Pros and Cons of going mainstream

Neonchameleon · Dec 1, 2012

Loonook said:
Cards that contain information on specific abilities?

No. Setting the whole thing up so you don't have to look a thing up in the rulebook because it's all printed in front of you including what everything does.

Using the idea that splitting your character's levels into artificial steps does not make you Campbell. Even so, such artificial cliffs did exist in earlier editions through the edition of various follower groups, the Druid's special type of advancement, etc.

If the rules need to make the story for you that could be an issue, as that is now making a system of resolution affect the narrative directly.

I see what your problem is now... The difficulty in separating mechanics from flavor. Now your choices of games to highlight also make sense. Also you're kind of an obsessive optimizer per your other discussions in threads.

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You mean that 3e bakes an entirely narrow flavour into the rules. 4e doesn't do this. It also has a much wider array of non-casting charaters and because the D&D casting flavour is so overwhelming it has a much wider variety of casting options.

Finally 3e had the narrowest monster design of any edition of D&D because of the stupid idea that you had to make NPCs by the same rules as PCs.

As for being an obsessive optimiser, not quite. I'm obsessive at understanding what I am doing. There's a difference - but understanding what you are doing is a prerequisite to most of the benign forms of optimisation.

That's definitely an interesting place to approach gaming from. While there will always be a certain amount of gamism, narrative and simulation can be achieved through the system. The problem is that you suffer from a need to optimize so much in 3e that you find the enforced limits of 4e to be comfortable.

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I don't suffer from a need to optimise. I suffer from a need to understand what I am doing - take your ad hominem away please. I also suffer from a need to roleplay within the world set up by the rules.

The less I understood 3.X the more I enjoyed it. I find that unforgivable in design terms. The more I understand 4e the more I enjoy it - and I was sold on it the first time I flung a monster into its own pit trap without thinking about it.

Which was kind of the point behind the Ikea vs. Carpentry argument.

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Except that it's not Ikea vs carpentry. It's a massive bucket of lego for 4e with everything working with everything else vs a junk box.

In 4e you can make what you want as long as it's fantasy heroic fiction. In 3e you need to make yourself stupid, ignorant, or a conspiracy theorist in character to not take certain spells over others.

An implied level of system mastery above those who play 3e and enjoy it is just worrisome.

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Most of the people whose system mastery I respect turned their backs on 3e because they understand how it works - see, for instance Logic Ninja. (The others, like Trollman, are 3.X obsessives). [MENTION=22424]delericho[/MENTION] is a 3e fan and he, himself compares the 3e mechanical structure to having a broken arm and people pointing it out to people poking at the broken arm.

We understand the breaks in the system, we deal with them. Like a homeowner we patch the walls, lay on some paint, maybe replace the ductwork here and there...

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A homeowner in a ramshackle house.

But we also can make a nice little comfortable sweet spot cottage, or an extravagant mansion with lakes filled with dire psuedonatural koi swimming in their Lovecraftian beauty.

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Guess what? So can we with 4e. Except that the whole thing isn't held together by string and duct tape.

And the argument against the game not playing like fiction... Well, we're creating something of our own. That's the fun of our group.

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The biggest problem I have with 3e is that the magic system is overwhelming enough that you need to make up excuses for it not to become a stock 3e world. Which means it actively impedes creating something of our own. 4e on the other hand fits a vast range of settings because the builds have a lot of character and the mechanics are purposely fairly generic.

If we want a shaved orangutan who grapples using holy tattoos as a fiendhunter? We can put it together.

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I thought you said you were making your own fiction not using prefabricated stuff like fiend hunter? And the 4e grapplers (brawler fighters) who get to drag people around are much more interesting than the 3e grapplers. You've just illustrated a concept 4e does better than 3e.

Wanna play a fat merchant who uses wind magic through his ornate fan? We can do it.

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Simple reskin. Your point?

There's all sorts of ways to tweak the levels of power, base this on that, go from there.

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The levels of power shouldn't need tweaking. That's what the character level should represent.

Loonook · Dec 1, 2012

Neonchameleon said:
No. Setting the whole thing up so you don't have to look a thing up in the rulebook because it's all printed in front of you including what everything does.

You mean like Spell Cards. Which have existed since at least 2e as an option and been made by people who enjoy recipe/note cards probably since the dawn of the hobby.

You mean that 3e bakes an entirely narrow flavour into the rules. 4e doesn't do this. It also has a much wider array of non-casting charaters and because the D&D casting flavour is so overwhelming it has a much wider variety of casting options.

