Dead Christmas Trees!! Woot!!

[Tharen the Damned]

Just think back to 05. Who designed Irone Heroes, the alternate Players Handbook for Malhavoc Press?
Yes, it was Mike Mearls!
My guess is that he takes much of his design ideas for IH to 4th ed.

Now I am exited too.

 

[WhatGravitas]

Every Arthur needs his Excalibur, but being dependent on your "stuff" was 3e's greatest fault in my mind. You couldn't ever feel heroic when your character could be nerfed by taking his equipment.

This makes me so happy.

Me too. And this allows more fun (MIC-like) items: Less mechanical stuff, more quirky magic items!

Characters become cooler, DMs can put weirde stuff in, without risking that the players will sell everything!

Happy!

Cheers, LT.

 

[howandwhy99]

I only hope they now evaluate Character Power in terms of both Character Level (CL) and Character Wealth (CW). My groups' PCs can lose their wealth just as they can earn far beyond the "norm". I'd like to reward them for the challenges they face taking those differences into account.

 

[Cadfan]

They could simplify down the number of magic items just by getting rid of "standard issue" magical equipment other than weapons and armor.

Gloves of Dexterity, for example, were essentially standard issue. Same with Belts of Strength. And Cloaks of Resistance. The Cloak slot was almost worthless past a certain point, because everyone had an identical cloak of resistance.

Eliminating the need for these items would do a lot to reduce the number of magic items characters carry about.

If I tell you I have a level 15 fighter in 3.5 who uses a sword and shield, with just that information you can probably guess one of my rings, my amulet, my cloak, my belt, and my gloves. Its going to be, Ring of Protection, Amulet of Natural Armor, Cloak of Resistance, Belt of Strength, and Gloves of Dexterity. Kill those items and we could get somewhere.

Once you've cut back there, you can spend time making the remaining items useful. Its always better to be Johann, Wielder of the Stoneshatter Maul, then to be Johann who's got a +3 hammer and is looking to pawn it to get a +4.

 

[Doug McCrae]

The quote is

the "christmas tree" effect, whereby characters are loaded down with magic items, buff spells and other magical effects was one of the designers' goals to remove.

This could mean that in 4e PCs will have a few items, equal in power to the many small items previously carried. Perhaps instead of a PC having a +1 weapon, a +2 save booster and three +1 AC boosters, he will carry a single +4 weapon. If this is the case, characters would still be just as dependent on gear as they were in 3e.

 

[Mallus]

Getting rid of items is tougher. Are they going to knock down the suggested wealth-by-level to the point where a "stock" character just can't afford to buy good equipment at mid-level?

They're going to make (some? most?) of the bonuses/powers currently granted by items into level-based class/racial abilities. Simple.

Instead of finding 'new toys in the field' you'll find 'new depths of quasi-magical badassery in yourself'. Or your characters self. Something like that.

 

[drothgery]

Gloves of Dexterity, for example, were essentially standard issue. Same with Belts of Strength. And Cloaks of Resistance. The Cloak slot was almost worthless past a certain point, because everyone had an identical cloak of resistance.

Well, identical vests of resistance if you could get them; nothing much else used the vest/shirt slot. On the other hand Cloaks of displacement are useful for everyone, and the only reason not to wear one is if you need a cloak of charisma.

 

[Merkuri]

It sounds to me like they are trying to eliminate the problem where the main source of a character's power was their items. For example, at higher levels, a fighter is pretty much useless if he does not have a magic weapon. I think the fighter was the class that suffered the most from this.

So they're not trying to take away magic items, they're just trying to take away a character's reliance on magic items. If I were a game designer given this task, I think what I would do would be to remove the boring "+x to attribute y" items altogether. No more +1 longswords or gloves of dexterity. The magic items that remain would be the fun and quirky items that characters in 3e never use because they'd take up slots that could be filled by the obviously preferrable "+x to attribute y" items.

I think also taking away DR, or making it much less frequent, would be a good plan, too, but mostly I want to be encouraged to find a way to use a use for things like hat of disguise, necklace of adaptation, or cloak of the manta ray. In 3e it's just too tempting to fill those slots with headband of intelect, amulet of natural armor, and cloak of resistence.

 

[The_Gneech]

I'll be very interested to see how they handle this. My guess is they'll use the "equipment bonus or your inherent bonus" that armor follows in SWSE. Also, rising damage/level replacing iterative attacks makes DR much less of an issue.

-The Gneech

 

[Irda Ranger]

To the question of whether XP will be required to make magic items Andy Collins replied, "No, Hell No." How magic items will be made in character wasn't discussed beyond a vague statement that you wouldn't be burning a feat on it, and out of character the structure of magic item creation will become more loosened.

Sweet! I'm liking this more and more.

Hopefully the phrase "wealth by level" will never, ever be uttered again. I must have traveled back in time, because I'm rocking like Marty McFly in 1985! Old school, baby.

I don't fetishize older editions of D&D (like Diaglo), but they did do some things right. Ring of the Ram, shizzam! Cloak of the Bat is where it's at!