4th edition, The fantastic game that everyone hated.

[S'mon]

The Moll Flanders/Social Climbing could quite happily be done in 4e as well is the issue here.

Yes, I expect so (well, except that I ran it on Dragonsfoot!)
Frankly that AD&D game was informed by a lot of stuff I'd learned from running 4e; just replace Diplomacy/Bluff checks with Reaction % checks and they'd not be too different except when combat broke out - and IME 1e combat is a lot easier to run in text-chat than 4e's grid based system. But with a tabletop or virtual tabletop the fights would have worked fine in 4e, and the stuff that didn't work in text chat using 1e was ironically the same stuff 4e does poorly, the process-sim dungeon & wilderness exploration - which I tried to minimise.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

You know, for years of AD&D and 3e play, I recall many a player or DM complain about the nature of high level play. A fighter who can't miss. A thief with over 100% chance to use his skill. D&D is riddled with stories of fighters taking 200 foot falls and surviving, taking lava baths, being pelted with over 100 arrows, and still being golden enough at the end of the day to enter the tavern and sleep with all the barmaids (save vs. disease, fail only on a 1). These were all considered BAD things and a giant reason high-level play broke down.

Whoa, you just took two very different issues and crammed them under one heading!

1. Fighters who can't miss and thieves who can't fail opposed skill rolls is an issue of the d20 becoming obsolete. It's a game design issue.

2. High level characters doing mile-high swan dives into lakes of lava and then climbing out ready to rumble is an issue of aesthetics. Some like it, some are ambivalent, some hate it. (I'm actually not sure this particular example is possible in any edition, except really really epic 3e...but I like the mental image!)

Neither of these is what AbdulAlhazred is talking about. (Correct me if I'm wrong, AA.) Even from level 1, 4e gives PCs protection against random death. Goblin #17 can't kill you just by a lucky roll, and unless a crazy improvised plan involves a bottomless pit with lava at the bottom, getting creative isn't going to kill you.

That's what 4e does that other editions don't.

I can only really project my own and to some extent the experience of the people I play with. All the FR, 2e/3e canon, etc never meant beans to us. I started DMing in 1975, you made up your own world. I haven't ever read FR, played in FR, owned anything to do with FR, nor could I give a crud about FR. I could BARELY give a crud about all but the most broad outlines of D&D Cosmology (that there are other planes of existence and they embody various ideals and conditions and that travel to them is both difficult and presents various kinds of adventures). The existence of demons, devils, dragons, and other familiar monsters is pretty useful, but to a first approximation all that exists in 4e. Honestly, where stuff did change, it seemed easier to use and incorporate in stories.

This has been my experience as well.

The only setting I've ever given two turds about is Planescape, which was canonically ruined in its own edition. I've never met a gamer who cared what 4e did to FR, or the default cosmology, because so what? If you don't like it, use the version you do like.

I can understand why gamers who play a lot of organized events might be miffed about fluff changes, but otherwise it's all static to my ears.

 

[Siberys]

Eberron lost its unique cosmology, had to adapt tieflings and dragonborn into more prominent roles, and wrecked holy-hell on the Dragonmarked houses to the point they barely resembled they're original intent.

As a /major/ Eberron fan, I'd contest these.

Tieflings weren't 'forced' in; Ohr Kaluun already existed (See Secrets of Sarlona), and the other suggestion for their use in 3e (nearness to supernaturally evil influences, such as in the Demon Wastes) still works just fine.

Dragonborn almost all live in Argonnessen, and are bit players in Q'barra, where they're next most common. Everything described about 'em fit pretty well with existing lore.

Eladrin are about the /most/ notable, but they're still rate and were worked in with the lore very well.

I'll agree on the planes, but that's honestly a non-issue - Thelanis and Dolurrh have new names, and Baator's there (which I can easily ignore).

Not sure what you mean with the Houses. If you'd just said Marks, I'd follow you, even if I disagree. (a couple of houserules to Rituals and they're /better/ than 3es, and encourage a more holistic approach to building 'marked characters than 3e where IME it was usually just a tacked on 'cool' feat.)

