Which edition change changed the game the most?

[Ahnehnois]

Just for the record, it's actually not the case that fighters and mages have the same attack bonus.

Fighters have a higher attack bonus with weapons (because they use Weapon powers that are STR based, and have high STR). Magic-users do not (even with daggers and staves, M-Us don't have very good STR, and so don't have very good weaopn attacks).

The converse of the above is true for implement attacks (ie spell casting). Fighters typically aren't so good - and especially won't be good at Wizard attacks, which are INT-based, because few fighters will have very high INT.

In 3e terms I meant to say that fighters and wizards (and every other character) have the same 'base' attack bonus. Obviously the typical fighter will be strong and the typical wizard will be smart, but a wizard (especially remembering he gets a choice of ability scores for attacks) has a much better chance of hitting with a weapon in 4e than in 3e. What differentiates them is mainly their power options. That's the change I'm getting at. BAB/THAC0 used to be a fighter's best asset (for better or for worse).

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

In 3e terms I meant to say that fighters and wizards (and every other character) have the same 'base' attack bonus. Obviously the typical fighter will be strong and the typical wizard will be smart, but a wizard (especially remembering he gets a choice of ability scores for attacks) has a much better chance of hitting with a weapon in 4e than in 3e. What differentiates them is mainly their power options. That's the change I'm getting at. BAB/THAC0 used to be a fighter's best asset (for better or for worse).

Isn't that a weird example? They both might use the same mechanic, but a wizard's spell is very different from a fighter's attack. You're better off comparing a fighter to a rogue (who might actually have the same attack bonus with a weapon, but deals less damage without combat advantage).

 

[Stoat]

It's a close call, but I think the jump from 2E to 3E was bigger than the jump from 3.5 to 4E.

Consider 3.0:

1. Reach and opportunity attacks (imported perhaps from late 2E) become core. Use of the battlemat/Minis becomes significantly more important than in previous editions.

2. Feats, Skills (as opposed to NWP's), and super-flexible multiclassing make "builds" more important than "classes".

3. CR and ECL introduce the era of "balanced encounters."

4. Wealth by level and the magic Wal-Mart appear. Treasure becomes "rationalized". The Christmas tree appears.

5. These facts, coupled with the overall rationalization/standardization of the rules, move the game away from "DM Fiat" toward "Player Entitlement."

Offhand, I'd guess that four out of five long-ass ENWorld grudgethreads arise out of changes made by 3E. The fifth arises out of 2E: specifically the decision to abandon 1gp = 1exp and the decision to focus the game on "stories" instead of "adventures."

Finally, the point that really tips things toward 3E for me: The OGL, which introduced an era of 3rd Party Publishing unseen before or since.

 

[Hussar]

For me, I'd have to say 2e to 3e. Now, granted, I have no direct experience with OD&D to Supplement I, so, I cannot comment there. I really don't know.

But, going from 2e to 3e marks, for me, the division of game design from talented amateur to professional. Now, put down that tar and feathers and let me explain. No, really, let me explain. Ow, ow, hey! Ok, fine. Now let me explain.

3e was the first edition based at least in part (and I think large part) on market research. Prior to 3e, material was released into the wild with little knowledge of how well it would do, and how well it did after the fact, other than gross sales. It was the amateur approach of throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks. Thus, game development tended to be very organic in nature. You had a huge number of supplementary material in 2e and the approach seemed to be very unguided as to what got sent out on the shelves.

3e changed all that. Lazer focus, very strong oversight on books and very high production qualities.

Could you imagine a book like, say, the original Unearthed Arcana coming out for 3e? With the warts included in that book? I don't think so. It would never get past the marketing department.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Agreed, although I personally think it's a bit of an insult to the HERO designers to put them in the same boat as Skills and Powers, which must be one of the worse-designed points-buy systems ever.

Intent and results are not congruent. Skills and Powers is to Hero as many a fantasy heartbreaker is to D&D.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Skills (as opposed to NWP's)

Skills are just a refinement of the concept, not really something new.

... the magic Wal-Mart appear.

I saw this in the 1980s- it's an artifact of playstyle and not mechanics.

The OGL, which introduced an era of 3rd Party Publishing unseen before or since.

That is a change to the market & industry, not the game itself. Even in the 1970s, you had 3PPs making products usable with D&D, like Judge's Guild.

 

[Mad Zagyg]

3e to 4e. It's not even close.

As another person mentioned, there was virtually no problem converting old characters and adventures to the newest edition.

Honestly, without getting into comments on whether you think the changes to the recent edition were for the better or not, I can't understand how anyone can conclude that jumps from 1e to 2e or 2e to 3e were more drastic.

I mean, dropping the Vancian spellcasting system ALONE makes for a change more drastic than any other edition.

My last point is less fact and more feeling, but having played every edition of the game, 4e is the only one that really felt like I was playing a different game than Dungeons & Dragons.

 

[Raven Crowking]

When I began work on RCFG, one of my goals was to make something easily compatable with my vast library of RPG materials. Part of the playtesting process is ensuring this ease of conversion.

In playtests, I have run adventures designed for BD&D, 1e, 2e, 3e, and 4e. I have yet to run into anything I cannot convert from 1e, 2e, or 3e in my head, without a break in the action. Frankly, I don't need to rewrite these adventures if I do not want to.

(I did rewrite Tomb of Horrors to take advantage of some options in RCFG not present in 1e, and to include a more extensive backstory that the PCs could learn.)

Conversely, running a 4e adventure requires that I do some pre-prep. In fact, nearly as much as if I was using MERP material.

Now, I can do both MERP and 4e without doing too much work, but, to me, that is a pretty clear indication of the level of change.




RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

I saw this in the 1980s- it's an artifact of playstyle and not mechanics.

Perhaps, but it is true that the rulebooks, prior to 3e, all discouraged mass sales of magic items, and the 3e rulebooks encourage that anything within a certain budget (based on settlement size) ought to be available. Moreover, with the WPL guidelines, the mechanics in 3e assume a level of availability which did not occur previously. EDIT: Spelljammer is the obvious exception, with its Arcane and magic-eating helms.

These change lead directly, IMHO, to magic items being in the 4e PHB, and to the idea that treasure parcels will continually present themselves until the PCs recover them, to keep the mechanics balanced.


RC

 

[Siberys]

I don't really have experience pre-3e, but I have yet to have any difficulty converting a character from 3e to 4e. It only fails to work if you're married to the mechanics, and even then it's usually a non-issue.

I have a player who loves PF barbarians, but hates 4e barbs. It's because 4e barbs don't have the round-by-round rage toggle that he wants. Nevermind that, in practice, he starts the fight raging and doesn't stop until all the enemies are dead; nevermind that the 4e barbarian has built-in damage buffs 'cause it assumes that's how things work. The rages that the 4e barbarian does have are functinally closer to PF rage powers, and for some reason this feels wrong to the player. It's not that his barbarian wouldn't work in 4e as a barbarian or a fighter or, hell, even an Avenger, it's that it doesn't work exactly like in 3e.

IMO, being unable to convert between the systems is more a matter of being too literally-minded, or else trying to get the system to be something it's not - trying to get 4e to play exactly as 3e, even though it isn't.

The same can be said of having difficulty converting between any two systems. If I were converting a fighter between 4e and, say, Savage Worlds, I would not need a way to represent every power and feat. Just those things that are central to the character from a conceptual standpoint. Crunch is slave to fluff, not the inverse.