D&D 3E/3.5 4E vs 3E... what are the main changes?

[Anguirus]

the major thing that i like about 3e was that options were basically limitless and no matter what class you were you could do well with enough smarts

3E has billions of options. 99.9% of them suck. As in, "you are a danger to yourself and your party" mind-blowingly, awfully, uselessly bad.

As for the remaining .1%, 90% of that merely sucks. As in, "I'm a 20th level fighter, my friend is a wizard, so I was obsolete 10 levels ago. At least I don't have a cleric friend, so I wasn't obsolete 15 levels ago."

Now, 4E may have only thousands of options. But all of them are at least decent options. Foolish "traps" such as 3E Toughness, idiotic game-breaking legacy spells, and entire classes made redundant by the spellcasting system that a few of them got to play with? They're all gone. Now you can make a character concept that isn't useless without online research. If you want to make, say, an elf rogue multiclassed to infernal warlock, the optimizers may laugh at you, but you're not destroying your party. No more do I have to teach first time players to take X levels of scout and X levels of ranger plus plan out all their feats and spells so they keep up with the veteran players...I just say "You want to wield a bow? Then make a ranger. All the powers are good, take the ones you like, ask me if you have any questions."

In addition, the depth of 3E multiclassing has now given way to vastly more options within the same class. I could literally make Fighters all day.

 

[Zandel]

Just signed on to check responses to my latest post but it's not here....

had a good one too but can't remember it all now...


ok by enough smarts i meant more along the lines of thinking outside the box.... not PrCs or other non core rules.


Not a troll.... i'm not here to start a flame war i'm interested. It sounded to me like they were trying to turn it into a MMORPG type system with your Tank, DPS, Heals and Utility classes. (Defenders, strikers, leaders and controllers)

tho after some other responses that does not seem to be the case. I will have a look into this but wanted to get the opinion of those who have used the new system first... best way to find out about any major changes / issues.

 

[Anguirus]

ok by enough smarts i meant more along the lines of thinking outside the box.... not PrCs or other non core rules.

4E has actually made an attempt to codify the "outside the box" stuff in the DMG. There are some general guidelines for when you want to reward a PC for an awesome idea that isn't explicitly covered by a power or feat. 4E also has a vastly expended emphasis on terrain, so with these two rules combined I see a lot more cool suff like jumping between ships at sea, hurling oneself off a balcony in order to cut off an enemy on a staircase, shoving the enemy into his own hell-portal...

As for big sweeping espionage, political, or tracking storylines...just because the skill system is simplified a bit doesn't mean these aren't as feasible as they ever were. The skill challenge system...though it is buggy...is a useful new tool to handle stuff like this. Rituals are great for information gathering, summoning extraplanar beings to chat with, communing with your god, and other cool stuff. And roleplaying hasn't gone anywhere...at least not in my groups.

 

[Mistwell]

Just signed on to check responses to my latest post but it's not here....

had a good one too but can't remember it all now...


ok by enough smarts i meant more along the lines of thinking outside the box.... not PrCs or other non core rules.


Not a troll.... i'm not here to start a flame war i'm interested. It sounded to me like they were trying to turn it into a MMORPG type system with your Tank, DPS, Heals and Utility classes. (Defenders, strikers, leaders and controllers)

tho after some other responses that does not seem to be the case. I will have a look into this but wanted to get the opinion of those who have used the new system first... best way to find out about any major changes / issues.

I agree that the best way to get a feel for 4e is to play it a few times. Just don't go in with assumptions. Accept it for what it is, which is a brand new game and not a simplification of an old game, and that will give you a better experience.

 

[Primal]

The man can disagree if he wants. It's not a crime to think that it's stupid.

In any case, 4th edition is simply a completely different game compared to the third edition. But to give you some comparison:

Some things are better. Probably the best improvement is that the game is a LOT easier for the DM. Preparation time for example is a lot less then in former editions and customizing monsters is easier.

The mechanics are simpler and more visible. People can retrain feats, powers etc every level (only one per level) which means you can take a feat to try it out and if it goes wrong, you can change it next level.

Combat involves more movement then before.

Some things are worse. The game seems less "realistic" and seems to require a greater suspense of disbelief. I can't put my finger on it but something's missing. It feels more like a game rather then something "real" But that is simply my opinion.

4th Edition is better if you believe you spend too much time preparing for the games, if you want classes to be more balanced or perhaps you'll simply like the more tactics orientated combat. Also because of the emphasis on balance combat is as balanced at level 5 as it is at level 25.

Third edition might suit you better (might) if you think you don't spend too much time as a DM balancing the encounters. If you like your classes to be more unique compared to eachother and didn't mind any inbalance. Or if you're simply still having lots of fun with it.

Here I have to disagree. After reading the rules I was left with the impression that the emphasized tactical nature of the rules requires *MORE* work from the DM, if he's going to write his adventures "by the book". Just take a look at the Skill Challenges or Traps -- all examples I've seen of them in written form take up a page or two! That's a lot of pre-play work, if you use them extensively. And although the monster stat blocks are easier to come up with, it's monster powers that got me really confused -- how many powers/special qualities should monsters have? Which number should each power "recharge" at on a D6? And so on. Apparently, the only official rule/advice is to "goggle it up in MM", which actually takes time -- I'm sure that all is very clear to the designers and playtesters, but even to a veteran DM of all the editions, it feels intimidating. Wasn't this the game that was billed as more "DM/Newbie-friendly" than ever before?

