4th to 5th Edition Converters - What has been your experience?

[Myrhdraak]

I have decided to do my own 4.5 Edition combining what I liked in 4th Edition and incorporating the changes I liked in 5th Edition.
However, I would be very interested in hearing from those of you that fully embraced 4th Edition - played it, liked it, but have now moved on and are running 5th Edition Campaigns. What has been your experience? What do you miss from 4th Edition, and what do you like, or feel has been improved in 5th Edition?

/Myrhdraak

 

[Tony Vargas]

Miss: game balance, player empowerment, class balance, sense of advancement for non-caster, encounter balance, consistency, and did I mention balance?

Improved: Advantage/Disadvantage, Death Saves. Calling fighter goodies 'maneuvers' instead of 'exploits' (thought the actual system attached to that name is terrible). Brought back that 4e should never have gotten rid of: Shocking Grasp.

Still miss from before 4e: 'Battlefield control' fighter builds from 3e - essentially Martial Controllers.
The Broadsword.

 

[pemerton]

[MENTION=996]Tony Vargas[/MENTION] - you know there was a 4e broadsword, don't you. (Adventurers' Vault: +2, d10, military heavy blade.)

 

[Raith5]

I am playing low level 5e and a high level 4e campaign (we are 30th level) with different groups.

I like the speed of 5e. I like the low level play and danger of 5e. I like the focus shifting away from encounters. I have got used to mixture of saves and attack rolls (despite thinking 4e is a much simpler and logical system). Some the classes have a great feel: clerics, paladins, wizards especially. The fact that you can break your movement up actually makes the battle somewhat fluid. The inspiration is basically Action points done in a new way.

I miss the same things as Tony. I am finding martial characters to be powerful but bland - and the advancement issue is a big one (everyone in my 5e party has the same to hit bonus which kind of zaps the feelings of the fighter! They need more toys or powers). The 5e leans very very heavily on hp - while 4e went overboard with conditions, I think 5e could have more effects.

I cant believe that I am going to say this, but I also miss 4e monsters - reactions, attacks when bloodied, Action Points makes them more interesting and unpredictable than their 5e counterparts.

Ultimately 5e went is a good direction but threw out too much.

 

[S'mon]

IME (just restarted my 5-year 4e campaign, running two 5e campaigns & playing two) they're just very different games. 5e does exploration - sandbox wilderness or dungeon - very well, with more of a big-damn-heroes, less fantasy-effin'-Vietnam, feel than AD&D or the OSR games. 4e does epic quests with a very strong focus on cinematic tactical combat. 4e is The Encounter - usually combat, not always - while 5e is Three Pillars - exploration, social & combat; in 4e the exploration pillar is unsupported and effectively absent in my successful
4e campaigns. This was really brought home to me recently using Dyson Logos' lovely dungeon maps - they were working great in my 5e game, so I used one in 4e - it was a complete waste of time, just got in the way of play. 4e really doesn't need or benefit from tactical exploration maps, what serves 4e is really good
encounter-level maps/floorplans. Which are unnecessary in 5e.

 

[Myrhdraak]

IME (just restarted my 5-year 4e campaign, running two 5e campaigns & playing two) they're just very different games. 5e does exploration - sandbox wilderness or dungeon - very well, with more of a big-damn-heroes, less fantasy-effin'-Vietnam, feel than AD&D or the OSR games. 4e does epic quests with a very strong focus on cinematic tactical combat. 4e is The Encounter - usually combat, not always - while 5e is Three Pillars - exploration, social & combat; in 4e the exploration pillar is unsupported and effectively absent in my successful
4e campaigns. This was really brought home to me recently using Dyson Logos' lovely dungeon maps - they were working great in my 5e game, so I used one in 4e - it was a complete waste of time, just got in the way of play. 4e really doesn't need or benefit from tactical exploration maps, what serves 4e is really good
encounter-level maps/floorplans. Which are unnecessary in 5e.

I totally agree to the litte support of exploration and social in the 4th Edition official DM material. There is much more in 5e DMG. In my own game I have tried to compensate by playing D&D as I always have (with these elements a natural part). However, as you have seen an actual change in how you run your adventures, is the reason for this then that you have mainly been running published adventures - which in 5e is much more focused on exploration and social, compared to the early 4e adventures? Or is it the rules themselves that have led to your change in how you run the game?

/Myrhdraak

 

[Myrhdraak]

Miss: game balance, player empowerment, class balance, sense of advancement for non-caster, encounter balance, consistency, and did I mention balance?

Improved: Advantage/Disadvantage, Death Saves. Calling fighter goodies 'maneuvers' instead of 'exploits' (thought the actual system attached to that name is terrible). Brought back that 4e should never have gotten rid of: Shocking Grasp.

Still miss from before 4e: 'Battlefield control' fighter builds from 3e - essentially Martial Controllers.
The Broadsword.

As I have introduced the 5e Death Save system 3/3 as well as 25% lover hit points in my own 4.5 version of D&D, I am interested to understand the player take on this. We have only gamed a few times with the new rules so I have not had first time experience of multiple death save rolls. My gut feeling is the risk that players get sitting outside of battle, just waiting to roll a new death save (fast getting bored), or has it lead to healers getting closer to combat to be there to help their friends get back into the battle (which I hope is the result)?

 

[S'mon]

I totally agree to the litte support of exploration and social in the 4th Edition official DM material. There is much more in 5e DMG. In my own game I have tried to compensate by playing D&D as I always have (with these elements a natural part). However, as you have seen an actual change in how you run your adventures, is the reason for this then that you have mainly been running published adventures - which in 5e is much more focused on exploration and social, compared to the early 4e adventures? Or is it the rules themselves that have led to your change in how you run the game?

/Myrhdraak

My online 5e game and my 4e game have mostly been homebrew material; I find the games push me towards very different sorts of adventures. 4e prep often feels like framing action movie scenes; 5e is far more traditional - my online 5e game runs much like 1e with a few pulp flourishes, esp the hit dice fast hp recovery. My tabletop 5e game uses Pathfinder AP adventures and runs fairly like 3e/PF, a bit smoother and looser.

 

[fjw70]

5e and 4e are tied for my favorite versions of D&D. I like things about both so I don't really miss either one when playing the other.

 

[Raith5]

As I have introduced the 5e Death Save system 3/3 as well as 25% lover hit points in my own 4.5 version of D&D, I am interested to understand the player take on this. We have only gamed a few times with the new rules so I have not had first time experience of multiple death save rolls. My gut feeling is the risk that players get sitting outside of battle, just waiting to roll a new death save (fast getting bored), or has it lead to healers getting closer to combat to be there to help their friends get back into the battle (which I hope is the result)?

My experience is that in 5e is that the death save system is somewhat gentle - because fights are quite brief in contrast to 4e. However, if you take damage (which counts as a fail) then it can get pretty harsh very quickly. But my issue with death saves is that in every edition of D&D I have played in, when somebody goes down, getting them up is a priority. So 3 rounds of inaction is so very rare.

But I agree that adding urgency and PC fragility to the system is a good design goal.