And again, you don't seem to understand this topic. 3e lays out 'Here is what we think a Barbarian is." Now, I can take that and make it into several different things... And go from there. Being provided with that framework gives me a great starting point to build on... But it isn't the end-all, be-all expression of that idea.

Finally 3e had the narrowest monster design of any edition of D&D because of the stupid idea that you had to make NPCs by the same rules as PCs.

Not really. Again, there was the supplied framework and how it is played. Sure, some DMs did completely encode the entire House of Plot merchant's guild into a rogue's gallery of NPCs. Others... Didn't.

4e codified a specific framework (Solos, Elites, Minions, effects, etc.) that most of us had been playing with for years. Believing that Elder Demon Bob has a CR of 21 because he appeared in the Codex of Fiends 3: Concerning All Demonic forces named Robert... Doesn't mean that's how it played out at the table.

Again, you're showing the Ikea vs. Carpenter right here.

As for being an obsessive optimiser, not quite. I'm obsessive at understanding what I am doing. There's a difference - but understanding what you are doing is a prerequisite to most of the benign forms of optimisation.

And part of DMing is knowing when to play with those optimal options.

I don't suffer from a need to optimise. I suffer from a need to understand what I am doing - take your ad hominem away please. I also suffer from a need to roleplay within the world set up by the rules.

The less I understood 3.X the more I enjoyed it. I find that unforgivable in design terms. The more I understand 4e the more I enjoy it - and I was sold on it the first time I flung a monster into its own pit trap without thinking about it.

That can be done... In any version of the game.

Except that it's not Ikea vs carpentry. It's a massive bucket of lego for 4e with everything working with everything else vs a junk box.

In 4e you can make what you want as long as it's fantasy heroic fiction. In 3e you need to make yourself stupid, ignorant, or a conspiracy theorist in character to not take certain spells over others.

You realize that, your attack on the system asides, you just made the exact same point I made through my Ikea vs. carpentry argument? 4e is a series of snap into place pieces with a heavily defined mode... Just like Ikea furniture.

Also, as I have stated... People who allowed every spell in 3e in every backwood spirit caller's shack were just silly. Those of us who remember the old Spell Compendiums saw the issues... And in our group and most of the groups I have played my almost a decade of 3.x in? We gain our spells through research, learning from others, capturing spellbooks, and traveling to learn new magic. It's fun for us to have that separation, that thematic mean, rather than just "Oh, well, everyone takes X,Y, and Z".

Most of the people whose system mastery I respect turned their backs on 3e because they understand how it works - see, for instance Logic Ninja. (The others, like Trollman, are 3.X obsessives). [MENTION=22424]delericho[/MENTION] is a 3e fan and he, himself compares the 3e mechanical structure to having a broken arm and people pointing it out to people poking at the broken arm.

And that is a recognition of the places where 3.x doesn't work, or needs to be corraled. Strangely enough, that does require a certain amount of system knowledge and the ability to delve into it. And almost never comes into play at a table unless someone has been spending fevered nights at a CharOp board.

A homeowner in a ramshackle house.

Or someone who has put that all together on their own.

Guess what? So can we with 4e. Except that the whole thing isn't held together by string and duct tape.

Really? Truly I am surprised. It is almost as if you can take disparate parts of a system and put them together as a whole.

The biggest problem I have with 3e is that the magic system is overwhelming enough that you need to make up excuses for it not to become a stock 3e world. Which means it actively impedes creating something of our own. 4e on the other hand fits a vast range of settings because the builds have a lot of character and the mechanics are purposely fairly generic.

Again... Not really. But if you believe that Vancian casting is an issue you can check out spell points, skill based magic, etc. You know, the things produced under that OGL to help people who don't like Vancian casting.

I thought you said you were making your own fiction not using prefabricated stuff like fiend hunter? And the 4e grapplers (brawler fighters) who get to drag people around are much more interesting than the 3e grapplers. You've just illustrated a concept 4e does better than 3e.

We used a lot of different mechanisms, from bull rushes, grapples, variant rules from OGL, to produce the concept.

Investing that time was part of the fun of it.

Simple reskin. Your point?

Yes. Reskinning... The thing we've been discussing that is available to anyone in any game.

The levels of power shouldn't need tweaking. That's what the character level should represent.

And again, saying that doesn't make it so. Character level is a quantifiable justification for the experiences of an individual in measure to others.

