D&D 4E 4e: Death of the Bildungsroman

Back in the days of yore, there were stories about heroes who went exploring and came across all sorts of nasty and wonderful things. People sat around the fire and listened to poems, tales, songs, whatever.

Then the oral tradition died. It happens.

Along came novels about heroes and magic and fantasy and everything else. The oral tradition was transformed. What had been a group performance became individualized. Readers read alone. And the stories which became novels transformed as well.

My main entry point into fantasy was literature; not movies, or video games, or anything else. Not to say that books are better than other cultural productions (although I do believe this), but that was my entry point, and that is how I got interested in D&D.

Many of the protagonists in many of the books I consumed featured youngish (usually) men (usually) who were put into difficult positions and ended up managing to overcome the odds. They acted, initially, heroic, but were not yet heroes.

It's not necessary to list many examples: this is a bedrock trope of the fantasy genre. Bilbo Baggins, Ged (of Earthsea)... these and many others characters were depicted at the start of the novel as distinctly weak. They were inexperienced, and often didn't know their own power (Ged), or never had any reason to expand their horizons and grow (Bilbo). Until adventure came along.

There are obvious psychological reasons why this sort of narrative is so durn appealing, particularly to young readers. The protagonist is, like many "real life" readers, inexperienced and ignorant about magic, war, love, life. Yet the protagonist manages to overcome many obstacles, and we cheer with them, even as we wonder... if perhaps... in some transformed way... the same sort of thing won't happen to us?

But enough of this silly grade school psychology, which I despise in any case.

The point is, the bildungsroman is dead.

Starting characters in 4e are not simply acting heroically. They are, in fact, already heroes. Not very powerful yet, but heroes. They can shoot magic all day. They can plow down a roomful of minions. They can do all sorts of neat tricks - things that a yokel from a farm using his uncle's old sword simply couldn't imagine doing.

If you didn't want to play low level D&D in 3e, you could start everyone off at level 3. You are safe from a one-hit critical, pretty much. You have a nice assortment of spells, lasting 2-3 encounters. Fighters have some feats, etc. etc.

But what if you want to play a budding mage who ran away from his village in 4e? It was easy in 3e. Just play a 1st level sorcerer or wizard. But what about 4e?

Do I have to create an artificial level 0?

Don't you remember how satisfying it was in 3e when you looked by (10 levels) and said to your friend "remember when those 3 goblins in the alley scared you to death - and almost killed you?"

There is a satisfaction which arises from moving from a state of weakness to that of strength.

I don't feel that 4e supports this.

I feel the 4e paradigm is this: move from weak Hero to powerful Hero to epic Hero.

And that saddens me.

Yes, 4e might be a much better game for having level 1 be robust and varied. But by doing this, it further removes itself from the literary precedents I hold dear, and make (in my opinion) for a less rich and varied game.

I see your point. I also like levels 1 and 2 of 3e. Simpler times.

But on the other hand:

-The ability to be killed by 1 lucky hit is not really essential to the billdungsroman, because by definition, no young hero of these stories actually ever IS killed by one hit. They live to become men.

-4e combat is predicated on a group fighting a group of around equal size. So combat is more like a 1st-level D'Artagnan and his 3 musketeer friends fighting an equal number of the Cardinal's Guard - instead of the 3e model of 4 musketeers ganging up on 2 orcs (challenge rating 1/2) or 1 Cardinal's Guard (a 1st-level swashbuckler, CR 1).

-Very little pre-D&D fantasy predicates a young mage who can only cast 1 or 2 spells a day. That's a purely D&D/Jack Vance concept. I think a young wizard who can cast at-will or with a short rest, but only weak spells and with a chance of failure, is a better model of older fantasy than a young wizard with 2 daily spells.

Yeah, that's pretty accurate.

Where the gap comes in is that, in most creative works, an inexperienced hero who manages to learn the ways after a trial period is good storytelling.

In a game, however, it's...awkward at best. Swingy. Risky. Not much fun.

4e hates characters who dn't have many skills or heroic abilities. 4e starts you as a hero, you don't earn your heroics, it is thrust upon you by Destiny.

I've yet to really see if I enjoy these kind of assumptions...but I must say, the idea that all PC's are inherently heros solves the problem of unsatisfying low-level game play, regardless of the violence it does to that particular narrative trope.

This actually reminds me of a post I was thinking of drafting, but have not had the time to write up, and was also concerned about the actual value of the post aside from me just saying "This is how I look at it."

