Do you consider 4e D&D "newbie teeball"?

[BryonD]

I haven't seen him personally for a while, but I understand he's still in the area and has crossed paths with some of my coworkers now and again. He's not much of a self-promoter, though, and he seemed disinterested in continuing with the RPG industry, so I'm not sure what he's been working on or anything.

Thanks

We were friends in high school, many many years ago.

 

[Filcher]

I think I could cede that 4e is newbie tee-ball if folks also agree that 3.5 is janggi for doddering retirees.

 

[Voadam]

But in my group, the rules of 3.x changed the group to be rules lawyers by (IMO) encouraging the rule for everything mindset and the DM plays by the same rules as the characters mindset.

We never had that problem in 2E or earlier, and we don't have that problem with 4E either.

Heh, so our different groups are not based on prior edition experience and the random uniqueness of every other monster and magic in AD&D.

My brother and I got into a 20 minute angry argument once in the middle of a 1e/2e game about an ambiguity of how backstab worked. Angry enough to make all of our other friends real uncomfortable at the time. I finally said this is how I'm ruling as DM, we can talk about it more after the game if you want but that's how it is right now. Let's get back to the game.

I think that was the point when we consciously decided it was better to avoid stopping the game to argue rules issues. Since then if we think the DM is making a rules error we might point it out ("Uhh, wand use doesn't normally provoke AoOs") but accept "I'm ruling this way now and we can talk it over after the game" as ending the discussion and directing us back to playing the game.

I feel our games are the better for it.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

Because it is trivially easy to follow the rules in 3e to get to such an end point and what is important in both 3e and 4e is the utility of the end point not the exact explanation of how you get there.

I think both matter. I agree that what 4e has taught me is exactly that...the utility of the endpoint is what is important.

But everything in the 3e books kept telling me the opposite. It wasn't important what the end AC of a monster was. It mattered that they were built on the same rules at the PCs so as to keep things fair. I bought into it completely. OBVIOUSLY it was balanced. Because everything the PCs could do or get, so could monsters. If the PCs can scour books looking for that feat to give them just ONE more point of AC, so could the monsters.

It made sense for an Ogre to have an AC of 13 because they were big and slow and rarely wore armor. This balanced out their large strength and hitpoints. It also made perfect sense for that Ogre to get an AC of 21 by putting on Full Plate. After all, if the PCs could do it, it was balanced for the Ogre. The game told me that was perfectly fair...even if an 8 point difference in AC could be enough to cause a TPK. It might be a little cheesy...but it was legal.

What you really meant by unfair was significantly tougher than baseline. It doesn't really matter how trivially easy in 3e it is to follow the 3e rules and get an AC of 36. It also presumably wouldn't fly in 4e to say "It's a level 10 monster, it has appropriate defenses for it's level. There's no rules for what AC it can have. This one is higher than normal." since "if you come across some custom monster that manages to have 10 more AC than every other monster anywhere near its [CRLevel]...well, it feels like it isn't fair anymore. Of course you're going to lose....even if it IS legal."

I agree. But the difference is that in 4e the rules say "Use this table, adjust it one or two points away from the baseline, but never more than that or you'll likely kill everyone."

So, I expect every monster I fight to be within 1 or 2 points of the baseline in 4e. And yes, you are right, I would call a DM on a monster who was 10 points above normal.

In 3e, I didn't expect any particular AC. I knew that it was perfectly legal and plausible that a monster had an AC of 30 as a CR 5 creature. Sure, that meant that no one in the party could hit it except on natural 20s. It was cheap...but fair. As long as the rules allowed it, we were playing the game the way it was intended. Can't complain about that. Well, we could complain about that if the DM just made stuff up. After all, it probably isn't immediately apparently how the monster got 30 AC. But if the DM can say "He's got a shield spell up because he had an Ioun Stone borrowed to him that lets him cast a spell out of it. Plus, his Full Plate was enchanted to +3 by his 14th level cleric ally who ran off before you got there." then you can say "Oh...we lost badly...but it was fair because he had the help of a powerful Cleric...of COURSE we lost. And we could have done the same thing back to him if only we had a powerful Cleric ally."

It meant that some combats were extremely easy and others were way too hard for their CR. I could get annoyed at my DM a little for trying to kill us and not giving us enough XP to make up for it. But I couldn't complain that the DM was running the game wrong. It's not entirely his fault if he's just following the rules, right?

