Once upon a time I was very happy with Dungeons and Dragons 4E. While it had its teething problems such as it's rangers that could one shot orcus, it's bloodmages that could inflict ludicrous damage that made any striker cry and other issues: It was the best damn edition of DnD I'd ever played. It was easy to think about and run as a DM, meaning I could focus my attentions on the actual important things about the campaign. Story, NPCs, encounter design and making a plot that wasn't a solid railroad my PCs couldn't effect.
Certain things about 4th Edition took me a long time to grasp. It took me a long time to get to grips with how to deal with the player characters power curve into epic. I had to really learn how to get the most out of encounters in 4E and once I did, I was rewarded with fun, interesting and tactically relevant combats. It meant they fit into the story as my villains weren't instantly one shot by some ridiculous SoD spell (or ridiculous rules quirks) and more was spent focused on playing the game.
As time moved on I enjoyed 4E more and more and more. While the digital magazines often varied in content, the wonderful monster builder tool made making new monsters - my favourite 4E hobby - easy. I could make "professional" looking stat blocks with ease and keep all my creations on my PC in one easy to find place. Regular updates to keep all monsters in the builder, meant I had an easily accessed archive to compare any two creatures together regardless of where I was. The character builder meant I could construct and keep easy track of my PCs, what items they had and basically make my life very easy (as a DM).
Monster manual 3 completely rewrote the book on how monsters were designed in a fantastic way. Epic creatures gained enough teeth to not ineffectually cat-scratch at PCs. Many solos rediscovered something between their legs that they had been missing: Their balls. Newer and better design principles for monsters came in across the board. This was a wonderful landmark in books for running a game in 4E, one that has pleasantly continued.
Then last year was possibly the best for DnD ever when Dark Sun came out. Dark Sun 4E captured my imagination in ways no other setting did since Planescape (in 2nd Edition). I loved the new mechanical crunch, I loved the setting for being everything I loved about the 2E setting with all the stupid gone, I loved making the second book a monster book and it really felt different to a Eberron/FR/PoL setting. Wizards were prepared to make a setting awesome by itself and not just compromise everything! This was awesome and I can't wait for it to contin-
Oh.
Where did we go wrong Wizards? The first thing you did was release essentials. Now, I am not against essentials and I don't think they are too bad overall and certainly not the devil. The new builds in fact I actually really approve of even though I thought I would hate them. But where was the love in these products that clearly went into every aspect of Dark Sun? It felt like reprints, especially the Warpriest (Redone Strength Cleric) and Mage (Redone wizard, obviously). That both of the "Heroes of" books reprint so much material between them doesn't help.
Then there are the boxed sets with essentials. The red box was good for nostalgia reasons, but was not really the introduction to 4E for a new player that I hoped it could be. The DM's kit was plain worthless as I already owned the previous two DMGs. All I got out of it was an adventure and tokens, which wasn't really a great return for the investment to be frank. The monster vault was a good product, but reading it the entire thing felt in many ways like errata to the original MM. This is especially telling when you consider most of the MV monsters have replaced MM counterparts in the compendium directly (Ala in an errata like fashion). Of course MV is a really good book and I think was great - but it had that tinge of disappointment attached to it.
Wizards decided that wasn't enough, they then took the character builder away from me. A resource that saved me countless hours and a very handy tool for me, became online only. Unfortunately during this process it made the character builder utterly unusable for me. I still haven't got it to successfully load before crashing and letting me make an entire character. Even if I could, it doesn't let me (or my players) add houseruled feats, magic items and other things easily. I can no longer easily keep a coherent record of my PCs characters - especially those PCs in my Dark Sun game (where themes aren't in the original CB at all). In the end I could live with this, but then insult was added to injury.
One update to the MB added a host of bugs that made editing monsters - if you've read my posts on monster design before you'll see the complexity of the creatures I make - a total nightmare for me. I frequently spend more time correcting errors for monsters I try to publish and share for others than I do actually writing the damn thing in the first place. Then of course Wizards decided just not to support the tool anymore. There isn't even an online equivalent, just a buggy mess that has been left to die and no longer supported. That's a real blow for me and now I'm back to writing monsters by hand. It's just easier to do the maths in my head and write a monster out than use the official tools. That's just stupid.
Then there is the terribly implemented and thought out magic item rarity in essentials. Now firstly I support the magic item rarity 100%. I think it's a solid concept but the execution is terrible. Consider for example that Ogre Gauntlets are apparently rare and give a +2 bonus to damage for a daily power. While an uncommon like Iron Armbands gives a +2 damage bonus all the time. This is plainly ridiculous, why would anyone feel that the gauntlets were a "character defining" item? Why would any player want it to begin with? But the real problem is there is an entire lack of rares and commons. It can be very hard finding suitable common and rare items for different slots, considering there is a huge lack of both kinds of items.
During all of this Dragon and Dungeon have really declined heavily. Dragon is filled with fluff articles that offer poor to really bad mechanical crunch most of the time (noting that this isn't always true: Always gems). Dungeon is becoming a delve magazine, where actual cartography is gone in favor of hacked together Dungeon tile maps and quality articles feel constrained by not getting enough space. Court of the Bramble Queen comes to mind. The one focusing on the Prince of Frost from earlier in Dungeons life cycle was almost twice the length! Now even when articles are posted is like betting on a blind man on fire throwing darts at a board. There is just no predictability anymore.