Having a bunch of broken elements, which can be ignored, doesn't immediately justify ditching an entire system.

I fear you did not strain your bath water. There seems to be an angry baby out your window.

Slainte,

-Loonook.

MoonSong · Dec 1, 2012

Neonchameleon said:
No. Setting the whole thing up so you don't have to look a thing up in the rulebook because it's all printed in front of you including what everything does.

If the rules need to make the story for you that could be an issue, as that is now making a system of resolution affect the narrative directly.

You mean that 3e bakes an entirely narrow flavour into the rules. 4e doesn't do this. It also has a much wider array of non-casting charaters and because the D&D casting flavour is so overwhelming it has a much wider variety of casting options.

Finally 3e had the narrowest monster design of any edition of D&D because of the stupid idea that you had to make NPCs by the same rules as PCs.

As for being an obsessive optimiser, not quite. I'm obsessive at understanding what I am doing. There's a difference - but understanding what you are doing is a prerequisite to most of the benign forms of optimisation.

I don't suffer from a need to optimise. I suffer from a need to understand what I am doing - take your ad hominem away please. I also suffer from a need to roleplay within the world set up by the rules.

The less I understood 3.X the more I enjoyed it. I find that unforgivable in design terms. The more I understand 4e the more I enjoy it - and I was sold on it the first time I flung a monster into its own pit trap without thinking about it.

Except that it's not Ikea vs carpentry. It's a massive bucket of lego for 4e with everything working with everything else vs a junk box.

In 4e you can make what you want as long as it's fantasy heroic fiction. In 3e you need to make yourself stupid, ignorant, or a conspiracy theorist in character to not take certain spells over others.

Most of the people whose system mastery I respect turned their backs on 3e because they understand how it works - see, for instance Logic Ninja. (The others, like Trollman, are 3.X obsessives). @delericho is a 3e fan and he, himself compares the 3e mechanical structure to having a broken arm and people pointing it out to people poking at the broken arm.

A homeowner in a ramshackle house.

Guess what? So can we with 4e. Except that the whole thing isn't held together by string and duct tape.

The biggest problem I have with 3e is that the magic system is overwhelming enough that you need to make up excuses for it not to become a stock 3e world. Which means it actively impedes creating something of our own. 4e on the other hand fits a vast range of settings because the builds have a lot of character and the mechanics are purposely fairly generic.

I thought you said you were making your own fiction not using prefabricated stuff like fiend hunter? And the 4e grapplers (brawler fighters) who get to drag people around are much more interesting than the 3e grapplers. You've just illustrated a concept 4e does better than 3e.

Simple reskin. Your point?

The levels of power shouldn't need tweaking. That's what the character level should represent.

No, 4e isn't a bucket of lego, it is a bucket of oversized building blocks with stickers to pretend they are anything else, and some people use paint where stickers don't suffice, you can build a lot of things with it, but there is only so much you can make fit on it's square shapes, may be enough for some and it's extremely safe, but pretty limited to build anything that doesn't fit on it's fundamental estructural asumptions. 3.x is more like the legos, you can build lots and lots of things with it, and if any pieces you have aren't enough, you can always go and buy the specialized pieces to fo the job, or even recurre to soem third party pieces if what you want is esoteric enough, but what you can do with it has no real limits, you arne't limited to build something that looks like a car, depending on how deep you went the thing will also move like a car, sound like a car and drive like a car. (the thing might even be able to move on it's own). and what you can build with a basic set of it goes way beyond what you can build witht he bigger blocks. Of course given their smaller granularity, they are choking hazards, and not everybody will feel comfortable with their more unstable nature, as nothing waranties they'll be structurally sound, but you can't have everything.

And there is only so much you can do by reskin, many 4e lovers have sold reskinning as the panacea for everything 4e doesn't covers. But tell me how do you create the equivalent of an exalted healer on 4e? (someone who contributes to party survivability in the wild, exudes healing, putting characters who also dabble on offensive magic to shame whern it comes to actually mending wounds and in a pinch can turn use her own blood to heal others, who can make creatures regrow limbs, cure illnesses and affections eventually brings back people from being actually dead in mere seconds, that no matter what other members on the party do, if she causes damage she contributes to that creature being subdued instead of being dead, and that eventually gets a unicorn companion who does actually fight, and most importantly she has to do all of that while playing differently than a cleric would, a skimisher more than a front-liner). Tell me how can you build something like that on 4e just by reskinning? (3.5 is just a base class pluss four feats)

pemerton · Dec 1, 2012

Steelwill said:
What is the point of using settings and creatures like Dispater and Mephistopheles that have canon already if not to stick with it?

