See previous posts for the details.
- The Evolution of the Fighter - Part 1: OD&D
- The Evolution of the Fighter - Part 2: BD&D
- The Evolution of the Fighter - Part 3: AD&D1
- The Evolution of the Fighter - Part 4: AD&D2
- The Evolution of the Fighter - Part 5: D&D 3e
- The Evolution of the Fighter - Part 6: D&D 4e
Your example used goblin minions, but minions are specifically designed to be mowed down. Had you used a non-minion goblin in your example, the results would have been vastly different. Minions are also not designed to go 1-on-1; they are there to add more bodies to an encounter. 4 or 5 minions per wave would seem like a better comparison.
Just a thought – but I don’t agree that the goblin minion is an appropriate “apples to apples” comparison with previous editions. A minion is meant to represent 1/4 the challenge of a normal creature, and when this is taken into account, your “jumped the shark” peak of 23.4 is reduced to 5.9 – a drop to pre-3E levels and still less than 2E.
If you replace the goblin minion with a goblin warrior – the Fighter will last an average of 15.4 rounds, and take an average of 2.04 goblins with him. That puts the curve even lower than OD&D.
You could use a random mix of warriors and minions – but even at the typical 4:1 minion:warrior ratio, the 4E fighter will still be below the 3E fighter.
There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. – Benjamin Disraeli
Using Goblin Blackblades instead of minions drops the 4e Fighter’s kills down to around 5. Of course this also means it takes over 20 rounds to kill these 5 opponents. That’s what 4e gives you- mounds of easy kills or long, slow slugfests.
I still think it’s a proper comparison. For example, the 3e Goblin only gets 1d8+1 hitpoints and the normal 1st level 3e Fighter will do 1d8+3 damage a swing usually killing him in one shot. Likewise, the 3e Goblin is a CR 1/3 creature so 3 of them only equals a single 1st level creature. Sounds like a minion to me.
Except that, in 3e, a CR 1 encounter (such as 3 goblins) is intended as a fighter for the entire party – whereas a CR 1 encounter in 4e is an appropriate challenge for a single character.
Without pitting the fighter against an equivalent challenge in each edition, these statistics are really, really misleading.
I seem to recall that the designers thought encounters in 3e were best when they were around party level + 3 or 4, so a level 1 appropriate encounter in 4e is more along the lines of a CR 4 or 5 in 3e.
Wow! This is a great series of posts on the Fighting-Man…err pardon me, Fighter, and the power inflation of D&D characters through the years.
Cheers!
~Sham aka Dave
I’d like to ask for permission to copy the above bar graph on my own blog, which will link to this post.
email: drbow66@hotmail.com
or comment here or at my blog.
Thanks!
~Sham aka Dave
Sure, no problem. I’ve really enjoyed reading about your OD&D games.
I like this project very much!
I would be interested in a C&C column though… Is that too unreasonable? It is after all a game which tries to be some kind of another heir to AD&D…
Just a Thought…
urg… it’s a lot of work to do actually. I would expect C&C to be on par with AD&D2.
Here is the problem:
D&D 4e Goblin Minion
AC- 16
HP- 1
Damage- 4
The minute he decided to use this instead of a standard goblin the test should have been tossed in the trash. A wizard could wade through endless mobs of minions, much less the fighter. The minion, regardless of level, is going to have 1 hp and is there to be more of a distraction than a threat. That test is garbage and says nothing about 4E and how the game is designed.
Redo the test, use an actual goblin and not a minion, and you will see the final result change dramatically.
Please see my previous post on why I did what I did- I’m really tired of arguing this point.
Yeah, I saw it, and its still a scewed poll. On the average most 4E fights are going to have more normal, non-minion monsters in them. If you did this same study using something other than a 1HP monster which is meant as nothing more than a distraction you would see your number decrease.
If anything you should add to the 4E section to present the difference between a minion and a standard monster. And even then, the numbers would change again with the Brute, Soldier, Controller, Lurker, and Strikers as each is built differently to handle different roles. This pole tells me very little at all about 4E except what I already knew, minions are cannon fodder and are easy kills for ALL classes, not just one.
Thank you. Your effort has framed very nicely the problem.
As to the detractors, stop and analyze your use of goblins. Did you fight chiefs, sub-chiefs, leaders, every encounter? No, you did not. Nor should you face the long list of suped up goblins all the time. The generic goblins were supposed to be swept aside, so you get to the big boys.
That is the point being made. It is now substantially easier to sweep aside the generice bad guys. I go so far as to take this as ruining the game. You may not see it that way.
The logic behind this approach is not invalidated because one appears statistically different (they are different editions after all).
ok here is all I have to say. One we are arguing crunch not use. If we are arguing use then it varies from DM to DM, thus making this a argument of normative state, and not an argument of positive state, for those of you without econ this means we are arguing what should be, while the other is what is as in hard facts.
Here are the crunch of numbers for 4e and 3e
Goblins of page 133 monster manual 1 for 3e will be my example for goblins, they hold a CR of 1/3 (I must admit I rarely found points in time where CR was truly accurate but meh) thus 3 goblins versus a party of 4 players. of course if you read the groupings a gang of goblins is 4-9 goblins. Now then if a CR 1 encounter grants the party 300 total xp then a single goblin is worth 100xp. also it takes 4,000 total xp to level to level 2, (4 members times 1,000) so 13.33333333 fights is how long it takes to level. Now then if I am a 4e character I know that it will take me ten fights of my level to go to the next level. I also know that a normal monster is equal to me, and that it takes 4 minions (or mooks) to equal me. Thus if I kill 40 mooks or 10 normal I will level if I am on my own. If I am a 3e character and I kill 10 goblins on my own I gain a level (1/3 a cr equals 100 xp 1000 xp equals level up) of course according to CR a level one fighter is CR 1/4 as he is in a party of 4. (also 4e is set for party of 5, luckily that is not important for this case) So one ones own a normal goblin is still very close to a 3.5 goblin xp wise until you hit level 2 then things get wonky. On the other hand a 3.5 character is weaker according to CR than the monster he is fighting, while the 4e is considered equal, and thus 1/12th stronger than a 3.5. So by CR the 4e is still stronger. As for how many he could kill well that you would need to calculate based on hp average damage accuracy ratio. I will just argue the simple stuff and let those who actually care about getting really into depth on this subject do it. Of course as I said this is just crunch and I never saw CR as accurate in 3.5 or 3.0 and 4e I feel is much more accurate (according to what they say that CR should cause to the party)
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that 4e blows no matter what the statistics are. If Gygax were still alive he’d kill someone.
if he were alive in control we would be playing AD&D 1.5e cleaned up and organized similar to AD&D 2e but still going… however my goblins get a 20hp kicker so go ahead and hack away o mighty warrior of lots of faith….
I looked at it as a very funny mock comparison…. this got so serious…..