DND 4E Is different! (Why is that bad?)

[DonTadow]

I'll be brief and to my point. A major complaint of DnD 4E is that isn't different, that its not like previous editions. Well, this isn't a new thing, as the races and world in general are different in each edition. So, instead of complaining "why", ask "why not?"

New rules, new races, new setting... so why stick to The Way it Used to Be?

Sequels should have a strong thing in common with a predecesser and fix concerns from the first. The one thing 4e, like or hate it, will be known from 5 years ago, is the edition that seperated the d20 community. There's no middle ground with 4e. It's one way to play it, its one way it is being designed, and though this ultra focus is seen as good as some, those alienated by it are kinda peeved.

NOrmal editions have tried to still keep a middle ground, 4e leans a bit one way. Imagine if any political candiate leaned one way either too left or too ritght, he would not garner the majority of votes. 4e is leaning too much one way and they've alienated a good amount of people, maybe 20% of the d20 world. Which, in a numbers name as a business person, isn't that bad if you know that the other 80% is strong. I just never thought I'd see D&D become such a numbers game.

 

[Dausuul]

Of course, maybe I'm talking out of my butt and WotC thought AoO was a little awkward to say.

That's my theory. Opportunity Attack is a slightly less clunky name than Attack of Opportunity. Was there a reason not to make this change? Is there anybody out there who's going to say, "Opportunity attacks? What are those? Does that have anything to do with attacks of opportunity?"

At my table, we kept calling them "attacks of opportunity" when we started playing 4E, because that was the term we were used to using. We've been slowly shifting over to "opportunity attacks," as repeatedly encountering that term in the rulebooks gets us into the habit of using it. But if anybody says "attack of opportunity," we all know what it means.

Sequels should have a strong thing in common with a predecesser and fix concerns from the first. The one thing 4e, like or hate it, will be known from 5 years ago, is the edition that seperated the d20 community.

Just like 3E was, and 2E, and AD&D. Every edition separates the d20 community*, and there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. You'll notice we have a number of folks on this board who are still playing OD&D; that's proof right there that new editions have been separating the community ever since some bearded grognard declared that all these "role-players" were ruining his beloved Chainmail.

I've yet to see any indication that 4E has caused a worse split than those that came before.

[SIZE=-2]* Okay, okay, technically there was no d20 community before 3E. Whatever. The community was separated, regardless.[/SIZE]

 

[Darkwolf71]

That's my theory. Opportunity Attack is a slightly less clunky name than Attack of Opportunity.

Ah, but it is considerably more clunky than the easily adapted to and often used A-Op.

Was there a reason not to make this change? Is there anybody out there who's going to say, "Opportunity attacks? What are those? Does that have anything to do with attacks of opportunity?"

Actually, yes. "Don't jack with what's familiar unless you have to." I'm pretty sure that's carved in stone somewhere.

 

[DonTadow]

. Every edition separates the d20 community*, and there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. You'll notice we have a number of folks on this board who are still playing OD&D; that's proof right there that new editions have been separating the community ever since some bearded grognard declared that all these "role-players" were ruining his beloved Chainmail.

I've yet to see any indication that 4E has caused a worse split than those that came before.

[SIZE=-2]* Okay, okay, technically there was no d20 community before 3E. Whatever. The community was separated, regardless.[/SIZE]

Sure there's always been the 5 to 10 percent, but you're talking aalmost 20 to 30 percent of he fanbase saying screw it, that is much different than any other edition, that's a large chunk. Large enough, that several sequels and writers have formed their own sequals to 3rd edition, hardly aything to laugh at.

 

[Dausuul]

Sure there's always been the 5 to 10 percent, but you're talking aalmost 20 to 30 percent of he fanbase saying screw it, that is much different than any other edition, that's a large chunk. Large enough, that several sequels and writers have formed their own sequals to 3rd edition, hardly aything to laugh at.

Do you have sources for those numbers?

 

[justanobody]

Why is it being different a bad thing? Because if someone didn't want to play D&D to begin with there were already so many other things to play that had different rules systems why even bother with 4th edition rather just play one of the other games made over the decades?

If D&D and Warhmmer had switched rulesets, would people still play D&D for the name, or switch to playing Warhammer to play a game they prefer more?

