D&D 4E What D&D 4e Should Learn From World of Warcraft

[mxyzplk]

I think the OP's got some good points. Some of your comments seem to be missing his point, though.

A couple of posters have scoffed at the idea that Azeroth is somehow "deeper" than the Forgotten Realms and other D&D settings. I haven't played WoW for more than about 30 minutes (which I enjoyed, btw) so I can't comment on the "depth" of the world, but that's almost not the point.

I'm not even sure if this was the OP's actual point, but how I'm reading that section of the post is that in some fundamental sense, everything in Azeroth (as in other non-generic games like Dark Sun) fits in with some sort of central "theme" that the world has. Everything that exists, is there for a reason.

The designers of 4E, on the other hand, are intentionally trying to create a shallow world as the default setting for the core books. The intent is to leave lots of space for gamers to come in and fill in the blanks with their own material, but the actual result may be that 4E drives its players back towards a more war-gaming focused style of play. The current edition of D&D already does that unless you have a group that really tries hard to not let that happen.

Exactly. Ok fine, so FR is cool - so let's hook D&D core to (ideally a "lite" version of) FR. Woo Elminster, woo Drizzt (ooo, I threw up in my mouth a little bit when I said that). But making it super generic (but not truly generic) leaves out a whole lot of "hook" that can create more of a shared experience and draw people more into the world of the game. Sure, those "in the know" may own a bunch of FR, but the point is to get a little of that coolness into the new player experience.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

1. Everyone has special abilities to use in combat.

And it can be too much of a good thing both in D&D and WoW. In both when characters get to a certain level they wind up with gobs of abilities that, for my part, DO NOT GET USED. In 3E I saw players many times slog their way through an encounter or handle it almost by rote in the "usual" manner and only afterward realizing they have potions, scrolls, feats, etc. that they COULD have used, but didn't and then they continue to remain unused the next time as well. Same with WoW, though my experience with WoW is more limited. Still, I get WoW characters to 20th level or so and I've got bar after bar filling up with more and more options and less and less desire to add to the pile, much less slog through trying to find reasons to use them in what specfic circumstances and in what order and... I'd rather just freakin' hack at things for a while. Same behavior as I see in D&D. Too many special abilities = too much of a good thing.

2. Azeroth is a deep and interesting world.

And yet still horribly limited in scope and conforming ONLY to the developers desires rather than the influence of PC actions. Computer games can only DREAM of a DISTANT future where one day they will have the adaptability and GENUINE interactivity of D&D. D&D has nothing to learn from WoW on this score - it ALL swings the opposite way.

3. Instant action. In WoW you can go kick some ass with a moment's notice.

Not true. In D&D the players at the table do not EVER need to while away 10 minutes as their characters sit on griffons or mounts, or worse yet run cross country, trying to get back to Ironforge or Stormwind to sell packfuls of useless crap to free space and exchange it for minimal cash just to continue adventuring, and then GO BACK to where they just were to resume or start a new quest. TIME and it's passing has an ENTIRELY different nature between WoW and D&D. I think D&D has the edge, as ANY time travel is necessary the time it takes passes just as fast as your DM can ready himself for the next encounter. D&D games can start in media res. WoW CANNOT unless you logged out in a dangerous area - and then you're on your own for a while...

4. PvP. Sure, there's non-PvP servers, but everyone knows they're for noobs.

D&D is NOT a competitive game. There is no ultimate win/lose. There is only fun/not fun. D&D dies a little more with EVERY measure taken to attempt to make it a player-versus-player tournament game. What you suggest is, to me, an unspeakable abomination and I for one WILL NOT ABIDE IT. Do as you like around your table but keep your competition rules the freak out of the books. [enhance calm][/enchance calm]

5. WoW is easy.

So is D&D. This is a wash, ergo D&D has nothing to really learn from WoW in this regard. I've got little nieces and nephews who roleplay at the drop of a hat and don't have clue from D&D, though if you give them an assortment of plastic minis including cows, dinosaurs, robots, and WotC plasticrack their imagination STAGGERS me.

You are correct, however, that D&D can learn, not just from WoW, but from previous editions of D&D, that FAST character creation is important for NEW players.

