Comments on the 4th Ed fact thread

[alhoon]

MINIONS:
(OK, not yet in the fact thread but it will be soon I guess.)

Well... I became wiser with this update. The WotC admits blatantly that Minions are not errorproof. They're there for filling encounters.

I.e: A party of 6 adventurers 1st level work well against a group with 4 skeleton warriors or an orc raider and three skeleton warriors etc.
A party of 6 adventures 1st level doesn't work well against 6 orc warrior minions although they give 600XP! ! !

Minions are there to:
- Give the feeling to the PCs that chew up many enemies. They don't defeat 4 devils, they defeat 10.
- Eat up precious actions
- Get killed in large numbers by area attacks balancing out solo monsters and elite monsters that give the minimum out of area attacks.
- fill up encounter XP when used at the right level!

I.e DM thinking "4 10th level PCs. I need an encounter worth about 2000 XP. Since it's the final one, I would go for one that gives 2200 XP.
The big bad guy is elite 11th = 1200 XP. His bodyguards are 8th level = 2 x 350 = 700 XP... Hmmm I need 300 more XP. Should I add a single 7th level lackey? Nah... I'll add 3 9th level minions (300 XP)."
So the PCs will have to face the tough bad guy, his bodyguards and a few easily dispatched minions.
The DM is advised to NOT use 6 level 5 minions instead, or 1 level 15 minion.

The author of the article admits that the level/4 is more an ad hoc thing than a tried and tested rule.
What I get from the article reading between the lines?
- If you like to use many of them, or your PCs have many area spells award XP/6 for each minion.
- In a single encounter about 1/4th of the XP or less should be given from minions. I.e if you want an encounter worth 1000 XP, no more than 250 XP should be from minions.
There's an example about this. A party of 1st level chars can kill a 25th lvl minion with a single natural 20, earning 1700 XP. Add to this that minions are killed by spells and powers that deal automatic damage like walls of fire etc.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

It's up now ... and I must admit, if the legion devils' example holds true for non-minions also, it'll be a lot easier to adapt existing adventures for more or less powerful PCs, under this system. No more fiddling with the numbers or types of the opposition; just raise or lower their baseline combat stats (attack bonuse, saves, resistances) by a few points, and you're all set.

[Lord Soth]

(Notice, BTW, that scrolls are not mentioned in the latter article's roster of items, unless they're being classified as "implements" now.)

Just wanted to point out that Rituals come on scrolls (or books. The scrolls are expended when the Ritual is cast, but not the book).

[Sorti]

Area spells are funnier than ever...

[Jester of the FoS]

NOTE: The orc bloodrager seems a bit... out of sync. 5 1st lvl PCs can kill a chuul even with the outmost difficulty. But 6 PCs have a better chance to slay a single orc chieftain (700 XP) than a bloodrager (600 XP)!

That ability to strike back immediately after each blow is ... insane! Suppose the PCs have never encountered such an orc. They will gang up on him, only to be beaten up, while more experienced players (not chars) would pelt him with ranged attacks.
Well the bloodrager seems on par with 2 7th level critters. But NOT with 6 1st level ones. I believe a fight with 6 PCs against 4 skeleton warriors (600 XP) is far easier than with a single bloodrager.
It still can be done but it will take a lot out of the PCs.

Remember that a chieftain is also a leader so his role is to make other orcs better. That's where his aura comes in.
It's only a one-level difference but the chieftain does have better AC and such and far more hitpoints.

The bloodrager is deadly but it is an elite (chulls are not). And while the immediate strike-back attack is scary it only works once, maybe twice before the party switches to ranged combat (and really, any arcane and most clerics, warlords and rangers are decent at ranged anyway).

[alhoon]

Yeap. I know all that. But the Bloodrager can beat his chieftain to a bloody mess and become a chieftain.

Also: Chuul gives 500 XP, Bloodrager 600 XP. 5 1st lvl chars can kill the Chuul (with difficulty) and 6 1st lvl PCs can kill the Bloodrager with more difficulty and good tactics.

Area spells are funnier than ever...

Well, the intention is to make these more usefull after all. If the party 90% faces 2-4 enemies then area spells aren't so great. On the other hand of the spectrum, if you use 1 enemy and 12 minions area spells make the encounter much, much more easy.

