The tragedy of 4th edition.

[Kraydak]

Or maybe their actual playtests determined something different from the community's theorycraft. Remember, they obviously didn't playtest 3rd that well, because monks were "obviously" overpowered.

A lot of lessons *should* have been learned from 3e playtesting and weren't. 3e was the first try at "professional" game design. Making mistakes is forgivable. Not learning from them isn't.

I have no idea what you're trying to get at. 4th Edition is the first edition in which magic items are accurately and transparently factored into the power curve.

NPCs and PCs scale slightly differently in 4e, resulting in about a -1/7 levels on d20 rolls power lag for PCs in combat.

And this conclusion is based on actually playing the game 1-30 in a real campaign? Or just theorycraft?

Everquest created theorycrafting (seriously, at least in the english-speaking market EQ was the first game with a large enough math-fluent on-line community to develop the tools needed to reverse engineer game mechanics and find the neato bits). WoW polished theorycrafting. Designers ignore theorycrafting at their peril, because despite theorycrafting being a derogatory term, competent theorycrafters (say the char-ops folks) are damn good at their job and the system IS the math.

Better hit the Wayback Machine and let Gygax know that his concept of hit points is inappropriate for the fantasy genre.

4e and previous editions handle injury differently from a mechanical PoV. The schizophrenic attempts to "quantify" ("excuse the existence of"?) what hp mean don't interest me. Mechanically, previous editions fit the fantasy genre better than 4e, which in turn fits the superhero genre *perfectly*.

Or maybe your theorycraft is meaningless in the face of actual play.

Twin Attacks>Careful Strike. Full stop. Skill challenges are broken mechanically. Full stop. Astral Storm>Meteor Swarm. Full stop. The fact that Combat Challenge goes from inflicting perhaps 1/5 of the targets hp at lvl 1 to about 1/20th at lvl 30 is indicative of bad/non-existent playtesting: at upper levels, Elites/Solos should just IGNORE the fighter's CC because the damage it inflicts is laughable.

 

[Andor]

Uh, yeah they are. If they weren't, then why did they change the Monk and Ranger both in 3.5? Why did Polymorph get changed so many times?

Hint: You don't change something that isn't broken.

Because they decided that their original design goal wasn't a great idea. And something doesn't have to be broken to want to change it. Tastes change too. If I move into a place that has 1973 style olive drab deep shag carpet I'm probably going to change it whether it's 'broken' or not.

And according to the book's example (a paladin with a flaming longsword), it adds the keyword for the appropriate type, but does not remove the original keywords. Since it specifies that the power would deal both radiant and fire, I'm going to take what the book says over some custserv guy.

The example is incomplete. It does not say if the flaming longswords at-will ability is on or not, it just says the sword is being used. Therefore it clarifies nothing.

Further down that page...

"If a power allows you to choose the damage type, the power then has that keyword for feats, resistances, and any other information that applies."

So, as a Lifedrinking weapon does not allow you to choose the damage type (no swapping between weapon and necrotic), then it does not apply the Necrotic keyword.

That's not how exception based systems work. A rule that starts out 'If a power allows you to choose' tell you nothing about what to do with a power that does not allow you to choose. Furthermore we're not discussing a nice clean single power but the interaction of a class power (Radiant Strike), and item property (lifedrinker weapon), the rule on page 55 discussing keywords and damage types and the rule on page 226 discussing only keywords.

Further the rule on page 226 states: "When you use a magic item as part of a racial or a class power, the keywords of the item's power and the other power all apply."

Read literally the items power keywords apply whether you use the items power or not. So if I cast 'To the Nine Hells with You' (pg 98) using a Symbol of life (pg 237) it gains the Healing keyword and your Hospitaler just healed his foe for his charisma Mod while blasting them with Holy fire.

Better yet, since page 55 state that [at-will, encounter, daily] are keywords if you use your daily powers while swinging a flaming sword they suddenly have both the at-will and daily keywords. What exactly does that mean?

Keywords and damage are related, but do not always go hand-in-hand. On that same page, they talk about powers that have the Poison keyword, but do not deal poison damage at all.

Page 55 explicitly states that Posion is both a damage and an effect type, Necrotic is only a damage type.

At any rate answer this: Do you disagree with the premise of this thread that a single clearly stated rule and example would have eliminated this confusion? Why didn't the damage example on page 276 use a flaming weapon (or, you know, the current incarnation of the weapon they did use?) You really don't think that another few months of polishing would have improved matters?

 

[Goobermunch]

It would seem to cast the quality of playtesting in a rather negative light that this was "missed".

Unless the problem arose from an attempt to modify a pre-existing system in response to feedback from playtesters.

--G

 

[The Little Raven]

NPCs and PCs scale slightly differently in 4e, resulting in about a -1/7 levels on d20 rolls power lag for PCs in combat.

NPCs and PCs don't use the same rules, so I don't really see the problem. The system for NPCs is built for you to adjust them above and beyond the base design characteristics.

Everquest created theorycrafting (seriously, at least in the english-speaking market EQ was the first game with a large enough math-fluent on-line community to develop the tools needed to reverse engineer game mechanics and find the neato bits). WoW polished theorycrafting. Designers ignore theorycrafting at their peril, because despite theorycrafting being a derogatory term, competent theorycrafters (say the char-ops folks) are damn good at their job and the system IS the math.

Theorycraft is often wrong. It's funny you bring up WoW, since it's community has one of the worst records for being correct when it comes to theorycraft (especially since they lack a lot of the fundamental math, since Blizzard doesn't reveal all).

