D&D 4E AICN 4e Review Part 2: DMing 4e

[Mercule]

XP works a lot differently now too. EVERYTHING you do can pretty much get you XP. The big change is that Social Encounters will net you xp. Traps and puzzles are XP based rather than just CRs. And taking a tip from WoW, there are even QUEST REWARDS now. The DMG even includes suggestions on how PC’s can instigate their own quests. These are no longer vague rule suggestions – but are instead hard and fast rules that allow you to really control the rate of level progression without feeling like you’re just lumping XP on the PC’s. At the same time, the new system allows you to take the players from one level to the next without ever having to swing a sword. Not that you’d necessarily want to, but all of a sudden courtly intrigue and puzzle quest heavy campaigns are just as viable XP wise as straight hack and slash. And it’s all based on the same simple mechanics.

These statements set me all aflitter.

I am not insufferably psyched for 4e.

 

[MarkAHart]

...I know from my own life that I am more inclined to like things that are made by people that I personally like...

I think this is a very true statement, although I don't know if Mouseferatu was directly involved with writing the 4th edition rules or not. I don't know if their group gets to playtest the stuff he designs (for publication), or if some kind of NDA prevents that sort of thing.

 

[Doug McCrae]

until Epic, when pretty much everyone can Res for free, on a daily basis. You get abilities that let you do cool things when you die. Swear to Pelor. Epic is weird.

I love this.

there was an interpretation of Stealth early on that allowed you to use another player to hide, then jump out and gain COMBAT ADVANTAGE (the 4E version of catching a character flat footed.) This led to a series of comments (and jokes) about a Halfling Rogue in the fighters backpack and ultimately led to a note from the lead developer that read “It shouldn’t work like that. We’ll fix it.” They did.

Did that need to be fixed? It sounds kind of cool, and very halfling-y.

 

[Mouseferatu]

I think this is a very true statement, although I don't know if Mouseferatu was directly involved with writing the 4th edition rules or not.

Nope. The actual 4E core was written entirely by WotC staff. The details of our first playtest draft were as big a surprise to me as they were to him.

Did that need to be fixed? It sounds kind of cool, and very halfling-y.

Given that the particular issue he was referring to wasn't a specific rule so much as a poorly worded sentence, I'd say it did.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Where are these magic item shops in 3x?

"The magic items described in Chapter 7 all have prices. The assumption is that, while they are rare, magic items can be bought or sold much as any other commodity can be. The prices given are far beyond the reach of almost everyone, but the very rich, including mid- to high- level PCs, can buy and sell these items or even have spellcasters make them to order. In very large cities, some shops might specialize in magic items if their clientele is very wealthy or includes a large number of adventurer [sic] (and such shops would have lots of magical protections to ward away thieves). Magic items might even be available in normal markets and shops occasionally. For example, a weaponsmith might have a few magic weapons for sale along with her normal wares."

DMG page 142

Also critics of 3e often use the phrases 'magic shops' or 'Magic Wal*Mart' to mean 'magic item trade' ie magic items can be bought or sold. It's one reason I've argued against the use of the terms, their meaning is very unclear.

 

[Lizard]

In the default game as per published adventures and supplements.

I never use adventures, so I wouldn't know. Which supplements had them?

 

[Spatula]

But those simple rule changes do make life a hell of a lot easier. During our first game, my intrepid game designer buddy decided to throw a monkey wrench into the works by having his character dive under a table and kick it out from under two guys fighting on top of it. He smiled devilishly, looked at me and asked “How are you gonna rule that…DM?” I glanced at the book for a moment and realized “Strength check against their reflexes.” Huh. He shook his head. Made sense. He made the attack, hit the numbers and all of a sudden he had two opponents prone on the floor. The rules are so straight forward now, on the fly decisions are total cake.

Yeah, I can't imagine how you ever could deal with such a situation in 3e. Setting an adhoc DC for a Strength check or ruling it as a melee touch attack (Str+BAB vs Ref, which is what was done above) would have been totally inconceivable. Yeppers...

Alphabetical, bullet-pointed, combat chapters is all kinds of usefulness, at least. I just wish 4e designers & testers would stop telling me how you can do all these things in 4e that you couldn't in 3e, except that you could do them just fine in 3e... Tell me the stuff that is an actual improvement over 3e, like the combat chapter. Hell, tell me about grappling, since Massawyrm mentioned it. That's an easy sell.

