Clark Peterson on 4E

[xechnao]

He's wrong. But entitled to his opinion.


He's still wrong. And still entitled to his opinion.


It was a role-playing game last night when my friends and I played it. Our characters rescued a goblin union organizer from an ambush by fae assassins. Later, my guy offered to compose 'highly eroticized propaganda' to aid the labor movement... it's a long story.


And that action is 'play with creative people'. At least, that works for us.


It's possible to not like something while still recognizing what it is. Liver and onions, for instance, while revolting, is still food, and anyone asserting otherwise is being silly.

That said, I wish Necromancer Games luck with their 4e products, if they decide to go that route. I'd love to see some diverse, high-quality takes on 4e. I just do think it needs to turned back into something is obviously already is.

You are wrong to "bewrong" him. It is a matter of your opinion as is his. Your opinion cannot make wrong his opinion.

 

[Yair]

No. No, that's not quite right. Tell you what, here are the major quotes, in their entirety...

The first one pretty much nails his views, the rest embellish it:

Excellent quotes, thanks for the summary.

I rather agree with Clark that 4e feels like a miniatures game, so far. I've still only played low-levels (1-3), though. I'm gonna give 4e a lot of more time to pan out, but so far it does feel like it's lost the free-form, versimilitude-feel. This despite having rules supporting improvisation and so on, which I am greatly thankful for.

I am not sure I agree with some of his notions, however. Like Vancian magic, or not being afraid of buffing.

Finally, I'm getting old grumpy and unwilling to learn new rule systems. I'm inclining more and more towards finding a more free-form system where I can focus on kicking ass, not on rules minutae. I have a feeling my current campaing will be the last campaign of D&D I'llr run, whether Clark manages to "fix" 4e or not.

 

[Darrin Drader]

What is interesting, to me, is that Clark doesn't need to win the war. Paizo *needs* (in my estimation) to claim and hold territory. Same with Wizards (although they need to make out with more territory than Paizo). But the N3cro edition can simply exist, in a worst case scenario, as a Clark Peterson vanity press variant.

Given that Necro has no full time employees and doesn't publish anything on a monthly basis, I agree with your assessment.

 

[Delta]

QFT. Sorry folks, but there's no way to say Clark isn't criticizing the current product here, which to me is just baffling considering how rah-rah cheerleader he'd been about it all the way up until recent months.

Look, from what I've read of Clark it's very simple. He has two competing desires that 4E has made incompatible.

(a) He loves, loves, loves to be involved in supporting the current-edition, currently-published Dungeons & Dragons brand.
(b) He can't stand the GSL or the actual 4E rules as written, now that he's seen them.

So now he's torn and trying to work it through. He wanted 4E to be successful prior to its release and publicly hoped for it really hard. (Personally I thought that was a fool's errand, but what the hey, a guy can hope.) Now he's trying to pick up the pieces like a lot of us are. Sometimes you can't have your cake and eat it, too.

 

[Treebore]

Amazing. I have seen this: "How dare you criticize 4E?!?" before. Except 3E was in that sentence.

News flash, 4E is NOT perfect. If it was I would love it. If it was ENWorld polls would not be indicating 30 to 40% of ENWorld board members are NOT playing 4E.

So Clark is honest enough to say, "4E is not perfect." Then, being the problem solver he is says, "I have some ideas that I think will fix 4E for me and be of interest to others who are also unhappy with 4e."

So rather than admit 4E is not perfect and could use some different ideas to increase its appeal, posters would rather talk like 4E is perfection.

We heard that story before. Now we have 4E. We hear the same story now, and there will be a 5E.

Some posters may actually feel 4E is perfect. However it is not perfect for a very significant number of ENWorld members. If Clarks ideas are published and turn more of the 30 to 40% of ENWorld members on to 4E thats a good thing for WOTC and 4E.

I agree with the heart of Clarks sentiments. I do not agree about it ruining role play. Even in the threads where I have commented on my feeling about how 4E plays I have always said that 4E has not ruined my ability, or the ability of those I am playing 4E with, to role play to our hearts content.

There is a fair bit of other things I do not like about 4E, though. So I look forward to seeing if Clark is enough of a genious to come up with changes to 4E that makes it the best game on the market for more ENWorlders. This should have people excited, not acting like their being insulted, or acting like 4E is perfection. He isn't insulting anyone, and he is being honest about 4E not being perfect.

Clark is in a position to put his 4E house rules into print, I look forward to checking them out, so I hope it happens.

 

[Mallus]

You are wrong to "bewrong" him.

Perhaps.

It is a matter of your opinion as is his.

I think it's possible to demonstrate that 4e is a role playing, using any reasonably objective definition of the term.

 

[Kishin]

Sometimes you can't have your cake and eat it, too.

Yeah, but you should probably expect a few strange and even dirty looks when you go around trying to sell that cake to other people, then turn around and declare the cake to be crap.

 

[Mallus]

News flash, 4E is NOT perfect.

Of course it isn't. But it's still a role-playing game and saying otherwise makes you look foolish.

Clark is in a position to put his 4E house rules into print, I look forward to checking them out, so I hope it happens.

So do I.

 

[Korgoth]

I don't think it's entirely fair to accuse Clark of "switching horses in midstream"... whatever that is supposed to mean here. His rah-rah stuff was pre-launch, when he was seeing teasers, etc., or early into the launch before he had much of a chance to play.

It seems to me like he was enthusastic about it, thought it looked really good initially, and then after putting it through the paces ended up not liking the play experience that it delivers.

My own opinion is that D&D has always primarily been about exploration. To care about what you're exploring, you have to believe in it a little bit. The boardgame mechanics ("shift a square", "hit him and he shifts", etc.) remove the feeling that you're in a world... the "economy of actions" thing doesn't help either, in that you're evidently not supposed to hire henchmen, animate the dead, etc. because it's not 'fair' according to some game standard. So if you're not exploring a world, I can see how it could feel like you're just playing Advanced Descent.

 

[The Little Raven]

Amazing. I have seen this: "How dare you criticize 4E?!?" before. Except 3E was in that sentence.

Can you point me to the posts in this thread that take that stance, because I can't find a single one. I can find plenty that take exception to some of the things that Clark said (such as my problem with his criticizing the game, then turning around and claiming it's not criticism when it clearly is), but not a single one that takes exception to the fact that he has any criticisms at all.

So Clark is honest enough to say, "4E is not perfect." Then, being the problem solver he is says, "I have some ideas that I think will fix 4E for me and be of interest to others who are also unhappy with 4e."

The problem is the way he says it. When you say "Imagine it done right" or that you can restore its "soul," that sounds like a "one true way" statement, because it implies that his way is the only way to get things "done right."