Except that my opinion goes one step further, to me D&D does not emulate video games or heroic action movies or even novels of any kind. To me D&D IS D&D. . . And the arguments about how such and such rule or means of advancement or manifestation of a power or ability in D&D does not match what wizards (for example) do in books or movies or whatever never struck me as a very convincing argument - because I don't play D&D to reenact books or movies - I play D&D to play D&D, which is its own thing with its own tropes and approaches to things, some of which may be inspired by those sources, but I never felt they should have to emulate any of the them, or be changed to be more like them (esp. since for every example of fighting or magic being like X in one book or series, you could point to how it is like Y or Z in another). So yeah, Vancian magic (for example) never bothered me- it makes as much sense any other way to model a make-believe thing.

So yeah, in a way I hear ya. . . but like I said, I go one better and say, don't even get hung up on what books do, do what you do as suggested by the rules of the edition that works for you.

two said:

I feel the 4e paradigm is this: move from weak Hero to powerful Hero to epic Hero.

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I have the same sort of concern but in retrospect I would argue that D&D has always been about taking someone who was a weak Hero to more powerful levels of being a Hero.

Sure, we started out as 1st-Level Magic Users. But we never started out in an "Apprentice" class or a "Rat Catcher" or "Orphan" class. That's never been a part of the D&D experience. WHFRP? Yes. D&D? No.

One of the reasons I liked Darkness & Dread so much was because it tacked on this possibility to 3e. But, really, even with the careers/classes listed in Darkness & Dread, it was not preferable to have a party composed of, say, a KennelMaster, a Veteran and a Sorcerer in the rules-as-written. The sorcerer would outclass the other two. But at least the option was on the table.

I agree that 4e will not support the Apprentice-to-Archmage story arc. But I'd posit that no version of D&D supported it well. 0-level play would not be a hack unique to 4e. Groups have been doing it since at least 2e and I've read many posts that suggest it was pretty common in 3e as well.

I think 4e makes it a little easier though. But I don't think we'd know for sure until we see a PHB and a DMG. Just have the PCs accumulate their powers bit-by-bit, as they start to fill their heroic shoes.

Assuming a three-stage 0-level tier, I don't think it would be too terrible. But that's speculation.

I'm guessing that the 4e design team ramped up the numbers for 1st level because it supported the math better and because they realized that most groups preferred starting at level-3 or higher. While I'm a fan of zero-to-hero play, I'll be the first to admit I'm a minority -- at least in the groups I've been associated with.

Perhaps a good compromise would be to have players recount their previous lives in flashback vignettes. Also, framing their experience in a world where Apprenticeships were brief and adulthood came on fast may help. Think more "Song of Ice and Fire" than "Bilbo and the Shire".

That way, the vignettes become more stories of their childhood and how they grew up, rather than playing out a 10-year apprenticeship to a Wizard. It could also be a nice way to introduce NPCs or connections to the PCs when they really need them.

First, let me just say, that was very well written.

I too entered D&D through the reading of various fantasy novels, and you do bring up some very valid points in your post. Somwtimes it was fun to play a character who was just starting off and was relatively weak when compared to the world at large. However, while this may be fun for some, it is not for all. There is great potential for character growth when the character in question begins their career when they are young and inexperienced, but that growth can only occur if that character does not "die". Most of the time in 3e, with ANY character, you faced the possibility of certain death delivered by a single, critical blow. So, without the ability to be inexpensively raised from the dead, the character you wanted to rise from the depths of obscurity has now fallen into just that...and never will he/she escape. Time to roll up a new character.

Again, this is fine for some, but not everyone wants to roll up a new character, who faces the same odds of dying as his predecessor. So, 4E's attempt to "Hero-fi" 1st level is, IMO, rooted in the hope of increasing character longevity and continuity, as well as to perserve the fun factor.

So, in short, yeah, it might be nice to play a character from the weak, commoner stage all the way to the Immortal Hero stage (and you still can in 4E with house ruling, so I assume), but playing a "hero" from the beginning has several advantages......like decreasing the odds of your character dying while your d6's are still warm from character generation.

-Ambitious, weak youth= Possibility of immense character growth, but also the possibility of instant death.
-Local Hero already= Possibility of character growth still present (though maybe not as dramatic), yet the chances of you dying without achieving that growth are lessened.

Just my thoughts.

While the style of play that starts characters as youths straight off the farm who can't do much is somewhat common, I agree with making this no longer the default. I have great faith that someone (3PPs, houserulers, or WotC themselves) will develop a reasonable system for doing farmboy-to-hero, since there is a demand.

But I think the majority of gamers want their characters to be interesting and at least somewhat effective from the start, and certainly new gamers will see level 1 as the appropriate starting point. They won't know to "start at level 3" to get what they want out of the game. If they "mistakenly" start from level 1 and don't like being ineffective, they may never make it to the "sweet spot".

So a question, is it enough for you that a game can reasonably and easily be made to suit your preferred style of play (perhaps even as an "official" option), or is it important to you that your preferred style of play is the default style in the game?

The point is, the bildungsroman is dead.

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Hmmm. An interesting topic, for sure.

