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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ipissimus" data-source="post: 4144114" data-attributes="member: 41514">Hat's off, JD, I know where you're coming from.I'm in 100% agreement that Wizards should be releasing more details. Holding important things this close to their chest this close to the deadline, particularly now that the books are going to print, seems a bit silly.However, on capturing the feel of oDnD I'm not sure that's something that really has anything to do with the core rules, since it depends greatly on your DM. See, I was the victim of a pessimistic DM for a long time. By a pessimistic DM, I mean a DM that lets you use your imagination to do cool things (e.g. encase a dragon's head in a wall of ice) but they always, 100% of the time, go wrong and wind up harming the party in a spectacular fashion. The problem? It's a valid playstyle. Not every cool, imaginative, idea you have is a good idea.It took me a long time to realize what was wrong with that way of DMing, though I knew I disliked it. Then, while I was DMing, I started DMing for new players and their expectations revealed the answer. Invarably, every newbie I've played with has this 'cool idea' moment. Their hero leaps off a wall, does a backflip, and stabs the bad guy in the eye. Ok, roll to hit... oh, you got a two, that's a miss, next player. Every single time, the light of creativity flickering in their eyes DIES. That was the worst thing in DMing 1E, 2E for me.When I started seeing this happening, I wanted ways to deliver the reward such creativity and encourage it rather than kill it with failure. Feats did that a little in 3E, Action Points did it more and what I've seen of 4E action points and Powers does it even better, since they're a renewable resource. And I can balance player creativity with a suitable cost for the innovation while each character comes with in-built cool stuff to do every day.I feel that with Action Points and Powers that renew, I am more empowered as a DM to adjudicate creative actions that aren't covered by the book by having the players pay the price in Action Points and the expenditure of Powers in their place, a limiting factor that does not nerf the player significantly. I can finally encourage player creativity fairly in relation to the other players.My point is that everything I've said above is just me eyeballing what little of the rules we know and applying a bit of DM creativity to find a fair and balanced method of dealing with actions outside the rules. It has nothing to do with the rules, it's my own way of solving the problem.Similarly, capturaing that old school feel of 1E and 2E adventures I think has more to do with the adventures that have been published than the rules. I miss rolling on a random table to find out just what the statue I just touched is going to do to me. I miss the wierdness of the unknown. I miss the fluid and changing circumstances of wholisticly designed dungeons rather than fixed encounters in a fixed space expressly detailed in two different places in the book that I have to flip between so I know what's going on. I miss the detailed descriptions of the monsters that inhabit a room and what they're preoccupied with at the moment rather than the generally bland description that they give in the grey boxes these days. Oh, or the maps all scattered through the book even if they're in the same dungeon, who thought that was a good idea?But that's an adventure design and philosophy issue, not a rule issue. Hopefully, the 4E exp system will help me throw appropriate encounters against my players, not too easy and just hard enough not to TPK 99.9% of the time. But fixed encounters the way they're presenting them in the last few 3.5E adventures? Yuck! I much prefer a more organic environment like old Temple of Elemental Evil adventure, that was a blast.Anyway, just my 10c.</blockquote>

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