D&D 4E How To Clone 4E Using 5E Rules

Yaarel · May 29, 2019

I never played BECMI, but my impression is, the last initial Immortal is also part of the Epic tradition that is missing from 5e.

4e Epic is a good model for 5e Epic levels 21+ because it is still kinda sorta balanced enough to be playable.

Immortal Sun · May 29, 2019

dave2008 said:
IDK. I came back to D&D with 4e and I don't feel that 5e doesn't include a bit of 4e in it. I don't think it needs to model the AEDU system to have been influenced by 4e. In fact, I think there are traces of it (AEDU design principles) in their, but I don't know how you could fully incorporate it and also not have it (for those who didn't like it). I personally feel 5e did a pretty good job of incorporating parts of 4e along with parts of other editions. Is it full on 4e, no - but that would be really odd if it was.

PS, isn't there a spell point system included in the DMG?

There is, and it's a vastly more flexible, fluid, simple and understandable system. But because 3.5 Psionics gives it a horrible rep, it never sees play.

Sure, I understand 5E can't both have the AEDU system and Vancian magic. Even 3.5 (prior to Tome of Battle) had AEDU-lite elements (though mostly on monsters). 5E is closer to the way Tome of Battle was designed than the way 4E was designed (which was an evolution on ToB) but its clearly done to a degree that sits well with people who already found ToB material acceptable.

Yaarel · May 29, 2019

Garthanos said:
Heck to be honest I thought there were issues of game board interfering with Epic being true to scale in 4e as well.
In other arenas Rituals should be summoning armies of zombies and other elements not really fully developed like Martial Practices filling the same niche.

It is sorta like,
• Heroic determines the fates of regions/towns (population 100s, 10,000s)
• Paragon determines the fates of nations/cities (populations millions, 100 millions)
• Epic determines the fates of planes/worlds (populations 10 billions and trillions)

Its like every two levels gets an extra zero, starting with 1 at 1.

Yaarel · May 29, 2019

The number of persons whose life one impacts increases each level ...

1, 3, 10, 30, 100, 300, 1000, 3000, 10 000, 30 000, 100 000, 300 000, and 1 million at level 13.

This is decent ballpark figure for a DM to keep in mind when think about the ‘scale’ of a campaign.

Garthanos · May 29, 2019

Yaarel said:
It is sorta like,
• Heroic determines the fates of regions/towns (population 100s, 10,000s)
• Paragon determines the fates of nations/cities (populations millions, 100 millions)
• Epic determines the fates of planes/worlds (populations 10 billions and trillions)

Its like every two levels gets an extra zero, starting with 1 at 1.

Hmmm makes me think of monetary resources in 4e

every 5 levels is 5x as much as the previous...
so a tier is 25 x

Garthanos · May 29, 2019

Sacrosanct said:
So..."You can totally play 5e just like 1e if you ignore all the rules in how 1e was played." Gotcha.

Tony, I played 1e from 1981 to 2012 when the 5e playtest came out. I'm pretty well versed in how 1e plays, and how it feels. What you're arguing is extremely dismissive of very important factors.

I thought players taking turns so that things felt all stop and go, was the dramatic change between 1e and 3e and and it has taken a lot to digest the lack of simultaneous feel in the newer editions. 4e had a lot of out of turn actions that brought some but not all of that back for me I think 5e has moved strongly to restrict that.

I do get how the feel is not there.

Yaarel · May 29, 2019

Yaarel said:
The number of persons whose life one impacts increases each level ...

1, 3, 10, 30, 100, 300, 1000, 3000, 10 000, 30 000, 100 000, 300 000, and 1 million at level 13.

This is decent ballpark figure for a DM to keep in mind when think about the ‘scale’ of a campaign.

With planet Earth today having a population more than 3 billion but less than 10 billion, I think it is fair to say, Earth is a level 20 campaign setting.

At level 21, the D&D character would be solidly impacting every human on this planet, for good or less good − and even then expanding beyond into the populations of other planets.

Garthanos · May 29, 2019

Yaarel said:
The number of persons whose life one impacts increases each level ...

1, 3, 10, 30, 100, 300, 1000, 3000, 10 000, 30 000, 100 000, 300 000, and 1 million at level 13.

This is decent ballpark figure for a DM to keep in mind when think about the ‘scale’ of a campaign.

I sometimes think about it in terms of scale in a different way Cinematic Visual scale... basically in terms of knockback or area of effect, it's also a bit arbitrary but its where awesomeness is felt in battle an Epic Melee attack needs to feel like it blows back enemies like Sauron in a recent LoTR movie. A hero in epic needs to be able to split mountains just as a ritual can drill through barriers.

Garthanos · May 29, 2019

Yaarel said:
With planet Earth today having a population more than 3 billion but less than 10 billion, I think it is fair to say, Earth is a level 20 campaign setting.

At level 21, the D&D character would be solidly impacting every human on this planet, for good or less good − and even then expanding beyond into the populations of other planets.

I guess i am thinking effect scale which is battle board restricted to this 100 foot x 100 foot area, which just doesn't feel epic.

Not scope of who your over all adventure impacts.

EzekielRaiden · May 29, 2019

dave2008 said:
Ok, OK, you built enough tension / anticipation - what was your hypothesis!?

Sorry, was very busy with games! (Just finished running another session tonight actually.) My hypothesis is that people for whom 4e is foreign to them have their back up most of the time. They're so worried about "messing up" that they can't feel comfortable doing all the things they feel completely comfortable doing in older D&D versions they're more familiar with. Even though the system is entirely robust and difficult to "break," I can't tell you how many people have point-blank told me they're "afraid" of breaking the "delicate" balance.

It sounds like you had played enough to become familiar with the system--if you played for most of 4e's run, anyway--so the hypothesis is at least partially contradicted.