After some thought...

[brehobit]

After some thought, and a bit of play-testing, I've made a list of things that concern me and things I like about what we know of 4e.

Things I like (so far):

• The fighter seems to be really well done. The sticky ability is nice, as is the -2 penalty. I'm not a big fan of the 1/day thing for the fighter as I don't understand what the "justification" is for being able to only do it once per day (tired?). But I liked Bo9S (other than balance issues) so I can live with that as needed...
  
• The healing system. Really nice way to have finite healing available without a healer. I also like how cleric and paladin abilities interact with it. All told, an outstanding idea. I would like something to be longer lasting (say death tokens cause long-term problems) but I can house-rule that if I feel the need.
  
• The saving throw mechanic and the different defenses. I'm a bit worried about parts of this (players trying to figure out what defense to attack) but I largely like it. The saving throw mechanic has some problems (no way to model long-term effects) but that can be handled fairly easily.
  
• Smaller power-step size between levels.

Things I don't like (so far):

• Wizards and other casters seem too limited to a blasting role. Rituals might save this, but I want to see more than blasting and area control magic. The high-level "utility" spells we've seen look largely lame. Where is my floating disk or illusion magic?
• Everyone has similar mechanics. While that might simplify things, it also leads to (say) the ranger, the wizard, and the warlock being functionally very similar.
• The cleric "buff" thing seems sucky. The "hit and give a bonus to some random person" thing seems cheezy. I was happy with the Bo9S abilities that did things like give everyone +4 to hit the person the warblade (or whatever) just hit. But +2 AC to someone _if_ you successfully hit someone else? Ick.
• Skills. I like some of the simplification (making a 10th level mult-classed character was _hard_ due to skills more than anything), but dude, we are past simple. I'm a player that tends to take craft ranks and professional skills. I'd like to have that around still....
• Too much "flashy video-game" magic, especially at low levels. Blasts all day were interesting for the 3e warlock because it was different. But for everyone, not so interesting.

Things I'm mellow about:

• More hit points seems like a non-change as more damage is being done.
• Multiclassing was fun, but we'll see how they replace it.

Things I'm worried about

• I'm really worried that a lack of play testing/rush job will cause problems.
• I'm also worried about how little we have heard about rituals. No one from WoTC has mentioned it as their "favorite thing" or the thing they are/were working on. I'm really worried it will be hacked together...

Mark

 

[smetzger]

This about sums up my concerns also.

It seems people are coming up with house rules already. In the days leading up to the release of 3e, people were not developing house rules. I have very few house rules for 3.5. If after trying 4e I find that I have more house rules, well I guess I'll go back to 3.5.

I don't like the simplification of choosing skills. I enjoyed the diversification and process of choosing where to put my skill points in 3e. Maybe I'll like the new system better, but right now it feels like a step backwards to the 2e non-weapon prof.

If the higher level wizard and cleric are not as complicated as the 3e counterpart I will be disappointed. When I play a wizard or cleric I am looking for the challenge of picking the right spell for the right occasion.

Another thing that concerns me is that the Rogue, Wizard, and Cleric seem to have a narrower role. If they do in fact have a narrower role and its more difficult to fit a character concept in these roles I fear we will get a 2e explosion of classes.

I also like the Druid and Monk. I have a number of adventures I would like to convert to 4e, but without the presence of these classes the task becomes much more difficult.

I really want to like 4e. But right now I am not sure.

Maybe I'll keep 3.5e for levels 1-12 and then when I want to DM/play higher levels go with 4e.

 

[mach1.9pants]

I'm not a big fan of the 1/day thing for the fighter as I don't understand what the "justification" is for being able to only do it once per day (tired?).

I agree with your points but this doesn't worry me. Heaps of people on this forum, including people who do martial arts of various sorts, have come up with heaps of good reasons. The most basic being that the opportunity (relative positions, current combatants stance, tiredness, luck, etc etc) to do this sort of attack comes up very rarely, say about once per day Not perfect but it gives enough of the 'V' word for me

 

[HP Dreadnought]

Another thing that concerns me is that the Rogue, Wizard, and Cleric seem to have a narrower role. If they do in fact have a narrower role and its more difficult to fit a character concept in these roles I fear we will get a 2e explosion of classes.

