items, then throwing a bunch of werewolves at them might or might not be a good idea.

If the players are new, don't understand the mechanics well, and lack confidence, then it could be a terrible idea. Even damage the monsters will require preparation and creativity, which the DM (perhaps via an NPC) could have to walk the players through, arguably robbing the players of their agency. Plus, you're at high risk of a TPK which can be rough on new groups.

If the players are experienced, enjoy a challenge, and aren't attached to the characters, then it could be a fantastic session where the players need to really work just to survive and everyone has a blast.

Also, it depends on what you're doing at that point of the campaign. In a campaign I'm currently running, the sessions have varied from being very sandboxy to very railroady, based on various things. For the sandboxy parts, I'd be perfectly happy to throw obstacles at them they're ill-equipped to deal with. The players are significant actors in their world, but the world certainly doesn't revolve around them. Not all their choices are going to end up being good ones, and things aren't always going to work out in their favor. That's life.

For the railroady parts, there's usually something specific I'm working towards and would prefer the characters reach the end. So I won't stack the deck against them, but if the characters don't get there, again, that's the way it goes. They've completely missed some NPCs and interesting bits I was looking forward to. On the other hand, I've been repeatedly delighted by their creativity and they've headed down some paths that never occurred to me and opened doors I never thought they'd reach, keeping me on my toes. That's part of the fun.

Sception

2017-12-27, 01:48 PM

Yeah, the idea that there's one best way to DM probably isn't the best mentality. It'll depend on the DM and the players and what they're looking to get out of the game. For my money, I prefer tabletop RPGs as cooperative story telling, where the DM works with the the players, both overtly and behind the screen, to tell the story they want to tell. In this perspective, the characters the players make signal to the DM what kind of stories they want to experience and tell. If somebody builds a character who is good at finding and disarming traps, picking locks, and that sort of thing, then they're telling you they want to tell a story where a character with those skills is important to the success of the party as a whole, where as if nobody plays a character with those skills, then what your party is signalling to you is that they're not looking to take part in that kind of story.

A lot of this kind of stuff is better worked out overtly via frank, up-front discussion, like if the DM was planning a campaign full of deadly traps and nobody in the party is playing a character who can deal with them, then there is a clear misalignment of storytelling priorities going on, one best resolved by the DM saying, 'hey, I was building some dungeons with a lot of traps, but none of you have the skills to spot or disable them, does somebody maybe want to change their character, or should I be coming up with some different dungeons?'

Or if the DM wants to run an urban crime investigation & society politics game, then they should be up front about it, so that the players can either make characters that fit, or have a chance to express that they would rather play a different kind of game, or whatever.

But while open conversation is best, I don't think there's anything wrong with adjusting the campaign to the kinds of adventures implied by the characters the players create. If one guy makes a bright shining paladin and another a cleric of pelor whose backstory revolves around hating the undead, then in my mind it's just good DMing to rework that early dungeon that you had planned to stock with goblins to instead have a necromancer and some zombies, or to re-imagine that villanous fey BBEG as maybe a vampire instead.

Likewise, if someone plays a trap-master rogue, imo it's just good DMing to include a few more dastardly traps than you otherwise might have done to give them a chance to demonstrate that mastery.

But again, there isn't really one right way to do things.

Talamare

2017-12-27, 04:07 PM

Snip

Snip

Points I've tried to make, but explained poorly!

The precarious balance is interesting
Since if your Tank has kept his AC high with magical items, to the point that mooks cannot realistically THREATEN him.
He is still highly threatened by the strongest of monsters due to Save based damage.

Barbarian will have Resistance regardless, so half damage inherently and chance of quarter damage
Rogue has Evasion, so half damage inherently and chance of no damage

The only real way for a Fighter to compete is by going Eldritch Knight to pick up Absorb Elements.

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 04:14 PM

Since if your Tank has kept his AC high with magical items, to the point that mooks cannot hurt him.

But that's wrong. No matter how high your AC will be, enemies will still have 5% of crits. And given mooks tend to be more numerous, they have more attacks to get in those 5%

2D8HP

2017-12-27, 04:15 PM

As long as everyone recognizes that we are discussing what we want for our own gaming, there's nothing wrong with complaining about something.... .
Of course, and whinging is part of the fun (thank you for the response)!

...Defeating an army of low-powered monsters actually isn't something that most 3.5 fighters would be particularly good at....
Okay, good to know, I feel calmer now.

...the difference is that in 3e, high-level looks vaguely Naruto-ish (or 4-color comics, DragonBall-Z, Adventures of Heracles or Gilgamesh, movie Legolas, whatever over-the-top characters you want), while in 5e high-level feels significantly... less distant from levels 3-4. The 'what level you are after X gaming sessions' is similar in 3e and 5e, but 5e is much more muted in high-level power (in relation to low-to-mid-level power)... .
That seems like a point in 5e's favor to me.

...earliest era items such as artifacts and Arduin Grimoire that broke all the rules.....
My first DM used the Arduin Grimoires, and while I look upon those games with a sepia and rose-tinted view, and think of it as a golden age, there really was a lot of weird stuff. Specifically, the "Technos" from Arduin just seemed off to me (and then my DM switched us from D&D to Villians & Vigilantes far too soon for my taste, forever predjudicing against superhero RPG's).

I've done the calculations, a lvl 20 Champion Fighter, sword-and-shield, with only a +2 armor as magic item, can technically defeat 500 hobgoblins.....
20th level PC's with that much power bother me less than the 10th level Fighter in @Ignimortis's example (which @Willie The Duck says is an exaggeration).

First of all, hi! .
Hello to you, thanks!

:smile:

...I do not dislike the classic fantasy characters - Fafhrd, Conan, and the innumerable others. However, it's just not what I want to play when I'm playing D&D...

...It's a progression where a normal, if heroic, person changes into a demigod. You're a nobody at level 1, you're Aragorn or Fafhrd at level 5-6, you're Achilles or Hercules at level 10-12, and after that you're even more - maybe Gilgamesh or Cú Chulainn (depending on the class, 3.5e being what it is, it requires some amount of system mastery to bring a concept to life). It's a hero's journey taken to its' extreme. I love 3.5e for this and don't begrudge anyone who doesn't. It's not a typical build, as, again, Willie has noted, but it's something I can strive for when playing 3.5e, without having to be a mage who just bombs the army with fireballs and cones of cold.

I don't feel that way about any other edition of D&D - even though I play in a 5e game right now, which is very much on the level of LotR or the Witcher or, indeed, Conan, and will never become anything greater than that.....
That fair.

I actually don't mind the "demi-god" thing at 20th level, my issue was at 10th level (given how fast one gets to 10th level in 5e).

Low level 5e D&D is the most consistently fun game for me (ignoring my dim memories of 0e D&D), and I wish level progression was a little slower (in the 5e games I've played), but that's just me..

I've seen other posts of how 5e PC's feel under-powered by many 3.5 (and some 4e) veterans, and while I don't feel that way (I've only played TSR D&D before 5e), it occurs to me that there's a craving out there for supplemental "Epic" rules (like the 3.5 WD&D ones, or the "Immortals" rules for old "BX"/"BECMI" TD&D, and I think 4e had higher levels as well).

What level the PC's are at is an easy "dial" for tables to adjust, but how much "power" each level represents is pretty "baked-in" to the rules (yeah there's magic items, but thst only goes so far).

I don't feel the need personally, but maybe higher levels than 20 should be made for those who want them?

Most feel 1st level is low enough power, and I really like playing at that level, but that's too much power for a Bilbo Baggins level starting adventurer, and in looking at say the Folk Hero Background's "Defining Event", I wonder, wouldn't those be good to play out?

I know that the old

Treasure Hunt (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_Hunt_(module))

adventure "module" was for "zero-level" PC's, so maybe some rules for below 1st level PC's as well?

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 04:21 PM

.

Most feel 1st level is low enough power, and I really like playing at that level, but that's too much power for a Bilbo Baggins level starting adventurer

I think you're underestimating Bilbo here. He wasn't great at the start, but he was far from incompetent. For exemple, he'd have succeeded stealing from the trolls if one of them didn't have a magic talking purse.

