Control: How much is too much or too little

Longtime readers (Ha!) know that I focus heavily around control, in particular the question of how to address control as it pertains to solos. But control isn't just complicated (read: problematic) for solos.

Control adds a dynamic element to the game. But it can have an unbalancing element too. If you think of it like this, ignoring elements like -defense or vulnerability effects, fundamentally most control is about turn denial, or otherwise reducing the effectiveness of enemy turns. You use Icy Rays and you immobilize two orcs, if those orcs don't have crossbows, well, you've just negated two of their turns.

So, if we compare control to direct damage, how much "damage" is control worth? We can think in terms of denied monster rounds, and you can deny monster rounds through control or through damage (that is, by killing enemies that much faster). Put another way, if a controller stuns the entire enemy field for one round, and by virtue of having a controller instead of a striker, the fight takes one round longer (with no deviation in resources expended), the controller is equally effective as the striker.

In practice though, control is not consistent in how effective it is. If your go-to spell is Icy Rays, you as a controller are going to be vastly more powerful in encounters with melee only enemies than in encounters with non-melee only enemies. Of course, in ranged only enemies, you can immobilize enemies and then laugh as the strikers OA the crap out of them, but those encounters are the minority. Stuns are fairly consistent in effectiveness, however.

The bigger issue tends to be that controllers often (by the books) can deny more enemy turns than they miss out on denying through raw damage, at least at higher levels. Aside from that question, if encounters are balanced assuming a certain amount of enemy turn denial, then any action aside from enemy turn denial suddenly turns an encounter into a lethal scenario. It's basically "Press X to not die."

This is particuarly noticable when it comes to solos. Under traditional outlines of solos, a stun negates an entire round's worth of enemy actions. But let's say you're running one of those newfangled dragons that has a bonus action, and a stun (or daze) negates that action. Well, what's the incentive for the character to deny that bonus action?

Generally speaking, no matter how I design my encounters, one of the following occurs:

1.) Control just becomes too important.
2.) Control becomes impotent (due to blanket immunities)

Ironically, I often combine BOTH of these together, often by having control immune enemies with non-control immune add on creatures or the like.

Choke Points Revised

In an earlier post, I noted the tendency of attacks and defenses to hit choke points. However, the model I was using in order to address this tendency actually led to a higher standard deviation from the proper values than the actual 4E system.

Then I realized the issue that I was having, and have since fixed the math. To understand the issue at hand, let's create a model:

If we assume that attack bonuses and defenses are supposed to level up at a rate of 1/level, then by 30th level PCs will be at -2 to hit/defenses relative to the proper baseline, assuming normal rules (+1 feat bonus per tier, +6 enhancement bonus). To quantify the deviation from the baseline, we create a chart that shows the estimated values for each level, compared to the expected value (which is the level of the character):

Normal 4E rules:

I'm playing a bit fast and loose with the statistics terminology here, but "Variance" is what we're trying to minimize-that is, at any given level, we want to be as close to zero as possible. So, as we see, standard 4th edition rules gives a sum of Var of 38 over 30 entries. As an alternative, let's look at the revised method I've been using in my campaigns-that is, giving PCs a +1 bonus at 1st level, and a +1 bonus every three levels:

Level	1/2 level	Ability	Sum		Boon	End Difference	Var
1	0	0	0		1	0	0
2	1	0	1		1	0	0
3	1	0	1		2	0	0
4	2	0	2		2	0	0
5	2	0	2		2	-1	1
6	3	0	3		3	0	0
7	3	0	3		3	-1	1
8	4	1	5		3	0	0
9	4	1	5		4	0	0
10	5	1	6		4	0	0
11	5	1	6		4	-1	1
12	6	1	7		5	0	0
13	6	1	7		5	-1	1
14	7	2	9		5	0	0
15	7	2	9		6	0	0
16	8	2	10		6	0	0
17	8	2	10		6	-1	1
18	9	2	11		7	0	0
19	9	2	11		7	-1	1
20	10	2	12		7	-1	1
21	10	3	13		8	0	0
22	11	3	14		8	0	0
23	11	3	14		8	-1	1
24	12	3	15		9	0	0
25	12	3	15		9	-1	1
26	13	3	16		9	-1	1
27	13	3	16		10	-1	1
28	14	4	18		10	0	0
29	14	4	18		10	-1	1
30	15	4	19		11	0	0

As we see, the sum of the var in this instance is a mere 12-a vast improvement over base 4E in terms of avoiding chokepoints. On the other hand, perhaps the proper baseline is actually not advance +1 per level, but rather advance +1 per level -1; that is, you should have gained +29 by 30th level, rather than +30. The boon system in this case can be simply amended to be +1 every three levels, but the base 4E system cannot. On the other hand, consider what happens if the +2 bonus to ability scores that many epic destinies grant are considered "math fix" features, and we are operating under this "+29 by 30th level" system:

