Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Anpu42 wrote:
A few years later some the group had interest. Two of the players did not like Shadowrun, but D20 Modern came out so we started to use it. It worked well until the characters started to hit 10th level. The main problems were actually the Hit Point system.
-The Uber Sniper armed with Single Shot .50 Cal would take 3-5 shots to kill a sentry of any were close to his level.
-Most of the Opposition if made of a level to challenge the team it would take entire clips to kill a guard.
-It would take 3-6 Guards armed with AK-47s to even worry the PCs.
-It quickly turned into a who could throw out the lead the quickest and no one ever used any thing but Automatics, the few fights that we just small arms or knife took 20-30 rounds to run.

I do remember some D20 modern/future variants had some special rules either in the core or class-specific to deal with this.

In general, there's a 'massive damage' rule that was often overlooked. I believe the d20 Call of Cthulhu variant did something like make it so if you took your Con score in one hit you risked auto-dying, while I think d20 Modern did something like half HP or 50 points or something.

For the sniper, it would depend on a lot of things. Theoretically, he probably should have gotten a lot of bonus 'sneak attack' dice from one source or another. Not as many as 4th would hand out, but a bunch I'd hope. A lot of it would depend on the build, though.

I tend to agree with your feelings, though. d20 games at low elves were fun, but I always felt them get boring to run or play (mechanically) once levels got above 7-8 or so. In D&D 3.0, it seemed like everyone ended up with a ton of spells (from base or prestige classes) to throw around. In other d20 games, you just had a ton of powers that weren't that interesting and have a lot fo HP to chip through.

4.th edition has smoothed that out a lot in an interesting way. My group is only at level 8 (which is a somewhat 'dull' level as you get a feat but now powers) and it seems a bit more of a smooth upgrade... Levels 11 and 21 are probably big jumps, but that seems to be a level where the GM is recommended to take a brief pause to let everyone decide how things should go. I'm hoping we run down our Paragon Paths with the group as it looks like it'll almost be like new characters!

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:I used to manage a comic shop and I got to hear SO MANY complaints. I played 4th ed. I quickly realized that in practice it felt like I was playing DnD. Play the game, quit griping and/or lying that you've played it. Games are completely subjective and they're only as good as who you get to play with.

YAY. Well said.

11 and 21 are fairly huge jumps. You think there are a lot of status effects and conditions to keep track of now, it gets crazy once you hit paragon. The monsters will be more pressing as well. This is also the time where you start seeing stun and dominate a lot more. Dominate is the fun one. On Monday our Fullblade fighter forget he was "Confused" and used a daily power on a Eladrin Shadow Dancer but hit me with it instead, taking me from not bloodied to -5 hit points. I also was weakened and slowed by the attack and continually failed my saving throws.

The proplem with the Massive damage rule was all it took was 3-4 of the caracterrs to fail the save is nthe same fight and then you have 1 Character of 10th level and 10-15 8th Level Drug Dealers armed with SMGs and Assualt Rifles, that takes 1-2 rounds to kill each, if the Character does not Move.

Ahtman wrote:11 and 21 are fairly huge jumps. You think there are a lot of status effects and conditions to keep track of now, it gets crazy once you hit paragon. The monsters will be more pressing as well. This is also the time where you start seeing stun and dominate a lot more. Dominate is the fun one. On Monday our Fullblade fighter forget he was "Confused" and used a daily power on a Eladrin Shadow Dancer but hit me with it instead, taking me from not bloodied to -5 hit points. I also was weakened and slowed by the attack and continually failed my saving throws.

Sometimes other level breaks can be surprisingly large as well, when more then one character gets a really good new power, for example. 7th can be nasty when a Fighter first gets Come and Get It. One of my groups just hit 16th level, and between the 15th level Daily powers and the 16th level Paragon benefits, we definitely perceive that we've had a jump up in power recently.