D&D 4E Presentation vs design... vs philosophy

[FrogReaver]

My experience differed.

Then maybe what you mean by "affect the encounter in very different ways" means something quite a bit different to you than to me.

 

[Charlaquin]

Then maybe what you mean by "affect the encounter in very different ways" means something quite a bit different to you than to me.

Quite possibly.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Re: italicized part--->No. Positioning mattered a lot. I thought 4e was supposed to be a miniatures game? Since when does positioning not matter in a miniatures game?

It can, sometimes. Particularly if there are a lot of interesting terrain obstacles that you need to worry about, or if the battlefield is crowded.

But something that matters all the time is damage. If you have a power that's 2W + push three squares, then you might want to take advantage of that push effect, if it would be circumstantially advantageous to do so. Or, regardless of whether or not pushing would be relevant, there's going to be a time when dealing 2W is better than dealing 1W.

Unless the DM is going out of their way to contrive huge set-piece fight scenes - which, I gather, long-term 4E DMs eventually did - a lot of Encounter and Daily powers ended up being "deal more damage, and nobody cares about the rider effect".

Likewise, if you remember back to the 5E playtest, an early version of the Battle Master could sacrifice damage in order to apply maneuver effects. The version which made it to print instead gives you bonus damage, in addition to maneuver effects; and the maneuver considered to be the most valuable is the one which increases accuracy.

Given a choice between damage (or accuracy), and other effects, damage is important and other effects are not. The only time those other things generally make a difference is when the math end is otherwise suspiciously balanced, and you need any edge you can get, no matter how small.

 

[Aldarc]

In our umpteenth thread where CapnZapp complains that Paizo made PF2 instead of the Advanced 5e D&D game that he wants...

Instead: Both games [4e & PF2] focus on the encounter. Both games are obsessed with balance. Neither game really trusts the GM.

This is disingenuous, @CapnZapp, because PF2 is an evolution of a system that, in your words, does not trust the GM. PF2 in this regard is cut from the same cloth as PF1 and 3.X. In fact, PF2 explicitly backtracks on this GM distrust more than either 3.X or PF1. 5E is the first game in the post-WotC era that "trusts" the GM.

However, I also don't think that 4e was designed out of a distrust of the GM, as per 3e-PF1, but, rather, out of a desire for GMing to be easy for newcomers. By a lot of accounts, even from detractors of the edition, 4e was actually one of the easiest editions of D&D to run as a GM.

tl;dr: I think the downfall of 4E was its overbearing controlling nature, and I see the same in PF2. This goes far deeper than merely "presentation", and even deeper than shallow gameplay comparisons.

I'm not sure if this explanation would even make it in my Top 10 reasons for why 4e struggled.

But I will say further that what you see in PF2 is likely your confirmation bias screaming at you, as it is well past an inside speaking voice when it comes to this subject matter. There are plenty of people who like 3.X, PF1, PF2, 4E, and 5E. Let people enjoy having nice things, please.

 

[Eric V]

Eh, I get that. 4e powers “feel like magical effects” to many people because they come in discrete packages just like spells do. You can call it a “maneuver” or whatever, but after so many years, it’s been ingrained into many D&D players’ heads that a little packet of effects that you “use” to produce a specific outcome according to a self-contained set of instructions is what spells are. In my experience, you show a 4e detractor Tide of Iron and Hammer Hands, and they’ll find Hammer Hands more palatable, because modifying a basic attack doesn’t “feel like a spell” the same way that a special attack with a bonus effect does.

Sure, but look at what the action does in the narrative: You push the target and then move up next to him. Or, you grab him, and prevent him from moving.

Yo, that's not magical...

 

[Neonchameleon]

Sure - but I'm not comparing whether an ability is interestingly differentiated from a basic attack. I'm talking about a slew of powers that -

Slide 1
Push 1
Grant +1 to next allys attack
Grant -1 to enemies next attack

The choice of which to take isn't meaningful or interesting at that point.

First, slides and pushes are meaningfully different. But your +3s are hyperbole - the weakest modifiers I recall seeing in play started at Advantage (which was +2 and triggering things like Sneak Attack), +3 (which is closer to 5e Advantage than it is to +1; Advantage is somewhere round 4 or 4.5) was normal, and I remember +5s and above until the start of the round.

So I call strawman here even if yes, it did get too fiddly. And yes, slides and pushes are interesting if you fight in varied environments.

Such an example rarely occurred in actual play

Only rarely if you fight in boring environments.

Nearly all forced movement in 4e gave an enemy the ability to not go into such a harmful location.

Sure - at the cost of (a) passing a saving throw and (b) making the target go prone - which was a reasonably powerful action denial effect in 4e. At this point you're basically telling me Hold Person is a useless spell because the target gets a saving throw against that.

Sure - and how about the million times when those abilities had no impact and made no difference?

Then you normally used your other At Will. Tide of Iron and Cleave were normally paired together in basic fighter builds - and Tide of Iron did a few damage to a target next to yours.

It's easy to cherry pick a few example when they worked as intended. It's more realistic to put them into their proper context where the choice of a particular power over another made no difference 95% of the time.

Weird how I don't see hardly any forced movement in 5e - even though nearly every class can push. Pushing is just not interesting tactically most of the time.

The part you're missing is opportunity cost. The push you get in 5e (and the unupgraded Bull Rush in both 3e and 4e) were almost never used because they took up the place of an entire attack and there are very few situations where it is better for someone to inflict a five foot push than it is to hit them with their sword. Meanwhile if you're only giving up a couple of points of damage or a minor modifier to a single attack it's just not that important.

In 5e to use a push you are literally asking the raging barbarian to give up hitting people with their axe. That's almost never a good alternative. Meanwhile if push only cost giving up the two points of rage damage it would be used a whole lot more.

