Brian Rogers (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
subplotkudzu) wrote2008-09-14 12:51 pm
subplotkudzu) wrote2008-09-14 12:51 pm
Entry tags:
More 4E stuff
I commented previously on how the ad hoc difficulty table advises the GM to ramp up the Target Number of checks based on the PCs level (and, by one possible by unlikely reading, whether the PC has the skill or not). The objective appears to be that Easy actions have a success chance of roughly 65%, moderate one 45% and hard ones 10%. The scaling is required because everyone adds one half their level to the rolls, so to keep the preferred targets you have to ramp up the difficulty.
The Skills chapter in the PHB runs a little counter to this, giving some more stable numbers (though it takes pains to point out that these age guidlines and the GM has specific rules). The default Target Numbers for Swim and Climb (just to grab the first ones I see) tie to the suggested difficulties for 1st level PCs in the DMG.
These stable numbers also correspond to the 3rd edition PHB. In 3rd edition, this made it possible for characters to hit a certain reliable level in a skill and then stop raising it - get you Climb or Swim to a +7 at 4th level and you could just "take 10" (an unhindered average skill check) and reliably climb cave walls or swim in rough water. This freed the character up to spend skill points elsewhere if they weren't trying to get really good at something. Meanwhile, some characters would never take any points in those skills and would rely on their attribute defaults and assistance from their more skilled allies.
In 4th edition there aren't skill points in that sense. Everyone just gets better at everything all the time. a 10th level Warlock has a +5 on his Climb and Swim rolls even if he never tries to climb and doesn't practice swimming. Mind you, this only matters if he tries to do something predictable where the PHB numbers would apply - any ad hoc action would have a +5 on the difficulty to balance it against his level.
This just strikes me as madness. Can someone playing 4E explain why this makes sense?
Is it to prevent the problems of bad adventure design, where modules had areas where everyone in the plarty had to make a DC 25 climb test? If so, I would think the very celver 4E Skill Challenge rules dealt with that.
Is it just number inflaction to make the players feel like their characters are better than they are?
The argument can be made that the new skill system silos off the skills that will be useful in a dungeneering/adventure context (the existing skill list) and those that aren't (everything that got cut) to prevent the PCs of casual players from being outlcassed by those who have maximized the rules - anything that isn't directly applicable to the numerics of adventuring is handwaved. I find this unsettling. I happen to like the little character filigrees - Hiram spending weeks wandering Emirikol to get a point or two in Knowledge: Emirikol; Cybele spending a point or two in Craft: Calligraphy, and so on. Yes, we could hand-wave them, but we could hand wave a lot of things. I like the Pcs having the option to flesh out and have the system reflect that, rather than a flat +5 bonus if they have the skill. That hearkens back to 2E Non-Weapon proficiences, which is not a step forward. I don't need the mechanics to protect my players from inefficient decisisions - first, I can do that myself; second, if everyone makes them no one is going to "get ahead".
Maybe that's just me.
The Skills chapter in the PHB runs a little counter to this, giving some more stable numbers (though it takes pains to point out that these age guidlines and the GM has specific rules). The default Target Numbers for Swim and Climb (just to grab the first ones I see) tie to the suggested difficulties for 1st level PCs in the DMG.
These stable numbers also correspond to the 3rd edition PHB. In 3rd edition, this made it possible for characters to hit a certain reliable level in a skill and then stop raising it - get you Climb or Swim to a +7 at 4th level and you could just "take 10" (an unhindered average skill check) and reliably climb cave walls or swim in rough water. This freed the character up to spend skill points elsewhere if they weren't trying to get really good at something. Meanwhile, some characters would never take any points in those skills and would rely on their attribute defaults and assistance from their more skilled allies.
In 4th edition there aren't skill points in that sense. Everyone just gets better at everything all the time. a 10th level Warlock has a +5 on his Climb and Swim rolls even if he never tries to climb and doesn't practice swimming. Mind you, this only matters if he tries to do something predictable where the PHB numbers would apply - any ad hoc action would have a +5 on the difficulty to balance it against his level.
This just strikes me as madness. Can someone playing 4E explain why this makes sense?
Is it to prevent the problems of bad adventure design, where modules had areas where everyone in the plarty had to make a DC 25 climb test? If so, I would think the very celver 4E Skill Challenge rules dealt with that.
Is it just number inflaction to make the players feel like their characters are better than they are?
The argument can be made that the new skill system silos off the skills that will be useful in a dungeneering/adventure context (the existing skill list) and those that aren't (everything that got cut) to prevent the PCs of casual players from being outlcassed by those who have maximized the rules - anything that isn't directly applicable to the numerics of adventuring is handwaved. I find this unsettling. I happen to like the little character filigrees - Hiram spending weeks wandering Emirikol to get a point or two in Knowledge: Emirikol; Cybele spending a point or two in Craft: Calligraphy, and so on. Yes, we could hand-wave them, but we could hand wave a lot of things. I like the Pcs having the option to flesh out and have the system reflect that, rather than a flat +5 bonus if they have the skill. That hearkens back to 2E Non-Weapon proficiences, which is not a step forward. I don't need the mechanics to protect my players from inefficient decisisions - first, I can do that myself; second, if everyone makes them no one is going to "get ahead".
Maybe that's just me.
no subject
I knopw it's supposed to be gamist, but as I read it I keep seeing doors close on what I could do with it rather than doors open. That's not what I want to see. I appreciate the Skill Challenge mechanics, and the decision to make a challenge rating of encounters based on the idea of basically 4-5 opponents rather than 1 that you can split up because it is clearly more versatile. They're clever and signficiant enough to warrant a new edition, but why not lay those over what I generally see as a working engine in 3E?
I should cruise the web and see if anyone has started reverse engineering those rules into 3E....
no subject
I suppose I never would have gone to 3e as a game with a solid or flexible skills system in the first place, so I'm not thinking of 4e in those terms. My yard stick is still the BRP line of games, starting with Runequest.
And I'm still pissed off at 3e for my cleric having to scrape around for skill points, though if I'm being honest it really didn't matter much in play as skill rolls were relatively infrequent for everyone except the Rogue and we had next to no urban encounters where the Diplo-Cleric concept might have had legs. Perhaps I'm just bitter.
no subject
I've found the 3E skill system to be perefctly suited to what I needed it for - more flexible than 2E's Non-Weapon profiencies, not hard to administer (it's easy for me to skill out a 6th level fighter for an opponent), easily allows for character growth (the mirikol PCs are slowly taking points in Wilderness Survival and Ride as they keep having to campaign outside the city) and perfectly servicable for marking the differecness between amature (+1 to +4) competent (+5 to +10) and trained professional (+11 and up) with the take 10 rules.
As for your diplo-cleric, well, that's something to take up with your GM. A diplo-cleric would have fit in just fine in Emirikol, and had I been running your game I would have found more places to put in some diplomacy for your PC to shine. I do note that the same thing would have happened in BRP if you were never presented diplomatic challenges, so it's likely not the system.