Dear Mike & Monte

I don't want rules, rules, rules - except for combat.

I don't want needless redundancy (see: the existing power system)

Refluffing should be an important part of the game - as long as the fluff can fit, it should be usable!

I don't want RP-only effects (craft, profession, certain feats, et cetera) to be built into the base system. These get in the way of RPing, in my experience, and detract from effectiveness. Make this a variant module.

I want more than two pillars of character creation! Race and class should carry near equal weight, and there should be a theme or similar as well!

I don't want feat glut - no feats just for elf wizards! Very few just for elves, or just for wizards!

I want fast combat that can be played with or without minis.

I want meaningful conditions, but I don't want them to dominate play and make tracking effects difficult.

I want combat to be dynamic - no full attack/pass, ever!

Off-turn actions should be available, but not the be-all, end-all.

In short; I want rules for combat, and a system for layering descriptions onto those rules, so I can do close to whatever I want with it, and without a lot of the glut seen in both 3e and 4e.

Magic should be flexible, dangerous, and wondrous, but also limited.

- Magic should not be the end-all be-all fix to problems in adventures. There should not be a spell for everything, as that not only bloats spell lists, but it also overshadows non-mages.

- Higher level magic should not be an automatic "I win" button.

- Mages, of all sorts, should have their moments to shine, but not at the persistent expense of "the mundanes."

- Drastically reduce the spell list, but make it flexible enough for both character customization/specialization and combat improvisation.

- Upper level mages should be of equivalent power as non-mages.

- Mages should have at-will magical attacks and prestidigitation. Let mages feel magical by constantly having spells to throw around to defend or amuse themselves. (Perhaps with minor restrictions, such as "must have a wand or staff" equipped.)

Classes should be defined and distinguished by playstyle.

- By designing classes around popular playing styles, you were both on the right track with Arcana Evolved and Iron Heroes.

- Simply having one caster who, for example, is basically designed around doing the same thing with divine magic instead of arcane magic is not going to cut it.

Clerics (and healers of all stripes) should be optional and not mandatory. for successful adventures.

- If people enjoy healing and support, then let them play that. But it should not be assumed or required for adventures. (I would honestly like to see [much like in Arcana Evolved] the arcane classes being given some magical healing to reduce the load and dependency of healer classes.)

Aldarc said:

Magic should be flexible, dangerous, and wondrous, but also limited.

- Magic should not be the end-all be-all fix to problems in adventures. There should not be a spell for everything, as that not only bloats spell lists, but it also overshadows non-mages.

- Higher level magic should not be an automatic "I win" button.

- Mages, of all sorts, should have their moments to shine, but not at the persistent expense of "the mundanes."

- Drastically reduce the spell list, but make it flexible enough for both character customization/specialization and combat improvisation.

- Upper level mages should be of equivalent power as non-mages.

- Mages should have at-will magical attacks and prestidigitation. Let mages feel magical by constantly having spells to throw around to defend or amuse themselves. (Perhaps with minor restrictions, such as "must have a wand or staff" equipped.)

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I don't mind higher-level magic having an "I win" component as long as there is an associated risk to the caster and-or her allies.

Classes should be defined and distinguished by playstyle.

- By designing classes around popular playing styles, you were both on the right track with Arcana Evolved and Iron Heroes.

- Simply having one caster who, for example, is basically designed around doing the same thing with divine magic instead of arcane magic is not going to cut it.

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I'll add in: give all classes some relevant out-of-combat utility abilities if possible; and make sure the utility spells stay in.

Clerics (and healers of all stripes) should be optional and not mandatory. for successful adventures.

- If people enjoy healing and support, then let them play that. But it should not be assumed or required for adventures. (I would honestly like to see [much like in Arcana Evolved] the arcane classes being given some magical healing to reduce the load and dependency of healer classes.)

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What's the point, then? All that would do is concatenate arcane and divine casters into one caster type...making it more powerful/essential to have in a party instead of less.

I don't mind healers/support being essential as long as there's an assumption going in that if the players don't want to play it then the DM will lob an NPC into the party to handle that role.

Lan-"I have 76 hit points, but not very often"-efan

Lanefan said:

I don't mind higher-level magic having an "I win" component as long as there is an associated risk to the caster and-or her allies.

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More in terms of things that basically having the caster completely rewrite the universe or instantly demolish everything.

What's the point, then? All that would do is concatenate arcane and divine casters into one caster type...making it more powerful/essential to have in a party instead of less.

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See Arcana Evolved's universal spell system. Also see other systems that opt for the warrior-rogue-mage trinity instead of the warrior-rogue-mage-cleric quaternary.

I don't mind healers/support being essential as long as there's an assumption going in that if the players don't want to play it then the DM will lob an NPC into the party to handle that role.