I think that is deliberate. If their intent is to issue a new volume of the PHB every year with additional classes in it, then all the classes are going to have to be more narrowly defined to avoid too much overlap. The 3.x classes are such generalists that it made coming up with really unique new core or PrCs very challenging.

Under 4E, we will have an explosion of core classes, each of which with a unique role - much like the explosion of PrCs in 3.x. . . except the roles will be better defined.

I'm ok with that. YMMV.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

[*] Wizards and other casters seem too limited to a blasting role. Rituals might save this, but I want to see more than blasting and area control magic. The high-level "utility" spells we've seen look largely lame. Where is my floating disk or illusion magic?
[*] The cleric "buff" thing seems sucky. The "hit and give a bonus to some random person" thing seems cheezy.

The Wizard of 4E is an Invoker, a fighting, blasting, war mage. Other specialties will have other abilities. (And I'm sure at higher levels, and with rituals, and with splatbooks, you will be able to diversify.)

I see the cleric buffs as divine inspiration. The Warlord ones will also be mostly about inspiring allies to greatness.

"C'mon, men! We can take this brute! See how I handily thump him?"

And I look forward to playing a mean, "drill sergeant" of a Warlord who "heals" downed characters by kicking them and screaming, "Get up soldier! Yo DO NOT have the luxury of dying today! ON YOUR FEET! That's right, get back in there and give them what for!"

Fun times.

Fitz

 

[FadedC]

It seems people are coming up with house rules already. In the days leading up to the release of 3e, people were not developing house rules. I have very few house rules for 3.5. If after trying 4e I find that I have more house rules, well I guess I'll go back to 3.5.

I actually remember quite a few people coming up with hiouse rules in the days leading up to 3e. If there are more people coming up with house rules for 4e, that may be because the current boards have aproximately 10 times as many people posting to them as the ones leading up to 3e did. Back in the pre-3e days a topic would be considered hot if it got 40 replies.

 

[Kwalish Kid]

I actually remember quite a few people coming up with hiouse rules in the days leading up to 3e. If there are more people coming up with house rules for 4e, that may be because the current boards have aproximately 10 times as many people posting to them as the ones leading up to 3e did. Back in the pre-3e days a topic would be considered hot if it got 40 replies.

Good points. Additionally, people now understand certain social conventions surrounding house rules that make them easier to construct and discuss. (Not necessarily easier to implement, though.)

I'm not concerned that there is a lock of playtesting with this edition. It's probable that this edition will have more playtesting than anything ever released aside from perhaps 3rd Edition.

 

[Lizard]

Good points. Additionally, people now understand certain social conventions surrounding house rules that make them easier to construct and discuss. (Not necessarily easier to implement, though.)

I'm not concerned that there is a lock of playtesting with this edition. It's probable that this edition will have more playtesting than anything ever released aside from perhaps 3rd Edition.

Then they really shouldn't have been surprised when people used the Paladin's mark to put an unremovable DOT on the foe and then keep him away from the Paladin. This tells me that people were *playing* the game, not *playtesting* it -- not trying every sleazy, skeevy, underhanded trick to break every rule and exploit every loophole. The idea often expressed here that it's the DMs job to decide on the "spirit" or "intent" of the rule and disallow uses outside of this is, as they said in my long gone youth, "bogus to the max". The DM's job is not to do what the designer didn't.

 

[Cor Azer]

Then they really shouldn't have been surprised when people used the Paladin's mark to put an unremovable DOT on the foe and then keep him away from the Paladin. This tells me that people were *playing* the game, not *playtesting* it -- not trying every sleazy, skeevy, underhanded trick to break every rule and exploit every loophole. The idea often expressed here that it's the DMs job to decide on the "spirit" or "intent" of the rule and disallow uses outside of this is, as they said in my long gone youth, "bogus to the max". The DM's job is not to do what the designer didn't.

Uh... they did catch that. not at first maybe, but they did catch it before D&DXP, just not in time to change the character sheets.

 

[Lizard]

Uh... they did catch that. not at first maybe, but they did catch it before D&DXP, just not in time to change the character sheets.

OK. That's not the impression I got from some comments.

Just to be clear, I'd never expect any game of this complexity to be bug/exploit free. I would expect that there be no bugs people exploit the very first time they see the rules.