6. People can do what they want to.

Nope. People can only do what the WoW structure allows them to do. Sure some people just like to fish in WoW (though for the LIFE of me I cannot understand why...) but they can't do it from a boat unless that boat is already in the middle of a lake. They can't make a fishing boat, buy one, or rent one, much less row one, sail one, sink one, steal one, etc... They fish from shore - and they kill REAL time doing it. A LOT of real time. And they only use a pole. They can't use a net, or a fish trap, or a spear. And they can't point to an NPC and say, "This is my father, Greel the Fisherman," and have the NPC say, "Yes I am. And I am proud of my son, Stogg FlounderFist for he has saved our village from the Murlocs." Because no PC has an NPC mother, father, cousin, wierd Uncle Fester, nor even a hut that he once upon a time called home and where everyone in the village knows his name.

D&D has ABSOLUTELY nothing to learn from WoW here.

7. Phat lewt.

Again, I'd have to disagree. In WoW, why does a cyan-colored shirt in WoW cost 30 gold to buy (at auction) and require 180 tailoring skill, and Spellweave Cloth made from the wool of the deadly Sturgeonsheep, and dye made from the ichor of 70 Altoid Birds (and you have to kill 225 Altoids to get that much ichor) in order to sew one (and just to get the color - it does NOTHING else special)? Yet a blue shirt can be made with 5 tailoring skill, with wool and some common blue dye and you make 30 of them so that you can make YELLOW shirts(!)? Does D&D need to take a cue from this way of thinking?

In WoW you can make a Singeface Stupendous Sword for your character by spending a week gathering all the components and working your skill up to where you can do it - or you can buy one on in-game-e-bay. In D&D you can do the same sort of thing but not have to spend 72 REAL LIFE hours doing it. Which is superior?

In WoW, once your pack and bag slots are full with everything from 17 tons of copper ore, a bale of cotton, 90 assorted animal hides, 9 pounds of various herbs, 6 suits of piecemeal armor, 4 swords, 19 axes (though 8 of those are special and will be exchanged with Wonko the Sane for a new pair of gloves!) 2 dead bear carcasses, and assorted apples, cheeses, a dozen skins of water, firewood for 18 campfires (but only if you should feel the need to cook as ice, snow, rain, and frozen lakes are no hindrance to anybody) and a bag of marbles... well then you need RUN to the nearest village to process the ore to make 3 daggers that you sell, tan the 90 hides to make 2 leather jerkins that you sell, and cash the rest directly for 16 silver pieces.

In D&D your backpack is already full when you enter the dungeon, but you can drag out a few chests full of gold and miscellaneous loot and load up your horses and mules. And then if you, your friends, your horses and mules all survive the trip back to something resembling civilization you'll... sell it all for cash. But you won't have to save up for a MONTH of real-world time spent in the game to buy a horse, or a second backpack.

No, I don't think WoW has much to offer D&D here either. Though D&D in the "phat loot" department is NOT perfect, it's at least not as insulting as WoW.

YMMV

 

[Raloc]

And it can be too much of a good thing both in D&D and WoW. In both when characters get to a certain level they wind up with gobs of abilities that, for my part, DO NOT GET USED. In 3E I saw players many times slog their way through an encounter or handle it almost by rote in the "usual" manner and only afterward realizing they have potions, scrolls, feats, etc. that they COULD have used, but didn't and then they continue to remain unused the next time as well. Same with WoW, though my experience with WoW is more limited. Still, I get WoW characters to 20th level or so and I've got bar after bar filling up with more and more options and less and less desire to add to the pile, much less slog through trying to find reasons to use them in what specfic circumstances and in what order and... I'd rather just freakin' hack at things for a while. Same behavior as I see in D&D. Too many special abilities = too much of a good thing.
And yet still horribly limited in scope and conforming ONLY to the developers desires rather than the influence of PC actions. Computer games can only DREAM of a DISTANT future where one day they will have the adaptability and GENUINE interactivity of D&D. D&D has nothing to learn from WoW on this score - it ALL swings the opposite way.

Not to mention special abilities in D&D are more meaningful, flavorful, and tend to be useful for all of your levels, rather than having a tiny subset of abilities that all do basically the same thing, but get replaced every X levels.

Not to mention the real strength, which is that D&D abilities don't have to be stat-modifiers, and can consist of things that simply can't be done in games (Wish for instance).