Level	1/2 level	Ability	Feat	Item	Sum	Diff	Var
1	0	0	1	1	2	2	4
2	1	0	1	1	3	2	4
3	1	0	1	1	3	1	1
4	2	0	1	1	4	1	1
5	2	0	1	1	4	0	0
6	3	0	1	2	6	1	1
7	3	0	1	2	6	0	0
8	4	1	1	2	8	1	1
9	4	1	1	2	8	0	0
10	5	1	1	2	9	0	0
11	5	1	2	3	11	1	1
12	6	1	2	3	12	1	1
13	6	1	2	3	12	0	0
14	7	2	2	3	14	1	1
15	7	2	2	3	14	0	0
16	8	2	2	4	16	1	1
17	8	2	2	4	16	0	0
18	9	2	2	4	17	0	0
19	9	2	2	4	17	-1	1
20	10	2	2	4	18	-1	1
21	10	4	3	5	22	2	4
22	11	4	3	5	23	2	4
23	11	4	3	5	23	1	1
24	12	4	3	5	24	1	1
25	12	4	3	5	24	0	0
26	13	4	3	6	26	1	1
27	13	4	3	6	26	0	0
28	14	5	3	6	28	1	1
29	14	5	3	6	28	0	0
30	15	5	3	6	29	0	0

We are then left with a variance of 30. Comparatively, a +1 every three level boon system, combined with the +2 to an ability score at 21st level gives us:

Level	1/2 level	Ability	Sum	Boon	Diff	Var
1	0	0	0	0	0	0
2	1	0	1	0	0	0
3	1	0	1	1	0	0
4	2	0	2	1	0	0
5	2	0	2	1	-1	1
6	3	0	3	2	0	0
7	3	0	3	2	-1	1
8	4	1	5	2	0	0
9	4	1	5	3	0	0
10	5	1	6	3	0	0
11	5	1	6	3	-1	1
12	6	1	7	4	0	0
13	6	1	7	4	-1	1
14	7	2	9	4	0	0
15	7	2	9	5	0	0
16	8	2	10	5	0	0
17	8	2	10	5	-1	1
18	9	2	11	6	0	0
19	9	2	11	6	-1	1
20	10	2	12	6	-1	1
21	10	4	14	7	1	1
22	11	4	15	7	1	1
23	11	4	15	7	0	0
24	12	4	16	8	1	1
25	12	4	16	8	0	0
26	13	4	17	8	0	0
27	13	4	17	9	0	0
28	14	5	19	9	1	1
29	14	5	19	9	0	0
30	15	5	20	10	1	1

We are again given a variance of 12-far better than standard 4th edition rules.

So, what's the takeaway? Well, first of all, getting a new weapon every 5 levels is a lot less work than every three levels. Other than that, "epic" weapons being +6 corresponds with pre-4E rules, so perhaps there were legacy issues at work. My general math fix is as follows:

1.) Decide if you're using a +29 over 30 levels system or a +30 over 30 levels system.

2.) If using a +29 system, award a +1 bonus to attack rolls, damage rolls, and all defenses for every three levels; either do this through changes to the item system, or in the form of boons. (More info on heavy armor is discussed in a bit).

3.) Prohibit feat bonuses to attack rolls, damage rolls, and to defenses. It's up to the DM whether or not to allow Superior Will as a feat that gives no feat bonus to will or the like (I tend to think it's a bit too powerful of a feat, personally, but that's outside the scope of this post).

4.) Figure out how you're going to handle armor. The numbers used for attack under the basic system do not quite fit the numbers for AC, because rather than getting feat bonuses at a rate of 1/tier, characters instead get Masterwork bonuses (and potentially a feat bonus in the form of Armor Specialization). If characters get +1 AC per three levels, this value essentially includes the masterwork bonus-as thus, there's no need to include separate masterwork armor.

However, heavy armor characters obviously need a bigger boost. There are a few ways of handling this:

1.) Heavy Armor increases at a rate of +1/2 level, instead of at a rate of +1/3 level. If this bonus is staggered-such that the bonus is (Level-1)/2+1, you'll actually end up with a character with an AC that is exactly equal to the baseline, assuming you're using a +30 model, since you are literally increasing your AC by 1 per level.

2.) Heavy armor increases at a rate of +1/3 level, and also at a rate of +1/6 per level. This rate gives a higher variance, but more closely approximates non-heavy armor classes.

3.) Heavy Armor increases at a rate of +1/3 level, and also at a rate of +1/7 per level. This is the rate you should use if you do not consider epic destiny bonuses to be math fix, but on the other hand, it's a great deal clumsier than the other two methods.

A few other considerations:

1.) Some common magical items (Circlet of Indomitability, etc) give bonuses. Consider whether these are "math fix" items for the purposes of your campaign, and if not, if having them is appropriate.

2.) Epic Fortitude, Epic Reflex, and Epic Will are game changers in this regard. Here's my fix:
  Remove Epic Fortitude, Epic Reflex, and Epic Will from the game:
Great Fortitude now allows you to use a +2 bonus in place of your strength or constitution modifier when determining fortitude; this bonus increases to +4 at paragon, and +6 at epic.
Lightning Reflexes now allows you to use a +2 bonus in place of your dexterity or constitution modifier when determining reflex; this bonus increases to +4 at paragon and +6 at epic.
Iron Will now allows you to use a +2 bonus in place of your wisdom or charisma modifier when determining Will; this bonus increases to +4 at paragon and +6 at epic.

