D&D 4E Anyone playing 4e at the moment?

[Zardnaar]

The thing that power source/role did that a lost a lot of long-time fans but I think was really brilliant, was it made classes bottom-up design, where in every other edition of D&D, they had been top-down. What I mean by that is, in other editions of D&D, classes are primarily archetypes, and their mechanical design follows from that fictional concept. In 4e, classes are primarily game constructs, and their story concept follows the design.

I think a proper successor to the ideas 4e tried to explore might not even have classes. Classes were kind of vestigial in 4e, and I think freed of the baggage of being a successor to D&D, You could cut them lose and just have players pick a power source and a combat role role, each of which would grant access to a selection of Powers to choose from at the appropriate levels.

You almost start to see this happening in Essentials, where there were a lot of shared powers between different classes of the same power source; although it also introduced secondary power sources, and eventually even started playing around with stuff like the Berserker that shifted from Striker to Defender when raging. God, I loved Essentials.

Are you familiar with Stat Wars Saga Edition?

It was kind of a 3.5/4E hybrid.

 

[Charlaquin]

Yeah, D&D fanboys don't like when systems have an actual design and are well focused for some reason ¯\(ツ)/¯

It’s a preference for top-down design vs. bottom-up. D&D has a long history of using bespoke and ad-hoc mechanics to emulate specific fictional concepts. 4e came at the design from completely the opposite direction, starting from a tightly focused mechanical design and creating fiction to fit that design. That’s also why reskinning works super well in 4e, which is another thing the old guard hated. It’s a total inversion of how they approach the game.

 

[Charlaquin]

Are you familiar with Stat Wars Saga Edition?

It was kind of a 3.5/4E hybrid.

I’m aware of it, but I never looked into it because my interest in a Star Wars RPG is next to none.

 

[Zardnaar]

I’m aware of it, but I never looked into it because my interest in a Star Wars RPG is next to none.

Each class was essentially feat, talent, the force powers anyone could take if they devoted resources to it and you had talent trees aka class abilities you could pick.

Not quite classless but yeah. It used NADS, had 5 classes, multiclass how you like.

Powered were essentially optional.

 

[Charlaquin]

Each class was essentially feat, talent, the force powers anyone could take if they devoted resources to it and you had talent trees aka class abilities you could pick.

Not quite classless but yeah. It used NADS, had 5 classes, multiclass how you like.

Powered were essentially optional.

Neat.

Classless design has its benefits and its drawbacks for sure. I’m not saying D&D would be better off classless - in fact, I think Essentials did a pretty good job of demonstrating the potential design advantages of classes. What I really think 4e did great was make class mean something mechanically. Wizards weren’t just people who used magic and and gained it through rigorous study, they were Arcane Controllers, which came with certain mechanical implications. Form followed function, and I think that was a step in the right direction for D&D to take.

 

[Campbell]

The thing that power source/role did that a lost a lot of long-time fans but I think was really brilliant, was it made classes bottom-up design, where in every other edition of D&D, they had been top-down. What I mean by that is, in other editions of D&D, classes are primarily archetypes, and their mechanical design follows from that fictional concept. In 4e, classes are primarily game constructs, and their story concept follows the design.

I think a proper successor to the ideas 4e tried to explore might not even have classes. Classes were kind of vestigial in 4e, and I think freed of the baggage of being a successor to D&D, You could cut them lose and just have players pick a power source and a combat role role, each of which would grant access to a selection of Powers to choose from at the appropriate levels.

You almost start to see this happening in Essentials, where there were a lot of shared powers between different classes of the same power source; although it also introduced secondary power sources, and eventually even started playing around with stuff like the Berserker that shifted from Striker to Defender when raging. God, I loved Essentials.

That all sounds incredibly terrible to me personally. I consider the original arrangement of 4e classes a marked improvement over 3e precisely because of strong theming and mechanical niches of powers. Each class was designed to have a different feel even if the structure was similar. Abandoning level by level multiclassing, having powerful class features available at first level, and focusing on what made each class distinct even if resources were structured similarly made me feel like I was playing a Fighter again instead of someone with 5 levels of fighters and feats x, y, and z.

I view most of the Essentials content as pretty much a separate game that moved away from damn near everything I liked about 4e. It ditched the attitude, the lore, and distinctive class design that made the game feel special to me. While some excellent supplements came out of this era the core Player's Handbook replacements featured extremely bland design that took all the edge and flavor out of the game.

Personally I feel that Dungeon World, Freebooters on the Frontier and Pathfinder Second Edition were much better spiritual successors than Strike or 13th Age precisely because they are strong archetypal designs with mechanics that have real teeth. To me they integrate the lore directly into the game in a way that rewards players for engaging with it in the same way that 4e did.

 

[Zardnaar]

Neat.

Classless design has its benefits and its drawbacks for sure. I’m not saying D&D would be better off classless - in fact, I think Essentials did a pretty good job of demonstrating the potential design advantages of classes. What I really think 4e did great was make class mean something mechanically. Wizards weren’t just people who used magic and and gained it through rigorous study, they were Arcane Controllers, which came with certain mechanical implications. Form followed function, and I think that was a step in the right direction for D&D to take.

D&D will never go classless then it's no longer D&D.

Not that one can't design a better game of course but yeah.

 

[Dragonblade]

Are you familiar with Stat Wars Saga Edition?

It was kind of a 3.5/4E hybrid.

This was a great typo! "Stat Wars Saga Edition" indeed.

Saga was a fun game in its own right. Still own all the books for it. A nice 'bridge' game from 3.5 to 4e.

 

[lockyreid]

Yes I still play 4e as my main DnD edition. We are currently 3 years into my campaign and the party just hit level 18. My group and I vastly prefer 4e game mechanics, and I've made some simple but hugely effective changes to the core game to fix some of the major pacing issues most players have.

In fact we started the campaign with 4e, and after a year we had 2 players leave, and 2 new players join. In order to help those new players join we decided to switch over to 5e and continue. This lasted for about 6 sessions before the party began to talk about switching back to 4e, and we did, and have been having a great time ever since.

 

[Retreater]

My group and I vastly prefer 4e game mechanics, and I've made some simple but hugely effective changes to the core game to fix some of the major pacing issues most players have.

Can you elaborate on a few of the changes? I'm very curious. Thanks!