Quote from: Cranewings;339813I think Dungeons and Dragons / Pathfinder is just way more fun when you keep it strait.

Different strokes make a horse race, or something like that.

Well the way to fix it is to have a narative driven plot. The Princess has been kidnapped by the orcs.... The Lord of the Manor has given you until midnight tomorrow to return with the dragon's head or he will outlaw you and drive you out of the province etc etc ... They don;t have to be railroady the lord of the manor one gives the PCs plenty of opportunity to take up lives as outlaws.

I think the issue was always prevelent though in fact it was worse in older editions. In 1e when you healed at 1 hp a day without magical curing and a wizard could cast 5 spells all in by the time they were 4th level (is that right ? 3, 2? ) a room with a thing to negotiate and then a monster was about it.
This, and a general lack of clerics and surpluss of common sense, was why we moved to a hp system much like 4e and toyed with various spell point systems.

I truly hate the idea of stacking up on wands of Curing and colour spray and all that crap. Its like there is an Honest Joe's adventruress' outfitters in each village that sells magical items ...yuk!.

No simple answer if you want to avoid players that rest and regroup is to avoid dungeon delves and points of light encounter based games and go for narative driven plot based games.

Quote from: DeadUematsu;339888EDIT: Assuming that your GM is actually using the treasure guidelines (which I think is not the case), your GM should also consider varying the ELs of the adventure site. The percentages found on page 49 can serve as a useful guide on how many encounters should be easy, easy (if handled properly), challenging, hard, etc.

That all depends on what game system you're talking about. Something tells me that "Page 49" isn't an exact reference 'cause I know that HM4 and HMB have different "Page 49s"...

Quote from: Soylent Green;339889I'm not sure that really works. If the players are rational (cynical? jaded?) enough to go back to town to rest between fights, then all restocking the dungeon between rest does is provide the players with more XP opportunities.  Same for putting random encounters between the town and dungeons - it's just more XP for the players, why should they care if it gained inside or outside the dungeon?

Depends on how XP is awarded. I'm not saying "Restocking" as in adding more monsters, just the monsters changing things around. So, instead of the monsters waiting around in a barracks, or whatever, because they don't think anyone is coming in on them, they post a lookout or two and dig a new Pit Trap. All depends on the Monsters, best example is Tucker's Kobolds...

Quote from: Age of Fable;339636I've noticed a problem in my current 3.5 D&D campaign.

The party often has the choice of continuing exploration, or resting for the day.

However the choice isn't a very meaningful one, since it seems that stopping is better in every case. The only reasons not to seem to be out-of-game reasons like role-playing a reckless character, deliberately creating a challenge for yourself, or not wanting to do the 'paperwork'.

I guess this is the purpose of wandering monsters, but either 3.5 doesn't have them, or they're not common enough to make the choice meaningful.

In any case, what do you do when the party has a safe haven to fall back to, such as a town?

It primarily depends on if the "dungeon" has intelligent inhabitants, and how dangerous it is between the dungeon and town, both in the case of monsters and bandits.

My "dungeons" are not frozen in time, things will logcially prgress after the PCs leave, the power vacuum from slain monsters may be filled.  Other monsters may kill weakend ones and take their treasure.  Intelligent ones will certainly prepare for any return by the PCs and bolster their defenses, traps, fake rtreats and ambushes.  Intelligent ones will also now have some knowledge of the weaknesses of the PCs and try to exploit them.  In a world where fire and forget spells are known, intelligent monsters will try to lure PCs in, get them to burn spells on "fake" encounters, wait for the spells to expire then hit them when they are on the way back to town when they are week.  

Hence, against intelligent foes going to rest means that the next time things will be so much harder.

If the PCs do a rinse, repeat, that is, going back and forth more than once.  Bandits (or a greedy dragon in the know) in the area are likely to ambush them next time they leave the dungeon.  Since at this point they will be weak and laden with the treasure.

I'm curious...does anyone else in the group care about this problem?

Quote from: DeadUematsu;339970I'm curious...does anyone else in the group care about this problem?

In Baldur's Gate 1 for the PC, which is the most 2E game I've ever seen, my party led by a wizard took about four times as long as the paladin's party to get anything done.

They leveled a touch faster because of all the random nighttime encounters, but, it just seemed to make sense.

Quote from: Xanther;339912It primarily depends on if the "dungeon" has intelligent inhabitants, and how dangerous it is between the dungeon and town, both in the case of monsters and bandits.

My "dungeons" are not frozen in time, things will logcially prgress after the PCs leave, the power vacuum from slain monsters may be filled.  Other monsters may kill weakend ones and take their treasure.  Intelligent ones will certainly prepare for any return by the PCs and bolster their defenses, traps, fake rtreats and ambushes.  Intelligent ones will also now have some knowledge of the weaknesses of the PCs and try to exploit them.  In a world where fire and forget spells are known, intelligent monsters will try to lure PCs in, get them to burn spells on "fake" encounters, wait for the spells to expire then hit them when they are on the way back to town when they are week.  

