What is the essence of D&D

[Garthanos]

If you had fun with 4E that's great but it ticked boxes for people on forums to argue about

They didnt have forums when they changed simultaneous resolution to turn taking like a bloody board game in yesteryear... but they did have apa zines and the like.

 

[Hussar]

I'm not arguing with you. 1e generates lots of magic items, absolutely.

But it, unlike 3e-and-newer editions, isn't shy about blowing them up; and isn't shy about salting cursed and-or deadly items into the pot.

My experience of 3e when it came to treasure was surprisingly similar to 1e (in most games I play in I tend to end up as treasurer, so I speak from experience): in either system we'd come back from an adventure with about the same amount of gype - same length of list, same rough total value. We were loaded with magic in 3e, with the main difference being that we could also make or easily commission exactly what we wanted. (self-made Rod of Wonder for the win!!!)

Honestly, I'm not sure how.

A 7th level 3e party should have about 16k worth of goodies/PC. That's about a +1 weapon, +1 suit of armor, a +2 stat boost item, and a couple of odds and sods. A 7th level AD&D PC, IME, was carrying at least twice, if not three times that. I look at the Dragonlance Pregens. 5th level PC's with +3 weapons. :wow: Now, that's certainly an outlier. But, given the mountain of magical loot in AD&D modules, I find it hard to see how you could have similar numbers. Unless your 3e characters were massively over wealth.

I played the minis game. It was designed by the same people who designed 4E. A 4E combat took a similar amount of time to play as a D&DM game.

It felt like a more advanced version of that with tick the box type powers.

4E combat could've fun but it took so long you couldn't do 3 or 4 combats in a session and have time for anything else.

I played a 3 hour session if 5E last week, had two encounters which lasted an hour or less and the other 2 hours were other stuff.

I wonder if my experience is so different because I play on virtual tabletops. Because, in our 3 hour sessions, in 4e, we routinely had 2-5 encounters with tons of time for extra stuff, even in the double digit levels. Actually combat time didn't really change too much throughout the campaign, but stayed relatively static.

But, I will certianly give 5e credit - MUCH faster combats than 4e or 3e. And it's definitely a plus AFAIC.

 

[Campbell]

I played the minis game. It was designed by the same people who designed 4E. A 4E combat took a similar amount of time to play as a D&DM game.

It felt like a more advanced version of that with tick the box type powers.

That's only looking at part of the game though. Did it have compelling skirmish mechanics? Yes. It also featured a compelling scene based noncombat resolution system that in my experience enabled heroic fantasy narratives better than any other edition did. That was part of the game. It was not the whole game.

My own games featured a combat maybe every other session.

 

[billd91]

Bull your 4e Doesnt do D&D is exactly denying my experience.

And your assertion that it does... by the same standards, doesn’t that deny our experiences that it really doesn’t?

Or is either statement really just a personal perspective that shouldn’t be seen as trampling over each other? This is the heart of the edition war - denying that either side had a point and belittling each other’s perspectives.

 

[Garthanos]

That's only looking at part of the game though. Did it have compelling skirmish mechanics? Yes. It also featured a compelling scene based noncombat resolution system that in my experience enabled heroic fantasy narratives better than any other edition did. That was part of the game. It was not the whole game.

My own games featured a combat maybe every other session.

What no clearing two orcs out of a room like the oh so heroic 1e?

 

[Zardnaar]

And your assertion that it does... by the same standards, doesn’t that deny our experiences that it really doesn’t?

Or is either statement really just a personal perspective that shouldn’t be seen as trampling over each other? This is the heart of the edition war - denying that either side had a point and belittling each other’s perspectives.

Difference is I'm not denying that you can have fun with 4E, or that you shouldn't enjoy it. If you like 4E its great, didn't do it for me.

Gathanos and Tony Vargas posts always have an undercurrent of your an idiot or not playing the game properly if you are playing any other edition other than 4E and its 4E that is the odd one out.

They're also insisting their experiences are the only narrative when we can look at an old adventure and find out that they're basically full of it. Can you play that way sure but very few adventures are actually printed like that.

If you look at what was printed for 4E and how long the copmbat actually took you can't really deny that as a personal anecdote. If 4E powers and class designs don't really do it for you its hard to argue against it its not really subjective.

Its not really subjective either that AD&D modules had a lot of loot in them, its mostly true. In the context of the edition though it kind of makes sense with gold= xp, if you don't like that fact that is fine. Personally I like the old find what you want approach others might like buying items and that is fine as well.

3E screwed up with powerful magic that was reasonably easy to get/trade for with powerful class options which OSR lacked (it had the powerful magic item part). Its basically what broke 3E.

4E powered magic down (fact) made them boring (mostly subjective but most people would probably agree). The items were even easier to aquire though you could ritual them up didn't even need to go back to town or spend xp making them.Both 3E and 4E had it baked in.

5E you still have OSR type magic items (nerfed a bit IMHO) but you get a lot less of them in printed 5E materials and you can't buy them RAW except for some of the most basic ones.

 

[Garthanos]

Or is either statement really just a personal perspective that shouldn’t be seen as trampling over each other?

Sorry you missed how I was pointing out he wasnt actually being so equimenical but rather argues just like Tony about inaccuracy he perceives in others assertions about games, "no that isnt how it was supposed to be it wasnt Fantasy Vietnam just ummm grittierr yeh" f ... just as he complained or actually another poster did with whom he agreed about Tony talking about how people who misattributed why they dislike 4e, where met with corrections with show they didnt make much sense.

Flatearth was considered valid ffs.

There is very much intentional trampling going on just like when I say 1e was Fantasy Vietnam.

The difference is the Trampling was used to helped burn 4e to the ground.

 

[Garthanos]

Difference is I'm not denying that you can have fun with 4E, or that you shouldn't enjoy it. If you like 4E its great, didn't do it for me.

LOL I do not care but apparently it still isnt D&D its not heroic fantasy its a skirmish game... its a board game go ahead you can say it.

Sure you can have fun with it but.....

 

[Garthanos]

Difference is I'm not denying that you can have fun with 4E,

Am I denying people have fun playing fantasy Vietnam...

 

[Zardnaar]

LOL I do not care but apparently it still isnt D&D its not heroic fantasy its a skirmish game... its a board game go ahead you can say it.

Sure you can have fun with it but.....

Its not a board game but it did tactical skirmishing very well, it just took a bit of time. 3 hour fights are an exaggeration but 30-45 minutes weren't. We were struggling to get more than 3-4 per 4 hour session.

I had some fun with it but I had DDI, the players at the table with only the core books were struggling. We had one really good session but it wasn't good enough to convert from 3.5 even though we were looking for something new (which turned into heavily houseruled 3.5 and SWSE).