Third Party: If So, Then What?

[ggroy]

I'll echo some others and say that third party player supplements are worthless to me. The Compendium and Character Builder have plenty of options in that regard, and adding third party material of that nature is more trouble than it's worth. I am similarly uninterested in monster supplements unless they are heavy on fluff that I could mine for ideas.

I've been using the Pathfinder supplements in the chronicles and companion series of books, to mine for ideas for my 4E sandbox game. Some Paizo people have mentioned that they have been writing the Pathfinder chronicles and companion books to be relatively crunch lite, or sometimes even almost system-neutral (such as some of the region books for the Pathfinder Golarion setting). The Pathfinder re-imagined monster and race books have a bit more crunch than the region books, but are nevertheless very much fluff heavy.

 

[pawsplay]

I blogged about this topic.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/blogs/pawsplay/1967-niches-mirror-may-smaller-than-they-appear.html

 

[darjr]

The Anarchists Gamemasters Cookbook is the kind of thing I'm after. Something like it with 4e as a focus would be very cool.

Sinister Adventures

 

[Truename]

Drag and drop encounters with interesting terrain features and the like would also be useful. It's easy to put a basic encounter together, but adding cool set pieces to take it to the next level requires more effort.

WoTC's adventures are lackluster, but Dungeon has included some great set-piece encounters that are pretty darn close to drag-and-drop, thanks to the Delve format. Just add adventure-appropriate monsters, and done.

(Actually, an rated index of Dungeon encounters would be an awesome resource. Too bad I don't have the time for it.)

 

[ggroy]

I'm always on the lookout for new 4E books in print at my local FLGS, where I recently saw a paper book version of "Scarrport: City of Secrets" published by Reality Deviant Publications and Mongoose. My first thought was combining it with Freeport would make an interesting game.

(No offense is intended to the authors of Scarrport, if they are lurkers or posters on here).

I looked through the Scarrport book and noticed it had a new class (the elementalist), with half of the book taken up by new paragon paths, epic destinies, races, feats, equipment, and monsters. The rest of the book describes the town of Scarrport. I knew right away this book would be almost next to useless for my present 4E players. The fact that the player specific crunch is not present in the DDI character builder, may very well doom this book to having a lot of resistance from my players who have been totally spoiled by the DDI. I ended up putting the book back onto the shelf.

I don't like having to say this, but my impression is that any future 4E 3pp setting and/or adventure books where my first gut reaction is knowing that it would be almost next to useless for my players (ie. due to 3PP player specific crunch being absent from the DDI character builder), may very well doom these books to be permanently off my shopping list. These days I will not buy any rpg books which will not see any use in my games. The crappy economy doesn't help much either, where I find myself spending less in general.

I don't know what the 4E Freeport companion guide will look like. But if it resembles the Scarrport book where I get a gut reaction that it will be almost next to useless for my players, then it will probably change my mind about buying it. The same can probably be said about other already announced 4E 3pp settings in the pipeline for future release, such as Amethyst, Nevermore, Age of Legend, Scarred Lands, etc ...

In the bigger picture, the DDI character builder has such a huge hegemony over the 4E 3PP market that the only supplement books I will still presently buy and use in my 4E game, are mainly setting and adventure type books which can be used "out of the box" with the DDI character builder (ie. no new classes, no new races, no new feats, etc ...).

I find it amazing that we're even having such a discussion in the first place, just a bit over a year after 4E D&D was first released, and how fast this has happened. In contrast back in the early 3E D&D days, it took almost 2 or 3 years for the "d20 3pp bubble" to pop. This time around for 4E, there wasn't much of a "3pp bubble" to speak of.

 

[Hjorimir]

Radically different settings. They don't even need to feel like D&D, they just need to work within the 4e ruleset. I'm tired of WotC's philosophy of "everything must fit into each of our settings" way of making settings.

Then take said setting and only add the crunch needed to support the fluff (less is more here).

Think mini-settings.

 

[Jack99]

I find it amazing that we're even having such a discussion in the first place, just a bit over a year after 4E D&D was first released, and how fast this has happened. In contrast back in the early 3E D&D days, it took almost 2 or 3 years for the "d20 3pp bubble" to pop. This time around for 4E, there wasn't much of a "3pp bubble" to speak of.

I do not find it amazing. GSL combined with an amazing quality in most the WotC products has made the need for 3pp stuff a lot smaller.

 

[BryonD]

I find it amazing that we're even having such a discussion in the first place, just a bit over a year after 4E D&D was first released, and how fast this has happened. In contrast back in the early 3E D&D days, it took almost 2 or 3 years for the "d20 3pp bubble" to pop. This time around for 4E, there wasn't much of a "3pp bubble" to speak of.

4E appeals to a different gaming style.

Even before the GSL disaster I predicted that a game marketed on simplicity and minimal prep time would run contrary to 3pp appeal. If a 3pp runs in tune with this approach (makes adventures) they can do ok, but even that is going to be limited.

That doesn't make 4E bad in any way. Just different.

 

[AllisterH]

Might also be more advertising done by Paizo itself.

If you're a PAthfinder fan, you check paizo's homepage every day and what do you see.

At the top of the page is a blurb for new product paizo is selling and many a time, it is ALSO a 3pp product.

I honestly was amazed that there were so many 3pp products released for 4e (in the One Bad Egg lthread) since I knew only of Wraith Recon.

 

[mudbunny]

I would like to see towns/cities/countries/interesting areas that I can pick up and plop into my campaign.

Either small, self-contained areas that can be placed down and, with only a little filing of the edges, placed in beside other ones, or large, world-spanning things that can be overlaid over the campaign world.