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[Very Long] Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War: a Key Difference in D&D Play Styles...
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<blockquote data-quote="S'mon" data-source="post: 7548764" data-attributes="member: 463"><p>It's not true because 4e is MORE sensitive to power differences than 3e, and in a very bad way - with defences going up +1 per level, PCs can't even hit creatures of significantly higher level. Furthermore, threat level increases faster than XP award in 4e so even if the PCs eventually win they get meagre XP.</p><p></p><p>5e is very forgiving of power differences once the PCs reach 5th level. Some DMs complain about this, that 5e PCs can defeat monsters of much higher CR. But in any case I don't expect or want all fights to be winnable. I do expect PCs to recognise a losing fight (easy in 3e & 5e, but hard in 4e due to the resource economy and the natural cadence of 4e combat typically having a 'looks like you might lose' bit in the middle) and to keep in mind ways to escape & evade. In the worst case scenario of a superior flying enemy, such as an angry dragon hunting ground-locked PCs, you are likely to lose some people, but I have seen parties avoid TPK by scattering, hiding, using a variety of techniques. Especially if you have some (tasty, tasty) NPCs or even just mounts along, PC fatalities can often be minimised.</p><p></p><p>My son sometimes gets called cowardly how he plays his PCs, because he's good at quickly recognising a losing fight and bugging out, as when his flying dragonborn bbn-19 fled the 3 fire giants within 1 round yesterday. It meant he still had enough resources he could suck up the damage from their final attacks as he fled.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="S'mon, post: 7548764, member: 463"] It's not true because 4e is MORE sensitive to power differences than 3e, and in a very bad way - with defences going up +1 per level, PCs can't even hit creatures of significantly higher level. Furthermore, threat level increases faster than XP award in 4e so even if the PCs eventually win they get meagre XP. 5e is very forgiving of power differences once the PCs reach 5th level. Some DMs complain about this, that 5e PCs can defeat monsters of much higher CR. But in any case I don't expect or want all fights to be winnable. I do expect PCs to recognise a losing fight (easy in 3e & 5e, but hard in 4e due to the resource economy and the natural cadence of 4e combat typically having a 'looks like you might lose' bit in the middle) and to keep in mind ways to escape & evade. In the worst case scenario of a superior flying enemy, such as an angry dragon hunting ground-locked PCs, you are likely to lose some people, but I have seen parties avoid TPK by scattering, hiding, using a variety of techniques. Especially if you have some (tasty, tasty) NPCs or even just mounts along, PC fatalities can often be minimised. My son sometimes gets called cowardly how he plays his PCs, because he's good at quickly recognising a losing fight and bugging out, as when his flying dragonborn bbn-19 fled the 3 fire giants within 1 round yesterday. It meant he still had enough resources he could suck up the damage from their final attacks as he fled. [/QUOTE]
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[Very Long] Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War: a Key Difference in D&D Play Styles...
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