.and in looking at say the Folk Hero Background's "Defining Event", I wonder, wouldn't those be good to play out?

Err, would it? Background's background for a reason.

so maybe some rules for below 1st level PC's as well?

You could use a NPC statblock and play them

2D8HP

2017-12-27, 04:26 PM

...You could use a NPC statblock and play them.
:smile:

Good idea, thanks!

Tanarii

2017-12-27, 04:34 PM

I actually don't mind the "demi-god" thing at 20th level, my issue was at 10th level (given how fast one gets to 10th level in 5e).PCs are already pretty heavily moving toward demi-god by level 10 in every edition of D&D. At least by my standards of "normal". OTOH you have a point about fast leveling. It doesn't take multiple years of weekly play any more.

Unoriginal

2017-12-27, 04:38 PM

Well, it depends what you call a "demigod".

Tanarii

2017-12-27, 04:44 PM

Well, it depends what you call a "demigod".
lol I'm crossing threads here.
Here's where I started down that exact discussion in the Roleplaying forum: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=22699928&postcount=1345

MxKit

2017-12-27, 04:50 PM

[snip]

100% agreed.

The game isn't the DM's story. The game isn't solely the player's story either, no, but it is collaborative. A Session 0 is a good idea specifically because it allows the DM and the players to talk about or see what the others want to get from the campaign.

Now, some DMs use the Session 0, or a pre-game document, or whatever, as more of a one-way communication, and that's fine. Saying, hey, this is the world and the setting and the playstyle, and maybe a hint at the problems you'll be dealing with, you might want to build your party keeping these things in mind lets the players craft their characters to fit rather than the DM changing the setting or plot at all. Like, if the DM says "we'll be playing Curse of Strahd," the players might agree that a Cleric and a Paladin would be good to have on the team. If the DM says "this will be a politics-heavy campaign with less of a focus on combat," a player who was thinking of playing either a Barbarian, a Rogue, or a Roguebarian might decide to just go with the Rogue. It lets them choose skills and backgrounds that make sense for the setting and what their characters are getting involved in. Maybe in a high seas campaign everyone takes the Sailor/Pirate background!

Some DMs don't give any hints and just let the players bring who they will, and have a... semi-set idea for what they want their game to be like, including what enemies they might want to concentrate on at each tier of play (like undead leading up to a lich, or hags leading all the way up to the group winding up in the Nine Hells somehow). That's fine, too, honestly, especially if starting at first level, since again the players can easily build their characters as they go through the campaign to fit what's necessary. It's often better to hint at style of play, especially if it's low on combat because a Barbarian player could easily wind up feeling out of place and might be like "why is my lv1 Barbarian getting involved in court intrigue anyway?" but even then a character can be adjusted to work (raising stats you might otherwise have kept low since you won't need the ASIs to raise your Strength as much; taking feats that give you more non-combat options; multiclassing) and it can make a great story (hanging around the court, your Barbarian, while still rough around the edges, has started learning things from the wizard who acts as the king's codebreaker, and winds up with the Linguist feat as well as multiclassing into Wizard and starting to bump Intelligence up). Some DMs and players think this feels organic, and when it works for people, it's great! When everyone's on the same page, I actually quite like this style of play as a player, even if it's not my favorite one.

I personally like working with my players to figure out what story all of us want to tell. I have a basic idea for what I want to do, tell them what races/classes are allowed, give them an idea of what balance of tiers things will be, but I also pay attention while they're building their characters. The traits they pick as part of their backstory, sometimes race, and now, with Xanathar's, class, give great potential hooks that a DM can play with, and players often love when a DM uses that sort of thing anyway, so it's a win-win. And yeah, if I see that someone is building their character in a certain way and blatantly wants to do certain things with that character, I'm probably going to give them some opportunity to do those things at least a handful of times. If someone's building a Light Cleric or a Grave Cleric and obviously gearing up to be good against undead, I'd rather work a few undead into my campaign than just go "lol nope no undead, it wasn't in my plans and I'm not changing them for you!" Especially, to follow up on Crusher's points, if these are new or relatively new players. "I don't care what you want to play or what you want your character to be able to do" might legitimately have a time and place! But I would argue that it's not always the time or place for that. I'll be DMing a game in the new year for 4-5 middle- and high-schoolers with little to no experience with D&D. Our Session 0 will involve me not giving a whole lot of information about the initial adventure we'll be playing (we're going to start with Mines of Phandelver), but helping them build the kinds of characters they want to play, and when we get to the end if everyone still wants to keep playing I will absolutely take the things the kids obviously want to focus on and use that to make the next stage of the campaign, to help everyone feel engaged and involved.

Sception

2017-12-28, 07:28 AM

The precarious balance is interesting
Since if your Tank has kept his AC high with magical items, to the point that mooks cannot realistically THREATEN him.
He is still highly threatened by the strongest of monsters due to Save based damage.

Fighter is really lacking in terms of effect & damage mitigation, yeah. At the very least, indomitable should have been on a short rest timer, or been an auto-pass instead of a reroll, or both. Extra ASIs do help this a little, as there are a few defensive feats that can be grabbed, but still.

The paladin at least lay on hands, divine health, aura of protection, aura of courage, and, eventually, Cleansing touch, along with spells like bless, protection from good and evil, lesser restoration, dispel magic,remove curse, and dispel evil and good - all of which help prevent or mitigate problematic effects via personal immunity, party-wide immunity, improved saves, or action-to-end. And some subclasses, most notably oath of the ancients, offer further mitigation options. Now, granted, much of that are aura or multi-target buffs, so they won't necessarily make you tougher relative to other party members and you still might end up feeling like the squishiest guy on the team...

Eh, I think the paladin is pretty alright in this regard, imo.

In either case, their protection from just bog standard roll-to-hit-vs-AC really falters at higher levels unless the DM is handing out +x armor /and/ shields, because the game seems to assume that by the time you're approaching level 20, if the potential bonus AC a tank could be carrying from magic gear is +9, that they'll probably at least have +6 or so.

Again, honestly, the whole 'bounded accuracy' and 'items are optional' concepts sort of become lies at that point. There's nothing particularly bounded or optional when the presence or absence of magic items are swinging d20 accuracy targets by nearly 10 points.

Talamare

2017-12-28, 07:53 AM

In either case, their protection from just bog standard roll-to-hit-vs-AC really falters at higher levels unless the DM is handing out +x armor /and/ shields, because the game seems to assume that by the time you're approaching level 20, if the potential bonus AC a tank could be carrying from magic gear is +9, that they'll probably at least have +6 or so.

Again, honestly, the whole 'bounded accuracy' and 'items are optional' concepts sort of become lies at that point. There's nothing particularly bounded or optional when the presence or absence of magic items are swinging d20 accuracy targets by nearly 10 points.

From over analyzing the Item Loot Chance Table
I don't think the game ever expects anyone to have a +3 Full Plate / Half Plate
Even a +2 Full Plate / Half Plate are unbelievably rare... You're more likely to find Named Legendary Weapons, than even this type of +2 Armor

However +3 Shields are insanely common, and it's not unreasonable to get both Cape of Protection and Ring of Protection
So +6 at 20 is more or less what I think is the 'standard' AC value for a Tank
or 18+1, 2+3, +1, +1 = 26 AC with no class abilities/spells

Tanarii

2017-12-28, 12:08 PM

The game isn't the DM's story. The game isn't solely the player's story either, no, but it is collaborative.Preferably any game I'm running or playing in isn't a story at all. :smallyuk:

Crusher

2017-12-28, 12:58 PM

Preferably any game I'm running or playing in isn't a story at all. :smallyuk:

So, are you saying you view it as purely a tactical simulation?

MxKit

2017-12-28, 12:59 PM

Preferably any game I'm running or playing in isn't a story at all. :smallyuk:

My definition of story is solely "an account of imaginary or real people and events, with some semblance of a plot holding it together, told for entertainment." And plot is just "they start at Point A and want to get to Point B, there is a problem between the two points, do they overcome it and how?"

