So while action points and healing surges are cool, I think they can be under utilized. I’m a huge fan of healing surges and think they make an interesting economy in the game. They are a requirement for recharging some magical items and I’ve liked that idea of using a PC’s vitality to enhance their power, so why not expand on that? Likewise, action points are cool but you can only use them once per encounter. Granted the bonus standard action is pretty huge, but only comes into play if you are going though several encounters in the game day.

A while back I talked about limiting choices of powers in my next 4E game. One downside of this is the limit of damage output players have. So to work on this I really wanted to be sure players could count on the limited encounter powers they have. Also, I wanted a way to get more powers that could inflict higher damage. So I’ve been thinking about the following changes.

Action points – Players have two options for action points:
A) Spend an action point can allow the player to do another standard action (as per rules)
B) Spend an action point to grant a +4 bonus to any roll. This can be done after the roll is made.

Players start with 2 action points at the beginning of each extended rest. They can spend multiple action points during an encounter, but can only take the additional action option once.

Healing surges
– Players may spend a healing surge to add one more damage die to at-will, basic, or trained basic attacks. This can be used after a successful to-hit die roll is made (but before any damage die rolls are made).
– If players activate an encounter power and it fails to hit, they may use a healing surge to recharge that power.
– Healing surges can also be spent to re-roll any single die roll. The second roll must be accepted as the result.

This is likely going to allow my players to really crank out the damage. However I want to encourage my players to use healing surges. Not to mention, those 2-3 healing surges they lose in an initial fight leading up to the big boss now have more impact. Players now have to weigh their options when using healing surges. Do they use the surges to keep on their feet, or use them to crank up the damage on an attack? I also want action points to allow the player to do big things. +4 is a huge bonus, but I want players to be able to pull out a huge attack, or pull out of that critical death save if needed. So I am making those action point bonuses go big or go home.

Taken as a whole with some of my other changes, I’m hoping it adds some spice to my 4E game and makes for some more engaging choices for the PCs.

One thing that crept into my game was analysis paralysis. My players got to late heroic tier and things began to shut down in combat. They had this huge pile of cards and all these options to go through, with magic items thrown in to boot. It became a little unmanageable.

My feeling with 4E was the cool bit about being able to do lots of different things, also became it’s fault. I think level 3 is the golden level for 4E (possibly level 5). At that point players have 2-3 options of encounter powers and dailies, with a few choices of repeatable standard attacks (at-wills and basic attacks). As they level up, this just starts adding on. You get more and more options, and all those choices seem to gum up the thought process for players. They just have so many choices and feel that pressure of wanting to do the most optimal action possible during their turn. So I began to think about power expansion differently.

Instead of adding more and more, why not reach a set amount of powers and abilities and cap it? As players level up, instead of gaining more options they swap out powers and upgrade the ones they currently have. The emphasis of having more options begins to lean towards fine tuning and improving the powers and abilities they have. With that in mind, there are a few other things to tackle too.

One magic item with a power/tier – For my next game I am leaning more towards the magic items that give static bonuses, over an optional power. While it’s cool to have that +1 acid sword that has a daily ranged attack, having another 3 items that also have daily/encounter powers just layers on the stuff players have to go through in their decision process. This can seriously add to analysis paralysis of the PC. If anything, I’ll add more consumables and one-shot items. Dark Sun introduced the idea of static enhancement bonuses for players without using magic items, and that is something I am also seriously considering. Another option would be to bump up the items they have making that +1 dagger slowly morph into a +3 dagger with +2 fort vs. poison.

Cap the number of powers – Players will have a limited selection of standard powers as they progress. At most from the advancement table, they can have 1 At-Will, 2 Encounter, 2 Daily, and 1 Utility in-combat utility power. Players may gain additional utility powers as described, but their use must have some out of combat effect. This is highly subjective, with the final interpretation of a utility power being decided by the DM. All bonus powers from class or race are not subject to this limitation (ex. Channel Divinity, Wizard Cantrips, Elven Accuracy).

