Forked Thread: Disappointed in 4e; 4e upgrade or new game??

[Crazy Jerome]

I don't know what marketing other people were seeing, but I had a pretty darn good idea that 4E was a new game, even radically new in places. I wouldn't have bothered to buy it if it weren't. (And in fact, wasn't planning on buying it, because for a long time I expected it to be too much like 3.5.)

 

[Janx]

my experience is this:

I started with mail-ordering 2e. They shipped us the 1e PH, and the 2E DMG. My friend got the 1e MM1 & MM2 from someone else.

My first PC was a Fighter-Thief half-elf from 1e PH. A few weeks later, we upgraded to 2e, when I got the correct PH I ordered.

Note, keywords, upgraded. I corrected for the differences in rules (multi-classing and thief skills) and we kept playing. We played for 2 years using the old 1E monster manuals, before we got the 2e MC's.

Definitely compatible enough with each other, that the upgrade mentality worked.

When 3e came out, we upgraded again (and WotC provided conversion documents).

The biggest difference between 1e, 2e, and 3e was how they handled skills. Changes to spells were trivial (look up the new spell description, big deal).

When 4e came out, WotC advised people to start new PCs. At this point, it was a new game. The spells were significantly different. Character classes were not remotely the same.

 

[Mallus]

I tend to think of the D&D rules as the tools used to make the game, not the game itself. Each campaign is the game.

So 4e is a new set of tools for building the same D&D-style fantasy role-playing experience.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

It was THE fundamental shift of 3e. In all other editions, class defined the character. In 3e, it was a suite of abilities.

Maybe in your games, not in ours. There is no real difference between the overarching class system from 1Ed to 3Ed. Each class is a bundle of abilities- whether the PC is bound by them is a matter of RP.

1. "My DM won't allow me to play it" is not part of a core to core comparison of editions. One of my players is quite happily playing a gnome barbarian that he played throughout 3e.

Sure it is- playing non-PHB races is purely a matter of DM's option. There isn't a standard rule to allow it.

Core to Core, there is no gnome barbarian in the PHB. End of story. That someone H-Red 4Ed to allow a gnome barbarian is just that- a house rule.

Furthermore, as we start seeing articles and previews coming down the Dragon pipeline, they're even changing the rules as to how (at least some) MM races can be played from the initial Core release- see the new rules about playing a Minotaur. If they'd gotten it right the first time, they wouldn't be revising it within the first year of play. The rules for playing races from the MM were apparently just an under-playtested afterthought.

6. The concept is not the class. What was the purpose of your 3e PC with 8 classes? If your whole concept is merely a collection of mechanics designed for uber awesomeness, yeah, you might find it a bit difficult. But if your wide ranging multiclassed character is actually built around an RP based concept, it's hard to imagine you can't make it work in 4e.

To look at the PCs where I massively multiclass, not a one is about being über. I know you have only my word for it, but anyone who has seen any of my long list of posts Re character development will back me up when I say this: I'm 100% about the RP, about using the game mechanics to make a given RPG character as close to the idealized version floating in my head. If that means the character is suboptimal, so be it. If it means he's "superman," so be it.

And that goes back to 1Ed.

From 1985 on, I've played a Drow Rgr/Dr/MU- admittedly, not a core build (it used optional rules from Dragon), but it fit the PC concept, so bear with me while I make my point. The original PC was primarily a shapechanging spellcaster (mostly transmutation spells) with a host of wilderness skills. Due to campaign level limits (it was a high-level campaign), when he was translated into 3.X, I had to drop the Ranger bit, making him a Druid/SpecWiz Transmuter. The 3.X Druid class gave him ample fighting and nature skills to keep him analogous to the original incarnation.

In 4Ed? With no Transmuter specialization and no Druid class with all of its inherent wilderness flavor- oh yeah, and no shapechanging- this PC would have to have been so radically altered as to be unrecognizable.

So why did I bring up a non-core 1Ed PC build? Well (but for the Drow part), he became core in 3Ed, yet 2/3 rds of his original core classes (present in each previous edition of the game) don't even appear in 4Ed...namely the 2 classes that remained from the original PC concept. The shapechanging non-blaster mage- an idea at least as old as Merlin (the PC's original inspiration)- is just an odd corner case that nobody would want to play on rollout day as far as 4Ed is concerned.

And as for PCs created new for 3.X? If you sat at our game table watching our group go through RttToEE, you'd have seen my 4-classed PC not doing all that much until 8th level; generally a joke at the table. It wasn't until late in the campaign that he gained any real respect.

IOW, hardly über.

But since his base class was SpecWiz Diviner...hardly extant in 4Ed.

