Do you think 6 months are enough for playtesting?

[Shadeydm]

Its plenty of time, after all the new edition books will come out in 08 we will buy them and pay to properly playtest the game for them for for the next 4-5 years. Then they can gather all our feedback, fix the game and sell it to us all over again with a new number appearing before the E.

 

[Jhaelen]

Plus, a lot of what's happening in 4E has been previewed in 3E and SAGA, so those concepts have already seen playtesting.

Yup. None of the 'new' tidbits they leaked so far sounded revolutionary to me. We've already seen everything in a very similar incarnation in previous systems (ToB, MM5, UA, etc.).

 

[Fifth Element]

Have a look at the playtester list for 3rd Ed. than have a look at the spells that got changed in 3.5 and you see what I mean (polymorph, haste, harm and the likes).

Yes, but for 3rd edition they had a lot of external playtesting before 3.0 came out. And yet, they still found many things to change for 3.5. If so much external playtesting was necessary, why would these changed have occurred?

The simple fact is that you'll never be able to have as much playtesting as you'll have actual play. They've been doing internal testing for some time, and will have several months of external testing. I doubt there's much value in having more than that.

 

[RangerWickett]

Very very true, I think.

Simply reading any 4e thread here shows that there are as many divergent opinions as players. If they tried to please ALL their potential clients, at the end they will get no one pleased.

Horacio! Long time no see, man. Lured back by 4e?

And we all know that WotC has secretly been observing the judging habits of the ENnies judges in an attempt to create a game that is 'perfect' for them. They miscalculated, and assumed diaglo would be re-elected, so for a while 4e was not going to be d20, but rather 3d6 (roll in order, d6 for hit points).

 

[Mouseferatu]

They miscalculated, and assumed diaglo would be re-elected, so for a while 4e was not going to be d20, but rather 3d6 (roll in order, d6 for hit points).

Good God, man! Don't even joke about that!

*shudder*

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Does anyone know how long the external playtest for 3E was? Is Piratecat hanging around this forum (he'd have an idea)?

 

[Horacio]

Horacio! Long time no see, man. Lured back by 4e?

Exactly, RangerWicket, when I saw the news about 4e I knew that I needed to be back here

To keep in topic, still no word about how playtesters will be chosen?

 

[heirodule]

Chris Tulach, content guy for RPGA, said that at DDXP (end of feb) you can play a "final" version of 4e in a preview of the Living Realms campaign.

Which means theres even less time

 

[heirodule]

It looks short, very short. And then they will need to edit the whole thing...
It reminds me of early 3.0, when some supplement used rules that had been scrapped at last minute (monsters of faerun rules for lycantropy were older than in the MM by example).

I think I will wait for a reprint of the PHB1

And then 3.5 books (Libris Mortis) used 3.0isms that were gone.

Sigh....

 

[Ian Demagi]

6 months enough?

No way

and testing mostly through RPGA? It has been my experience that the best games are not RPGA.

Who you really want testing are the guy & gals who have been playing the game for 10 -15 years. They are a loyal core group , and have long experience on what is game breaking.

my 2 cps

Ian