Imaginary people and events, with a goal they want to reach, potentially multiple ones for each dungeon or arc, and it's all for entertainment purposes. D&D that is solely dungeon crawling with absolutely zero characterization, character interaction, and RP wouldn't be a story, but I'm finding it hard to imagine how any other type of D&D wouldn't be.

Tanarii

2017-12-28, 01:05 PM

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-28, 01:29 PM

My definition of story in RPGs is "using narrative resolution instead of causal resolution". In other words, things happen as required by the story, either under control of DM or player as the case may be, instead of having logical outcomes and consequences linked to the player's attempted intentions and approaches for actions. (Or possible outcomes, if dice are involved.)

In other words, things happen because they fit the story. I don't want that. I want things to happen as consequences for my in-character decisions.

As relates to the topic of the thread: same for changing the game world to fit my party, especially on the fly. I want the opportunity to make in-character decisions with meaning and have resulting consequences based on them, and changing things around to benefit me makes that harder.

As has been noted before, you're using a very non-standard definition of story here. Just to be clear--I don't like your version of stories either, but in the more normal definition (a sequence of events that is connected, often with continuity of timeline, characters, or situations) it's a standard part of RPGs.

I'd suggest that instead of saying "story" you might say "narrative resolutions." It would be much less confusing for everyone.

Tanarii

2017-12-28, 01:33 PM

As has been noted before, you're using a very non-standard definition of story here. Just to be clear--I don't like your version of stories either, but in the more normal definition (a sequence of events that is connected, often with continuity of timeline, characters, or situations) it's a standard part of RPGs.You left out "retold after the events". Except for some reason, others are trying to view the sequence of events as they happen, as opposed to after the fact, which isn't what emergent storytelling actually is. So it doesn't even make sense to apply it in this case.

I'd suggest that instead of saying "story" you might say "narrative resolutions." It would be much less confusing for everyone.I'd suggest instead of story or collaborative storytelling, others might say "emergent storytelling", and recognize that they're still misapplying the term. That'd be less confusing.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-28, 01:50 PM

You left out "retold after the events". Except for some reason, others are trying to view the sequence of events as they happen, as opposed to after the fact, which isn't what emergent storytelling actually is. So it doesn't even make sense to apply it in this case.

I'd suggest instead of story or collaborative storytelling, others might say "emergent storytelling", and recognize that they're still misapplying the term. That'd be less confusing.

Except that we are retelling it after each event happens. That's the nature of a freeze-frame game like D&D. We don't continously tell the real-time set of events, we progress the timer a bit, then tell the change in the situation between frames. Thus, we're telling what happened between two close events. That's a story. I can tell someone the story of my epic trip to the store in installments, each installment after it happens. No difference there and an RPG.

I don't know that anyone but you on these forums uses "story === narrative mechanics" as a definition. You're getting caught up in a particular, tightly bound definition that doesn't match other people's definition. Trying to insist that the majority is using it wrongly is a loosing battle--language is descriptive (words mean what they're commonly used to mean), not prescriptive.

Tanarii

2017-12-28, 01:54 PM

I don't know that anyone but you on these forums uses "story === narrative mechanics" as a definition.Guess no one talks about storytelling RPGs on these forums any more.

Edit: I'll grant I instinctively think of something different from many people when "story" is mentioned. But that's because I've put some thought into the effect of story on RPGs, as opposed to parroting a meaningless phrase like "collaborative storytelling".

Willie the Duck

2017-12-28, 02:13 PM

I don't know that anyone but you on these forums uses "story === narrative mechanics" as a definition. You're getting caught up in a particular, tightly bound definition that doesn't match other people's definition. Trying to insist that the majority is using it wrongly is a loosing battle--language is descriptive (words mean what they're commonly used to mean), not prescriptive.

Tanarii is using (and expecting) language that seems to me to clearly be influenced from other forums--those with less of a D&D+Pathfinder specific Tabletop RPG focus. Places like Enworld, RPG.net, therpgsite.org, and historically a site called The Forge. Storygames, narrative mechanics, and so forth are perfectly coherent concepts there and talking about the term "story." In other words, yes he is using a particular, tightly bound definition, and one that doesn't conform to the majority--here.

Guess no one talks about storytelling RPGs on these forums any more.

No, they really don't. You're using subgroup-specific jargon outside of that subgroup. I know exactly what you're talking about, but get why others don't.

Tanarii

2017-12-28, 02:28 PM

No, they really don't. You're using subgroup-specific jargon outside of that subgroup. I know exactly what you're talking about, but get why others don't.*grumble grumble* Okay fine, I'll drop it. Until next time someone triggers me. :smallwink:

MxKit

2017-12-28, 02:42 PM

I mean, for the most part, we're quibbling. If you pretend I said something other than story—"narrative" or "improv" or, hell, just "game"—my point still stands. Whatever is being built over the course of the game, with its logical outcomes and consequences, is being made by both the DM and the players. It belongs to all of them. The DM going "this is MY story and MY world and I don't care what you want" far too easily leads to exactly the kind of "story game" you've said you want to avoid. My point was that most players would want to avoid that kind of game, so it can often be good for a DM to keep an eye out for what the players blatantly want to be playing in the game, and preferably not denying them any opportunity to try to do the things they want to do because that's not what he wants them to do.

ETA: You said that you'd drop it so I'm gonna drop it too; I don't think we're actually disagreeing all that much anyway, when it comes down to it. I just want to leave in the part where I'm clarifying what I meant with my original post.

Knaight

2017-12-28, 02:49 PM

But that's because I've put some thought into the effect of story on RPGs, as opposed to parroting a meaningless phrase like "collaborative storytelling".

Seriously? People disagreeing with you isn't an indication that they haven't thought through their position, and "collaborative storytelling" is a perfectly meaningful phrase that describes how a lot of people play RPGs. It doesn't describe how you play RPGs, but that doesn't necessarily mean much; the hobby is broad enough to include games which have very distinct game play.

Tanarii

2017-12-28, 03:53 PM

Seriously? People disagreeing with you isn't an indication that they haven't thought through their position, and "collaborative storytelling" is a perfectly meaningful phrase that describes how a lot of people play RPGs. It doesn't describe how you play RPGs, but that doesn't necessarily mean much; the hobby is broad enough to include games which have very distinct game play.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?545883-Why-collaborative-storytelling-is-a-meaningless-phrase&p=22703179#post22703179

furby076

2017-12-28, 11:43 PM

'E6' come in),

What is e6...

There needs to be a sticky thread, for acronyms only

Naanomi

2017-12-29, 12:31 AM

What is e6?
A version of 3.X edition where characters only went to 6th level (and a few other differences); intended to focus on the gameplay when the system is a bit more balanced, and the characters feel more ‘heroic’ instead of ‘superheroic’

mephnick

2017-12-29, 03:07 AM

What is e6...

The only thing that made 3.5 palatable.

ad_hoc

2017-12-29, 01:48 PM

And so....? Seriously, so what? Games are generally supposed to be fun, and if a player designs a rogue who can save the party from traps, and he does what his character is supposed to do, the game will be better for him.

And the same for a Cleric who is good at turning undead; if he does, and trivializes an encounter, he's doing what his character is meant for.

Your logic is true, but your thought behind the logic is just silly, to me. And if you block the rogue from doing what he's supposed to do, why don't you just make him be another class?

It seems to me that you're just saying "Goodness forbid they use their class features."

I'm sorry if this came off abrasive, or rough, or if I inadvertently personally attacked you; it was supposed to be a rational and well-thought-out argument in a debate of sorts.

You're not abrasive, just wrong.

If traps are added just because someone is a Rogue then they should be another class. Picking Rogue should not make the party hurt more by traps. That is counter to what the class does.

At my table if there are no Rogues (or characters who are good at traps...) then they get hurt more by traps. If there is a Rogue trapfinder then that Rogue gets to shine by saving the party.

Adding traps takes that away from the player.