4e and previous editions handle injury differently from a mechanical PoV. The schizophrenic attempts to "quantify" ("excuse the existence of"?) what hp mean don't interest me. Mechanically, previous editions fit the fantasy genre better than 4e, which in turn fits the superhero genre *perfectly*.

4e: "Hit points (hp) measure your ability to stand up to punishment, turn deadly strikes into glancing blows, and stay on your feet throughout a battle. Hit points represent more than physical endurance. They represent your character’s skill, luck, and resolve—all the factors that combine to help you stay alive in a combat situation."

3e: "Hit points mean two things in the game world: the ability to take physical punishment and keep going, and the ability to turn a serious blow into a less serious one."

I fail to see a fundamental difference.

Twin Attacks>Careful Strike. Full stop.

Two attacks that miss are not better than one attack that hits. My group's ranger thought much as you do, until her damage output dropped due to lack of successful attacks.

Skill challenges are broken mechanically. Full stop.

I haven't found this to be true in play.

Astral Storm>Meteor Swarm. Full stop.

I'll agree there. That was a WTF moment for me. However, it's something more easily fixed (just a change or two would do it) than, say, Polymorph (which has had complete rewrites multiple times).

The fact that Combat Challenge goes from inflicting perhaps 1/5 of the targets hp at lvl 1 to about 1/20th at lvl 30 is indicative of bad/non-existent playtesting: at upper levels, Elites/Solos should just IGNORE the fighter's CC because the damage it inflicts is laughable.

So, is this based on actual play?

Remember, read-through theorycraft is meaningless in the face of actual play.

 

[Doug McCrae]

The Eladrin teleport is my favorite example. The idea that a core race could just pop all over the place, I cannot even imagine what their homes, cities, society must be like to have such an awesome power. Excellent and kewl as a tactical combat move, but totally completely WORLD BREAKING as anything else. (Imho)

As this interpretation of the rules leads to a broken world I would advise not interpreting the rules this way.

Solution 1:
Only powerful eladrin, such as PCs and the MM entries, can teleport.

Solution 2:
Eladrin are very rare. There are no eladrin cities, or even towns. Like the Vadhagh in the Books of Corum they are found in family groups of a couple dozen at most.

Solution 1 is not at odds with the rules. Solution 2 is implied by the core fluff.

 

[SteveC]

While I agree with the OPs assessment in many ways, we have to remember that this is essentially 4.0. I fully expect to see a fair bit of errata, and eventually to have this cleaned up in the second printing.

About that time, expect to see a lot of PHBs show up in the used bookstore market...just like with 3.0.

--Steve

 

[The Little Raven]

Because they decided that their original design goal wasn't a great idea.

Ah, the "it wasn't a mistake, it reflects a change in design philosophy" excuse that's just a cop-out to say that 3e's designers made no mistakes.

They screwed up in the original design and had to fix it later.

Tastes change too.

The 'taste' in this example are actually something that is broken, as they were substandard character types (and claiming 'system mastery' as a reason for making two classes worthless is just an excuse for poor design).

If I move into a place that has 1973 style olive drab deep shag carpet I'm probably going to change it whether it's 'broken' or not.

That's cosmetic.

A substandard class that cannot perform with other classes is far from cosmetic.

The example is incomplete. It does not say if the flaming longswords at-will ability is on or not, it just says the sword is being used.

True, but if you try to take the wording as others have, then the weapon-to-fire change would only apply to basic melee attacks (since powers would automatically gain the fire keyword, and thus fire damage), and that makes no sense at all.

That's not how exception based systems work. A rule that starts out 'If a power allows you to choose' tell you nothing about what to do with a power that does not allow you to choose.

That's exactly how it works.

General Rule: Powers that allow you to choose a damage type add the keyword of that damage type to the power.

Specific Rule: There is none under Lifedrinking weapon, thus the general rule applies.

Furthermore we're not discussing a nice clean single power but the interaction of a class power (Radiant Strike), and item property (lifedrinker weapon), the rule on page 55 discussing keywords and damage types and the rule on page 226 discussing only keywords.

And the example on page 226 uses damage types (since fire damage is a damage type).

I'll address the rest after lunch.

 

[Lurks-no-More]

As this interpretation of the rules leads to a broken world I would advise not interpreting the rules this way.

Solution 1:
Only powerful eladrin, such as PCs and the MM entries, can teleport.

Solution 2:
Eladrin are very rare. There are no eladrin cities, or even towns. Like the Vadhagh in the Books of Corum they are found in family groups of a couple dozen at most.

Solution 1 is not at odds with the rules. Solution 2 is implied by the core fluff.

And the teleportation is both short-ranged and needs a line-of-sight (something which the people decrying Fey Step seem to forget or ignore all the time). I can see Eladrin using a lot of curtains to divide the interiors of their buildings, or to block outside windows, so as to keep people from popping from here to there.

 

[noretoc]

I like how you say this is not a review, and then promptly review it.

I don't know, I find this to be a more prepared and more thought out product than 3.0 was. I doubt there will be a 4.5, as they've stated their intent to fix things online, but, still.

Compared to 3.0 when it wasn't even a month old.. this game looks like the holy grail.

I like how you ignored pretty much everything he said and turned this into an edition war. Great job there redcard.

 

[redcard]

I like how you ignored pretty much everything he said and turned this into an edition war. Great job there redcard.

This was an edition war the moment he pointed out something bad about 4.0 that didn't exist in 3.0.

Just because I pointed it out doesn't mean I made it into one.

EDIT: Actually, let me clarify.

THis became an edition war the second he used the topic title:

"The Tragedy of 4th Edition."