Or to quote Saelorn:

It can, sometimes. Particularly if there are a lot of interesting terrain obstacles that you need to worry about, or if the battlefield is crowded.

But something that matters all the time is damage. If you have a power that's 2W + push three squares, then you might want to take advantage of that push effect, if it would be circumstantially advantageous to do so. Or, regardless of whether or not pushing would be relevant, there's going to be a time when dealing 2W is better than dealing 1W.

Which is why pushing only normally took the place of a couple of points of damage - or at the outside an extra target in melee which is no use at all when you're only next to one enemy.

Unless the DM is going out of their way to contrive huge set-piece fight scenes - which, I gather, long-term 4E DMs eventually did - a lot of Encounter and Daily powers ended up being "deal more damage, and nobody cares about the rider effect".

You do not need a huge set piece fight even if many DMs enjoy them and enjoy that 4e makes them shine. But a fight round a camp fire is not a huge setpiece so much as an improvised wandering monster check. And someone's going to end up in the campfire. Bad guys fighting near a pit trap isn't a huge set piece; it's a consequence of one school of dungeon design and again comes out of improvised terrain drawing. Likewise in a manor a fight on the landing at the top of the stairs isn't a huge set piece. The fight in a room with a chandelier on a rope might be - but in 4e you're going to try and position the monsters under that chandelier. And sending someone down a coal chute or into a latrine is always fun, again without being a huge set piece involving overlapping walkways or things exploding.

Yes, 4e works well with huge set pieces if that's your thing. But it just requires a non-boring environment.

Likewise, if you remember back to the 5E playtest, an early version of the Battle Master could sacrifice damage in order to apply maneuver effects. The version which made it to print instead gives you bonus damage, in addition to maneuver effects; and the maneuver considered to be the most valuable is the one which increases accuracy.

Given a choice between damage (or accuracy), and other effects, damage is important and other effects are not. The only time those other things generally make a difference is when the math end is otherwise suspiciously balanced, and you need any edge you can get, no matter how small.

Other attacks are situational. It's not true to say the only time other things make a difference is when the math is suspiciously balanced (for one thing 4e's balance isn't that close - and for another attrition matters in some schools of play). It is true to say that accuracy and damage are always important - but pushing someone into the campfire is damage. Also that one of the reasons you get two at will attacks in 4e is so that one can be raw damage and the other can be for the fun stuff.

 

[Eric V]

It can, sometimes. Particularly if there are a lot of interesting terrain obstacles that you need to worry about, or if the battlefield is crowded.

But something that matters all the time is damage. If you have a power that's 2W + push three squares, then you might want to take advantage of that push effect, if it would be circumstantially advantageous to do so. Or, regardless of whether or not pushing would be relevant, there's going to be a time when dealing 2W is better than dealing 1W.

Unless the DM is going out of their way to contrive huge set-piece fight scenes - which, I gather, long-term 4E DMs eventually did - a lot of Encounter and Daily powers ended up being "deal more damage, and nobody cares about the rider effect".

Likewise, if you remember back to the 5E playtest, an early version of the Battle Master could sacrifice damage in order to apply maneuver effects. The version which made it to print instead gives you bonus damage, in addition to maneuver effects; and the maneuver considered to be the most valuable is the one which increases accuracy.

Given a choice between damage (or accuracy), and other effects, damage is important and other effects are not. The only time those other things generally make a difference is when the math end is otherwise suspiciously balanced, and you need any edge you can get, no matter how small.

Well, 4e also had ways to pump damage, so it wan never an either/or choice. And while damage is always good, my friend's wizard was very happy when we could lump the enemies together for a big AoE spell.

You reminded me of the playtest fighter though...yeah, I wish that creature had made it through to the game.

 

[Eric V]

However, I also don't think that 4e was designed out of a distrust of the GM, as per 3e-PF1, but, rather, out of a desire for GMing to be easy for newcomers. By a lot of accounts, even from detractors of the edition, 4e was actually one of the easiest editions of D&D to run as a GM.

Agreed. Heinsoo went on to design 13thAge with Hickman and that games asks players to trust the GM a LOT.

 

[CapnZapp]

It’s absurd to me that you consider anything besides attack bonus, saves, and damage “the superficial things.” I believe quite the opposite, those are just numbers, and by far the least interesting way to differentiate characters. What actually matters is the tangible effects they can cause outside of plain damage. I see a much bigger difference between Tide of Iron and Grappling Strike than I do between a fighter with the great weapon fighting style attacking with a greatsword and a fighter with the duelist fighting style attacking with a rapier. The only difference between the latter is boring numbers, the former actually affect the encounter in different ways than each other.

Great for you. Your anecdote is noted, but this isn't personal.

The way you look at it makes me believe 4E was attractive to you. Unfortunately, your views weren't shared by nearly enough gamers to stop 4E from failing, and I fear PF2 too.

My entire point here is exactly that people like choices that matter, meaning numbers, actual probabilities, and I came here to discuss why it might be that Paizo didn't learn this lesson from the fate of 4E.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Great for you. Your anecdote is noted, but this isn't personal.

The way you look at it makes me believe 4E was attractive to you. Unfortunately, your views weren't shared by nearly enough gamers to stop 4E from failing, and I fear PF2 too.

My entire point here is exactly that people like choices that matter, meaning numbers, actual probabilities, and I came here to discuss why it might be that Paizo didn't learn this lesson from the fate of 4E.

And yet you seem unwilling to acknowledge that maybe people see the choices as mattering, maybe the numbers are more varied than you think, and maybe Paizo isn't just copying a twelve year old game because they didn't have anything better to do.