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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6177209" data-attributes="member: 42582">I GM 4e and don't use the tools, but agree that I am probably a bit of an outlier. For me the ease of GMing 4e isn't mostly the tools or the maths (although that's good, too). It's the fact that it behaves the way I want it too. The game surprises me, as players do wacky or unexpected things, and I respond in ways that I didn't anticipate. But the mechanics don't surprise me. And so they leave me free to push the players hard (via their PCs) without having to worry that I need to second-guess myself or massage the resolution to make sure that the game doesn't crash to a halt.I don't know if I'm an edition warrior or not - that's really something for others to judge. I have strong views about what I like - whether or not I'm right in those views is also something that others would have to judge.I don't fully understand Mearls' remark that "You're not attached to any specific ways of doing things as long as the game works." For me, part of the game working is that things are done in specific ways - for instance, it's important to me that the mechanics enable action resolution without GM fiat, and that resolution deliver exciting outcomes without the GM needing to prescript what those outcomes will be, and I think there is good reason from the history and experience of RPG design to think that this does require things being done some ways rather than others (in particular, I think process simulation mechanics don't satisfy my desiderata).I haven't filled in all the playtest surveys, but I've done some. I've always been asked what my favourite edition is, and have answered with 4e. And my responses to other questions reflect that preference. In the most recent survey I made some critical comments about the knight ability in the current packet that is a substitute for marking, that reflect the preference I've just outlined for non-process sim mechanics. Does that make me an edition warrior (and hence, assuming Mearls is accurately reporting his data, an outlier)? Or am I a non-edition warring playtester who's simply letting Mearls know whether or not the game works for me?</blockquote>

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