Saying such negative and spurious things as what you said about the polling data, is no different (whether intentional or not) than those who hated and attempted to sabotage 4E. Simply put; an illogical assumption at best, certainly counter-productive, and wholly falacious.
All of us have the opportunity to show how we're different than those that attacked 4E, that we've all learned from the mistakes of the past, and we're better than those that attacked 4E.
So far, there's a very vocal minority of 4E fans that are showing they're no different than the fools who bash 4E, and doing the entirety of 4E fans a huge disservice.
I used to bash 4e a lot more. I was a horrible fan and said things I wish I could take by and was generally a troll on the 4e forums.
I try not to be overly negative and trollish to 4e anymore - aiming for critical but fair - but I’m argumentative by nature so sometimes I slip.
This also goes for those who like to characterize 4E as a failure ( @
Jester Canuck and others), under the supposedly innocent guise of only talking about it as a business. This is also disingenuous and fallacious, and nobody here is fool enough to not know what is really being said.
Okay, this will be long. Sorry.
Financial failure does NOT equate with failure as a product. The market is filled with products that were great ideas but terrible financial failures due to poor marketing, inadequate presentation, unlucky timing, or just a smaller than expected audience. (These are generalizations, not specific comments aimed at 4e.)
4e was great at what it did, but what it did was narrow. It chosed a tight gameplay focus over broad appeal and strong, consistent mechanics over flexible diverse mechanics. None of these changes are bad in and of themselves. They’re simply design choices. And if you like tight mechanics, consistent gameplay, and firm balance they’re positively great design decisions.
(I’ve often argued that none of the mechanical & design changes 4e made were bad individually and all looked like great ideas on paper. I supported most until I saw the final execution. I think that’s why I trolled-out as much as I did: I had been a strong advocate of 4e for almost a year and was disappointed by the final product.)
Did 4e fail as a game? Ummm... maybe?
As much as find 4e not for me, I can only think of three ways.
First, the math wasn’t as tight as promised, especially regarding monsters. Second, one of the major design goals was to remove the Christmas Tree of magic items, which was a partial failure as magic items were just as important for high level characters and suddenly important for mid-level characters. The game became more high magic with characters getting a +2 magic item at 2nd level.
Now, both of these problems were fixed, via changes to the monster math, the expertise feats, and the inherent bonus rules. So they’re not really failures with the edition so much as the initial books in the edition.
The final problem was the skill system. They revised the DC by Level chart twice but this didn’t fix the underlying problem: the numbers get too big too fast and it’s too easy to stack bonuses for skills. I’m hesitant though to call this a failure, as you have to try to fail. It’s a problem, but I think it wasn’t a priority and they instead focused on the other systems of the game. “Fixing Skills” was never a design goal.
Notice I didn’t mention the whipping boy of 4e: combat length. This is because I wouldn’t call that a failure. In set-piece fights, big boss fights, this is a feature not a bug. If you design around it, it’s not a problem.
So did 4e fail as a game? Yes. In two ways that were fixed and one one way that was not part of the design goals.
I’m a Pathfinder fanboy and I can rattle off more ways Paizo failed than that.
Did 4e fail financially? Yes, for much more varied reasons. Reiterating my earlier points, and those from my blog:
First, as mentioned before, the economy tanked. Not WotC’s fault, and unrelated to the edition.
Secondly, the edition was sold based on digital tools. This was one of the primary focuses of selling the edition. But because of the death of the programmer in charge, work on the tools had to be restarted from scratch. Not WotC’s fault, and unrelated to the edition.
Third, to gets as much content out as possible, the books were exceedingly fluff-light and very crunch-heavy. A boon for people who liked crunch. But when the Character Builder was released it enabled people to get all the content from the books for a single one-time payment of $7. Only minorly WotC’s fault, but unrelated to the edition.
Fourthly, because classes and books required so much content and WotC was trying to get it out as quickly as possible for a game system they were still themselves learning. So powers were often shaky and content not playtested thoroughly. This led to sweeping errata that devalued the physical books in favour of said digital tools. WotC’s fault, but unrelated to the edition.
The rules themselves hurt the edition in an subtle way. Because of the exception based design the core rules are simple to learn. Check out the rulebook for the revised miniature game. The rules are almost identical (the miniature game has an extra condition and more detailed rules for AoEs interacting with cover, so it’s actually more complicated). This made it possible to skip the core rulebook, learn the rules from someone else, and buy another book, be it secondary PHB or Powers book. But an edition is buoyed by continued and regular sales of the core rulebooks, which should be a continual revenue stream. WotC then made this worse with Essentials releasing three books that also replaced the Core Rulebook. WotC’s fault, but unrelated to the edition.
Fifth, there was the GSL. While the OGL was overly lenient the GSL was overly limiting reducing the number of 3rd Party Publishers, which feed sales of the Core Books. This was paired by WotC’s secrecy. They didn’t share the rules or work with 3PP, who were kept in the dark regarding the GSL until they suddenly found out they could not release books until after GenCon 2008, could not have books or product lines that shared content between 3e and 4e, could not change any of the rules. And because the online tools became the place to make characters, using 3PP content became harder.
For example, Paizo first got a look at 4e at D&D Experience in Winter of 2008, at the same time as the fans. Instead of working with Paizo and letting them get the rules early in exchange for, say, switching their product lines over to 4e, WotC let the company nervously wait as the time to start publishing books for GenCon 2008 neared. Again, WotC’s fault, but unrelated to the edition.
Lastly, there were the changes. While many of the mechanical changes were not popular, the lore charges really stand out. There is no shortage of role-playing games out there, especially with PDF publishing and the OGL. You can find the game just for you if you’re willing to look hard enough. There are likely many games more balanced than 4e or with equally tight tactical combat. What makes D&D stand apart is it’s legacy, its history and lore. Likewise, after thirty-odd years, people are invested in the lore. Their stories depend on it. Every monster or race or class might be someone’s favourite. While I was largely indifferent to the Blood War ending and the elimination of Yugoloths, I’m sure that wrecked someone’s campaign.
Again, every change made sense in a vacuum and were done for solid defensible reasons, but when taken as a whole it’s a heck of a lot of changes. It made D&D something else, something many players felt less of an attachment towards . And again, WotC’s fault, but mostly unrelated to the edition.
This is not a comprehensive list by any means, but it’s some of the big factors that hurt the game and sped its end.
And (again) most were unrelated to the actual gameplay.
