I was at D&DXP on the Thursday and Friday. I was able to play the 4th edition preview adventures 3 times. I played the eladrin ranger, halfling paladin, and half-elf warlock. Much of what I learned is on the character sheets that are posted on the WotC site. But there are a few other things that I learned, such as:
Some weapons are versatile which means they are one handed weapons that will do +1 damage if used two handed. Halflings can only use these weapons two handed.
Some weapons, like the great ax, are High Crit weapons that do max damage + a die roll on a crit.
There are no fumbles on a natural 1.
Slow effect reduces speed to 2 squares. It does not affect attacks or reduce how many actions can be done in a round.
Shields add to the reflex defense.
Sleep spell slows the target the first round then they fall unconscious the 2nd round.
You add half character level to initiative.
Longbows do d10 damage.
The warlock had rogue skills like thievery.
A 5 minute rest renews per encounter abilities and a long rest is now 6 hours instead of 8.
My game play experience gave me a few impressions:
There are a lot of on going effects that go on for multiple rounds. This becomes so much for the DM to keep track of that the playtesters who DM’d came prepared with colored tokens or checkers to mark miniatures on the battle map. For instance, if someone became bloodied a red token was put under the mini. If someone became dazed a blue token was put under the mini. If someone was marked a yellow token was put under the token. Etc.
Some of the things a DM has to keep track of ever round are: who is bloodied, who is marked and by whom (there is a lot of marking), spell effects like slow & sleep, on going damage from fire and acid, and who has to make a saving throw to end effects.
The cleric was a damage dealing spell caster. There was no need for the cleric to pull out his mace and attack in melee, he just cast his radiant light spells from range. The ranger was an awesome damage dealer, he did 6-22 points of damage per hit. Most of our table’s enemies were killed by the ranger. I was told the ranger’s careful strike had a misprint in that it can be used with melee weapons as well as missile weapons.
The warlock and ranger played a lot alike. They did have encounter and daily powers that were different but there main at will attack was mark the nearest enemy for extra damage (ranger had hunters quarry for 1d8, warlock had curse for 1d6) then use a range attack for 1d10 (bow or eldritch blast respectively).
On going damage messes with your mind. Several times someone was down to less than 5 hit points and had on going fire or acid damage for 5. So you would sit there waiting for your next turn knowing you would drop before you could do anything.
Everything has more hit points. Our first level characters were fighting hobgoblins that had around 40 hit points each. Kobolds had much more hit points than in 3rd edition also.
That’s all I can think of for now. It was fun to play.
Some weapons are versatile which means they are one handed weapons that will do +1 damage if used two handed. Halflings can only use these weapons two handed.
Some weapons, like the great ax, are High Crit weapons that do max damage + a die roll on a crit.
There are no fumbles on a natural 1.
Slow effect reduces speed to 2 squares. It does not affect attacks or reduce how many actions can be done in a round.
Shields add to the reflex defense.
Sleep spell slows the target the first round then they fall unconscious the 2nd round.
You add half character level to initiative.
Longbows do d10 damage.
The warlock had rogue skills like thievery.
A 5 minute rest renews per encounter abilities and a long rest is now 6 hours instead of 8.
My game play experience gave me a few impressions:
There are a lot of on going effects that go on for multiple rounds. This becomes so much for the DM to keep track of that the playtesters who DM’d came prepared with colored tokens or checkers to mark miniatures on the battle map. For instance, if someone became bloodied a red token was put under the mini. If someone became dazed a blue token was put under the mini. If someone was marked a yellow token was put under the token. Etc.
Some of the things a DM has to keep track of ever round are: who is bloodied, who is marked and by whom (there is a lot of marking), spell effects like slow & sleep, on going damage from fire and acid, and who has to make a saving throw to end effects.
The cleric was a damage dealing spell caster. There was no need for the cleric to pull out his mace and attack in melee, he just cast his radiant light spells from range. The ranger was an awesome damage dealer, he did 6-22 points of damage per hit. Most of our table’s enemies were killed by the ranger. I was told the ranger’s careful strike had a misprint in that it can be used with melee weapons as well as missile weapons.
The warlock and ranger played a lot alike. They did have encounter and daily powers that were different but there main at will attack was mark the nearest enemy for extra damage (ranger had hunters quarry for 1d8, warlock had curse for 1d6) then use a range attack for 1d10 (bow or eldritch blast respectively).
On going damage messes with your mind. Several times someone was down to less than 5 hit points and had on going fire or acid damage for 5. So you would sit there waiting for your next turn knowing you would drop before you could do anything.
Everything has more hit points. Our first level characters were fighting hobgoblins that had around 40 hit points each. Kobolds had much more hit points than in 3rd edition also.
That’s all I can think of for now. It was fun to play.