The Early Verdict (kinda long)

[Sanzuo]

I guess I'll repeat what I've said before, but I'll go more in depth this time.

My history with D&D began in AD&D in the beginning of high school. At the time, the idea was so novel I couldn't help but have fun as long as I was included in the game. Our games at that time consisted of "random wacky magical adventures" with at least one or two random character deaths per session. It was great fun.

Then something happened and I began to familiarize myself with the rules and also concepts like "optimization." This was also about the time 3rd edition came around and I started tentatively DMing, forcing me to learn many more rules. The first few games I ran were terrible and I fell into the horrible habits of narrative-style DMing like leading the players by the nose, npc self-inserts and just storytelling without any player input. It was strangely fun for me to tell a story but I soon realized it was not fun for the players to just sit listen to me talk, so I took a different approach.

My first "successful" game lasted well over a year. It was 3.0 edition and very much more "simulationist" style. I just threw the players down literally in the middle of nowhere and let them go hog wild, making sure to throw obstacles in their way when the game looked like it was about to get boring.

The "sequel" campaign was very similar, only better! We had memorable characters; especially Kregous the half-orc who became a legendary warrior/druid/woodcarver with odious personal habits/hygiene and a charming flying booger companion.

These campaigns mostly consisted of the players visiting different landmarks on my updated-by-session world map and kicking the crap out of anything that got in their way. I don't even remember what the overall plot was or even if there was one. I think it revolved around the character's personal aspirations (ruling the universe, et al) and this eventually became a point of contention when certain players hogged all the screen time and it drove away others in the process.

I'll get to my point in a second here...

I think it was around this time I was beginning to feel disillusioned with the game in general because it seemed overall like one combat encounter after another catering to the player's selfish desires for phat lootz, with hardly any time left for real plot or character development. I realize this is not a unique complaint. Today I'm still not sure what I really wanted out of the game.

My revelation hit me actually not long ago when I realized: "Hey, it's SUPPOSED to be like this!" D&D really began its life as a tactical miniatures war game with more complex rules reduced to personal scale. It's like that to anyone who plays a game of Warhammer. Nothing matters beyond the scale of the encounter. Anything extra like rhyme or reason is just fluff.

Suddenly I enjoyed the game a lot more. I once thought of combat as an unpleasant interruption to the narrative of the game. Now I see it as an anticipation of the inevitable combat encounter, that is flavored with style and narrative. In other words, I accepted D&D for what it is. It is a tactical fighting game with roleplaying elements.

Once this became clear to me I adjusted my line of thinking was happy to play this game and became even more delighted when plot and flavor would leak into the game. I think I still have a more narrative style, but I understand what my players expect. They want to kill things and get rich doing it.

4th edition to me has taken this core concept and streamlined it. I fully believe that with each new supplement that gets released it will gradually become just as power-gamey as 3.x ever was. It'll just be slightly easier for me to keep up.

As far as my desire for a much more narrative style game with little to no combat... well, there are other systems out there to try. All with their own style.

My argument is simply this: D&D is and always has been a game based around fighting. You can add as much or as little role playing or narrative as you like based on your players style, but the core mechanic has not changed since its origins. If you want a more story-centric system, pick a different game.

 

[BraveSirRobin]

This is precisely it, and this is why the comparisons to MMORPGs, specifically WoW, are actually sometimes valid, because that's pretty much exactly the situation you have there. Everything and everyone has the stats the game needs them to. Not the stats they should logically have, the ones the game needs them to. If they need you to not kill an NPC, he's unkillable, or level a zillion, or what-have-you. You can't open that door because there's nothing behind it. In 4E, you could open the door, of course, but because you'd have a fair inkling that it wasn't one of the DM's carefully Pre-Prepared Level-Appropriate Encounters (TM), you'd know it was pretty much being made up.

Further, if you find yourselves in a situation where you have to fight the king, you know the king is fight-able. Maybe it was likely that he was in previous editions, but in 4E it's even more clear.

Like you say, though, I'm not sure it matters for most purposes. It does matter for some, though, and I can definately feel it, and feel the sacrifice that's been made in 4E's rules. It's one I can probably live with, but failing to acknowledge serves no-one but bonkers fans.