Yet I'm not saying that 4E is inferior to 3E, or "not D&D". It's just that I wouldn't DM this edition, because I would have to learn to be much more tactically-inclined and do much more work than ever before. I'm sure that in time it all would become crystal-clear, and I could run encounters without figuring out the synergies behind different roles, abilities, hazards and traps in every encounter. To be frank, PF Beta/RPG suits my style and preferences a lot better.

I have a friend who belongs to our WFRP/Ars Magica group (I game in a number of groups, actually) who participates in a 4E campaign. Now, this group consists of long-time D&D veterans, yet apparently they're role-playing a lot less in 4E than ever before. He said that everybody feels that the rules (e.g. quite a lot of the powers) emphasize and encourage suspension of disbelief and combat so much, that it's like playing a boardgame ("I'll use Hammer Shot on the Golem, and shift him here."). Of course, this is his opinion, and *NOT* a fact, but I think that if you're not into "proto-magical" martial powers and tactical thinking, 4E may not be an ideal game for you.

Yet try it to see if it suits you and your group -- at least take a look at the books (maybe someone you know owns them, or you could take a peek at your FLGS).

 

[Gruns]

Not here.

Here I have to disagree. After reading the rules I was left with the impression that the emphasized tactical nature of the rules requires *MORE* work from the DM, if he's going to write his adventures "by the book".

No, no, no...
As someone who has DM'd pretty much exclusively since 2E, I can say with conviction that 4E is by far the easiest edition to prepare and write adventures for. This is exponentially more true for newer DMs. In previous editions, I had enough experience to know what was a decent encounter for my PCs. I instinctively knew just how many of Monster X I should include to make the fight challenging without making it too hard. In 4E, the system for creating encounters removes the need for guesswork or prior knowledge. So far, (we're only up to level 8) there have been no real surprises.

As for answering to the OPs original question: A lot.
The changes from 2E to 3E were pretty substantial.
The changes from 3E to 4E a lot moreso.

Later!
Gruns

 

[SabreCat]

Yeah, I'll add to the folks saying DM prep is smooth and simple in 4e. I attempted to DM in 3.5 a few times and found it a massive headache, what with CR and XP calculations, monster spell selections, etc. etc. 4e, on the other hand, has me eager to build entire modules and campaigns, because any given monster group only takes a few minutes to construct. That frees you up to spend most of your encounter planning time doing things like drawing maps and dreaming up interesting terrain and complications.

There are a few things that are a little tricky, like inventing new monster special abilities, as pointed out. But there's so much doable out of the box that it doesn't slow you down much. And skill challenges? They might be page-length blocks in a book, but for your own purposes it's more like three sentences, such that you can even improvise them from scratch if your party starts attempting something grand and complicated.

 

[Fieari]

In my experience, the biggest difference between 3e and 4e is this:

In 3e, the most fun, and the most options, were before the game began. Allocating your equipment and classes and powers and abilities and feats were the real game. The encounters were a test to see how well you'd done.

In 4e, the most fun, and the most options, are during the game. You have fewer choices before the game starts, but during the game? You can hand the same character to two different people, and those two people can play that character differently. The battles will go differently. The TACTICS matter, and they matter for more than the strategy (character building) of 3e.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Here I have to disagree. After reading the rules I was left with the impression that the emphasized tactical nature of the rules requires *MORE* work from the DM, if he's going to write his adventures "by the book".

Well, you're wrong.

Not being snarky, I just did both extensively now and prepping for 4e is considerably faster, period. Fights themselves are somewhat faster. Not to as great an extent as the prepping, but still noticeable so (though you need to get used to it first).

 

[Primal]

No, no, no...
As someone who has DM'd pretty much exclusively since 2E, I can say with conviction that 4E is by far the easiest edition to prepare and write adventures for. This is exponentially more true for newer DMs. In previous editions, I had enough experience to know what was a decent encounter for my PCs. I instinctively knew just how many of Monster X I should include to make the fight challenging without making it too hard. In 4E, the system for creating encounters removes the need for guesswork or prior knowledge. So far, (we're only up to level 8) there have been no real surprises.

As for answering to the OPs original question: A lot.
The changes from 2E to 3E were pretty substantial.
The changes from 3E to 4E a lot moreso.

Later!
Gruns

Oh, I'm not saying that the system wouldn't give you tools to build "balanced" encounters with the exact number of X level brutes and X level skirmishers and so on. What I'm saying is that the tactical emphasis on monster ability and trap/hazard "synergies" makes my head hurt. And, the trap/hazard system plus complicated skill challenge write-ups consume a page each (at least). Of course, if you don't run the game "by the book" and don't care if everything is written down, it may be easier. Then again, you could do that it 3E, too ("Okay, the DC for this trap might be 22, and the golem maybe should have AC 20 and three attacks at +16").

Even though I say skill challenges are "complicated" to build (if you include all the skills and at which point they become "relevant" to use), it's one of my favorite mechanics in 4E. I hope PF would adapt a "subsystem" like that, but it may not be "backwards compatible" enough.