D&D 4E What's so bad about 4th edition? What's so good about other systems?

[AbdulAlhazred]

Yeah, I am not really one of those people who thinks 4e invokes AD&D to any great extent. Perhaps late era 2e to a certain extent. AD&D characters were far more fragile at lower levels. I mean consider that a fighter had 1d10+CON mod hit points at level 1. Even if you granted every level 1 PC max hit points (a common house rule) that still meant said fighter would stand an excellent chance of dying in a fairly routine encounter with a few orcs, and said demise could trivially happen in the first round.

OTOH my experience with 4e is that deadliness is a highly tunable parameter. It is relatively trivial to off a character at lower levels if that's what you're after, or you can be nice and spread the love around, in which case actual death is relatively rare. MM3 grade monster damage does make the game a bit more swingy, and fights a bit quicker, both of which are OK. It bears little resemblance to AD&D though.

Higher level play is maybe a bit more similar. AD&D characters never really got to the point where they could be comfortable knowing a tough monster couldn't one-shot them, OTOH 80 or 100 hit points on a paragon PC can vanish pretty darn fast in some situations.

 

[Argyle King]

Looking back at what I said, and giving it some more thought...

Personally, when I've DMed a 4E game, I found that I was really unhappy with the math behind skill challenges. I like the concept, but I had to fiddle around with the numbers and ignore most of the advice given in the DMG to get it to work the way I wanted.

I then considered my comment about monsters. Of the two games I am involved in, the tougher one seems to be the one in which the DM creates his own material. From speaking with him, I am aware that he uses a method which is quite different from the advice given by the books. He uses the advice in the books as a very very loose guideline; mainly to get a vague idea of a frame, but he then ignores a lot of the other advice.

Maybe it's the conventional advice about 4E which conflicts with the group more so than the system at times.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Looking back at what I said, and giving it some more thought...

Personally, when I've DMed a 4E game, I found that I was really unhappy with the math behind skill challenges. I like the concept, but I had to fiddle around with the numbers and ignore most of the advice given in the DMG to get it to work the way I wanted.

I then considered my comment about monsters. Of the two games I am involved in, the tougher one seems to be the one in which the DM creates his own material. From speaking with him, I am aware that he uses a method which is quite different from the advice given by the books. He uses the advice in the books as a very very loose guideline; mainly to get a vague idea of a frame, but he then ignores a lot of the other advice.

Maybe it's the conventional advice about 4E which conflicts with the group more so than the system at times.

Yeah, my feeling with SCs is that there's just no real way you can have a one-size-fits-all mechanic. I've designed plenty of really good ones, and had other ones go utterly crazy wrong or have the mechanics just not be applicable at all. I think they've polished the concept a fair amount over the last couple years, but it is inherently limited. OTOH I also find that the best SCs I've done were mostly just made up on the spot, so it can be a great tool to just pull out of your back pocket when you need something.

I mostly agree about encounters. The funny thing is if you stick quite close to the DMG1 encounter templates and use MM3 monsters/damage expressions things usually work OK, but that covers only a very small subset of the tools you want to bring to bear on encounter design. A whole book could easily be written on the subject, maybe several! I say break the 'rules' liberally, but also study them and experiment with them a bit to get a feel for why the advice the DMG gives is there. It is not at all bad advice, just a starting point.

4e really does seem to work out to a pretty consistent baseline, so you do apparently have to actually think about "OK, now, for my group..." which certainly has been true of previous editions, but less in terms of how things are set up and more in terms of how they played out. I think writing adventures for 4e can be tough, ideally they should really be tailored a decent amount to the group.

 

[WarlockLord]

4e adventures!

I'd like to start by saying that I bought the 1st edition 4e books the day they came out, and was extremely excited over 4e's release. I played it for a year. Now I can't stand it. Here's why:

(I'd also like to thank the men and women of the Gaming Den for showing me some of these)

1) Extremely long, boring combats - This is a big one. The grind is boring, and I always got sick of everyone spamming at-wills. Everyone knows this.

2) The differences between PCs and NPCs: This is arguably one of the worst things in the system, IMO. One of the things I like about 3.5 is that you and the NPCs share the same abilities, so that if an NPC uses some kind of cool power or spell you can go out and learn it. So the evil human wizard used awesome death magic? Add it to your spellbook on level-up.

However, in 4e-land, every single NPC can use their own random spells you can never learn. Sure, the DM could houserule it for you, but...why the hell did I just shell out 39.95 for this stupid book? This is even worse when it comes to rituals. Do you want to animate an army of the dead? That NPC did it, but you can't, because you're a PC and you're special. Specifically, short bus, idiot special. Wanna pick up that evil fighter's weapon? Well it doesn't work for you, that's NPC only. Suck it!

Why don't you feel your PC is special?

3) Remember the Christmas Tree the designers said they were getting rid of? Does it look like they did? No? They lied? Why would anyone be mad about that?

