4th Edition and the Immortals Handbook

[WarDragon]

This is one that I don't think is a good thing. The level of transparency between PCs and NPCs in 3E was a great stride forward, in my opinion. It allowed you to take PCs modifications (such as class levels) and easily add them to NPCs. Likewise, it let you easily run NPCs as PCs; playing "monsters as player-characters" was much much easier in 3E than in, say 2E.

I'm going to miss the level of detail that was given to us in that regard.

Indeed; now, if you want to make a minotaur barbarian, or mind-flayer wizard, it looks like you'll have to rebuild the minotaur or mind flayer from scratch. :\

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey WarDragon matey!

Wow, that's a lot of hyperbole in that post, U_K.

Just making sure everything is crystal clear before people start popping off with "idiot" or "fascist" labels.

No such thing. Only that 4E is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

By what...not using the Great Wheel!? Hardly the cornerstone of D&D.

I, and many of the people I've spoken to, like the Great Wheel, and how it creates a unified setting. I'll bet you a lot of the people who do buy 4E will keep it, regardless, rather than throwing out 30 years of history.

Okay, so then whats your problem? People who like the Great Wheel can still use it because the material in your 3E Manual of the Planes is still relevant, just not the stats bit.

Personally I don't want to see another Manual of the Planes retelling and regurgitating the same material as before with different stats. Hence the reason I welcome something new.

So, less ways to enhance our characters.

No, they are just trying to reduce the magic items arms race that totally dominates high-level play and does so purely derived from boring maths based magic items (Cloak of Ressistance).

Its also a way to try and get characters to THINK about what items to use tactically rather than just add more and more items (or buff spells) to overcome problems.

I don't see this as a bad thing.

Which bit, the problem or the solution?

You say simplifying, I say dumbing down. Using the same mechanics to create monsters and PCs was one of the great strides forward that 3E made, and I'm disappointed to see this regression.

Even though the vast majority of monster races used as PCs actually meant nothing more than a few points here and there to ability scores.

Personally I'd ratyher see something more substantial to differentiate playing a goblin to playing an orc or playing an ogre. Put some imagination into it rather than well the orc has 2 points more strength than the hobgoblin.

So they claim. I'll believe it when I see it. And even if so, I'll be surprised if wizards still feel like wizards, and not ranged fighters with armor.

Wizards still feel like wizards...do you mean by virtue of being miles better than almost every other class at high level and totally dominating the game? Or do you mean by being next to useless at very low levels.

They already are.

Incorrect. If we stat up a 20th-level dwarf and a 20th-level Elf there would be virtually no mechanical difference due to race at all.

Not how I read it. As far as I can tell, a non-multiclassed PC, or unmodified monster, will be completely incapable of anything outside its preset role.

...and how is that any different from 3/3.5E, except that they are now telling us the roles as opposed to not telling us!?

Mmm, somebody else's words in my mouth, yum.

I have to keep second guessing you because up until now you had disclosed nothing but vitriol.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey dante dude!

Of those I definitely have to agree with this one in particular. PC vs. NPC? As far as I'm concerned the only difference between a PC and an NPC is which side you just so happen to be on. It is severe dumbing down to eliminate this factor and quite the regression indeed.

Despite the fact that in 3/3.5E the difference between PC and NPC is massively pronounced because of the wealth/equipment factor.

Dumbing something down in the name of "simplification" only complicates things down the road in a campaign when you begin to run out of OPTIONS. I prefer my NPCs to be just as threatening and as dangerous as PCs. I also prefer them to have just as many options.

NPCs will have as many options as PCs. More so than 3/3.5E because there will no longer be the need for arbitrary NPC wealth caps, since magic equipment will no longer be so overbearing to the system.

Furthermore, those simplified stat blocks are just another excuse for WOTC to NOT use their imaginations. Which is pure laziness from my perspective. Ambiguously talented Monsters simply makes for an ambiguously lame campaign session.

On the contrary, the previous stat blocks were needlessly overcomplicated, and at high-level were ridiculously complicated to the extent that even experienced DMs were forgetting abilities in mid-play.

Also the fact that so many monsters had the same powers and spell-like abilities really softened their identities. Thats where the real laziness of design came from, 3/3.5E.

Lets pick this apart...

Lets try you mean.

1. Less reliance on magic items? Sure, we could do with a few less.

Okay, so you concede the point, fair enough.

But there is no reason why DMs can't simple declare them to be a lot rarer.

Is there any reason why DMs cannot declare items more prevailant (except for the fact that it will only lead to undermining their system)?

I say if you find a magic item, you obviously earned it and should be able to use it. Who cares if by 50th level you have 20 magic items.

