D&D 4E Ben Riggs' "What the Heck Happened with 4th Edition?" seminar at Gen Con 2023

[cavalier973]

One interesting thing about the Great Edition War was how people bounced off of the requirement of 4e to use minis/tokens and a tactical map. 3e was certainly designed with this sort of thing in mind, and there are examples in the rulebooks showing tokens on a tactical map to explain things like attacks of opportunity. Characters got powers that granted additional or alternative methods of movement, 5' steps were a thing, etc. etc..

So when they said 4e was designed to use a map and mini/tokens, I was like, yeah ok, I've been using both extensively since 2000? In fact, after starting to use them, after my "theatre of the mind" AD&D years, I found a lot of the little headaches I used to have with arguments about who is where and how did that goblin attack me vanished, so I almost always use them, save for small skirmishes where it really doesn't matter.

So what was the problem? It seemed to come down to two sticking points. The streamlined rules for diagonals (leading to one of my favorite 4e-isms, the dread FIRECUBE!) and "squares of movement".

See, while races generally moved at the same speed as they did in 3e, rather than say "30' movement", suddenly Humans had 6 squares of movement. Even though squares were still 5' x 5', so it wasn't hard to figure out how much distance was being crossed, this apparently was "too gamist" for some. They pointed at the forced movement and zones and pointed out how this game was designed to be used with maps and tokens (just like 3e was!) and said "you'll take my Theatre of the Mind away from me when I'm dead and buried!", even though 3e had the same things (though they were more common in 4e).

In the end, 4e's presentation and it's marketing doomed it more than the actual game did. That and the fact that, as I said way upthread, the fact that not everyone was ready for a new edition, or hadn't yet experienced the more experimental concepts of late 3.5, like the Warlock, the Miniatures Handbook, or the Tome of Battle.

And while 3e made a lot of changes to 3.5, they were largely culled from late 2e and popular house rules. Enough stuff stayed the same that while people did reject some 3eisms, they grumbled and sallied forth (I recall a fantastic debate about "attacks of opportunity" where I pointed out they were directly inspired by AD&D attacks on retreating characters, and were actually created in late 2e to people who thought this "new" rule would destroy the game (or something, it's been 24 years).

The Miniatures Handbook, interestingly, is a piece of the puzzle I hadn't considered before, but makes this push for 4e to be played with a battle map come into sharp focus. During 3.5, WotC attempted to make a miniatures game for D&D (far from the first time this has happened) that used very compatible rules with 3.5.

They produced a line of plastic miniatures to go with the game. But the game flopped, yet they had all these miniatures that weren't selling...and wouldn't you know it, it was for my 4e game that I bought like 50 goblins (among other things) from this line cheaply online!

Detective: “So, Ma’am, tell me what you saw.”

Witness: “I was just pulling the iron rations out of the oven—I make my own, you know; let me know if you want the recipe, because I have it written—“

Detective: “Just the facts, Ma’am”.

Witness: “Oh, right. Anyway, I heard a deafening crash, and looked out my window down The Wide, and only twenty squares away, I saw one of the biggest ogres I ever heard tell of. He was, maybe, two, two and a half squares tall, and looked to weigh between four and five thousand coins.”

Detective: “What was he doing?”

Witness: “He was looking for something, I think, lifting whole roofs off the buildings and peeking inside, then letting the roofs drop.”

Detective: “Then what happened?”

Witness: “Well, about half a turn later, a wizard stepped into the road, cast a spell, and a giant cube of fire shot out at the ogre and turned it into a crispy critter.”

Detective: “…a cube…of fire? That’s impossible, Ma’am. You’re under arrest.”

 

[Red Castle]

Part of the issue there was, I think, that in at least one major instance the role of a class was changed from what it had long been seen as to something else. That instance was the Fighter, long seen as both the main damage dealer AND tank being changed to "defender", with its damage-dealing side stripped off to other "striker" classes; one of which (Rogue) was mostly seen prior as an occasional damage-dealer and otherwise non-combatant.

So yes, they codifed the roles...but also changed some of them in ways that might not have been as popular as expected.

Another awful role definition, but this one's a 2e error that perpetuated.