Not true. In D&D the players at the table do not EVER need to while away 10 minutes as their characters sit on griffons or mounts, or worse yet run cross country, trying to get back to Ironforge or Stormwind to sell packfuls of useless crap to free space and exchange it for minimal cash just to continue adventuring, and then GO BACK to where they just were to resume or start a new quest. TIME and it's passing has an ENTIRELY different nature between WoW and D&D. I think D&D has the edge, as ANY time travel is necessary the time it takes passes just as fast as your DM can ready himself for the next encounter. D&D games can start in media res. WoW CANNOT unless you logged out in a dangerous area - and then you're on your own for a while...

Absolutely. You can *start the game* on a very climactic note, in D&D. I don't find slogging through the world for 15 minutes until I run into a bandit very instant action.

D&D is NOT a competitive game. There is no ultimate win/lose. There is only fun/not fun. D&D dies a little more with EVERY measure taken to attempt to make it a player-versus-player tournament game. What you suggest is, to me, an unspeakable abomination and I for one WILL NOT ABIDE IT. Do as you like around your table but keep your competition rules the freak out of the books. [enhance calm][/enchance calm]
So is D&D. This is a wash, ergo D&D has nothing to really learn from WoW in this regard. I've got little nieces and nephews who roleplay at the drop of a hat and don't have clue from D&D, though if you give them an assortment of plastic minis including cows, dinosaurs, robots, and WotC plasticrack their imagination STAGGERS me.

As multiple people have noted, "WoTC platicrack" (D&D Minis) already does this, and shouldn't be part of the RPG, which isn't a dueling game. That said, we used to run one off duels against characters we played with just for fun. There's no problem with it, but it's pointless in the context of the larger game, so it should be done outside of normal play.

You are correct, however, that D&D can learn, not just from WoW, but from previous editions of D&D, that FAST character creation is important for NEW players.

I think crippling the character generation is probably the worst thing one could possibly do, and making it WoW-esque would be doing just that. It does need to be faster, but you can always generate with computer apps.

Nope. People can only do what the WoW structure allows them to do. Sure some people just like to fish in WoW (though for the LIFE of me I cannot understand why...) but they can't do it from a boat unless that boat is already in the middle of a lake. They can't make a fishing boat, buy one, or rent one, much less row one, sail one, sink one, steal one, etc... They fish from shore - and they kill REAL time doing it. A LOT of real time. And they only use a pole. They can't use a net, or a fish trap, or a spear. And they can't point to an NPC and say, "This is my father, Greel the Fisherman," and have the NPC say, "Yes I am. And I am proud of my son, Stogg FlounderFist for he has saved our village from the Murlocs." Because no PC has an NPC mother, father, cousin, wierd Uncle Fester, nor even a hut that he once upon a time called home and where everyone in the village knows his name.

Yeah, honestly I don't know how WoW can be the model for "people can do anything they want to" in comparison to D&D. WoW is infinitely inferior in this regard (and others) simply due to the limitations of games (and I'm a game developer, I should know).

Again, I'd have to disagree. In WoW, why does a cyan-colored shirt in WoW cost 30 gold to buy (at auction) and require 180 tailoring skill, and Spellweave Cloth made from the wool of the deadly Sturgeonsheep, and dye made from the ichor of 70 Altoid Birds (and you have to kill 225 Altoids to get that much ichor) in order to sew one (and just to get the color - it does NOTHING else special)? Yet a blue shirt can be made with 5 tailoring skill, with wool and some common blue dye and you make 30 of them so that you can make YELLOW shirts(!)? Does D&D need to take a cue from this way of thinking?

In WoW you can make a Singeface Stupendous Sword for your character by spending a week gathering all the components and working your skill up to where you can do it - or you can buy one on in-game-e-bay. In D&D you can do the same sort of thing but not have to spend 72 REAL LIFE hours doing it. Which is superior?

In WoW, once your pack and bag slots are full with everything from 17 tons of copper ore, a bale of cotton, 90 assorted animal hides, 9 pounds of various herbs, 6 suits of piecemeal armor, 4 swords, 19 axes (though 8 of those are special and will be exchanged with Wonko the Sane for a new pair of gloves!) 2 dead bear carcasses, and assorted apples, cheeses, a dozen skins of water, firewood for 18 campfires (but only if you should feel the need to cook as ice, snow, rain, and frozen lakes are no hindrance to anybody) and a bag of marbles... well then you need RUN to the nearest village to process the ore to make 3 daggers that you sell, tan the 90 hides to make 2 leather jerkins that you sell, and cash the rest directly for 16 silver pieces.

