D&D 4E 4e: Death of the Bildungsroman

[Storm-Bringer]

Someone picking up D&D for the first time is going to start at level 1. If they play at level 1, and die at level 1 because the characters are nearly-incompetent newbs, they will not like D&D very much. WotC has determined that most new players don't like frustration in the game, since it turns them off the game. They probably figure the players who like to start out as dirt farmers are in the minority, and are worth irking if it means that more new players will be able to enjoy the game out of the box.

Except, that isn't a problem with the rules. That is a problem with the DM. If the DM throws too much at the players, that will only be solved by giving the characters thousands upon thousands of hit points. Which will only encourage DMs to throw tougher monsters at them. And so forth.

Far more helpful would be advice on how to balance an encounter to the party. In fact, that would be the better way.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Except, that isn't a problem with the rules. That is a problem with the DM. If the DM throws too much at the players, that will only be solved by giving the characters thousands upon thousands of hit points. Which will only encourage DMs to throw tougher monsters at them. And so forth.

Far more helpful would be advice on how to balance an encounter to the party. In fact, that would be the better way.

I disagree. 3.x did have (reasonably good) rules for balancing an encounter to a party. The problem was that a level 1 party had so few hp that one unlucky crit could outright kill a character. While the game ought to be challenging, it's no fun to die on the point of a crappy goblin's arrow in the first round of the first combat of the campaign (which has actually happened to me on more than one occasion... I have terrible luck as a player). It's hardly unrealistic, but it tends to suck the fun out of the first game session and often sets a poor tone for the rest of the campaign (at least in my experience).

An experienced DM shouldn't have much difficulty throwing together a set of 0th level rules, if that's how he wants to start his campaign. An inexperienced DM, IMO, probably shouldn't attempt to run such a game until he's gained a bit more experience as to how things work and what doesn't. As far as I'm concerned, setting the default starting point to where characters are hardy enough to survive a mistake or some bad luck is a very good thing, particularly for new DMs (and unlucky players).

 

[I'm A Banana]

As such, this needs to be a foregone conclusion, which to me means removing randomness

Well, it's no more of a foregone conclusion than "The PC's win an encounter."

Which is to say, the "game" element of this lies in playing out characters who might fail in their goals, in the same way that the PC's of any D&D game might fail in their goals (with death being one of the ways they fail).

The criticism doesn't mandate that it be a literary conclusion, just that the storytelling device, for better or worse, has become alienated from 4e. Like any other storytelling device in 4e, it would serve the purposes of the game, rather than vice-versa.

you now have enough space to have powerless constitution = hp players which can group together and kill a goblin or maybe an orc, just by using their base attacks and one or two aps...

I tried it, and it worked...you just have to improvise a bit... if you start powerless in 3.5, your hp are so low that one solid blow will kill you...

Yes, we're all aware that we can do whatever we want with our own games, that really doesn't contradict what kind of games 4e actively serves. I could play a game using this motif that uses poker hands for task resolution and call it D&D if I wanted.

The concern/criticism is that 4e does not serve this kind of game by design. It seems fairly accurate to me. Yes, 4e assumes that you are already a weak hero and that you just become a stronger hero with time, rather than assuming you are "some random farmer" and that you become a hero with time. It didn't invent the idea, and I'm pretty sure EVERY edition of D&D has encouraged that line of thought. 4e just eliminates a lot of the "wiggle room" that 3e did have. 3e achieved that with NPC/PC transparency, for one, which 4e expressly disregards.

That's not bad, necessarily, but it seems pretty true regardless of what kind of game you are personally interested in playing.

 

[Cirex]

Conan the Cimmerian killed for first time at 12 (A Vanir Ranger) and was scoring with forest witches at 15. Shortly later he leaves his town and begins his adventuring career.

Ok so raise your hand, who is going to play a worthless farmer for your first PC?

Have you watched Uwe Boll's In the Name of the King, that Dungeon Siege tale? Now that's a farmer!

 

[drjones]

Have you watched Uwe Boll's In the Name of the King, that Dungeon Siege tale? Now that's a farmer!

I respect myself too much to do that.

 

[Cirex]

I respect Uwe Boll as an unintentional bad comedian.

 

[ruleslawyer]

The Conan thing could easily be handled by a Flashback mechanic. At an appropriate time, the Player narrates a Flashback to their youth to earn an Action Point or some other thingamabob. Limit it to once per session (or adventure) and you're good to go.

Besides, that scene in the movie didn't play a big role in the Conan opus. I'm not even sure if it's in the Howard stories. Maybe someone can clarify that to me. In the stories I've read, Conan is more than competent and fits more along the lines of a competent Thief/Fighter/Barbarian who grows more competent as the tale continues.

Yeah; the whole slave/gladiator thing isn't part of Howard's original stories at all; the screenwriters put it in so that they could fashion a more traditional revenge motif for the movie. The earliest moment in Conan's "career" that's referred to in the stories is his participation (at the age of 15!) in the sack of Venarium. He's clearly already tough enough to be part of a badass barbarian horde by then. In Conan's first actual story appearance (chronologically), he's tough enough to kill a lion and a giant spider... pretty much impossible for a 1st level 1-3e PC.

 

[I'm A Banana]

In Conan's first actual story appearance (chronologically), he's tough enough to kill a lion and a giant spider... pretty much impossible for a 1st level 1-3e PC.

Yeah, that's more like level 3-5 stuff.

Definately competent at the beginning, though. He's not "some mook" at first and grows into a hero. So he's not a very good example of the trope that is looking to be tapped, here.

 

[Jive Professor]

If I want to run coming-of-age type gaming I run WFRP. The PCs wallow around in the muck, speak poorly imitated cockney accents, and loot corpses at every turn (and if there aren't any corpses to loot, they make some). If the PCs don't "come of age" then, well, they're probably orc-meat or getting slaanesh raped in a ditch somewhere.

I'm ready for 4e to deliver some high fantasy.

 

[smathis]

Yeah; the whole slave/gladiator thing isn't part of Howard's original stories at all; the screenwriters put it in so that they could fashion a more traditional revenge motif for the movie. The earliest moment in Conan's "career" that's referred to in the stories is his participation (at the age of 15!) in the sack of Venarium. He's clearly already tough enough to be part of a badass barbarian horde by then. In Conan's first actual story appearance (chronologically), he's tough enough to kill a lion and a giant spider... pretty much impossible for a 1st level 1-3e PC.

Thanks for clearing that up. I've read a whole bunch of REH's stuff but wasn't sure if I'd missed something along the way.

Your comments about Conan's participation in the sack of Venarium kind of illustrates a side point I've been pinging.

Why can't this zero-to-hero thing be handled by some sort of Flashback mechanic?

It just seems more interesting to me to have a player who's character is a hero but then one night by the campfire tells the group about a raid he participated in when he was 15 or narrates a flashback to watching his sister being dragged to Scalegloom Hall to be sacrificed to a Black Dragon.

It's more scalable than a backstory campaign, doesn't force the party to be inseparable buds all their lives and helps cement why the PCs are where they are and why things are important to them.

It also gives those Background Novelists something to play with, yet doesn't force the Lone Soldiers of the Apocalypse to give even a second thought to how their Swordmaster got his two dragon katanae or even what katanae are doing in a Medieval-themed world...

This happens all the time in fantasy novels and stories. And many times I would propose that what we're mistaking for a bildungsroman tale is actually just a little vignette. Like with Aragorn. We don't follow him from his humble beginnings.

He just shows up and we learn more about him as we go.
.