Its more a case of you having 20 magic items at 20th-level which means that all other PCs and NPCs need 20 magic items at that level just to keep up and stop you from automatically defeating them by virtue of the magic items arms race.

Then the difference between those 20 magic items comes into play because of the massive discrepancy (still) between min/maxing magic items and someone who doesn't min/max. SO the system not only forces magic items upon you, but forces you to min/max. to stay competitive.

Most of them will be worthless anyways. Nice keepsakes from your younger years as an adventurer.

Except for the fact that magic item creation rules and magic item shops easily allow for unused magic items to be converted into useful magic items.

2. I love those feats. They let you customize your character in a manner akin to the way some people customize their cars. If you don't like using a lot of feat, put them all into stackable feats like toughness. It's a lot easier to figure out where to spend them if you know what you already want. And if you don't...then wtf are you doing playing an Epic Level Character? Epic is for experienced gamers, not novices. It never was for novices. The D20 is always relevant when you are combating creatures in your own power tier. If you aren't combating creatures in your own power tier, you are either a bully or just begging to die.

Theres no reason why you couldn't still customise monsters with new feats or abilities. But there was no reason for them to be built in to monster stat blocks. If anything they only dilute the individual identity of the monster.

Its stupid design. Why the hell worry about the feats for the Tarrasque for instance when you can just hardwire what you want into the actual mechanics from the start. Instead of Toughness just give it more hit points, instead of weapon focus just give it a higher attack bonus and so forth.

3. Yeah, I covered this one above. Let's not rape the monsters and NPCs. They have enough problems without being turned into useless blocks of immalleable text.

We already have that, its called 3rd Edition.

4. Balanced? From who's perspective?

From the perspective of anyone familiar with the lack of balance in 3/3.5E.

And how can you say this, when none of us has seen these so called "balanced" classes.

You would almost have to go out of your way to unbalance the classes to get them as badly balanced as 3/3.5E.

And Interesting? Yet again...from who's perspective?

From the perpective of anyone thinking rationally.

Classes that gain some new unique power each level are more interesting than those who don't.

From what little I've seen the classes they have made are no more than Diablo/WOW remakes with different names and slightly different abilities all rearranged and resorted into different level slots.

Even though the Warlock and Marshal (aka Warlord) have appeared in 3.5E to some extent already, to you WotC simply ripped them right out of WoW. Utter rubbish.

I don't know about you, but I'd rather play the He-Man Masters of the Universe Boxed Set tabletop RPG than waste my time with poorly designed classes that have ability names that sound like they came out of a box of Magic cards.

Given that you have been playing 3/3.5E for some years now and it has horrendously designed and badly balanced classes tells me that you should go play the He-Man RPG.

5. Races are already relevant.

On the contrary, they are mechanically irrelevant.

Your race is supposed to be minor flavor text that you build your classes on top of.

No, thats what you THINK its supposed to be derived from past 'sacred cows'. But race could be so much more than that.

The point of D&D is to transcend racial limitations and become more than just a racial stereotype. Not some tired old race based board game where all elves are frivolous idiots and all dwarves are cranky heartless gold stealing jerks. The point of race is to say...this is where I started...not what I'm limited to.

So why make races interesting when we can make them boring...is that what you are saying?

 

[Upper_Krust]

Howdy Alzrius mate!

This is one that I don't think is a good thing. The level of transparency between PCs and NPCs in 3E was a great stride forward, in my opinion. It allowed you to take PCs modifications (such as class levels) and easily add them to NPCs. Likewise, it let you easily run NPCs as PCs; playing "monsters as player-characters" was much much easier in 3E than in, say 2E.

I'm going to miss the level of detail that was given to us in that regard.

Unfortunately its just too much work for not enough return.

It also went some way to diluting the identities of monsters and reducing many to simply a bunch of feats as opposed to something more unique.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Indeed; now, if you want to make a minotaur barbarian, or mind-flayer wizard, it looks like you'll have to rebuild the minotaur or mind flayer from scratch. :\

So about 30 seconds work then given that most monsters were basically ability score differences.

 

[dante58701]

We definitely have very different perspectives on RPGs. I prefer classic, you prefer...corporate.

 

[Alzrius]

Unfortunately its just too much work for not enough return.

That's a pretty subjective statement, though. The level of work that went into giving PC levels to NPCs (who weren't a core race) was less in 3E than it ever had been in the game's previous twenty-five year history, and likewise made the return (monstrous NPCs with class levels) that much easier to attain. The same could be said for monstrous PCs. 2E's The Complete Book of Humanoids was a much more complex affair than Savage Species.

