Cirex
First Post
Introduction: Not as revolutionary as it seemed. I got some doubts and my players got mixed feelings. It started very bad, but after a heavy discussion, it went smooth and they got more involved.
The DM: That's me! After DMing Vampire (Dark Ages, modern), Lord of the Rings, old Call of Cthulhu, a Spanish RPG based on Star Wars (old d6 system) and stuff, I managed to get my hands on two AD&D books, player handbook and DM handbook. After that, everything changed and I sold my soul to it. AD&D, then 3rd edition, then 3.5. I DM quite often, since creating worlds, characters, plots and then leading them is very satisfying.
After reading about the 4th edition I raised an eye-brow (Well, I had been reading rumours about it at the official D&D forums), but after reading the first pack of rules (Thanks Enworld), I started to like it more and more. I spent a few hours learning everything I could and started to tell my players some of the rules. Three were open-minded about it, while the fourth already said that he didn't like it (After I said salvation throws are now passive defenses).
So I designed my own character sheet, translated to Spanish, inspired by Neceros' one, modified slighty Raiders of Oakhurst and translated some NPC stats. Everything was ready after hours and hours of work.
The players: Four regulars. I got two players who have been playing with me since forever. Experienced players, they were open-minded about 4th. The third is an old friend, he's been playing for us for many years too, but due to work, he hasn't had the regularity of the other two. My fourth player is an old-class mate, very intelligent guy, bit newbie at D&D, but he's a very quick learner. He didn't mind about 4e, he just wants to play any table RPG.
The two experienced players got Corrin (the halfling paladin), Riardon (eladrin ranger). My old friend got the human cleric and the "newbie", the Half-elf Warlock.
We are 24-26 years old.
Raiders of Oakhurst : I made some changes, like adding an evil wizard, who was blackmailing the town, with the aid of three bandits. Then I weakened Nightscale (reduced all defenses by four, removed the cloak of darkness ability and left her at 200 HP) and slighty changed the layout of the cave.
Before the game : My players were roughly 30-50 minutes late, which started to fill my stress-meter. At least they had been reading the four pages ruleset I had e-mailed them. We reviewed it in a few minutes, went through character powers to make sure everything was clear. Sadly, the player who came with a negative mindset, went to worse, saying he just didn't like it, failing to give me a reasoning why. Little more stress for my body, especially when he was reading some comic while I was reviewing the rules. Ah well.
Battle at the inn : Kneelit, the evil and powerful wizard, entered the inn and commanded people to leave everything valuable over the tables. Corrin, courageous paladin, stepped in front and challenged them. Shortly after, commoners were fleeing from the scene, while Corrin was tanking the three bandits without much trouble, thanks to his small-sized body and maneouvers. Tira and Riardon were trying to take down the bandits and the wizard, without much luck. Erais, the human cleric, decided to go to the upper floor of the inn, just in case he was attacked, he would have an advantadge (disruptive gaming, even justified, more stress for my body and mind).
The battle kept going, but people started to interrupt the game with off-topic issues, which aren't bad by themselves, but when we are interrupting more than playing, I feel I've wasted my time.
I was getting stressed and was thinking of just cancelling all of this, but the food arrived just in time. Thanks, KFC.
The combat finished slighty later and we started to eat. I asked if they were liking it. One said that no (of course), the warlock was enjoying it (he loved eyebite) and the other two prefered to wait for more combats to cast a judgment.
Time to kill some kobolds: Once we were done, after 10 minutes of resting, we tried to go back, but for one reason and another, I ended losing my patience and we argued for 90 minutes about things that have been happening and well, everybody exposed what he didn't like of the others (it quickly evolved in a big, but calmed down, discussion) and after that, people were very focussed. I guess they finally understood how important this was for me, so we kept going.