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I take that as a sign that the necessity of healers should be reconsidered. Why should healers be required at all?

Aldarc said:

More in terms of things that basically having the caster completely rewrite the universe or instantly demolish everything.

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If instantly demolishing "everything" is going to include the caster and allies I suspect most casters would have serious second thoughts.

As for rewriting the universe (I assume you're referring to "Wish" here), that's where the DM comes in: the more you ask for, the greater the chance of it going horribly irredeemably wrong.

See Arcana Evolved's universal spell system. Also see other systems that opt for the warrior-rogue-mage trinity instead of the warrior-rogue-mage-cleric quaternary.

I take that as a sign that the necessity of healers should be reconsidered. Why should healers be required at all?

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Because otherwise you're going to spend an awful lot of time every session watching people rest and recuperate. (the 4e idea of getting back to full h.p. after a night's rest just doesn't work for me at all)

Healers are a game mechanic to allow you to get on with the game, pure and simple, only they have been inserted into the game in a way that is sensible and believable within the game world. I'm more than ready to live with that.

That, and I like the divine influence. If I ever were to go to a "trinity" as you call it, it'd probably be warrior-thief-cleric and leave out the arcane. But I don't see myself ever doing that.

Lanefan

Lanefan said:

Because otherwise you're going to spend an awful lot of time every session watching people rest and recuperate. (the 4e idea of getting back to full h.p. after a night's rest just doesn't work for me at all)

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What do you mean "otherwise"? Doesn't that presume that a healerless D&D must work in one particular way with one particular design? But it doesn't have to be that way. Nor does it have to be the 4E way.

Edit: For example, what if the design of "healing" and clerics were completely rethought such that they did not so much cast spells to patch up damage, but to prevent the damage from being taken? This is an approach that is becoming increasingly common in video games with "healers" or even those without healing roles (i.e. Guild Wars 2). Taking a cue from 4E, what if healing or damage prevention was simply a secondary effect of a cleric's attack?

Healers are a game mechanic to allow you to get on with the game, pure and simple, only they have been inserted into the game in a way that is sensible and believable within the game world. I'm more than ready to live with that.

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And that's what I find so problematic. The class is designed to be a crutch that let's players of other classes play the game properly. The cleric helps cope with the fundamental design flaw without actually fixing the problem. But D&D should be designed, in some way or another, to make playing support an option but not a requirement (i.e. a crutch).

That, and I like the divine influence. If I ever were to go to a "trinity" as you call it, it'd probably be warrior-thief-cleric and leave out the arcane. But I don't see myself ever doing that.

Lanefan

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Isn't the triune in the original edition of D&D though? Isn't the triune what you find in many RPGs? (e.g. Diablo 1, Dragon Age, etc.)

1) When providing game advice, don't state it in absolutes, like "talking with guards isn't fun". Provide different interpretations and approaches to issues. Don't make believe you really think there is just one way to do things.

2) Fluff vs Reference Manual:
The rule books should provide stuff that is written "fluffy". In-character descriptions of events and things like that. Make a large enough section of the book fun to read for a player.

But when it comes to the hard rules, formulate them clearly, present them in a clean format that is fast to read and works as a reference at the gaming table. Do not shy away from repeating information in a more formal context.

3) Points of Light:
The setting, t he mythology, and all the vague and undefined elements, the cosmology, it's all awesome. Don't throw it out!

4) Balance
It is still important. D&D 4 presents the best attempt at it so far. Don't sacrifice any of that. There must be ways to maintain balance and still appeal to storytellers, grognards and whatnot.

Mustrum "Grogn4rd" Ridcully

Mustrum Ridcully said:

1) When providing game advice, don't state it in absolutes, like "talking with guards isn't fun". Provide different interpretations and approaches to issues. Don't make believe you really think there is just one way to do things.

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Oh, for the love of all that is holy, DO THIS!

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Here's something I want. I want, as a DM, to be able to stat up a monster, by hand, in under five minutes. I want a stat-block to take up two lines at most. I want to go back to very simplistic monsters which had maybe one special ability at most.

The "stat block" needs to go.

However, that being said, I would like a fairly lengthy list of maneuvers that monsters could perform - fairly standard actions (not the game mechanic standard action, but, stuff that comes up fairly often) that work based on the creature's capabilities. For example, a giant's stat block would have what the PC's need to roll to hit it, it's HP, move, attack bonus and damage. It's a giant, it doesn't need anything else.

However, in the Monster Maneuver's section there would be something with the prerequisite of hands and very large size which would allow me to pick up an enemy and toss him X squares away for Y damage. All creatures that fit the pre-requisite can do this. Add in a bunch more like that, and I'm a happy camper.