The Early Verdict (kinda long)

[SSquirrel]

So to build this kind of characters you have to ignore rules. Strangely in 3E you didn't have to do that. So which edition does support this kind of characters better?

What edition of D&D are you not ignoring rules to play a Wizard who only has one spell? Hand-waving rules goes both ways.

I really get tired of this kind of argument. The bard's been core since 1989 and in the main books since a decade before that. Why should we have to wait for it now? Why should it have been removed from the initial core to show case the promotion of a second string character class from a previous edition supplement?

Because while it has been in the books in various forms for ages, it has never been very good mechanically and they wanted to spend more time to make it the best it could be. I see people (heck I yell about it myself) complain when a company rushes something out to meet an arbitrary deadline than to say "when it's done it gets released" like some companies do. No, I'm not talking about WotC here

Oriental Adventures (1st edition) included non-weapon proficiencies that could be extremely important in the highly stratified world of the samurai, where warriors were expected to exhibit refined social graces as well as martial prowess. These non-weapon prpficiencies were incorporated into at least 2 adventures published by TSR. One of these was a tea ceremony, the other an impromptu poetry contest during a moon viewing event. Good performance could lead to a better political connection with the daimyo.

A very good example of how this can be handled very well. One thing I would note tho is that the setting specifically added NWPs b/c there was a view that they were more needed than some of the other settings that TSR had published. Yes some of them were released prior to NWPs existence, but the social needs of a more eastern game, they felt, called for them.

So in 4E, why not create a setting where social niceties like that are more expected and say that every character gets to pick 3 skills off of a list. These are now your social class skills. I'm sure the response of some would be that WotC should have done that upfront. Possibly so, but it appears that their data told them that it was unneeded in the base, generic, PoL core setting.