D&D 4E 4E Retroclone

[Jer]

Thinking about it a little more and looking through some old notes, it would be almost trivial to recreate the AEDU system under the OGL. With short rests and long rests a standard 5E mechanic, simply have always available abilities (cantrips/at-wills), short rest abilities (encounter), and long rest abilities (dailies). 5E already works that way. It's just "hidden".

YES! This is what my analysis has always led to too - which is why I keep noodling with trying to use the 5e SRD to produce a 4e retroclone but never really pull the trigger on it.

There's a lot of 4e mechanics in the 5e SRD, even the math is there just at a different scale. You have to put the grid back in to get the feel to work, but a lot of that is just translating feet back to grid measurements which folks often do with 5e anyway.

Looking at the PHB1 and the fighter, there are four at-wills. They're all [1]W + rider. The riders are: STR mod damage to second, adjacent target; damage on a miss; +2 to-hit; push the target 5ft.

Just rename those stunts (or something) and have them all always available when the fighter attacks. Maybe add in one or two other simple riders. +2 damage. Pull the target. Shift the target. These could literally be a list for the fighter to pick from with every attack. It solves the problem of the players who want simpler characters ("I just want to swing my sword") and the problem with players getting bored with their locked-in power selection.

I like this. I'm going to keep watching this thread and when I get some free time see if I can contribute anything I've got scratched out in my various notes.

 

[Jacob Lewis]

Looking at the PHB1 and the fighter, there are four at-wills. They're all [1]W + rider. The riders are: STR mod damage to second, adjacent target; damage on a miss; +2 to-hit; push the target 5ft.

Just rename those stunts (or something) and have them all always available when the fighter attacks. Maybe add in one or two other simple riders. +2 damage. Pull the target. Shift the target. These could literally be a list for the fighter to pick from with every attack. It solves the problem of the players who want simpler characters ("I just want to swing my sword") and the problem with players getting bored with their locked-in power selection.

You should look at the Essentials fighter classes (i.e. knight and slayer). They're already doing what you described by building them around the Basic Attack power.

 

[Jer]

There are many hurdles getting in the way of projects like this. One of the most common is the compulsion to retain a high level of backwards compatibility in order to keep previous materials relevant and useful. I get that it's easier to reuse existing content so you're not having to redesign a ton of material that already exists. But it also limits the need for new innovation and mechanics which could actually make the system work better.

I agree BUT I've also watched other 4e retroclones founder on this reef. I think the goal of getting a solid, minimal implementation of a 4e-like OGL ruleset done first as a skeleton to build on and then having the ability to tweak that would go a long way towards building up a community of 4e retro players, which can then extend the rules in various ways.

(It also doesn't help that the 4e framework was so open an obvious that the kinds of folks who like 4e are also the kinds of folks who like to tinker with 4e. Including myself. Which comes back to why having that minimalist skeleton to grow a community around is kind of important IMO).

Now imagine if they had the option to spend some of those surges to recharge one of their powers. Or if surges were required to use your strongest abilities. Players will need to make more tactical decisions regarding how they manage their resource as a group. Do they save their last surges to stay in the fight? Or expend them on a powerful attack which could be the difference between victory and defeat?

heh - I came to the same conclusion while we played 4e and was allowing them to use Healing Surges as resources for things like ritual spells. The Healing Surge resource was never as exploited as it could have been in 4e IMO.

 

[Jer]

You should look at the Essentials fighter classes (i.e. knight and slayer). They're already doing what you described by building them around the Basic Attack power.

The mechanics in the core books are more obvious so they might be a bit easier to build a framework around. Essentials is where they really start trying to hide the mechanics more as they realized that the majority of people didn't want the mechanics to be so exposed, but it's still probably a good place to look when trying to figure out how to work backwards from 5e into 4e...

 

[Jer]

Thinking on this further - over my lunch - it might be a good idea to limit the scope initially to the core game rules and levels 1-10 for a core set of classes. Limiting the scope makes things more likely to succeed and also limits places where the desire to tinker might become overwhelming (like the math around higher level play). Once the core is there going back to extend the levels out would be easier.

(As an aside I actually think they misstepped by not including more classes/races in the PHB1 and limiting the game to level 20 - as an old BECMI player I like the idea of 30 levels of play, but leaving out some favorite classes and races and making people by the PHB2 to get them also didn't do a lot to win people over to the new edition. They could have playtested the higher levels more and released an Epic supplement later).

 

[DrRazr]

I've often tried re-imagining the game in a way that still allows me to use the old MM's. The trouble with 4e is it is highly balanced and to start changing things would mess with that balance.

 

[Emryys]

There is a 4E retro-clone that is fairly faithful and developed that's OGL... Orcus
Perhaps most of the heavy lifting is done...

 

[Sanglorian]

There is a 4E retro-clone that is fairly faithful and developed that's OGL... Orcus
Perhaps most of the heavy lifting is done...

Thanks for the shout-out, Emryys!

It sounds like Orcus is perfect for the use-case described in this thread: the 4E chassis, which can be either played straight or used as a basis for a 4E-inspired game.

It already has examples of what @Jacob Lewis described up-thread, of healing surges (called recoveries) as a player resource for more than healing. Although I can't take credit for those -- they're just lifted from the Open Game Content in Ultramodern4.

--

I've recently been thinking about what @overgeeked described in the OP -- adding riders to attacks. You inspired me to polish off a document I worked on over the Christmas break -- Sublime classes. These classes get bonus damage dice, which they can alternatively trade in for a variety of effects depending on what stance they're in.

This is the debut of the sublime classes -- so would be very interested in any feedback you had!

 

[overgeeked]

That's awesome. Good job. Best of luck with it going forward.

 

[overgeeked]

Looking at my write up for fighter at-will stunts, I have to admit that Goodman Games did it first and did it way better with Dungeon Crawl Classics and Might Deeds.

Now to apply that to everyone’s at-wills.