Why I'm done with 4e

[avin]

It's not compatible.

I don't see that as a solid argument... maybe I'm reading you wrong, and I apologize if this is the case, but it's just your opinion 4E didn't improve the game.

3.5 improved over 2E in lots of aspects, but people can argue 2E's worlds were far more interesting and there wasn't an advance in this area.

4E improved over 3.5 in lots of ways, also, but not every single aspect.

Dudes, seriously, this topic is wasted... feeling like the same dead horse: 3.5 players can't see good aspects of 4E and vice-versa.

Only a few arguments step back from personal taste, IMHO... =/

 

[Dimitris]

You could say the same for 3.5 versus earlier editions...

I agree. If you want to say that 4e is D&D even if it incompatible with the previous edition, I agree. I didn't say it is not D&D. I just said it is incompatible with the OGL / 3.5e version of the D&D.

I believe there are a series of reasons for a D&D player to let the system anchored to OGL / 3.5e and express this opinion to WotC (at the end you are voting with your dollar). In my opinion we don't need yet another system to play the same type of worlds. I believe that OGL / 3.5e is 1) sufficient (for this type of game); 2) flexible (there are "mods" that could adjust the system from high-magic to grim-and-gritty); 3) mechanically coherent; and 4) OGL / 3.5e is an open standard. You could also add to this list that its problems are known, there were a very reliable base of players etc.

Of course there were also important reasons that drive WotC to produce an incompatible system instead of an OGL / 3.5e improvement: address a new market, get the control of the fate of D&D back into the company etc. For the fisrt time, given the OGL and the opportunity that PAIZO catched, they can not force everybody to follow. This opportunity will not be there when they will switch to 5e.

In any case now we have 2 different systems to select.

Dimitris

 

[Dimitris]

I don't see that as a solid argument... maybe I'm reading you wrong, and I apologize if this is the case, but it's just your opinion 4E didn't improve the game.

3.5 improved over 2E in lots of aspects, but people can argue 2E's worlds were far more interesting and there wasn't an advance in this area.

4E improved over 3.5 in lots of ways, also, but not every single aspect.

Dudes, seriously, this topic is wasted... feeling like the same dead horse: 3.5 players can't see good aspects of 4E and vice-versa.

Only a few arguments step back from personal taste, IMHO... =/

Sorry, I didn't express it correctly. I meant they did not try to update or correct the weak points of the OGL / 3.5e but they make a new incompatible version. Essentially this is another system. Given the incompatibility, we are talking for other systems with the same brand name "D&D".

Dimitris

 

[Pbartender]

As an aside, I think there's a bit of an expectation that a role-playing character flaw should most of the time be accommodated as a good thing - when as a matter of fact, something like fear of snakes in a snake based combat can and should have significant drawbacks for your party and for yourself. I rather like the paradigm that adventurers that have survived countless lethal combats either do not have such drawbacks, or have learned to control such drawbacks in a way that would only minimally express itself in game terms. Otherwise they'd have died long ago.

Indiana Jones would be an excellent example. He's terrified of snakes, but that doesn't stop him from doing what needs to be done when snakes are around. If it did, he wouldn't be Indiana Jones.

 

[Bluenose]

Sorry, I didn't express it correctly. I meant they did not try to update or correct the weak points of the OGL / 3.5e but they make a new incompatible version. Essentially this is another system. Given the incompatibility, we are talking for other systems with the same brand name "D&D".

Dimitris

I don't think you're quite understanding the points that are being raised, or else I'm not. You seem to be saying that 4e shouldn't be called D&D because it's so different from the previous edition. Gnomeworks and avin seem to me to be saying that 3e is just as big a change from the previous edition. And that your conclusion that it's not D&D because it's not compatible is rendered either invalid or irrelevant, since either 3e wasn't a true version of D&D because of it's lack of compatibility, or compatibility is largely irrelevant to the question.

 

[I'm A Banana]

If so, it's high quality buttformation!

Beyonce would be jealous.

There seems to be a group of people who can't find happiness in 3rd or 4th Edition.

There's a whole world of RPGs out there to explore! It make take a lot of work, but there is an RPG out there for you! The Song of Ice and Fire, OSRIC, True 20, Mutants and Masterminds, GURPS, Shadowrun, and Kobolds ate my Baby are just a few of the RPGs out there!

All of them progressively harder to find or create a group for, or with their own bags of problems (there is no perfect system, after all).

I also play T20 on occasion (for when I'm feeling constrained by the fantasy genre), and I use FFZ (though it's technically not a totally complete ruleset, I've run and played a few games), and I'm getting some mileage out of Spirit of the Century, but we always come back to D&D. The brand, and what the various systems to right, is more powerful than what they do wrong.

I mean, if the rules were FATAL but the cover said D&D, it would still be easier to find players than for T20.

(and I'm in NYC, which is hardly a gaming backwater, I can find players of strange games if I look hard enough; for those in more rural areas, it might not even be an option)

 

[Dimitris]

I agree. If you want to say that 4e is D&D even if it incompatible with the previous edition, I agree. I didn't say it is not D&D. I just said it is incompatible with the OGL / 3.5e version of the D&D.
...