Edit: I do use the "formula" when planning an adventuring site. I pick a level for the site, a difficulty, and build my encounters for it. Then I tweak it a bit. But the level I pick has no relatin to the mix of PC levels in any given party that eventually explores the area and encounter it, except for being in the same Tier. Also often I steal content form old edition modules and adapt it, usually keeping a rough eye on the difficulty, but not always. Some stuff will be much easier or harder in that case.

This sounds great.

Sception

2017-12-29, 05:25 PM

IMO, adding a couple attention grabbing traps for the rogue to overcome is the same as incorporating that rival blackguard from the paladin's backstory into the game by making them a recurring npc villain, or adding a bunch of orcs and an orc warchief npc to the campaign to give that character whose home town was destroyed by orcs someone to vent their anger at.

And if you want to talk about real lived in immersion, an adventuring team is going to look for adventures that match their skill sets. If they know they have an expert trap fixer, they're going to look for treasure-filled dungeons protected by expert traps. Likewise from the adventure-hook end. If the local lord is looking for adventurers to stop the nefarious demon king, he's going to tell his agents to look specifically for adventurers with specialized skills in demon-bashing.

It's all fine and good to have a static world that the players have to adjust to, but the campaigns I've found the most enjoyable always spice those worlds up with a few npcs and encounters tailored specifically the the backstories and skill sets of each of the characters in turn.

Mostly DM

2017-12-29, 06:53 PM

[E6 is...] The only thing that made 3.5 palatable.

Preach, brother.

Mostly DM

2017-12-29, 07:05 PM

No accounting for taste, I suppose, because I have a thing for one-man armies who can do those things on their own, without divine blessings or something to "even the odds" besides their own skill. I dislike E6 for the same reasons - it's too limiting for me.
Then again, I'm usually playing or running campaigns that assume that the PCs are special not only because they're at the right place at the right time, but also because there's no one exactly like them in their age, they have an unmatched raw potential for becoming anything they want to become, and eventually they eclipse everyone in the setting besides deities and their equivalents - there are no bands of roving adventurers just like them, and if there are any, they're not exactly on their level. If I ever wanted to run something more akin to LotR or classic fantasy tales - I'd definitely choose 5e, sure, it lends itself well to such stories.

For sure, I get why people don't like that style of game. Everyone's got their preferences. I engaged with you because I found it interesting that you seem to specifically key into all the same features of 5e that really caught my attention, but for opposite reasons. :)

The treadmill in 3.5e is actually a "you must be this tall to ride" sign, where you can't deal with certain things unless you're close enough in power, and you have to run just to catch up. The treadmill in 5e is "we're doing the same stuff with more attacks/slightly bigger numbers", and actual progression can only be measured by what spells casters can cast (just like 3.5e core, which is why splatbooks are a godsend), because Fighter 20 just swings his sword 3 times for slightly more damage each swing compared to Fighter 1. It is less noticeable, because the treadmill isn't outpacing you naturally - it just speeds up at the same rate you do, but you can't outpace it, either. Everything is a level-appropriate challenge if there's enough of it.

That's an exaggeration, of course... particularly the bold part. The over-emphasis on casters in 3.5 at least made sense to the extent that casters really could do anything noncasters could do and better. But that's not remotely true in 5e. Casters have limited niches of things they can do that noncasters can't hope to replicate, but these are few. Casters aren't the dominant supermen they used to be. And frankly, pretty much everyone gets awesome abilities as they level up. But I think all this is a bit of a tangent, the age-old "are martial classes boring and lame if we don't make them casters with a veneer of martial skin over them?" debate. Give your signature line I think I know where you fall ;)

But to the point of the treadmill... I don't get how you can call 5e a treadmill. A game where you can defeat monsters 15 challenge ratings above your party level, and likewise be killed by monsters 15 CR below your level, is not a game where there's a strong "treadmill" in any sense of the term I can imagine.

5e is so loose that there's no need for "level appropriate" challenges. I have had no problems at all running 5e sandboxes, interspersing threats of basically all CRs throughout the world and letting the PCs engage with them however they like. The whole concept of leveled zones can be thrown into the trash where it belongs.

Knaight

2017-12-29, 07:23 PM

But to the point of the treadmill... I don't get how you can call 5e a treadmill. A game where you can defeat monsters 15 challenge ratings above your party level, and likewise be killed by monsters 15 CR below your level, is not a game where there's a strong "treadmill" in any sense of the term I can imagine.

3e and 4e have really thrown off the standards here. Yes, compared to them there isn't a dramatic spike in power across 5e. Compared to most other games though, it's huge. A level 20 fighter is something like ten times as good at hurting things (more attacks, higher accuracy, higher damage) than a level 1 fighter, and also something like twenty times as good at not getting hurt (more HP, better AC, miscellaneous other defenses). They're roughly 200 times better at fighting than they used to be. Spell casters progress even further.

"Treadmill" isn't really a great descriptive term in either case for these mechanics, instead working better to describe a campaign structure. Still, both games have mechanics very friendly to that campaign structure, and as with so many other things 5e gets seen as opposed to 3e/4e in some regard when it is more accurately similar to them, but less so.

Mostly DM

2017-12-29, 07:41 PM

3e and 4e have really thrown off the standards here. Yes, compared to them there isn't a dramatic spike in power across 5e. Compared to most other games though, it's huge. A level 20 fighter is something like ten times as good at hurting things (more attacks, higher accuracy, higher damage) than a level 1 fighter, and also something like twenty times as good at not getting hurt (more HP, better AC, miscellaneous other defenses). They're roughly 200 times better at fighting than they used to be. Spell casters progress even further.

"Treadmill" isn't really a great descriptive term in either case for these mechanics, instead working better to describe a campaign structure. Still, both games have mechanics very friendly to that campaign structure, and as with so many other things 5e gets seen as opposed to 3e/4e in some regard when it is more accurately similar to them, but less so.

Fair enough. My main game is a hodgepodge homebrew that's 3.5 E6 at its core, with bits from early editions, 5e, FATE, Savage Worlds, and other systems all cobbled in. I agree, it's fundamentally different from core 5e. Much less overall vertical progression, the difference between a skilled hero and a newbie hero is much much smaller.

While 5e still has a strong progression system, the core mechanics like Bounded Accuracy strip away the "you must be this tall to ride" elements of 3e and 4e. It is "opposed" in some key ways. Threatening 15th level PCs with goblins, and 5th level PCs taking out adult or ancient dragons, is something that 3e and 4e simply could not support in any reasonable sense. That's a qualitative difference, not just a quantitative one.

Xetheral

2017-12-29, 07:57 PM

Threatening 15th level PCs with goblins, and 5th level PCs taking out adult or ancient dragons, is something that 3e and 4e simply could not support in any reasonable sense. That's a qualitative difference, not just a quantitative one.

In a Combat-as-War game one could occasionally see 5th level PCs taking out adult/ancient dragons in 3.5. My sense is that CaW was harder in 4e (or at least required ignoring more mechanics), but I only played 4e rather than DM'd for it, so I could be mistaken. But, yes, in a Combat-as-Sport game your point holds.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-29, 08:46 PM

In a Combat-as-War game one could occasionally see 5th level PCs taking out adult/ancient dragons in 3.5. My sense is that CaW was harder in 4e (or at least required ignoring more mechanics), but I only played 4e rather than DM'd for it, so I could be mistaken. But, yes, in a Combat-as-Sport game your point holds.

I'm assuming that those victories were more "outside the rules" as opposed to "within the rules," meaning that you'd trick the dragon into an instant-kill situation (shivering touch abuse?) or otherwise bypass the normal defenses as opposed to actually dealing HP damage while it's free to act.

Because otherwise...I'd love to hear how that worked.

Xetheral

2017-12-29, 10:12 PM

I'm assuming that those victories were more "outside the rules" as opposed to "within the rules," meaning that you'd trick the dragon into an instant-kill situation (shivering touch abuse?) or otherwise bypass the normal defenses as opposed to actually dealing HP damage while it's free to act.

Because otherwise...I'd love to hear how that worked.

