Another Reason to Like The Flavor Changes...

[Arashi Ravenblade]

If they are going to reimagine they need to be 100% original. If your going to change the way devils and demons are then make something new to replace them. Dont suddenly make Devils some sort of Astral plane thingy.
Dont use the same name either. Asmodeus is suppsoed to be a god in the PHB right?
Well why? It's not gonna be the same guy that we all know and love. It's gonna be some new guy with the same name that resides somewhere else and rules over a bunch of things called devils but arent. Of course I dont know that for sure, but with the changes to the planes how can the super-beings we like be the same? Unless there is some story reason, such as when Asmodeus became a god he moved them. Or the Blood war caused all the changes.
What about canon in the campaign settings? How is it gonna change the realms, or eberron or future Greyhawk products, or ravenloft if they do another one?
I dont think they are fully thinking things through, and are doing things for the sake of change.
I cant be the only one thats concerned. I know I can ignore it, but thats a poor excuse to accept something.

 

[TwinBahamut]

If they are going to reimagine they need to be 100% original.

I challenge you to find a single piece of art or writing in the entire history of mankind that is 100% original. I certainly have never seen anything like that. In fact, some of the best works in the history of the english language, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and Shakespeare's plays, steal whole plots and characters from other writers outright. Shakespeare wasn't the first guy who wrote a play about a star-crossed couple in Venice named Romeo and Juliet...

To quote the words of the painter Picasso, upon seeing the prehistoric cave-paintings of France: "We invented nothing."

 

[Kae'Yoss]

I'm all for new ideas, but what I really want out of 4e is a new edition, not a new game. Those "stale" things we have had in the past are still there because they work, and are popular. If you go change happy and imagine all those cool new things, you're going to end up with a 4e that doesn't have much to do with the other editions of D&D.

That's what apparently happens with the FR: They went change happy and changed this, changed thus, changed some more, changed, changed, changed. But now the only way to tell that this is supposedly still the FR is because of the name, and that some names of characters and places still match (if it wasn't for the setting name, we could assume that it's something different that borrows more than the usual amount of names. I mean, something that's called Silvermoon isn't exactly unique)

 

[Scribble]

If they are going to reimagine they need to be 100% original. If your going to change the way devils and demons are then make something new to replace them. Dont suddenly make Devils some sort of Astral plane thingy.
Dont use the same name either. Asmodeus is suppsoed to be a god in the PHB right?
Well why? It's not gonna be the same guy that we all know and love. It's gonna be some new guy with the same name that resides somewhere else and rules over a bunch of things called devils but arent. Of course I dont know that for sure, but with the changes to the planes how can the super-beings we like be the same? Unless there is some story reason, such as when Asmodeus became a god he moved them. Or the Blood war caused all the changes.
What about canon in the campaign settings? How is it gonna change the realms, or eberron or future Greyhawk products, or ravenloft if they do another one?
I dont think they are fully thinking things through, and are doing things for the sake of change.
I cant be the only one thats concerned. I know I can ignore it, but thats a poor excuse to accept something.

Like TwinB said, most good art refferences other art. Tak a look at the Simpsons sometime.. The Episodes are FILLED with refferences to other art. Granted, they intentionally refference stuff, but it's true of all art.

Jungian Archetypes and all that.

Aside from that...

I think the changes will emphasize what a campaign world is. It'll show just how much you can change the "flavor" stuff around within the game.

If you liked the great wheel, go ahead and use it. The ideas are still there. Only now, since the authors don't have to spend their time updating everything to match 4e, we can get books about other things. Books about whole new realms.

Almost like going back to the start when everything was new. New stories to tell, new battles to fight...

I won't have to look at a book and think: "Eh... maybe the next one will be original..."

 

[TwinBahamut]

Those "stale" things we have had in the past are still there because they work, and are popular.

I think you are going to need to provide proof for this statement. I think the number of people on EN World alone who are celebrrating the death of things like Vancian magic and the Great Wheel is enough of a counter-example that I can't accept this statement as truth.

As far as I can tell, they don't work and they are not popular. For every person who hates these changes, there is another person saying "meh", and another person reaching for his tinfoil hat because the new cosmology is just like what he has been using as his homebrew for years.

 

[TwoSix]

If they are going to reimagine they need to be 100% original. If your going to change the way devils and demons are then make something new to replace them. Dont suddenly make Devils some sort of Astral plane thingy.
Dont use the same name either. Asmodeus is suppsoed to be a god in the PHB right?
Well why? It's not gonna be the same guy that we all know and love. It's gonna be some new guy with the same name that resides somewhere else and rules over a bunch of things called devils but arent. Of course I dont know that for sure, but with the changes to the planes how can the super-beings we like be the same? Unless there is some story reason, such as when Asmodeus became a god he moved them. Or the Blood war caused all the changes.
What about canon in the campaign settings? How is it gonna change the realms, or eberron or future Greyhawk products, or ravenloft if they do another one?
I dont think they are fully thinking things through, and are doing things for the sake of change.
I cant be the only one thats concerned. I know I can ignore it, but thats a poor excuse to accept something.

Because names like "Asmodeous", "devils", and "demons" have a lot of historical imagery behind them, not just Planescape imagery. And Asmodeous might not be the same guy you know and love, but most of us don't love him. It's just a cool name that has a little more respnance than "Barflbrax" or something.

I can understand being in a bit of a snit if they decided to make him the lead god of the Seven Heavens, but really, is there a huge difference between being "Lord of the Nine Hells" and "God of the Nine Hells"? He pretty much does the same thing. Devils do pretty much the same thing. Demons do pretty much the same thing. Does it matter that they moved the house and redid the siding? Same people in the house.

 

[The Little Raven]

If they are going to reimagine they need to be 100% original.

Ecclesiastes 1:9 - What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

I dont think they are fully thinking things through, and are doing things for the sake of change.

Seeing as this is their livelihood they're risking with all these changes, they're thinking things through far more carefully than an upset forumite is willing to do, or give them credit for.

 

[Belorin]

I'm all for new ideas, but what I really want out of 4e is a new edition, not a new game. Those "stale" things we have had in the past are still there because they work, and are popular. If you go change happy and imagine all those cool new things, you're going to end up with a 4e that doesn't have much to do with the other editions of D&D.

That's what apparently happens with the FR: They went change happy and changed this, changed thus, changed some more, changed, changed, changed. But now the only way to tell that this is supposedly still the FR is because of the name, and that some names of characters and places still match (if it wasn't for the setting name, we could assume that it's something different that borrows more than the usual amount of names. I mean, something that's called Silvermoon isn't exactly unique)

I remember when Elf was not just a race but a class too. Then they changed it and Elves could be almost any class up to a certain level. Then they got rid of the limits altogether and yet the game is still called D&D after all those changes, were they good changes? Depends on who you ask, I liked them.
Of course, there were other changes in the game besides this, this just is an example to illustrate the point that the game has changed, drastically in some ways, before and it's still D&D.
One of the coolest changes in 3.x was the Prestige class, till they started coming out with 1, 2, 3 or 5 with every adventure and supplement, now there are literally hundreds. Some that are almost exactly the same with the exception of a skill requirement or feat or a bonus given.

Bel

 

[Kae'Yoss]

I remember when Elf was not just a race but a class too. Then they changed it and Elves could be almost any class up to a certain level. Then they got rid of the limits altogether and yet the game is still called D&D after all those changes, were they good changes? Depends on who you ask, I liked them.

I wouldn't call that stale, though. It changed with each edition. In the D&D version of Trivial Pursuit, there'd probably be a card like "Identify the following editions by the rules for elves"