The ones that stick with a name tell you something about them, while the ones that switch tell you something about them as well.

What it tells you may vary from what it tells to someone else, but there are a few things it tells in general from a scientific standpoint and psychological standpoint, that I will let you draw your own conclusions to.

 

[Aus_Snow]

I don't dislike it because it is different, but because it is a PoS.

But yes, there are those who dislike it for that reason alone. And you know what? That's fair enough too.

Who cares why people dislike it. I mean, really. Live and let live, yo.

 

[DonTadow]

Do you have sources for those numbers?

You can try every poll on here that's every mentioned it (you got a year of them). You can also look at 3.5 alt systems like pathfinder which have garnered some 80k in downloads and basae that against estimated rpg tabletop players of somewhere between 500k.

YOu can also just take personal accounts that I"ve bee nthree three edition changes and never seen it like this before. Not where whole groups and playstyles were alienated. Not enough to make other systems lucrative.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

There's no doubt that some of what you say is true, but as someone who prefers 4E, I have to say that 4E did fix some of 3E's issues BY becoming different. High level play in 3E is not fixable for a vast majority of people it seems (just read the oodles of posts about it on the Pathfinder playtest boards) without changing some fundamental facet of the core 3e system. 4E high level play is something I enjoy, rather than something I loathe.

And high level play in 3E is pretty godawful without major alterations, I agree. But yet again, I don't see how 4E was such a great fix. Scaling values (like damage) was only a small factor in unwieldy high level 3E play. The main generic problem was the growing list of absolute immunities creatures would gain, rise in length to resolve turns as actions got more complex and numerous, and the basic exponential growth high levels produced. 4E "fixed" this by implementing a mostly linear growth through the levels and strongly limiting amounts of actions and what they can do. 3E can also be fixed in this manner, by using E6 or E[number] rules, or some other drastic measure to stop standard progression. I only faintly remember 2E, but it had level limits and after a certain level, hp gains went down a lot, so this isn't even a new concept. Yeah, you can go to level 30 in 4E, but is the difference between level 15 and 30 that you experience in play (unlocking brand new abilities, not merely increased bonuses, as challenges rise in DC accordingly) really much different than going from say...level 5 to 10 in 3E? How much does the end level matter numerically? I can just cut my 3E games off at level 12 and not worry about high levels, and the players will still accrue a whole bunch of cool abilities over that time period.

While I feel that everybody is free to like or dislike 4e as much as they want, this argument feels very incomplete to me. "most don't like change merely for the sake of change" is a statement I can accept as being true without further support. But the implication is that 4e has changes that were made purely for the sake of having a change. I'd like some evidence and examples of that. I don't think it is true. As it stands, argument A simply hangs around without proving anything.

Let me clarify. To people who prefer 3E to 4E, 4E is change for the sake of change, because we find the changes to be either pointless or worse overall (of course there will be some changes that a given person will like, for example: I like that fixed scores and point buy are listed before rolling for stat generation). To people who prefer 4E, this is obviously not the case. But the OP was asking why 4E being different is bad. I thought that meant he wanted to know...why it's bad. If you don't think the differences are bad (you like 4E), how much are you going to contribute in response beyond "It's not bad."?

Others have listed some things they find to be change for no good reason, I could make up my whole list, but I don't really feel like it. All of it would just end up being a subset of "change for the sake of change."

 

[ProfessorCirno]

The question isn't "why not change," the question is "why change to begin with?" For some people, 4e answers that question and tells them why to change. For others, it doesn't answer that question. For that latter group, they never once have to tell you why they decided not to change; that's the default. They're quite comfortable where they are.

God knows if I'm sitting on a couch I find very comfortable, someone's going to have to go to some long measures to make me want to sit somewhere else. Some people who sat on the couch previously still like sitting there. Others liked sitting there at the time, but have since then found more comfortable seating arrangements for themselves. Some never sat in my couch to begin with, and hate me and everyone who sits on couches because they're so mainstream. There's even a group that sat on the couch, have a different couch, and constantly tell me how much they hate my couch now, and how much better their sofa is. Every now and then, a few buggers go to my couch and steal some cushions for themselves.