CaW is often "outside the rules" (to use your terminology)... avoiding stand-up fights when possible is usually the point of that playstyle. The cases I'm thinking of, however, weren't entirely outside the rules, but were definitely edge cases.

In one case, the party used a cave-in to block the lair exit and a dispersed particulate accelerant (cooking flour) to use up all the oxygen in the blocked cave. The dragon couldn't escape in the few minutes it had before the suffocation rules dropped it to zero HP. Spells involved were Stone Shape (to engineer the cave-in) and Gust of Wind (to disperse the accelerant).

In another case, it was simply social engineering, a pit trap, and a lot of pre-aimed siege weaponry.

Tanarii

2017-12-29, 10:44 PM

5e is so loose that there's no need for "level appropriate" challenges. I have had no problems at all running 5e sandboxes, interspersing threats of basically all CRs throughout the world and letting the PCs engage with them however they like. The whole concept of leveled zones can be thrown into the trash where it belongs.
I found it was absolutely required to divide my campaign into Tier 1 and Tier 2 sessions, and provide different continent content for each. My campaign is (to rattle off some internet-isms): open table, combat as war, sandbox, strongly dungeon-oriented in Tier 1, and vaguely west-marches (wilderness exploration + adventuring sites / lairs / small dungeons) in Tier 2. Even within Tier 1 it gets a bit iffy having level 1s adventuring with level 4s, because a 4th level is (in theory) five times more powerful than a level 1. Which isn't too far off the mark IMO. And a level 5 is theoretically twice as powerful again as a level 4, which is definitely the case.

But within Tier 2 it's no problem. The theory is a level 10 is supposed to be less than three times as powerful as a level 5, and it shows. Characters at the beginning of the tier

I haven't yet added Tier 3 content / sessions, but to be honest I'm not sure I need to do that for power differential reasons. Because if the theoretical, which says a 16 is about twice as powerful as a 10, lines up as well as it does at lower levels, then power wise there's no problem with (say) 8s and 12s adventuring together.

Which is my long winded way of saying I agree, once you're past level 5. But if you run a lot of low level content like I do it's well worth subdividing Tier 1 into its own thing.

(I still want to add Tier 3 specific content and sessions, but that's mostly so I can have it be something new. Currently Tier 3 characters retire to some kind of position of power, often unspecified. I've considered just using them for special events, since lots of them are rulers of small areas in their own right.)

Mostly DM

2017-12-30, 12:07 AM

I found it was absolutely required to divide my campaign into Tier 1 and Tier 2 sessions, and provide different continent for each. My campaign is (to rattle off some internet-isms): open table, combat as war, sandbox, strongly dungeon-oriented in Tier 1, and vaguely west-marches (wilderness exploration + adventuring sites / lairs / small dungeons) in Tier 2. Even within Tier 1 it gets a bit iffy having level 1s adventuring with level 4s, because a 4th level is (in theory) five times more powerful than a level 1. Which isn't too far off the mark IMO. And a level 5 is theoretically twice as powerful again as a level 4, which is definitely the case.

But within Tier 2 it's no problem. The theory is a level 10 is supposed to be less than three times as powerful as a level 5, and it shows. Characters at the beginning of the tier

I haven't yet added Tier 3 content / sessions, but to be honest I'm not sure I need to do that for power differential reasons. Because if the theoretical, which says a 16 is about twice as powerful as a 10, lines up as well as it does at lower levels, then power wise there's no problem with (say) 8s and 12s adventuring together.

Which is my long winded way of saying I agree, once you're past level 5. But if you run a lot of low level content like I do it's well worth subdividing Tier 1 into its own thing.

(I still want to add Tier 3 specific content and sessions, but that's mostly so I can have it be something new. Currently Tier 3 characters retire to some kind of position of power, often unspecified. I've considered just using them for special events, since lots of them are rulers of small areas in their own right.)

In my experience, I feel you're overstating things a bit.

All I really need is locations of relative safety with some threats, and skittish level 1-4 PCs have the sandbox they need to advance in relative safety. For the main 5e setting I run, which is a sort of points-of-light post apocalyptic (ancient-tech apocalypse, not future-tech) setting, this is achieved by adventuring in most population centers.

If the city is fairly lawless but has some aloof/corrupt officials that keep the basic structure of society chugging, that works well. It means high level threats can't show their face for fear of being killed (a big enough mass of CR 1/2 or even 1/4 or 1/8 dudes can wipe the floor with even very high level monsters and villains). But low level threats are generally left alone, because the corrupt government isn't in the business of actually preventing crime per se.

Great environment for low level characters to tangle with gang thugs and other low-level threats. Step outside the urban environment, and anything goes. Some places are inhabited by goblins, some by orcs, some by dragons. Shrug. Roll the dice and see what you can do to survive.

Tanarii

2017-12-30, 12:33 AM

In my experience, I feel you're overstating things a bit.
Well, it sounds like you're doing something similar, in you're providing an area for Tier 1 to stick in and do their stuff without getting stomped.

I found it easier to devote sessions to Tier 1 and Tier 2 separately, so players know which characters to bring to the session. Mixing up 2s and 6s was often too much for the low levels, to the point they just couldn't contribute very much. So ... separate sessions was the way I went. I could have chosen some other way to set up the break points, but Tiers are supposed to be the natural division for 5e. So I went with that. Plus it gives me a break point for planning my content.

But like I said, that's a very low level thing. The power curve is most extreme from 1 to 5. After that it definitely tapers off. And for someone working with a single group of players, it's even easier. The system can definitely handle mixed levels to a certain point, as well as a variety of threat levels relative to the PC level.

Mostly DM

2017-12-30, 12:56 AM

Well, it sounds like you're doing something similar, in you're providing an area for Tier 1 to stick in and do their stuff without getting stomped.

For sure, but I think separating them out to different continents seemed a little excessive. I mean, even the "safe" areas aren't really leveled zones... for example, in one of the main cities, it's run by an aloof lich with a sort of gestapo secret police of powerful undead wizards. There are powerful, rich guilds filled with high level people with rival high level people. Even in the slums gangs there are some really powerful creatures and NPCs.

The thing is, they generally don't act too openly, because they know they'll be smacked down. Not uncommon for low level troubleshooters to realize that they accidentally took a job that crosses a major player, and quietly bow out. All the high level dangerous stuff happening happens in secret.

To me, it strains credulity to not constantly mingle various levels and CRs. But that's just my own issue, to each their own. :)

Tanarii

2017-12-30, 01:11 AM

For sure, but I think separating them out to different continents seemed a little excessive.You misunderstood something I wrote. I don't do that.

I just pick a level for a dungeon or adventuring site, and build it around that. Or estimate an appropriate Tier for purloined content taken from modules, adapted to 5e, and inserted into the campaign. Parties that come together pick what challenges, and thus difficulty, they will face within the campaign area. The various adventuring sites are "level appropriate" to whatever I designed them for, or whatever difficulty the adaption works out to.

Edit: ah I see. "Continent" must have been autocorrect. It was supposed to say "Content". No wonder it seemed crazy to you. :smallbiggrin:

Ignimortis

2017-12-30, 10:00 AM

That's an exaggeration, of course... particularly the bold part. The over-emphasis on casters in 3.5 at least made sense to the extent that casters really could do anything noncasters could do and better. But that's not remotely true in 5e. Casters have limited niches of things they can do that noncasters can't hope to replicate, but these are few. Casters aren't the dominant supermen they used to be. And frankly, pretty much everyone gets awesome abilities as they level up. But I think all this is a bit of a tangent, the age-old "are martial classes boring and lame if we don't make them casters with a veneer of martial skin over them?" debate. Give your signature line I think I know where you fall ;)

But to the point of the treadmill... I don't get how you can call 5e a treadmill. A game where you can defeat monsters 15 challenge ratings above your party level, and likewise be killed by monsters 15 CR below your level, is not a game where there's a strong "treadmill" in any sense of the term I can imagine.

5e is so loose that there's no need for "level appropriate" challenges. I have had no problems at all running 5e sandboxes, interspersing threats of basically all CRs throughout the world and letting the PCs engage with them however they like. The whole concept of leveled zones can be thrown into the trash where it belongs.

