D&D 4E Is there a "Cliffs Notes" summary of the entire 4E experience?

[Neonchameleon]

The deeply ironic thing is that you can't grasp that the truth of this statement inside your own mind as 4E fan is tied directly to you *being a 4E fan*.
It is a lack of respect for the honest opinions and tastes of others, resulting in an inability to see the big picture fairly.

I am CERTAIN this is true *for you*.

Can you accept that, to me, that statement couldn't be further from the truth?

Yes - but I also suspect you would rather play FATAL than 4E.

I'm playing Curse of the Crimson Throne right now as a Summoner (next session on Sunday). I'm deliberately holding back to avoid snapping the AP across my knee - and we're only in the third module. To me that's a sign that Pathfinder doesn't work well for Pathfinder APs. I also know how much prep time is put into running Paizo APs if you translate and if you don't. (Less if you do - keeping the DM constant, and no that wasn't me as I won't run Pathfinder).

Edit: If I were trying to zero in on how to create mass market adventures for 4E they would look almost exactly like Paizo APs except with much cleaner statblocks and better mechanics when there are local ones to be used.

Please note that you are not arguing with my statements. You are arguing with Tony's.

No. I'm arguing with your misunderstanding of Tony's.

I will, for the record, state that I'm pretty convinced that there is a serious flaw in the way "we" are assessing the "current number". I've seen the conversations and justifications. But, in the end, you really don't know and the numbers floated around don't sync with anything else.

In the end we know that as soon as someone stops subscribing to DDI their name is removed from the subscriber list. Which means either Wizards have literally tens of thousands of fake accounts, or the number of DDI subscribers is established better than anything short of an annual report. (And even then there are companies whose annual reports I wouldn't trust...) If that number disagrees with your preconceptionsthen I suggest you check your preconceptions.

 

[Remathilis]

To put it bluntly, if fewer lies had been spread about 4e in the edition wars, more people would have given it a fair chance. And first impressions count for a lot. Many people who did give 4e a fair chance had their first impression of playing as Mike Mearls' execrable Keep on the Shadowfell - and the best way to save that module is to drop an asteroid on the entire keep (it's actually not too bad before you reach it but there's no edition it would play well in after, and it's especially bad in 4e).

Honestly, most people don't care much about game systems. I may enjoy picking them apart but the main condition a game needs is as a package to be good enough. And the system includes what you're trying to do with it.

I played 4e for slightly less than a year (release to about the Eberron books, I stopped a month before Pathfinder came out).

I played the DMG dungeon, the Forgotten Realms Campaign starter adventure, Scepter Tower of Spellgard, DCC: Forges of the Mountain King (Goodman Games) and some day one demo adventure. They all sucked. Two companies whose 3e modules we generally enjoyed (WotC and Goodman) both let us down. Repeatedly. What conclusion would you draw? We thought Wizards of the Coast literally made a system that nobody could design adventure's for. Sure, they learned how to, but as you said, first appearances matter.

I'm probably the most open-minded of all the people in my group who played during those day. (Well, I game now with someone who liked 4e. Except him). You don't want to know THEIR opinions. And guess what? None of them are active in the online RPG community. Most of them never touched a RPG blog or forum. Nobody lied to them except their own lying eyes.

Even before Pathfinder was announced, we were rolling up 3.5 characters again. We'd probably have house-ruled up 3.5 and kept going with that if not for PF.

And I was the biggest 4e cheerleader. Don't believe? Click the "blog posts" link under my name here.

All that goes to show that maybe some people heard it sucked and didn't try it. But lots of people did try, and it didn't work for them. I'd wager more did than didn't.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I agree with you. Obviously there is a subset of the market who love it. I've said EXACTLY this several times. 4E is an outstanding success at doing what it set out to do.