You may note that this system is similar to Perico's (author of the blog Square Fireballs), though using feats instead of items.

3.) The biggest difficulty in implementing the system described above is that it requires a total revamp of how weapons, armor, and neck slot items work. In particular, weapon changes require a change in critical hit dice. Other issues include the fact that armor, weapon, and neck slot features may be dependent upon enhancement bonus; therefore, a 12th level item in standard 4E goes from having a +3 effectiveness on special effects to having +4 or +5 effectiveness. I'm still working out these issues myself. For most "casual" campaigns, it's much simpler to simply stay with the baseline 4E model.

Solos Revisited

When last I approached solo monsters, I dealt with "status effects" as "give them a save to resist."

But players don't like seeing their effects go entirely to waste. Instead, I now endorse the following rules:

For any solo that gets two full rounds worth of actions each round (and increasingly, I think that should be the norm), any "short duration" effects end at the end of each of their turns. Thus, your ENT immobilization will in fact immobilize the solo, but only for one of its two turns. This is thus comparable to immobilizing an elite, rather than an entire encounter-so it's still a big change on the encounter, but it's substantially harder to totally lock the encounter down.

DnD: The tactics of soul and possibly controllers

So, I was in an argument with a fellow player and Dungeon Master, over why his system of choice (Legend) isn't as "tactical" as 4th Edition. It's kind of an odd argument, as I'll concede that a lot of it is intuitive. But the biggest thing I took away is this: less is more.

If you think about Chess and you think about Dungeons and Dragons, which is more complicated? Rules wise, Chess is significantly less complicated. But the fact of the matter is that, the game is entirely based on positioning-where you can move. But where you can move is the counter-point to where you can't move. So, where am I going with this?

4th edition assumes a grid. Every game mechanic is built with this in mind, from the way auras and bursts are described to range and reach. And moreover, the simplicity of Square Fireballs (my apologies to Perico) ensures that the consequences of positioning are obvious, compared to circular bursts. The obviousness and simplicity of how game effects are defined allows for the implications to be defined-meaning that the mental calculus for how the game plays is something actuall doable. Certainly, in a "twenty foot radius" burst scenario, characters know to "fan out," but doing the square by square count of "are we safe?" is more troubling.

In 4E, positioning is a thing. It's not just a question of "are they close enough to catch them both in the same attack" or "are they in melee range." And it's this element of positioning that makes Forced Movement such a powerful effect. Drop "move an enemy five squares" into a previous version of Dungeons and Dragons, and it doesn't have the same level of effect. But the implications of 4th edition aren't merely about hindering terrain-they're about ensuring enemies are in the exact spot you want them to be.

In 4th edition, no one really understands "What is a controller" and "what does a controller do." Oh, we all know controllers have forced movement and area attacks and status effects... but so does every other class. As someone who has played almost exclusively controllers, I can tell you, there is a methodology behind control-the complete understanding of the arena. Whenever I start an encounter, I don't simply think "who am I going to attack," though that's certainly true as well. No, my first thought is "where are the enemy, and where do I want them to be."

More to the point, it's not just controllers that are tactical. Numerous monster abilities make heavy use of the grid as well. The "doughnut" aura effect is an interesting example, wherein an aura is more powerful at a longer range than at a short range, and enemies can have forced movement-or even forceful teleportation as well. So many of the better monsters are built not just in the concept of "how can we make this damage the PCs" but "how can we make it dangerous for the PCs to engage this enemy."

In summary:
1.) Positioning is more limited, which is paradoxically more freeing; tactics in games is intrinsically related to predictability.
2.) The game is centered around using the grid.
3.) Characters just have more options, from level one up. Sometimes those options don't matter, but even the simplest builds have at least two choices in virtually all circumstances, and often three.

D&D Next: Atomic Scaling

 UPDATE: It occurs to me I made a huge mistake here. In addition to DEALING less damage, since it takes less damage to fell an enemy, the damage they do over the course of an entire encounter is substantially less. Therefore, damage to be "equal threats" scales at a much slower rate than I noted here.