It's an exaggeration, but not a large one. If we measure "progression" as "getting more ways to influence the game both tactically and strategically", then the best fighter ever gets is Battlemaster maneuvers or EK (very limited, but still possessing effects that are not available to default fighters - Darkness, Magic Circle, Protection from X). Yes, 5e curbs casters' power by drastically reducing "casts per day", but the basics are still there - casters can do what no non-caster can, and can work as an okay version of a non-caster, as well (stone sorcerer, hexblade, bladesinger, war cleric). Not a 100% replacement, but good enough. Meanwhile a non-caster cannot be a "good enough" version of any caster without magic - how do you prevent mind control, or fly, or teleport, or summon reinforcements? You just get better at killing stuff, which is all fine, but you don't get anything else special. Not even mundane crowd control - why not hamstring your enemies to reduce their speed, or ram them into a wall so hard that they're unable to act on their next turn? No heroic willpower to reroll saving throws? And so on and so forth. I'm not even going into "Combat as War", where having access to the right spell is often essential.

And I can't really imagine how you'd defeat a monster ten levels above you without lapsing into "Combat as War". Yes, you could arm a town with shortbows and tell them to go shoot that Balor, because bounded accuracy and de-powering of higher-level monsters means that 400 people actually have a good chance of just shooting an archdemon to death. But with your own party and without rigging up an elaborate trap or other conditions that even the odds? A CR 15 dragon will absolutely wipe the floor with a level 5 party, even if they're not all dead after his first breath attack.

The treadmill in 3.5 is "quality > quantity, always, therefore you have to be as good as your opponent or better, catch up to them and leave yesterday's opponents in the dust". 5e instead uses "quality and quantity are interchangeable, therefore if you can't beat them on even ground, just bring more friends". Those are both valid design philosophies, but I feel that the latter detracts from that feeling of uniqueness and power that a high-level character is supposed to have.

Tanarii

2017-12-30, 10:58 AM

The treadmill in 3.5 is "quality > quantity, always, therefore you have to be as good as your opponent or better, catch up to them and leave yesterday's opponents in the dust". 5e instead uses "quality and quantity are interchangeable, therefore if you can't beat them on even ground, just bring more friends". Those are both valid design philosophies, but I feel that the latter detracts from that feeling of uniqueness and power that a high-level character is supposed to have.
Effective immunity to any number of sufficiently lower level enemies is necessary for you to feel a high level character is unique & powerful?

Ignimortis

2017-12-30, 11:14 AM

Effective immunity to any number of sufficiently lower level enemies is necessary for you to feel a high level character is unique & powerful?

In direct combat? Yes, I feel that it's a good measuring stick for the power level I presume when I hear "high-level". If a hero can be decisively dispatched in direct combat by his lessers, then he's either not really high-level or those lessers are close enough and probably aren't faceless goons themselves.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-30, 11:22 AM

In direct combat? Yes, I feel that it's a good measuring stick for the power level I presume when I hear "high-level". If a hero can be decisively dispatched in direct combat by his lessers, then he's either not really high-level or those lessers are close enough and probably aren't faceless goons themselves.

That reminds me of the Dynasty Warriors video-game series where you cleave through hundreds (if not more) regular troops without blinking, but the officers/heroes are a challenge. That works for that hack-and-slash style, but it causes serious world-building issues for me.

If the only threat for a "high power" character is another "high power" character then you inevitably end up with something akin to Naruto or Dragonball Z aesthetics with ever escalating power levels and lots of incongruous elements to the world. If they're so powerful, why haven't they fundamentally reshaped the world around them? If such "high power" threats are rare (so regular people have a chance to breathe), then why do the adventurers run into them 6 times a day? How does the world sustain such constant assaults from world-shaking threats?

Ignimortis

2017-12-30, 11:55 AM

That reminds me of the Dynasty Warriors video-game series where you cleave through hundreds (if not more) regular troops without blinking, but the officers/heroes are a challenge. That works for that hack-and-slash style, but it causes serious world-building issues for me.

If the only threat for a "high power" character is another "high power" character then you inevitably end up with something akin to Naruto or Dragonball Z aesthetics with ever escalating power levels and lots of incongruous elements to the world. If they're so powerful, why haven't they fundamentally reshaped the world around them? If such "high power" threats are rare (so regular people have a chance to breathe), then why do the adventurers run into them 6 times a day? How does the world sustain such constant assaults from world-shaking threats?

Actually, Dynasty Warriors are a pretty good fit for high-level martial characters as I see them. Regular troops only matter because 1) there's no guarantee of heroes existing at the moment 2) if they do, they can't be everywhere and do everything, someone needs to defend the borders/patrol the territory/etc.

And those are legitimate questions - however, I do take them into account when designing my own games.
First of all, unlike the aforementioned manga/anime series, the campaigns don't need serialization. You have a plot and when it's resolved, that's it, the game is over one way or the other. Therefore, you don't get the insane jumps of DBZ arcs where the new bad guy has to be a hundred times more powerful than the last one to threaten the heroes. So if it comes to saving the world, you do it once, not every year with increasingly high power. The stakes go high, but they don't stay high.
Secondly, as I've said before, the world-changing potential is rare and it's realized ever more rarely. The non-heroic majority never advances past level 5 or so - there aren't any city guards with 10 levels of fighter or warrior. The creatures in the world are also mostly low-level, and exceptions are usually quite far from civilization or only appear when the Planes come into close proximity to each other, which is also when the most amount of heroic personae arise, which is not exactly a coincidence, but it happens rarely enough (centuries or even millenia apart) for most mortals to notice. Last time that happened, a certain wizard did indeed attempt to fundamentally reshape the world...only to be stopped by other heroes. That period of greater power lasts for a short time (a decade or two), in which legends are born and the world is indeed changed and threatened, and afterwards there's a prolonged period of relative peace and quiet, in which many things happen, but they're not world-shattering apocalypses, even if they're devastating on the level of the Black Death or Thirty-Years War.

Tanarii

2017-12-30, 01:10 PM

Ah. Yeah if you want manga-esque power, 5e isn't the best edition for it. I mean, compared to many other RPGs it's still an insane power curve. But within d&d it's not so much.

In theory a level 19 is 50 times as a level 2.
In theory they should be able to wipe the group with 50 guards without significant threat, although difficulty multipliers may be off for that many enemies. Regardless, that's plenty for me for an epic hero.

What's more important to me is a level 10 is approx 12 times as powerful as level 2, able to theoretically handle around 14 guards without any danger. Thats also plenty for me for a high level hero.

ad_hoc

2017-12-30, 03:05 PM

What's more important to me is a level 10 is approx 12 times as powerful as level 2, able to theoretically handle around 14 guards without any danger. Thats also plenty for me for a high level hero.

Inigo quickly dispatches of 4 armoured guards in the castle. That is plenty for me to see how skilled he is. Definitely tier 2.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-30, 03:11 PM

Tanarii

2017-12-30, 03:22 PM

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-30, 03:25 PM

Some,things off with the XtgE tables then, because using the DMG, 20 guards should be between a Medium challenge for 4 5th level PCs. Or about 5 each, with appropriate action economy.

Of course, the tables aren't really designed for 1 character, nor should we expect them to be that precise even for multiple characters, they're estimates only. (My numbers 2 posts above for numbers of Guards used the DMG tables for one character, which isn't what they're handled to do. So they weren't accurate anyway.)

The XtgE tables were designed as rough estimates for medium encounters on a per-character basis (rough estimates since the variability of other factors is huge). The DMG tables (with the multipliers) don't handle single characters--the lowest they go is 3.

One other note is that the DMG numbers are for the bottom of the medium range, while XtgE seems to hit the middle of the band (rounded to whole number ratios), although I haven't calculated it explicitly.

ross

2017-12-30, 04:12 PM

:sigh:

I usually don't quote a post that long in full, and after I was alerted to it's existence I thought that I should stay away from this thread as it just sounded like something that will make me grumpy, but this grinds my gears!

A single 10th's level Fighter defeating a whole Hobgoblin army, not whole army of what, kittens?