If you're gonna have roles (and I'm not sure they add much if anything) they absolutely have to encompass things other than just combat.

The Ranger's role should be something like "explorer". The Bard's, "talker". The Rogue's, "scout" or "looter". Etc.

So the issue seems to be about players expectations more than the roles, not agreeing with the role chosen for a particular class. A matter of personnal preference regarding the fighter because as I recall, a lot of people consider that the 4e fighter is the best version of the class.

But your exemple just emphasised the purpose of being transparent with the class role. If there was no role and you create a 4e Fighter expecting to be the damage dealer killing machine of the group, you'll be disappointed. Knowing right from the beginning that a Fighter is a Defender and not a Striker avoid this kind of disappointment once the game start, it sets your expectation.

For exemple, the first time I finally played in 5e, I decided to create a Monk. Based on my previous experience with monks in 2e and 4e, I was expecting to be a damage dealer. But once the game started and we got to the first fight, I realised that it was not the case, the barbarian and rogue with me were doing a lot more damage. So, even though I figured out what to do with my character and still liked him, I was disappointed because it was not what I was expecting, what I had visualised my character. This would not have been the case if I would have know right from the beginning what its role really is. Maybe I would have played something else, or at least I would not have expected to do a lot of damage.

....

As for role encompassing both combat and non-combat situation, I disagree. There is a lot of mecanic involve in combat (most of the class mecanics are tied to combat), not so much in non combat situation (mainly just skills and an ability here and there). The role you describe sound more like a background than anything else to me; a ranger, in any edition, can be an 'explorer', a 'scout', a 'hunter', a 'guide', a 'bounty hunter'... but it says nothing about how he fight. If you tell me that the role of the Rogue is a 'looter', I have absolutely no idea how he would perform in combat. Tell me that he is a striker and I know that he'll do a lot of damage and rely on movement to survive.

 

[Red Castle]

Changing feet to squares always seemed like an unnecessary complication when we already have a measurement (feet) that works just fine and is more relatable to real life. I can easily visualize in my mind what a 20-foot distance looks like, but to do the same in squares (or meters, for that matter) I first have to convert it to feet - an extra step.

My guess is the 'squares' bit was done to appeal to metric types who don't use feet.

Which is pretty much everyone outside the US...

But I think it mostly had to do to simplify combat, since 4e was meant to be played on a grid, avoid the extra step to convert feets to squares you are talking about, only the other way around.

Also, it may be a personnal preference, but I find it easier, faster, to multiply a number than divide it.

 

[Thomas Shey]

One interesting thing about the Great Edition War was how people bounced off of the requirement of 4e to use minis/tokens and a tactical map. 3e was certainly designed with this sort of thing in mind, and there are examples in the rulebooks showing tokens on a tactical map to explain things like attacks of opportunity. Characters got powers that granted additional or alternative methods of movement, 5' steps were a thing, etc. etc..

So when they said 4e was designed to use a map and mini/tokens, I was like, yeah ok, I've been using both extensively since 2000? In fact, after starting to use them, after my "theatre of the mind" AD&D years, I found a lot of the little headaches I used to have with arguments about who is where and how did that goblin attack me vanished, so I almost always use them, save for small skirmishes where it really doesn't matter.

So what was the problem? It seemed to come down to two sticking points. The streamlined rules for diagonals (leading to one of my favorite 4e-isms, the dread FIRECUBE!) and "squares of movement".

To be fair, while it'd have been annoying, there were less things in 3e where your spatial memory had to be really, really good for people to be able to use their abilities fully if you were going TotM. 4e had a lot more things involving pushing or pulling people around, so precise positioning tended to be even more critical.

 

[Thomas Shey]

We've used a grid and minis since before I started in 1982, mostly to avoid the bolded piece. 10' squares, though; nothing "snapped to grid", circular things are circular, and in an open area you can move any direction you like (assuming no obstruction) and we'll just measure the distance by eyeball or a bit of string rather than count squares if your movement doesn't happen to line up either straight or diagonal sacross the squares.

