Making Combats faster:
• Starting HP = Con score (no mods) and everyone has 4+Con modifier surges per day. Im not sure one could remove the entire surge concept as a whole but in theory I guess you could and just make all Leader healing per/day. Another method is to remove all in-combat healing altogether.

• Drop Monster HP by 1/4 but increase all damage their attacks do by a set amount per tier and role. Minions would do less, elites and Solos do more. Or as an easier method pick a set number for all monsters and use that (like 5/10/15 per tier).

• Drop the overall amount of resources Characters have except spellcasters. Honestly the fact that certain spells instantly end encounters is a fast way of overcoming them. Going back to more traditional roots: Druids, Clerics, and Wizards get more Dailies (no encounters) and just adjust their encounter attacks by 2 or 3 die and make them dailies. Conversely make other classes that use the Martial Power sources all use encounters but give them 1 daily that is inline with your level. Half casters, like the Paladin, can choose to either get 1 or 2 dailies at the cost of two encounter powers. It's messy but you have less decision paralysis.

• Critical hits are doubled (in addition to all the stuff they alreadd do). Make them actually dangerous instead of just some extra icing.

Rituals: allow them to be cast mid-combat but make casters spend surges to do it, again by tier. Rituals from 1-10 require 2 surges/ 11-20 require 3/ 21-30 require 4

Remove martial class exploits and allow any class to take them. Want two-weapon fighting Mr. Wizard? go ahead and grab it. Want twin strike Mr. Cleric, by all means have at it. Still, you have to have the ability score to utilize the power.

Edit:

Forgot Magical Items:
• remove the level as its really unimportant. Instead stick with the tier system.

• allow properties to stack but restrict them to 1 daily per day. If an ability is per encounter, allow it until a daily is used then it goes inert until a long rest. At-will properties stay in place. The cost of enhancing the weapon is the cost of the enhancement bonus but that's not added in.

Gnomeworks is onto something.

What if we broke tiers up more 1-3/4-6/7-10, etc, and you treated monsters of lower tiers as minions? Or maybe 2 tiers down?

AKA, if I'm 7th level, the 3rd level monster can be one punched.

Quote from: Opaopajr;887806- Drop current Initiative entirely. (Create a table of contextual group or individual modifiers if you must, but best not. Fog of War is infinitely better here in practice; waaay more drama integral to it.)

What about fixed initiative?

Maybe Level + DEX/INT mod?

Quote from: Opaopajr;887806- Change Healing Surges & Action Points into Hero Points. Hero Points are Level & Tier, so every equivalent mythic hero gets the same point pool.

Interesting. I want to ponder this more.

Quote from: Batman;887944Can someone explain to me what the fuck traditional D&D means?

Whatever edition you played when you were 12.

I like F/X, but they are a problem in play when too many arrive in one fight.

I am unsure how to fix this. We could trim down the F/X list, but then you limited options which creates its own problems.

Quote from: Batman;887990Just make them Save Ends or Until the end of your next turn. The vast majority of effects are that way anyways.

I'd go with Save Ends for Offensive F/X and Until End of Your Next Turn for Beneficial F/X.

Quote from: Doom;888130That leads to the next fix: hit points/damage could stand to be lowered as well. How much? I dunno, though I'd heard of some fixes where they were going with 50%...once again we've an issue where the problem is so widespread that just making a new game would be a wiser choice.

Morale rules end combats with foes fleeing with their remaining HP, but I would be happy to combine that with 50% HP reduction.

I'm all for glass cannon monsters. Then the big bag of HP monsters could be special and rare. Wow, this one won't go down! would then be interesting instead of the regular grind.

Quote from: Daztur;888143because having Shroedinger dragons make stating up a hexcrawl in 4ed a nightmare as you don't know what stats to use for what monsters until you know the level of the PCs fighting them so you can't stat stuff up before the campaign start.

This is true. 4e didn't sandbox easily.

Quote from: Daztur;888143As for healing surges, they're my favorite part of 4ed design bar none, just don't like the implementation. PCs get too many of them and they're too easy to refresh so it's a lot harder to get proper attrition going on.

Instead of 1/4 HP, make surges 1/2 HP and give them 1/2 the number of surges (maybe less).

