You don't like the new edition? Tell me about it!

[billd91]

I don't see it as "good role-playing" is my charisma 8 Fighter is constantly engaged in general role-playing and relating to other people, or if an INT 8 Barbarian comes up with a good strategy to unravel the cultists conspiracy.
It might bel fun, it might be problem-solving, but it is decidedly not playing my role.

You assume that either of those situations requires your character to be either eloquent or clever. Playing either of those stats in those situations can be both rewarding and memorable... though frankly, even worse stats would be even more fun.

 

[GVDammerung]

. . . Every class looks EXACTLY the same. There are all just sets of powers.

. . . It's all so generic.

IMO, 4e is a textbook example of how NOT to present a game. Allowing that 4e can be fun to play, you would never know it from reading the core books. 4e comes across in print as wooden. Blah. Generic. Repetitive to the point of dullness. This is a game of adventure? Not from reading it, it isn't.

From a play standpoint, IM (limited experience)O, 4e is over designed with the result that its a muddle. Its about ziggy a little here, zagging a little there and mostly noodling around in the middle. 4e seems to be about performing mostly small, coordinated actions that add up to actuarial success. It does not immediately play as high adventure for me.

YMMV

 

[fuzzlewump]

Hmm, your response was so brief Nellisir you left me nothing to work with, speaking only to the effect of 'no, you're wrong.' I look forward to a more in depth response to my points.

There is no possible way that even I can argue with Storm Raven on this one.

RC

There is definitely a way I can argue with what Storm Raven is saying here. Alright, let's get this straight. In core 3.5 skills were something tacked on to classes that really had nothing to do with the abilities they had. Why do I say tacked on? Well, that's just it, the skills themselves didn't have anything to do with the class that took them, except for of course the rogue with his sole ability of finding and disabling traps. You may say well, "Knowledge(Arcana) had everything to do with being a wizard," and I'll say no, not really. High intelligence had everything to do with being a wizard, not the knowledge skill, not even spellcraft. If anything, concentration was the bread and butter and that only had COMBAT uses. Or in other words, you don't have to roll concentration in the king's chamber while your negociating with him. Anyway, the point isn't to argue about what is useful and what is not here, I'm just saying the wizard didn't need his skills to cast his spells.

Now, in 4th edition, some skills are required in order to use the out of combat wizard spells, Rituals. Notably Arcana, not sure about others. Rogues need to use thievery to unlock doors and disable traps. So, skills have a bigger role out of combat, even if only slightly. Let's take it a step further.

The barbarian/fighter of 3.5 likely has a low intelligence, preferring to have strength and constitution instead. So, they have maybe 1 or 2 trained skills to level up each level. So, they can climb and jump outside of combat and that's about it. In 4th edition, each class has around 4 trained skills no matter what your intelligence is. So, now in 4th edition, the group as a whole has more out of combat options than ever. Skills play a role for every single player at the table. So where is the restriction? Where is the "4E has no out of combat?"

It seems that the authors of 4e simply decided that the only element that matters is how quickly a character can bash heads - and the rest just doesn't matter at all.

That, to me, just creates a game that seems very limited in scope.

So, now considering that each class now has access to skills, how can you possibly say that the only element that matters is how quickly a character and bash heads? Because that's what powers are centered on? Some utility powers increase the power of skills, out of combat. If anything, I should be arguing that 3.5 focuses on combat. I look at the table for the core classes and see Saves, Base Attack Bonus, Feats, Special Abilities, nothing to do with skills. Now, I'm not arguing that, because I don't really care which one is more focused on combat, but you're being completely unfair in your judgment of 4E. To get it straight, 3E was fun to play too, in the same way that 2E was fun to play, but I defend the new edition now because I play it and have fun with it, in combat and out. I look forward to your response.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

I think there's a difference between saying "I don't think I'd have fun playing 4e" or even "4e is a stinking turd," on the one hand, and saying "4e is a boardgame with no roleplaying which could only appeal to the juvenile," on the other. The latter is an assertion of fact which is pretty confrontational. The former two are expressions of dislike which are, if sincere, uncontestable (other than perhaps flouting the forum language prohibitions).