Riardon scouted the area, spotted Ichi-Ichi, always ready to ring the gong and four kobolds waiting patiently for the food time. They spent a few minutes planning what to do and decided to take a little risk. Tira, the warlock, would use eyebite on Ichi-Ichi, so Ichi-Ichi would suffer from a heavy headache, but with no visible target. So it happened, the kobolds raised an eye-brow at Ichi-Ichi, while he roamed around the gong without knowing what was going on. Then they charged in, with Corrin tanking the minions, Riardon bull rushing Ichi-Ichi and the other two started the mayhem. In a few rounds, it was over.
Riardon scouted the 1b area, they cleared it from the four kobolds and decided to take positions and play the gong, to receive the enemies. Otto-Wombo, four kobold minions and another skirmishers were quickly destroyed. They quickly advanced to get Meepo caught while trying to hide. Ix and Meepo took down the paladin with a nice combination of rapier attack, a critical with the crossbow and an extra 2d6 of damage for the combat advantadge of flanking. The cleric quickly brought back the paladin and they battled for not much longer, since the cleric and the ranger started to roll 20s, which turned Meepo into radiant dust.
Since it was getting quite late, Valkaze, with his warrior companion and Doros, appeared fromt he hidden door behind the throne and charged. Many players went down, but raised up by lucky healing rolls, the help of laying of hands and the wonderful healing word. Hard battle, with the hobgoblin archer hitting with every single attack and rolling consistely 12-14 damage (which is almost half HP of each character).
At this point, players had total control of their characters, using lance of faith+eldritch blast combos in example, with the paladin tanking whoever he could and the ranger having a personal duel against the hobgoblin archer.
The paladin was making a very good use of his powers, but the balance could shift to any side in any moment. Thankfully, Riardon split the tree and the battle was almost done. Tira almost died, but she was saved in the very last second by Erais with a heal roll.
The hobgoblin bandits were defeated.
Nightscale : The nerfed and weakened version of Nightscale was harder than I had predicted. Even with lowered defenses, PCs kept missing their attacks and people were suffering a lot from the ongoing damage. Erais deciced to try to use "cause fear" on Nightscale. Amaunator himself appeared and scared Nightscale, a simple young dragon can do nothing against a God! I wasn't very sure if fear lasted one round or if salvation ended it, so I went for the latter and they had three "free" rounds.
All characters went down 1-2 times each, min, but finally Nightscale was defeated and killed (I decided to reward them with Nightscale horns and scales, as a reward for enduring the discussion and stuff).
Aftermath:
So, why do I have doubts?
Well, it's some things that my players pointed and I feel they are right, however, we lack a lot of information yet. Magical items are a bit toned down and what my players enjoy is surpass challenges having a wide array of magical items, wands, rings, hats, etc. for each thing. They love to pull out wands for certain situations. They spend the money, they sacrifice getting better weapons and armors to get stuff like this. And it seems that this, in 4e, may not be possible.
With all available powers, trying to avoid the "attack power, attack power, attack power" routine, happened the same as in 3.5 after a while. Once important powers are spent, they had little reason to use different powers. The cleric was using lance of faith continously, the ranger was using his basic attack (he had no need to shift), while the warlock was combining eyebite with a random eldritch blast. The paladin was trying to keep the 3 temporary hit points up all the time, but at the last rounds, it was like "Ok, I use same power." "Same, roll, X". Not very different from 3.5...and considering spellcasters got less options now...well, we will see how it goes.
The same thing happens with NPCs, with I believe I will have to adapt to my style. If they face a human wizard, I don't expect the second wizard they fight to be the same. But well, I want to get my hands on the Monster handbook to see what I do.
For very important battles, at 3.5, I totally forget the books and create what I want. I guess I will be able to do the same with 4e, but I want to see it.
I also got doubts about my players and how they will like 4e...but well, I hope they finally like it as much as they like 3.5.
I'm sorry for the rant, but I usually don't write long posts here at Enworld, since I'm limited by the language. So, thanks for reading (or trying to
).