There've been hints (not exactly in great detail) of toying with the idea of what I call atomic scaling of damage. The idea, as I understand it, is that an orc is an orc is an orc; rather than having a 5th level monster whose "longevity" as a threat is done away with due to attack and defenses scaling, a monster's "level" is a function of its HP and its damage. Therefore, an orc at 5th level (I don't have hard stats so we're just talking in the abstract) is as dangerous as 5 orcs at 10th level (or 15th level, or whatever), not because it's suddenly a minion and thus has higher attack and defenses but less damage and the like, but because an orcs damage at 10th (or 15th) level is 1/5 that of 5th level. Here's my problem: the math quickly proves untenable. Let's assume that orcs are actually a 1st level threat-you think "Oh there's a party of five orcs. My party of 5 PCs will be reasonable challenged by them." Now, let's assume that there is a monster that deals so little damage that even a single PC can take out five of them. Let's say that this applies to kobolds. Thus, our atomic damage rating is measured in "Kobolds." Finally, let's assume that there are such monsters that we expect them to be able to challenge an entire party at 1st level all by themselves. Let's call them "Adult Dragons." We can define kobolds, orcs, and dragons, using kobolds as the common unit. 1 Kobold = 1 Kobold 1 Orc = 5 Kobolds 1 Adult Dragon = 25 Kobolds So, we're not past 1st level, and already, in order to keep to the "danger is purely a function of damage/HP" we have to have one type of enemy have 25 times the HP of another. If Kobolds deal 1 damage, that means that Adult Dragons have to deal 25 damage (on average) (orcs deal about 5, so, 1d10, or 1d6+2, or the like). On the other hand, if we want even Kobolds to deal variable damage, then we have to have them deal at minimum 1d4. This means that orcs would have to deal the equivalent of 5d4, and Adult Dragons 25d4 damage! We're at first level, and we're already throwing 25 dice? Of course, the raw dice problem can be easily avoided by simply using static values (for instance: 5d4+50), but this means that the variability of the dice becomes massively less significant for higher level threats. What's more crucial is that, we're still at the lowest level scale. We know, for instance, that Orcs will eventually become the new kobolds-which means it's necessarily true that Adult Dragons will become the new orcs, and SOMETHING will become the new Adult Dragons. This something (We'll call them "Wyrms") will have damage scaling of 125 times the damage of kobolds. Now, you can reduce this problem by eliminating kobolds entirely-let's say there's no monster on earth that's weaker than an orc. Okay, so now our wyrms-which you're not expected to face until you're well into the game (how well into it? Beats me)-only deal 25 times our atomic value. However, since Orcs are 1 PC threats, we presume we want them to deal more than 1 damage per hit, so that's still 50+ damage. The other question is, how many adult dragons equals a Tarrasque? If we assume a Tarrasque is "worth" the same as a single Wyrm, then that means that the answer is five-and only 25 orcs. Somehow, I can't see the Tarrasque being taken down by anything less than a massive army. So we can pretty much assume there's at least one more level of scale beyond wyrms-so instead of a scale of 25 orcs (or 125 kobolds), we're left with a scale of 125 orcs (or 625 kobolds!) Now, the fact that a monster is worth hundreds of times the damage of another monster is only a problem if we're talking extremely high damage values (moreover, it's a problem if we realize "how are we going to get PC HP to scale like that?") What is almost certainly going to happen is that damage will be measured by "After Resistance" damage values. Imagine armor that absorbs damage, rather than just sets your AC (sacriledge in Dungeons and Dragons I know, but I'm trying to give this system the benefit of the doubt). So, an orc may always deal 5 damage, but then your resistance reduces that to four at the same time that your net total HP has doubled, meaning that the percentage of HP is roughly 1/5. It's impossible to really say without the specifics-but if you want to avoid exponential HP, you need to have a resistance value that will, eventually (probably not quickly, but eventually)-reduce enemy damage to 0. My own fears are more along the lines that a Tarrasque won't be "worth" enough orcs. Because epic level play has always been problematic, I suspect there will be a push to more "traditional" gaming-which I've always seen means low level grinds. And if we're talking low level, we're generally not talking about a need for monsters that can single handedly take out entire armies.

My thoughts on 5th edition

Don't kid yourselves. You can call it D&D Next all you want, but even if you add stat blocks for Phibrizio, it's still just Season Five.

Okay, that analogy was stupid and I apologize, but I'm going to continue calling it 5E-if only because I want my blogger domain name to remain relevant.

Wizards has links to a number of Q and A sessions with the staff on their site, so head over there and make a search check if you want the full context of what I'm ranting about.

So, my thoughts? Well-

1.) Roleplaying is not game balance. Seriously, when you break the game down into Combat, Roleplaying, and Exploration, if you're going to have some classes be better at Roleplaying than others because-hey-that's how the game is balanced, what you're really doing is you're disincentivizing those classes that aren't as good at Combat.

I have always had a problem with predominantly roleplaying game stats-things like charisma especially, but even Intelligence-because I feel it gives the wrong kinds of incentives for those of us that like to twink builds. I don't want to play a dumb barbarian because being dumb is the ability score economically feasible choice, I want to play a dumb barbarian because playing a dumb character can be fun. On the flip side, I'd like to be able to play a smart fighter without having to pigeonhole myself into intelligence score based fighter abilities.

The entire thing just creates a giant unnecessary conflict of interests. Roleplaying involvement should have to do with a player's active involvement in the game-how much backstory they have, how much they work with the DM, and how much they actually care about those things. When you reward certain classes with roleplaying benefits at the expense of combat benefits, you're saying some classes are better at being involved in the game than others.