Hence, against intelligent foes going to rest means that the next time things will be so much harder.

If the PCs do a rinse, repeat, that is, going back and forth more than once.  Bandits (or a greedy dragon in the know) in the area are likely to ambush them next time they leave the dungeon.  Since at this point they will be weak and laden with the treasure.

Never been a problem.
I didn't answer this at first as it seemed to be system-specific, and I do my own thing.

But much of the logic of the system was bent around time management, such as spellpoint reclamation rules, longitudinal spell effects (the small buffs and such that last hours).  Lower level healing spells have can only be cast a few times a week on people before they lose effectiveness.  And there are no 'magic' shops...it's hard to make magic items...

So all of the above makes my PCs want to get a breather every chance they can.  But I guess I have done the same thing others have mentioned and that Xanther describes so well.  The element of surprise is critical for my PCs.  All three groups are scared to death about losing that, because of past history.  

15-minute day?  Christmas, my newer live group (in their second itereation)has mananged to play through 11 days in 28 sessions.

Quote from: Cranewings;339973In Baldur's Gate 1 for the PC, which is the most 2E game I've ever seen, my party led by a wizard took about four times as long as the paladin's party to get anything done.

They leveled a touch faster because of all the random nighttime encounters, but, it just seemed to make sense.

What?

My question was directed to AoF.

Quote from: Soylent Green;339889I don't know, but perhaps the solution is tinkering with how XP is awarded. So maybe the first combat encounter of the day is worth 1/4 of the notional XP value, the second fight 1/2, the third the correct XP value and any further fight is worth 1.5 the normal XP. That would give cynical players a reason to press on rather resting after ever little scrap.

I have thought about exactly this sort of system, though not quite as steep at the beginning - 50% penalty, normal, normal, 25% bonus, 50% bonus is what I had thought about. And I would press on, so I guess I am a more cynical player than I thought.

Quote from: DeadUematsu;339970I'm curious...does anyone else in the group care about this problem?

I don't know. I'm going to a barbeque with the DM on the weekend. I think he wants to talk about how the campaign's going. This struck me as the main problem, but I wanted to have a solution before I raised it.

Incidentally, in Original and Basic D&D you get most of your XP from treasure, and wandering monsters have far less treasure than 'lairs'. So wandering monsters are almost entirely something to be avoided. I wonder if the change to XP mostly coming from combat, while it makes more sense, is the root of the problem?

Quote from: Age of Fable;340003I don't know. I'm going to a barbeque with the DM on the weekend. I think he wants to talk about how the campaign's going. This struck me as the main problem, but I wanted to have a solution before I raised it.

Incidentally, in Original and Basic D&D you get most of your XP from treasure, and wandering monsters have far less treasure than 'lairs'. So wandering monsters are almost entirely something to be avoided. I wonder if the change to XP mostly coming from combat, while it makes more sense, is the root of the problem?

Interesting observation, although treasure it perhaps a little too narrow, it you perhaps should also have XP for achieving other goals too , but not just grinding on monsters.

I've certainly gained a lot of respect reward systems in the past year. It wasn't that long ago I used to think good roleplaying was reward in itself and that a GM should not need rely on XP "bribes" to keep the players interested. But, especially after my recent Marvel Super Hero game I've come to view the reward system as a very important and subtle aspect of a game. The different ways XP is awarded does influence how the players approach the game.

Well, if they feel like going for short jaunts, and then heading back to a "safe haven", that's something that can make sense. Of course, if they leave the dungeon overnight, in the morning things might be different there; you might have some new monsters coming in, or other forces (cultists, evil adventurers?) taking advantage of the early work the PCs had done.

If they're resting too often in the dungeon itself, then you want to have them face Wandering Monsters regularly.

RPGPundit

Yea, that's another one of my favorite tricks to pull. If the party stays away too long from the dungeon then I've been known to have a NPC party, who are all slightly less experienced, to go in and loot stuff after the PCs have taken out the really dangerous guardians.

Quote from: Age of Fable;340003Incidentally, in Original and Basic D&D you get most of your XP from treasure, and wandering monsters have far less treasure than 'lairs'. So wandering monsters are almost entirely something to be avoided. I wonder if the change to XP mostly coming from combat, while it makes more sense, is the root of the problem?

While it may not be the root of the problem, it is part of the problem.

Originally, 80-90% of a PC's XP came from non-combat activities (getting treasure). This meant the best way to gain experience was to get treasure with as little risk to your party as possible. Combats were risky an tended to inhibit your ability to go on and get more treasure so you either tried to get treasure without fighting or at least by setting things up so your side had as much advantage as possible before fighting. Pressing on for more treasure while wounded did not seem illogical as you could get treasure and its XP without a fight if you put your mind to it.

When the rules changed to where fighting monsters was the way characters earned most of their experience, combat ceased to be optional as fighting things was the best way to get XP. This changed the tone of the game a lot, IMHO.  If combat is the main way to get XP, avoiding it is silly -- and pressing on while wounded isn't very productive as being wounded makes it much harder to get more XP and remain alive to enjoy it.