If the problem is just a refusal on your part to apply your imagination or creativity (as in, hey, you can't reflavor things), then there's really no point.

We're not talking reflavoring, not H-Ring. We're talking RAW, out of the box comparisons of Core to Core.

But this is a game of imagination. If you're unwilling to bend and only want to highlight "differences" to complain about 4e, then there isn't much that can be said.

The differences are THE reason why a 20+ year campaign cannot be converted to 4Ed. Its not just my PCs, its the majority of them- every single player in the campaign has made the same complaint. Its why we're not moving on.

Its not D&D to us because to "upgrade" to it would kill a campaign older than someone who just had his first legal swig of Johnny Walker Red.

A concept should have legs outside of the mechanics of any system. A character is represented by the mechanics of a system, not defined by them.

The system shouldn't hack off the legs of a PC concept. Core 4Ed doesn't really support the nature-themed PC- that's why they're putting them in a supplement.

 

[RFisher]

When 3e came out, we upgraded again (and WotC provided conversion documents).

The biggest difference between 1e, 2e, and 3e was how they handled skills. Changes to spells were trivial (look up the new spell description, big deal).

When 4e came out, WotC advised people to start new PCs. At this point, it was a new game. The spells were significantly different. Character classes were not remotely the same.

My impression is that they didn’t provide a conversion for 4e because of the negative feedback they got about the 3e conversion they published.

Based on what I saw among groups who tried to convert → 3e, I advised people at the time to start new PCs rather than convert. For a few groups conversion went well. For many, it didn’t.

 

[Thasmodious]

Maybe in your games, not in ours. There is no real difference between the overarching class system from 1Ed to 3Ed. Each class is a bundle of abilities- whether the PC is bound by them is a matter of RP.

It's not a gameplay issue, its in the system. The conclusion you draw when evaluating the game systems is that, in 3e, the class/level relationship has shifted. Levels are a commodity in 3e, and at each one you choose a class. It's step 1 in the level up rules. The multiclassing rules are built for diping into classes for a suite of abilities. Anything you add to that in regards to story or RP is your own.

Sure it is- playing non-PHB races is purely a matter of DM's option. There isn't a standard rule to allow it.

Core to Core, there is no gnome barbarian in the PHB. End of story. That someone H-Red 4Ed to allow a gnome barbarian is just that- a house rule.

Core doesn't mean PHB only. There is a section in th MM with rules for playing a number of races not given the full treatment in the PHB. It is not a house rule to play a gnome. Calling your fighter a barbarian is not a houserule either. It's a title. He was a gnome fighter, at first.

If they'd gotten it right the first time, they wouldn't be revising it within the first year of play. The rules for playing races from the MM were apparently just an under-playtested afterthought.

No. They explain this in the books. They gave brief write ups for a number of playable races in the MM. They intended to give these races the full treatment in supplements down the road. The first was Warforged in Dragon. It has nothing to do with playtesting or revisions.

To look at the PCs where I massively multiclass, not a one is about being über. I know you have only my word for it

I don't doubt you at all. But that makes your stubborn unwillingess to treat 4e characters the same way you go on to claim to treat all your character concepts - forming the concept then studying the mechanics of the system for the best way to bring it to life. Instead, you seem insistent on sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting "nu-huh" to any suggestions on how it can be done. Reflavoring is not a house rule. Flavor and minor tweaks like changing damage types is something that IS part of the RAW of 4e. It IS part of the game system. So you can't disqualify it in an attempt to disqualify the means to achieve certain concepts.

In 4Ed? With no Transmuter specialization and no Druid class with all of its inherent wilderness flavor- oh yeah, and no shapechanging- this PC would have to have been so radically altered as to be unrecognizable.

Yeah, no doubt druids are a bit difficult right now in 4e. Won't be long until we've got em, though. Meanwhile, it would be fairly simple to utilize what is there to build your own version. There are a few builds available on EnWorld.

We're not talking reflavoring, not H-Ring. We're talking RAW, out of the box comparisons of Core to Core.

A) Reflavoring is RAW in 4e.

B) No we're not. We are talking about converting concepts between editions. That very often requires a bit of tweaking. The important thing about conversion is not some weird adherence of core to core only or strictly to some intepretation of RAW, but to achieving a mechanical realization of the concept.

Its not D&D to us because to "upgrade" to it would kill a campaign older than someone who just had his first legal swig of Johnny Walker Red.

Only a failure to be creative and follow the spirit of the game would kill the campaign. That's up to you. If you had any interest in playing 4e in the first place, then you wouldn't be arguing that conversion was impossible, you'd simply be thinking of ways to make it work.

We seem to have two different goals here. You seem to want to play 'gotcha' with the system in some effort to "prove" it is inferior to 3e. I want to test the limits of the new system and find ways to make things work, not ways to hit a roadblock and turn around and go the other way.