I'll admit that a lot of players don't seem to care about monsters as PCs (but then, most don't seem to care for epic level gameplay much either), but having the option there was nice for those who did. I didn't like a lot about 3E's whole dynamic, but the credo of "options, not restrictions," was one that I never begrudged it, and 4E seems to be indicating that it's instead going to bring back restrictions for the sake of ease of playability. Honestly, I think that's a step backwards, since it's easier to have rules and mechanics that you can just ignore, rather than need them and not have them published.

And of course, I think this will be much more notable in regards to classed NPCs. There'll be at least one extra element of work involved now when you want to lay wizard levels on your mind flayer, because questions like "well, monsters don't get feats, but the wizard gets bonus feats after so many levels, so what do I do?" need to be answered (that's a general example, the wizard may not give bonus feats anymore, but it's indicative of how those things will come up).

It also went some way to diluting the identities of monsters and reducing many to simply a bunch of feats as opposed to something more unique.

I don't necessarily agree with this; people seem to remember the Tarrasque a lot more for its reflective carapace and regeneration than the fact that it has Awesome Blow and Blind-Fight.

You seem to be indicating that monsters (in 3E) suffer from something similar to the race problem; does it matter much that the monster is a mind flayer when it has 20 wizard levels? And to a degree I can sympathize with that - 3E could have done better in that regard (monster powers should, I think, scale with class levels; e.g. caster level for spell-like abilities increases, save DCs increase, etc.), but when enough levels are taken, any degree of static powers will eventually be overshadowed. I don't think the answer is to place roadblocks in the path of giving class levels to monsters.

No doubt 4E monsters will be scalable. There'll be templates, and there'll probably be rules on natural Hit Dice advancement. Maybe, there'll even be rules on adding class levels also (hopefully in a way that doesn't make their monstrous abilities obselete), but by making PCs and NPCs use fundamentally different rules, the crossover between the two will be more difficult, and take more work for the same results we're getting now.

 

[dante58701]

From the perpective of anyone thinking rationally.

Irrationally speaking about rationality while simultaneously not spelling perspective in a rational manner when Enworld comes equipped with a built in spellchecker? Simply legendary!

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hiya mate!

That's a pretty subjective statement, though. The level of work that went into giving PC levels to NPCs (who weren't a core race) was less in 3E than it ever had been in the game's previous twenty-five year history, and likewise made the return (monstrous NPCs with class levels) that much easier to attain. The same could be said for monstrous PCs. 2E's The Complete Book of Humanoids was a much more complex affair than Savage Species.

Yes but what they are trying to do is make each race mean some special beyond a +2 strength bonus (or whatever). Thats why they are taking more time and care over monstrous PC races than the incredibly bland approach favoured by 3/3.5.

I mean, okay so you had a gnoll PC, how was that different to a human PC in anything but looks. To be honest it pretty much wasn't any different except for a few ability score points added here and some subtracted there. The same could be said for 90% of the humanoid races.

I'll admit that a lot of players don't seem to care about monsters as PCs (but then, most don't seem to care for epic level gameplay much either), but having the option there was nice for those who did.

But you are still going to have the option in 4th Edition. SImply that choosing a different race is going to bring with it some interesting mechanics of its own to make them play different. The offshoot of that extra detail is that we will probably see less monstrous PC races detailed in the Monster Manual than say 3.5 did.

I didn't like a lot about 3E's whole dynamic, but the credo of "options, not restrictions," was one that I never begrudged it, and 4E seems to be indicating that it's instead going to bring back restrictions for the sake of ease of playability.

Of course, because it was the weight of the options that bogged the game down.

4th Edition will have the same options for PCs, but monsters don't need them to be monstrous.

Honestly, I think that's a step backwards, since it's easier to have rules and mechanics that you can just ignore, rather than need them and not have them published.

But feats for monsters (to use one example) were borderline irrelevant. Therefore their addition was counter-productive and just slowed the game (and game design) down.

And of course, I think this will be much more notable in regards to classed NPCs. There'll be at least one extra element of work involved now when you want to lay wizard levels on your mind flayer, because questions like "well, monsters don't get feats, but the wizard gets bonus feats after so many levels, so what do I do?" need to be answered (that's a general example, the wizard may not give bonus feats anymore, but it's indicative of how those things will come up).

I don't understand what you are talking about here.

e.g. Lets say the Mind Flayer is a Level 8 Elite Monster (meaning its equal to an 8th-level PC). Then you want to add 5 levels of Wizard to it. You don't have to work anything out, you just add the five levels of wizard to it. I fail to see the problem here.

Where is this extra level of work? If anything monsters not having feats makes your job easier!

I don't necessarily agree with this; people seem to remember the Tarrasque a lot more for its reflective carapace and regeneration than the fact that it has Awesome Blow and Blind-Fight.