Now we've just got to the point after the best moment in 4E (IMO) all the way back when I was discussing Dark Sun to the current situation. Three books have been canned, one of them a desperately needed book on rare items (that are sorely lacking right now), the release schedule looks completely barren, the digital tools/offerings have still not improved and the monster builder is still a broken mess. Everything that was starting to get somewhere in July and August of last year has now been practically dismantled bit by bit. There just isn't anything to cheer about anymore or even look forward to - the ship looks like it is firmly beginning to sink.
I love Gamma World, but for those who don't I can feel their pain because the last few months big releases were Gamma World and two expansions (One is due next month). But for DnD since essentials there has been nothing except... dungeon tiles? You don't want to hear my opinion on what I think of that frankly.
Over the time since 4E has been released I've bought everything just about. I can even name the products I don't have: Dungeon/Dragon annual, Players Handbook Races: Human/Dragonborn/Tiefling and Hammerfast (slipped through the cracks, but I intend to get it). Right now there just isn't anything that excites me the way the previews of say - Dark Sun - excited me so much last year. In fact all looking at the release schedule this year reminds me of how little actual books/supplements seem to still be coming out for DnD. I am also uniquely concerned that the epic tier is going to be entirely ignored by Wizards. Monster Vault , which is excellent in spite of my quibble about it feeling a bit "errataish" has a miserable amount of epic monsters (13 IIRC). The next "monster" book is Threats to the Nentir Vale and quite honestly I can't see that book having a big focus on more epic monsters (where we desperately need more standard non-demon monsters).
In fact, I can't figure out what Wizards is doing anymore. All I see when I look at the sparse release schedule, the entire lack of content that I want and the seemingly volatile situation DDI has gone through is the last throes of this edition. I would love to be wrong here, but as someone who truly enjoys 4E to such an extent I've devoted a lot of time over these 2 years to running 2 campaigns minimum, it just seems that it's all going to be over. It's especially hard to take because when Dark Sun was released, I couldn't have been happier about 4E and felt it was truly getting to the point it was really great.
Ever since Dark Sun it's just been purely downhill. I personally hope that Wizards doesn't just wait on whatever they've got planned if they do have something planned. The whole fiasco with everything that happened recently has put a major damper on how I feel about 4E. Just doesn't feel like there is any future in 4E right now. I was one of those who argued with the essentials "naysayers" (for lack of a better description) that essentials would be over and then back to normal business.
Don't I feel stupid now.
Certain things about 4th Edition took me a long time to grasp. It took me a long time to get to grips with how to deal with the player characters power curve into epic. I had to really learn how to get the most out of encounters in 4E and once I did, I was rewarded with fun, interesting and tactically relevant combats. It meant they fit into the story as my villains weren't instantly one shot by some ridiculous SoD spell (or ridiculous rules quirks) and more was spent focused on playing the game.
As time moved on I enjoyed 4E more and more and more. While the digital magazines often varied in content, the wonderful monster builder tool made making new monsters - my favourite 4E hobby - easy. I could make "professional" looking stat blocks with ease and keep all my creations on my PC in one easy to find place. Regular updates to keep all monsters in the builder, meant I had an easily accessed archive to compare any two creatures together regardless of where I was. The character builder meant I could construct and keep easy track of my PCs, what items they had and basically make my life very easy (as a DM).
Monster manual 3 completely rewrote the book on how monsters were designed in a fantastic way. Epic creatures gained enough teeth to not ineffectually cat-scratch at PCs. Many solos rediscovered something between their legs that they had been missing: Their balls. Newer and better design principles for monsters came in across the board. This was a wonderful landmark in books for running a game in 4E, one that has pleasantly continued.
Then last year was possibly the best for DnD ever when Dark Sun came out. Dark Sun 4E captured my imagination in ways no other setting did since Planescape (in 2nd Edition). I loved the new mechanical crunch, I loved the setting for being everything I loved about the 2E setting with all the stupid gone, I loved making the second book a monster book and it really felt different to a Eberron/FR/PoL setting. Wizards were prepared to make a setting awesome by itself and not just compromise everything! This was awesome and I can't wait for it to contin-
Oh.
Where did we go wrong Wizards? The first thing you did was release essentials. Now, I am not against essentials and I don't think they are too bad overall and certainly not the devil. The new builds in fact I actually really approve of even though I thought I would hate them. But where was the love in these products that clearly went into every aspect of Dark Sun? It felt like reprints, especially the Warpriest (Redone Strength Cleric) and Mage (Redone wizard, obviously). That both of the "Heroes of" books reprint so much material between them doesn't help.
Then there are the boxed sets with essentials. The red box was good for nostalgia reasons, but was not really the introduction to 4E for a new player that I hoped it could be. The DM's kit was plain worthless as I already owned the previous two DMGs. All I got out of it was an adventure and tokens, which wasn't really a great return for the investment to be frank. The monster vault was a good product, but reading it the entire thing felt in many ways like errata to the original MM. This is especially telling when you consider most of the MV monsters have replaced MM counterparts in the compendium directly (Ala in an errata like fashion). Of course MV is a really good book and I think was great - but it had that tinge of disappointment attached to it.
