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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aldarc" data-source="post: 5454565" data-attributes="member: 5142">Re Worldbuilding with 4E: To provide some background, I tend to do a lot of worldbuilding, and rarely do I actually have the chance to play in these worlds that I design. I frequently just want to preserve an idea for a world that I can potentially use later to some degree or another. At other times, I design just as a sort of "RPG thought experiment" of world creation. I admit to coming into D&D by means of 3E, at least seriously, as I have played a few sessions of AD&D, though I recall little of the mechanics on an experiential level. I do agree that 4E is far more challenging to customize and makes world-building more difficult in some respects. One of 4E's greatest strengths in regards to world-building is its modularity that allows for certain flavors of classes to be used or removed without a fear of losing an "essential" role and risk the integrity of an ideal party composition. For example, 4E demonstrated this through the removal of divine power source classes in Dark Sun, a feat that was practically impossible or impractical to do in either 2E or 3.XE mechanical assumptions. But 4E's modularity allows for an arguably "truer" Dark Sun in 4E than the original in 2E, at least when it comes to classes. Much like in Dark Sun, I found this to a breath of fresh air when it comes to world-building, as I do not feel compelled to retain a divine, psionic, arcane, or primal power source. But the mechanics of 4E also sometimes come with their own set of "world assumptions," that could be frustrating to the DM. For example, the eladrin's fey step assumes the existence of a Fey Wild. But in this respects, this may not be all that different from assumptions regarding an ethereal plane with respects to ghosts or a far realm with respect to abominations. Or in like turn, 3E also had its own set of assumptions regarding classes that sometimes vexed my world-building, such as rangers with divine spells (or any spells for that matter). (As an aside, I greatly prefer 4E's more "mythological cosmology" than the Great Wheel of old. The new cosmology has actually been more conducive in my idea generation for world-building than the old cosmology.) Re "Feels like D&D": Both 3E and 4E "feel like D&D" to me, but they seem to be aimed at different markets and attempting to address different "problems" and issues. While I like both and both "feel like D&D" to me, I am not truly satisfied with either. Hearing people say "it does not feel like D&D" in regards to any edition irks me on some level. Behind this statement seems to be the qualifying question of what would make it "true D&D." So the statement "it doesn't feel like D&D" seems to be a step removed from committing what could be considered a "no true D&D" fallacy. I would not mind the statement "it doesn't feel like D&D" as much if the point was elaborated and qualified more fully. "What would make it feel more like D&D?" (IMO, while Pathfinder may be a more polished variant of 3.5, it fails to address many of the problems - such as fighter vs. wizard power scaling - of 3.X. If anything, it seems to accentuate some of those problems. I do agree with Aberzanzorax that I wish that 4E had taken its cues more so from SW Saga, which itself is obviously built on the customizable d20 Modern. One of my own problems with 4E is its "square-dancing" tactical combat system that practically requires minis. And it seems that neither Pathfinder nor 4E learned from highly praised alt systems such as Arcana Evolved, Iron Heroes, or True20, etc.)</blockquote>

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