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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="brislove" data-source="post: 3973095" data-attributes="member: 49861">I love anime, I have seen many different ones, and own quite a few.I think the names are cool for the most part. "Five-Shadow creeping ice enervation strike" is fun to say. I don't particularly mind these names, nor would I mind Robilar's Gambit, or mordenkain's disjunction. These things don't bother me.That said I prefer "Mage's Disjunction" in my core books. I would like to avoid names based on individuals, or names with an obvious feel towards EITHER east or west. I like a couple "flowery" here and there on higher level maneuvers to set them apart from the norm. I think these names should have the feel of their class. If you have a monk learning "serpent strike" thats ok, if you have a Knight learning "five-shadow Creeping Ice enervation Strike" thats messed up.Onto Games:Respec's: Ultima Online was a skill based game, if you wanted a different skill you ground it up. Dark age of camelot DID have respecs, and was out prior to Psychic reformation. Did they add this to D&D based on the video game, probably. Was the reason to be more like a video game, heck no.I doubt I'm the only person that has ever wanted to play a different character, or try something different with one of their characters. I also doubt I'm the only DM who has watched a player roll up the same character with 2 feats different and a different name because a new splat book came out. With the advent of these additional books (and the length of campagins) it is only natural that WOTC would create an in-game method to allow you to attain these new feats/powers ect. I think this would have happened even without respec'ing in video games prior to the 3.5 XPH.Final Fantasy: Characters get "knocked out" when they die, they die. FFtactics advance is a good example of this. there were 2 places on the map that weren't protected with (effectively) subdual damage. if you died in those, you died. Also Raise dead was in D&D before it was anywhere else.Talents are straight up from diablo and WoW, BUT THEY ARE GOOD! they allow you to customize your character to play the way you want to. Talents are ultimately just an advanced version of feats/skills. D&D has pretty much always been "first" and then Games adapt the D&D principals and streamline them. D&D in turn uses that feed-back and streamlines these same basic ideas and polishes them more. It is a cycle, but D&D and TSR started it.People tend to call things "stealing" from whatever source they found it in first. Ultimately anything that wotc "stole" is really just an update that some other company play-tested for them. Nearly All RPGs are based in D&D at the root, thats what being first does. I'm sure there were things before D&D, but D&D was the first really successful RPG.WOTC is trying to do the best thing they can for D&D. Streamline the game, this is something that video games have always done with RPGs. no dice, no calculations, it tells you when you have to choose a feat/talent/skill/whatever. This is something that is good The easier the game is to pick-up and play, the more people will play it. More people is a positive change. yes they cater to kids/animefans/video gamers a bit more, because thats how you attract a NEW market. World of Warcraft shattered all the barriers, it's rarely considered dorky anymore. World of warcraft is a superior product, that catered to multiple markets. It's cartoony looking, this caters to kids, it uses warcraft backstory, this brings in Real time strategy players. It's easy to pick-up and play, leveling is quick an easy (as MMOs go) so anyone can play. The quests are fun, varied and challenging enough to be rewarding but also doable for those not in the top 100 guilds in the world. They attracted all these groups, not catering primarily to the hardcore MMOers. The reason is simple, Blizzard produced a superior game-system, talent system, and raid system. They listen to their players and added solid PVP, 5-man and smaller raid number content. They have the best product on the market game-play wise, so they didn't HAVE to appeal to everyone for looks/difficulty because the game itself is better.If you want a link between wow and 4e it's this: They will provide "fluff" looks,names, ect. to attract new groups, and they will create a superior GAME to keep the players they have and the new ones who try it out.4e art: it's pretty, colorful, obnoxious, but grabs attention. This will make people interested who weren't before. Those who don't like it and play now, will play for the rules.4e system: It's streamlined, faster, and easier for everyone. A group of new players should be able to pick it up, read through a bit, and learn as they play. I expect pre-generated characters (completely) in the PHB. This will get those new players to actually PLAY instead of try, get frustrated and quit.Is D&D following World of Warcraft? I hope so, I would like to play a superior product that has  a ton of players. Ultimately a game is nothing without players, more players=more gaming.</blockquote>

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