In D&D your backpack is already full when you enter the dungeon, but you can drag out a few chests full of gold and miscellaneous loot and load up your horses and mules. And then if you, your friends, your horses and mules all survive the trip back to something resembling civilization you'll... sell it all for cash. But you won't have to save up for a MONTH of real-world time spent in the game to buy a horse, or a second backpack.

No, I don't think WoW has much to offer D&D here either. Though D&D in the "phat loot" department is NOT perfect, it's at least not as insulting as WoW.

YMMV

It would probably take 72 hours just to mimmick the insanity of WoW's economy.

 

[Erithtotl]

I played WoW, two PCs up into the mid-30s, and I inevitably found it as tedious as all other MMORPGs. I know the endgame is different, but it's even more demanding of time and commitment, and what's worse, the reward system breaks down because it's my understanding players play 4-5 hour chunks on the hope that one random item will drop that they need.

I'd really hate D&D to turn into WoW, and as the original poster said, the worst case scenario is that Wizards takes the worst elements from WoW, thinking they are what makes the game successful.

As per the points of the original poster, I agree with #1. The one that sets off a ding ding ding, but not for the same reason perhaps as the rest is the WoW is Easy part.

The original poster touched on this but most have not focused on it. D&D has too many WRONG CHOICES in character design.

In the group I currently run, all the players are at least competent, and most know the rules. And yet, of that party, the powergamer has made a kick ass character, and the remaining four range from mildly effective to utterly ineffective. This is all done by the abundance of bad choices that can be made by the players. These range from the earliest like ability score allocation, to feat and skill selection, spell choices, multiclassing, buying the right gear, and the dreaded prestige class.

This becomes a real issue in combat because I have one PC that is virtually indestructable and does huge amounts of damage, and in order to give him any kind of challenge the encounter ends up too tough for the rest of the party. Additionally, that one PC grabs much of the glory of each battle.

Now I have a good group who takes it in stride and doesn't complain too much. Additionally I have tried to provide magic items that help them improve their deficiencies. But the point is these guys are not idiots. They are trying to create interesting and effective characters, but the chances for making a bad PC are so great that without detailed analysis and planning ahead, they will inevitably make bad choices.

I don't want to take away choice from the players, that was the great innovation of 3.x over previous editions. But conversely, unless they are truly looking to optimize every detail, players shouldn't have to be rules experts and meticulous planners to create a PC that is both interesting, fun, and effective. The rules should strive to reduce the number of bad choices while making the good choices easier to navigate.

 

[Raloc]

I played WoW, two PCs up into the mid-30s, and I inevitably found it as tedious as all other MMORPGs. I know the endgame is different, but it's even more demanding of time and commitment, and what's worse, the reward system breaks down because it's my understanding players play 4-5 hour chunks on the hope that one random item will drop that they need.

I'd really hate D&D to turn into WoW, and as the original poster said, the worst case scenario is that Wizards takes the worst elements from WoW, thinking they are what makes the game successful.

As per the points of the original poster, I agree with #1. The one that sets off a ding ding ding, but not for the same reason perhaps as the rest is the WoW is Easy part.

The original poster touched on this but most have not focused on it. D&D has too many WRONG CHOICES in character design.

In the group I currently run, all the players are at least competent, and most know the rules. And yet, of that party, the powergamer has made a kick ass character, and the remaining four range from mildly effective to utterly ineffective. This is all done by the abundance of bad choices that can be made by the players. These range from the earliest like ability score allocation, to feat and skill selection, spell choices, multiclassing, buying the right gear, and the dreaded prestige class.

This becomes a real issue in combat because I have one PC that is virtually indestructable and does huge amounts of damage, and in order to give him any kind of challenge the encounter ends up too tough for the rest of the party. Additionally, that one PC grabs much of the glory of each battle.

Now I have a good group who takes it in stride and doesn't complain too much. Additionally I have tried to provide magic items that help them improve their deficiencies. But the point is these guys are not idiots. They are trying to create interesting and effective characters, but the chances for making a bad PC are so great that without detailed analysis and planning ahead, they will inevitably make bad choices.