Last time I was talking about using a trained attack in place of your out-of-the-book basic attack as an option for players. At face value, it’s really just a glorified at-will attack. Mechanically, it’s no different from having a 2nd at-will power, but it’s a subtle shift from an additional power to becoming a fall-back regular attack. Rather than having another card in front of the player, it’s on the character sheet and emphasizes that point of when in doubt use this attack. It’ll never be a horrible choice for a player to use the trained basic attack as it’s geared towards their ability scores as an optimized attack.

Some classes are going to come out ahead with power choices. Your wizard and cleric are going to have more options than your fighter. But at the core of it, even the classes with limited choices should still have situational options. They just won’t have a laundry list that’s what is in the game now.

Allow for more retraining each level – At each level, players can retrain up to 3 powers. In addition they can retrain 1 feat. This is key to limiting powers. Each level you have to allow the player to get cooler toys. While they may not be able to add more to what they have, they can at least pick up powers and abilities to create interesting combinations and improve on the attacks they make.

Limited choices break down – This is far from perfect. Utility powers become a huge issue. Some classes get situational skill bonuses that transform into static bonuses. Some classes have utility powers that can only be used in combat. It’s just the way to the cookie crumbles. By the book, at level 10 players have 3 utility powers tacked on to all the other powers they have. Utility powers make a good target for power pruning.

Psionic classes just don’t work with this. This cap power limit is doable with your core classes, but psionic augmentation powers just break down. If anything, possibly the number of power points might be reduced. I don’t play with psionics for my game, so not too worked up over this. Multiclassing and hybrid classes might need a little more tweaking too, however my players never really explored those options.

It’s a huge game change, but I’m liking it. I think the focus shift from more powers to better powers will work out. It’s far from perfect, utility powers especially, but having a cap on the powers players gain through advancement will likely allow them to have more focus, while still retaining a few options, and hopefully curb that analysis paralysis.

I’m still throwing the idea around of at least doing a one-shot of 4E once in a while. Maybe do another campaign if I can get some interested in giving it a go. So far they’ve been enjoying another setting and another game. One thing that I want to do is bring back the idea of using a basic attack or at the very least have it in place of an at-will.

Face it, a lot of at-will attacks have that generic option of a single target attack that simply uses a high ability score aligned with a certain class. As I mentioned way back in an old post, there is even a PHB2 feat that does something similar. So why not make a go of it and go full out? I think this actually might open up some classes to being able to focus on other abilities and not lag too behind other builds. Now I could have that CON-based fighter which could still be able to reliably roll out the basic attack damage. So here are my thoughts for a different basic attack-like ability.

All players at level 1 gain a trained basic attack. The player must select one option for this power at character generation, and cannot be re-trained.

A) The player picks a weapon group they are proficient with (ex. axes, bows, light blades, etc.). The player can use one ability score of their choice to be applied to that weapon group. If this ability replaces the default strength (melee) or dexterity/strength (ranged/heavy thrown) modifiers for that weapon, then the chosen ability score bonus is applied to both to hit and damage rolls. The power retains the martial keyword and weapon keyword. At 21st level, the power gains [2W] damage (plus appropriate bonuses).

B) The player gains a ranged basic attack that can target 1 creature. The power has a range and damage equivalent to a level 1 At-Will power of choice from their class. The power gains a damage keyword equivalent to the power source of the class (i.e. arcane, divine, primal, etc.) and the implement keyword. The power gains a bonus to hit and damage rolls based on an ability score of choice. At 21st level, the power gains one additional damage die, plus the appropriate bonuses (example, if the trained basic attack power does 1d8 + modifiers, at 21st level it will to 2d8 + modifiers).

Regular basic attacks are still in the game, but the player can have this listed first as their bread-and-butter attack. It’s the go to attack when they aren’t sure to pull out an encounter or daily power. A fall back choice for an attack and be comforted that they aren’t crippling themselves. I’ll have to tweak this some more, but looking forward to trying this in game.

So the gang is back together after an extended holiday and we’re discussing what to play next for our campaign. 4E is something still being considered. Think running with Savage Worlds will be the most popular choice, but 4E is still on the table. At the very least, it might be an occasional break from our regular game as a one-shot once in a while.

I’ve got some plans however to do some serious tweaking to the game. I’ve been thinking of some things to do for streamlining combat and speeding things up. I plan on still having a map, but throw out the grid. Also considering on really altering the number of powers players have in play and thinking of tinkering with the whole magic item power bit. More on that later.