Because they're evocative? Because someone already put the stats and backstory together? Because you want to see how they change and evolve in your game?

Dispater is a paranoid devil lord who lives in an Iron City. It doesn't follow from that that he won't bargain with an epic PC!

Steelwill said:
I mean if you don't want any expectations associated with canon, run a home brew with home brew monsters and everything. It seems really backwards to act shocked that player's would respond to the canon being wrong when it is in fact being used and incorrectly.

Luce said:
My point exactly when I talked about the two sides of the screen expectations.

There seems to be some confusion here. The example I posted wasn't a player complaining about his/her GM's "misuse" of canon. It was about a third party observer complaining about a GM's "misuse" of canon despite overwhelming evidence that the players of the game in question were very happy with the game, and were in fact driving the way that Dispater was used by the GM.

What surpised me is that an outsider would think it is more important for Chris Perkins' game to conform to canon than to be fun for and responsive to his players.

pemerton · Dec 1, 2012

Luce said:
As for why I group 3e and 4e, in the context of this discussion I see both as shift in the direction of making the rules not only consistent in terms of crunch but also in fluff. Thus the concept of overcampaigns, fluff that applies to all those who choose to run a game in published one (or even the one implied in the core books). While there are several advantages to this approach it can also lead to the mentality that if you change detail X in setting/edition Y you are not in fact playing Y but a homebrew.

Huh? 2nd ed AD&D introduced settings with canon, didn't it (though Dragonlance was the prefiguring of this trend).

I think the relevant contrast is between backstory and metaplot. 4e actively eschews metaplot. 2nd ed AD&D embraced it. 3E, I don't have a firm handle on in this respect.

JamesonCourage · Dec 1, 2012

howandwhy99 said:
It all depends upon the rules you use for your games. There are all kinds of rules you could design to cover this. I'd suggest the first step is determining what nobility will be in the game.

Oh, my RPG does have rules for determining what nobility is. Some of what you talked about was setting issues, but nobility is definitely defined mechanically in my game (how desirable you are as nobility, minor or major, what your noble family specializes in, etc.). I was just curious how you'd use rules to determine where the PCs start play, etc., or if that was decided by GM fiat (which is normal, from my understanding of most RPGs).

howandwhy99 said:
Players are generally in control of how and where their PCs move, but of course sometimes they are forcibly moved, like an earthquake ...or the city guard. The key is the NPCs are already there before the players characters arrive. And why and when those NPCs are in their where is predetermined by rules.

Yes, this is what I was curious about! It sounds very interesting. Can you give me an example of how rules decide why/when/where NPCs are? Or, point me to a system that covers this? Because I want to steal from that system.

howandwhy99 said:
That's the easy answer. Before each session you generate a scenario. You run the simulation outward far enough - along both time and space - to cover just enough of what the players may get into the next session.

I'm interested where there's rules governing this, too. For example, I get that I can use social skill rules to determine if people behind the scenes can convince each other of certain actions; however, how do I use rules to determine which person they want to talk to, or convince?

howandwhy99 said:
To answer your question, NPCs and everything about NPCs are generated just like treasures and dungeons and outdoor terrain and everything else. The first time this stuff is constructed this way (or converted from player created content) it receives a place in the game world. Where the PCs go, who they choose to stop, if they talk to them, what is talked about, what is learned/passed on, what creatures actively stop and/or seek out the PCs, and so on, is either a result of the players actions or an expression of monster behavioral rules (e.g., these monster, sometimes with these classes, know these tactics which fall under this INT rating and then implemented in these manners which fall under WIS, and so on). In the end it isn't a chart or a roll, but a mental construct of high detail backed up by notes and maps. This method provides for both a level of detail and a degree of coherency for which there is no substitute. Nothing quite compares to actually having an imagining in one's mind.

Okay, I get this, and it's more or less what I'm used to. Is there any system that has rules for placing NPCs, monsters, cities, etc. before the game starts? I'm curious, because I'd probably use that system on the fly for a lot of stuff. Thanks for the reply! As always, play what you like

Neonchameleon · Dec 1, 2012

Loonook said:
You mean like Spell Cards. Which have existed since at least 2e as an option and been made by people who enjoy recipe/note cards probably since the dawn of the hobby.