As for other settings, Dark Sun was very well recieved. In fact, the timeline rollback is pretty widely considered to be an improvement over the post-novel setting. I'd have liked to see something similar with DL; the focus on the novels and their characters makes it difficult to use the settings, IME. A rollback to, say, partway through the War of the Lance (with descriptions of the official timeline and possible 'branches') could be very good.

In the end, I honestly don't care about fluff changes - I'll only use 'em if they're good, and I'll ignore them if I don't like them, so something like that determining someone's opinion of an edition just seems foreign to me. Mechanics? Yeah, I dig it - even stuff there that's easy to change requires some know-how, regardless of game, and it can color the tone. But fluff takes next to no work to change.

 

[Remathilis]

I don't disagree. If they were going to break from what came before, I wholeheartedly believe they should have left the immediate 3e settings behind in order to establish unique, 4e settings in alternating release of some old favorites (I love me some 4e Dark Sun, and would have cherished a 4e Birthright with mass combat and more elaborate stronghold rules). Yes, there would have been a risk of initial release alienation ("Whoa, whoa, new rules AND a new setting!") but look at the alienation from including them. Could it have really been worse? They also had the auto-buy buzz going for them, which would have sold some people, at least, in the early months on setting X.

I think X, Y, and Z new settings would have generated excitement and formed a united fan base ready to explore and develop, certainly not all-inclusive amongst D&Ders, but stronger than what exists now. Encounters could have supported these new settings even further, and gotten more people to play and enjoy what 4e did well. My gosh, it might have even attracted non-4thers from a world standpoint alone, allowed them to experience D&D in a new way. Then WotC might have gone one for one, something new, then something obscure and 2e which would have tickled the nostalgia itch. Instead of offending the loremasters and boring the rest of us with revamps, I think we would have all been happy and still talking about X, Y, and Z original settings. We might even have been anticipating 4.5 instead of this monstrous 5e.

But Nentir Vale was as close as we got..........

Nentir Vale/PoL/Nerath should have been its own default setting for 4e; fully developed and supported. I think it was endemic of the larger 4e "problem"; I'm sure I'd have enjoyed 4e a lot more on its own if it didn't keep trying to be D&D in my mind. To that end, I'd probably have accepted it better if everytime I saw a nostalgic name placed on some new concept, my brain didn't scream "THAT'S. NOT. FIREBALL!"

I have complaints about 4e that don't stem from comparison to earlier D&D (early math and grindspace being big ones) but I'm sure I'd have gotten over them by the time Essentials-era math fixed them. However, anytime my brain connects a concept from 4e to what it was previously, my mere dislike boils over into nerdrage. As a game, I can appreciate much of what 4e did. As D&D however, I found it inexcusable.

YMMV and all that.

 

[S'mon]

I quoted this one because it reminded me of something I was going to say elsewhere, but forgot...

To some extent, I agree that 4E equipped the characters to be heroes. However, one problem I found was that it didn't really equip the opposition to be worthy adversaries in conflict with those same heroes.

Never been a problem for me since I (a) started using MM3 damage, which hopefully everyone does, and (b) stopped allowing unlimited sources - which I suspect is where a lot of games fall down. You can't just allow moderate or higher powergamers access to everything published and expect to challenge them with BTB encounters. Allowing PHB + PHB2 plus Essentials is a good baseline.

 

[Siberys]

[[Double Post, sorry]]

 

[Remathilis]

As a /major/ Eberron fan, I'd contest these.

As a /major/ Eberron fan, I'll refute them.

Tieflings weren't 'forced' in; Ohr Kaluun already existed (See Secrets of Sarlona), and the other suggestion for their use in 3e (nearness to supernaturally evil influences, such as in the Demon Wastes) still works just fine.

Tieflings felt the least forced, but 4e's insistance on making them infernal-only crippled some of the cooler ideas with them (such as the raksasha touched). Oh, and don't EVEN get me going on how the deva's raksasha duality screws with their unique niche in Eberron!

Dragonborn almost all live in Argonnessen, and are bit players in Q'barra, where they're next most common. Everything described about 'em fit pretty well with existing lore.