One thing for certain, I want to get rid of the minor temporary bonuses that float around in the game. I want something with bigger effects. Static bonuses aren’t much of an issue, but all those little +1 bonuses seem rather fiddly. I’m thinking of a couple of options.

Make it all +2 – Not a groundbreaking change, but I’m liking the idea of making each bonus or penalty a +/- 2 and rounding things up. So that combat advantage with some temporary power boost might translate into a larger bonus to hit. That’s okay with me. I want the PCs to make those big rolls, the monsters are going to get the same thing.

Advantage/Disadvantage – The other idea I’ve had is using the advantage mechanic from DnDnext. Basically use simple color markers to indicate either a bonus or penalty to hitting a target. The marker with the highest total would grant either a disadvantage or an advantage.

This will likely make for some very chaotic combats, and I entirely expect my players to pummel the stuff I throw at them. However this might also put some hurt on them (given the proper circumstances), as I’ve just been able to double the chances of me critting my players. This might just make combats too wild and unpredictable, but of the two options I am leaning towards this more.

It’ll take a bit of playtesting. Fortunately I’ve got a patient group while I pull out the crazy houserule stuff. Honestly they haven’t been too keen on doing another fantasy campaign, but I might be able to get a one shot session in sometime. Certainly looking forward to trying this idea out.

For my game I wanted to try and have a pitched battle and struggled a bit to think about how I could run something like that on the tabletop. Some ideas were a combination of a skill challenge in tandem with a few fights. Successful (or failed) rounds for the skill challenge would result in advantages (or disadvantages) in the following fights of the battle. Although it still was a bit longer than I wanted, and I didn’t want to get bogged down in a massive combat with tons of participants on each side.

A long while back I touched on handling fights through an abstract way. Another past post of mine looked at randomizing attacks of opportunity. So looking at these ideas I whipped up some quick and dirty rules how I would handle a mass combat.

Players fight the leaders – Recreating a massive battle where players hacked through nameless throngs of minions would be boring. I wanted the PCs trading blows with the main villain as something heroic. The goal was simple, either they kill the lead baddies, or end up worm food themselves, or potentially so beaten and battered they surrendered and end up as captives.

In my game I had the players fighting against a wizard that had a huge golem in toe. These guys were the big threat. If the group took them out, the remaining forces would likely break and run. I think that is key to having this kind of engagement. Don’t just throw bodies at the players, give them a few personalities on the field. Maybe a general and a few commanders scattered about. If the players drop enough of them, morale for the opposing army will wane and eventually make them rout.

All sides suffer attacks of opportunity – I figured out the appropriate bonus for attack and typical minion damage for the player’s level and used this as a battle attack of opportunity. Then each turn, including for the villain NPC’s I employed the following rules:

1. At the beginning of the turn, they provoked a battle attack of opportunity.
2. If the players (or creatures) moved up to ½ their speed, each square of movement, ignoring shifts, would provoke a battle attack of opportunity on a 1 in 8 (using a d8).
3. If they moved greater than ½ their speed, they provoke a battle attack of opportunity for each square of movement on a 1 in 4 (using a d4).
4. Players make their move as normal, and then the battle attacks of opportunity are resolved.

All sides can suffer combat advantage – At the end of their turn players (or monsters) may be in a poor tactical position. On a 1 in 4 all opponents have combat advantage against them. If they moved less than half their speed (including shifts), they suffer combat advantage on a 1 in 8. Players offer combat advantage until the beginning of their turn.

Narration, Narration, Narration – The most important part of the fight is describing the scene. Players are going to see very few tokens and monsters on the map. Effectively, they are going to pair off against a handful of monsters at most representing the main villains and command elements of the enemy army. However it’s important to stress that there are others all around them. Every one of them are in a pitched battle, parrying attacks and making several attacks themselves, but all of these actions are never rolled.

It’s important to paint a picture that the players have fellow soldiers flanking them, and if they are lucky, find their opponents distracted by unnamed foot soldier giving them an opportunity to effectively land a powerful attack. Be graphic and try to paint a scene. If a player runs across the battlefield to engage an orc commander, quickly count the squares, roll all the dice and describe the action.