If AC 36 is too high and feels like a cheap shot unbeatable monster to your players it does not matter whether it is in 4e or 3e, whether it was created on the fly, came out of a book, or followed a formula.

It does. In the same way it matters whether you get 200 dollars for passing Go in Monopoly. If you don't get the $200, the game can still be played. It'll be a slightly different game, but the game doesn't suddenly break down because of a slight change in rules.

But you aren't playing the same game any longer. You can no longer claim that you are the best at Monopoly when you do really well with your new rules. You can't entirely be sure you'd be just as good with the real rules.

For me, it's always in the back of my mind that I may be winning...but would I be winning if the DM was playing fair using the rules exactly as written. If the DM decided 25 was a fair AC for a CR 10 creature and I look later and find quite a few examples of AC 28 CR 10 creatures....would we still have won if it had AC 28?

I suppose it's because I trust game designers more than I do DMs. I know a DM will VERY likely make a mistake when "estimating". I've seen it over and over again. DMs giving powerful artifacts that would unbalance a level 20 group to 1st level characters while claiming that it will have no effect on their game at all. Are these the people I was deciding randomly what the AC of the creature is? At least if they are following the rules in the book, I know that someone who knew what they were doing sat down and thought about those rules for a LONG time and came up with the "best" answer they could come up with. If a DM follows those rules, they should succeed no matter how smart they are.

It's just that I figure game designers had to have a job interview, qualifications, a team of people checking their work, playtests and so on. The DM running my game could sniff glue in his spare time for all I know. Most of the time, DMs get the job because no one else wants it.

 

[Oryan77]

3.5 is janggi for doddering retirees.

I don't know what janggi or doddering is....but if it has to do with being extremely charming and good with the ladies, I agree with you 100%!

Doesn't everyone know that 3.5 players are the best looking D&D players out of every edition?

 

[Garthanos]

I don't know what janggi or doddering is...

Dang it how can you be insulted with an attitude like that ;-)
ummm I think comparing looks with other D&D players is shooting at low apples ;-)... one should be shooting at WOD players after all they got them goth girls and boys upping there style quotient, snicker.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

My brother and I got into a 20 minute angry argument once in the middle of a 1e/2e game about an ambiguity of how backstab worked. Angry enough to make all of our other friends real uncomfortable at the time.

Yep, this was my group in 1e/2e.

I think that was the point when we consciously decided it was better to avoid stopping the game to argue rules issues.

I wish. We never decided this. Because we had enough people who were really passionate about their point of view. If one player felt his character could backstab in the middle of combat, he was going to argue that point until the DM changed his mind. The rest of our group felt it was best to argue until the point was resolved so we wouldn't have to go through the same argument next week. Plus, each of them had an opinion about how it should work and wanted it known.

Most of our arguments were about "realism" though. It was always "I can jump this far because I say so"/"No you can't, that's WAY too far to jump", "I think I should be able to grab someone and throw them over a cliff with a Str check"/"I think it takes more than just Str to throw someone over".

That's why we loved 3e so much. It had rules for all the things we used to argue about because there were no rules for them.

Of course, it didn't take long before we realized that more rules meant more rules issues. Did the free attack from Improved Trip happen before or after you get up? Could you stand in another person's space while attacking using Dervish Dance? If you knocked someone prone with an AOO while they were charging, what happened to their actions for the round? How did that monster get the ability to attack 4 times in one round?

Our arguments became a lot shorter and less based on subjective opinion and instead were based on trying to find pages in the books with rules we could use to support our arguments. But they were still there.

 

[Voadam]

I suppose it's because I trust game designers more than I do DMs. I know a DM will VERY likely make a mistake when "estimating". I've seen it over and over again. DMs giving powerful artifacts that would unbalance a level 20 group to 1st level characters while claiming that it will have no effect on their game at all. Are these the people I was deciding randomly what the AC of the creature is? At least if they are following the rules in the book, I know that someone who knew what they were doing sat down and thought about those rules for a LONG time and came up with the "best" answer they could come up with. If a DM follows those rules, they should succeed no matter how smart they are.

It's just that I figure game designers had to have a job interview, qualifications, a team of people checking their work, playtests and so on. The DM running my game could sniff glue in his spare time for all I know. Most of the time, DMs get the job because no one else wants it.

Heh.

Here's how it worked for me and the little bits of freelance game writing I did.

