The Truth About 4th Edition.

[avin]

Do you think that no one plays games in which all the players remain engaged, even during other player's turns?
Or do you believe these people and games exist out there?

Do you personally become disengaged when it is not the time for your personal action?

Speaking for myself, the same crew playing, my friends seem to pay far more attention on 4E combats than they used to on former editions.

4E combat is engaging.

I think you *could* be mixing things a bit here, inserting a good narrative on this equation, pushing the players into paying attention.

Well, being myself still a 3.5 fan, I can assure you that, by the rules, 4E combat seem to translate into more focused players.

This style of combat maybe will need some tweaks to bring back some players on 5E, but it's very very fun...

 

[Njall]

I am not sure you have played WoW if you beleive taunting works in that way, They have added a hate meter to show you how far up on the hate bar you are, the more you use taunt spells the faster your taunt meter goes up, as a paladin I do not even use taunts in the regular way, I have a 150% hate gain when using spells with a holy effect. Not a yes or no binary system, but a percentage system. EQ2 has also added a hate bar so you can see how far up you are, and each hate gain spell tells you a specific number that using that spell raises your hate by, 1500 plus 42 every 3 seconds for example, trust me tank classes are the class I play. If you need I will send you a screen shot of my paladins spell showing you it telling you it increases hate by a specific amount, it is not an either or situation.

Man, taunt is a binary effect. Taunt is an ability that can miss ( 8% against boss level mobs ), and some mobs are/used to be immune to taunt.
If taunt hits, it forces a mob to attack you for 3 seconds and sets you on top of the threat stack. That's why it's a binary effect: either you hit and the mob attacks you, or it misses ( or the mob is immune ) and the mob doesn't attack you.
Sure, if the second guy on the threat stack generates more TPS than you do, he'll snatch the aggro back, but Taunt is still a binary effect.
In addition, the way threat works in WoW is totally different from how marking works in 4e.
Even the way threat works is fundamentally binary: either you're on top of the threat stack and the monster attacks you, or you aren't and the monster attacks someone else. Only the two highest numbers on the stack are relevant for the purpose of threat.
In WoW, a monster cannot choose to attack another target as long as your threat is the highest on the stack: to take the mob away from you another PC has to increase his threat to 110% or 130% of the tank's threat ( for melee and ranged, respectively ).
In 4e, a marked opponent can attack whomever it likes: he'll just face the consequences for doing so. That's pretty different: WoW creates an artificial resource ( threat multipliers ) that's really abstract, and is really, really hard to explain from an irl POV.
4e, instead, gives the monster a logical reason to attack the "tank": the defender is trained to whoop your ass if you don't focus on him. That's just what happens in real life if you stop caring about the guy who's trying to punch you in the face to do something else.
Threat forces the monster to attack you, marking incentivizes them instead.
Another difference, for example, is that threat doesn't work in a PvP environment, because that would make PvP dull and easy.
Marking doesn't have such a drawback.

(Since it seems that we need to provide our curriculum vitae to discuss WoW, I'll add that yes, I've played WoW for about 5 years, as a tank, with 250 played or so. Not that it should really be a requirement, since, you know, WoW is not exactly rocket science... )

 

[Mallus]

This sort of RPGing may not be to everyone's taste. But I don't see how it can be described as "less refined".

The first things that popped into my head after reading that remark was "Refined D&D? Oh you mean like The Unbearable Lightness of Being an Oozemaster and The Discreet Charms of the Prestige Class?

(I suppose 3e is refined!)

 

[ExploderWizard]

It depends. I know that in games I've played, some people wander away from the table when certain situations happen. I recall very well a 3e game in which we were fighting in, basically, a closet. The player of the guy at the back, who was a priest with no ranged weapon, had his character wander into the room next door (in the dungeon) and eat jam. He was roleplaying being bored. Fortunately, he was entertaining, and it became a running joke, so we salvaged something from it.

I wouldn't have been at all surprised if a less experienced roleplayer (i.e. a newbie) in that situation had just gone to play the X-Box with a "call me when you're finished with this fight."

It isn't, generally speaking, fun to do nothing for most people. To the extent that D&D has moments where characters are mandated to do nothing, that's, IMO, a flaw, not a feature. Again, I'm speaking for what I think is the vast majority of gamers. Are there people (like my friend) who can turn those moments magical? Sure, but they really shouldn't be put in that position in the first place.

So yeah, I've run into games where it's an issue. Ergo, I'm glad it's been addressed. That doesn't mean it was an issue for everyone. If it never came up in your games, count yourself fortunate.

This is what can happen when the grid/battlemat and fiddly combat rules are allowed to dominate the game. Turn based individual initiative is a horrible system that just feeds the " me time" crowd and actually contributes more to the wandering away from the game problem more than any other rules related issue. Boardgame grid focus combines with this to produce situations like the one you describe.

This isn't just a WOTC D&D issue either. Advanced GURPS combat gets like this too. The turn structure and the hex grid focus produce the same kind of situations.

 

[BryonD]

Speaking for myself, the same crew playing, my friends seem to pay far more attention on 4E combats than they used to on former editions.

4E combat is engaging.

OK.
But that does not answer my question.

 

[Gort]

This is what can happen when the grid/battlemat and fiddly combat rules are allowed to dominate the game. Turn based individual initiative is a horrible system that just feeds the " me time" crowd and actually contributes more to the wandering away from the game problem more than any other rules related issue. Boardgame grid focus combines with this to produce situations like the one you describe.

This isn't just a WOTC D&D issue either. Advanced GURPS combat gets like this too. The turn structure and the hex grid focus produce the same kind of situations.

Well, what do you do instead? Just have people say vaguely where they are and every so often ask a person at DM whim what they want to do next?