If a player gets suffers a few attacks and takes a bit of damage, describing how a brutish orc hurled a spear at them, catching them in the side as they bolted across the ground to face the orc leader, is engaging. Just telling the player they opened up three attacks of opportunity, with two hitting for 12 points of damage just doesn’t cut it. Frequently remind the players they are darting and weaving, parrying attacks and aiding fellow comrades, even if there is nothing on the map to show these other participants in the battle.

What comes out of this is that players are under constant threat of attack. It’s assumed that surrounding them are allies and enemies alike. If they are moving slowly, they maintain some form of rank with allies and suffer less attacks of opportunity. If they break ranks and whirl around the battlefield, they have less companions watching their back.

Finally, throughout the battle they could be dodging missile fire, or having their attention split among several attackers. The greater the movement their turn, the more likely they will allow opponents to have combat advantage against them. If they stand firm, or move little during their turn, it’s less likely that someone can flank them.

For my group it worked well. Constantly having an attack against them, right at the start of their turn, having the potential of offering combat advantage, all the while trying to take out the main villains made for an exciting fight. It takes a lot of handwaving and describing the action, but in the end I think my players had a memorable fight of a large battle that worked using a few additional rules and a lot of narrative action.

A common complaint about 4E is the length of fights. There are a lot of suggestions to curb combat length, but something I often see neglected is the variation in damage that PCs do. To me it has always been an odd mechanic that how well you hit has no effect on the damage inflicted. You can just barely hit a creature and max out damage, or get a solid hit (just below a critical) and flub your damage roll with a 1.

How minions deal damage has a nifty idea there. Minions do a steady amount of damage per hit. No die rolling. Perfect for the 1 hit creatures they are, but that concept of a steady state of damage output with less overhead in running them has some appeal when streamlining combats.

Another game comes to mind where damage output was less random is Star Fleet Battles. This was a tactical space combat game set in the Star Trek universe that first came out in the late 70s and hit its stride in the early 80s. What was interesting about the game was that many weapon systems had a flat damage rate, it just depended on whether you hit based on a D6 roll. Other systems (like phasers) had effectively no ‘to hit’ roll at all, they just did a random amount of damage. However the closer you were the less random the damage output was, effectively shifting a damage roll from 1-4 at long distance to 5-6 at broadside range.

What I particularly liked was that certain ranges had a sweet spot where the variation in damage output was minimized, and got better as you closed the distance. It was very predictable. Risky long range shots sniping at a target across the map was exactly that, risky and did little damage. Closer in, you could predict how much damage you could inflict (and take yourself). The game came down to pre-planning moves, maneuvering, and efficient energy allocation.

So with D&D I found it odd there is this huge disconnect with damage and to hit rolls. They are completely independant from each other. On top of that a series of rolls is needed with each effective strike. It’s a lot of manhandling of dice and steps to resolve combat. So why not consider dropping the idea of random damage altogether if fights are dragging?

Write down 4 typical damage rolls beforehand – Take the normal die roll a player would make and replace it with an average damage, or a simple mean of the potential die outcomes. Additionally make a limited damage value being 25% of the potential damage from the same die, and an improved damage value calculated as 75% of the potential damage. Don’t forget to include the max damage roll from critical hits too.

With those 4 values, add the bonuses to damage due to feats, enhancements, ability scores, etc. and you’ve got a simple list of damage numbers a PC does with each attack. If extra bonuses come in from other player’s powers they can quickly add it to those totals.

Average damage is the default – Any powers or abilities that do multiple weapon hits are just multiplied by this number, just follow up and add the various bonuses to damage from feats, etc. This is the bread and butter output from attacks.

Critical hits work as before – Roll a 20 and you max out damage. Nothing changes.

Limited Damage on an even hit – If a player scores a hit roll that evenly matchs a creature’s defense, he uses the limited damage value. Just a little variation to the damage. You barely get a hit and in turn do less than average damage.

Improved Damage at one less from a critical hit – Typically on a 19 (but may be different for some characters that can expand the range of successful critical hits), but this is a hit that would do a bit more damage from normal yet still not quite the max damage from a natural 20.

