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[Neonivek]

So then it was a stripped down boss. So you havent actually used an encounter properly yet, then jab at it, that 4e did it better.

Yes, it was. However, since it had never been used before, and was based around a gimmick mechanic that also had never been used before, it was difficult to tell how to use it properly.

My remark about 4e was in reference to the way that power economy and party composition worked in a very specific way. Your controller has access to powerful AOE, so a fight against 5-6 goblins is suddenly a lot easier. Boss battles can now be deadlier, but at the same time, easier, as you now feel okay about spending Daily powers. The intensity gets ramped up in an interesting way naturally, while I find myself having to work much harder to find ways to develop that intensity in other editions.

I'm not trying to start an edition fight, I'm just comparing the two edition's boss/gang fights. I love 5e to death, and have a grudging respect for 4e as a fantasy tactical game. It does that well, if nothing else.

Well the thing is... they kind of both use the same system for bosses

Actually 5e is more of an evolution of it, as it is more flexible with the boss mechanics.

[Arcvasti]

At one point, I didn't know how CR worked and thought that FOUR monsters with a CR of the party's level was an appropriate challenge.

...

I'm still not quite sure how they managed to survive the 5-6 adventures until I figured out the actual rules. Lots of 20s and Dwarven bonuses to Con and saves, probably.

[BlackFlyme]

Just remember: no matter how badly you fucked up as a DM, it's always the players' faults.

Party wipes are never fun. Neither are near-PKs. Even at its silliest, it's infuriating.

When we were in a Mythic campaign with the DM that's terrible with encounter design, all our frontliners went down trying to chase down and melee a dragon. In two different dragon encounters.

Also, fuck the Giantslayer Adventure Path. Whoever designed that just loves meat-grinders.

[Jimmy]

This is why I love playing spellcasters, especially summoner classes. A huge amount of monsters are statted to have "nope, nope, fuck nope!" abilities that work in melee range. Let some other chump take the saving throws. Die for me, my minions!

[Jimmy]

Since two of my regular Friday group is away for Christmas, the remaining four of us will be doing a level 1 Pathfinder one-shot with one of my players in the DM chair.

I've gone with Amiri, the human female barbarian for my character. My goal is to try and pull off as many Skyrim guard one-liners as possible

[highmax28]

Thoughts on Curse of Strahd?

I want to run it from how ProJared keeps talking about it but I don't know if that's because he had a good DM or if it's because it's actually good

[Criptfeind]

At one point, I didn't know how CR worked and thought that FOUR monsters with a CR of the party's level was an appropriate challenge.

If this was 3.5 (not sure about 4 or 5) this isn't totally inaccurate. Cr has only a passing resemblance to correct in 3.5, which makes sense of course, since the power level of parties can vary wildly between the same level and a lot of times enemies can loose a huge amount of effectiveness when you've got characters a bit above the 'expected' power level, a situation that I find much more common then the reverse. 4 dudes of the parties CR isn't that wild in that situation.

[Neonivek]

Thoughts on Curse of Strahd?

I want to run it from how ProJared keeps talking about it but I don't know if that's because he had a good DM or if it's because it's actually good

You REALLY REALLY need players who want to roll with the punches.

Because that thing can be very easy or cripplingly difficult depending on how lucky (yes lucky) the players are. It is actually hilarious how easy victory can be if luck is on the player's side and how hilariously bad it can be if they are unlucky... I want to reveal more but I can't.

ALSO! Unlike some adventures this one requires you to sort of keep who knows what inside your own head and invent it... Because, unlike what I would have suspected, the scenario doesn't tell you what each NPC knows.

It is a lot like the elemental adventures book where it requires YOU the player to actually design the sessions yourself. You CANNOT run the session from the book inspite that being the point of these

[BlackFlyme]

This is why I love playing spellcasters, especially summoner classes. A huge amount of monsters are statted to have "nope, nope, fuck nope!" abilities that work in melee range. Let some other chump take the saving throws. Die for me, my minions!

I prefer ranged characters myself, but that and minion-mancy won't save your ass from coup-de-graces in your sleep. We had to check the official Paizo messageboards to discover that the way the assassin encounter was supposed to be run is not actually mentioned in the books. We live in the town, why the hell would the devs expect us residents to all sleep in a single small room in the inn when we haven't even met any antagonists? Why would the assassins sneak into a town, pick the doors to our room(s), then just make a regular attack on us while we sleep, even though their weapons are poisoned and they are intelligent Rogues?

Sorry, the rest of the party and I are still salty. One person ripped up their character sheet. We've been told that the adventure only gets harder from here, and we are expected to hold off an entire army in an immense encounter that will last us several levels. As in no break as we rapidly gain levels from wave after wave of opponents. At least according to those I've spoken with that have run the campaign.

Also, we're not really allowed to play "team too many friends" anymore, due to a Necromancy incident.

[Neonivek]

In all fairness I have seen GOOD games where the characters are attacked, undeserved, by some assassin in the middle of the night.

Mind you, those games were good... So the fact that you really didn't do anything... was a plot point.

In one of them it was because you were destined to defeat someone, so they sent assassins after you to kill you early... essentially throwing you on their track immediately (OPPS!) which is especially funny because there is no reason for you to have even bothered with this person (As they are hard to get to) anyhow.

Bonus point that you got woken up first.

In another one it was purely random chance and a LOT of people were killed or captured before you... also immediately throwing you on track.