Changing feet to squares always seemed like an unnecessary complication when we already have a measurement (feet) that works just fine and is more relatable to real life. I can easily visualize in my mind what a 20-foot distance looks like, but to do the same in squares (or meters, for that matter) I first have to convert it to feet - an extra step.

My guess is the 'squares' bit was done to appeal to metric types who don't use feet.

And then, as with most shiny new design ideas, vastly overused. Adv-disadv in 5e is the same way.

I'd suggest it had more to do with, for people who did routinely use 5' squares for movement and positioning, that the "feet" were normally not really used for anything except defining the squares anyway. Your case was obviously different, but the groups I played with had counted by squares or hexes for decades at that point.

 

[payn]

To be fair, while it'd have been annoying, there were less things in 3e where your spatial memory had to be really, really good for people to be able to use their abilities fully if you were going TotM. 4e had a lot more things involving pushing or pulling people around, so precise positioning tended to be even more critical.

Pretty much. I think for some folks it was just one too many straws, but I agree with folks that 3E wasnt that ToTM friendly either. I think it really came up during NEXT surveys which lead to 5E pulling back.

I'd suggest it had more to do with, for people who did routinely use 5' squares for movement and positioning, that the "feet" were normally not really used for anything except defining the squares anyway. Your case was obviously different, but the groups I played with had counted by squares or hexes for decades at that point.

I think the complaint had more to do with the dreaded "simulation" idea than actual issue with the game. Feet sounds more like a real world term than squares which sounds like a gamist one.

 

[Lord Shark]

So the issue seems to be about players expectations more than the roles, not agreeing with the role chosen for a particular class. A matter of personnal preference regarding the fighter because as I recall, a lot of people consider that the 4e fighter is the best version of the class.

But your exemple just emphasised the purpose of being transparent with the class role. If there was no role and you create a 4e Fighter expecting to be the damage dealer killing machine of the group, you'll be disappointed. Knowing right from the beginning that a Fighter is a Defender and not a Striker avoid this kind of disappointment once the game start, it sets your expectation.

4E fighters can actually do respectable damage -- not as much as a barbarian or a ranger, maybe, but they're the hardest-hitting defenders in the game.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Pretty much. I think for some folks it was just one too many straws, but I agree with folks that 3E wasnt that ToTM friendly either. I think it really came up during NEXT surveys which lead to 5E pulling back.
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Yeah, my own feeling was once AoOs became a big part of the game, a lot of TotM was going to be problematic, even moreso if a character wrapped themselves around some feats that heavily used it. But as you say, 4e took it even farther.

I think the complaint had more to do with the dreaded "simulation" idea than actual issue with the game. Feet sounds more like a real world term than squares which sounds like a gamist one.

Well, they're not wrong, but it still added up to an extra divider that was, in practice, often pointless. This in contrast to some games where 1 hex = 1 meter where it was a distinction without difference.

 

[Mannahnin]

Quite frankly, I think this argument is bizarre. 5E is more simulationist than 4E; again, does 5E have damage on a miss? No? Well, that's a highly gamist mechanic which – by virtue of confusing the issue about whether or not hit point loss is injury or stamina reduction – negatively impacts the simulationist aspect of play. Since 5E doesn't have it (or related mechanics, such as "minion" monsters who are defeated if they take any damage, but for some reason can't be damaged on a miss), it's therefore more simulationist.

Well, D&D in general has "damage on a miss" in the sense that it's always had "save for half damage". Remember that 4E was also making Fireball an attack roll against Reflex and "half damage on a miss" at the exact same time as it was letting Fighters also have a 5th level daily power (like Fireball) which did half damage on a miss. EDIT: Actually, I went to edit this to specify a power name and was reminded that they DIDN'T give Fighters a half damage on a miss Daily in the PH1, at least not until 15th level! The lower level Dailies instead have the Reliable keyword, so you don't expend the power if you miss with it, rather than giving them half damage on a miss. Rangers and Rogues do get a couple of half damage on a miss options at 5th, though. Using that "Reliable" keyword instead definitely seems like a nod to keeping Fighters a little different in feel.

Some of this is compounded by the overall shift to how attacks worked and the aligning of magical and non-magical attacks to work the same.

