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

[Rechan]

I don't think summoning, famaliars, bards, animal companions and odd effect magic items were at the end of 3.x.

Not the end, but a serious headache.

In general anything that added extra attacks and a second character (animal companions, summoning, to a lesser extent familiars) meant slow-down at the table. This is increasingly true of upper level play, where even your animal companion or whatever you summon has multiple attacks.

 

[Rechan]

Reading comprehension. Get some.

Did you read the whole of my post, or just flip out after the first line and decide to go off on me?

For someone accusing me of not having reading comprehension, you sure didn't look very close. Like, at the top of the next page.

Bad Taste and "Insulting playstyles" are two different things entirely. Jack was not accused of Bad Taste, he was accused of insulting people's playstyles. Jack was calling rules retarded, not people who like 4e.

To avoid repeating myself I'll redirect you to my response to the Professor.

However, I was wrong. You had provided what you felt was evidence. I misinterpreted your response, assuming that you couldn't be confusing criticising 3e for criticising 3e Players. So, I apologize.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

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.

Interesting. 3E didn't have them, right? Is it an incomplete game for it? Because I definitely see people fighting Banshrea, Battlebriars and Sorrowsworn in 4E...

 

[Jack99]

I don't think summoning, familiars, bards, animal companions and odd effect magic items were at the end of 3.x. To some people it will be incomplete unless some of those things are added. My group didn't really use splat books. I don't like that I feel I need to. (and yes I know companions and summoning were evil/broken to many groups)

While I do not miss any of the features mentioned above, I fully understand why some people feel that it is something that should be included in the first core books.

But, as Rechan explained quite well, there is a reason. And I prefer them to add these features as they figure out how to make them balanced, instead of breaking the game from the get-go, which they did in 3.x (IMO, ofc).

Cheers

 

[Samuel Leming]

I never said they were useless. Using myself as an example, I was merely pointing out that at least some DM's rarely ever used the stats for metallic dragons. Yes, I also believe that to be the majority, but that is an all together other matter. My players have interacted plenty of times with metallic dragons. I just rarely needed the stats, as they are for combat (in my mind).

They can also be used for comparing one creature to another and judging how you'll use that creature in your world.

I do not believe that I have posted such a thing.

It's most of what I've seen you post and certainly the post I originally responded to.

I said that I think 4e is mechanically superior to 3.x. Is that what is bothering you?

It's that you're treating that as an absolute. Like there's some kind of completely objective scale. There's none such. There are different tastes and different needs so different tools will achieve better results in different circumstances.

For the kind of D&D I currently enjoy, C&C is superior to 4e in almost every way. If I were to claim that C&C was absolutely a superior version of D&D it would raise a few eyebrows, and be almost the same as what I see you do around here.

Is 4e better for what you want out of the game? Well, you'd know. Is 4e better for everybody? It looks like that's what you're claiming and the only way that could possibly be true is if all the people who don't like 4e are playing D&D wrong.

In fact, how do you even know that my playstyle is different from yours? Because I like 4e?

I have to change the way I play to enjoy 4e and you don't. Given that, how could our styles possibly be the same?

I am sorry you feel that I have attacked your playstyle, because I haven't. Maybe if you point out to me where I am rude (your words) and attack your playstyle, I could help explaining what I meant?

Well, the post I originally responded to was rude.

Oh, I understand that just fine. But that doesn't mean I have to agree with the "logic" they use to produce said statement. Especially since I consider myself pretty old-school and immersive, while preferring 4e.

You care about 'balance.' That's not very old-school is it?

This isn't a matter of "logic." It's a matter of taste.

Sam

 

[Fenes]

THe 4E D&D doesn't offer enough options for me to play my (not so combat focused) D&D game.

It may be a good combat game, but it lacks a lot of the fun options we use far more often than fighting in our game - like performances, charm&illusion spells, and different prestige classes.

In that sense it really is incomplete. The Feywild sounds interesting, but why should I use it without illusions and charms available? Or should I take pride in telling players "and that too is limited to NPCs" all the time? I don't need a new space like the Feywild just to have battles in.

 

[Fenes]

Not the end, but a serious headache.

In general anything that added extra attacks and a second character (animal companions, summoning, to a lesser extent familiars) meant slow-down at the table. This is increasingly true of upper level play, where even your animal companion or whatever you summon has multiple attacks.

Only if one does play them out. I have had good experiences with simply stating "your henchmen fight their minions. Now, the Orc Leader and his shaman face you. Fighter, your turn is up. What do you do?"

 

[Rechan]

Only if one does play them out. I have had good experiences with simply stating "your henchmen fight their minions. Now, the Orc Leader and his shaman face you. Fighter, your turn is up. What do you do?"

And that pretty much makes having them pointless to many players. "They face their minions"? So that completely invalidates being able to roll their attacks and direct their movements.

I've never seen a game where the DM directs the character's animal companion. Never. Hell, the last game I saw a druid in, the animal companion was his mount, and integral to his tactics in combat.

That's not even counting summoning. The last game I was in with a summoner, he was summoning 3 celestial badgers per fight (at 3rd level). Each badger gets three attacks on a full round action. So that's 9 attacks in addition to the mage's. And they weren't "engaging minions", he'd intentionally summon them to flank a target. Not to mention the obvious benefit of summoning creatures to make use of their spell-like abilities.

 

[MerricB]

The big trouble I had with the animal companion was that he was a better fighter than the fighter. Stupid grappling bear...

Cheers!

 

[Darrin Drader]

My opinion is simple. If you were running a 3rd edition game with just the core books and then decided to switch to 4th edition, the new game isn't complete if you can't accommodate all of the characters in the campaign. If you happened to be running a half orc barbarian or a gnome bard, I guess you're out of luck.

Dear Gimble and Krusk,

This is never an easy thing to do, but unfortunately we're going to have to let you go. Your contributions were invaluable over the past eight years, and we all owe our very lives to you several times over; however, the powers that be have made the decision that you no longer exist.

Don't worry though, it is possible that the multiverse will spontaneously change sometime next year and your existence might be restored at that time.

Please accept severance pay of 250,000 gp. and this Girdle of Giant's Strength as compensation. Any vacation pay you have accumulated will also be paid, per your usual salary. Health benefits will extend to the first day of next month, at which time you will become eligible for COBRA.

Thank you for helping to make this party a success and please don't hesitate to use us as a reference for your next employer, in whatever multiverse you happen to be shunted off to.

- Jozan