Let's help Mouseferatu with the APG

[Charwoman Gene]

I didn't even thing that non-WotC employees had even gotten a look at the 4E rules yet.

He has an NDA, he can't really answrer.
Play Tester?
Working on a Freelance Project for WotC?

 

[Henry]

Why would people be interested in this product if they know WotC will release those races and classes anyways in the near future?

Considering the "near future" could be one to two years away, it's worth a look-see.

 

[Rechan]

He has an NDA, he can't really answrer.
Play Tester?
Working on a Freelance Project for WotC?

Ari is a freelancer. Many of the freelancers got their hands on the rulesets.

 

[Oldtimer]

2) Sorcerers were created specifically to allow a second class to make use of the wizard spell list, and to provide a spontaneous arcane caster for those who wanted it. These are no longer necessary viable requirements in 4E, given the chance to at-will, encounter, and daily powers.

Yes, I can well understand this point. There were similar thoughts about the sorcerer class in R&C.

I suppose "casting with Charisma instead of Intelligence" is not enough (or maybe not even true) in 4e.

Funny, that the first caster class to deviate significantly from the age-old vancian caster, turned out to be too similar to the wizard in the end (after the extreme wizard make-over of 4e). It just makes me wish there was some way to salvage the concept, but basically the wizard killed the sorcerer and took his stuff...

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Eh? I thought the Druid was introduced in 2e via kits.

Back in my 1st ed. days, I was one of those guys who only ever played one class, and I played druids. Somewhere, I still have some official AD&D character sheets complete with druid spell lists and my old player characters.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Base Classes:

Assassin (possibly a mix of Fighter/Rogue with some sort of Poison Use talent tree), but not restricted to evil (like Paladins are no longer restricted to LG).

Druid (more spells-oriented, with Rainbow and Chariot of Sustarre spells waiting at 7th level, dammit!)

Monk (Grand. Master. Of Flowers. Less of an overt shaolin feel and more Scarlet Brotherhood feel)

Barbarian (self-buffing, doesn't trust magic, even beneficial ones).

Naturally-occurring half-orcs.

My art.

I endorse this post.

 

[Irda Ranger]

How did you finish so quickly? I didn't even thing that non-WotC employees had even gotten a look at the 4E rules yet.

Freelancers (who are doing work for WotC) have had the rules (in draft form) longer than the third-party publishers. Orcus admitted this in his post about jumping to 4E; and about how he hired Ari to write the APG before Orcus had even seen the rules. I assume Ari is doing work on 4E books for WotC (though I would not presume to know (or ask) which ones).

 

[Acid_crash]

All I can say is wow, there's already an options book in the works and the game is still six months away from being released... isn't that jumping the gun a bit?

 

[morbiczer]

Why would people be interested in this product if they know WotC will release those races and classes anyways in the near future. I'd rather just wait for the official product instead of ending up with redundant material.
Wouldn't it be better for the 3rd parties to stay away from Wotc's path?

Apparently plenty of people were happy to pay 2 × 20 USD for the preview books, although they could have waited half a year for the official product.

So there will be many, who will buy this APG, even if they would know that some of the content will get official treatment soon.

 

[Vradna]

Apparently plenty of people were happy to pay 2 × 20 USD for the preview books, although they could have waited half a year for the official product.

So there will be many, who will buy this APG, even if they would know that some of the content will get official treatment soon.

That is a valid point, but I do not think people are looking at this to get stuff they might have later from WotC or have stuff that WotC are not covering in an official capacity. From what I gather, the Advanced Players Guide is how to have the character classes and races that appeared in the first editions of AD&D using 4th Edition rules. It sounds like a variant players handbook as opposed to a book that illustrates all the bits that WotC left out but may add in later.

For example, Thief-Acrobat was something a Thief took at 6th level (I think). I would hazard a guess that were a Thief-Acrobat analogue to appear in the APG, it would use a Talent Tree or some sort of Paragon Path (ala 4th Edition rules) to do the same thing.

We may even see several variants of the Ranger, similar to what happened with the Ranger class and all its variants of 3rd Edition, only this one may be a Giant Slayer, able to use some Druidic and Wizard abilities. Bard would mix Fighter, Thief and Druid, so on and so forth. To take it a step further, you may even see some 1st Edition Oriental Adventures classes and races thrown in there as well.

(And yes, I did miss Cavalier from my earlier post. Sorry.)

It may help to pick up the old PHB or the OSRIC rules and have a skim though it, using a 4th Edition eye to how things can translate across.

I just hope I am right!