PS: I will be ordering the English version of the handbooks, so I don't have to wait 6-12 months to get them and pay the double. My friends got little grasp of English, so we will have to be very patient, but I hope it works.
The DM: That's me! After DMing Vampire (Dark Ages, modern), Lord of the Rings, old Call of Cthulhu, a Spanish RPG based on Star Wars (old d6 system) and stuff, I managed to get my hands on two AD&D books, player handbook and DM handbook. After that, everything changed and I sold my soul to it. AD&D, then 3rd edition, then 3.5. I DM quite often, since creating worlds, characters, plots and then leading them is very satisfying.
After reading about the 4th edition I raised an eye-brow (Well, I had been reading rumours about it at the official D&D forums), but after reading the first pack of rules (Thanks Enworld), I started to like it more and more. I spent a few hours learning everything I could and started to tell my players some of the rules. Three were open-minded about it, while the fourth already said that he didn't like it (After I said salvation throws are now passive defenses).
So I designed my own character sheet, translated to Spanish, inspired by Neceros' one, modified slighty Raiders of Oakhurst and translated some NPC stats. Everything was ready after hours and hours of work.
The players: Four regulars. I got two players who have been playing with me since forever. Experienced players, they were open-minded about 4th. The third is an old friend, he's been playing for us for many years too, but due to work, he hasn't had the regularity of the other two. My fourth player is an old-class mate, very intelligent guy, bit newbie at D&D, but he's a very quick learner. He didn't mind about 4e, he just wants to play any table RPG.
The two experienced players got Corrin (the halfling paladin), Riardon (eladrin ranger). My old friend got the human cleric and the "newbie", the Half-elf Warlock.
We are 24-26 years old.
Raiders of Oakhurst : I made some changes, like adding an evil wizard, who was blackmailing the town, with the aid of three bandits. Then I weakened Nightscale (reduced all defenses by four, removed the cloak of darkness ability and left her at 200 HP) and slighty changed the layout of the cave.
Before the game : My players were roughly 30-50 minutes late, which started to fill my stress-meter. At least they had been reading the four pages ruleset I had e-mailed them. We reviewed it in a few minutes, went through character powers to make sure everything was clear. Sadly, the player who came with a negative mindset, went to worse, saying he just didn't like it, failing to give me a reasoning why. Little more stress for my body, especially when he was reading some comic while I was reviewing the rules. Ah well.
Battle at the inn : Kneelit, the evil and powerful wizard, entered the inn and commanded people to leave everything valuable over the tables. Corrin, courageous paladin, stepped in front and challenged them. Shortly after, commoners were fleeing from the scene, while Corrin was tanking the three bandits without much trouble, thanks to his small-sized body and maneouvers. Tira and Riardon were trying to take down the bandits and the wizard, without much luck. Erais, the human cleric, decided to go to the upper floor of the inn, just in case he was attacked, he would have an advantadge (disruptive gaming, even justified, more stress for my body and mind).
The battle kept going, but people started to interrupt the game with off-topic issues, which aren't bad by themselves, but when we are interrupting more than playing, I feel I've wasted my time.
I was getting stressed and was thinking of just cancelling all of this, but the food arrived just in time. Thanks, KFC.
The combat finished slighty later and we started to eat. I asked if they were liking it. One said that no (of course), the warlock was enjoying it (he loved eyebite) and the other two prefered to wait for more combats to cast a judgment.
Time to kill some kobolds: Once we were done, after 10 minutes of resting, we tried to go back, but for one reason and another, I ended losing my patience and we argued for 90 minutes about things that have been happening and well, everybody exposed what he didn't like of the others (it quickly evolved in a big, but calmed down, discussion) and after that, people were very focussed. I guess they finally understood how important this was for me, so we kept going.