Oh and:

But the biggest revolution is game design for 4E is the fact that the monsters scale PERFECTLY. And so do the PCs. The amount of damage they deal and can take moves up appropriately so multiple monsters of a lower level is EQUAL in damage output and the amount it can take as a single monster of a higher level.

This is only true if player defenses do not scale as they level. Which may be the case in the absense of magic items (or may not, monsters seem to get 1/2 their level as a defense bonus, do PCs get the same?), but I would not expect it to be the norm. Otherwise the damage output is not the same; the low level monsters will not be able to hit the higher level PCs as often, and thus deal less damage. Damage output depends as much on the attack bonus as it does actual damage dealt.

Traps and puzzles are XP based rather than just CRs.

CR is XP...

Oh yeah. And there’s no such thing as a magic item shop anymore. Which is fine, because they’ve finally made Crafting rules that actually make sense and don’t require calculus or the loss of XP. If you want a certain magic item, learn how to make it, and spend the gold to make it. Crafting magic items is what the gold cost is for now a days.

Magic item shops have always existed in the game. 1e had gp values for magic items, and you know what? There were magic item shops in our games. That was back in the early 80's, and I don't think we were alone. If there are gp values for magic items, people will use them.

And in any case, the players are going to find items that they don't want, but that others logically will. There is going to be a market for such things. D&D is, and always has been, far too magic-heavy (in its default mode) to pretend that each and every sword +1 is a rare and priceless treasure.

 

[Lizard]

"The magic items described in Chapter 7 all have prices. The assumption is that, while they are rare, magic items can be bought or sold much as any other commodity can be. The prices given are far beyond the reach of almost everyone, but the very rich, including mid- to high- level PCs, can buy and sell these items or even have spellcasters make them to order. In very large cities, some shops might specialize in magic items if their clientele is very wealthy or includes a large number of adventurer [sic] (and such shops would have lots of magical protections to ward away thieves). Magic items might even be available in normal markets and shops occasionally. For example, a weaponsmith might have a few magic weapons for sale along with her normal wares."

DMG page 142

I never interpreted this as meaning, "I walk into Swords-R-Us and buy a flaming +2 longsword", which is what I assume most people mean by "magic shop".

Rather, in the largest of cities, if you suceed at a GI check, you might find out where a retired adventurer has set up as an innkeeper, and he might be willing to part with his old sword if the price is right...

In a "worst case" scenario, you might find a place which specialized in Rare Treasures And Wonderments, but the selection is limited to what the DM decides on, not what the players want. Mechanically, this is identical to finding magic items on monsters.

ie, there's no difference between, "You find magic item 'a' on the monster" and "You find 2000 gold on the monster, and meet someone willing to sell you magic item 'a' for 2000 gold."

Who on this thread actually had a "Wal-Magic" in their world, where players could just buy any item in the DMG at will, if they had the cash?

 

[Wormwood]

Rather, in the largest of cities, if you suceed at a GI check, you might find out where a retired adventurer has set up as an innkeeper, and he might be willing to part with his old sword if the price is right...

In a "worst case" scenario, you might find a place which specialized in Rare Treasures And Wonderments, but the selection is limited to what the DM decides on, not what the players want. Mechanically, this is identical to finding magic items on monsters.

I like your house rules, and I've even used 'em myself.

But they are a departure from the assumptions of the game.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Who on this thread actually had a "Wal-Magic" in their world, where players could just buy any item in the DMG at will, if they had the cash?

While I never ran a game with such--the closest I came was a church that sold potions and a few scrolls, or a curio shop that had a smattering of lower-level magic items--I've played in games under no fewer than four DMs who included precisely the "Magic Wal-Mart" (or at least hand-waved magic item purchases to such an extent that they might as well have come from a discount chain). And at least in some cases, it wasn't that they wanted to; it was that they felt the rigidity of the "magic item value by level" guidelines of 3E didn't really offer them a good alternative.

The fact that it wasn't an issue in your experience, Lizard, does not in any way mean it wasn't a problem for a lot of others.