D&D 4E Are powers samey?

[Garthanos]

you messed up the quote. Someone else was responsible for those words, not me.

Sorry yes the reply was to @pemerton

 

[Maxperson]

Here's my current take on the argument.

Most (not all) 4e powers boil down to:

a) power = roll to hit -> if yes, deal damage (and +special)
b) else, power = roll to hit -> if yes, inflict condition (and +special)
c) else, power = movement (and +special)

That being said +special can take a multitude of form. Honestly, 4e managed to pack an unbelievable about of variance into the +special compartment. For some, that compartment is diverse enough to create sufficiently disparate powers that feel unique in use.

For other, however, those there packages (a, b, and c) are not sufficiently diverse enough, no matter how many unique instances of +special may exist. They expect +special to stand alone (e.g. power = +special).

That's my take on the argument anyway. No one's wrong, we'll all just coming from different perspectives.

That's a very good way to put it.

 

[Maxperson]

In fact, my point is exactly that the objective measures of a thing are largely divorced from whether and to what degree most people like or dislike the thing. People don't examine Freebird before deciding if they like it. Liking something is purely subjective. How good Freebird is as a southern rock song meant to be fun to sing along to and do weird country dances to, or how well composed the song is, or even how effective it is at garnering the love of it's target audience, is a matter of objectively discernible qualities. They are two separate considerations.

For the first half of that paragraph I was like, "Yeah! Freebird rocks!" Then I got to the point where you called it a southern rock song and was like, "Say what?" and you lost me.

Here in Los Angeles, Freebird was a good burrito place. After you mentioned it, I Googled it, because I wanted it for dinner. Then I found out that it went out of business and now I'm sad.

Thanks for ruining Freebird you meanie!

 

[Panda-s1]

If you're meaning to imply that 4e is not suitable for playing sessions with combats, I strongly disagree. Here are two actua play pots of combat-free 4e sessions.

But I don't think 4e is well-suited to a combat free campaign. That would make too much of PC buil irrelevant.

yo is any version of D&D well suited to a combat free campaign? you can argue spells had more utility in other versions of D&D, but AD&D only had skills for like 3 classes, how is that useful for a non-combat campaign?

 

[Maxperson]

The thread isn't "DO you dislike 4e?" it's "are 4e Powers samey?" Not, "What do you experience" but what are the actual qualities of the powers, is there any objective measure or rational explanation that points toward sameyness?

Whether someone likes 4e literally isn't relevant to that.

It's not only relevant, but it's pretty much everything. I can(and have in this thread) pointed to mechanics(objective facts) that make powers feel(subjective opinion) samey to me.

You and others have pointed to mechanics(objective facts) that make powers feel(subjective opinion) different to you.

It's literally the subjective portion that makes the difference between samey or not.

 

[Don Durito]

Whether a car is well made or not, I would argue, is only partially objective. Once a list of criteria and ways of measuring them have been chosen, I agree that determining the value of the car is quite objective. Unfortunately compiling the list of criteria and the method by which data will collected is quite subjective.

I think you guys are arguing more about the list of criteria by which the quality of an RPG should be measured than whether or not 4e satisfies those criteria.

Hmmm...I sort of thought that earlier.

But this whole thread began with an assertion that there was an accusation of "sameyness", but no actual poster making that accusation.

That's really why this thread has gotten nowhere. There isn't really an "ur" accusation that can actually be interrogated. Posters have come in to sort of defend the rights of people to say they feel that 4E powers are "samey", but I don't know if anyone has flatout identified themselves as being aligned with such a position overall.

 

[FrogReaver]

likewise, 4e either is or isn’t samey, depending on the definition of the term. (Or, the term is meaningless and has no useful definition) We can argue about how samey it is, but I’d find that pretty boring.

Option 3: it's both samey and not samey depending on the vantage point from which one views the game.

 

[FrogReaver]

Hmmm...I sort of thought that earlier.

But this whole thread began with an assertion that there was an accusation of "sameyness", but no actual poster making that accusation.

That's really why this thread has gotten nowhere. There isn't really an "ur" accusation that can actually be interrogated. Posters have come in to sort of defend the rights of people to say they feel that 4E powers are "samey", but I don't know if anyone has flatout identified themselves as being aligned with such a position overall.

No. In another thread I and others said 4e powers were samey.

 

[FrogReaver]

I kind of like the idea of adding additional action surge uses to the champion.

Not sure at all if this could be balanced.

 

[Don Durito]

No. In another thread I and others said 4e powers were samey.

Well perhaps. But whatever criteria that they were being deemed to be samey by really needed to be in the first post of this thread, if it was to ever get anywhere.

Positing other criteria and positing that they're not samey by those, doesn't really achieve anything.

Objectivity can be somewhat achieved if everyone agrees to abide by the same criteria for analysis. (Although there is not particular reason any one should). But choice of criteria is rooted in subjectivty. And I'm pretty sure I made that point in the other thread before parts of the post in question got dragged out of context and used for tedious edition warring.