Again speaking as someone that only knows 3.x, I fail to see how everything you wrote above isn't applicable to 3.x.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

SIDE NOTES: 1.)Contrary to the popular sentiment, I'm also experiencing a strong dislike for the monotony that player attacks seem to have. I don't just mean the use of the same at-will for 95% of combat (which does happen)... but also the fact that each PC's attacks are based of their strongest ability and so even the bonus to hit is usually close to or the exact same for each PC. Now my players don't realize this yet, as I don't tell them monsters defenses but I see it. Perhaps I'm judging to soon, we've only played a few sessions and just got into campaign mode with my players close to 2nd level, but I definitely

2.) As a DM there seems to be alot to keep track of when using different monster roles in fights. I recently ran a fight with some goblin warriors, minions and blackblades...and it seemed like I had to spend more mental power keeping track of which, how best and when of their slightly differing abilities to use. Definitely seemed like more than I had to monitor in a 3e low-level game. Again this may get easier with time but it was something I noticed.

Are not player attacks allways going to be similar numbers? In 3.x until BAB difference really weight in the players will be hitting similar AC and so need similar BAB and adjustments and is they have any sense of combat optimisation will seek the same numbers. One thing I see is that 4e rewards tactical accumen more than 3.x and good tactics can trump build optimisation

As for the other, yes at low level the burden on the DM is bigger but since the total number of powers in play at any given time is limited that burden should remain relatively constant over the levels.

 

[SSquirrel]

Then perhaps what many of us feel is wrong with 4E is that the PCs have become SOLDIERS and are no longer WARRIORS/adventurers. There is a sense that tactics and teamwork have overshadowed the individual and his heroism.

It is almost as if the party is now the focus, not the individual characters, at least in combat. I have tested the combat system and it plays very well, but there is something "not right" and I could not define it before.

I guess there is an association in my mind with a sophisticated sort of wargame. This type of game is great fun, but it is not an RPG. I am not saying 4E is a wargame, but there is an uncomfortable association that perhaps makes many of us unconciously uneasy.

If you look at fantasy novels and movies, you see groups who can be strong or weak individually, but they learn to work well together. 1st level characters already have some worldly experience now and it's entirely probably that a group of characters who say they have been together (ie not the "you all meet these strangers in a bar and go adventure together") for a bit have already learned to work well together. Heck, just look at the Heroes of the Lance. I would stat Tanis as a Warlord for 4E.

I don't see a lack of opportunity to be heroic, I see powers that help give extra description (and damage stats etc) to heroic actions. Your Rogue is being heroic if he Castle's w/the Mage who just got ambushed by some sneakier enemies.

D&D came from a wargaming past and has always had that aspect in the game in varying degrees of depth. 1E talks about using minis, I haven't looked at my 2E books in ages, but they did have mass combat rules in 2E w/BattleSystem. 3E and 4E are definitely more focused on it, but it has always been around. Me, I'm using some packs of Dungeon Tiles, a battle mat and some counters and calling things good.

 

[jackston2]

On gimping players: I think the point is that players can not JUST gimp their character's combat ability, but that they also gain other benefits for doing so (example: skill focus).

On "the living world" that 3.5 provides: it's just not practical to have the DM prepare stats for everything, we will never be able to compete with computers so 4e just capitalizes on our creativity instead.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

All of this...I've been trying to put my finger on it as well, and you know what your post made me think about... The Matrix. Remember in the first movie when Mr. Smith is talking to Morpheus about the failure of the original matrix that was suppose to be a utopia. Now he claims not to know why it failed and goes on even further to postulate it's because humans can't accept a "perfect" world. I always thought it was because

1.) There is no way a computer can create a "perfect" world for a human being.

I prefer this explanation about the cynical "humans don't accept it".

But I also say that humans can't create a "perfect" world, either.

SIDE NOTES: 1.)Contrary to the popular sentiment, I'm also experiencing a strong dislike for the monotony that player attacks seem to have. I don't just mean the use of the same at-will for 95% of combat (which does happen)... but also the fact that each PC's attacks are based of their strongest ability and so even the bonus to hit is usually close to or the exact same for each PC. Now my players don't realize this yet, as I don't tell them monsters defenses but I see it. Perhaps I'm judging to soon, we've only played a few sessions and just got into campaign mode with my players close to 2nd level, but I definitely

You're looking at the wrong numbers. Maybe even looking at the numbers itself is wrong in the first place. Off course everyone has similar attack bonuses - if they hadn't how is the math supposed to work? But look at what each power does. Each is different. Yes, most of them are deal damage +extra. But the extra is the distinguishing, critical feature. It sets the theme of the power, and it defines its tactical "application".

Why is it that people find it important that the numbers look different? Does every class need a unique subsystem to feel right?

2.) As a DM there seems to be alot to keep track of when using different monster roles in fights. I recently ran a fight with some goblin warriors, minions and blackblades...and it seemed like I had to spend more mental power keeping track of which, how best and when of their slightly differing abilities to use. Definitely seemed like more than I had to monitor in a 3e low-level game. Again this may get easier with time but it was something I noticed.