It was still a shoe-horn. Argonnessen was pretty much humans living in a draconic shadow. The addition of dragonborn upset the balance. It wasn't terrible (as 3e had already crammed in three draconic races already) but they're prominence in the PHB gives the illusion Eberron is full of them.

Eladrin are about the /most/ notable, but they're still rate and were worked in with the lore very well.

They're the ones who stick out the worst for me. Again, as a optional race in a supplemental book, they'd have been fine in a niche role in Eberron. As one of the core eight? Not so much.

I'll agree on the planes, but that's honestly a non-issue - Thelanis and Dolurrh have new names, and Baator's there (which I can easily ignore).

It was unnecessary. It reminded me of how Every world in 2e shares Planescape as a cosmology. It smacked of "We made this, we're going to use it regardless of whether it needed it or not."

Not sure what you mean with the Houses. If you'd just said Marks, I'd follow you, even if I disagree. (a couple of houserules to Rituals and they're /better/ than 3es, and encourage a more holistic approach to building 'marked characters than 3e where IME it was usually just a tacked on 'cool' feat.)

There was a reason only the seven PHB races got marks while even the cool new races of Eberron did not; to encourage players to make choices using the old races too. I saw a lot more halfling clerics due to the mark of healing and human fighters due to the sentinel mark. Getting mark also meant family considerations, status, and issues surrounding that. Marks were family, and you were buying into that when you took the mark. When 4e opened the floodgates on any race getting marks, they stopped being a consideration and became "yet another kewl power". Now half-orcs, dwarves, warforged and goblins could all get the mark of healing and there was no reason for this or why halflings ran House Jorasco. It took something special and unique that those PHB races had and gave to anyone who wanted it, and the setting was poorer for watering them down like that.

As for other settings, Dark Sun was very well recieved. In fact, the timeline rollback is pretty widely considered to be an improvement over the post-novel setting. I'd have liked to see something similar with DL; the focus on the novels and their characters makes it difficult to use the settings, IME. A rollback to, say, partway through the War of the Lance (with descriptions of the official timeline and possible 'branches') could be very good.

Dark Sun was much better handled IMHO, but then again they opted for some exclusion (no divine classes) and radical departures from the default assumptions rather than trying to force Athas to use the Astral Sea, Invokers, and Genasi.

In the end, I honestly don't care about fluff changes - I'll only use 'em if they're good, and I'll ignore them if I don't like them, so something like that determining someone's opinion of an edition just seems foreign to me. Mechanics? Yeah, I dig it - even stuff there that's easy to change requires some know-how, regardless of game, and it can color the tone. But fluff takes next to no work to change.

If I'm using a setting, its because I like the setting. Radical "on a dime" changes is why I didn't like 3e Ravenloft, 2e Realms, or 4e Eberron. I'm using a setting because I like the fluff. If I have to start re-writing or picking-and-choosing what's cannon and what's not, I'm better off homebrewing.

 

[NewJeffCT]

You know, for years of AD&D and 3e play, I recall many a player or DM complain about the nature of high level play. A fighter who can't miss. A thief with over 100% chance to use his skill. D&D is riddled with stories of fighters taking 200 foot falls and surviving, taking lava baths, being pelted with over 100 arrows, and still being golden enough at the end of the day to enter the tavern and sleep with all the barmaids (save vs. disease, fail only on a 1). These were all considered BAD things and a giant reason high-level play broke down.

Yet in 4e, having PCs defy the laws of physics and nature (at low levels, to boot) are good things?

Yes, it is. In 1E/2E D&D, most campaigns went from level 1 to somewhere around level 9 or 10 at the end. So, when PCs got access to Raise Dead (at level 9), it was only something that happened at the very end of a campaign, when you've invested X number of sessions going up to that level (it took us 50+ very focused sessions to go from level 1 to level 8/9 at the end of a great 2E campaign.). So, it was something that was special, because you only did it at the very end of the campaign when the fate of the world is resting upon the PCs. If you really needed a Raise Dead before that, you had to go to a special high level NPC cleric and either spend a ton of money in church donations, or go on a special quest for them.