4) The errata. I don't know what the hell 4e rules even ARE anymore, because all the 4e books I own have had the crap errata'd out of them. Seriously, stop with the fricken errata. Most of this stuff is either "we can't proofread" or removing decent options which kinda weren't broken. One notes the infamous orbizard was left alone for quite a while, but we needed to kick Grasp of the Grave in the nuts. Legion's Hold? Nerfed for no reason. Again, many of these nerfs seem random, senseless, and force me to jump through hoops in the hypothetical event I'd want to make a 4e character. Could someone explain why the tiefling needed a change? Was there some "OMG THE TIEFLING POWER GIVES A BONUS TO HIT OH NOES CHANGE IT NOW" unbalance? Nah, but hey, we can change things, cuz we're WotC? Lastly: Magic Missile.

5)Rituals I don't think many people use these. This wasn't a bad idea, but it's horribly, horribly flawed. I can understand summoning some vile creature to do your bidding, animating an entire ancient city of undead, or raining hellfire on a city. What do we get? A floating disc. Which costs money. Yep. If you want a floating disc to carry your crap, it costs money. The same money which you need to spend on magic weapons to stay on the random number generator and do useful things like "hit monsters" and "not die." The utility siloing we were promised when 4e came out? Yeah, that never happened, because all the utility powers turned out to be combat related. And no, rituals do not let you interact with the world in any meaningful way - teleports are limited to where the DM says, you can't reshape continents, and they cost too damn much. Also, they take too long to cast, so if you're on the run and need to put up a magic circle between you and the demon, you can't because it takes 10 minutes! Best of all, all the 'x image' illusions are now rituals, because player characters having actual, interesting abilities are not allowed in 4e land. I think I would trade an entire 4e class for the ability to use silent image at will in 4e land, and still come out ahead.

6) The game world makes no sense Called out here on many occasions, so I will not elaborate (and I have a lot to say on this) unless asked. However, I will point out that certain elements (minions, etc) make it so that leveling is somewhat pointless. If your random level 1 magic missile can kill a lvl 30 minion (it never misses! Great errata, guys), what the hell difference, in the game world, does it mean if you use a lvl 29 power to kill it? How much power, in game, are each of these powers putting out? If your level 1 AT-WILL can kill level 30 creatures, what the hell does that mean in universe?

This is also a perfect way to introduce the "4e is a video-game" concept. You will note that in 4e-land, you can only attack objects and creatures the DM says you can attack - just like in MMOs where you can smash the crates along the wall but not the wall itself, or kill the red-dot evil goblins but not attack the vendor because he has the green dot. It's a violation of common sense and is bad for the game. Furthermore, it puts more power in the hands of the DM AND THAT IS BAD FOR THE GAME. For every good DM who will use this power wisely, there are a bunch of idiot DMs who will use it to lord it over their players and screw them over. This gets people to leave the hobby (I nearly did) and drives off new players who have the misfortune to play with these execrable morons. It's bad for the game, hobby, and community, so kill it with hellfire.

Lastly, I will now break the game. Give a flying melee monster a bow. Now that it has a 40 square ranged attack, fly above the PCs and kite them to death. Also, I don't even know how to calculate the to-hit bonus anyway (is it per the table, or do I add numbers? Well?)

More later.

 

[FireLance]

3) Remember the Christmas Tree the designers said they were getting rid of? Does it look like they did? No? They lied? Why would anyone be mad about that?

To be honest, I recall only that the designers intended to reduce the Christmas tree, and it seems to me that succeeded in that. (See this article for details.)

That said, the inherent bonuses variant rule makes giving out any magic items at all completely optional. Yes, the standard assumption in the game is that you will be giving out magic items. However, it is trivially easy to run a game where you don't have to.

So, to answer your questions, in order: Yes. Yes. Huh? No. Why indeed.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'd like to start by saying that I bought the 1st edition 4e books the day they came out, and was extremely excited over 4e's release. I played it for a year. Now I can't stand it. Here's why:

(I'd also like to thank the men and women of the Gaming Den for showing me some of these)

....

More later.

Yay! Perhaps in the future Enworld can simply incorporate an "I hate 4e" button that auto-inserts one of these... lol.

I guess the topic including what people don't like about 4e there's really no room to complain, so never mind me, lol.

Suffice it to say if you find combats to be long boring slugfests I'd suggest that the blame rests on whoever decided dropping 4 orcs into a blank room was a good idea...

Eh, I won't go on.

 

[delericho]

1) Extremely long, boring combats

I agree.

2) The differences between PCs and NPCs

When this was first discussed, I was very much opposed to having PCs use different rules. I'll now quite freely admit that I was badly wrong about this.

While there's a certain elegance I can admire in making the rules symmetric like that, the simple truth is that the DM doesn't need anywhere near as much information on each monster as the players need on their characters, and providing that information simply led to a huge amount of preparation.

(At least, to do it 'right'. There are many shortcuts the DM can use. Problem is, if he uses them, and only preps what he needs, then he's not really using the same rules for both. )

3) Remember the Christmas Tree the designers said they were getting rid of? Does it look like they did? No? They lied? Why would anyone be mad about that?

