Discussion - LEW 4th Edition

Jerrand Redband said:

That's what I was saying let them do all the conversions themsleves

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I'm not sure if you misunderstood Knight Otu, or we misunderstood you. Your suggestion, as I understood it, was to have the 4th-edition gme be set in the same world as LEW, different continent but travel between the two possible. Knight Otu's point was that that's not feasible -- how to explain totally different sets of races, classes, spells/abilities/feats, even equipment? If your character travels to the other continent where the rules don't allow for a certain feat, or for a particular weapon he uses, how would you handle that? Much easier to have to separate, unrelated campaigns in separate, unrelated settings.

Jerrand Redband said:

but if a new lew 4.0 does start won't all the PCs be first lvl??

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Most likely, that does seem to be what we're aiming at, and what I'd agree with.

New Idea

o.k. keeping with the old

Still have a new world only it's locacted on the belly of the elephant??
It is easy to go from the back to the belly but travel the other way is almost impossible(someone may find a way later). So any characters wishing to travel from LEW3.5 to the new LEW4.0 can and conversion would need to be approved. People could make new 4.0 characters and say they traveled to the new world. People who make a character of one of the new races has to be a local. You set up a trading post and have it be where adventures start. No need to have new gods or explain about the time gaps. Just an ideal to expand LEW not cut it and start over. Unless the lichwrym wins then it just may be the end of the world. Later

J

Alright. Having actually read the 4e PHB now, I can come in on a few points that I was just guessing at before:

Regarding Deities: Y'know, it might just be easier to use deities as written, as KO suggested. There are some neat powers tied to deities - my personal favourite being a deities' power that, when you roll a 20 on a saving throw, you can flip the bad effect on you to the guy who put it there in the first place.

Plus, if everyone knows the main deities, it'd make things easier for people starting up. That being said, I do think we need to make the deities our own, in any case. I think this can be done by personalizing the churches - since a church is really how PCs will interact with the deities to begin with, most of the time. The cult of the Raven Queen, for example, could really be an entity to deal with, and would be something wholly ours, even though hundreds of other tables are using the exact same Raven Queen we are.

DM Credits: Y'know, we can pretty much use credits as we have them. The best way would be to say that each credit gives you 1/10th or 1/20th the XP you would need to level your character up. And that's it. No using credits for extra gear (since that can unbalance the game, apparently). I think we should go with 1/10th. That way, if I ran an adventure for a year (12 DM credits), I'd have enough to level any of my characters by only one level - regardless of what level he is actually at. A small step, really, but one that I'm sure DMs would appreciate.

Points of Light: I think Points of Light is a good place to go, and needs to be the core of any world we build. An exploration model is a good one, too - we could have a small barony, and surround it with the unknown. Could be fun.

New Products: Alright. Here's the big kicker. When we set up LEW, it was based around the SRD. We use the SRD, and anything else is added by us. It worked, and it kept LEW's power creep level fairly low. I like how that was set up.

One of the problems with LEB, unfortunately, is the level of power creep that got in. Once we opened the gates to wotc products, some bad powers got in, even with judges closely looking at powers. Still, LEB is fairly low in terms of overall power.

Now, the problem with 4e is that the game has obviously been designed with the intent of depending on splats. I don't expect designers really intend on only the PHB being used, which was our core assumption with LEW. As it stands, we're going to be adding new material. I have a sneaky suspicion that 4e will not be "Open" in any sense - we're going to have to out and out say "our pbp will use the PHB, PHB 2, and Complete Marmot", or whatever.

Picking and choosing powers that are acceptable could be a problem, too - if, for example, we decide all of the ranger's powers from book x are okay, but warlocks are just too munchkiny, then we're really shifting the balance towards rangers, right off the bat.

A problem, I think, but a small one. Someone else can deal with it, or we can at least get talking about it.

Now. Here's the plan: we get together three or five players, and they get voted on in the LEW boards. They form a world-building council - with the job of getting religions set up, describing the main cities, and putting together a smallish (less than 20 pages) PDF detailing the world in basic form. I think it's time to start - 4e PbPs are probably already starting up, since you can get the PHB from torrent already (for the record, I got mine in print... simply by asking for it at a bookstore that didn't know it hadn't released yet... a guy in the GD mentioned the idea, and I did it).

