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

[Najo]

@ WOTC - dont make this mistake with 4e

ok, my number one concern is fluff being put in the wrong spot. The first two pieces of evidence:

Dragon Tail Cut (which you guys said, ok, we get it you guys don't like and we will take out)

and Golden Wyvern Adept....

Golden Wyvern Adept and anything that is like it needs to go, right now. Here is why:


D&D core books are the engine that is going to drive players home brew campaigns and the settings WOTC plans to publish each year. A feat like this colors the characters of the setting and ties them into an assumed world.

Now, I know your saying, hey we are doing that with all kinds of stuff...the Gods, the magic items, the monsters, etc.

Thing is, those things are placed by the DM and the DM needs inspiration like that. So do the players. But those things should remain in the realm of elements that the DM can control.

All of the fluffy connected spells, feats and other player connected things are bad in my opinion. Really bad. Especially if they contridict the setting your plugging on top of the D&D ruleset.

Not every single D&D setting (official or homebrew) should have golden wyvern adepts in them. What if wizards don't have orders in my game, or what if wyverns don't exist. I have to remove character building blocks that tie in with other build blocks. This is not the same thing as banning a race, prestige class or other things that may or may not exist. It is taking an effect that should be there (altering spell areas to avoid my friends) and attaching it to story fluffy that may or may not be there. In order to unplug that effect, I have to rename the feat or create another one, and then change any game rules that attach into that feat.

Please do not do this to us or your own settings. It will hurt the game and the feel of all those worlds.

 

[Wepwawet]

2.) I think too many people are stuck in 3rd ed mode. I can't personally see a reason not to multi class if you need to. Fighters defend. If you need to defend and strike, you'll probably need to multiclass. I'm sure the multiclass rules are not the same.

QFT

In 3ed you had to halt development in your class to get 1 or 2 levels of another class. I hope (and I believe) that in 4E it will be different, much smoother.

 

[malladin]

I have two noobs in my game at the moment. If I were to apply your standard for competence, I'd have chucked them a long time ago. But they're my friends, and they're slowly learning how the game works. Perhaps some of us have other priorities than you do, and perhaps this game isn't as transparent and easy for some people as it is for you. One of the things I'm hoping for 4E is that I'll have an easier time teaching it to new players without overwhelming them. If they need to memorize a list of random jargon words just to learn how their character works, it's going to make that process more difficult for me.

What he said is spot on. Game design is not about setting standards but about making clear, accessable mechanics that allow all players with varying levels of commitment and interest to participate and enjoy the sociable experience of roleplaying. Doing so inheranrtly increases your potential customer base. Obviously, some people will want certain levels of commitment from players in their games, which is fine, but its not the job of a system to set those levels. If 4th ed is supposed to be increasing the ease and accessibility of D&D to a broader market then this understanding is a key one and IMHO context dependent, jargonised, if there is such a word, feat names don't help do this.

 

[Wepwawet]

What... Another Golden Wyvern Thread(TM)?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

What... Another Golden Wyvern Thread(TM)?

Apparently.

And I think there are two books where such things are needed:

Somewhere in the Core Rulebook, preferably the book that everyone gets to read - the PHB. Because you want to capture your (new) audience, and just some cold, hard mechanical terms won't really do it.

And the other is setting books.

The 3.x Core rulebooks always had their implied settings. The races and gods and the named spells and magic system in the PHB, the monsters in the Monster Manual.

Why is Gold Wyvern worse than having a vancian inspired magic system? I mean, this system was totally inappropriate for most fantasy settings - except those that were already builded on the D&D foundations.

 

[BryonD]

Never said the sky was falling though.

Neither did I..... And yet you found those words appropriate when the shoe was on the other foot....

just saying

 

[OakwoodDM]

Well, everyone's entitled to their opinion. It's just a shame that they aren't all expressed in the one thread...


As for the problem with the feat name, surely it's no worse than Tenser's Flying Disk or Mordenkainen's Disjunction. These are spells whose names assume you are using certain NPCs in your world's history just as much as Golden Wyvern Adept assumes the existence of Golden Wyvern school of magic/magic guild/style of magic/whatever you choose to make the fluff mean in your world.
Those spells (and the many others like them) weren't held up as BadWrong and destroying anything, so these feat names can surely be recovered from.

 

[fuindordm]

I don't think it's inappropriate to have a small amount of setting information in the PH, especially if it comes with guidelines for how to modify it.

For example, in the 3e PH there was a list of gods, complete with holy symbols and favored weapons. Was this inappropriate? No, because it was clear that if the DM wants to make god X then they just need to pick some appropriate domains and a favored weapon and they're good to go.

The PH had almost no feats for clerics, which was too bad. But if they did have a few of those nice feats powered by turning attempts, it would have made sense to name "Shield of Pelor" (grant energy resist to you and allies for X rounds) or "St. Cuthbert's Doom" (free sunder attempt on opponent's weapon that strikes you). At worst, having to change the name for your homebrew is slightly irksome. At best, it gives the DM another guideline on how to make their homebrew's religion more interesting to players; perhaps they'll come up with their own feats.

Well, this is the same thing. Now wizards have a "religion" of their own: a few examples in the PH of mystical orders that they might belong to. Each will probably have a handful of unique spells and feats that players can take if they want to show their devotion. The fact that they are given names that link them implicitly to the setting shown in the PH does not bother me. This is a guideline to the creative DM, not a straitjacket.

And finally, I always have more fun reading a rulebook with some fluff and setting information than a rulebook without. Since I doubt they will allow their writers to be as playful with language as Gygax was, some setting information is needed to keep the reader's imagination fired up. This will be particularly true for newcomers.

 

[Jinete]

The 3.x Core rulebooks always had their implied settings. The races and gods and the named spells and magic system in the PHB, the monsters in the Monster Manual.

Why is Gold Wyvern worse than having a vancian inspired magic system? I mean, this system was totally inappropriate for most fantasy settings - except those that were already builded on the D&D foundations.

I don't think that a vancian inspired magic system can compare to "Golden Wyvern".


1. I can see how by opting to play a wizard you have to choose from several different types of wizards, each one having an emphasis on different spells/powers. I think that's great.

2. I can see how wizards need to use implements to enhance their spellcasting. I love the idea. (Obviously I'm never going to play a wand using wizard since I don't want to seem girly and Harry Potter-ish compared to my staff wielding wizard friends, but that's just my low self esteem talking.)

3. I can see that each of these wizard "types" gets tied to a wizardly order. I'm not so crazy about this, since this kinda forces my wizard into an organization, in the same way 3,5 clerics were (mostly) forced into churches. But I can live with this.

4. I can see how feats and powers related to said orders use the orders name. I don't like it because I have to remember the mentioned orders, thus giving them more significance than I want to, but whatever gets the WotC material selling, right?

5. I don't know why the names have to suck as hard as Golden Wyvern.

 

[Aristotle]

I've not read all the replies, which means folks won't likely read mine, but...

1.) I think there is way to much drama over a feat name at this point. I'm just not sure we have enough evidence to be as up in arms as people seem to be. I tend to remember the bonuses I get from feats far more than the name of the feats, and my players are about as likely to use the name of a feat that isn't explicit as they are to simply cite the bonus they get from "a feat".

2.) I'm mildly concerned about this. In 3E I could run an archer ranger or an archer warrior. I won't be happy if all of the cool archery feats are ranger exclusive. I tend to prefer classless games, but made the exception when I came back to D&D for 3E, and was pleasantly surprised. Forcing to much rigidity on the classes could easily cause me to return to my classless mindset. I have hope though. Everything we've heard of multiclassing so far implies that it works the way it should, providing an evenly powered character that melds two or more classes right from the start. That could really spin the rigid classes, allowing for all sorts of hybrid characters if desired.