I don't find minions generally more disturbing to my suspension of disbelief than Evasion giving creatures/PCs "save for no damage" against a Fireball. Saving Throws in general have always required the DM/players to tweak the narrative to explain how exactly the victim mitigated the damage, as Gary colorfully illustrated in the 1E DMG with the example of the fighter chained to the rock vs. the dragon's breath. For me "damage on a miss" requires no more mental exertion than saving throws. YMMV, of course.

Im guessing the DNA is palatable things? For example, the hard coded roles and tactical combat is not present in 5E. Nor is there hybrid multiclassing. ADEU is interesting because its sort of still there, its just not the same structure for every class. I can only speak for myself, but the two games dont play much alike, even if they share some design points.

Im thinking more along the lines of the leader, defender, striker, controller roles of each class. 5E multiclassing makes mixing among the roles a possibility that is much more difficult, IME, in 4E.

I find it to be more a difference of degree than kind. Classes are about as hard-coded in their roles in 4E as 5E. 4E is just more explicit and clear about it. Both allow you to branch out from your role. 4E again supported this more clearly and explicitly by talking in black and white about secondary roles for classes and making it clear what kind of powers to take or how to multiclass if you wanted your character to focus more or less on another role. Fighters could be built with varying degrees of focus on damage vs being hard to kill, for example. My first 4E Fighter was extremely mobile, and pushed a little into Striker territory in that way.

Never felt broken to me, especially in heroic tier (1-10 level). In fact, looking through the monster manual 1 (first one release) and Monster Vault (release near the end where the math is corrected), there is not a lot of difference when you compare creatures that are in both and I still use creatures from the Monster Manual in my campaigns without any problem.

So I think the ‘problem’ came up once you reach paragon or epic tier…. Admittedly, I never really played in those tiers.

It shows up a bit in Heroic tier. As Riggs is reported as having mentioned in the seminar, apparently a lot of monster HP were inflated at the last minute on original release, which led to an issue folks sometimes called the "padded sumo" effect, where PCs would burn out their Encounters and possibly Dailies while the monster still had a lot of HP, and the combat would become unnecessarily prolonged as they whittled the monster down using At Wills. A common house rule for MM1 monsters is to buff their damage and reduce their HP.

Oh to be sure, the game could be played with maps and such from a very early stage (it was born as a mod to a wargame after all). I remember a fun discussion on this topic too. "Why do you think AD&D races have their movement speed expressed in inches?". 12" movement for humans? That'd be 12 5' squares, so 60', which is a 3e "double move".

Of course, I didn't realize that myself until the late 90's- when I played AD&D, we never used a battle map, and none of my DM's ever seemed to concerned with how much time it took to get places on dungeon maps- I mean, they could have been, but often it felt like some arbitrary unit of time was decided on the spot.

Which always struck me as odd considering how emphatic Gary was about timekeeping in the DMG!

The folks I played 2E with a ton in the 90s were big battlemap fans for the reasons folks have talked about in the last couple of pages. Eliminating disputes about positioning in TotM games. We mostly used hex grid battlemaps in 2E, but we used rules for attacks of opportunity, had our own rule for flanking, etc.

4E fighters can actually do respectable damage -- not as much as a barbarian or a ranger, maybe, but they're the hardest-hitting defenders in the game.

Yup. You can definitely build Fighters to be more focused on damage and less on being tough as nails. Striker is a secondary role for them. And of course the Essentials line introduced the Slayer as a simplified variant Fighter focused more on damage dealing (while still tough) specifically to cater to the folks who loved the Classic Fighter.

For me, the 4E Fighter was the first time I ever enjoyed playing a single-classed Fighter. I was an inveterate multi-class fan in AD&D. 4E giving me, as a Fighter player, as many options and toys and ways to be cool as a spellcaster has was revelatory.

 

[Red Castle]

4E fighters can actually do respectable damage -- not as much as a barbarian or a ranger, maybe, but they're the hardest-hitting defenders in the game.

Oh absolutely! But like you said, not as much as a proper Striker, so if you expect to be the killing machine of the group, you might be disappointed… but yeah, two weapon fighting fighter could do a lot of damage on a turn if I recall correctly!