D&D 4E Concerned with 4e now, do you agree or not?

[WyzardWhately]

I actually don't find this all that disturbing, or really even as limiting as we might think it is. I never saw a Wizard with whirlwind attack anyway. Further, I suspect that the Wizard's in-class powers are essentially going to BE their spells. I have no evidence for this, but I wouldn't be in the least surprised if most of their magical abilities came from picking powers every level or two rather than the classic methods of gaining spells known. I think we also have good cause to believe that multiclassing between martial classes will be very common, if you want to make a character who straddles the line.

The only thing about that post that disturbed me was the fact that the writer used the term 'build.' Man, that really pushes my button. It's ridiculous, I know.

 

[Orryn Emrys]

I do agree with both of your points, in as much as we actually know about the material from the conjecture supported by the article. However, I have an additional thought on the second point.

Historically, prior to 3E, the game never offered the kind of cross-pollenation of character abilities frequently associated with individual classes that it now does. In all honesty, I was so accustomed to viewing the rules of the game as exclusively modular, i.e. different abilities were, by and large, unique to different classes, that I was overjoyed to see a "build" system in which levels were modular enough to multi-class with such simple efficiency. Obviously, we have long since uncovered the various drawbacks of this approach to character design, but I feel the core principle is very solid and I hope to see it improved upon in 4E... and expect to, from much of what I've heard. I have also noticed, however, that the manner in which archtypical skillsets have become so watered down by cross-pollenation, making an individual character capable of doing so many different things, has also had an effect on character role-association that was always a strong element of the game during the early years, and many players still try to associate them as well as possible. Filling a particular role in the party helps a PC feel useful and functional without overt competition.

Many of my players are roleplaying purists, far more interested in the characters' personal motivations, agendas and experiences than their unique skillsets... but these elements are still strong motivating aspects of a character's level of interaction and, more importantly, value. Even if they are relatively invisible under the level of person-to-person interaction that more clearly defines their role in the party... i.e. he's the smart one, she's the charmer, he's the tactician, etcetera (some of which are often a marriage of the character's skills and the player's, like it or not)... they often have an obvious subconscious effect on the character's sense of self-worth. In fact, if a party never expects anything specific from a given PC... or worse, never needs him for anything... they are all the more likely to act as individuals with little regard for how their actions affect the group. Much of the time, this detracts in many ways from the flow and momentum of the game, even if it can add depth to a character. In my experience, most groups end up with a mix of these elements: characters who are useful for unique abilities as well as characters who aren't. And that has the potential to be quite problematic.

Essentially, I am not concerned about the idea of pigeon-holing certain abilities into the skillsets of specific classes, particularly if multiclassing becomes even more effective than it is... but it might depend on what abililities we're talking about. So the jury's still out on this one.

As for your initial point... I really liked the fact that 3E feets, as a general rule, had names that simply described their utility in some fashion. I rather disagree with the idea of granting them more colorful or stylistic names, particularly in the core rulebooks.

 

[Umbran]

I am not sure what you want to call a "concern".

I do find the overly colorful names to be irksome. I prefer a feat name to be descriptive of what the feat does, and names like "Golden Wyvern Adept" don't tell me much out of context. But I don't know where the drawling line is between a concern, and something I don't like.

I won't have an opinion about the feats and talents thing until I see the whole structure. How good or bad it is is dependent on too many particulars of the rules we haven't seen.

 

[Mercule]

I somewhat agree with #1. Not really enough to be "concerned" by it, though.

Unless, of course, you throw in the tieflings and dragonborn. I guess I don't mind them as a PHB2-type of race, but I don't think either belongs in the main PHB. Who woulda-thunk -- my biggest zone of "sacred cows" is in race.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

I agree with the first point. I know everyone says "but you can just change it!", but the problem is that if you change it the conversation will go like this:

