Forked Thread: Rate WotC as a company: 4e Complete?

[ProfessorCirno]

Yeah, mean bastards them Good catch.

I'm surprised they didn't even get some nasty elemental form in 4e.

No, but they are unaligned now. And pheonixes are just rocs on fire.

...Actually, are there ANY animals or NPCs or monsters or what have you that are good or Lawful Good?

 

[lutecius]

But right now, I do think the game is complete and playable. It just doesn't look "complete" compared to the splatbooks released under the previous version. […]

The problem with "sacred cow" classes (and races) are that not all of them are sacred cows to everyone. We'll all have our favorites and the reality is that not every one of them can fit in one book. […]

It's mentioned somewhere (sorry, no link) that they wanted to include the Warlord and Warlock because it adds something new to the base classes, just as the Sorcerer added something new to 3.0 when it first came out. It's a conscious decision, yes, but hardly what I'd call a straight-out ploy.

And let's say you did omit those two classes, which two classes would you replace them with? The Bard? The Barbarian? The Druid? The Sorcerer? Remember, you can only pick two. And fans of the other two that don't get chosen will similarly say that their decision was a ploy.

The thing is, even if you consider the new classes as a suitable replacement, the first 3e phb alone still had more classes, 10 of which were legacy classes. That’s more than any previous lineup, so the sorcerer didn’t really take another class’s place, he used the existing wizard spell list and provided a long overdue alternative to the vancian casting mechanic.

Thematically, the warlock isn’t that different from the wizard and there are 2 other strikers, so mechanically, he certainly doesn’t add anything to the game that justifies removing most of the summoning, charm or necromancy spells.

I would also argue that the dnd druid or "nature mage" is a classic fantasy archetype, not covered by any of the 8 phb classes (not even the fey-pact and certainly not by the laser-cleric) whereas "inspiring warrior" could easily have been folded into fighter or paladin.

But like I said in the other thread, I don’t buy the page count excuse. The 30 pages of magic item don’t belong in the phb. Putting them back in the dmg would make it a bit more useful and would make room for more classes.
And it’s not like the 4e designers were taken by surprise and didn’t have the time to work all these things out before 4e was announced.

Indeed, even the 'missing' classes, (which are hardly essential,) can be approximated too with a simple process of renaming/redescribing powers.

So basically 4e is complete because you can still make things up? Or do you mean that 4e classes are really interchangeable?

I mean, for Christ's sake. 3.x had more than 60 base classes, more than 3500 feats and than 700 PRC's at the end. So many options that I bet less than 1% of the players even had a clue about how many options he or she had. Rather than trying to catter to every single retarded combination that some random John Doe liked, WotC decided to do quality over quantity. To get things right before they are released. And they have. So yeah, with regards to options, some might say 4e is less complete. I say it is better.

What makes you think 4e will be different? With such narrow classes and limited multiclassing, I think 4e will end up with even more optional classes, paths and powers.

Not only that but since 3e had "system mastery", most of those choices sucked from a mechanical standpoint. Maybe half of those numbers, if that, were actually solid choices to pick. The rest were fool's gold. […] 4e feels complete to me. Things like the Bard, Druid, Sorcerer, etc. aren't that big a deal to me. I recall in 6 years playing 3.5 one person playing a sorcerer, two playing a druid (and not abusing it), and the one time I played a gnome bard for a one-shot I was nearly laughed off the table for playing such a "useless" choice. I'd rather have WotC take the time to properly balance than rush things out to appease the notion of "It's always been in D&D" and end up with 3.x all over again.

System mastery is a worthless concept in a game, and should be left to rot. 4e is complete in the sense that they got rid of that and are willing to take their time with things in order to get them right the first time.

What a bizarre definition of "complete". If some choices were useless, I think the best solution would be to, you know, fix them, not sweep them under the rug.

 

[Fifth Element]

Start proving me wrong? Someone made a complete insult towards others' playstyles simply because they were different, they were called on it, and now you're pretending it never happened in the first place. This happens in just about every thread. Obligatory 4e fan insulting and dismissing others is obligatory.

If there are problematic posts, report them. "Obligatory 4e fan insulting" was an interesting choice of phrase. Ah, the ambiguities of English grammar.

 

[Fifth Element]

If some choices were useless, I think the best solution would be to, you know, fix them, not sweep them under the rug.

I would argue that for an actually useless choice, sweeping it under the rug is fixing it. You might also be able to fix it in another way, but that's a legitimate fix for a truly crappy option.

 

[lutecius]

I would argue that for an actually useless choice, sweeping it under the rug is fixing it. You might also be able to fix it in another way, but that's a legitimate fix for a truly crappy option.

But that won't make the game more complete. Especially if the concept was perfectly valid and only the implementation was underbalanced.