They didn't lie, they failed. Or maybe they didn't even fail - the "inherent bonuses" optional rule removes any need for magic items, the "big six" was reduced to a "big three", and there's generally much less reliance on magic items.

IOW, I think you're wrong about this. (Now, if you'd complained that 4e magic items are boring...)

4) The errata.

Yes, I agree absolutely.

5)Rituals

Rituals were a brilliant idea, and I'm absolutely gutted they were never allowed to reach their full potential, and that they've been de-emphasised in Essentials.

6) The game world makes no sense

I agree, with the caveat that neither did any previous editions. It's just that the breakpoints are in different places. (Sadly, for me, some of those places in 4e are quite intolerable.)

This is also a perfect way to introduce the "4e is a video-game" concept. You will note that in 4e-land, you can only attack objects and creatures the DM says you can attack

Um, really? In any previous edition, if the DM flat refuses to allow you to attack an object, just how can you force him?

4e takes some inspiration from video games. It takes some inspiration from board games. It takes some inspiration from miniature games. In some of these cases, I would consider this to be a mistake (it doesn't seem wise to try to compete with WoW by aping the things WoW does better; better instead to focus on the things WoW can't offer). But as a whole, I simply don't accept that 4e is video-gamey, board-gamey, or whatever. (Some groups can, of course, play it that way, but that's their choice.)

Lastly, I will now break the game. Give a flying melee monster a bow. Now that it has a 40 square ranged attack, fly above the PCs and kite them to death. Also, I don't even know how to calculate the to-hit bonus anyway (is it per the table, or do I add numbers? Well?)

You probably use a number close to that for their other attacks. Or use the table on Page 42 of the DMG for inspiration for a value that's "about right". And that's about it - it's quite simple, it does work, and it gives generally good, usable, and fun results.

As for "breaking the game", it really doesn't. Don't your party have ranged attacks? The striker? The controller? Failing that, if they literally have no means to strike back, then they need to run, find cover, or find a way to change the battlefield... just like in the real world. It's a sucky situation to be in, to be sure, but it hardly breaks the game. (Unless, of course, you as the DM just wants to deliberately wipe out the party for whatever reason. In which case it's a DMing flaw rather than the game - pretty much any game allows you to pull the unwinnable combat on the PCs.)

One final thought: I'm not particularly a fan of 4e, and I'm not keen on having to defend it. But, really...

 

[catastrophic]

Yeah, my feeling with SCs is that there's just no real way you can have a one-size-fits-all mechanic.
. . .
I mostly agree about encounters
. . .
4e really does seem to work out to a pretty consistent baseline, so you do apparently have to actually think about "OK, now, for my group..."

Both skill challenges and monster power are key failures of early 4e design, and tbqh skill challenges should be scrapped and replaced. I would advise against the assumption that what's needed here is specialisation for a group or style- there's a lot of straight, generic failure going on in for instance, earlier monsters, and the fact that a skill challenge punishes anyone unsuited for it, who tries to contribute, instead of sitting passivly on the sidelines.

Monster design has come a long, long way, and will continue to improve. Skill challenges. . for all the efforts they made a while back, the failure threshold is an enduringly terrible mechanic, and directly contrary to 4e's mission statement.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Both skill challenges and monster power are key failures of early 4e design, and tbqh skill challenges should be scrapped and replaced. I would advise against the assumption that what's needed here is specialisation for a group or style- there's a lot of straight, generic failure going on in for instance, earlier monsters, and the fact that a skill challenge punishes anyone unsuited for it, who tries to contribute, instead of sitting passivly on the sidelines.

Monster design has come a long, long way, and will continue to improve. Skill challenges. . for all the efforts they made a while back, the failure threshold is an enduringly terrible mechanic, and directly contrary to 4e's mission statement.

Bah, humbug! Skill challenges work quite effectively, and if your skill challenge forces people to sit on the sideline then design it correctly. lol. I've run tons of them and they were great fun.

 

[FireLance]

Both skill challenges and monster power are key failures of early 4e design, and tbqh skill challenges should be scrapped and replaced.

You know, I'm starting to think that the skill challenge framework works better for designing non-combat challenges than for running them.

The skill challenge framework ensures that a DM at least thinks about:

1. How the PCs might be able to overcome a non-combat challenge, and what a successful [Skill/Ability] check actually means in narrative terms.
2. The kind of complications that might arise in the course of a non-combat challenge, e.g. if the PCs act in an inappropriate fashion.
3. The consequences of succeeding or failing at a non-combat challenge.

I wonder if skill challenges might actually work better if the DM defines the complexity of the challenge only after he has thought through what the PCs need to do to overcome the non-combat challenge, and how to narrate each step and setback. A challenge in which the PCs need to accomplish four tasks would be a Complexity 1 challenge, and so on. Then, the skill challenge becomes framed in terms of what the PCs need to do to overcome the challenge rather than in terms of X number of skill checks.