The system shouldn't hack off the legs of a PC concept.

Every system has its limitations, even 3e. Not every concept is going to be available out of the box in any edition.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

But that makes your stubborn unwillingess to treat 4e characters the same way you go on to claim to treat all your character concepts - forming the concept then studying the mechanics of the system for the best way to bring it to life.

There is no way to bring to life a PC concept for whom the necessary mechanics are entirely absent from the game. I don't see how you can possibly keep missing that point.

No. They explain this in the books. They gave brief write ups for a number of playable races in the MM. They intended to give these races the full treatment in supplements down the road. The first was Warforged in Dragon. It has nothing to do with playtesting or revisions.

And as the new versions are filtering to us, they have different mechanics, and thus, different fell and balance within the game. Check out the thread about playing Minotaurs- http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/244251-playing-minotaurs.html

The people posting in it point out the different effects on game balance between the Core version and the one from the expansion.

If they were just about "full treatments" they wouldn't be fundamentally altering some of the race's mechanics. Clearly, someone noted the effect of certain mechanics on game play- it seemed obvious to the posters- and changed them.

Furthermore, this means that NPC minotaurs and PC minotaurs differ in capabilities- something I really dislike- and PCs even differ from which set of rules got used.

Only a failure to be creative and follow the spirit of the game would kill the campaign.

That is quite insulting, not just to me, but the other frustrated would-be player/purchasers of 4Ed in that group. We've kept this campaign running though 20+ years and 3+ editions and you think we're not following the spirit of the game? Give me a freakin' break.

I've told you that a major PC in the campaign is absolutely not supported in 4Ed's Core- the shapeshifting non-blaster mage- and you say I'm not "creative?"

And that PC isn't the only one facing similar lack of support. Of the arcane spellcaster PCs in the campaign (PCs ranging from 3rd to what is currently termed "epic"), one and only one is primarily a blaster.

The spirit of 4Ed mages seems 'Lets blow stuff up reel good, hyuk, hyuk." A campaign in which "transmuters," "diviners," "illusionists" and "enchanters" predominate simply doesn't translate into 4Ed.

And the lack of support isn't limited to the mages. Its just the most glaring and most pervasive.

If there is a failure of creativity and imagination on anyone's part, it is on the heads of 4Ed designers who sorely underestimated the popularity of playing subtle casters instead of 2-legged howitzers.

Are there expansions in the works for supporting some our concepts? Sure, but who wants to spend an extra $30+ and wait a year or more

 

[carmachu]

So what do others think about this, should D&D 4e have been marketed as a totally different game? Could the fact that it wasn't be driving alot of the disappointment with the final product in certain camps. I will state upfront that 4e was not what I expected from the marketing buzz WotC put out there, but I'm curious what others think...

Yes. It should have been marketed as a totally different game. Radical departure, both background and mechnics wise.

They repeatedly said they were divorcing themselves from various "baggage" in the previous editions.....

 

[ProfessorCirno]

See the Interplay Fallouts versus Fallout 3 for details.

This is probably the best way of looking at 4e I can think of. Because while Fallout 3 can be a fun game (until you get so suited up that everything is a cake walk, or until you reach the atrociously bad ending which completely ruins the entire game completely, FOREVER), it's a bad Fallout. And much like 4e, I think the game would've been a lot better if they hadn't slapped the trademarked name onto it and just went with "A new RPG by Bethesda/A new RPG by Wizards."

 

[jdsivyer]

Yes. It should have been marketed as a totally different game. Radical departure, both background and mechnics wise.

They repeatedly said they were divorcing themselves from various "baggage" in the previous editions.....

This is strictly from my point of view, ok?

I kept up to date with most of the WOTC announcements regarding the coming of 4e, and from what I read (a fair bit), I never got the impression that the game would be such a radical departure (in my opinion). I read them saying they would clarify some rules, tidy up others (grapple, etc.), to make the game more streamlined. But it took a while for them to state that druids, monks, gnomes, etc., would be gutted from the main core rules. And it took a while for me to see something that said Vancian casting would be removed (in my opinion it's been gutted - for better or worse is your opinion).

If they stated somewhere that the mechanics of the game were to be radically altered, I must have missed it.

The bottom line is that I feel WOTC mislead people on some of the areas in the mechanics...well, maybe not mislead, but at least ommitted from their announcements. Now, I know they can't tell us everything before a new edition (not many gaming companies do), but I do know that I had a much better idea of what 3e would be before it came out than I did 4e.

I kept in getting the impression with 4e that it would be 3.5 but with tweaks. It would still be pretty much the same, just better...but not so different.

That's my opinion