Jerrand Redband said:

o.k. keeping with the old

Still have a new world only it's locacted on the belly of the elephant??
It is easy to go from the back to the belly but travel the other way is almost impossible(someone may find a way later). So any characters wishing to travel from LEW3.5 to the new LEW4.0 can and conversion would need to be approved. People could make new 4.0 characters and say they traveled to the new world. People who make a character of one of the new races has to be a local. You set up a trading post and have it be where adventures start. No need to have new gods or explain about the time gaps. Just an ideal to expand LEW not cut it and start over. Unless the lichwrym wins then it just may be the end of the world. Later

J

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LEW 3.5 isn't going to end. I imagine it'll carry on, much stronger, than L4W for years to come. It has the strength of continuity behind it, and I know at least a few players aren't going to like 4e. I've read the PHB, and I can tell you there're a few things about it I really don't like (the huge amount of die-rolling, for example - but that's really a moot point in a PbP anyways, where IC does the math for you).

If you want to convert your characters, feel free. I have a sneaky suspicion I might re-create Brelach, my spellthief in LEB, into 4e as a magical half-elf follower of the moon goddess... because half-elves rock again in 4e.

We don't want to connect LEW to L4W in any way but perhaps thematically. If we followed your method, for example, there would be a huge story element that a lot of GMs would hate - namely, how so many people are travelling to the new world? Not to mention the fact that the only people who would be easy to convert - 1st level characters - should have no need to convert anyways. After all, if you wanted to play in 4e, why would you bother creating an LEW character to begin with?

If I tried to convert Galwynn, my soon-to-be 4th level paladin, into L4W, there would be all sorts of problems. How would I transfer his skills over? His abilities and feats? What about his magical items? What about the fact that his goddess, Halina, doesn't exist in the new world?

Not to mention the fact that I'd be way out of level, since most of the other L4W characters around him would have been made for the world, meaning it'd be tough to get good ol' Galwynn into a challenging game.

If you want to make another Jerrand Redband in L4W, that is totally do-able, and no one is going to fault you for it. Like I said, I'll be thinking of doing the exact same thing. If you really wanted to, you could even take the character's conversion as a personal thing - ie, it's the same Jerrand from LEW, and he was teleported to this new world, weaker and slightly different than he was before (you'd have to retire the LEW Jerrand to make this one stick, of course). It works for you, without messing with the PbP's continuity.

Wik said:

LEW 3.5 isn't going to end. I imagine it'll carry on, much stronger, than L4W for years to come. It has the strength of continuity behind it, and I know at least a few players aren't going to like 4e. I've read the PHB, and I can tell you there're a few things about it I really don't like (the huge amount of die-rolling, for example - but that's really a moot point in a PbP anyways, where IC does the math for you).

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I was worried we might lose LEW the world builder being on hold and all. I saw in a post you wanted to get a world builder group together for L4W we should think about it also for LEW and get some of those placeholder spots filled. For the record I will not be playing 4.0 I read some of the PHB online and the system looks sound just not a big difference as I can see from 3.5. Am glad they changed the 1/2elf tho.

Wik said:

We don't want to connect LEW to L4W in any way but perhaps thematically. If we followed your method, for example, there would be a huge story element that a lot of GMs would - namely, how so many people are travelling to the new world? Not to mention the fact that the only people who would be easy to convert - 1st level characters - should have no need to convert anyways. After all, if you wanted to play in 4e, why would you bother creating an LEW character to begin with?

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I don't see the problem you suggest? There are not that many approved LEW characters as I can tell. A large number won't make the conversion so your talking only alittle leaving LEW to go to L4W. Most players will want to try new races and classes so all they have to do is make a 4e character and in their background put if they sailed over for adventure or are a native of the new contient. Most people traveling could be refuges fleeing the coming of the lichwyrm or just a story about new lands and riches like back in the 1500.

Wik said:

If I tried to convert Galwynn, my soon-to-be 4th level paladin, into L4W, there would be all sorts of problems. How would I transfer his skills over? His abilities and feats? What about his magical items? What about the fact that his , Halina, doesn't exist in the new world?

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I was hoping WotC would have any conversion rules ready by the time anything like this was neccasary but who knows? From the little I have read about 4e characters if your soon to be 4th lvl paladin did "go over" and was convertated he may end up a couple lvls lower than 4th. I mean first lvl in 4e is like 2nd almost 3rd in 3.5. And the same gods would be worshipped on both contients your in the same world the one they all created right. Just picture the sun and moon (birds flying?) around the elephant starting one over his back the other under his belly. His head is north right?? So the sun and moon fly around east to west making day and night on both sides. The gods would be the same no need to make new just convert some to 4e maybe some gods don't pay attention to the belly to much going on up top.

Wik said:

Not to mention the fact that I'd be way out of level, since most of the other L4W characters around him would have been made for the world, meaning it'd be tough to get good ol' Galwynn into a challenging .

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See above.

