Re: Review: 4th Ed

On 12 Jun 2008 01:51:30 GMT, Seebs <usenet-nospam@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 2008-06-12, Kyle Wilson <kyle@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 12 Jun 2008 01:07:40 GMT, Seebs <usenet-nospam@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The movement system's just approximate. If you actually MEASURE it, it's
about 141 feet. Give or take.

That can't be, because the time to walk there and the distance for a
bow shot both correspond to 100 feet.

No they don't! It just looks that way because of the fog of war. The
actual range of a bow is pretty approximate.

By a factor of 1 1/2? I'd think that most bowmen would notice a real
difference between 100 feet and 150 feet.

The interesting thing is that I tend to use a ruler or tape measure
for longer battle grid distances in 3.5. It looks like you can't do
that in 4e, because depending on the angle from the grid, the distance
will be seriously off (or are you suggesting that the range to your
target depends on how you measure it?).

Of course it does!

It's a GAME.

Squares are just an approximation we use to make it easier to count.

The under 10% differences that 3.5e approximations created were
something I could accept. The nearly 50% difference that 4e creates I
can't get used to.

3.5e gave anywhere from -20% to +40%, depending on how accurately you counted
and how often you forgot whether you were on an even square or an odd square.
:)

A shot on the diagonal is 1.4 times further if measured with a ruler
than counted out. If you allow this then running away on the diagonal
is either brilliant or stupid depending on which distance is measured
how. Maybe I'll eventually get used to it, but so far it really
bothers me.

So just use a ruler.

I almost certainly will (and the various bursts are likely to become
spherical again as well). The thing is that you can't mix the two
without really mangling things.

As far as I've been able to determine, in 4e by the RAW, the distance
across the diagonal of a square room (measured by walking, shooting or
generating a magical effect) is the same as the length of one of its
walls. I'm not sure where or when you cut over to the 1.5 (or 1.414
if you're picky) factor, but for all game mechanical effects it
appears that rooms that seem square are mechanically circular. This
is intended to avoid making folks count 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2 as they move.

Exactly. It's just an approximation.

I also would expect that bursts must be visibly cubic in the game as
they very clearly are bounded by lines not curves. A 4e burst that is
the equivalent to a 3.5e fireball is very different in shape and
effect from a spherical burst. Again, the in-game difference should
be highly visible to the inhabitants (unless the whole realm is warped
that way and rulers change length as you rotate them).

No, it's spheres. It's just that it's not worth our time to fix up the
details for the exact radius of a sphere when mapping.

Hmm. Let me see if I can explain this another way.

You're assuming that the measurements are precise, and therefore, either
the world is warped or the measurements are wrong. I'm saying the
measurements are pretty much imprecise, so while it's true that they're
sometimes wrong, we don't care because they're good enough to play a game.

Given that I can maneuver my guys (or the bad guys as I usually am
DMing) precisely so that they get range advantages or are exactly
spaced to avoid fireball, it really mucks with my sense of proportion
that distances are off by around 150% at times. If a player standing
15 feet from the edge of the firecube had to roll a save (say at an
advantageous target) because the fog of war makes things imprecise
then I might buy it.

On the other hand, the easiest way to have structured the rules then
(if factors of 1 1/2 aren't relevant) would have been to borrow from
old naval miniature rules and prohibit counting or measuring and have
everyone eyeball it. This would certainly speed things up...DM says
'that looks like about ten inches, roll it' and you do it...also means
that you can totally eliminate the grid (and the minis in many cases).

Now that I've gone down this path, I think that something like this
might actually be interesting. Accept that everything has a very
large fog of war factor and the DM eyeballs all effects and applies
them as appropriate. It also avoids the exact spacing games to make
sure that the whole group can't be hit by a firecube or that the
archers get the best range increment.
--

Kyle Wilson
email: kylewilson@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Review: 4th Ed
    ... bow shot both correspond to 100 feet. ... and how often you forgot whether you were on an even square or an odd square. ... You're assuming that the measurements are precise, and therefore, either ...
    (rec.games.frp.dnd)
  • Re: Initial Digit In Random Numbers
    ... areas had the same distribution whether they are measured in square ... Each initial digit is equally likely. ... Measured in feet the answers would be 0 to 33 feet. ... This is true of scaled measurements, because by making the scale small enough we can make the upper limit unbounded. ...
    (sci.math)
  • Re: Variance var(X)
    ... >Suppose that the variance of your heights, when measured in feet, is ... The units of variance are the square of the units of measurement. ... the measurements were in feet and the variance is 9 that's 9 square ...
    (sci.math)
  • Movement on large scale battlefields
    ... For a large scale battle I want to use a grid with squares equalling ... increasing the scale from the default of 5 feet per square ...
    (rec.games.frp.dnd)
  • Re: Movement on large scale battlefields
    ... increasing the scale from the default of 5 feet per square ... grid is clear-cut. ... from one round to the next. ...
    (rec.games.frp.dnd)
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