 

[jadrax]

So basically 4e is complete because you can still make things up? Or do you mean that 4e classes are really interchangeable?

It terms of Background, yes classes have always been really interchangeable, its an abstract concept at best, which was weakened even further by so many classes fighting over so few clearly defined roles.

The Joy of 4th is classes finally have properly unique power sets, so you can have a Nature Fighter, Nature Paladin, nature Wizard who will all be nature themed, but diverse mechanically. (And that's without even multi-classing, which opens it up even more.)

I cannot think of a single character type you cannot currently play, that will not end up being effective under the basic rules. (Apart from arguably broken ones, like Summoner) Sure classes will come along to add more nuances to that, but the basic system is incredibly solid.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Grab is the replacement for grapple, as there is no 4e core class that supports unarmed combat as one of it's shticks. It works just fine as a basic ability.

No, it's not. They already said that Grapple will be added later, and you keep using grab as an example. Grab is not grapple, it's not a replacement for it, grapple will come later.

Cut it back and made it gone are two entirely different things. Stick to the facts and I might be less dismissive.

You understand what I meant, as you use the more freeform Flight as an example of what you didn't like. You're saying your dismissive tone is because I didn't properly qualify the flight comment?

Flight in 4e is an encounter, rather than a method of traveling. It would still avoid encounters as much as before, but is now limited in how often. Rather than design a system that takes flight into account, they nerfed it.

Being able to invalidate a vast chunk of encounters due to one ability gained at level 5 is overpowered. This is a game, not a simulation, just as Gygax intended.

So, your problem was the level you gained it at?

I'm not sure why you decided to argue with me when you claimed that everything that doesn't fit on the grid was cut from the game, and I pointed out things that weren't on the grid and are still in the game.

Because I didn't properly qualify Fly, even though you knew the difference? Even though you think Grab is Grapple, even though Mearls said Grapple is coming?

My point was that D&D is a core of a game, and any situations/powers that don't fit on the grid are out. Freeform Flight was removed and replaced with a limited flight that fits into the grid, Fantasy be damned.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

You know, I dislike lots about 4e and could not in any way be called a 4e fan, but complaining about the Fly change is just...dumb. The 3.x version of Fly was insanely broken and flat out had to go. It's not something you could balance around, because it was unbalancable. It had to but axed.

 

[Andor]

Because things you hardly ever fight need combat statistics?

Good point. Thank God they included Banshrea, Battlebriars and Sorrowsworn. They were certainly common encounters in earlier editions, not to mention their rich mythical background.

It covers mounted combat better, and offers far more variation based on mount type, than 3e ever did.

Huh. 4e PHB. 1 feat for mounted Combat. No skill. No Equipment.
3.0 PHB. 3 Skills (with many different foci) and 5 feats for Mounted Combat. Saddles, bridles, tack, barding, feed, pack saddles and more covered in the equipment section.

Yeah, you're right, 4e offers so much more.

As for the 4e MM covering more possible mount types than everything ridable ever printed in 3e.... I don't even know how to respond to such an absurb claim.

And melee encounters being invalid in 3e past 5th level. It's an false arguement and you know it. The only thing that happened at 5th level was that the wizard might be able to fly his way out of melee range, if the battle was being fought outdoors. He couldn't fly the rest of the party and the Sorcerer and Warlock couldn't fly till 6th.

And ignoring overland travel encounters is still there in 4e, it's built right into the system with the teleportation ritual rules starting at 8th level. And of course flying mounts will let you do it at any level, just like they have in all earlier editions of D&D. Any more strawman arguements you'd like to make in favor of 4e's flight rules over 3e?

 

[Hussar]

The rules system is non-intuitive, abstract and poorly written. Furthermore the writing style denies insight into the designers intent which makes things harder than they need to be when a problem crops up.

/me points to the 3e PHB, particularly the first printing. Then points to the 1e DMG.

If you want examples of arbitrary rules, written in opaque styles, one could do a HECK of a lot worse than the 4e core books.

On Continuity of Magic -

Let's not forget that there is a magic system in place. It's different, but, it is in place. Honestly, it's a LOT closer to the B/E/C/M/I magic system, where school didn't matter. Actually, when you think about it, school didn't matter in 1e either. It wasn't until 2e that school made any difference.

So, really, the only loss is summoning and illusions. Necromancy can be reproduced fairly easily (just not the pokespells). I don't like that summoning is out, but, I can certainly see why they are. The whole "economy of action" thinking. I can certainly see the logic behind it.

But, axing summoning doesn't make an incomplete game. An incomplete game would allow summoning but then not give any mechanics for resolution. Or incomplete resolution rules. There's a horde of games out there guilty of this. Heck, D&D's illusion rules are guilty of this and have been for years.