No. I mean power cards. Including martial attack powers. Have you ever played WHFRP 3e?

And again, you don't seem to understand this topic. 3e lays out
'Here is what we think a Barbarian is."

Indeed. 3e lays out "here is what we think a Barbarian is", 4e lays out "Here are five very distinct conceptions of what we think a Barbarian might be and you can mix and match building blocks from all of them". I've seen 4e barbarians so metal that when they roared to the heavens, the heavens answered their thunder with lightning. The 3e Barbarian is positively colourless alongside the 4e one - but you can cover the entire range of the 3e Barbarian with the 4e one - and have a vast array left over.

Again, you're showing the Ikea vs. Carpenter right here.

You want Ikea? Putting together prefabricated constructions with obscure names like "fiendhunter"? I'd call that the very essence of Ikea.

You realize that, your attack on the system asides, you just made the exact same point I made through my Ikea vs. carpentry argument? 4e is a series of snap into place pieces with a heavily defined mode... Just like Ikea furniture.

If that's what you mean by Ikea so is 3e. Each level in 3e is a snap into place part.

Again... Not really. But if you believe that Vancian casting is an issue you can check out spell points, skill based magic, etc. You know, the things produced under that OGL to help people who don't like Vancian casting.

Oberoni fallacy. Yes, you can houserule 3.X to take away all the 3.X rules and leave something less obnoxious and with less overwhelming fluff. Why not just take away 3.X - after all a full third of the PHB is spells.

We used a lot of different mechanisms, from bull rushes, grapples, variant rules from OGL, to produce the concept.

And it's dead easy in 4e.

Yes. Reskinning... The thing we've been discussing that is available to anyone in any game.

Except that reskinning doesn't work when you have overwhelming fluff mixed in with the mechanics - as for Vancian Casting.

And again, saying that doesn't make it so. Character level is a quantifiable justification for the experiences of an individual in measure to others.

Which means that the entire philosophical basis of the ECL and the CR system is impossible.

Having a bunch of broken elements, which can be ignored, doesn't immediately justify ditching an entire system.

No - but you need a damn good reason not to. Especially if they can't be ignored.

KaiiLurker said:
No, 4e isn't a bucket of lego, it is a bucket of oversized building blocks with stickers to pretend they are anything else, and some people use paint where stickers don't suffice, you can build a lot of things with it, but there is only so much you can make fit on it's square shapes, may be enough for some and it's extremely safe, but pretty limited to build anything that doesn't fit on it's fundamental estructural asumptions.

And yet it is more varied and versatile for building characters like those in fantasy fiction than 3e. 4e kicks the arse of 3e without breaking a sweat for non-caster versatility.

but what you can do with it has no real limits, you arne't limited to build something that looks like a car, depending on how deep you went the thing will also move like a car, sound like a car and drive like a car.

You've heard about the car with the wooden engine and the wooden wheels of course?

and what you can build with a basic set of it goes way beyond what you can build witht he bigger blocks.

Fine. Build me a Warlord with the basic set. Or build me a Barbarian who can cry to heaven and have the heavens call back. Or build me The Grey Mouser.

You're making unsubstantiated claims - back them up.

And there is only so much you can do by reskin, many 4e lovers have sold reskinning as the panacea for everything 4e doesn't covers. But tell me how do you create the equivalent of an exalted healer on 4e? (someone who contributes to party survivability in the wild, exudes healing, putting characters who also dabble on offensive magic to shame whern it comes to actually mending wounds and in a pinch can turn use her own blood to heal others, who can make creatures regrow limbs, cure illnesses and affections eventually brings back people from being actually dead in mere seconds, that no matter what other members on the party do, if she causes damage she contributes to that creature being subdued instead of being dead, and that eventually gets a unicorn companion who does actually fight, and most importantly she has to do all of that while playing differently than a cleric would, a skimisher more than a front-liner). Tell me how can you build something like that on 4e just by reskinning? (3.5 is just a base class pluss four feats)

That's just a normal 4e wisdom based PHB cleric other than the unicorn. Skirmisher? Check. Stuns rather than kills? If you like. Doesn't do much hit point damage but heals massively? Sure if you take the right powers. Sacrifices own health for others? If you take the right powers. Seriously, that's your idea of a big challenge?

If you like you can also take the Pacifist Healer feat. At that point you're outhealing anything by a very comfortable margin including other PC clerics at the cost of taking backlash if you do any damage to bloodied foes. But it really isn't necessary.

