4th Edition and the Immortals Handbook

[Upper_Krust]

Hiya cperkins!

I'm not as angry as Dante BUT think that 4.0 is moving the game into the World of Warcraft realm and moving away from D&D's roots (purposely).

I think mechanically thats a wise decision though. According to what I have read, World of Warcraft pulls away Power Gamers most of all. So I think restructuring things to better appeal to power gamers (while not alienating other gamers) is a good thing.

The 30-level advancement,

A step in the right direction as far as I am concerned.

move away from Greyhawk as being the core world,

Was it ever the core world in anything but name? PersonallY I like the idea of moving away from Greyhawk as the core world because I think we will no wsee a Greyhawk Campaign Worldbook...I'd love Gary Gygax to be involved in some capacity.

the Mortal Combat-esque character abilities,

To make all classes relevant at all levels. Again, another step in the right direction.

This is pretty much what I have tried to do with the Immortals Handbook anyway.

and the heavy reliance on online content (which must be subscribed to at $10/month)

I don't think thats a major amount of money. I mean if you were buying Dragon and Dungeon magazine each month it was $16 or something like that.

are WotC spitting in the eye of D&D's roots and D&D's core fans.

I don't think so, I just believe they are changing with the times.

I will definitely be sticking with 3.5 (and am encouraging my gaming group to do the same) and Castles & Crusades (MY D&D game of choice at this point).

That tells a story in its own right. You are condeming 4th Edition, yet point in fact you play Castles & Crusades rather than 3/3.5!

I know many others opt for the simpler C&C rules so I empathise with you on that. But it 4E is simpler, yet still has depth I'm interested in it.

To get back on-topic, I'd be more interested in you made the Immortal's Handbook for 3.5 and/or C&C than for 4.0.

I am making it for 3.5. As for C&C, I have contemplated IH rules for C&C under the moniker of "Godlight", based on some IH 1st Edition rules.

 

[WarDragon]

Regarding extensions; I don't think that will be possible, without deviating even more radically from 4E than the current stuff does from 3E. What I've seen indicates that level 30 will be an absolute, hard cap, that no PC can ever bypass in any fashion. Which really, really sucks, but fits perfectly WotC's statements regarding Epic in the past couple of years.

 

[Pssthpok]

Hiya mate!

Hey hey!

How about this idea, instead of Class extensions after 30th (although I could have those too...?), we have 30-level Portfolio 'Classes' for immortals. Then for sidereals we have 30(?)-level Dimensional 'Classes'.

So you might have a 30th-level Fighter/30th-level War Portfolio/30th-level 'Matter' Mastery, or 30th-level Wizard/30th-level Magic Portfolio/30th-level 'Thought' Mastery etc.

Oh, you know what? I think that's just about sweet. I mean, right now the divine templates are pretty much that: quasi-deity is a 20th-level template, etc.

 

[GQuail]

I know, I know, its just been a mess with circumstance upon circumstance getting in the way. All I can guarantee is that I won't make the same mistake again. In my defense, obviously it doesn't help me in any way, shape or form to have taken this long, so I hope you can take my word for it that the delays certainly haven't been done on purpose.

Without rehashing old ground: yes, I understand that it's not in your interests to be late, and I don't think you're doing it out of spite. I also appreciate that various other things kept getting in the way, and that 4E might well be the next of those. It's easy to, as the Americans say, "armchair quarterback", so I don't think there's much I can add at this stage that I, Pssthpok and others haven't already said.

Still, the biggest casualty of all this is enthusiasm for your product: after the Bestiary came out I was super-pumped about your products and was checking your website and this board all thet ime, whereas only in the past few days have I started doing that regularly again: in fact, I've only this week printed out the current edition of Ascension. I can't really get that pumped about your next release when I don't know when it'll be, what'll be in it, if it'll be for the rules I'll be using at that point and whether I will be able to use it as is or if I'll need any more of your books to get the "full experience" - and to be blunt, I would be surprised if I'm the only person who feels that way.

Even after that I plan to keep releasing 3rd (3.5) Edition material. I am just curious about the feasibility of releasing both 3.5E and 4E versions of the same products. Personally I don't see a problem with doing monster books like that, since the only difference would be the actual stat block itself. As regards other books, who can say until we have seen more of their system.