Riardon scouted the area, spotted Ichi-Ichi, always ready to ring the gong and four kobolds waiting patiently for the food time. They spent a few minutes planning what to do and decided to take a little risk. Tira, the warlock, would use eyebite on Ichi-Ichi, so Ichi-Ichi would suffer from a heavy headache, but with no visible target. So it happened, the kobolds raised an eye-brow at Ichi-Ichi, while he roamed around the gong without knowing what was going on. Then they charged in, with Corrin tanking the minions, Riardon bull rushing Ichi-Ichi and the other two started the mayhem. In a few rounds, it was over.
Riardon scouted the 1b area, they cleared it from the four kobolds and decided to take positions and play the gong, to receive the enemies. Otto-Wombo, four kobold minions and another skirmishers were quickly destroyed. They quickly advanced to get Meepo caught while trying to hide. Ix and Meepo took down the paladin with a nice combination of rapier attack, a critical with the crossbow and an extra 2d6 of damage for the combat advantadge of flanking. The cleric quickly brought back the paladin and they battled for not much longer, since the cleric and the ranger started to roll 20s, which turned Meepo into radiant dust.
Since it was getting quite late, Valkaze, with his warrior companion and Doros, appeared fromt he hidden door behind the throne and charged. Many players went down, but raised up by lucky healing rolls, the help of laying of hands and the wonderful healing word. Hard battle, with the hobgoblin archer hitting with every single attack and rolling consistely 12-14 damage (which is almost half HP of each character).
At this point, players had total control of their characters, using lance of faith+eldritch blast combos in example, with the paladin tanking whoever he could and the ranger having a personal duel against the hobgoblin archer.
The paladin was making a very good use of his powers, but the balance could shift to any side in any moment. Thankfully, Riardon split the tree and the battle was almost done. Tira almost died, but she was saved in the very last second by Erais with a heal roll.
The hobgoblin bandits were defeated.
Nightscale : The nerfed and weakened version of Nightscale was harder than I had predicted. Even with lowered defenses, PCs kept missing their attacks and people were suffering a lot from the ongoing damage. Erais deciced to try to use "cause fear" on Nightscale. Amaunator himself appeared and scared Nightscale, a simple young dragon can do nothing against a God! I wasn't very sure if fear lasted one round or if salvation ended it, so I went for the latter and they had three "free" rounds.
All characters went down 1-2 times each, min, but finally Nightscale was defeated and killed (I decided to reward them with Nightscale horns and scales, as a reward for enduring the discussion and stuff).
Aftermath:
So, why do I have doubts?
Well, it's some things that my players pointed and I feel they are right, however, we lack a lot of information yet. Magical items are a bit toned down and what my players enjoy is surpass challenges having a wide array of magical items, wands, rings, hats, etc. for each thing. They love to pull out wands for certain situations. They spend the money, they sacrifice getting better weapons and armors to get stuff like this. And it seems that this, in 4e, may not be possible.
With all available powers, trying to avoid the "attack power, attack power, attack power" routine, happened the same as in 3.5 after a while. Once important powers are spent, they had little reason to use different powers. The cleric was using lance of faith continously, the ranger was using his basic attack (he had no need to shift), while the warlock was combining eyebite with a random eldritch blast. The paladin was trying to keep the 3 temporary hit points up all the time, but at the last rounds, it was like "Ok, I use same power." "Same, roll, X". Not very different from 3.5...and considering spellcasters got less options now...well, we will see how it goes.
The same thing happens with NPCs, with I believe I will have to adapt to my style. If they face a human wizard, I don't expect the second wizard they fight to be the same. But well, I want to get my hands on the Monster handbook to see what I do.
For very important battles, at 3.5, I totally forget the books and create what I want. I guess I will be able to do the same with 4e, but I want to see it.
I also got doubts about my players and how they will like 4e...but well, I hope they finally like it as much as they like 3.5.
I'm sorry for the rant, but I usually don't write long posts here at Enworld, since I'm limited by the language. So, thanks for reading (or trying to
).PS: I will be ordering the English version of the handbooks, so I don't have to wait 6-12 months to get them and pay the double. My friends got little grasp of English, so we will have to be very patient, but I hope it works.
