D&D 4E New "Confessions of a Full Time Wizard" - 4e tidbits!

[Cadfan]

Gotta say, this column has solidified my decision on D&D 4e. I am sure other people love it, but for me, D&D and point buy character creation systems are mutually exclusive. When I create D&D characters I expect to be rolling dice for attributes. If I want to play a point buy fantasy game, I will pull out my GURPS and play that. That little bit of information pushed me from "I am going to continue playing 3e at least until this campaign is over, possibly longer," to "I really don't see how 4e is D&D anymore, I don't think I will bother." It just strikes me as another "let's change it because we can" situation. As I said, I am sure lots of people love the change to point buy. I just don't like it.

Move over bad dice rolls, now there’s something meatier: point buy! You start with six base numbers and get to improve them with points you can distribute where you like. I dumped a bunch into Intelligence and Wisdom, and then bumped up Charisma because someone has to sweet talk the minions. If you’re the gambling type and don’t want to mess with science, you can still leave it to the dice -- just start saving your gold now for braces and SAT prep classes.

If you can be turned solidly against 4e because you like rolling for characters and 4e has point buy, even though the same article that told you that also told you that rolling for characters is still supported, well...

 

[The_Gneech]

And when she kills a monster, candy comes shooting out of its neck.

Or something.

-The Gneech

 

[sjmiller]

If you can be turned solidly against 4e because you like rolling for characters and 4e has point buy, even though the same article that told you that also told you that rolling for characters is still supported, well...

Yes, because, dice rolling will most likely be optional. Optional rules don't have to be allowed by a DM, and quite often are not allowed, at least in the games I have seen over the years. the DMs I have played with in the recent past have been extremely frugal on allowing optional rules. Not only that, but it is one of those changes that, I feel, is being done just to make it different from previous editions. "See, this edition is cooler because you do not have to use those nasty dice to create your character, you can assign points just like your favorite video games!" Sorry, to me, that's not D&D.

 

[Driddle]

I surprised no one mentioned the bits about the char sheet yet. Apparently there will be a space for personality ...

I don't know if you intended it as such, but that's darned funny.

 

[Traycor]

*snip* but it is one of those changes that, I feel, is being done just to make it different from previous editions. *snip*

More likely the change was made for balance reasons concerning Pick Up games played over DDI. Things become dubious when unknown players enter your game with all 18s.

Having point-buy as default makes it easier to check a little box that only allows point-buy characters into your games online.

 

[Agamon]

I dunno. 2 hours? That's just way too long to actually read the blog and any of the above posts.

 

[Lanefan]

Why is it every time I start getting a bit more optimistic about 4e, something gets revealed that pushes me right back to the wrong side of neutral.

This time it's the revelation that point buy is to be the default stat-gen rule...an awful development, from my perspective, which pretty much ensures that although I may buy a few 4e core books, I'll never play it as written.

Lane-"pass me some dice"-fan

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Why is it every time I start getting a bit more optimistic about 4e, something gets revealed that pushes me right back to the wrong side of neutral.

This time it's the revelation that point buy is to be the default stat-gen rule...an awful development, from my perspective, which pretty much ensures that although I may buy a few 4e core books, I'll never play it as written.

Lane-"pass me some dice"-fan

Wow, I cannot believe that point-buy versus dice roll would be such a divisive feature of 4e. You can play it "as written" if they have written in dice rolling as an optional rule, it just isn't the default method.

 

[3d6]

I seem to remember polls on ENWorld that indicated that most groups used point buy -- that certainly matches my experiences with 3E D&D. It sounds like they're making the more commonly used rule the default one, which seems eminently reasonable.

 

[am181d]

The point-buy thing is one of those elements of 4e that's been telegraphed quite plainly. What I want to know is: "Will more or fewer people be upset when they announce that you dodn't roll for hit points every level?"

Honestly, these are the sort of no-brainer changes that should have been made decades ago. Random stats means that one player gets a bad-ass character when another has to play a midling or weak one. It means a few poorly rolled stats can unbalance the entire game. It just doesn't make sense, except in that 11 year old "I rule! You drool!" sort of way.

In my current game, I'm playing 3.5 RAW and one of my players got stuck with a 3. That's fine if that's the kind of character you want to play, but why on Earth would you force that on someone?