D&D 4E 4e - Too much change?

[ZombieRoboNinja]

You know how you can't see a D&D discussion on the internet without a whole bunch of people talking about how much better 1e or 2e was? I expect the same phenomenon to persist when 4e rolls around. Some people will continue to complain about the halcyon days of their youth when 3.5 was the Best System Ever, while the rest of us will roll our eyes the way we do now when somebody tries to convince us that THAC0 was really a better way of calculating hit chance.

 

[Henry]

Look at the change from core OD&D in 1974 to the 1e PHB 4 years later. Elves, dwarves and hobbits became races instead of classes.

Minor nitpick - those were races in 1974, too - the whole "race as class" thing didn't come until Basic D&D in 1981. Otherwise, all the other stuff is dead on.

If 4e isn't D&D, then 1e wasn't D&D times four, because it was twice the amount of change in half the time.

However, from 1974 to 1978, all of those were just add-ons to the existing system; spells still worked the same, AC and to hit was same, etc. Now, we're dealing with a LOT of different subsystems, some just tweaked from previous (defenses instead of AC and saves), and some are radically different (the spells, powers for classes, per encounter focus, etc). I can completely understand the apprehension out there - I've got some of it myself.

 

[Reynard]

You know how you can't see a D&D discussion on the internet without a whole bunch of people talking about how much better 1e or 2e was? I expect the same phenomenon to persist when 4e rolls around. Some people will continue to complain about the halcyon days of their youth when 3.5 was the Best System Ever, while the rest of us will roll our eyes the way we do now when somebody tries to convince us that THAC0 was really a better way of calculating hit chance.

Probably true. But I also expect that when 5E is announced, there'll be the same eye-rolingly-tiresome devotion to whatever shiny new version of D&D is on the horizon, regardless of how much love was granted the old version by the individual when it was new.

 

[Henry]

You know how you can't see a D&D discussion on the internet without a whole bunch of people talking about how much better 1e or 2e was? I expect the same phenomenon to persist when 4e rolls around. Some people will continue to complain about the halcyon days of their youth when 3.5 was the Best System Ever, while the rest of us will roll our eyes the way we do now when somebody tries to convince us that THAC0 was really a better way of calculating hit chance.

Oh, I can TOTALLY sympathize with the 1E and 2E players in 1999 and 2000 bemoaning the radical alteration of the game they love. I'm seeing a lot of the same arguments now as back then.

 

[WyzardWhately]

The complaints about the Wizard being narrowed into an artillery-piece are exactly what I've been concerned about the whole time. Playing spellcasters is sort of my niche, and the reason I enjoy it is the flexibility. If that goes away, the game has become sharply less fun for me in one fell swoop.

 

[A'koss]

For a while I thought this, but after hearing the wizard change, ... no. This, IMO, is the final nail in the coffin. The wizard is no longer a generalist but a video game character.

A couple of things to keep in mind... One, we certainly don't have the whole picture yet and two, the Races & Classes book was written some months ago and there will certainly have been some changes since then. If you've followed some of the WotC blogs, they've touched upon this some already...

""Every class gets cool "non-attack" power choices as well as attack power choices. Wizards will still be able to cast spells such as Disguise Self, Jump, or Levitate. It's true that we'd like to "narrow" wizards a bit, and save (for example) some illusion spells for an honest-to-gosh Illusionist class down the road, or necromancy spells for a Necromancer. But wizards will still "splash" at least a few of the iconic powers in these themes of magic. For example, wizards still have Invisibility available to them. But when the Illusionist class comes around, he'll have better Invisibility options."

I remember a blog from not-so-long ago that specifically talked about them adding back some more utility spells into the Wizard's list.

 

[DaveMage]

4E - Too much change?

Answer: yes. (For me)

 

[dmccoy1693]

I Officially Dub Fourth Edition Dungeons and Dragons as Gauntlet Edition​

Comments?

 

[Roland55]

i think the news we are getting, like the news we got back with 3e, is too disjointed and out-of-context for me to make a judgement about whether or not it will be good.

That is something we need ot remember - back with the 3e release, there were people saying pretty much the same thing - that there were too many changes for it to be D&D - who came to love the new game.

Which is not to say you will love 4e. It merely suggests that making final judgments before you can see the entire set of rules is perhaps not the most wise course. There is no need to decide now whether you'll like the new game, so why do so without complete information.

I still think that this is the best course.

True, looked at individually and in isolation, there do seem to be a lot of major changes. Despite the well-meaning efforts of folks who try to help us see the changes as somehow 'smaller' or 'less' than those made in previous editions, there isn't enough solid information to make such an argument persuasive. Clearly, a great deal of nerfing, balancing, and 'jiggling' are going on all at once behind the scenes.

Let's give them time. Try to keep a cool head and don't make heated vows you might want to take back later. We're still like the blind men touching the elephant...

That said, I'm sorry to see that all my old Wizards are about to become dinosaurs (along with me). They just won't fit into 4E.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

I Officially Dub Fourth Edition Dungeons and Dragons as Gauntlet Edition​

Comments?

Too video-gamey.