2.) I'm not sure I trust their math. In particular, the Fighter versus Wizard scenario discussed here. I understand what Monte is getting at, but he gave a really bad example:

Monte: Fireball is a static 5d6. If you want more damage, you use a higher-level spell slot. Much more balancing. Monte: the play session that I envision with the fighter and wizard fighting together is that the figher is always better than the wizard. The fighter hits someone for 12 damage and then the wizard hits someone for 4, and the wizard wishes he was a fighter. Then that happens again on the second round, and the wizard feels the same way again. But then on the third round the wizard whips out his fireball and does 16 or 20 damage total and the fighter goes ahh, I wish I was a wizard. I want each class to shine and to have reasons to want to play that class.

Seriously Monte? In your suggested example, the fighter did 36 damage over three rounds, whereas the Wizard did a crappy 28. This is assuming that a Wizard has enough spells to use one every three rounds equivalent. At that rate, there's never any reason to play a Wizard-their peak may be higher, but their average damage is a whole lot lower, and consistency of play is a lot more useful in combat than having occasional novas that don't even deal twice as much damage as the guy who's being consistent all the time!

But, maybe I'm underestimating how many spells per day/encounter/full-moon that Wizards have in this newfangled old school Vancian magic system (which, BTW, I'm rather conflicted on-I like how the Mage uses spells in Essentials, and I'm not sure whether they're moving away from that from the discussions here). Maybe Monte forgot to note "Oh yeah, and the wizard is damaging two or three targets at once." Any number of possible justifications for the rather shoddy math. But those weren't there, which gets me to wonder if anyone really understands what they're talking about.

3.) Skills: You know me, I hate skill checks. So, when they're talking about things like "Oh, your strength is 17? Yeah, you can do that" that's a definite move forwards in my book. Kudos.

4.) Classes as themes: Works for me, but without knowing what constitutes a theme, I can't say anything particularly meaningful. The "kits" idea makes sense, but I question the game balance involved. After all, a lot of the things that end up being broken are mixing unexpected combinations with one another. 4E was nice in that there was a lot of mutual exclusivity baked into the game system, so it was a lot easier to balance-having some old style classes as themes sounds like it has the potential to break some of that. Still, I'm optimistic.

5.) Ability score boosting items: Meh. I know that our old pal Percio over at Square Fireballs seems to have a beef with these, but I'm a bit more conflicted. I like the idea of ability score boosting items, but I HATE the effective necessity of them. The idea that you can take a dumb character and make them smarter by, say, bonking them on the head with a wooden paddle (been reading Nodwick) is fun, but if ability scores are crucial to the game's balance, that means that any significant increase to scores is appropriately more useful for characters who are likely to already have high ability scores.

Thinking about 2nd edition (my experiences of which were mostly the various computer games and the like), we can remember that Gauntlets of Ogre Strength and the like tended to grant flat specific ability scores, rather than granting a bonus (excluding Manuals of Awesomely Overpoweredness).

Of course, the big thing to remember is that it doesn't matter if magical items can boost your stats if you don't HAVE them. But, well, it's hard to imagine that monty haul DMs aren't going to monty haul.

Concerns for 5th edition

I've personally been a fan of the direction Essentials took 4th edition, so structurally, I'm not too concerned. However, there is one thing that will inevitably suck:

A complete lack of content at first. After all, it took quite a long time to get the monk into standard play. The amount of content actually available not only shapes play experiences, it shapes campaign design. This is probably just a necessary evil of starting a new edition, but it still sucks balls.

Ironic Echoes

Go figure

The Problem with Skill Checks

I don't like skill checks. In fact, I don't really like skills either. To me, skills are part of that glorious part of roleplying that is tertiary to actual play, but essential to character development. That is, it feels that, by having rules based access to skill checks, all you do is prevent characters who otherwise have good reason to have those skills from having those skills.

To me, skills feel like something that's not part of the challenge, but rather part of the narrative. To be part of the challenge, it really has to be something where players make active informed decisions. And when your skills boil down to "I have X% chance of doing this," that element doesn't really apply.

Skills, in my mind, should not be part of the challenge of the game. They are pass fail. That's not to say that your character may or may not play differently based on what skills they have. But rather, it's to say that if you distant skills from gameplay, then it doesn't matter what skills a character has, it's not going to be gamebreaking. It may break the *narrative,* but I think it's unwise to try and shoehorn protections against the destruction of narrative structure into the game-this is the same reason why I feel rituals, rather than being explicitly codified, should be vague and subject to the DM's whims. It's less about challenge and more about narrative.

That being said, I absolutely love skill powers. A DM can completely ignore skill checks altogether, yet skills can still be a useful part of a character's build. I feel like there's something to that. In the same way that you're technically permitted to select as many backgrounds as you want, but only get one background benefit, I feel that the same should apply to skills: you get as many as you want, but when it comes to gameplay, you gain one bonus skill power.

I'm not going into specifics here.