Because that sounds confusing as heck. There's a good reason we had paper maps in 2nd ed, which turned into grids in 3e. They prevent every combat from being:

DM: "Seven guys rush you. Each of you get engaged by two guys, except for Tough Player, you get three."
Wizard Player: "But how can they reach me? I'm round the corner/at the back of the party/on the moon/under the table!"
DM: "You didn't say you were under the table, I thought you were in the room with the others!"
Rogue Player: "Can I backstab yet? Am I behind anyone? Can I sort of like slip between some guys so I can backstab them? I never get to backstab anyone!"

Well, maybe not every combat, but there've been plenty of times when the idea the DM has of player positioning has been very different to the idea the players have.

Generally speaking whenever anyone brings up miniatures or grid maps as a bad thing, their expectation is that the GM should just handle it all. Something not covered by the game? GM handwaves it! Which is great and all, but I'd sooner just know that I'm behind someone and can backstab them rather than having to ask permission from The Master beforehand.

 

[Alaxk Knight of Galt]

Here's a little secret, Andy. D&D is a cooperative game. Your point of comparison isn't Carcassone, let alone Dominion. It's games like Arkham Horror you should be looking at for inspiration. A group of players gets together and pulls off a collective gigue in the face of escalating tension.

Wow, just wow. Someone please help me to erase my memory of that interview. It tarnished my active appreciation of 4E.

There are cooperative board games: Shadows over Camelot is a perfect example. Seven players working together to complete quest and overcome the game. Of course, one of the players may (or may not be) a traitor to the cause, working for the game against the other six.

You can see some elements of Shadows in 4th, especially as it relates to turn actions. Each player has the same actions they take each turn. How well (or poorly) they use each action will directly relate to victory or defeat. 4E, in strictly codifying the actions a PC can take each turn, is very similar to Shadows.

An interesting idea of the game is that the player selects the game's action each turn. Perhaps this will be explored some day in the DnD rules set...

Furthermore, there are interesting things to learn from games like Settlers of Catan. Resource management is key in Settlers, just as in DnD (any edition). Acknowledging and building upon sound design of other game is good for DnD.

 

[BryonD]

It depends. I know that in games I've played, some people wander away from the table when certain situations happen. I recall very well a 3e game in which we were fighting in, basically, a closet. The player of the guy at the back, who was a priest with no ranged weapon, had his character wander into the room next door (in the dungeon) and eat jam. He was roleplaying being bored. Fortunately, he was entertaining, and it became a running joke, so we salvaged something from it.

I'm not certain that is a good example. If he was truly making a show of representing his character being disconnected from the activity, then he was still engaged from the group. Which isn't to say that makes my point either, just that it is neither here nor there as an example.

I have no doubt whatsoever that there are people who get bored and wander away from the table. But I don't accept that it is universal or that the game mechanics are the preferred method of solution.

I wouldn't have been at all surprised if a less experienced roleplayer (i.e. a newbie) in that situation had just gone to play the X-Box with a "call me when you're finished with this fight."

So getting bored is a function of being a newbie? That position was not part of the claim I replied to. And I don't think I agree with it in any case.

It isn't, generally speaking, fun to do nothing for most people. To the extent that D&D has moments where characters are mandated to do nothing, that's, IMO, a flaw, not a feature. Again, I'm speaking for what I think is the vast majority of gamers. Are there people (like my friend) who can turn those moments magical? Sure, but they really shouldn't be put in that position in the first place.

I doubt it is even a majority, much less "vast".

"Vastly" more people enjoy reading fantasy fiction than gaming. And yet they "do nothing" but passively observe the story. And they consider it a pleasurable activity.

The very idea that "engagement" and not doing "nothing" is directly tied to it being the individual's turn is quite contrary to my experience in gaming and much of what I enjoy most in gaming. If you can get your players in character, and have those characters feel like part of the group and have that group feel like it is part of an exciting story in an exciting world, then it can be deeply engaging.

The idea of walking away from the table because it is not your turn is slightly more bizarre to me than the idea of walking in and out of a movie theater every five minutes. You are either into the movie or not. So either stay or leave.

But if the activity is not a source of interest and the player is only there because of their personal chance to kill the next orc, then the game (and killing that next orc may be way way fun) is not being the kind of roleplaying experience that it can be.

I've had players with dead characters and yet a casual observer would not be able to tell they were any less engaged than the others, until after a while they might notice that person not taking any turns.

If someone is walking away when it is not their turn, they are not participating in the same activity that I think of when I play a roleplaying game. They may be having a ton of fun. I'm not making a relative value statement there. But we are not talking about two different ways to achieve the same thing, we are talking about achieving two different things.

So yeah, I've run into games where it's an issue. Ergo, I'm glad it's been addressed. That doesn't mean it was an issue for everyone. If it never came up in your games, count yourself fortunate.

You make your own luck.

 

[Windjammer]

Sociopathy used to be classified as a serious mental disorder, now it´s regarded as a neuropathologic disorder.

Except that classification and aetiology have nothing to do with the symptoms which make up the phenomenon in the first place - and which determine how the word is applied outside medic textbooks in everyday parlance.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Generally speaking whenever anyone brings up miniatures or grid maps as a bad thing, their expectation is that the GM should just handle it all. Something not covered by the game? GM handwaves it! Which is great and all, but I'd sooner just know that I'm behind someone and can backstab them rather than having to ask permission from The Master beforehand.

I never said miniatures or battlemaps were a bad thing. The bad part is the rules that make these things such a priority over everything else.

Why does a halfling (or a human for that matter) need a 5' personal bubble? Minis and a battle map can be used to avoid confusion about ranges & positioning without dominating the game. I have been collecting and painting minis for about 22 years and I love to use them in games.