I don't think that this style of play is going to destroy bildungsroman in the way you describe. As I understand it, Bildungsroman is not necessarily about moving from an immature to a mature state, but the process of maturity and the journey towards that change.

If we talk about this purely game mechanical terms, this movement from immature to mature state still exists, it's just that the scale is different. Level 1 is still the least mature state a character can be in, level 30 is the most, and truly represents an endpoint for all characters. Instead of fighting 4 kobolds at 1st level, a party might fight 12. You might notice that the curve of power is significantly flattened across the levels, so while power has been increased at first level, what is gained as a character levels appears to have been spaced out more evenly.

If we talk about bildungsroman from a narrative perspective, (as I suspect you are really concerned with) PCs may have a few extra powers, but a 1st level character can still be representative of whatever you like. The standard narrative tropes will work just as well in 4e as they have in the past. The talented-but-mercenary youth might start a quest to gather riches and improve his personal power, but his outlook may greatly change as the story progresses. The cleric gifted with tremendous divine power may not really understand that power, and his callowness makes him impressionable to multiple parties, both good and bad. Who will seek to influence him, what will his choices be, and where will those choices take him?

At the end of the day, I think the kinds of stories you mention will remain. Perhaps they will look slightly different, but I think the chances of them being swept away by 4e are slim. Rather, as you mention in the beginning of your post, they will undergo and transformation.

Rex Blunder said:

I see your point. I also like levels 1 and 2 of 3e. Simpler times.

But on the other hand:

-The ability to be killed by 1 lucky hit is not really essential to the billdungsroman, because by definition, no young hero of these stories actually ever IS killed by one hit. They live to become men.

-4e combat is predicated on a group fighting a group of around equal size. So combat is more like a 1st-level D'Artagnan and his 3 musketeer friends fighting an equal number of the Cardinal's Guard - instead of the 3e model of 4 musketeers ganging up on 2 orcs (challenge rating 1/2) or 1 Cardinal's Guard (a 1st-level swashbuckler, CR 1).

-Very little pre-D&D fantasy predicates a young mage who can only cast 1 or 2 spells a day. That's a purely D&D/Jack Vance concept. I think a young wizard who can cast at-will or with a short rest, but only weak spells and with a chance of failure, is a better model of older fantasy than a young wizard with 2 daily spells.

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I agree with pretty much everything in this post. What you have to remember is that 4e is trying to model, to a much larger degree, a story rather than strict realism. Just as Rex here said: Sure, a young hero in one of these stories realistically could be dropped in very few hits, but does that ever happen in a story? No. Given extreme circumstances, such as being ganged up on by kobolds or facing a much larger foe, yes, he will die, but that single lucky crit from a goblin is no longer enough to make that player reroll. Which is a good thing, imo. Keep in mind, too, that everything, damage, hp, etc has been boosted slightly upwards, so a 23 hp level 1 wizard shooting 2d4+4 magic missiles might seem extreme in 3e terms, but it has to be seen in context with the system (and more specifically, the monsters).

Regarding the powers, I certainly see where you're coming from, but the way I see it the DM just has to redouble his efforts in giving the PCs an appropriate fear of death. You know, kind of show them that "yeah, you can do all this fancy stuff, but there are still beings out there that are much, much tougher than you are, so watch it." I think the PCs can still feel weak without being rendered useless on a regular basis.

Don't you remember how satisfying it was in 3e when you looked by (10 levels) and said to your friend "remember when those 3 goblins in the alley scared you to death - and almost killed you?"

There is a satisfaction which arises from moving from a state of weakness to that of strength.

I don't feel that 4e supports this.

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This is in error.

The simplest answer is to tell you to just go and look at the encounters in Keep on the Shadowfell. Also, take a look at the compiled 4e preview info, including the stats on goblins. You seem to be under a grave misapprehension about them.

A more complex answer would be to explain the various ways you seem to be applying 3e rules to 4e.

Why, for example, is it bad that 4e wizards have at will spellcasting? How is that incompatible with being new at magic? Its not, of course. It just seems that way because in 3e casting Magic Missile at will was considered a very high level power that required a feat and permanently consumed a high level spell slot.

Or take 4e fighters. In 4e, if you know how to fight, you get some special combat tricks that aren't generally available to the rest of the world. That's just the nature of the gameworld. And in D&D, fighters know how to fight. In 3e this was represented by weapon and armor proficiency, and a bonus feat. In 4e, they get powers just like anyone else. If you want proof that this does NOT make them awe inspiring engines of destruction, just compare their stats to a standard issue human guard, which is a level 3 opponent.

4e has reshuffled the power curve. First level characters have more "things" they can do, but, it takes them eight levels before they get to the point where, if they outnumber their foes 2 to 1, they can take on the tougher orcs in the monster manual.