Yeah, a lot of this is ultimately pointless talk at the moment, since we have no idea what's coming: still, I would repeat that I'd rather see an Immortals Handbook product released, full stop, than worry about what rules edition it was for. And "the only difference would be the actual stat block itself" doesn't fill me with confidence considering the size of the stat blocks... ;-)

How about this idea, instead of Class extensions after 30th (although I could have those too...?), we have 30-level Portfolio 'Classes' for immortals. Then for sidereals we have 30(?)-level Dimensional 'Classes'.

So you might have a 30th-level Fighter/30th-level War Portfolio/30th-level 'Matter' Mastery, or 30th-level Wizard/30th-level Magic Portfolio/30th-level 'Thought' Mastery etc.

I agree with Pssthpok: this is a very interesting idea. Doing it as a class rather than a template allows for more traditional, level-based D&D growth: possibly tying into Worship points in the same way the old Immortals Box set essentially eschewed XP for a whole new point system.

 

[Matrix Sorcica]

RANT!

Did WotC kill both your puppies?

 

[Xzoltar]

I will fully embrace the 4th edition as I switch from 2nd to 3rd. Of course even now I sometime miss 2nd edition and even part of 1st edition, but it get improved and there'S more good stuff in new editions than what they forget was nice in last editions.

Like people did when 3rd came out, everyone said they wont buy any 4th edition book, but most have made the switch (even if I know some still play 2nd, my friend decide to buy 300$ worth of D&D3 books and then yesterday I told him of the 4th edition, he start to cry...)

As for the Immortal Handbook, you have the choice of staying with 3rd edition, but overall most will change to 4th and you will thenhave less and less people interested in your stuff. You can't make both edition stuf as 4th edition will be a lot different than 3rd and not compatible together. At the time it take you to finish a product you better choose now if you stay 3rd or 4th, Just the 2 books you have made so far, will require you to do lot of change to became 4th. But if you move to 4th you need to update those, so it will delay other products even more. So it may be a good thing to stay with 3rd for you. You have near a year until next edition and probably one more until people really start to use it and forget about 3rd. So in 2 year you should have the time to make another book and start thinking about updating to 4th.

Its bad because as UK is alone in his projects, things are really really slow. He really need to have contributors as Dicefreaks do. They have members on their forum like here and they also have members that are allowed to work on their "Official Rules" and im sure everyone agree with that Dicefreaks is probably the best company out there. They make flavor and crunch work together and balance everything with the rest of their works. Even with that many contributors, its a long for a Dicefreaks project to be finished, but the quality is here, like with what UK done with Ascension, I really do like both of his books. And if we want to still have that quality UK provide us with, he need to still make only 1 or 2 book per year if working alone, or maybe 4 a year with contributors

So UK you decide what you do as its your company, but even if you stay with 3rd edition. I will still come here and make my own conversion of stuff I like. Do what please you more, if you really like the 4th edition when you will see it, then switch, dont care about others, if you like it, they will probably like it too as you probably like the stuff you make and we do like your stuff.

 

[Axolotl]

Well I would like to think I could come up with some cool 4E Immortals rules good enough that you would convert future WotC 30+ rules to my version rather than convert mine to theirs.

Of course I would do that but to attract more customers you need to use the offcial rules. You could bend them into a whole new shape but you still need to use them as a baselinf if you want the most customers possible.

If your going to continue with 3rd as well as 4th then thats good (I won't be converting to 4th personally though I may want to). However that will require more work making the project take even longer, the idea of having people help you is a good one.

Until 4th edition comes out I advise you put back Gods and Monsters and work on things that aren't rules specific (like how pantheons are structured, new monster ideas, epic organisations, adventure ideas and artwork).

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hiya mate!

Regarding extensions; I don't think that will be possible, without deviating even more radically from 4E than the current stuff does from 3E. What I've seen indicates that level 30 will be an absolute, hard cap, that no PC can ever bypass in any fashion. Which really, really sucks, but fits perfectly WotC's statements regarding Epic in the past couple of years.

...yeah but, I don't wear that cap.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey hey!

Howdy!

Oh, you know what? I think that's just about sweet. I mean, right now the divine templates are pretty much that: quasi-deity is a 20th-level template, etc.

I'll need to wait and see 4E's templates, but by solidifying divinity into a class structure (such as 30 levels of War Portfolio) there may be no need of a divinity template.

Instead what we can do is integrate the divinity template into the Portfolio 'Class' Levels.

Although still early days - just thinking out loud here.

 

[Axolotl]

...yeah but, I don't wear that cap.

And thats why I, at least, buy your products.