In 3E/3.5E, the game was designed to go from level 1 to level 20 at the end. However, Raise Dead was still available at level 9 to the players. So, it was less than halfway through the typical campaign where the players got access to what used to be something very special and only available at the end of the campaign. It is now the equivalent of a 1E/2E cleric getting access to level 3 spells like Remove Curse or Cure Disease in terms of where it goes in the campaign.

In 4E, the game was now designed to go from level 1 to level 30 at the end. But, Raise Dead was now a ritual available at level 8. So, less than 30% of the way through a campaign and the players can perform the previously awesome feat of bringing somebody back from the dead. In terms of comparison, it's like a 1E/2E cleric getting access to level 2 spells. The spell/ritual has lost its wonder. It's no longer a special act to bring somebody back from the dead - it's routine.

I think that's the problem - when you can do the previously awesome things much earlier, it loses its sense of wonder. Why is it a big deal to bring somebody back from the dead now - it's only a level 8 ritual. it's now like it's an epic tier ritual? (edited to add - this is a criticism of 3e and 4e both)

 

[Sunseeker]

Conversations with @Balesir certainly give me the impression that 4e encourages this. Certain 4e mechanics and rules also give me this impression (Skill Challenges, for instance, allowing players to dictate how their skills work, and the poster-boy Come and Get It allowing the fighter to dictate how eager the orcs are to attack her). I imagine it's possible to avoid that, but that also seems...challenging.

I'm not familiar with your conversations with Balesir, so I can't really comment on that.
I'm not sure what you mean by players dictating how their skills work. 4e has a seriously compressed list of skills, no doubt about it, which by nature makes each one of the much more generalized, leaving a lot more room for interpretation on how they function. Being knowledgable in History now means all of history, rather than specific parts. I think it's fair for players to be able to add specifics of where their historical knowledge may lie as an aspect of roleplaying, even though they could make a history check on anything under the sun it applies to. I mean it's pretty obvious that Jump only covers jumping and Swim only covers swimming. But Athletics is a pretty wide road, covering Swimming, Jumping, Running, Sprinting, and any number of other things. So while I'm all for telling players what they need to do, I'm certainly fine with players coming up with creative ways to use their skills to accomplish that.

As for "Come and Get It", I understand the intent with the power, it's a taunt, a common game mechanic utilized by tank-types in a variety of video games in order to create "aggro" as a form of crowd control in order to draw foes from your squishier allies to your more defensive ones. Non-magical "pull" effects are awkward formatting, it would be better to encourage attacking the user of such a power with debuffs to attacks or damage upon others rather than forced movement. Of course that was covered under the Fighter Challenge effect and other defender classes similar effects.

AI in D&D, as in other games, is a difficult beast. On the one hand, you can have "smart" AI, which targets squishies and healers first, and while this represents the most likely course of action an enemy would take, it is notably un-fun. You can have "aggro" mechanics, based on some variable numbers such as damage or something, but without a way to control the enemy short of "stop attacking"(which is rarely a good option) is can be difficult to manage. You can have in D&D, "DM AI" which is a weird hybird of smart and stupid AI, sometimes the same foe will attack a viable target, sometimes they'll continue to wail on the tank they can't actually hit.

I support "taunt" mechanics in some form as an effective form of crowd control, especially since it fits into martial themes, but provides them with actions other than "hit them with stick." Pulls are still somewhat awkward for martial classes though.

Though, to the subject, I wouldn't call that determining the world. It's a very micro-level of determination. "Come and Get It" isn't changing how eager all orcs are to attack the fighter, only the specific ones on the battlefield. But then I guess it depends on if you want a type of gameplay where players are always asking if they can do something, rather than telling the DM what they want to do, and then the DM determining how possible that course of action is.

I prefer a style of gameplay where players tell me what they'd like to do, and I determine how they might go about that.

 

[Siberys]

Okay, now I see what you were saying re: the Marks. I still disagree; the 4e Eberron books were very clear about just how major an off-race mark would be. If I, as DM, didn't think it'd fit my campaign or I didn't think a player would be interested in dealing with the consequences, I'd say no, and IIRC the Player's Guide says to check with the DM first.

YMMV, of course.

(Edit: [MENTION=7635]Remathilis[/MENTION] )