Quote from: GnomeWorks;888167Or that thing where the world scales to the PCs. Because that is complete fucking bullshit.

That's existed in every edition. It's the default way most DMs have run their campaigns from the beginning. Even the TSR modules reflected this by having "level appropriate" monsters in their adventures.  

However, I agree the concept was most codified in 4e.

Quote from: Opaopajr;888201Then I would wholly encourage PCs using objects, spells, the environment, and improvising actions to what they think their mythic hero would do.

I agree. 13th Age promotes this, but the adjudication is DM hand waive. I wonder how to add mechanics to support newer DMs or whether just more anecdotes in the text would do.

Quote from: Batman;888225cool story bruh....

*sigh*

I thought this post would never end. FFS do you like to hear yourself talk. But by all means take a heaping pile of your own words.

I honestly don't give a shit what you think about 4e and me, just as much as I don't give a shit about 4e and you. Yet I am glad your following post is attempting to contribute to the original post's topic. So for that, thank you.

Quote from: Spinachcat;888254Gnomeworks is onto something.

What if we broke tiers up more 1-3/4-6/7-10, etc, and you treated monsters of lower tiers as minions? Or maybe 2 tiers down?

AKA, if I'm 7th level, the 3rd level monster can be one punched.

I commented on an equivalent beforehand, but it was "minions had hits equal to their tier."

Then, since I was worried about scaling, I added an analog of the old rule of "fighter has as many attacks as his level against creatures less than one hit die."

PCs would have as many attacks as their level against minions. By tier 4+ it seems like a lot of attacks, but higher tier minions also become more durable, too. Then you can mix and match different tiered minions, using less higher tiered ones as they can last longer. So e.g. a 19th lvl PC can have 19 attacks vs minions, but 3rd tier minions take 3 hits and 4th tier minions take four hits.

I don't know where that would eventually break in scale, but it keeps older, weaker monsters-turned-minions into more than just soap bubbles. And the attack-minions-equal-to-level speeds things along for all classes without fretting about which class gets more action economy (*cough* Twin Strike *cough*). It might even sport huge battles that come in waves that however mop up fast, a la Smash TV (which really supports that Mythic Heroes vibe).

Quote from: Spinachcat;888254What about fixed initiative?

Maybe Level + DEX/INT mod?

Nah, stat dependence supports chargen gameability whil not allowing an interesting back and forth flow of battle. Totally un-mythic in my view. There's no drama!

Easiest fix to retain some player control would be to let them burn a Hero Point at the top of the round's initiative roll to choose their PC's order in the following round. Then they can go at the top, bottom, or middle depending on their tactics (this sometimes matters greatly for healers). Yet those points should be precious, and spending them so freely for initiative... will likely catch up with them over time. Mythic heroic, but eventually costly, just like good myths trying to point out a lesson about patience.

Quote from: Spinachcat;888254Interesting. I want to ponder this more.

It's pretty well detailed by now in my previous posts.

Class Level plus Tier Level equals Hero Points.

Tier Level refreshes after every eight hour (Long) rest anywhere.

Class Level refreshes one point after each day reveling amid civilization (bedouin oases will count), recounting your glory, and spreading your heroic story.

These points fuel your hero getting away with things, or pushing himself to greater glories.

So far I have that you can spend Hero Points on:
Triggers, Skills, Saves, Initiative (new)...
maybe add Ensure Single To-Hit Attack Lands.

More ways to drain them off the better; let's people learn the difference from strategy and tactics.

Traditional D&D Cleric

Combat

1. Bloodied. Hastened Blessing. (bless spell while keeping your action).
2. Downed Ally. Salvation. (target, such as downed ally, gains 1/4 HD HP).
3. Last Stand/Sacrifice. Desperate Plea (moderate miracle, GM choice).

Explore

1. Evidence/Slip Up. Guiding Whispers. (GM handholds through trifling trouble).
2. Exposed. Mere Coincidence? (uncanny timely interventions).
3. Cornered. Seems Innocent... (who'd blame an agent of the divine?).