All I was suggesting is you create a Living 4e World and add it to the other living world threads. Maybe have everyone post one character to start and give them the option to bring a LEW character in if they wanted I don't see many taking that option tho.You wouldn't need to make a lot of maps with cities and such just a coastline with the main trading post. Gods would only need to be address as cleric spots are made, everyone could read the deities thread for flavor and such. And you could almost get started right away.

Jerrand Redband said:

I was worried we might lose LEW the world builder being on hold and all.

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I'm not sure what you mean by "the world builder being on hold". LEW's "world builder" is contained on these boards. I don't see any threat to LEW's continuation -- as long as people here wish to continue playing in this campaign, it will continue.

Jerrand Redband said:

I don't see the problem you suggest? There are not that many approved LEW characters as I can tell.

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About 200.

Jerrand Redband said:

A large number won't make the conversion so your talking only alittle leaving LEW to go to L4W. Most players will want to try new races and classes so all they have to do is make a 4e character

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*Everyone* will be able to make a 4e character if they wish to play in the new campaign. No need to have any conceptual connection to LEW, or any other existing campaign, to do that.

Jerrand Redband said:

I was hoping WotC would have any conversion rules ready by the time anything like this was neccasary but who knows?

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When 4e was announced at GenCon last year, the presenters discouraged any attempt at conversion -- the two systems are just too different to make that work. Let 3e campaigns remain 3e campaigns, let 4e campaigns be 4e campaigns, and ne'er the twain shall meet.

Jerrand Redband said:

All I was suggesting is you create a Living 4e World and add it to the other living world threads.

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Ummm... we're already ahead of you on that. Did you notice when this thread was first created? That's exactly the plan. The thing that you keep suggesting, that we're all disagreeing with, is the idea of tying this new world into the existing game in some way.

Jerrand Redband said:

Maybe have everyone post one character to start

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... no problem there

Jerrand Redband said:

and give them the option to bring a LEW character in if they wanted I don't see many taking that option tho.

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I have yet to see any credible reason for that option, and I can thing of many strong reasons not to. The difficulty of conversion, for example, given different races, classes, alignments, even the style of level progression. Also, as one who has invested a lot in LEW, I'd hate to see the new game provide any motivation for players to take characters out of LEW. When LEB was created, I don't think anyone suggested there be any kind of portal to allow characters from one campaign to migrate to the other, although conversion would be a lot easier in that case. They're simply two separate campaigns, with different PCs, different mythos, different rules, different processes, although some of the same players. So it should be with L4W.

The world builder I was talking about

Sticky:Enworld World Guide (Work in Progress)

Has not had a post since 12-03-05 I was wondering how to help in making suggestions for some of the placeholder spots available. My intentions on the suggest of a new contient were to make sure LEW is still around for a long time to come. I thought I saw suggests about changing LEW to L4W not having both. I aslo made the suggestions as it would make it faster for everyone to get started no need for new gods or a large map with cities, histories, and all. The players exploring the new world would help decide all that.

And I only had the (Record) Official Character Thread to go on for characters. It has around 120+ which is still alot if you figure 5-6 characters in a party.

I did not know about the non-conversion annoucement. I have looked at a couple previews of 4e it would be difficult that's for sure.

As long as LEW is staying around ignore all my previous suggestions they were from a mad man who just found a cool place to play D&D and didn't want to lose it.

So I am just wondering now how I can help with LEW to give others time to work on L4W

Jerrand Redband said:

The world builder I was talking about

Sticky:Enworld World Guide (Work in Progress)

Has not had a post since 12-03-05 I was wondering how to help in making suggestions for some of the placeholder spots available.

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The posting dates are irrelevant, since the posts were all originally made as placeholders. It's the editing dates that tell you when content was added. Although, now that I look at it, I realize how little we've actually put there.

Jerrand Redband said:

And I only had the (Record) Official Character Thread to go on for characters. It has around 120+ which is still alot if you figure 5-6 characters in a party.

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I'm not sure how you get that number -- I see followup #371 (each of which is a character) was just posted there. I hadn't realized we'd gotten that high. Granted, a lot of those have been abandoned.

orsal said:

The posting dates are irrelevant, since the posts were all originally made as placeholders. It's the editing dates that tell you when content was added. Although, now that I look at it, I realize how little we've actually put there.

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Oh didn't think about the edit dates your right. Still I'd like to help so after the judges decide what they want to do let me know.

orsal said:

I'm not sure how you get that number -- I see followup #371 (each of which is a character) was just posted there. I hadn't realized we'd gotten that high. Granted, a lot of those have been abandoned.

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I don't know what a followup # is (still new) all I did was count the number of approved characters in post #1

Well like I said let me know if your going to want ideals on any of the LEW stuff I'm full of ideals as you can see. And good luck with L4W.

So, what are we doing now? How can I help get L4W going?