One other issue with skills is that there's an implication that because it's a d20 roll, a high enough roll should be able to pull off any task. So you get skill monkeys with +50 to diplomacy, expecting to talk the main villain out of their plot. It's a problem with narrative. Players feel entitled to their skills, because it's part of their build. The point is, that's where the problem lies: you shouldn't have to sacrifice your gameplay for the sake of your narrative. Your narrative should be able to flow without sacrifice.

But I'm rambling a bit more than usual.

The Problem of Entitlement

Anyone who knows me knows that I tend to think arguments surrounding people being "entitled" are ridiculous. Unfortunately, when it comes to 4th Edition, I think the issue of entitlement really is a strong one.

Look at the off-line character builder. When Wizards of the Coast decided (rightly or wrongly) that they weren't going to offer everyone a permanent access to all the game's rules (up to a certain point) for the cost of a 1 month subscription, they pulled it. And there was backlash. A lot of backlash. People felt entitled to it.

But, even ignoring Wizard's concerns (that range from digital piracy to just how much they're really charging for content), entitlement is what Essentials is all about. Rather, it's about fighting that entitlement. Players feel entitled to artifacts. Players feel entitled to Slidespam builds for wizards. Players feel entitled to this and that.

If you take a look at an Essentials Only game-rarity rules, no pre-essentials classes, etc-you really don't see that. And surprise surprise, there's complaints about how the content sucks. Because it doesn't live up to the pre-existing expectations. And that's intentional: the game can't meet those expectations.

Wizards is releasing a lot less crunch, and a lot more fluff these days. And that's partially because it's easier for them to catch up with that much. But in the current market, I ask all players of the game: If you hadn't been given so much before, would you really think what you're getting now is inadequate?

Not Exactly Top Tier

So apparently Sly Flourish is a popular site for Dungeon Mastering advice on 4th edition. They realized the same things about solo monsters I did, though taking a bit less of an issue by issue systemic approach to it.

I don't qualify for their top blogs, as I haven't been releasing posts weekly (inspiration is so hard to find~) but it's worth checking out, at http://slyflourish.com

The Problem with Published Monsters

It's always been tacitly understood that different parties have access to different resources. So, if the party "just happens" to have Mass Resistance in store, then they can make a battle become utterly boring. Alternatively, you can design monsters that are basically impossible without Mass Resistance. This actually works if you're tailoring monsters for the party-it rewards players for their choices without threatening a TPK (because you know they have that choice). The problem, of course, is that any such monster inherently has to be ad hoc.

It's rather like having trolls that are entirely impossible to kill without fire or acid damage. If the party has access to fire or acid damage, there's no issue, but if you run such a troll against an all-melee party with nothing but sticks and stones, you'd better make sure you drop some torches on them.

Not Joking Anymore

You know, originally, Fifth Edition Now was just a way of saying that things need to change. I wasn't really suggesting we release 5th edition. But the more I think about it, the more I think the game really does require a few fundamental changes that ultimately I don't think can be accomplished within the 4th edition framework.

It's unfortunate, but perhaps it really has become time for us to launch into 5th edition. Over the coming days, weeks, centuries, whatever, I will be explaining some basic frameworks going forwards.

Defenses are like a Dollar Store...

Price-point marketing. You look at a demand curve, and it's either a straight line, or convex. But you think of it as Price-Pointing, the line kind of bumps, with peaks and valleys.

Defenses are like that.

When you hit 21st level, BOOM! Improved Defenses (and its ilk) suddenly increase by one. Your ability scores are all (well, the important ones) even again. You're in reach for +5 armor, which for heavier armors can lead to yet another +1 to AC.

There are lots of "Price Points" for defenses, and some of them are spread out, making it look like a straight line from a distance. But if you zoom in, you can really see the texture of the curve.

I just thought that was something interesting.

How Plato Speaks of Dungeons and Dragons

I recently had a conversation with a friend who, by all means, radically diverges with me on what he think makes for optimal game design. His criticism of my manner was to suggest "There's no Plato's Perfect Form of Dungeons and Dragons."

Which pretty much sums up his opposition to my position-the position that, there is indeed a theoretical "best" or "perfect" model, and that the purpose of game balance discussions is to move us closer in that direction.

Of course, there was no argument as to why there is no Plato's Perfect Form of Dungeons and Dragons. But to be fair, that would have been a lengthy philosophical conversation in and of itself.

A change in tone

You may have noticed the change in header. 5eNow hasn't particularly had anything going for it to distinguish itself from other Dungeons and Dragons blogs. It doesn't have the hard-hitting numbers like Square-Fireballs, or the ... ... ... actually, I don't currently follow anyone else's Dungeons and Dragons related blog.

So, I'm going full acid damage. Expect to see more complaining about people I disagree with in a totally unjustified and hateful-but still utterly rational (and presumably correct?)-manner. Why? Well, everyone has to have a hobby.

I've already unconsciously undergone this transformation (as you'll notice in my Fallacies posts) so I figure, why fight the tide.

Not a Fallacy: Just Plain Wrong

In response to "minor action attack powers have changed the balance of the game:"

"Changed it, despite having been there from the start."