In a third one, it was meant to show how the entire town was watching you. You didn't really get any real leads, no one would really talk to you, but everyone was hostile towards you... You would later get attacked at the inn (which they used to get rid of... unwanted guests) but there were ways around it such as barricading the door in advance (or, technically I guess you could not ask the town questions)

[NullForceOmega]

I kind of enjoy the sheer paranoia my players tend to have, especially in RIFTS.

Hostile town?

If players are Coalition:

1 ) they are clearly d-bee/magic user/demonically possessed.  Level the entire area with ridiculous firepower.

2 ) we need to question them.  Send a request up to HQ for air support and a company of skelebots.

3 ) the location is strategically important.  'This is lieutenant x, calling for DHT deployment of third airborn at my location.'

If players are not coalition:

1 ) they are clearly CS/vampire/demonically possessed.  Level the entire area with ridiculous firepower.

2 ) we need to question them.  Send in the dragon, he'll get answers.  (alternately: where is the nearest nexus, we'll use magic to pacify the whole town)

3 ) the location is strategically important.  'Run!! The CS is coming!!'

[highmax28]

Thoughts on Curse of Strahd?

I want to run it from how ProJared keeps talking about it but I don't know if that's because he had a good DM or if it's because it's actually good

You REALLY REALLY need players who want to roll with the punches.

Because that thing can be very easy or cripplingly difficult depending on how lucky (yes lucky) the players are. It is actually hilarious how easy victory can be if luck is on the player's side and how hilariously bad it can be if they are unlucky... I want to reveal more but I can't.

ALSO! Unlike some adventures this one requires you to sort of keep who knows what inside your own head and invent it... Because, unlike what I would have suspected, the scenario doesn't tell you what each NPC knows.

It is a lot like the elemental adventures book where it requires YOU the player to actually design the sessions yourself. You CANNOT run the session from the book inspite that being the point of these

I'm sold. Ill pick it up tomorrow

[Teneb]

Just came back from my group's almost-weekly (it often gets canceled due to someone having personal problems) D&D 5e session. I'd say it was a good session. We exorcised our rogue, who was possessed, and I became gnome Che Guevara in Fantasy Mexico.

[Rolan7]

Good post-holiday NWoD session last night.  With one particularly bittersweet moment...

In true Scooby-Do fashion our party of demonically-enhanced investigators split up to investigate 3 separate lights...  deep in a Tennessee forest graveyard, at night.  Mm-hm.
My character Brian carries the high-tech camera, and as he walked it switched it to infrared mode.  Mm.  Completely surrounded by frigid signatures in the july heat, figures with shoulders squared towards him.  Moving out of his way as he approached the light.
Definitely not the creepiest thing so far this chronicle.  Bit close though.  He carried on, for truth (and, he added out loud, "to find the problem plaguing these poor souls who are very kind to let me by")

As he got closer to the light, something was especially off.  He was fortunate and noticed- the trees.  They were taller, much taller.  Impossibly tall?  Not natural for this area...  Intelligence has its perks. 

The point of light became a glow as he reached a clearing.  In the center was a child, capturing fireflies.
My character turned and ran, flat-out, never looking back.

See, here's the thing:  I don't know how changelings work in NWoD, hardly at all.  But I recognize the signs, and my character would certainly know them too (high points in occult, kinda obsessed).  This was some Feywild shit.
And as a player, I really wanted to see where that went.  A lot.
But, my character?  In his meteoric plunge into immorality, the one derangement he's gained is:  A severe phobia of children.
So, no.
Not visiting the... fey...  Realm of Thorns?  Again, I don't know the details, doesn't matter.  It was disappointing, but there was absolutely no way my character was staying another second.

Which, IDK.  Kinda works.  Particularly since it took the rest of the party (GM included) a second to remember Brian's child phobia.
Said phobia was obtained by tricking kids into being possessed by demons, and the NWoD fey realm (from my little understanding) is a very acute form of that shame.  Changelings...

We also sought a not-bigfoot called The Knobby (NOTHING HAPPENED NOTHING HAPPENED) and a supposed bobcat-like creature called the wampus cat (literally, nothing happened).

[highmax28]

So my party pulled the stupidest shit tonight.

The mystic told a giant boss to jump off a cliff into a river, and he missed the river. The height of the cliff caused the damage to be 97 damage total.

THEN. The most ridiculous thing ever happened.

The party had to traverse an area without mounts, which wouldn't do for the party wizard. So she says:

"Why don't I just attach the carriage to my nightmare?"

My first mistake was letting the wizard be able to tame it with an animal handling check (which she crit because she asked if she could, and a DM never says no).

My second one was underestimating the creativity of the girl I'm dating and her friend.

The cleric whips out a flying carpet and says "We can have him work with this!" And it ended up with the party taking off the wheels and the canopy of the carriage, making it much lighter, essentially making it a sled.

So they jury rig with a lot of rope and over things, a carriage stretched to a flying carpet, with both being pulled by a nightmare.

Being the dead of winter in world, I made a joke saying:

Barely even a month after the winter solstice, over the elvish woods, people saw a man driving a flying sleigh being pulled by some strange horse-like creature that led them through the cold with its reddish glow. Something was also being pulled as well, but some say it was four people huddled, others say it was a bag of goodies.

And that, my friends, is the beginning of the story of how Santa Claus was born

My party warlock said "so we're essentially acting as Santa while hunting an undead menace known as vampirism...