Then you agree with me that its feats are irrelevant and its special abilities are all that matter.

You seem to be indicating that monsters (in 3E) suffer from something similar to the race problem; does it matter much that the monster is a mind flayer when it has 20 wizard levels?

If playing a Mind Flayer Wizard 20 is no different from playing a Human Wizard 20 then playing a Mind Flayer is all but superfluous. You may as well play a human wizard and paint a purple moustache for all the difference it will make.

Reading between the lines it appears WotC are trying to make each Monstrous PC race unique in some fashion. My guess is through talent trees.

And to a degree I can sympathize with that - 3E could have done better in that regard (monster powers should, I think, scale with class levels; e.g. caster level for spell-like abilities increases, save DCs increase, etc.), but when enough levels are taken, any degree of static powers will eventually be overshadowed. I don't think the answer is to place roadblocks in the path of giving class levels to monsters.

Its not about roadblocks, its about cutting out the waste. Its like giving a Balor 1st-level spells that will see use in one in a million campaigns. Not to mention these 1st level spell-like abilities are not what make the Balor or the Dragon unique. They just sully the monsters identity.

No doubt 4E monsters will be scalable. There'll be templates, and there'll probably be rules on natural Hit Dice advancement. Maybe, there'll even be rules on adding class levels also (hopefully in a way that doesn't make their monstrous abilities obselete), but by making PCs and NPCs use fundamentally different rules, the crossover between the two will be more difficult, and take more work for the same results we're getting now.

As I mentioned above I think the racial traits will be expanded via talent trees.

 

[WarDragon]

By what...not using the Great Wheel!? Hardly the cornerstone of D&D.

Those were two separate comments, and you know it, dude. 3E is a perfectly serviceable, and salvageable system.

Okay, so then whats your problem? People who like the Great Wheel can still use it because the material in your 3E Manual of the Planes is still relevant, just not the stats bit.

Personally I don't want to see another Manual of the Planes retelling and regurgitating the same material as before with different stats. Hence the reason I welcome something new.

The problem is that they're making so many changes, people who still like the Great Wheel will have to rewrite half the mechanics from scratch, like that nonsense about all devils being humanoid, and all demons being mindless beasts. Not to mention the new cosmology seems to be.... well, silly.

No, they are just trying to reduce the magic items arms race that totally dominates high-level play and does so purely derived from boring maths based magic items (Cloak of Ressistance).

Its also a way to try and get characters to THINK about what items to use tactically rather than just add more and more items (or buff spells) to overcome problems.

I still maintain that your hatred of these items is making a problem where one never existed. Higher numbers make the character feel more powerful, and there is a ton of precedent in the mythology you keep touting.

Which bit, the problem or the solution?

The fact that there's less uncertainty at higher levels. You rely on tactics instead of luck.

Even though the vast majority of monster races used as PCs actually meant nothing more than a few points here and there to ability scores.

Personally I'd ratyher see something more substantial to differentiate playing a goblin to playing an orc or playing an ogre. Put some imagination into it rather than well the orc has 2 points more strength than the hobgoblin.

4 more Strength. And really, that's all some monsters are, tougher humans. No reason to go overboard on every one of them.

Wizards still feel like wizards...do you mean by virtue of being miles better than almost every other class at high level and totally dominating the game? Or do you mean by being next to useless at very low levels.

No need to get snarky. I meant that their statement about "every class will have per day, per encounter, and at will abilities" seems to be throwing resource management down the crapper. Some designer or other was quoted as saying that a wizard who'd used up all his spell slots will still be at 80% capacity; how is that in keeping with anything we know about D&D wizards?

Incorrect. If we stat up a 20th-level dwarf and a 20th-level Elf there would be virtually no mechanical difference due to race at all.

The elf can never have as many hit points, and he can never get darkvision, stonecunning or be a Runesmith or Dwarven Defender. The dwarf can never be as agile, get martial proficiencies without burning a level or feat, and will always be 10 ft. slower. There's really no need to overcomplicate things more than that.

...and how is that any different from 3/3.5E, except that they are now telling us the roles as opposed to not telling us!?

For example, a 3E fighter can be built as a hulking mass in plate mail, a dedicated weapon master, a rapier-wielding duelist, or a deadly-accurate archer. In 4E, if you don't want to stand in the front line taking hits, or don't want to specialize in a single weapon, you can't use the Fighter class.

So about 30 seconds work then given that most monsters were basically ability score differences.

I meant in 4E. From what we've been told, there's no way to make a monster unique without rewriting it as a whole new race, vaguely based on the MM entry.

I don't have the energy to pop the rest of your optimistic statements.