Though it's technically true that Dragon Breath existed in the good old PHB1, this was not a crowd pleaser at the time. With low damage, low area of effect, and a moderate attack bonus, it was by no means the level of gamebreaking you see with rogues who take Low Slash up through 30th level (and Snap Shot, and Tumbling Strike, and you get the idea).

And all those other minor action attack powers? All of them, with only one exception (unless the compendium is lying to me, which is possible) are daily powers. The one exception? Daggermaster's 11th level encounter power. Paragon Paths have often been the source of some of the best (and worst) encounter attack powers, but when coupled with paragon paths with bad to moderate features, this tends to even out-they don't crowd out options in the same way general class powers do. Moreover, Daggermaster's attack power A.) Requires a dagger (low damage dice) and B.) Requires that you have critically hit that round. It is altogether still inferior to Low Slash.

As for the dailies, well, certainly a lot of those are as overpowered as anything, I'll grant you that. There have been a number of options even from the PHB1 that have dominated the charts. But hey, they got around to nerfing Rain of Blows pretty quickly. We can go back to "It's Only a Daily" for why daily powers shouldn't have nigh infinite power, but it's clear that the ability to access multiple minor action powers, and to easily access immediate action powers, was initially very restricted (rangers were the only ones to have Immediate Action attacks back then, excluding a single 27th level Paladin attack).

Now, I'm not saying the Player's Handbook was somehow gold in terms of game balance and everything else is power creep. But saying that minor action attack powers "can't have changed the game because they've always been there" is just plain wrong.

Of course, even if they were, that doesn't change whether they're a good idea or not.

Fallacies that prevent game balance.

In arguing over the nature of balancing the game, I am often met with a few fallacies, most of them in regards to strikers.


You're taking something away without adding anything
  I hear this a lot from people who basically just want to have their cake and eat it too. You can't, for instance, declare "multiple damage rolls per round subvert the basic assumption of how damage in 4th edition works and thus should be regulated heavily" for these people. As far as they're concerned, you're limiting options-regardless of whether those options are balanced or not. Unless you arbitrarily add options, you're somehow a tyrant.
 Obviously, the fallacy here is that you're not making the game any different than it was before these overpowered options were introduced in the first place. Maybe rogues needed something more before Snap Shot and Low Slash were introduced (just to give a couple of examples), but that doesn't mean that those two powers aren't disproportionate powerful or in need of nerfing.

He's being a striker-stop punishing that
I get this one a lot. Basically, "he's doing his job." Well yes, of course, the striker is intended to deal damage. But that's completely missing the point that he's not supposed to deal infinite damage. Just how much damage a striker should deal compared to any other class is too complicated of an issue to go into full detail here, but the point is that it's supposed to be a ratio.

Note that the same basic fallacy applies to protecting Pacifist Clerics ability to heal infinitely with Astral Seal and whatnot. The bottom line comes down to the fact that a character's abilities are basically a resource, but those resources come from a limited number of builds. If you have one character that heals infinitely, then you can basically accomplish as much with two characters as you could otherwise with five. Balance doesn't begin and end with everyone "doing their job."

Damnit Tom, you tell everyone to twink and then punish them when they do!
This one is a bit more personal. Basically, it comes down to the assumption that you are, to use TV Tropes terminology, either a Scrub or a Stop Having Fun Guy. Being a power gamer doesn't mean that you can't recognize where the game is fundamentally broken. It also doesn't mean you don't obtain a level of dissatisfaction from interacting with the more broken elements. There's a qualitative difference to optimizing, and breaking the game.

Slipping through the cracks: Slidespam and autodamage powers

For whatever reason, Wizards seemed content to release the playtest for the Arcanist last. However, they decided to change the design of powers radically when doing so. What this means is that now there's an army of zone powers that deal damage based on the old model-making newstyle Arcanists crap in comparison.

Here is a non-exclusive list of powers that either still have Minion Ganking (meaning, they deal damage at start of turn) or Slidespam (meaning you can slide an enemy into and out of a zone numerous times to theoretically get massive damage).

Predatory Shards (Artificer 5): No slidespam, but minion ganking. Immobile and party friendly.

Wall of Shadows (Assassin 9): Small area, but allows both slidespam and minion ganking. Immobile, not party friendly. Low ability synergy.

Wall of Death (Assassin 25): Small area, but allows both slidespam and minion ganking. Immobile, not party friendly; non-damage roll.

Wall of Sound (Bard 15): Small area, but allows both slidespam and minion ganking. Ideal for Enchanters to multiclass into.

Consecrated Ground (Cleric 5): Small area. Minion ganking. Impractical for controller abuse-probably not an issue.

Blade Barrier (Cleric 9): Decent area, both minion ganking and slidespam. Superior to old Firewall in many ways. Seriously needs to be nerfed.

Flame Seed (Druid 1): Pre-nerf Cloud of Daggers, but with less damage.

Wall of Thorns (Druid 5): Similar to pre-nerf Wall of Fire in damage capability. Increased movement cost makes it difficult to abuse with slidespam, and lack of adjacency damage limits minionganking to those in the wall.

