I’ve been going down the 4AD rabbit hole lately purchasing (too many!) of the books, printing some of the zines, etc. I actually played a bit of it way back when it first came out but wasn’t all that taken by it (though I did enjoy it for how simple it was back then.)
The party I’ve been playing is a dwarf (warrior), rogue, cleric and a wizard. Last night, I started a new dungeon with the dwarf at lvl 4 and everyone else at lvl 3. On the fourth room, my wizard bit the dust. I think it was partially due to some bad rolls on spells but also something else I’ve noticed. Levels 1-2 were very comfortable/fun/easy but around level three and certainly level four, things got…difficult. Not just more challenging but in some cases near impossible. I say “near” because there’s always a 1/6 chance you can roll an exploding six. The monsters I ran into last night were HCL + 3 (and there were 10 of them) which would make them level 7 since my dwarf was highest level at lvl 4. Since my rogue and wizard both use a dagger which hits at -1, they’d both need to roll an 8 on a d6 to hit. Obviously, that means only an “exploding six” will work. Same for defense (8). So, the sudden ramp up in difficulty as I see it is the d6 still being used at level 3 or 4 and encountering enemies at level HCL+2..or more like my HCL+3 frog people I ran into who were only minions! (this was a dungeon from Twisted Dungeons).
Is level 3/4 always so hard? Is it one of those things where if you survive it then levels 5+ will have smoother transitions? Or will levels 7/8 also be very difficult because you’re using a d8 now (or d10?) and your encountering monsters at HCL+2 or +3 again??
What do you all do when you lose a character? I was able to escape the dungeon (failing it in the process) but we don’t have 1k gold for a resurrection. Due to the HCL system, it seems like adding a lvl 1 character to my party of level 3 & 4 chars will be a death warrant for the new guy.
Overall, I’m really enjoying the game and looking forward to digging into more of the books!