That just sounds ridiculous.

For the record, I played D&D from 1978 to the mid 1980's, and then again with 5e, but if what you describe is typical of 3.5, my immediate reaction is:

That's not Dungeons & Dragons that's Champions!

Yes I know DC did Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, and Marvel did Conan in the 1970's (I have some of those issues!), but in general, please keep "four color" comic-book superheroics away from my Swords & Sorcery game settings, please!

I've seen some of the Naruto cartoons that my son watched, and yeah we're supposed to be inclusive and not say something is badwrongfun, yadda, yadda, yadda. .. oh just damn it, what in the name of Crom's backside sweat is an any level Fighter doing defeating a whole Hobgoblin army?!

Did PC's rocket up to high levels in 3.5 like they do in 5e? If so just Nope!

:annoyed:

We get it, you're old.

Ignimortis

2017-12-30, 04:44 PM

One alternate way of analyzing this progression is to look at the guidance from Xanthar's and note when each CR hits 12:1 (1 PC is a medium fight for 12 foes of that CR, the highest the table goes):

CR: Level
1/8 : 5
1/4: 7
1/2: 11
1: 15
2: never--ratio at level 20 is 9 monsters to 1 PC.

That means that 12 CR 1/8 guards are a medium challenge for a T2 PC (level 5), 12 (CR 1/2) orcs are a medium challenge for 1 level 11 PC, and 12 Dire Wolves (CR 1) are a medium challenge for a level 15 PC.

Which doesn't really work out that well. A level 5 PC, let's say, a VHuman Champion Fighter (the blandest of the bland), with GWM (classic) and a greatsword and splint mail (haven't seen plate by level 5 in 5e myself), 18 STR, 16 CON. 49HP (using averages), AC17, +7 to-hit twice per turn for 2d6+4 (11 avg) each. So he hits a guard (AC 16, 11HP) on a 9 or better (60%) and kills them on hit with a 55% chance (damage range 6-16, 11+ is a kill). So basically, he kills a guard on 1/3 of his swings, and he has a 56.5% chance to get another swing from GWM per turn, so that's 0.855 dead guards per turn on average. (Do correct me if my math is wrong, I might've made mistakes on how chances interact). So it'll take him about 14 turns to deal with them on his own.
The guards have +3 to-hit once per turn for 1d6+1 damage. All 12 cannot fit around the fighter, too - only 9 at a time, if we're using the standard grid. So each of them makes a +3 attack vs 17AC with a 30% chance to hit each, and due to the fact that there are nine of them and they don't influence each other in any way, that's 2.7 attacks hitting per turn, each dealing 4.5 damage on average. That's 12,5 avg damage per turn, reduced by approx. 1.4 damage for each space free near the fighter (so basically 8 or less guards left alive).
Therefore:
Turn 1: -0.855 guards, -12.5HP
Turn 2: -1,71 guards, -25HP
Turn 3: -2,565 guards, -37.5HP
Turn 4: -3,42 guards, -50HP, fighter is dead, and one guard is stuck either dead or alive forever, falling victim to statistics.

Of course the fighter could get lucky and cleave three guards per turn and probably win with some few hitpoints left. But that's still not a "medium" challenge. It's quite deadly, even if the guards just rush the fighter and try to stab him really hard.

P.S. Actually, let's see if he gets lucky on his own attacks and autohits and autokills the guards and goes before them:
Turn 1: -3 guards, -12.5HP
Turn 2: -3 guards, -21,875HP
Turn 3: -3 guards, -28,125HP
Turn 4: -3 guards, -28,125HP

He's still wounded for more than half his HP, and that's some extremely good luck on attack rolls.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-30, 04:49 PM

Which doesn't really work out that well. A level 5 PC, let's say, a VHuman Champion Fighter (the blandest of the bland), with GWM (classic) and a greatsword and splint mail (haven't seen plate by level 5 in 5e myself), 18 STR, 16 CON. 49HP (using averages), AC17, +7 to-hit twice per turn for 2d6+4 (11 avg) each. So he hits a guard (AC 16, 11HP) on a 9 or better (60%) and kills them on hit with a 55% chance (damage range 6-16, 11+ is a kill). So basically, he kills a guard on 1/3 of his swings, and he has a 56.5% chance to get another swing from GWM per turn, so that's 0.855 dead guards per turn on average. (Do correct me if my math is wrong, I might've made mistakes on how chances interact). So it'll take him about 14 turns to deal with them on his own.
The guards have +3 to-hit once per turn for 1d6+1 damage. All 12 cannot fit around the fighter, too - only 9 at a time, if we're using the standard grid. So each of them makes a +3 attack vs 17AC with a 30% chance to hit each, and due to the fact that there are nine of them and they don't influence each other in any way, that's 2.7 attacks hitting per turn, each dealing 4.5 damage on average. That's 12,5 avg damage per turn, reduced by approx. 1.4 damage for each space free near the fighter (so basically 8 or less guards left alive).
Therefore:
Turn 1: -0.855 guards, -12.5HP
Turn 2: -1,71 guards, -25HP
Turn 3: -2,565 guards, -37.5HP
Turn 4: -3,42 guards, -50HP, fighter is dead, and one guard is stuck either dead or alive forever, falling victim to statistics.

Of course the fighter could get lucky and cleave three guards per turn and probably win with some few hitpoints left. But that's still not a "medium" challenge. It's quite deadly, even if the guards just rush the fighter and try to stab him really hard.

The numbers aren't balanced around single PCs. Put him with a suitable party (especially with people who specialize in popping lots of low-health minions) and watch them fall like wheat. A fighter is one of the worst classes to handle multiple enemies--everything he has is single target, especially at those levels. Repeat after me--ACTION ECONOMY IS KING.

Ignimortis

2017-12-30, 04:54 PM

The numbers aren't balanced around single PCs. Put him with a suitable party (especially with people who specialize in popping lots of low-health minions) and watch them fall like wheat. A fighter is one of the worst classes to handle multiple enemies--everything he has is single target, especially at those levels. Repeat after me--ACTION ECONOMY IS KING.

Yep. That's why I double-checked the post where the numbers were quoted - those are supposedly per character? Hilariously, a level 5 caster can probably just cast a single AoE spell and kill the guards in a single turn if the caster wins initiative. And 12 (or 20 as per DMG) guards are nothing to a 4-man party of 5th level, indeed. Mostly a waste of a spell slot, if even that. Maybe a hit dice or two for healing.

Tanarii

2017-12-30, 04:55 PM

The XtgE tables were designed as rough estimates for medium encounters on a per-character basis (rough estimates since the variability of other factors is huge). The DMG tables (with the multipliers) don't handle single characters--the lowest they go is 3.

One other note is that the DMG numbers are for the bottom of the medium range, while XtgE seems to hit the middle of the band (rounded to whole number ratios), although I haven't calculated it explicitly.
My point is numbers don't line up anywhere near the middle. 40 guards (10 per PC, 4 level 5 PC) is a deadly battle, and that's only if you assume there's no multiplier for action economy after 15 enmies.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-30, 05:00 PM

My point is numbers don't line up anywhere near the middle. 40 guards (10 per PC, 4 level 5 PC) is a deadly battle, and that's only if you assume there's no multiplier for action economy after 15 enmies.

I'm pretty sure that there is a lot of rounding going on, but I'm also sure that the DMG guidance is highly conservative. I tend to run 4+ borderline deadly encounters per day and rarely push anyone to 0, let alone kill them.

At high numbers of opponents, you also have to figure in spacing, reach, etc. I did that calculation for an adult red going up against a castle (4 ballista, 100 guards with light crossbows, 50 veterans)--as long as the castle can open up from max range they'll win with ~30% casualties. It was a pain in the butt. And doing so for smaller creatures makes my brain hurt to think about.

Such battles are also way outside the normal range for the combat system entirely--they'd be handled narratively if at all at my table. Too many variables. The system is not designed to handle that case--no wonder it breaks down.