Flurry of Stingers (Druid 9): Adjacency slidespam possible. Static damage.

Pummeling hail (Druid 19): Static damage, but slidespam and minion ganking.

Thorns of the Hinterlands (Druid 19): More Wall of Fireishness. Slidespam and minion ganking.

Avian Clouds (Druid 25): Start of turn only, static damage.

Creeping Doom (Druid 25): Start of turn, mobile, large area of effect.

Whirling Firestorm (Druid 29): Start of turn, variable size, also comes with a decent minor action attack power.

Rain of Steel (Fighter 5): Start of turn adjacency. Surprised they didn’t nerf that.

Unyielding Avalanche (Fighter 15): See Rain of Steel.

Reaper’s Stance (Fighter 25): See Rain of Steel.

Invocation of Ice and Fire (Invoker 5): Very limited damage, but slidespam usable.

Wall of Blades (Invoker 15): Minion Ganking and Slidespammable.

Plague of Poison (Invoker 23): Minion ganking.

Eye of the Sun (Invoker 25): Minion ganking. Mobile.

Invoked Devastation (Invoker 29): Minion ganking, static damage.

Invoke the Absolute Dark (Invoker 29): Minion ganking, static damage, grows.

Burning Flux (Psion 3): Minion ganking, at will. Like a wildly powered up pre-nerf Cloud of Daggers.

Shredding Ribbons (Psion 5): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage. Better off with Burning Flux at this rate!

Ectoplasmic Servant (Psion 7): Slidespam, static damage.

Malicious Lightning (Psion 9): Minion ganking, static damage.

Forest of Exclusion (Psion 25): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Reality Meltdown (Psion 27): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Rime Strike (Seeker 1): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Black Arrow of Fate (Seeker 19): Minion ganking, static damage. Enemy controls zone’s position.

Rending Vines (Seeker 19): Minion ganking, static damage.

Dust Storm Binding (Shaman 1): Minion ganking, static damage, low area of effect.

Spirit of Endings Begun (Shaman 19): Minion ganking.

Shocking Magnetism (Sorcerer 1): Minion ganking. You control the zone’s area of effect.

Explosive Pyre (Sorcerer 1): Normally, I wouldn’t put “requires a hit for this effect to occur” powers in place, but due to the damage roll, slide-spam possibility, and potential for sorcerer damage buff (which can be accomplished by hybriding), this power gets the extra attention.

Flame Spiral (Sorcerer 3): Minion ganking, slidespam.

Ice Stalagmites (Sorcerer 9): Minion ganking.

Spitfire Furnace (Sorcerer 15): Minion ganking

Cloak of Winter Storm (Sorcerer 25): Minion ganking, slidespam, can benefit from a hybrid sorcerer’s damage boost. Utterly ideal for an Enchanter.

Fury of Dragotha (Sorcerer 25): Minion ganking.

Deep Freeze (Swordmage 5): Minion ganking, slidespam. Target determines positioning, but party friendly.

Flamewall Strike (Swordmage 7): Minion ganking, slidespam, absurdly low area of effect. Theoretically possible to use at-will at 30^th level by going Arcane Sword, though I question the wisdom of doing so.

Winter’s Grip (Warden 5): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Creeping Brambles (Warden 19): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Armor of Agathys (Warlock 1): Minion ganking.

Vestige of Ugar (Warlock 5): Minion ganking, slidespam.

Feast of Souls (Warlock 9): Minion ganking, slidespam. Mobile.

Plague of Frogs (Warlock 15): Minion ganking, slidespam. Mobile

Forbiddance of the Ninth (Warlock 29): Minion ganking.

Cloud of Daggers(???) (Wizard 1): Oddly enough, this power does not limit its damage to once per turn. The static damage makes it low intensity for slidespam, but it’s still one of the slidespammable powers out there. Give an enemy vulnerability to force damage (… somehow) or change the damage to cold, and you can actually wrack up the damage, post nerf!

Orbmaster’s Incendiary Detonation (Wizard 1): Minion ganking. Slidespam, but for two damage, it’s unlikely to be disastrous.

Acid Mire (Wizard 5): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Grasp of the Grave (Wizard 5): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Corrosive Mist (Wizard 7): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Furnmace of Sand (Wizard 17): No Minion ganking, but this is one of the strongest slidespammable powers there is, and it’s an encounter power!

Bubbling Acid (Wizard 25): Minion ganking, slidespam, static damage.

Bigotry and hatred!

You know, there's a certain subsection of players who seem to dislike Epic play not for anything reasonable (and let me tell you, there are reasons to dislike epic play), but out of some sort of almost hipster-esque distaste. The type of person who insists that even an Essentials build at that level is "too complex."

Being that I'm in the staging process for building a new planes hopping campaign that starts at 21st level, I've found myself having to ask how to deal with this problem.

BTW: for those of you wondering whatever happened to my "NEVER AGAIN!" mentality, well, let's just say old habits die hard.