I'm more refering to this exact thread, in which a moderator flat out stated it wasn't for defending 4e or insulting those who dislike it, but turned into just that.

Seriously? Where's the moderation? This is why some people honestly feel EN World is for people who like 4e only.

 

[Nifft]

I'm more refering to this exact thread, in which a moderator flat out stated it wasn't for defending 4e or insulting those who dislike it, but turned into just that.

Seriously? Where's the moderation? This is why some people honestly feel EN World is for people who like 4e only.

I'd honestly prefer if people who don't like a particular thing find something else to talk about -- or fix it.

If you like 3e, fine: we can discuss that.

If you like Mutants & Masterminds, cool: tell me about it.

However, I have less than zero interest in a support-group for nurturing nerd rage.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Banshee16]

Well, it can be kind of selfish to not even consdier the contribution your character will make to the group; the group may simply not need another rogue, for instance, so no matter how hard you try to find a way to fit in, playing one might mean that you don't earn your keep.

I'm not sure I agree with that. Players can *always* contribute to the group. In my games, I've never demanded a player play a certain role. I usually just say "Hey, these are the characters we have already. Over here is a list of the roles that haven't been filled. Choose what you want to do, but I won't force you to pick a certain type of character.

Banshee

 

[billd91]

Rogues need to use thievery to unlock doors and disable traps. So, skills have a bigger role out of combat, even if only slightly. Let's take it a step further.

Are you trying to say this is different from 3e?

The barbarian/fighter of 3.5 likely has a low intelligence, preferring to have strength and constitution instead. So, they have maybe 1 or 2 trained skills to level up each level. So, they can climb and jump outside of combat and that's about it. In 4th edition, each class has around 4 trained skills no matter what your intelligence is. So, now in 4th edition, the group as a whole has more out of combat options than ever. Skills play a role for every single player at the table. So where is the restriction? Where is the "4E has no out of combat?"

Except that some skills from the previous edition are off the table. Need to repair your armor or make arrows when you run out? I'm not even sure if that's in the rules in 4e, but they were in 3e. So, more options? Not really. A few of the character classes may have more trained skills but that doesn't exactly translate to more options.

I look at the table for the core classes and see Saves, Base Attack Bonus, Feats, Special Abilities, nothing to do with skills.

That's because they chose to give the players plenty of choice in picking the skills they spent their skill ranks on. There were always more skills than a PC had ranks. It allowed you a great deal of control in customizing the character they way you wanted to customize it. But there were classes that offered special bonuses on skills in their class/level tables.

 

[SSquirrel]

Would this mean it's best to have all abilities randomly designed with no underlying system?

No!! That way lies Palladium ;()

 

[fuzzlewump]

Are you trying to say this is different from 3e?

Oh, no, sorry, I was unclear there. I just meant that you can do what you did in 3E(in this case, rogue stuff,) and a little more, given the new use of skills in rituals. Good point on the crafting, but is that enough to say that 4E is completely restrictive and devoid of options to the point of unplayability? To be clear, as I said before and will say again, I just want the judgment of 4E to be fair, I don't want to prove 4.0's dad can beat up 3.5's dad.

Except that some skills from the previous edition are off the table. Need to repair your armor or make arrows when you run out? I'm not even sure if that's in the rules in 4e, but they were in 3e. So, more options? Not really. A few of the character classes may have more trained skills but that doesn't exactly translate to more options.

Hmm, good point, there is a complete lack of crafting 4E, which is something I don't really like, but as far as I'm concerned I never had skill points to put in things like that. But on your other point, how does having more trained skills not lead to more options? If a skill is an option, and 4E gives you more skills, 4E gives you more options. I'm not sure how you define option here. In another way, each class having more skills gives you more option of what to do. If you want to play a stealth campaign, you aren't losing very much by either selecting stealth at first level or taking skill training, seeing as how you get much more feats than you did in 3E. That wasn't really as good of option in 3E, unless you counted a beguiler using zone of silence and invisibility sphere to completely negate the point of Move Silently and Hide. The same applies to any skill, say you want all your characters to use rituals, everyone can get skill training in arcana or religion and then can get ritual casting. Sounds like an option to me. Warlocks have access to thievery, so can take over the job of a rogue if need be. Option.