Social

1. Faux Pas. Patronizing the Flock. (let it slide, child, let it slide...).
2. Gross Breach. Owe a Ritual Service. (you fail - offer an institutional prayer in their name. they fail - make an example of them in your next sermon.)
3. Grave Insult. Unimpeachable Name. (you insult - call upon most high mutually respected -- and owe them a favor for backing you. they insult - call out heresy/apostasy and invoke future retribution).

Quote from: CRKrueger;887855Justin's just joking.  We all know any mother would rather die then live with the dishonor of their son running 4e.

Thank you for finding the perfect response to that.

Quote from: Daztur;887926Did you use side-based initiative? That was one of the main things that sped up combat for me in 0ed.

My experience with OD&D was LBB-only (which meant I didn't have "access" to the Chainmail initiative system). I ended up going with simultaneous action until the groups became too large for me to handle that, at which point I started using a phased sequence similar to the Perrin Conventions but still with simultaneous action.

Quote from: Batman;887944Can someone explain to me what the fuck traditional D&D means?

Start with OD&D. Move forward through the various editions. When enough shit has been changed that it feels like the fundamental gameplay has been altered, you've officially left traditional D&D.

For a very small minority that's either 1977 or 1989. For the majority of people it's either 2000 or 2008.

I tend to go with the latter: My 3E games feel like the OD&D, BECMI, and AD&D games I've played. Another good measurement is running modules across systems with a simple "goblin = goblin, giant = giant" conversion method (i.e., if the adventure says there are 8 goblins you pop open the MM for the edition you're running and use the stats you find in there). If you pick up one of the early modules (say 1977-1980 timeframe) you can run it in OD&D, AD&D, B/X, BECMI, and 3rd Edition and you'll end up with a pretty comparable experience. You run it in 4th Edition, though, and you end up with a radically different experience (and probably a horrifically sub-par one).

YMMV. (Although I can't imagine anyone honestly looking at 4E and saying, "Yup. That plays like AD&D.")

Quote from: Daztur;887922-Playing 4ed in a traditional D&D way is wrong.

Since it is published as D&D, fixing 4e to me would involve making it work when playing in a traditional D&D way (and a traditional old school D&D way, for me). That's what I expect/demand of any game calling itself a new  D&D edition which is published to replace the previous editions. But don't worry, this will be my only comment in this thread.

Daz, Opa, Spinach...

You guys could just let it go, accept that bringing a beautifully designed MMO to paper was not the best thing that ever happened and just play something else.

You'll be free, and happy, there will be butterflies...and beer.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;888282Start with OD&D. Move forward through the various editions. When enough shit has been changed that it feels like the fundamental gameplay has been altered, you've officially left traditional D&D.

For a very small minority that's either 1977 or 1989. For the majority of people it's either 2000 or 2008.

I only started with AD&D 2e in 96'. And that was a terrible experience. Jumped on at 3.0 moved to 3.5 and then onto 4e and 5e. From that perspective, seems pretty "D&D" to me. Obviously many people will have different experiences and Expectations. YMMV.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;888282I tend to go with the latter: My 3E games feel like the OD&D, BECMI, and AD&D games I've played. Another good measurement is running modules across systems with a simple "goblin = goblin, giant = giant" conversion method (i.e., if the adventure says there are 8 goblins you pop open the MM for the edition you're running and use the stats you find in there). If you pick up one of the early modules (say 1977-1980 timeframe) you can run it in OD&D, AD&D, B/X, BECMI, and 3rd Edition and you'll end up with a pretty comparable experience. You run it in 4th Edition, though, and you end up with a radically different experience (and probably a horrifically sub-par one).

Well I'm going to find out. Just got a copy of S-2 White Plume Mountain and I'm going to convert it almost verbatim using 4e-isms and see how that goes. I might add/subtract a monster here or change the level a bit from the 4e version if the level all over the place. So far from reading it, seems plausible. If it's a total train-wreck I'll have a better grasp of how to modify and change 4e's total structure to accommodate that particular style. In any sense, it'll be fun.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;888282YMMV. (Although I can't imagine anyone honestly looking at 4E and saying, "Yup. That plays like AD&D.")