I have said I agree with this.

But still I cannot DM a group in AD&D second edition. And I cannot play in a 4e group. They are incompatible systems. What are the common parts of these systems ? Very few. I believe the reason we call them all "D&D" is not the common mechanics of the systems.

 

[Dimitris]

So, 4e is incompatible with OGL / 3.5e and ..

I believe there are a series of reasons for a D&D player to let the system anchored to OGL / 3.5e and express this opinion to WotC (at the end you are voting with your dollar). In my opinion we don't need yet another system to play the same type of worlds. I believe that OGL / 3.5e is 1) sufficient (for this type of game); 2) flexible (there are "mods" that could adjust the system from high-magic to grim-and-gritty); 3) mechanically coherent; and 4) OGL / 3.5e is an open standard. You could also add to this list that its problems are known, there were a very reliable base of players etc.

Of course there were also important reasons that drive WotC to produce an incompatible system instead of an OGL / 3.5e improvement: address a new market, get the control of the fate of D&D back into the company etc. For the fisrt time, given the OGL and the opportunity that PAIZO catched, they can not force everybody to follow. This opportunity will not be there when they will switch to 5e.

And ..

If you prefer the 4e game than the OGL / 3.5e game, it's ok. But don't change your game to 4e because THIS was the decision of THE D&D company and THIS is going to be the new D&D and it is safer to be a follower and go with the crowd. As you have noticed, 4e became just another system. OGL / 3.5e is alive, updated and well supported.

Dimitris

 

[Sir Robilar]

There seem to be a lot of people here who tried 4E, found out it's not theirs but also couldn't return to 3E since they suddenly felt that system's flaws were too obvious to return.

My group was in the same position. We tried 4E and played it up to 6th level, which took almost a year. Then we discussed the rules and found out that most of us were burnt out on them, for reasons that have been said often enough in this thread, but also the following: 4E doesn't do low-magic well and (all IMO of course) it doesn't do simulationist well. My homebrew is a world in which magic is very rare and dangerous. I continuously had to remind the players of that fact, since the rules didn't represent it. This should have been obvious to me after reading the books for the first time of course, but back then I thought I could tweak the system here and there and it would work out ok.

Still it didn't and we decided to change to another system. We couldn't imagine returning to 3E, so we started looking for other fantasy RPGs. In fact we were so engaged in the campaign, that we wanted to convert without stopping it. The problem was, that there is simply too much choice. RuneQuest, Hero, Savage Worlds, Warriors and Warlocks, Barbarians of Lemuria, and on and on goes the list.

In the end we decided to try True20 and it was just right for us. It is close enough to the kind of D&D we enjoy. Combat is fast and deadly and we could finally stop using miniatures. T20 is meant to be a system which you have to tweak and make your own before you can even start gaming. So we added corruption rules for magic, forbid certain spells, and made some other small tweaks here and there. In the end, and after the whole group had invested work in it, it felt like the right system for what we wanted.

I encourage everyone who has stranded between systems to look at one of the toolbox games. If you like it, go and create the gaming experience you want from it.

 

[Imaro]

I'm not Piratecat, but you seem to be operating under a very common misconception. Some people think that because there is only one table on page 42 that it only deals with one topic - which would be the categories of damage.

This is not what page 42 actually is about.

Rather, it handles three separate things.

1. "The DM's best friend"
This is the good old circumstance bonus of 3.x, just providing a +2/-2 modifier for good or bad situations. This could be clever tricks, useful distractions, particularly (un)convincing lies, and so on.

2. "Cast the Action as a Check"
You have the option of resolving an unusual action as either an attack roll or a skill/ability check. You can pull the rug out from under somebody's feet to knock them prone, throw sand in their faces, maybe even use a scarf to tangle up a construct's gears. Whatever the DM is willing to let you get away with, really.

3. "Improvised Damage"
Based on how devastating and common a source of hurt is, the table tells you how much damage an unspecified hazard might deal.


Part of people's misconception comes from the table, but also the example used: swinging from a chandelier to push an ogre into a fire. This makes people think that the stunt (swinging from a chandelier) causes 2d8+5 fire damage.
It doesn't.
The stunt lets Shiera knock an ogre back 1 square. The damage comes from the fact there's a brazier over there. It's important to keep these two things apart, because the damage would have been determined the exact same way if Tide of Iron had been used to knock the ogre back. The example simply combines two seperate rules into one action, but that doesn't mean that all actions are like that. Some improvised damage comes without using a stunt. Some stunts don't do improvised damage at all.

I'm not operating under a misconception... where does it tell you how or even give guidelines for fairly adjudicating any effect besides damage? Now it would be different if powers didn't have effects, but because they do some type of balance should be maintained as far as ease of action vs. effect garnered. I have seen many people post what they feel is the right way to measure the value of effects... but nothing on page 42 helps you with this.