D&D 4E I'm here 4e and left wondering....

I'm a huge fan of 4e myself... I remember begrudgingly giving 3e a try before finally deciding I liked it. I remember gawking at the loss of THAC0 (defense scores go up?! What madness is this?!) This never happened for me with 4e. I was probably the most excited member of my group about it when it first came out.

That said, if I had to sum up my disappointments with the system, they would be thusly:

1: In earlier editions (3.x especially), if you played a character that had little no utility in combat, that was okay. There was still plenty for your character to do. One of my favorite characters was a Master Inquisitive who fired crossbow bolts wide in most combats and one time threatened a kobold prisoner into helping out with a difficult melee, and that was it. Later in that same run I played an eight-year telepath who could certainly do thing in combat, but that wasn't his defining characteristic. Everything that defines your character in 4e is what their combat utility is. Even non-combatants (like the aforementioned princess warlord) is generally defined by how she contributes to combat without actively attacking herself. This was due to game balance and I do appreciate that, but I do miss my "utility" characters. This leads to disappointment number two:

2: Race/Class combos. With every race gaining two stats and every class's attacks keying off any of the six different stats, there's now an almost key prerogative to use one of the pre-defined race/class combos. Dwarven Rogues are simply outclassed by their Elven and Halfling comrades, and in a game so delicately balanced it makes any such pairing (where the class attack stat doesn't match your racial bonuses) completely undesirable, especially considering how expensive it is to buy a natural 18 in stat buy.

These few nitpicks aside, I will say that 4e produces greater fun with greater ease than any of the previous editions I've played (started at AD&D 2e).
 

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2: Race/Class combos. With every race gaining two stats and every class's attacks keying off any of the six different stats, there's now an almost key prerogative to use one of the pre-defined race/class combos. Dwarven Rogues are simply outclassed by their Elven and Halfling comrades, and in a game so delicately balanced it makes any such pairing (where the class attack stat doesn't match your racial bonuses) completely undesirable, especially considering how expensive it is to buy a natural 18 in stat buy.

There are several race/class combos that don't match up stats, but still rock though. Dwarf fighters come to mind. Gnome rogues could also work well with the stealth abilities and invisibility.
 

The spell casters are no longer over shadowed by others at low levels they are now very magical and competant starting out... but they no longer make fighters and thieves marginal at high levels. And the martial classes now have interesting moves and tactical choices. But 4e is very easy to DM. The best tool if you have somebody who wants to make a character and you dont want to spend a ton but have all the nice options... is Character Builder (download the demo from WOTC website) - though the full version rocks even better.

Hmmm maybe I should have said mostly easy to DM if some elements like skill challenges only work well with DM craftsmanship .. there are some greatly improved guidelines for them in the DMG2.

Character design is far more versatile than when it came out too.... I would be seriously annoyed using just phb1.

I would agree with this - 4E is WAY easier to prepare for as a DM than 3.5.

At the end of my 3.5 campaign, the players were in the high teens level-wise, and it was literally like a 2nd full-time job for me to prepare good, challenging and unique encounters, as we have a big group (myself and 7 players at the time) that had so many answers in terms of firepower. Plus, each bad guy had so many options, that I would find myself forgetting or missing something each time out.

I like a lot of each edition 1E, 2E, 3E, etc, but 3E was a bear to prepare for as a DM.
 


1: In earlier editions (3.x especially ), if you played a character that had little no utility in combat, that was okay. There was still plenty for your character to do.

Must be just 3e - not my experience at all with AD&D. In fact the low level mu were useless in a fight and eventually made everyone else feel useless . It wasn't OK by anybody I knew for there characters to feel useless for level after level

A non combatant is quite fun in 4e... :lol: but you as a player arent on the bench during battle even if your character isnt making attacks.

Thing is a hero definitely needs to be useful in conflict (that is where stories lie) whether its because of their heroic luck or perception or whatever in the violent fantasy worlds of D&D a lot of that conflict is going to be blades and magics of destruction. I seriously don't get wanting your character to be useless a healthy part of the game.

That said as a DM your backstory is my first go to for hooks to bring you in to the game so if something is featured in your background expect to see them in play. If you want flower arrangement, origami and cooking ... they are free of charge (these can indeed be significant elements of an authentic Samurai or Sainted Archer Priestess.) For instance = if you try to use them to influence somebody it may be a circumstance bonus on a diplomacy check if they like/dislike the things you do. etc...
 

To the OP, get some peeps, make some characters, and play. Secondhand feedback will only get you so far. I would suggest trying it as both a player and a DM to get a feel for the system from both sides of the screen before you make a decision.
 

Everybody who didn't like it has pretty much stopped trolling D&D forums and moved on with their life (including a certain king-killer who will not be named).

Oh wow and you know imagination is king when you roleplay. I hadn't noticed he wasn't around.
 

Eh, I wish there was a better "intro" module for 4E. I like 4E a lot... but KotS can be very, very grindy and drags a bit.
Have you looked at HS1: Slaying Stone? Apparently it's a very nice adventure. Very open ended.

KotS had a nice framework ot make a good story, but it needs work to be made a good adventure.

It's comments like this that interest me... How different people can have a big difference in play experience.
I honestly think that a lot of it may just be nostalgia. Most of thsoe who started with 1e started as kids.
 

I honestly think that a lot of it may just be nostalgia. Most of thsoe who started with 1e started as kids.

While true in some cases, there are groups playing earlier editions in the present just out of preference. I don't see it as a mutally exclusive thing. I can enjoy playing the old and the new.
 

A non combatant is quite fun in 4e... :lol: but you as a player arent on the bench during battle even if your character isnt making attacks.

Thing is a hero definitely needs to be useful in conflict (that is where stories lie) whether its because of their heroic luck or perception or whatever in the violent fantasy worlds of D&D a lot of that conflict is going to be blades and magics of destruction. I seriously don't get wanting your character to be useless a healthy part of the game.

It's basically a different mindset, I guess. And I wouldn't say it's not necessarily in being "useless" for combat (I may have used the word but I didn't necessarily mean); just in being useful in different ways, both in and out of combat.

And to be honest, most of my trepidation comes when I've tried to convert certain favorite 3.5 characters into 4e. The aforementioned Inquisitive has no place in a 4e party. Same with practically any non-invoker mage specialist.

Starting a 4e character from scratch, though, I've always had plenty of ideas that do work quite nicely, and it's good to see that there's no shortage of character possibilities (I would say you have far more range in 4e than in any previous edition.)

It's also good to see non-humans being so dominant. A good 60-70% of my 3.x characters were human. This hasn't been the case in 4e.
 

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