D&D 4E 4e players, why do you want 5e?

[Neonchameleon]

I still think 4e is better in most ways than previous editions I've played, but it's not a question of 5e vs previous D&D editions because I have little desire to play any of them any more; it's 5e vs all the other systems that I've been enjoying lately.

Agreed. I consider 4e the least clunky D&D. But D&D is pretty clunky in all forms.

*remove "skill gaps" with actions not covered by any available skill (sailing? devising battle plans? crafting?)

Hi there GURPS I'm afraid is my reaction. Although I do replace dungeoneering with engineering and allow a +5 to any unknown skill for the "Tell me why you have it as part of your background".

*incentive for combat/situational improvisation and good role-playing

p42 for combat improvising if the DM is on board. Good roleplaying - action point aspect mechanics?

*rules for high-level, game-shifting rules (armies, ruling kingdoms/religions/cabals, etc)

WANT

I'd like to see the following go away:

*rest-to-full hp

I ... want to keep that. I want a paragraph in the PHB and page in the DMG saying that the default time for an extended rest is overnight but this is campaign dependent, and the DMG version having a discussion on using weekend, week, or even month long rests.

*magic items built into the math
*magic items so common they lose their magic
*gp as second xp track, required to balance game math

Inherent bonusses mostly fixed those. An actual 4.5 (rather than the two superb splatbooks and the best Monster Manual D&D has ever seen that make up Essentials) would IMO get rid of any static bonusses on items.

*feat-fixed math

And here I thought you got your free L1 feat for Expertise and your L11 for Improved Defences...

*thousands of worthless and/or boring feats and magic items contrasted to a handful of near-auto-picks

Agreed. It needs a winnowing and 5e style themes as well as 4e style.

*skill challenges

Emphatically and completely disagreed. Skill Challenges have their uses for handling insane PC plans (or just PC plans in general). They are pacing, difficulty, and experience guidance.

 

[zoroaster100]

I have read through the Playtest packet, and as someone who likes 4e a lot, I am not at all happy to see D&D going back to what looked a lot like 2e to me. I loved the ease of DMing 4e, and will not go back to the challenges of tracking spell durations, tracking spell slots, worrying about classes not balanced in combat with each other, etc.

Since it looks like 5e is going in a direction that is not for me, I can only hope WOTC continues to provide the 4e tools through D&D Insider, like the character builder, etc. or I may have to quit DMing and playing D&D.

 

[Iron Sky]

Hi there GURPS I'm afraid is my reaction.

*Shudder* With the way the seem to be going right now (skilled = +3 in a skill) it seems like it would be pretty easy to add in your own skills: "Sailing +3"

p42 for combat improvising if the DM is on board. Good roleplaying - action point aspect mechanics?

More than any other RPG I've seen, 4e players tend to get "sheet obsession" - I.E. the DM says "what do you do" and the first thing they do is look at their sheet. Having it more blatant than an (admittedly useful) page in the DMG would be good (which again the current playtest rules do well with the "improvised action" listed right in the "what can I do with an action" section).

I ... want to keep that. I want a paragraph in the PHB and page in the DMG saying that the default time for an extended rest is overnight but this is campaign dependent, and the DMG version having a discussion on using weekend, week, or even month long rests.

The majority of groups I know of and have played with use the default rules whenever possible, especially on their first campaign.

I think getting all your HD back after a rest but not your hp is perfect as then you still need some healing applied and HD expended to regain hp and are expending resources rather than getting a magical "full reset".

Inherent bonusses mostly fixed those. An actual 4.5 (rather than the two superb splatbooks and the best Monster Manual D&D has ever seen that make up Essentials) would IMO get rid of any static bonusses on items.

And here I thought you got your free L1 feat for Expertise and your L11 for Improved Defences...

Again, I'm talking about default rules, not houserules. There are some known kludges for the issues, but I'd rather have them not needed at all. With the new flat math, having +1/2/3 items wouldn't actually be a bad thing IMHO as the +x actually means something again vs 3.x/4e where they're just another little piece in your +7/17/27/whatever to-hit calculation.

Emphatically and completely disagreed. Skill Challenges have their uses for handling insane PC plans (or just PC plans in general). They are pacing, difficulty, and experience guidance.

At first I loved them - especially Stalker0's modified version and the version I made to modify his. Eventually though, in all my experiences of them, they fell prey to the same "what do you do? *looks at sheet*" mentality where PCs just looked at their best 2/3 skills (at Paragon often being 2-4 times better than their bad skills) and figured out some way to work those in or just pretty-much auto-failed one of their other skills.

I'd rather have PC plans be handled in a more freeform manner and adjudicate them organically as they go rather than saying "that was an awesome plan AND you critted your roll, sweet... uh, you need 3 more successes".

 

[pemerton]

More than any other RPG I've seen, 4e players tend to get "sheet obsession"

<snip>

in all my experiences of them, they fell prey to the same "what do you do? *looks at sheet*" mentality where PCs just looked at their best 2/3 skills (at Paragon often being 2-4 times better than their bad skills) and figured out some way to work those in or just pretty-much auto-failed one of their other skills.

My own view is that players who want to win will look to the resources they have available. If their sheets don't tell them anything, they might look to the GM instead. (At its worst, this becomes "Mother may I?")

If you want players to engage the fiction without worrying about the resources they have to hand, you have to make winning matter less. There are RPGs around that show how this can be done. On my reading of the playtest materials, though, D&Dnext is not one of them.

 

[Neonchameleon]

More than any other RPG I've seen, 4e players tend to get "sheet obsession" - I.E. the DM says "what do you do" and the first thing they do is look at their sheet.

I'd have said that more so than msot other games, D&D players tend to get sheet obsession. "How do you solve this problem?" *Wizard starts reading down his page long spell list* I've never seen GURPS character sheets that were as long as 3.X ones used to get. 4e players get sheet obession in combat.

The majority of groups I know of and have played with use the default rules whenever possible, especially on their first campaign.

And certain ones (Inherent Bonusses) should have been default.

For that matter I think that 4e is in need of a 4.5 and has almost come to the end of its possible material anyway. (No, Essentials isn't 4.5, and yes 3.5 was an entire new edition - when you've changed the shape of a horse you're way into new edition territory, whereas Essentials is a glorified splat book).

One of the things 4.5 could do would be to strip the plusses from all the items. Inherent bonusses only. No +1 every two levels (merely a +1 to hit and NADs about every three as you roll up the expertise feats and inherent bonusses). Monsters get +1 every two levels to their attacks and defences...

And fundamentally the problem isn't that 4e items are uninteresting. It's that people see the tables and multiple levels and their eyes glaze over. Properties and effects mean much more than simple plusses (although a small plus as something really exceptional is itself interesting).

I'd rather have PC plans be handled in a more freeform manner and adjudicate them organically as they go rather than saying "that was an awesome plan AND you critted your roll, sweet... uh, you need 3 more successes".

To me that appears to be where you're going wrong. I have literally never told my PCs they are in a skill challenge or how many successes they need or even how many they have. I'm sure certain of my players can and do work it out.

 

[Mattachine]

If you want players to engage the fiction without worrying about the resources they have to hand, you have to make winning matter less.

Well said.

As a 4e player, I want a game with the streamlined rules of 4e (particularly DM stuff), but overall simpler, with some more improv thrown in.

This early in the playtest, I don't know if that's the way the game is going.

We still have about a year to go.

 

[Zaukrie]

Why not? I pretty much play the newest version when it comes out. I am just not so hung up on the precise rules like so many of you are.

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