I mostly don't remember my AD&D days. I recall dumb things like THAC0, racial restrictions, ability score requirements for classes, weapon speeds, turn-by-turn initiative, and spells going off where there were no monsters. In general, a clusterfuck of time spent either not knowing what I should be rolling and often dying to some save vs. magic or paralysis. So for me, 4e playing nothing like AD&D was probably a good thing.

Quote from: Batman;888312I mostly don't remember my AD&D days. I recall dumb things like THAC0, racial restrictions, ability score requirements for classes, weapon speeds, turn-by-turn initiative, and spells going off where there were no monsters.

Sounds like you remember quite a bit, you just learned nothing from it.

Quote from: Batman;888312often dying to some save vs. magic or paralysis.

Holy Christ, you poor tortured bastard...

...feel better?

Quote from: CRKrueger;888319Sounds like you remember quite a bit, you just learned nothing from it.

Actually I learned what a fucking terrible mess that game was. But please don't let me stop you from circle-jerking to the TSR gods and how "real D&D was".  

Quote from: CRKrueger;888319Holy Christ, you poor tortured bastard...

...feel better?

Now apply that same emoji to pretty much every 4e experiences you've probably had and we'll call it a day . At least I was attempting to add to the conversation. And seriously THAT'S the best you can do?! I really wonder why you waste your time?

Quote from: Batman;888321Actually I learned what a fucking terrible mess that game was. But please don't let me stop you from circle-jerking to the TSR gods and how "real D&D was".

Lemme guess, your older brother didn't let you play Batman?

Seriously though, you started with 2nd Edition, without ever seeing what came before, a hell I really wouldn't wish on anyone, especially if it was in the 2.5 Skills & Powers phase.  

Quote from: Batman;888321At least I was attempting to add to the conversation. And seriously THAT'S the best you can do?! I really wonder why you waste your time?

You were obviously so emotionally scarred by your character dying when you didn't want it to that you think bringing that up is adding to the conversation.  You kind of have to respond to that level of...yeah, whatever that was...but really that's the only reply that ever really fits in response to the "save or die" argument.  Sorry it didn't help, it was meant to be cathartic...at least for me.

Quote from: RandallS;888302Since it is published as D&D, fixing 4e to me would involve making it work when playing in a traditional D&D way (and a traditional old school D&D way, for me).

I agree...but I am more interested in 4e as a fantasy skirmish RPG hybrid, not as a D&D replacement, because my OD&D never needed replacing.

What I do need is a better done fantasy skirmish RPG hybrid for when I want to play something different than OD&D.

Not better, not replacing, just different and equally fun.  

Quote from: CRKrueger;888307You guys could just let it go, accept that bringing a beautifully designed MMO to paper was not the best thing that ever happened and just play something else.

Like Forge Conan? Or Kull the Storygamer in the Tower of Safe Spaces?

I had lots of fun with 4e, and even more fun with 4e GW, but I am very interested in how the 4e concepts could possibly be evolved.

In the future, after I get off my ass and finish my current RPG projects, I do want to launch a new 4e game that fits my vision. In the meantime, all these kinda threads have my interest because I get lots out of seeing what people liked, hated, changed, or want to change.

It's why I bought the new Conan boardgame.

Quote from: CRKrueger;888307Daz, Opa, Spinach...

You guys could just let it go, accept that bringing a beautifully designed MMO to paper was not the best thing that ever happened and just play something else.

You'll be free, and happy, there will be butterflies...and beer.

Butterflies AND beer!? Well, shit, why didn't anyone say so... :thanx:

Actually, as much as my initial thoughts on the matter were "I'll have to change too much for it to be worth the bother," Daztur's Game Statement of Purpose — Mythic Saga Heroes — and his system stripdown to a freeform chassis with surges and action points converted into epic boo-boo erasers is a really interesting seed of a 4e homebrew.

(A statement of purpose to bring an MMO to paper, however, is definitely not my idea of an interesting seed.)

It's like looking at the product from its own system conceits and then constructing setting conceits from what you consider the most choice morsels. And then rebuilding from almost scratch with your favorite iconic morsels. I mean, Daztur's efforts got down to making three of 4e's most obvious digressions (surges+action points, bloodied, & minions) into intriguing epic-mythic material. That's rather exciting from a coffee clatch brainstorm.