D&D General Why is D&D 4E a "tactical" game?

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

No, sorry, when you mark someone in a sport, you stand next to him and you foil his attempts at something. Please explain how this works out with the Fighter's mark, in which you do not even need to stay adjacent or even be able to attack him at range ?

So no, absolutely no correspondence to anything happening in real life, it's a purely technical and tactical artefact. I'm cutting all the rest because it's wishful thinking about a mechanic that does not work the way you think it does.



Even if the fighter or the target moves away, please explain how this is not totally "magical" (without actually being magic. since, you know, magic is a very strange thing in 4e and martial is not supposed to be magical).

But it is rather easy to explain that part without magic. The fighter is a distraction. You need to keep an eye on him, because if he gets close, he can naughty word you up. The last attack he made against you reminded you again how dangerous he really is. You can't give that wizard in front of you your full attention, because there is someone over there that could really mess you up.

Though you don't really need to explain it without magic. Martial is a power source. It's not "arcane", not "divine", not "psionic", not "shadow", not "primal". But it's a source of power. It's probably something beyond what mere mortals can do, because mere mortals can't expect to go toe to toe with a monster the size of a house, that spews fire, has claws as sharp as a blade and scales as strong as iron. But in a world full of magic, you can reach into this power with a pure dedication to honing your body and reflexes to the highest level.

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[Oofta]

But it is rather easy to explain that part without magic. The fighter is a distraction. You need to keep an eye on him, because if he gets close, he can naughty word you up. The last attack he made against you reminded you again how dangerous he really is. You can't give that wizard in front of you your full attention, because there is someone over there that could really mess you up.

Though you don't really need to explain it without magic. Martial is a power source. It's not "arcane", not "divine", not "psionic", not "shadow", not "primal". But it's a source of power. It's probably something beyond what mere mortals can do, because mere mortals can't expect to go toe to toe with a monster the size of a house, that spews fire, has claws as sharp as a blade and scales as strong as iron. But in a world full of magic, you can reach into this power with a pure dedication to honing your body and reflexes to the highest level.

Label it whatever you want, fighters had supernatural abilities. That mindless ooze that's basically got the intelligence of a giant amoeba had an arrow just fly over it's head? Hoo boy, gotta watch that fighter instead of this barbarian in my face trying to chop me to pieces. There's no logical explanation for it other than A) It's a game and that's just how it works B) supernatural ability to affect the reactions of other creatures.

But this is where these arguments always seem to go. Nitpicking details, labels, telling people that their opinion and impression of the game are totally wrong because you have a different opinion or impression.

Maybe someday we'll get over the edition wars.

 

[Lyxen]

But it is rather easy to explain that part without magic. The fighter is a distraction. You need to keep an eye on him, because if he gets close, he can naughty word you up. The last attack he made against you reminded you again how dangerous he really is. You can't give that wizard in front of you your full attention, because there is someone over there that could really mess you up.

But he cannot, since he moved away, or you moved away, or there are people or even a chasm between you, etc. And actually, he did not really mess me up, not specifically anyway. And if he could, why did he not do it while hitting me the first time ?

As for me, I will continue to manage "aggro" and tanking like I've always done in D&D, which is mostly about roleplay and actual threat and positioning, I don't need more than this and in particular a mechanic that feels extremely artificial like a lot of 4e powers because, once more, they were not designed to make sense in the game world, they were designed as cards to play on a tactical boardgame, they just reused names from the previous editions to try and make a link, but in the end, they mean something usually fairly different from the original.

Don't get me wrong, it's a very nice fantasy boardgame probably the best ever since it's varied, the rules are really tight, it's really tactical, etc. But for me, all that tactical interest is at the expense of cutting it of way too much from the flow of a TTRPG.

Though you don't really need to explain it without magic. Martial is a power source. It's not "arcane", not "divine", not "psionic", not "shadow", not "primal". But it's a source of power. It's probably something beyond what mere mortals can do, because mere mortals can't expect to go toe to toe with a monster the size of a house, that spews fire, has claws as sharp as a blade and scales as strong as iron. But in a world full of magic, you can reach into this power with a pure dedication to honing your body and reflexes to the highest level.