[Jester of the FoS]

The author of the article admits that the level/4 is more an ad hoc thing than a tried and tested rule.
What I get from the article reading between the lines?
- If you like to use many of them, or your PCs have many area spells award XP/6 for each minion.
- In a single encounter about 1/4th of the XP or less should be given from minions. I.e if you want an encounter worth 1000 XP, no more than 250 XP should be from minions.
There's an example about this. A party of 1st level chars can kill a 25th lvl minion with a single natural 20, earning 1700 XP. Add to this that minions are killed by spells and powers that deal automatic damage like walls of fire etc.

I *love* the idea of minions. It's great for LotR style big battles and the like, especially if you have minions on both sides.
I am *so* looking forward to having my PCs face-off against a dozen orcs at first level.
AoE aren't as reliable because multiple hits are still needed. That's why same (or close) level minions are used, the to-hit numbers work out well. If the minion is too high you need that crazy-lucky shot while if they're too low you seldom miss.

4-6 Minion = 1 regular makes sense, simply because the average monster takes 4 to 6 hits, so it's harder to make them exact because you might drop the regular monster in 3 hits with a couple lucky criticals then flub against the minions with a series of "1"s.
Of course, minions become deadly because, unlike regular monsters, they can attack en masse and really do some crazy damage.

[alhoon]

I *love* the idea of minions. It's great for LotR style big battles and the like, especially if you have minions on both sides.
I am *so* looking forward to having my PCs face-off against a dozen orcs at first level.
AoE aren't as reliable because multiple hits are still needed. That's why same (or close) level minions are used, the to-hit numbers work out well. If the minion is too high you need that crazy-lucky shot while if they're too low you seldom miss.

4-6 Minion = 1 regular makes sense, simply because the average monster takes 4 to 6 hits, so it's harder to make them exact because you might drop the regular monster in 3 hits with a couple lucky criticals then flub against the minions with a series of "1"s

Mmmm... I respectfully disagree here. If the minion level is too high... you need a single 20. 5 PCs against two 21st legionaire devils is 5 rolls per round, so a 20 will come up in 3-4 rounds at most. All the time the devils do 7 or 8 damage per round. Again: A cleave hit kills both minions.
I mean using high level minions doesn't work because they are too easy. Too low on the other hand and the PCs have no reason to waste actions on them.

As for a battle against a horde of orc minions, don't be surprised if the PCs dispatch them without breaking a sweat. The scorching burst (a 3x3 square) of Skamos would easily get 4-5 of them, killing about 3 in a single roll. Then he will repeat again. The dwarf with her cleave will two a couple of minions with a single hit. The first minion that would attack Riardon will probably die...

All in all, a hell of a fun, but not worth 528 XP. I would suggest playtesting it to see how difficult it is and award XP accordingly. My estimation is about 300 XP.
Though... it would really be a fun encounter. Thumps up Jester.

Also: 10th level brute = 110 hp+con = about 130 hp. 4-6 hits? 10th level chars would deal 20-30 damage per hit?

EDIT: Now that I think of it, most monster types have 8/lvl instead of 10/lvl. Artillery and lurkers have 6. So I believe it is modeled about them.

3rd lvl soldier/Skirmisher: 32+con= about 45 hp. 8-11 per hit.
6th lvl soldier/Skirmisher: 56+con= about 70-75 hp. 12 - 18 per hit.
11th lvl: 96+con= about 115 hp. 19 - 28 per hit.
16th lvl: about 155 hp. 25 - 38 per hit.

Reasonable power increase and following those we have been told. What does this tell us?

PC: I would like my char to have an at will spell as a 6th lvl power that deals 3d6+int modifier hp of sonic damage.
DM: Hmm. That's on average 10 (from the dice) + 7 (intelligence 18 +3 from levels) = 17. It's a bit too powerful. Make it 2d6 instead of 3d6 and we have a deal.

[Lord Soth]

The scorching burst (a 3x3 square) of Skamos would easily get 4-5 of them, killing about 3 in a single roll.

Well, one would assume that a DM using nothing but Minions in a fight would know better then to bunch them all up together. Not to mention that, once the Orcs are amongst the PC's in hand-to-hand, it's going to be a whole lot harder to drop those area effect spells down on them as you'd risk catching the other PC's in the blast, too. Considering that they charge 8, the odds of them getting right up in the faces of the PC's in the very first round are pretty good. That being said, five PC's against 11 or 12 Orc Drudges looks to be pretty fun. Let's just hope Boromir doesn't get caught alone when those Orc Drudges come running in. After all, we know what happens when he tries to single-handedly fight off a horde of Minions.