Player A: I use my Sweep Kick feat.
Player B: Sweep Kick? Which one was that again?
Player A: In the PHB it's called Azure Tragic Howitzer
Player B: So why aren't we calling it that?
Player A: Because no one could remember what it did, and it sounds stupid. Sweep kick describes the feat.
Player B: But if I want to look it up, I need to remember that it's called Azure Tragic Howitzer, so we should just call it that. Exactly how many feats did we rename?
Player A: All of them.
Player B: Do we have a translation key?
DM: I made an Excel file to translate. You just type in the new name here and it tells you the feat you're looking for, and vice versa.
Player B: So, I need to use that to know what I'm supposed to write down on my character sheet, because we're not using the regular names for the feats. Plus I need to use it to translate if you mention any feat at all?
DM: Yes.
Player B: Did we rename anything besides feats?
DM: Well, just talent trees, spell names, skills, magic items, monsters, two-thirds of the weapons, gnomes, and the various planes.
Player B: Where is this lexicon?
Player A: It's all on the wiki.
Player B: So, in order to simply check to see that what I think something is called is actually what it is called, I have to look online?
DM: Well, what do you want me to do? Publish a translation dictionary?
Player B: We could just use the names from the PHB. We're going to be doing so anyway, as part of the process of looking them up.
DM: I will move heaven and earth in order to avoid using the phrase "Golden Wyvern" in my game. And so will you.

 

[Cadfan]

Perhaps, rather than change it, you might just ignore it?

"I cast fireball, centered on the fighter. I have a wisdom of 14, so I leave the fighter and the cleric out of the blast zone. The rogue will have to hope their Evasion saves them."

 

[Simon Marks]

My concern for 4e is equality of effects for Monsters and PCs.

I don't care if the Orc and the Human have the same mechanics, just that they can achieve the same results.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

I agree with the first point. I know everyone says "but you can just change it!", but the problem is that if you change it the conversation will go like this:

Player A: I use my Sweep Kick feat.
Player B: Sweep Kick? Which one was that again?
Player A: In the PHB it's called Azure Tragic Howitzer
Player B: So why aren't we calling it that?
Player A: Because no one could remember what it did, and it sounds stupid. Sweep kick describes the feat.
Player B: But if I want to look it up, I need to remember that it's called Azure Tragic Howitzer, so we should just call it that. Exactly how many feats did we rename?
Player A: All of them.
Player B: Do we have a translation key?
DM: I made an Excel file to translate. You just type in the new name here and it tells you the feat you're looking for, and vice versa.
Player B: So, I need to use that to know what I'm supposed to write down on my character sheet, because we're not using the regular names for the feats. Plus I need to use it to translate if you mention any feat at all?
DM: Yes.
Player B: Did we rename anything besides feats?
DM: Well, just talent trees, spell names, skills, magic items, monsters, two-thirds of the weapons, gnomes, and the various planes.
Player B: Where is this lexicon?
Player A: It's all on the wiki.
Player B: So, in order to simply check to see that what I think something is called is actually what it is called, I have to look online?
DM: Well, what do you want me to do? Publish a translation dictionary?
Player B: We could just use the names from the PHB. We're going to be doing so anyway, as part of the process of looking them up.
DM: I will move heaven and earth in order to avoid using the phrase "Golden Wyvern" in my game. And so will you.

I LOVE IT.

I'd sig it, but it's too long... Maybe I can find a piece...

 

[Mallus]

I don't agree with either point.

#1 is of no concern to me at all. I've ignored whatever flavor came bundled with the game mechanics for as long as I've been playing and I've never had the slightest bit of trouble leaving my --how shall I put this?-- indelible and frequently inexplicable mark on the games I've run.

Besides, no rule set can make the players buy into your setting/campaign, and that's pretty much the only way you achieve a specific "feel", especially while using a sort-of generic fantasy hodgepodge like D&D.

#2 is closer to a concern, but really, it's far too early to tell if the new rules don't work. Honestly, I like cafeteria-style point-buy systems like the Hero system and M&M. Any class-based system is going to look like a kludge to me and from what I've seen, 4e will be no more of one that 3e, less so if they use something like the Saga rules.

 

[delericho]

I agree with point 2, disagree with point 1, and have other concerns about 4e. Frankly, the names they give things are not of great interest to me - characters living in the world's I run using D&D don't have 'behind the curtain' knowledge of game terms, such as classes, levels, or alignments anyway, so changing the names is a trivial matter. Also, you won't hear some badly-acted Rogue commenting that someone is "a low-level Mage"...

The tying of what were once feats to specific classes struck me as a bad idea - especially things like Two-Weapon Fighting should be available to everyone who wants to invest the feats, IMO.

But I have lots of other concerns about this game. Chiefly, I'm concerned that while they're putting together what might be a fun game... it won't be a game that I have any interest in playing. A somewhat lesser concern is that there's some sort of "Inverse Star Trek Rule" as applies to even-numbered editions.

But, for the moment, they're just concerns, and a general uneasiness. Come June, I will make a proper judgement of the game that is actually produced, and decide what to do then.