I'm sorry, I would really like to have a martial power source that makes sense (See the Wheel of Time for example for a martial power source that works really well), but it just does not, in particular because even a level 1 fighter has it, and he clearly has honed nothing to such a level.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think one of the key differences for me in play comparing 3E and 4E in tactics was that in 3E, a lot of what we did as a group was basically rolling off a list of actions and spells we would do to always get everyone into optimal fighting position.
For the adventuring day, we were buffed with Cat's Grace, Mass Bear's Endurance and Protection from Evil. In combat, we would buff each other with Haste or Mass Haste, Death Ward and other spells that only provided short-term benefits. As a Fighter, I got into position to make full round attacks and included Improved Trip into the routine to ensure I could knock someone over so he would provoke attacks of opportunities when standing up or suffer penalties. Then you used 5 ft steps to ensure the party rogue could take his 5-ft step to keep in flanking position, or Tumble into the right spot for flanking so he delivers his sneak attack.
A lot of this was basically standard operating procedure, and it depended a lot on making build choices to faciliate it. (SOme if it required mapping out all your ability score improvements to ensure you would qualify for the right feat, pick the right feats, skill rank levels and multiclass correctly to qualify for the right prestige class.
The combat themselves were not that varied.

In D&D 4, the pre-combat buffing went away basically completely. I can't actually remember anything of it surviving.
Character build choices were still plenty, but they tended to be a bit more straightforward, making choice of ability scores... easy.

But during combat, things changed a lot. Instead of having Improved Trip to make my last Full Round Attack a trip attempt, a fighter might have one or two abilities that he can use per encounter to trip an enemy - so you have to decide when it matters the most - for example, when you want him to hinder moving, or when you can ensure that other characters are in position to benefit from it.
You might have a push/pull/slide to move your enemy into a different position, but when was the right time to use it, and what is the most effective position. A Cleric or Wizard might have the ability to give a short lasting +2 buff to some attack against an enemy - what enemy should it be used on? When should it be used? How can we benefit most from it? And if you enjoy being granted such a +2 bonus - what ability do you use, given what you have available and what you know about the enemies capabilites (including their hit points).

I think one key component here to the tacticalness was: You had some powerful options that you could use only a limited amount of times per combat. This meant resource management, and the resource you spend also had its internal, situation-dependent usefulness or potential, and you tried to maximize what you got out of it. The way the powers were designed in 4E, they usually all had perks over just using a standard attack, so even a poor guess still got you a consolation prize. But if you truly wanted to shine, you needed to work together and pick the right moment for your abilities.

 

[Umbran]

Can we ever have a 4E discussion without edition wars with accusations of people making "sweeping accusations" that are just opinion?

Mod Note:
We can, when people who have critique of the game can stop venting their spleens in manners that aren't constructive.

If your intent in this thread is just to say bad things about 4e, it is time to find another discussion.

 

[Parmandur]

So we’ve established that different people have different experiences and like different games for different reasons.

No, that can't be right, that clashes with my prior assumptions.

 

[Parmandur]

4E was more tactical not because it made grid play it's baseline, while gridplay even predates D&D, the fact that it it had more rules to it than movement, but AoE, foced movement, traps and hazards etc

My group always used They're of the Mind with 3E, but 4E made it untenable to continue, so there is something to that. The rules really encouraged grid play in a big way.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mod Note:

Amplifying & clarifying Umbran’s note- “Edition Warring” isn’t (currently) a thing that will get you moderated, but it IS still annoying and provocative, Keep it up, and you can still earn warning points for “threadcrapping”.

 

[Lyxen]

In D&D 4, the pre-combat buffing went away basically completely. I can't actually remember anything of it surviving.

It was actually a good thing, because in 3e the buffing was really ridiculous in terms of complexity, generated tons of modifgiers and then you had to compute them almost for every single attack, knowing that they could be overridden or dispelled, it was a huge mess, which also totally imbalanced the game, a combat could go completely one way or another depending on who was buffed, and the buffing on the NPCs/Monsters side was a pain to manage.

On the other hand, 4e almost completely removed it and it was a bit too much a swing in the other direction, I'm happy with the limited buffing of 5e, which still offers you lots of choices but forces you to choose and not spend too much time on it.

 

[Parmandur]

On the contrary I think boardgamers were.

I think this is beyond right, I think it is more accurate to say that boardgames still are the tsrget audience today. Consider that the 4E derived Dungeons & Dragons Adventure System board games are still in print, with the latest several tying into 5E Adventures with 4E rules, as recently as the 2019 Dungeon of the Mad Mage board game.