D&D 4E My compiled list of 4E's WoWisms

[Firevalkyrie]

Eh, blizzard steals most of its ideas from games workshop.

warcraft = warhammer
starcraft = 40k

Nope. Metzen has specifically said in interviews that Warcraft is based on his D&D campaign from the early-mid 80s. That's why he insisted that the Warcraft RPG be based on D&D even though a custom system (or at least a more heavily customized one) would have better suited the game.

 

[Daniel D. Fox]

Warcraft is clearly based off of Warhammer. Frankly, I am surprised Games Workshop never fully realized a case of plagarism against the creators of Warcraft.

 

[Cryndo]

These are just my personal feelings on what seems to be almost direct imports or ideas that the 4E designers seem to be "borrowing" from WoW (or other MMOs, but mostly WoW).

• WotC's Sample Dragon Fight is very similiar to the Onyxia Fight in WoW
• The Quest card "idea" - resemble WoW's quest log
• Level limits on magic items, rings specifically - WoW has items that require a certain level to equip
• 4E classes are now sub-divided into character roles (Defender, Leader, Controller, Striker) - WoW has similiar roles (Tank, Crowd Control, Healer, DPS aka damge-per-second)
• Certain creatures in 4E will be designated as "elite" creatures, meant for a whole party to take on one of these creatures; see the Eilte Bulette - WoW also has elite creatures

I don't think there can be any doubt those features appear in WoW; just as they appeared in EQ long before WoW came out; as many of these features appeared in D&D a couple decades prior to the release of EQ.

Of the WoWisms you list, the Quest cards and level limits on magic items are really the only "new" ideas to D&D. Quest cards can hardly be considered an earth-shattering change since I know some DMs already implemented a similar system.

WoW has borrowed considerably more from D&D than D&D will ever borrow from WoW. WoW owes it's whole existance to D&D.

 

[Cam Banks]

Warcraft is clearly based off of Warhammer. Frankly, I am surprised Games Workshop never fully realized a case of plagarism against the creators of Warcraft.

Warhammer comes out of the British fantasy gaming scene, which was for the most part D&D and RuneQuest for a good long while. White Dwarf used to be a general gaming magazine, and many of the "chaos spikey bits" present in Warhammer were once part of Citadel Miniatures, D&D adventures written by TSR UK, etc. It's entirely believable that Metzen's own D&D game shares many things in common with Warhammer, given the gaming culture at the time.

Cheers,
Cam

 

[Tewligan]

These are just my personal feelings on what seems to be almost direct imports or ideas that the 4E designers seem to be "borrowing" from WoW (or other MMOs, but mostly WoW).

Disclaimer: If the "feature" above appears in WoW, then I consider it a WoWism. That does NOT mean that other media does not have it or that they didn't have it first. It does NOT mean that the "feature" doesn't predate WoW, it very well could.

So, you're suggesting that the 4e designers are lifting some features from WoW, but then a couple of paragraphs later you admit that it may have already been in D&D in the first place? It hardly seems far to put those things on the list of things they've lifted from WoW then, does it?

EDIT: Hm, I didn't read the whole thread - however, it looks like several people have probably already said the same thing I did. Ah, well.

 

[nerfherder]

I'd like to see a list of WoW's D&Disms and see which is longer.

By the OP's bizarre definitions, the two are synonymous :\

 

[Doug McCrae]

It's perfectly possible for a concept to have originated in source A, been copied by source B at a later date but be rightly regarded as a B-ism rather than an A-ism. The outstanding example is the light sabre, probably the most distinctive feature of Star Wars, definitely a Star Wars-ism, but the concept didn't originate there. It probably came from some 50s Asimov stories. But no one would regard the light sabre as an Asimov-ism.

Likewise it's clear that 'kaboom gnomes' have become a WoW-ism even though tinker gnomes predate WoW.

So it would be possible for other features that WoW stole from D&D to become WoW-isms rather than D&D-isms.

 

[glass]

Possibly as a point of reference. While he may not have a stake in this, there are a lot of people who have accused 4e of drawing from WoW and been told in reply that it does not. Much like that "find the anime" thread, it makes it its own issue which can be resolved rather than being a constant sideline in 20 other debates.

Doesn't this:

To be clear: WoWism = feature that appears in WoW, regardless if it appeared/appears elsewhere as well.

Make it kinda pointless for that too?


glass.

 

[FadedC]

The first attack in each instances is a area-effect breath of fire.
They both have an attack that deals damage to the targets in front. For WoW it is Onyxia's Cleave ability, for 4E it is a claw attack.
They both have a tail attack, the effects of which knock people back.
They both have another fire attack, but this is a ball of fire that targets a single target (something D&D dragons weren't previously able to do).

Hmm.....well quite a few corrections here.

Onyxia's first attack is not an area effect breath, she usually whacks the target a few times first.
I don't believe that Onyxia has a frontal cleave (although some other dragons in WoW do...perhaps your thinking of Vael?).
Onyxia cannot throw balls of fire at people in the middle of melee. She only does this when she completely disengages from melee, flies into the air, and begins to breath fire on people at random.

The tail attack is the only thing that made me think of Onyxia.

 

[Kanegrundar]

I personally thought that Blizzard ripped off the idea for the Draenei from the old Diabolus race. Hell, they even look alike!