Unoriginal

2017-12-30, 05:57 PM

Also consider that PCs can punch above their weight class if they use more ressources

Knaight

2017-12-31, 08:55 AM

The guards have +3 to-hit once per turn for 1d6+1 damage. All 12 cannot fit around the fighter, too - only 9 at a time, if we're using the standard grid. So each of them makes a +3 attack vs 17AC with a 30% chance to hit each, and due to the fact that there are nine of them and they don't influence each other in any way, that's 2.7 attacks hitting per turn, each dealing 4.5 damage on average. That's 12,5 avg damage per turn, reduced by approx. 1.4 damage for each space free near the fighter (so basically 8 or less guards left alive).

Eight at a time can attack, not nine. This also assumes that the fighter fights in roughly the single stupidest fashion, or that the terrain doesn't have any usable obstruction for them. That 8 drops to 5 if they can get to a wall, 3 if they can get to a corner, and 2 if they can get to a narrow passageway. If they can't be flanked in said narrow passageway that 2 drops to 1.

If you're actually using the conga line battle approach of heavy spring attack then all 12 guards can generally attack, although there are ways around that (e.g. tripping on reactions) to hold down a square.

Xetheral

2017-12-31, 10:46 AM

If you're actually using the conga line battle approach of heavy spring attack then all 12 guards can generally attack, although there are ways around that (e.g. tripping on reactions) to hold down a square.

Is there another way to trip on reactions besides the Battlemaster's Trip Attack manuever, Readying the Attack Action (permitting a Shove), or the Blade Pact's Eldritch Smite invocation?

Ignimortis

2017-12-31, 03:02 PM

Eight at a time can attack, not nine. This also assumes that the fighter fights in roughly the single stupidest fashion, or that the terrain doesn't have any usable obstruction for them. That 8 drops to 5 if they can get to a wall, 3 if they can get to a corner, and 2 if they can get to a narrow passageway. If they can't be flanked in said narrow passageway that 2 drops to 1.

If you're actually using the conga line battle approach of heavy spring attack then all 12 guards can generally attack, although there are ways around that (e.g. tripping on reactions) to hold down a square.

I just laughed out loud - I forgot that there are eight cells for guards instead of nine. Very well, that does reduce the damage somewhat and does prolong the fight for one round on average.
The dumbest tactics ever are intentional - when considering the threat level of an encounter in general, you can't really rely on terrain. Of course in normal conditions it's probably there, but not all the time and I don't think it's taken into consideration when assigning CR. I would assume that a medium-threat encounter is mostly "you can just stand there without a tactically advantageous battleground or specific tactics for that situation only, and trade blows and probably win". But that's not really important, because if the numbers of XGtE are per character, they aren't really that good.

Naanomi

2017-12-31, 03:40 PM

I generally assume terrain doesn’t affect such things because opponents will have an equal opportunity to exploit it as PCs do

Knaight

2017-12-31, 03:45 PM

I generally assume terrain doesn’t affect such things because opponents will have an equal opportunity to exploit it as PCs do

That's not necessarily true though - certain terrain effects are much easier for combatants in certain circumstances to take advantage of. Walls or similar are one of them, where smaller groups in general can benefit.

On top of that there's no real single baseline. Perfect surrounding would constitute the enemies taking advantage of a terrain effect to the PCs detriment, not a demonstration of the baseline.

Naanomi

2017-12-31, 03:48 PM

That's not necessarily true though - certain terrain effects are much easier for combatants in certain circumstances to take advantage of. Walls or similar are one of them, where smaller groups in general can benefit..
Right, there are times it matters specifically to one side or another, but generally it is a wash (to me anyways)... and you are right, a wide open field is just as much terrain to consider than anything else. Hope there are no rocks or anything to throw at the lone Fighter, or that hoard is looking a more more dangerous in a wide open field

Mostly DM

2017-12-31, 04:22 PM

Edit: ah I see. "Continent" must have been autocorrect. It was supposed to say "Content". No wonder it seemed crazy to you. :smallbiggrin:

Yep! That's pretty much 100% of why I felt the need to comment. Change that word to "content" and I think I'm pretty much in agreement with you.

PhoenixPhyre

2017-12-31, 04:25 PM

That's not necessarily true though - certain terrain effects are much easier for combatants in certain circumstances to take advantage of. Walls or similar are one of them, where smaller groups in general can benefit.

On top of that there's no real single baseline. Perfect surrounding would constitute the enemies taking advantage of a terrain effect to the PCs detriment, not a demonstration of the baseline.

For example, "white room of infinite dimensions" makes ranged attackers (especially those with extended range) look lots better than an underground dungeon or thick forests. All the DEX or movement speed in the world ain't gonna save you if the room is only 40' square and has one set of doors. Or if there are trees/underbrush that make the mean LoS to be 35'.

Mostly DM

2017-12-31, 04:31 PM

It's an exaggeration, but not a large one. If we measure "progression" as "getting more ways to influence the game both tactically and strategically", then the best fighter ever gets is Battlemaster maneuvers or EK (very limited, but still possessing effects that are not available to default fighters - Darkness, Magic Circle, Protection from X). Yes, 5e curbs casters' power by drastically reducing "casts per day", but the basics are still there - casters can do what no non-caster can, and can work as an okay version of a non-caster, as well (stone sorcerer, hexblade, bladesinger, war cleric). Not a 100% replacement, but good enough. Meanwhile a non-caster cannot be a "good enough" version of any caster without magic - how do you prevent mind control, or fly, or teleport, or summon reinforcements? You just get better at killing stuff, which is all fine, but you don't get anything else special. Not even mundane crowd control - why not hamstring your enemies to reduce their speed, or ram them into a wall so hard that they're unable to act on their next turn? No heroic willpower to reroll saving throws? And so on and so forth. I'm not even going into "Combat as War", where having access to the right spell is often essential.

We strongly disagree. I think that pursuing that line of discussion will be a fairly distracting tangent, and I suspect we will not reach much in the way of common ground. I'm gonna leave it with a single big picture comment:

I disagree with a lot of what you said here factually. But more important than that, I fundamentally disagree with you philosophically.

And I can't really imagine how you'd defeat a monster ten levels above you without lapsing into "Combat as War". Yes, you could arm a town with shortbows and tell them to go shoot that Balor, because bounded accuracy and de-powering of higher-level monsters means that 400 people actually have a good chance of just shooting an archdemon to death. But with your own party and without rigging up an elaborate trap or other conditions that even the odds? A CR 15 dragon will absolutely wipe the floor with a level 5 party, even if they're not all dead after his first breath attack.

Sure, that's the easy way. I've seen huge CR disparities be achieved through a wide variety of outnumbering, terrain,
and unorthofox tactics. Definitely Combat as War, you're 100% correct there.

For the record, I have not actually seen a disparity of 15 at my table. But an ex-poster over on ENWorld named Hemlock often described his own CaW approach, which was way more hardcore than mine. And I have confidence he could pull this off for specific party compositions and specific monsters that have 15 levels of CR on them.

The treadmill in 3.5 is "quality > quantity, always, therefore you have to be as good as your opponent or better, catch up to them and leave yesterday's opponents in the dust". 5e instead uses "quality and quantity are interchangeable, therefore if you can't beat them on even ground, just bring more friends". Those are both valid design philosophies, but I feel that the latter detracts from that feeling of uniqueness and power that a high-level character is supposed to have.

Referring back to my earlier comment, this is illustrative of our philosophical differences.

Effective immunity to any number of sufficiently lower level enemies is necessary for you to feel a high level character is unique & powerful?
In direct combat? Yes, I feel that it's a good measuring stick for the power level I presume when I hear "high-level". If a hero can be decisively dispatched in direct combat by his lessers, then he's either not really high-level or those lessers are close enough and probably aren't faceless goons themselves.

Yet more evidence of the philosophical difference.

I don't think we're likely to reach common ground on this area. It's cool, we disagree. Fortunately, there are literally hundreds or thousands of RPG systems out there, including many editions of D&D, that all cater to our respective tastes to varying degrees. We can both peacefully co-exist, even if we probably wouldn't want to play in the same game. :smallsmile: