4e / GSL For Those Who Love, Hate, or Love & Hate 4E: What Did 4E Do Right?

[Obryn]

I'm a 4e fan nowadays, but I'm also running 1e/OSRIC, and will soon be running (another) Call of Cthulhu d20 game. I love 4e, but no single RPG can ever scratch all of my gaming itches.

Love:
* The action structure. Really, this is my favorite part of the system, by far. I love the lack of full-round actions, and plan to implement it in CoC d20 and SWSE.
* At-Will and Encounter Powers. These really give a nice menu of options that remain fun and interesting from character to character. Dailies are okay, too, I guess. I have no problem whatsoever with Martial dailies, FWIW; they don't bother me whatsoever.
* Character Builder. Honestly, I can have fun with this for hours on end.
* The modularity of the Class/Power system. I think it's wonderful that you can add or remove individual components without disrupting the whole thing. I also generally like the implementation of multiclassing.
* Elite/Normal/Minion enemies.
* Death and Dying
* Healing surges as a good, day-long indicator of character health. Also, I like the simplicity of the full overnight refresh, versimilitude be-damned.


Don't Love:
* Solo monsters, generally.
* Magic items in general. Item daily powers are often lackluster and have nothing on a decent always-on Property. Also, tracking Daily item uses adds another layer of bookkeeping, which I'd prefer to disregard. I also think the strict 5-level groupings of +1/+2/etc. weapons don't work as well as I'd like.
* The Implementation of Implements. I'd like Implements to work somewhat like Weapons; as it stands, they act more like limits for powers that really aren't any better. They just make multiclassing a bear, and handicap weapon + implement classes.


That's about it for me right now.

-O

[Remathilis]

Originally Posted by avin

This feeling that D&D is GOOOOOOOOOD vs evil that 4E pushes. Former editions fit better my shades of gray DM style. Everything has a reason, not just "becuz i'm evilz lolz".

Really? You get that feeling from the "tiefling infernal warlocks are in the Players Handbook" 4e? The "there are no good aligned creatures in the Monsters Manual" 4e? The "Points of light against the darkness" 4e? The "by in-large, the world is unaligned" 4e? The "paladins don't have to be LG" 4e?

I took the opposite; 4e seems much more shades of gray compared to the shining knights and "baatezu" of years gone by...

[Remathilis]

Things I like:

1. Defenses, not Saves
2. Simpler rules for certain actions (grab vs. grapple)
3. a better balance of non-magic and magic PCs
4. Healing surges
5. The Encounter-structure system
6. Some of the fluff (devas, dragonborn)

Things I'm not as big on

1. Certain nostalgic elements (fireball d6/level, etc)
2. Magical items seem sterile
3. COMBAT SPEED when things go awry
4. WotCs "lets not waste a room when we can have COMBAT" approach to modules

[Particle_Man]

Like

1. Monster races easier to do as 1st level PCs
2. More prominent role for the fey
3. Minions
4. Easier play at high levels
5. Advice for new DMs
6. Death saving throws
7. More hp at level 1
8. Standard/move/minor action breakdown

That said, I wish there was an option for players that don't want to worry about managing dailies/encounters etc. and just like getting in there and hitting things. The roles of characters are different, which is fine, but the resource management "subgame" is too similar between classes. Also, some monsters seem to have ludicrously high hit point totals, which can turn a combat into a grind. Yes, this somewhat contradicts what I said earlier. I contain worlds. Or else I personally like resource management at the encounter level but not at the daily level.

[Doug McCrae]

Originally Posted by avin

This feeling that D&D is GOOOOOOOOOD vs evil that 4E pushes. Former editions fit better my shades of gray DM style. Everything has a reason, not just "becuz i'm evilz lolz".

D&D shifted from 'PCs are amoral tomb robbers' to 'Good vs Evil' some time around the mid-80s. When Gary left and Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms supplanted Greyhawk. PCs stopped being Cugel the Clever and started being Aragorn. It's been that way ever since.

[Gothmog]

4e has been a real blessing for my groups. It fits very well with our playstyle, and gives us a very 1e AD&D vibe when we play it, without all the excess rules clutter of 3e. I like almost every thing 4e, with the highlights being:

* Rebalancing of the classes so everyone has something interesting/fun to do
* The classes are also awesome- I especially love the warlocks and their pacts, avengers, and the new paladin is awesome!
* Rituals- great idea, even if the costs are a little steep for some of them
* Powers- I love the powers and their utilization. Unlike some other folks, I haven't had a problem with players spamming powers- my players tend to try weird stuff which I rule for on the fly.
* Roll to hit vs. one of four defenses
* No need for dedicated healers anymore- healing surges are a great idea
* 4e is a lot easier to improvise and run due to simplified and better balanced math behind the system
* Monsters and PCs do not use the same design rules
* This might just be psychological on my part, but 4e feels like a more open and free system (much like 1e/2e), which encourages me to be more creative when I play or DM
* Minions, standard, elite, and solo monsters
* Character and monster roles
* Death and dying rules
* Saving throws for a way to represent duration of powers
* The disease track (which I also ported over to represent curses)
* The action structure (standard, move, minor)- plays very well
* The character generator
* Tiered play
* New multiclassing rules
* Dynamic combat with lots of movment
* Focus on cooperation of PCs and tactics for success
* Loss of iterative attacks
* NO MORE BUFFING!!!
* The new cosmology really grabs me in a way the old one never did. I especially love the Feywild (and increased use of fey), Shadowfell, Elemental Chaos, and the Primordials/Gods war before the start of time.

There are three things that do bug me about 4e though:

* Magic items are kind of sterile. I'd like to see most items have BOTH an encounter and daily power, and/or a weak "always on" effect in replacement of an encounter and daily power.
* No way to represent long-term injuries. We've houseruled this one and it works pretty well, but it bugged me when I first read 4e.
* More at-will powers are needed, and a way for characters to gain them later in their careers (maybe via a feat or something when they hit paragon, and again at epic).

[Gearjammer]

Originally Posted by Gothmog

.

* Magic items are kind of sterile. I'd like to see most items have BOTH an encounter and daily power, and/or a weak "always on" effect in replacement of an encounter and daily power.

Agreed with most of your post, especially this part. I gave our group's level 9 cleric a +5 holy symbol just to break out of the "ok, here's your +2 upgrade over your +1 item..." kinda vibe. I love 4Ed but my biggest complaint is that the magic items just don't seem as wondrous anymore, and are too "mechanicky" for lack of a better word.

[Betote]

What I love of this thread is how something can be both the best and the worst feature of 4e for different people, and for the exact same reasons. Different strokes and all that, I suppose

My love list:
* Simplified maths
* Minions
* Rituals
* Skill challenges

My hate list:
* Sameness between classes and powers
* Implementation of most of the concepts from my love list
* One-trick-ponyism of monsters
* Loooooooooong combats
* Defender marks
* Separation between "game" and "world"
* Loss of randomness

[resistor]

I'm not a fan of 4e, but there are definitely some good points to it.

I like
- Defences instead of saves. It was a good idea in SWSE, and I'm glad it made it into 4e.
- More movement in combat
- The extensive use of at-will and per-encounter abilities.
- Reduced dependence on buffs and magic items.
- The monster templates system
- Generally faster-moving combat.

I dislike:
- The death of simulation as a primary goal of the game. I'm OK with moderating simulation in the interest of improved play, but I think it should always be at least a secondary for. For me, 4e goes too far in this direction.
- Martial powers. I'm fine with the idea of martial characters having powers like everyone else, but the way its implemented (Warlords in particular) just bug me.
- Playing fast and loose with traditional flavor elements. Tieflings are OK, but they're not the tieflings I liked in Planescape. Same goes for Eladrin, etc.
- Death of the Great Wheel. I seem to be in the minority here, but I LOVED the Great Wheel. In fact, it was reading a 3e Manual of the Planes in a bookstore that got me interested in D&D in the first place.
- The art and presentation. I'm sorry, but 4e tieflings are the worst piece of RPG art direction I've ever seen.

[Tequila Sunrise]

For me, the primary thing that 4e did right was to drop all those quirky [to be polite] things that I had to house rule out of 3e. Alignment & multiclassing restrictions, turn undead and rolled abilities & HP to name a few.

Originally Posted by resistor

- The art and presentation. I'm sorry, but 4e tieflings are the worst piece of RPG art direction I've ever seen.

I can sympathize with this. The bottom line is that anyone who paints anything that Toni DiTerlizzi once painted is almost certainly a dissapointment.

[Hexmage-EN]

I never cared for hooved Tieflings. The only thing I don't like about the 4E Tiefling design is that their horns grow from the brow. It looks strange and in some cases makes the females look like they have a receding hairline. I'd rather that they grow out of the forehead or from the sides of the head.

[resistor]

Originally Posted by Hexmage-EN

I never cared for hooved Tieflings. The only thing I don't like about the 4E Tiefling design is that their horns grow from the brow. It looks strange and in some cases makes the females look like they have a receding hairline. I'd rather that they grow out of the forehead or from the sides of the head.

I'm not hung up on needing hooves, but the brow-horns and iguana tails are just atrocious, IMO.

[JeffB]

I really like 4E and I'm going to answer firstly with my gripes as they are few-

1) I don't like "slave to the grid" combat systems that pretty much necessitate the use of minis, counters, etc.

2) I also wish that the game was a bit more gritty and made healing surges recovery a bit tougher.

Those are my 2 big gripes and I can live with (or ignore) pretty much everything else that is a minor grip.

What did it get right? Pretty much everything else-

I don't really have issue with power systems as everything is right there in a smaller stat block at your fingertip- very little having to reference elsewhere in a rulebook.

I love the abstract/vague nature of many rules. I like being able to define things myself.

I like that skills are simplified/and reduced in number.

I love that the cosmology is very open ended (more of that "vagueness") so I'm not tied to anything concrete like the Great Wheel- which I actually have loved since the OD&D days-just gets boring after 30 years.

I love that the game is extremely DM friendly from a prep standpoint.

Like the powers system, the Monster stablocks RAWK! everything right there.

I like being able to re-skin powers/monsters- very easy to modify them for flavor or mechanical need.

Lack of buffs and PCs with bandoliers of rods/staves/wands or Golfbag of weapons.

[Opus]

I don't care for 4e but they did some things right:

-Overall simpler system provides more play, less prep
-Limited skill list so you can focus on the important ones
-Rebalancing the classes, everyone can participate
-Healing surges, keeps the game going without having to break things off and wait an imaginary 8 hrs after every combat
-Action points
-Monsters are not PCs and have simplified stat block

My main beefs with 4e and why I don't like it as much as other editions:

-Generic classes. A wizard is really not much different than a paladin. All classes use the same powers, they might give them different names but their effect in combat is the same.
-Replacing spells with powers. Removes all the mystery of magic users. See first beef.

[Mathew_Freeman]

Originally Posted by BryonD

You know, this really doesn't say anything.
It is like saying that baseball puts the fun up front and center, and basketball is hung up on bouncing a ball and throwing it through a hoop. Therefore, baseball is more focused on fun than basketball.

Obviously, 4E touches on *something* that is more fun *to you*. But without providing any data whatsoever on what constitutes "fun", you haven't made a complete statement.

That's a great response to what I posted, thanks. Let me elaborate:

What I mean is that I really like the mechanics of 4e, even if I can see why people have problems justifying them in terms of description.

A good example is the Come and Get It Power. I totally understand why people dislike the idea that a Fighter can just pull people next to him without having to make a roll, particularly if they are, say, a huge Dragon or Beholder, or Vecna or something. I get that.

On the other hand, as a mechanical power, it utterly rocks. It makes the Fighter feel like a total bad-ass, it feels great as a player and I love the concept.

That's what I'm talking about when I say the fun is up front and centre, and the fluff and description comes afterwards.

Other things I like:

Daily/encounter/at-will powers for all classes. Puts everyone on an equal footing and gives everyone options all the time.
Minions & eiltes. Really helps differentiate monsters from each other.
Monsters aren't the same as characters.
Warlock pacts - love the idea, but need to spend some more time developing the in-game details with my Warlock player.
Character roles - it's brilliant as a DM to know that a certain mix of characters will "work" as a party, even if it's not immediately obvious how.
Monster roles - makes plotting encounters easy.
Character builder - hours of fun.
Healing surges & milestones - help the character to continue to adventure

[avin]

Originally Posted by Remathilis

Really? You get that feeling from the "tiefling infernal warlocks are in the Players Handbook" 4e? The "there are no good aligned creatures in the Monsters Manual" 4e? The "Points of light against the darkness" 4e? The "by in-large, the world is unaligned" 4e? The "paladins don't have to be LG" 4e?

I took the opposite; 4e seems much more shades of gray compared to the shining knights and "baatezu" of years gone by...

I thought this was each one personal feelings, not a debate, but let's go...

- Tiefling Warlocks = Wow paste, nothing more (I'm a Wow player).

- Compare the number of good aligned creatures in 3E to 4E. 4E forces you fight evil all the time.

- Points of light: "oh no, there's too much evil around, save the world good boy!"

- I don't get this "world unaligned" quote, I never used an aligned world.

- Excellent 4E change! All alignments paladin is one more step from AD&D to the right direction.

Chaos vs Law has been nerfed while GOOD vs Evil is stronger than ever, this is what I get from 4E fluff all the time.

PS. My "I LOVE IT" list is far bigget than my "hate" list

[AllisterH]

Strange...I've always seen 2nd edition as the edition most slanted towards the "Aragorn is who you play"".

[mmu1]

I like the idea behind Rituals, even if the way they're implemented would actually work better as part of a 3E rather than 4E game. (they'd be a nice addition to a 3E magic system, but they're not enough to fill in the gaping holes in the 4E system)

Other than that, I can't off-hand think of anything I actually like about 4E. Some of the art, maybe?

[BryonD]

Originally Posted by Mathew_Freeman

That's what I'm talking about when I say the fun is up front and centre, and the fluff and description comes afterwards.

Fair enough.
I'll point out that you are still replacing "what you find fun", with "the fun".
Magic: the gathering puts the fun right up and center.
WHFRP puts the fun right up and center.
3E puts the fun right up and center.
4E puts the fun right up and center.

In my context, that is a starting point for conversation. You identify it as if it is a conclusion. So either you are saying 4E has nothing new (I know you are not), or you are saying that it is something new that 4E suddenly thought of. I don't buy that, but you have found a game that works for you, so cool.

To me, overcoming challenges within a rational model of how things work is a big part of the fun. 4E has pushed that fun, my "fun", to the side for the sake of simplicity and instant gratification.

And least things get sidetracked, I dislike Come and Get It, but that is one particular power. I'm certain a list if equally distasteful specifics could be identified for 3E. I avoid those elements and if I liked 4E as a whole I could just as easily avoid this one detail. It is a matter of overall design philosophy.

[Windjammer]

Like: Encounter Design.

Dislike: Disparity of support for combat and non-combat portions of the game.