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Message: <blockquote data-quote="evilbob" data-source="post: 4849450" data-attributes="member: 9789">Forked from: <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showpost.php?postid=4831777" target="_blank"> what do you do when a +3 bloodclaw weapon is more powerful than a +4 artifact </a>I forked my own thread (does that cause blindness?) because I think it kept getting mired in folks' very helpful solutions to very specific problems, instead of taking a look at what I believe is a much bigger, meta-problem.  Or maybe it's just a rant from someone who's expectations are unrealistic compared to what 4.0 can deliver - you decide.  This is a continuation of that previous thread's thoughts, especially in response to everyone's continued calls to "JUST HOUSERULE BLOODCLAW ALREADY!"So I've thought a little more about this issue, and I think there's another aspect of what is bothering me that I perhaps haven't fully expressed.  Let me be clear:  I don't mind house rules - I actually really like them.  I have made tons and tons of house rules, and spent hours and hours (back in 3.5 especially) trying to tweak ideas or create new rules or create settings and change ideas to suit what I thought was good.  For example, I had house rules like "gold weighs nothing", "barbarians don't gain illiteracy", "casters can sub gold for material components", and "all magic items resize to fit their wearer" - stuff like that.  When I think back about those rules, it occurs to me that what I was mainly doing was to change the game to make it easier or faster, or to suit a setting.  I was side-stepping rules that I thought were boring or cumbersome, or I was altering how things worked to fit the game idea that I wanted to run.  And I never felt bad about these rules or coming up with new rules or the endless amount of tweaking I did, because - as I now feel - I wasn't really "fixing" anything so much:  I was just changing it to suit me.  That is what house rules are all about:  changing the game to suit your ideas and conceptions, and personalizing it.  And I think those house rules are great.My 4.0 house rules don't work that way.  They're more like "there's only one expertise feat and it grants +1 to all attacks at level 5/15/25" and "wizards can choose the artificer power vanguard's lighting as an at-will instead of scorching burst and use int instead of wis" and "all dual-stat classes are single-stat classes - pick a stat and it works for all powers".  100% of the house rules I have implemented or considered for 4.0 are not designed to color or tweak the game to suit me:  they are designed to fix what I consider (in my own, admittedly limited knowledge) blatant game imbalances.  In other words:  I'm not improving on a design or customizing the game; I am correcting it.  I am proof-reading it.This is the heart of the matter for me.  I know lots of stuff in 3.5 was imbalanced, but somehow, the longer I play, 4.0 keeps starting to seem even more so.  Perhaps the even power levels just make it more obvious?  In any case, the thing I keep running into - over and over and OVER again - are things that are just plain ...well, I hate to use that horrible "b" word, so I will say "game-altering."  Bloodclaw, reckless, storm of blades, hurricane of blades, (mild low-pressure system of blades,) endless save penalties combined with several wizard daily powers, auto-damage wizard daily powers - these are just a few examples off the top of my head.  Divine Miracle, the whole Punisher of the Gods destiny - the list goes ON and ON.  (Punisher of the Gods is one of my favorites, actually:  when the Char-Op forum collectively agrees not to use an epic destiny in power comparisons because it's just too over-the-top, you KNOW it's game-breaking).  And since new books and new Dragon articles keep coming out each month at a frantic pace, the list just keeps getting longer and longer.Folks, this is not my job!  It is not my job to proof-read WotC materials, play-test them, and then fix it!  I HAVE a job, and it's not NEARLY as interesting as that one!  (Ok, to be more specific:  I WISH I HAD THAT JOB!)  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />  But I don't, and no matter how much I wish they did, WotC doesn't pay me to fix or proof-read their material.  In fact, I pay them to use it.  And the more money I give them so that I can beta-test their products, the more I resent it.  The more I feel like I am getting duped.  And the less I want to play.This is the heart of the matter:  this is why I get frustrated, and why I come complaining to those who could possibly understand.  You can't just put a band-aid on the problem because the patient is bleeding out, folks.  I know people will disagree with specific examples, and I know that there is a wide range between what is actually game-altering and what is not, and I know there are specific solutions that exist for many of these specific problems (including the ever-popular BAN BAN BAN) - but this doesn't solve the problem.  Sure, they might solve a problem, or some problems, but it doesn't solve the problem.  And that problem is that WotC doesn't pay me to edit their books.Does this make sense?  Does anyone else agree?  Is this a problem without a solution or is there some shining beam of light that I have missed?  Or is it all just in my big conceited head, as I am sure many already believe?  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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