Now try The Grey Mouser. Or the Thunderborn Barbarian I mentioned above. The one who's so metal he cries to heaven and the heavens answer.

Loonook · Dec 1, 2012

Neonchameleon said:
]
Oberoni fallacy. Yes, you can houserule 3.X to take away all the 3.X rules and leave something less obnoxious and with less overwhelming fluff. Why not just take away 3.X - after all a full third of the PHB is spells.

So if we decide to change one portion of the rules... We are now worried about whether the boat is still the boat? Yes. Elements of Magic made a complete 1:1 swap for spells, with built in guidelines for any spellcasting class and full modular spellcasting for any spell with dozens of examples in a spell point system.

There was also the skill based method as presented in Eom: Mythic Earth, which did it in the style of Jedi powers for each possible type.

And it's dead easy in 4e.

It takes about the same time with 3e and a hint of system mastery.

Except that reskinning doesn't work when you have overwhelming fluff mixed in with the mechanics - as for Vancian Casting.

Not really. But it's alright.

Which means that the entire philosophical basis of the ECL and the CR system is impossible.

Or it shows that, for each group, there is going to be different ECL and CR bases. But again, it's alright.

No - but you need a damn good reason not to. Especially if they can't be ignored.

Except they can. It's weird that for approaching over a decade I've been able to do something that is impossible.

And yet it is more varied and versatile for building characters like those in fantasy fiction than 3e. 4e kicks the arse of 3e without breaking a sweat for non-caster versatility.

Uhhuh.

Fine. Build me a Warlord with the basic set. Or build me a Barbarian who can cry to heaven and have the heavens call back. Or build me The Grey Mouser.

You're making unsubstantiated claims - back them up.

Grey Mouser exists in one of the Lankhmar books statted out. Barbarians 'crying to the heavens' for lightning? Wow, a simple magic item or even a PrC could do the same... Not even difficult.

"So Metal" Barbarian, fwiw, sounds like a pretty shoddy concept for a character. But if you need we could always just check the outline for making a character class, match up the appropriate guidelines, and give a wide range of lightning and thunder based abilities over levels... Then supplement that with some basic magic items.

You seem extremely focused on being flustered regarding the fact that more people play 3.x/d20 than 4e. I understood that years ago... I had some of the same feelings. But for what we do in my group and the groups I have played with?

Never been an issue.

Slainte,

-Loonook.

MoonSong · Dec 1, 2012

Neonchameleon said:
That's just a normal 4e wisdom based PHB cleric other than the unicorn. Skirmisher? Check. Stuns rather than kills? If you like. Doesn't do much hit point damage but heals massively? Sure if you take the right powers. Sacrifices own health for others? If you take the right powers. Seriously, that's your idea of a big challenge?

If you like you can also take the Pacifist Healer feat. At that point you're outhealing anything by a very comfortable margin including other PC clerics at the cost of taking backlash if you do any damage to bloodied foes. But it really isn't necessary.

Now try The Grey Mouser. Or the Thunderborn Barbarian I mentioned above. The one who's so metal he cries to heaven and the heavens answer.

1) where is the unicorn?, the unicorn is an important part of the character.
2) it isn't "doesn't kill the thing if I'm the last to hit it", or "Apply the stunned condition" (in fact healers have zero debuffs on their spell list) is "If I ever hit it it won't die no matter how hard or mercilles my allies hit it, short of massive damage or a coup de Grace"
3) What are those powers? anything that can leave you practically dead? ( laser powers are a big no, no; the only way this character ever inflicts damage is by the way of an unaugmented melee attack with no other effect than the above one.)

Well I'm not familiar with the grey mouser at all, and the barbarian if you give me time to search for an appropriate psionic power I might be able to do it. Or short of that I'm sure we'll find something if we look for third party books hard enough.

timASW · Dec 1, 2012

The flaw in this whole thread is equating 4e with mainstream.

It wasnt. It failed because Mearls and Co dont know what mainstream gaming is anymore.

They thought 3e stopped sellling because people wanted something different. They were wrong. Some did, just like some wanted warhammer, or white wolf. But the problem with 3e sales at the end wasnt a bad system. It was that everything had BEEN DONE.

Monster books, setting books, alternate books, 3e had been done. There was nothing left to do. And so they had to publish more and more niche books, because WoTC is a business and they need to sell books.

And they made something so far from 3e that it was absurd. They tried to be games workshop or white wolf while still being D&D. And that was impossible.