I don't want to take away choice from the players, that was the great innovation of 3.x over previous editions. But conversely, unless they are truly looking to optimize every detail, players shouldn't have to be rules experts and meticulous planners to create a PC that is both interesting, fun, and effective. The rules should strive to reduce the number of bad choices while making the good choices easier to navigate.

Well, you as DM should probably just help them fix their characters, IMO. If you didn't manage to do so early on, you could always just do it now and get it over with. Yes it'd be some work, and it's not that great a solution, but really, I don't think it'd be very painless and would be nice in the end. Heck, get the powergamer to help them.

 

[Corinth]

Reminder: In WOW terms, D&D is a hardcore carebear PVE game focused entirely upon instanced group quest content while solo gameplay is so rare as to be unthinkable by most.

 

[Raloc]

Yeah, but WoW terms are very skewed from reality. In objective terms, WoW is in fact infinitely more carebear than D&D could ever be.

Blood and Gore
WoW: No blood, everyone dies* into a shower of sparkles.
D&D: As much gore as is necessary, sometimes much more than.

Verdict: WoW gets the carebear award for Blood and Gore.

Death
WoW: * - No one ever actually dies except temporarily for a couple of minutes at best, with very token, minor drawbacks.
D&D: Death can either be the final end for a character, and often is, or if they have resources they can come back, but this is far more limited. NPCs that aren't very powerful tend not to come back at all.

Verdict: WoW gets the carebear award for Death.

Player vs. Player
WoW: Basically the same EQLike keyboard mashing as the normal game, except you have to strafe, and get the best gear.
D&D: PC in fighting happens, and when it does it's messy and brutal. Also, in a way, all of D&D is PvP since you're playing "against" (in a way) the DM.

Verdict: WoW gets the carebear award for PvP.

By no stretch of the imagination do WoW terms actually have any semblance of reality.

 

[helium3]

Exactly. Ok fine, so FR is cool - so let's hook D&D core to (ideally a "lite" version of) FR. Woo Elminster, woo Drizzt (ooo, I threw up in my mouth a little bit when I said that). But making it super generic (but not truly generic) leaves out a whole lot of "hook" that can create more of a shared experience and draw people more into the world of the game. Sure, those "in the know" may own a bunch of FR, but the point is to get a little of that coolness into the new player experience.

The reason I've generally avoided packaged settings in the past is because they're usually very generic. The fear that a campaign setting that leaves out specific elements of D&D will not sell as well seems to lead a lot of campaign settings to try to be everything to everyone.

So far, I haven't been very impressed by the fluff that's been coming out of the 4E design team. It's all just felt very tired and rote. So, I suppose it's good that they're not tying the core directly to a setting. If they did, I'd prefer it be Ebberon, as that's the packaged setting I've liked the most since the days of Darksun.

 

[helium3]

This becomes a real issue in combat because I have one PC that is virtually indestructable and does huge amounts of damage, and in order to give him any kind of challenge the encounter ends up too tough for the rest of the party. Additionally, that one PC grabs much of the glory of each battle.

I hate to break it to you, but the situation you've described above is pretty much the definition of a PC that's utilizing a "broken" game mechanic.

 

[Derren]

2. Azeroth is a deep and interesting world. Even for those who weren't into the Warcraft series and don't know anything about the world's history and development, it's at least clear that it's a living, vibrant world that has a realistic feel derived from its evolution over time.

In my opinion this is not the case. Azeroth is good for what it is supposed to do, a framework for quests, but besides that it is rather lacking as nothing which does not lead to quests for adventurers is detailed or even makes sense. That is not a living world to me. Just look at the whole Shardworld/Drenai whatever things.
Sadly that does seem to be the direction4E is going to.

4. PvP. Sure, there's non-PvP servers, but everyone knows they're for noobs.

Simply no. PvP has no place in D&D games as D&D is a cooperative game. You can of course do arena style combat but such things should not be the focus of the rules.

5. WoW is easy.

D&D should not be rocket science but it should have a certain level of complexity as complexity is simply required to make some thinges work right.

6. People can do what they want to.

That was always the case in D&D and still is. Every PnP RPG offers you a lot more freedom than WoW.
Sadly it seems to me that 4E will, more than previous editions, only focus on combat and disregard the other stuff one can do (See point 2).

7. Phat lewt. [/QUOTE]

Which leads to equipment defining your character. WoW is a good example for this. You are nothing without the latest epix etc.