1 No job interview, I simply saw publisher solicitations for things like items for GURPS Magic Items III, monsters for Creature Collection III or Penumbra Fantasy Bestiary, and spells for Relics and Rituals II.

2 Qualifications, I'm familiar with 3e D&D and GURPS, have ideas for relevant stuff, and can write.

3 People checking my work, usually one editor from the company, maybe more.

4 Playtests, most stuff no. A few monsters were used in my home games.

5 I never sniffed glue.

 

[rjdafoe]

Heh, so our different groups are not based on prior edition experience and the random uniqueness of every other monster and magic in AD&D.

My brother and I got into a 20 minute angry argument once in the middle of a 1e/2e game about an ambiguity of how backstab worked. Angry enough to make all of our other friends real uncomfortable at the time. I finally said this is how I'm ruling as DM, we can talk about it more after the game if you want but that's how it is right now. Let's get back to the game.

I think that was the point when we consciously decided it was better to avoid stopping the game to argue rules issues. Since then if we think the DM is making a rules error we might point it out ("Uhh, wand use doesn't normally provoke AoOs") but accept "I'm ruling this way now and we can talk it over after the game" as ending the discussion and directing us back to playing the game.

I feel our games are the better for it.

I am glad that you guys could do that in 3.x. For some reason, my group could not. I attribute it to 3.x actually.

The more we played, the more that came out, the more rules people memorized, the worse it got.

I think alot of my group got into finding ways to use the rules to their advantage to an obsession. It was more about rules than about real gaming. For some reason, we could not get out of that slump.

It also made the DMs job REAL hard. We were constantly looking up rules, becuase (as I said) we were more concerned with the rules, than the actual game. It was a mini-game in a game. Character optimization led to DM monster/NPC optimization just to be able to keep up.

Of course, that is just my groups experience. I think 4E was a breath of fresh air, and alot of us realized what exactly we really were doing during the 3.x era. Yes, we could have recognized it and played 3.x differently, but like I said, we fell into (what I call) the mini-game within 3.x.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I'm not arguing right or wrong here, just pointing out differences. But this instantly reminded me of our recent debate regarding CMDs in Pathfinder.

To me an RPG feels disappointing when the monster doesn't feel like the monster it is supposed to be. I would never make the two statements you made. To me it is a very different approach to gaming, with, apparently, a different goal for how it is enjoyed. There must be many many points of commonality. But, clearly, there are differences.

I kinda get that, but I think there are easier ways to make a monster feel just like I want it to feel.

"The Birds" - Level 4 Skirmisher
A large flock of birds is sitting on trees and buildings nearby. As you approach, they suddenly all fly into air, building a large, dark mass - and fly towards you.
[sblock]Large natural beast (swarm) - 250 XP
Initiative +8, Senses: Perception +4, low-light vision
Claws and Beaks: Aura 1; any enemy that starts its turn within the aura takes 5 damage.
HP 53, Bloodied 21
AC 19, Fort 12, Ref 17, Will 17
Resist: Half damage from melee and ranged attacks
Vulnerable 5 against close and area attacks
Speed: 3, fly 8 (hover)
(Basic): Swarm Attack (standard, at-will)
+7 vs Reflex, 14+2 damage and the target is blinded until the end of "The Birds" next turn.
Scattering of Feathers (immediate reacton, when first bloodied, encounter)
"The Birds" break apart into its constitution birds and cannot be attacked until the end of its next turn, at which point it reforms in any space within 5 squares of the space it vacated.
Mass of Feathers
"The Birds" block line of sight. Creatures entirely in its space are blinded.
Alignment: Unaligned
Str 4 (-1), Dex18 (+6), Wis 13 (+4),
Con 9 (+1), Int 3 (-1), Cha 6(+0)
Retrademarked by the Attorney General of London. (= stolen and modified from the latest Dungeon article)
[/sblock]
This "monster" just feels right. It does everything I would want a large mass of birds that suddenly decided to take it out on the hapless characters should feel. I especially love the "Scattering of Feathers".
I don't need to play around with Hit Dice or skill points. I don't need feats. I don't need equipment. I really just need the concept of a swarm and some ideas how to model the idea of the swarm scattering and reforming itself. I don't really want to think about "what can the AC realistically be?" I just give it a level and that throws out all the numbers I need. I can focus on the creative part. Or, well, maybe Robert J. Schwalb had to.