In the business sense, it set out to make $50-100 million a year, and kill off the OGL. In that sense it was an abysmal failure.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I played the DMG dungeon, the Forgotten Realms Campaign starter adventure, Scepter Tower of Spellgard, DCC: Forges of the Mountain King (Goodman Games) and some day one demo adventure. They all sucked. Two companies whose 3e modules we generally enjoyed (WotC and Goodman) both let us down. Repeatedly. What conclusion would you draw?

I've never much cared for published adventures, so I'd just conclude the adventures sucked.

Of the first few adventures I played in, only Thunderspire was any good - and it's final 'boss' fight was as screwed up as anything in KotS. Aside from a few really bad encounters like that, though, the system itself held up surprisingly well.

We thought Wizards of the Coast literally made a system that nobody could design adventure's for. Sure, they learned how to, but as you said, first appearances matter.

4e set out to fix a lot of perennial mechanical problems with D&D, and largely succeeded. Thing is, long-time D&Ders had spent the prior 3 decades getting into the habit of compensating for those problems...

I don't know if you ever tried building your own encounters and adventures in 4e, but it's stunningly easy. So much so that relative newbies can pretty consistently handle it.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I played 4e for slightly less than a year (release to about the Eberron books, I stopped a month before Pathfinder came out).

I played the DMG dungeon, the Forgotten Realms Campaign starter adventure, Scepter Tower of Spellgard, DCC: Forges of the Mountain King (Goodman Games) and some day one demo adventure. They all sucked. Two companies whose 3e modules we generally enjoyed (WotC and Goodman) both let us down. Repeatedly. What conclusion would you draw? We thought Wizards of the Coast literally made a system that nobody could design adventure's for. Sure, they learned how to, but as you said, first appearances matter.

I'm probably the most open-minded of all the people in my group who played during those day. (Well, I game now with someone who liked 4e. Except him). You don't want to know THEIR opinions. And guess what? None of them are active in the online RPG community. Most of them never touched a RPG blog or forum. Nobody lied to them except their own lying eyes.

Even before Pathfinder was announced, we were rolling up 3.5 characters again. We'd probably have house-ruled up 3.5 and kept going with that if not for PF.

And I was the biggest 4e cheerleader. Don't believe? Click the "blog posts" link under my name here.

All that goes to show that maybe some people heard it sucked and didn't try it. But lots of people did try, and it didn't work for them. I'd wager more did than didn't.

I'd wager a lot tried it. This is part of Tony Vargas' perfect storm - 4E was released about a year early. But that doesn't change the fact a lot of people feel the need to lie about 4e.

And I've no idea why the early 4e WotC modules managed to be clarinetists (simultaneously sucking and blowing) but it was a huge problem and I suspect that if I'd started playing in mid 2008 as opposed to mid 2009 I'd be less fond of 4e than I am. Goodman Games are, to be honest, the last RPG company I want writing 4e adventures - what they write is old school dungeon crawls and those just don't work with 4e. Paizo APs do (and as I say better than they do with Pathfinder) and even Fate adventures need little in the way of tweaking.

 

[Savage Wombat]

I'm playing Curse of the Crimson Throne right now as a Summoner (next session on Sunday). I'm deliberately holding back to avoid snapping the AP across my knee - and we're only in the third module. To me that's a sign that Pathfinder doesn't work well for Pathfinder APs.

I don't think that's proof - there is a growing consensus, and certainly one I support, that the Summoner as written is broken as hell. Even at 1st level - I don't think the designers balanced the eidolon's AC with the assumption that the summoner would cast Mage Armor on it constantly. And it gets worse with level.

I think Pathfinder works fine with APs, but with the caveat that the adventures are based around CR appropriate challenges, which probably translates as 1-2 levels too weak for the effect they wanted.

 

[Nergal Pendragon]

I don't think that's proof - there is a growing consensus, and certainly one I support, that the Summoner as written is broken as hell. Even at 1st level - I don't think the designers balanced the eidolon's AC with the assumption that the summoner would cast Mage Armor on it constantly. And it gets worse with level.