[alhoon]

It's a bloodrager that kills him!

As for the scorching burst: It deals 1d6+5 damage. It is good against minions that do 5 hp/successful hit, even if it hits one of your guys as well. The 1st level PCs have 25+ hp, the minions have 1. It is a fare trade to hit the tank with 8 damage if you save him from having to deal with 4 minions.

Speaking of Boromir and drudges: Riadron can use two arrows in the same shot to kill two minions. Legolas used three.

Another note about minions: Monsters that are normal enemies, can be turned to minions in greater levels giving the feel to the PCs that they have Grown in power.
I mean, at level 1, five heroes would fight 2 orc raiders and one orc berseker.
At level 9 they may again fight orcs. But not 3 orcs. They would fight a bloodrager and an orc shaman leading dozens of orc warriors to combat. These orcs can be potrayed as orc bersekers and raiders but in effect they are in stats like the orc warrior minion. This would give the PCs the illusion that what was challenging foe before they went through X and Y adventure can now be killed with a single sword hit.

[Jester of the FoS]

I *love* the idea of minions. It's great for LotR style big battles and the like, especially if you have minions on both sides.
I am *so* looking forward to having my PCs face-off against a dozen orcs at first level.
AoE aren't as reliable because multiple hits are still needed. That's why same (or close) level minions are used, the to-hit numbers work out well. If the minion is too high you need that crazy-lucky shot while if they're too low you seldom miss.

4-6 Minion = 1 regular makes sense, simply because the average monster takes 4 to 6 hits, so it's harder to make them exact because you might drop the regular monster in 3 hits with a couple lucky criticals then flub against the minions with a series of "1"s

Mmmm... I respectfully disagree here. If the minion level is too high... you need a single 20. 5 PCs against two 21st legionaire devils is 5 rolls per round, so a 20 will come up in 3-4 rounds at most. All the time the devils do 7 or 8 damage per round. Again: A cleave hit kills both minions.
I mean using high level minions doesn't work because they are too easy. Too low on the other hand and the PCs have no reason to waste actions on them.

That's why minions should be the same level as PCs.
So they're not glass ninjas doing crazy amounts of damage until a single hit squishes them.

Of course ranged attacks and burst/blast attacks are great against minions, but there's no way to know they're minions until you drop a couple of them.
But an entire encounter of 16 minions would be scary because, while they'd be taking the same number of hits, they'd be doing 4x the damage each round.
The early review describing them as zombies works. They're easy to dispatch in small numbers, but when they swarm you're screwed.

As for a battle against a horde of orc minions, don't be surprised if the PCs dispatch them without breaking a sweat. The scorching burst (a 3x3 square) of Skamos would easily get 4-5 of them, killing about 3 in a single roll. Then he will repeat again. The dwarf with her cleave will two a couple of minions with a single hit. The first minion that would attack Riardon will probably die...

Well, they'd have an AC near 15 or so, while at most attacks at first level hover around +5, so you'd have a 50/50 chance of hitting each.

All in all, a hell of a fun, but not worth 528 XP. I would suggest playtesting it to see how difficult it is and award XP accordingly. My estimation is about 300 XP.
Though... it would really be a fun encounter. Thumps up Jester.

That's the plan.
And it really highlights the differences between 3e and 4e, starting your first adventure with an orc raid on your village and a good dozen orcs rampaging through.

[Jester of the FoS]

This caught my eye:

The pit fiend chooses to summon one of the following groups of devils:

* 8 legion devil legionnaires (level 21), or
* 2 war devils (level 22), or
* 1 war devil (level 22) and 4 legion devil legionnaires (level 21)


Perhaps an indication that a level difference is now very significant? Or maybe the war devils have some ability that makes them worth summoning over the superior numbers of legionnaires?

I guess we know how this works now...

[Lord Soth]

Riadron can use two arrows in the same shot to kill two minions. Legolas used three.

Legolas is broken!

[alhoon]

Riadron can use two arrows in the same shot to kill two minions. Legolas used three.

Legolas is broken!

Or just not 1st level.

Jester: I included the 50% chance in my take on the blast. I assumed 5-6 targets= 3 dead.

To all: OK, who will start preparing a 4th edition Ravenloft adventure for us to play with D&D insider?

[Jester of the FoS]

I was tempted to set-up a bi-weekly or monthly 'Loft game on DDI, but I want to see how flexible the system is first and how many people it can accommodate. I'd rather not have everyone dropping $15, and want to make sure I can do what I want.