Wizards decided that wasn't enough, they then took the character builder away from me. A resource that saved me countless hours and a very handy tool for me, became online only. Unfortunately during this process it made the character builder utterly unusable for me. I still haven't got it to successfully load before crashing and letting me make an entire character. Even if I could, it doesn't let me (or my players) add houseruled feats, magic items and other things easily. I can no longer easily keep a coherent record of my PCs characters - especially those PCs in my Dark Sun game (where themes aren't in the original CB at all). In the end I could live with this, but then insult was added to injury.
One update to the MB added a host of bugs that made editing monsters - if you've read my posts on monster design before you'll see the complexity of the creatures I make - a total nightmare for me. I frequently spend more time correcting errors for monsters I try to publish and share for others than I do actually writing the damn thing in the first place. Then of course Wizards decided just not to support the tool anymore. There isn't even an online equivalent, just a buggy mess that has been left to die and no longer supported. That's a real blow for me and now I'm back to writing monsters by hand. It's just easier to do the maths in my head and write a monster out than use the official tools. That's just stupid.
Then there is the terribly implemented and thought out magic item rarity in essentials. Now firstly I support the magic item rarity 100%. I think it's a solid concept but the execution is terrible. Consider for example that Ogre Gauntlets are apparently rare and give a +2 bonus to damage for a daily power. While an uncommon like Iron Armbands gives a +2 damage bonus all the time. This is plainly ridiculous, why would anyone feel that the gauntlets were a "character defining" item? Why would any player want it to begin with? But the real problem is there is an entire lack of rares and commons. It can be very hard finding suitable common and rare items for different slots, considering there is a huge lack of both kinds of items.
During all of this Dragon and Dungeon have really declined heavily. Dragon is filled with fluff articles that offer poor to really bad mechanical crunch most of the time (noting that this isn't always true: Always gems). Dungeon is becoming a delve magazine, where actual cartography is gone in favor of hacked together Dungeon tile maps and quality articles feel constrained by not getting enough space. Court of the Bramble Queen comes to mind. The one focusing on the Prince of Frost from earlier in Dungeons life cycle was almost twice the length! Now even when articles are posted is like betting on a blind man on fire throwing darts at a board. There is just no predictability anymore.
Now we've just got to the point after the best moment in 4E (IMO) all the way back when I was discussing Dark Sun to the current situation. Three books have been canned, one of them a desperately needed book on rare items (that are sorely lacking right now), the release schedule looks completely barren, the digital tools/offerings have still not improved and the monster builder is still a broken mess. Everything that was starting to get somewhere in July and August of last year has now been practically dismantled bit by bit. There just isn't anything to cheer about anymore or even look forward to - the ship looks like it is firmly beginning to sink.
I love Gamma World, but for those who don't I can feel their pain because the last few months big releases were Gamma World and two expansions (One is due next month). But for DnD since essentials there has been nothing except... dungeon tiles? You don't want to hear my opinion on what I think of that frankly.
Over the time since 4E has been released I've bought everything just about. I can even name the products I don't have: Dungeon/Dragon annual, Players Handbook Races: Human/Dragonborn/Tiefling and Hammerfast (slipped through the cracks, but I intend to get it). Right now there just isn't anything that excites me the way the previews of say - Dark Sun - excited me so much last year. In fact all looking at the release schedule this year reminds me of how little actual books/supplements seem to still be coming out for DnD. I am also uniquely concerned that the epic tier is going to be entirely ignored by Wizards. Monster Vault , which is excellent in spite of my quibble about it feeling a bit "errataish" has a miserable amount of epic monsters (13 IIRC). The next "monster" book is Threats to the Nentir Vale and quite honestly I can't see that book having a big focus on more epic monsters (where we desperately need more standard non-demon monsters).
In fact, I can't figure out what Wizards is doing anymore. All I see when I look at the sparse release schedule, the entire lack of content that I want and the seemingly volatile situation DDI has gone through is the last throes of this edition. I would love to be wrong here, but as someone who truly enjoys 4E to such an extent I've devoted a lot of time over these 2 years to running 2 campaigns minimum, it just seems that it's all going to be over. It's especially hard to take because when Dark Sun was released, I couldn't have been happier about 4E and felt it was truly getting to the point it was really great.
Ever since Dark Sun it's just been purely downhill. I personally hope that Wizards doesn't just wait on whatever they've got planned if they do have something planned. The whole fiasco with everything that happened recently has put a major damper on how I feel about 4E. Just doesn't feel like there is any future in 4E right now. I was one of those who argued with the essentials "naysayers" (for lack of a better description) that essentials would be over and then back to normal business.
Don't I feel stupid now.
) and...well, I wont go on, this is opinion only and I dont want to step on peoples feet. I just think Essentials is a great product. Does it totally reinvigorate the game for the existing player base? No...Sorta.
), needed simplicity.