With a little prep time, the players have their turn streamlined a little. Additionally, there is a small amount of variation in their damage output. The big, and less than optimal, hits are there. More importantly, they are tied to how well you roll to hit. Also, different damage output is tied to some simple conditions (i.e. score an even hit roll with a monster’s defense and you do less damage). If anything, I think this could work out well on the DM side of the screen for handling monster damage.

I’ve yet to to try this out with my group. I expect most players will balk at the idea of dropping an opportunity to roll a damage die. I think most will still want to roll that 1D12 rather than agreeing to constantly hit at 6 damage (plus all the bonuses). Still, if combats are dragging this might be something for groups to explore.

Having my campaign filled with new players, I will admit that sometimes options can be a little daunting during their combat turn. Between the at wills, encounter powers, and class abilities, it can be a bit of information to process when they step up to the melee plate. There is this general idea among the group that each player should try to maximize their actions during their turn. Sometimes they pull off coordinated maneuvers getting a lot of synergy from their respective abilities which is really cool. But sometimes, things can slow down as they are unsure what would be the best course of action.

That’s when I pipe in, ‘Just make a basic attack.’

At will powers seem to be the bread an butter for most player combat attacks. They should be. They are often focused on key ability scores that translate into substantial bonuses for damage and to hit rolls. However at times I do find that they can curb options for players, where basic attacks open up a more free form of potential actions. Can’t quite make the distance to get into melee? Charge in and just make a basic attack. Still a bit too far even with a double move and all your powers are melee attacks? Throw that hand axe and make a basic attack. I tend to see new players so focused on their powers, they begin to ignore the option of just using the lowly basic attack.

Movement effects are optional – There is something a lot of new players forget about with powers that have movement effects, you can ignore them completely (PHB pg. 57). I’ve had players get into an optimal tactical situation and fret a little about using some power which employs a shift, or some other forced movement. That movement is completely optional. So if a player wants to just crank out the hurt and not bother dancing around, remind them that all that forced movement on a power means they can do it if they want to, and not that they are forced to.

Weapon proficiency is your friend – Making attacks using key ability score powers helps tons in getting past a monster’s defence. However weapon proficiency bonuses are worth noting too. At times I’ve found my ranged-heavy PCs cornered or surrounded, so that making ranged attacks is difficult. I try to remind them of that option of making a basic attack with a melee weapon. While it may not be the most optimal attack, they do get some form of a bonus to their to hit rolls.

Melee Training feat – There is a little gem of a heroic feat locked away in the PHB2 (pg. 187). Melee training allows a player to select any ability score other than strength with melee weapons they are proficient with. For melee basic attacks, they get a full bonus for that ability score with to hit rolls and ½ the ability score for damage (been hit with errata). Now non-strength characters have another option in place of other powers. That wizard might not be to hesitant to hit something with their staff if backed into a corner knowing they can use their intelligence modifier as a bonus (and don’t forget the weapon proficiency bonus to boot).

I am seriously considering giving this feat away as a freebie my next campaign, but just limit it to one proficient weapon type of their choice. I might even consider keeping this limitation in and house rule a similar feat for ranged weapons also.

Heavy thrown weapons – Fortunately there are weapon types that give a little flexibility for ranged attacks using strength instead of dexterity. Suggest that fighter to think about picking up a javelin or a throwing hammer. It gives them just a little bit of tactical flexibility if their mobility is hindered during a fight, and still allow them to make some kind of attack.

I’ve found once I started suggesting making basic attacks as an option, my players have begun to think beyond the stack of cards in front of them. The ranged rogue in the group has picked up an enchanted sword as a backup weapon. The warlord now opens up combat hurling a javelin before making a charge into the fray. I’m getting players doing bull rushes, kicking over braziers, throwing chairs, making all sorts of improvised attacks. Even the group sorcerer has stepped up and hacked away at a lowly minion with their dagger, rather than sacrifice a move action to get some distance for a ranged attack.

So I implore DMs out there if your players get locked into turn indecision, encourage that basic attack. Push PCs into realizing there are other things they can do in fights outside that list of powers. More importantly, those options are not horrible actions for PCs to take. After some time don’t be surprised if your players start coming up with some creative attacks and trying to use the environment in fights too.