I think Pathfinder works fine with APs, but with the caveat that the adventures are based around CR appropriate challenges, which probably translates as 1-2 levels too weak for the effect they wanted.

I have to agree with this. The Summoner is one of a few classes where balance issues come into play. The Gunslinger is easily another (though, that one is because of the bizarre way firearms were treated).

 

[Neonchameleon]

I don't think that's proof - there is a growing consensus, and certainly one I support, that the Summoner as written is broken as hell. Even at 1st level - I don't think the designers balanced the eidolon's AC with the assumption that the summoner would cast Mage Armor on it constantly. And it gets worse with level.

We're level 7 and I think my Eidolon's been involved in five fights so far. I don't even have Mage Armour. I'm instead using my Eidolon as a rogue/scout, my Summoner as a very efficient Sorcerer, and using my summons to fight after researching thoroughly. Which may just be a whole lot more broken than the ordinary Summoner approach, but this is literally the first Pathfinder PC I've played.

I think Pathfinder works fine with APs, but with the caveat that the adventures are based around CR appropriate challenges, which probably translates as 1-2 levels too weak for the effect they wanted.

Kingmaker has serious 15 minute working day problems. You can rest in each hex most of the time.

 

[Tony Vargas]

what they write is old school dungeon crawls and those just don't work with 4e.

They do require a subtly different approach. For instance, I ran Temple of the Frog (can't get much older-school than the module in Blackmoor, AFAIK the first D&D adventure to appear in print) using Essentials and ran it off-grid, on a bare table-top like in the olden days. We mapped for a bit until the players gave up and switched to a skill challenge. Inserted a trivial minion 'random encounter' into it for each failure, and it told the same story without the tedium. Finished the dungeon in 6 hours.

I think the 'old school feel' is less about the story and more about the process of getting around the game, itself, though. Like, if you're playing a Thief, and you actually care whether he lives or dies for some reason, you /know/, you can't go out scouting ahead of the party and depend on your 'special' abilities to find traps and sneak up on enemies. You'll set off 7 out of 8 traps and would do better at surprising enemies if you were just a halfling 'not in metal armor.' So you have to find a way to use 'player skill' to accomplish your thiefly duties.

 

[Rygar]

I've never much cared for published adventures, so I'd just conclude the adventures sucked.

Of the first few adventures I played in, only Thunderspire was any good - and it's final 'boss' fight was as screwed up as anything in KotS. Aside from a few really bad encounters like that, though, the system itself held up surprisingly well.

4e set out to fix a lot of perennial mechanical problems with D&D, and largely succeeded. Thing is, long-time D&Ders had spent the prior 3 decades getting into the habit of compensating for those problems...

I don't know if you ever tried building your own encounters and adventures in 4e, but it's stunningly easy. So much so that relative newbies can pretty consistently handle it.

Could you please cite sources for this? Preferably sources that wouldn't have been through WOTC/Hasbro's PR approval process. Because it looks like 4th edition's design was driven by...

1. Kill the OGL by being as different from anything it covers as possible.
2. Increase revenues by designing the game such that it "Encourages" people to increase their average spending. Tactical combat that encourages the use of miniatures which WOTC convienently sold in randomized packs. "Everything is Core" followed by an onslaught of material that made playing without a DDI subscription difficult.

I see this sentiment frequently that 4th edition set out to "Fix" the game, but honestly it looks to me like the changes were largely driven by monetary concerns, not design/gameplay concerns. Perhaps I am wrong, but given that Heinsoo recently described alignment changes as "Rebranding", I really wonder if there's any evidence of WOTC/Hasbro being sold on "Fixing the game" versus them being sold on the above two items and everything else was designed/driven by those two items. Ryan D's words on the matter also strongly indicate that the design was driven by monetary concerns, not gameplay concerns.

It really just seems to me that there's lofty motives being assigned after the fact when all evidence points to a fairly standard corporate plan to increase revenues.