That's because they chose to give the players plenty of choice in picking the skills they spent their skill ranks on. There were always more skills than a PC had ranks. It allowed you a great deal of control in customizing the character they way you wanted to customize it. But there were classes that offered special bonuses on skills in their class/level tables.

Same in 4E. More skills to choose from than you can have. What classes had skill bonuses on their tables in core 3.5? Anyway, the customization aspect is definitely there, inside and outside of combat. It doesn't matter if 3.5 has more or less, I just want to know what is the threshold that 4.0 must have to be considered having options, for my own curiosity, because I think some are being unfair in their judgment of 4E.

 

[Arthnek]

Hi Fuzzle =D

To answer your last question regarding how many options should a game have to have enough. In my opinion 3.5 had it just about spot on so that I as a dungeonmaster or player could decide...ok I want to create a priestess of Mask or a priest of Bane. I look over the list of the hundred plus spells and I plot out the types of spells I think will most reflect a cleric of a god of thievies or a god of hate. I look over the massive list of feats and finally decide whether it makes the most sense for me to play my character as a straight cleric or bounce back and forth between cleric and rogue.

In 4e there is almost no difference between the priest of one god or goddess and another. THey all begin play with the same narrow range of powers. Character alignment has little to no impact on priestly powers either.

To my mind this creates a very generic universe and one which I have a very hard time getting excited to play in or create adventures for.

Alignments

You may not like alignments in the old edition but they at least had a certain lore and tradition closely tied into the pantheons and histories of settings spanning back thirty years. The new alignment structure is about the worst possible approach I can imagine. Its like they gave the alignment issue about ten minutes of thought during a coffee break and just rolled with whatever came to mind.

I mean I can play a character which is "good" or "super duper good" or I can play a character which is "evil" or "super chaos lord gangsta vampire puppy stabbing evil". My other option is to play with team "unaligned" which seems to include most of the gods.

They would have been better off just abandoning the entire alignment structure altogether as this new one is pretty poorly put together in my opinion.

A short list of other issues...

Players are discouraged from rolling characters. Everyone is supposed to be the same vanilla just slightly above average character (which pretty much describes the entire flavor of the books to me).
No rolling hit points.
First level feats are assigned.
First level power options are so narrow that you might as well pick the recommended options because there aren't any or many beyond what is recommended for you. This means that every cleric, fighter, paladin while not exactly the same is darn close. Sameness on that scale to my mind as a DM = boring.
Gods - The starting list of gods presented in the PHB looks like someone took a few gods from the Realms, a few from Greyhawk, a few from other campaigns and put them into a box, shook them up and randomly picked out eleven as the new gods of DnD. There is no feel of a mythos to any of it.
Monsters - monsters are crunchy hero clix figures now with little to no information on their behavior, habitat or means of fitting into a DM's setting. Just a collection of combat stats.
Minions - The perfect thing to ambush a party with in huge numbers provided the monsters win initiative. A single initiative roll can sway an entire battle determining whether the scads of one hit point minions all get their shots off first or the players pop off their AOE's and drop them before they have a chance to fire.
Moving and Sliding in Combat - Ok this is cool but we've played this sort of thing forever in other game systems it is only new to DnD.

The last bit that bothers me is the assumption that first through third level was a bummer to play. I really enjoy playing the low levels. Those levels can be some of the most fun times in an entire campaign both as a player and as a DM.

Don't get me wrong. I was really looking forward to this edition. All the hype online certainly made it sound awesome. I was the one banging the drum for 4th edition in my local gaming group. I can't tell you how disappointed I was to see what feels like the heart and soul of the game gutted in order to turn the thing into a vehicle for selling a hero clix style board game that used to be dungeons and dragons.

Again just my opinion. Lots of people love the new game. I'm probably just old and set in my ways but I'm sticking with my old books.