The question of numerical representation and randomness is one that is deeply embedded in gaming. Gary Gygax worked for an insurance company before writing D&D, reviewing actuarial tables and that sense of both the need to calculate an individual's relevant statistics and a sense of the chance of random occurrence are easily visible from the first RPG to the present day.
And D&D has often been the worst. Sometimes, it's just a weird way in which they choose to represent the math. The THAC0 tables from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons are the butt of many jokes, but they're just a pivot table away from being the same as base attack bonus. Sometimes, it's a lot of fiddly bonuses that when put together allow a distinct unbalancing.
This became very bad indeed in the 3.X versions of the game. The perceived need for continuous improvement and potential advantage made it so that the optimizing of characters left a significant gulf between the specialist and the non-specialist. Additionally, the continuous improvement meant that encounter levels were drastically important to design because encounters much above the party's level were impossible in the best circumstances and encounters much below the party's level were laughable. There even developed folklore around the issue "There's a 20 on every die" indicates the common 5% chance of success in a task for which a character is not optimized.
D&D5 has a much smaller window of proficiency. The least competent character at a given task will have at worst a -1(level 1 character, no proficiency, ability score of 8). The most competent character will have at best a +17 for a skill(expertise multiplier of +6 proficiency bonus, ability score of 20) or +11 for an attack (max +6 proficiency, max 20 ability). An Ooze has an AC of 8 An Adult Red Dragon has an AC of 19. So, even the least competent character with an unfamiliar weapon can hit the most intimidating monster with enough luck. Most first level characters will have at least a +2 to hit using the weapon in their starting equipment. Which gives a 15 percent chance to hit that Red Dragon. But there's a chance for even the most competent character has only a 60 percent chance of hitting with a specific attack against an adult red dragon(probably more, given the possibility of a magic weapon, but assuming they max out at +5, even then, there's only an 85 percent chance).
This has a lot of possible implications for running D&D5. In the past, I've run into encounter design issues based on scalability. An encounter that is challenging to the skill of one character is impossible for any other. At the other end of the scale, once characters reach a certain level, earlier challenges simply do not register on their radar. With the narrowed proficiency window, encounters are more challenging and doable at the same time.
Finally, the lack of higher math necessary to calculate bonuses and penalties for a given attack mean things will run more smoothly. I've seen people resort to using makeshift spreadsheets to calculate their attacks in Pathfinder. The 10-15 seconds of calculation really add up in game time, so losing that is in my mind a good thing.
Overall, we'll see, but at the very least, I can see where they were going with this and hopefully the design intention will show through.
I'm a big fan of bounded accuracy as a concept because I've never liked the way earlier monsters just become obsolete as the PCs move up the power tree, but I wonder if they've dealt with the biggest problem that can result from it--massed archers. If anyone has a chance to hit anything, then the best way for the PCs to deal with a powerful enemy is for them to hire all the local peasants, form a mob, and point them at the enemy. Get 150 archers and that's 15 arrows hitting the adult red dragon per round.
ReplyDeleteAre there any mechanics to mitigate this, or is it left up to GM adjudication?
Well for the Red dragon it's in the form of the range of frightful presence exceeding the range increment of the heavy crossbow and a 60 ft. cone of fire to deal with the statistically remaining 15 archers that make their DC 19 wisdom save.
ReplyDeleteBut it's a GM's call to a certain extent as to how to deal specifically with such issues.
Ooh, right. Dragonfear would still make wandering murderhobos the logical answer for dragons, and similar mechanics probably work for powerful undead or anything else with any kind of morale-sapping powers. It does make Against the Giants a bit less likely, though.
DeleteOn the other hand, I've read enough about the Self-Replicating Shadow Apocalypse or various other creatures that the average D&D peasant is utterly powerless against that giving a reason why civilization exists at all that isn't "because powerful wizards" is all to the good.
But it's a GM's call to a certain extent as to how to deal specifically with such issues.
Yeah. " 'You want us to do what?' " or "I get it, guys, but this is Dungeons & Dragons, not Generals & Grunts" are worthwhile too. To some extent, the game relies on people buying into the idea of heavily-armed wandering heroes fighting monsters on the border of civilization and not inquiring too much into the conditions that allow that kind of thing.
The flipside for me is that I think that the idea of recruiting peasants to fight a great evil is perfectly reasonable within the context of many fantasy stories. The PCs as heroic intermediaries can make for good story.
DeleteAnd I personally think that the idea of wandering heroes fighting monsters at the border of civilization comes directly from narratives like Gilgamesh and Jason and the Argonauts, fantasy stories from which D&D draws its inspirations.
I've always described it to people as "the Wild West with swords" when I need a quick capsule summary.
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