Hmm. I found the roles part pretty useful. "Ah, Artillery, better let it it stay behind" (well, that's obvious). But I found it astoundingly easy to figure out good tactics for most monsters. (The hard part was always implementing them - how do I get the Skirmishers in flanking position without them getting hammered?)

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think it was around this time I was beginning to feel disillusioned with the game in general because it seemed overall like one combat encounter after another catering to the player's selfish desires for phat lootz, with hardly any time left for real plot or character development. I realize this is not a unique complaint. Today I'm still not sure what I really wanted out of the game.

My revelation hit me actually not long ago when I realized: "Hey, it's SUPPOSED to be like this!" D&D really began its life as a tactical miniatures war game with more complex rules reduced to personal scale. It's like that to anyone who plays a game of Warhammer. Nothing matters beyond the scale of the encounter. Anything extra like rhyme or reason is just fluff.

Suddenly I enjoyed the game a lot more. I once thought of combat as an unpleasant interruption to the narrative of the game. Now I see it as an anticipation of the inevitable combat encounter, that is flavored with style and narrative. In other words, I accepted D&D for what it is. It is a tactical fighting game with roleplaying elements.

Once this became clear to me I adjusted my line of thinking was happy to play this game and became even more delighted when plot and flavor would leak into the game. I think I still have a more narrative style, but I understand what my players expect. They want to kill things and get rich doing it.

I had similar thoughts. "Hmm, each game session is loads of fun and entertainment. But we focus pretty much on combat. There is an interesting story around, but in the end, isn't it just there to motivate the combats?
Is that really role-playing what I do? Is that how it's supposed to be played?

And well, it hit me that it doesn't matter. Am I having fun? Oh yes, I do. Could some more "role-playing" be added. Sure, but don't over do it - the combat parts is fun, after all!

And on the discussions around the 4E release, other posters quoted some excerpts from Gygax and older editions, and it appeared to me that yes, the role-playing part of RPGs is not just the "social interaction", it is also the combat part. A Fighter was supposed to lead his allies in combat, and if he didn't do that, he's not role-played well. The "deep immersion" thing of role-playing is something people added later. Maybe it is a refinement of what RPGs are, but maybe it's just a shift of focus, and nobody has to justify himself for not going there, and enjoy a combat heavy game.

As long as the game offers a motivation and characterization for NPCs and PCs, and tells a story in the process, it's a role-playing game. It might be an "action movie" your describing and not a mystery novel or a romance, but it's still a role-playing game you play.

 

[Orryn Emrys]

The individual weapons and fighting styles, while modified or derived by feats, are just tools for bringing that main class feature to bear in a meaningful way, like the individual spells cast by the wizard/cleric/druid. So there's no way they're nearly as all important in 3.5 in defining what the class is as they are in 4e. That's a decision the 4e designers made for good or bad. And where a player likes it or not, it does come with a decrease in a character's developmental flexibility, a quality that some 3e players have come to enjoy.

Very much so. Though this is hardly the whole of my consternation, the developmental flexibility of the system is of tantamount interest to my group as a general rule. I think that this may extend from an interest in developing character designs rather independent of the system and wanting to feel like they can find a way to readily represent that character with the options presented, without castrating them statistically as many of the suggestions I've seen in this thread seem to be suggesting is the best way to achieve greater flexibility under the mantle of 4E.

 

[Orryn Emrys]

The central focus of my gaming group has always been role playing. Combat is one gaming element, I always like a good climax battle to end a moudle with, but I consider combat far from the central focus. To me the most central focus points are storytelling and character interactions with the other characters. The best module that our weekly gaming group ever played actually went on for sixteen game nights before the first combat encounter.

I did not mean to suggest that combat was the central focus of my own games... I imagine my players would find the idea a little confusing. Just last night, I was once again struck by how goal-oriented they tend to be, as they strove to avoid certain combat encounters in an attempt to reach their story objective with less possibility of failure, i.e. having their numbers thinned out in combat encounters. By and large, my gamers are far more interested in their characters as people than in what they can do in combat, which is, to us, far from the most crucial element of their gaming experience.

My point was that the mechanics of the game have always been heavily focused on combat. Happily, this doesn't dictate who the characters are, though the new edition appears to be somewhat less liberal in this regard than previous rulesets, if only because its combat-focus is even more specifically forged in the structure of every class.

 

[el-remmen]

Does every class need a unique subsystem to feel right?

Yes, I am coming to think they do. At least, it would seem to be my preference. . .