D&D 5E D&DN going down the wrong path for everyone.

[AbdulAlhazred]

Clearly, a great many people find this debatable, particularly since AEDU introduces its own problems. Among these are reduced flexibility in arranging daily resources by no longer allowing the caster the flexibility of slotting the same spell twice. And there's also the issue of effectively conforming all spells to the hit point attrition model of opponent neutralization when save or sit spells of previous editions specifically offered an alternative track to that method.

Slotting the same spell twice is a specifically forbidden thing in 4e, but AEDU doesn't inherently require that. Without such a thing AEDU as just as flexible as Vancian, more in some ways as you can't trade down in Vancian (take a level 1 instead of a level 2 spell) but you CAN in AEDU.

EDIT: I meant to add that neither is any specific type of spell mandated by AEDU. You can dislike the 4e spells if you want, but that is (largely) a separate issue from AEDU as a mechanic.

I certainly think that the D&D game changed at various points as a party of adventurers leveled and much of that change was driven by the appearance of significant spells in the casters' repertoires. Raise dead, teleport, fly, various planar spells all have an effect, but I don't think that renders the game unplayable. But even if it did, wouldn't the ritual system in 4e also have the same potential effect? While the AEDU powers may have to conform to a fairly tight structure, rituals were easily as wide open as any spells in any previous edition of D&D.

They have more than "an effect", if you run trans-level-12 AD&D you'll see. Experienced and or clever players will be miles ahead in terms of options available to them. Challenging those parties becomes NOTHING but trying to play gotcha with the wizard and the cleric. Hell, when we got to that level we literally replaced the non-casters in our party with extra casters. Sure, they were always about a level behind the main guys, but having a fighter was a waste at that point. Not that the fighter couldn't hold his own, but it is just all about playing clever loopholes with this and that spell. I could write a book on all the tricks we invented back in the day. Sure, DMs challenged us, but it was silly stuff at a certain point. Sure, you can say it "just changed" but it changed mostly for the worse. There were fun elements about it, but 4e seriously kept those and got rid of a lot of the less fun stuff.

As for rituals... Yes, in theory, you could make them stupidly broken powerful, but you have a much more coherent idea of what is appropriate and what isn't, what will and will not cause problems. You know that flying is not TOO big a deal for a level 16 PC, and that lengthy effortless no-limitations invisibility is pretty much always a no-no. OTOH it also brilliantly lets you mix back into the game anything you DO want, and keep it in the DM's hands (IE I can give out scrolls full of whatever one-use rituals I want, or just invent silly materials for them that will only be available as desired by the DM, etc). Because these rituals don't take up SLOTS of any sort, those limitations and shortcomings aren't dicking the players. Its a nice system. You could of course hose yourself, but if you stick mostly to the published rituals you're good.

 

[drothgery]

Celebrim and Iosue are right that there are significant changes in the rules that make the Vancian casting of spellcasters in 3e (and PF) more powerful than in 1e. There is, however, the question of actual rules in practice which, I think, alludes to why the rules changed as they did in 3e in the first place. For a lot of gaming tables, the substantial restrictions on spellcasting, including things so far not mentioned like limited rosters of spells known and available to prep, were relaxed as house rules because they led to wizards being "unfun" to play. I know I've relaxed some casting rules in my day. 3e designers, I honestly believe, intended to move the game in a direction players already occupied rather than, as some people allege, create a game of super-casters and weak martials. Unfortunately, doing so left some unintended consequences that a strong DM and agreeable players can handle, but on which weaker DMs and more divisive groups may founder.

At least in my experience, this was the case. Most of the restrictions removed from casters in 3e were either explicitly or implicitly house ruled away in the 2e games I played in (i.e. the rules for interrupting casters weren't ignored, it's just that monsters would always attack the melee guy standing guard rather than the wizard, if the wizard didn't manage to become improved invisible and flying first).

 

[NewJeffCT]

At least in my experience, this was the case. Most of the restrictions removed from casters in 3e were either explicitly or implicitly house ruled away in the 2e games I played in (i.e. the rules for interrupting casters weren't ignored, it's just that monsters would always attack the melee guy standing guard rather than the wizard, if the wizard didn't manage to become improved invisible and flying first).

hmm, in my 1e/2e experience, it didn't always run that way. Sure, the "dumb" monsters like goblins and orcs would attack the big guy with the sword, but the more intelligent bad guys would try to take out the casters first. I guess that's why the change to 3E was huge for me. We had a lot of caster-interruptus in old school days.

But, I do agree that some things that came out in 3E were already houseruled for 2E - level limits demi-humans, for example, and we kind of hand-waved spell prep time. But, I don't think we ever added as many extra spells as 3E casters got.

That said, I ran a 2 1/2 year long 3.5E campaign for a big group of gamers, and the melee/martial types were rarely overshadowed by the casters. Sure, there may have been an individual encounter where the cleric or psion hit the "We win" button to essentially short-circuit the encounter, but there were also encounters where the barbarian, rogue or dwarf made a key hit and practically won the encounter as well. But, I guess that since the wizard, cleric and psion didn't outshine everybody else, I was doing something wrong.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

To me, the biggest tell on the 3E front is that you can run a mid-level game where all the full spell casters must multi-class at or near a 50/50 mix with non spell casters (or at least different spell casters that don't stack with the first class)--and you'll get a more functional game. This doesn't work so hot below 6th or 7th level, but after that it does. Given how weak a cleric5/wizard5 or fighter5/wizard5 (to pick some at random) is compared to a full caster, that's just pitiful. Solve the problem of the escalating saving throws, and it becomes even more true.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

At least in my experience, this was the case. Most of the restrictions removed from casters in 3e were either explicitly or implicitly house ruled away in the 2e games I played in (i.e. the rules for interrupting casters weren't ignored, it's just that monsters would always attack the melee guy standing guard rather than the wizard, if the wizard didn't manage to become improved invisible and flying first).

That wasn't my experience pre 3E. Interruptions were a really big deal, and intelligent enemies would always try for an interrupt. We did have some house rules in place that might have affected this though: spells started on initiative and continued through initiative plus cast time. Damage prior to cast meant no spell this round. Interrupt during cast meant loss of spell.

 

[Zardnaar]

I might buy D&DN I might not. See how it goes.

 

[Bluenose]

That wasn't my experience pre 3E. Interruptions were a really big deal, and intelligent enemies would always try for an interrupt. We did have some house rules in place that might have affected this though: spells started on initiative and continued through initiative plus cast time. Damage prior to cast meant no spell this round. Interrupt during cast meant loss of spell.

I don't think that's a house rule. As far as I remember that's exactly how it was meant to play. Though arguably all it took to interrupt casting was a hit, even one that didn't do damage.

 

[Balesir]

That said, I ran a 2 1/2 year long 3.5E campaign for a big group of gamers, and the melee/martial types were rarely overshadowed by the casters. Sure, there may have been an individual encounter where the cleric or psion hit the "We win" button to essentially short-circuit the encounter, but there were also encounters where the barbarian, rogue or dwarf made a key hit and practically won the encounter as well. But, I guess that since the wizard, cleric and psion didn't outshine everybody else, I was doing something wrong.

I would say that indicates that you were doing something right, rather than something wrong - but that misses the point, somewhat. My issue with running 3.x is not that you can't work around all the imbalances; absolutely you can, and I did so on occasion (and played in a game where the GM did so, too). My issue is the effort this sucks up. I found I spent a large chunk of preparation time rigging encounters and situations so that (a) the spellcasters couldn't too easily circumvent the mysteries, blow the surprises and neutralise the dilemmas, and (b) there were likely to be opportunities for the "mundane" characters to show their stuff.

A large part of why I enjoy running 4E is that I don't have to futz about with that stuff - I just set up what seems fun and fits.

 

[NewJeffCT]

I would say that indicates that you were doing something right, rather than something wrong - but that misses the point, somewhat. My issue with running 3.x is not that you can't work around all the imbalances; absolutely you can, and I did so on occasion (and played in a game where the GM did so, too). My issue is the effort this sucks up. I found I spent a large chunk of preparation time rigging encounters and situations so that (a) the spellcasters couldn't too easily circumvent the mysteries, blow the surprises and neutralise the dilemmas, and (b) there were likely to be opportunities for the "mundane" characters to show their stuff.

A large part of why I enjoy running 4E is that I don't have to futz about with that stuff - I just set up what seems fun and fits.

I agree on that being a drawback in 3E - it was also a drawback in 1E as well, especially when half the group were multi-classed demi-humans. You could be a human fighter level 3, or an elf fighter 2/magic-user 2. Of course, the elf was better, even though they had the same overall XP. You had to design encounters where the superior non-humans wouldn't always outshine the weaker humans.

But, after my 3.5E game, I ran a 2 year long 4E game and ended up finding encounters bland on my end as DM. For a Solo bad guy, it was Round 1: Daily Power, Action Power, Recharge Power; Round 2: Check if recharge power works; Encounter Power; Action Point; At-Will (or Recharge if it recharged); then from rounds 3 until the end (round 8, 9, 10, 11?) , it was just At-Will after At-Will while hoping for a Recharge for variety. However, it was vastly easier to prepare, and it allowed me to develop the story and NPCs more and also work on more role-playing opportunities. (gasp! more R/P with 4E??)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I agree on that being a drawback in 3E - it was also a drawback in 1E as well, especially when half the group were multi-classed demi-humans. You could be a human fighter level 3, or an elf fighter 2/magic-user 2. Of course, the elf was better, even though they had the same overall XP. You had to design encounters where the superior non-humans wouldn't always outshine the weaker humans.

Yeah, ftr/mu was pretty much always better, unless you were playing beyond level 12 where the elves stopped advancing. TBH though there wasn't even that much difference between a ftr 9/mu 12 and a mu 18.

But, after my 3.5E game, I ran a 2 year long 4E game and ended up finding encounters bland on my end as DM. For a Solo bad guy, it was Round 1: Daily Power, Action Power, Recharge Power; Round 2: Check if recharge power works; Encounter Power; Action Point; At-Will (or Recharge if it recharged); then from rounds 3 until the end (round 8, 9, 10, 11?) , it was just At-Will after At-Will while hoping for a Recharge for variety. However, it was vastly easier to prepare, and it allowed me to develop the story and NPCs more and also work on more role-playing opportunities. (gasp! more R/P with 4E??)

Hmmmm, as opposed to what? Your 1e red dragon, rounds 1-3 breath, round 4+ claw/claw/bite. Clearly in neither case is it the rolling of dice and delivering of hits that is the fun part. A 4e dragon that just sits there and dukes it out is no more or less boring than a 1e dragon that does the same thing. I guess the moral of the story might be that the system can't make things exciting.

I would say that indicates that you were doing something right, rather than something wrong - but that misses the point, somewhat. My issue with running 3.x is not that you can't work around all the imbalances; absolutely you can, and I did so on occasion (and played in a game where the GM did so, too). My issue is the effort this sucks up. I found I spent a large chunk of preparation time rigging encounters and situations so that (a) the spellcasters couldn't too easily circumvent the mysteries, blow the surprises and neutralise the dilemmas, and (b) there were likely to be opportunities for the "mundane" characters to show their stuff.

A large part of why I enjoy running 4E is that I don't have to futz about with that stuff - I just set up what seems fun and fits.

I think there's a continuum in terms of differences in tactics. One system gives you more variable results, and since say a group of thieves will lack many things they would need to go beat up on a group of orcs, they won't. They'll probably pick some other tactic. In 4e this choice can also be presented, but its quite possible you will have a situation where EVERY party will just go beat up on the orcs. I think ideally the next iteration of 4e would tick the dial back one notch. I think in the most ideal game you'd be able to make more of a trade between combat and other tactics, and strategic preparation would be a little more encouraged.