From 3.5 to 4e to PF, back to 4e and beyond

[Dragonblade]

Greetings all,

I played 1e/2e for years until 3e came out. I played 3e, then 3.5, and then upgraded to 4e when it came out.

Every edition has had a lot of fun moments for me and I enjoy different aspects of each one. Going from 3.5 to 4e was a very refreshing change. In the beginning I enjoyed everything about 4e.

Over time of course little things started to add up. The class structure began to feel confining, magic was too fiddly and commoditized, and some encounters and even whole adventures had serious grind issues (I'm looking at you Pyramid of Shadows). We started playing it more as a skirmish game and less as an RPG doing delve night instead of game night. After a couple years of 4e, we decided to switch gears and play a little Pathfinder.

After all, we don't care about edition wars, we love all D&D! As any true gamer should!

So we played PF for the past year and we started out having a blast and still do enjoy it. The classes felt open and free, and Paizo puts out solid material and solid APs. But much like our experience with 4e, littles issues began to crop up that caused rules arguments and frustration in our group. There were arguments over HP rolls, grappling, casters dominating, melee PCs needing magic to keep up, and so on. People would fail a save and were frustrated that they suddenly became spectators for the entire duration of one to two hour combats at their own game table. In short, all the little things that caused our 3.5 games to break down began to rear their ugly heads again in PF. So while I love it for the APs and the occasional dungeon crawl I realize its not a long term fix. At least for me. The rest of my group has varying degrees of like and dislike for various elements of PF and 4e and vice versa.

And so my wandering gamer's eye began to look askance at 4e once more. I dug out my books and fell in love with 4e all over again, especially now that I know how to house rule around the issues. I am currently prepping a Jade Regent campaign using 4e rules along with a number of new house rules designed to open up the game and gives players some of the open feeling that PF has but to take advantage of what (in my opinion, so no edition wars please) is a more solid, fun, and balanced rules foundation.

I'm looking at 5e with some trepidation. I think PF is in good hands with Paizo, especially with the way they have embraced the PF SRD and the PDF market. But WotC doesn't have the best track record of supporting older editions and there is no way for me to legally acquire PDF's of 4e material. That saddens me.

There is much about 4e that I love and don't wish WotC to throw the baby out with the bath water when they go to 5e. My dream would be for WotC to make a modular game in 5e that can encompass both play styles and allow a savvy DM and players to scavenge material from either one for their 5e games. I also hope that WotC endeavors to make their legacy materials available to gamers. Even if its subscription based, I certainly hope that long after 5e debuts, gamers can continue to go online and access the 4e character builder, and 4e dragon articles via DDI alongside the new 5e material. I also hope that we see older edition material made available as well. I'd love to be able to access and read old Gygaxian modules, and AD&D rulebooks online via my DDI sub.

I realize I'm kind of rambling now. I just wanted to share my thoughts. I love both PF and 4e and though I fully intend to check out and play 5e, I hope that the companies that carry the torch for these games recognize that they each do something special the no future or prior edition does. I consider PF the penultimate expression of the 3e era of D&D and I love it, warts and all. I also consider 4e to have the most enjoyable tactical combat and monster system of all the editions and love it, warts and all, as well. 5e will have its own strengths and weaknesses but it won't be 4e and it won't be PF. Likewise, someday in the future when Paizo releases PF 2e, it too will be unique and special and I plan on playing it too.

 

[Dausuul]

I'd love to see your house rules for 4E. Like you, I enjoy 4E and consider it a game with many strengths but also some glaring flaws.

 

[Glade Riven]

Yeah, I remember some heavy fudging with HP and minions to make encounters work back when I played 4e because of the grind. Then it worked so well I did it for Star Wars Saga and Pathfinder. I'll admit to bringing a bit of 4e to the table every time I DM, and I'll raid the sock drawer of any system I need to in order to make sure everyone is having a good time.

I don't see Monte Cook stepping back to 3.0 for 5e - from what I've read of him and what he's written directly, my guess is that he'll aim for something new. Some problems will be solved, some new problems will arise, fans of 4e and Pathfinder will be split on the new edition (especially new players to 4e). Of interest is that DDI's data will play a prominent role, and I expect the player's guide to reflect the most popular choices in DDI's character generator. So there is going to be some target marketing going on from the ground up. I can't guarentee that I'll buy, but it is probable that I will.

 

[Alaxk Knight of Galt]

I agree with the thoughts expressed by Dragonblade. I think 4E is brilliant when it comes to tactics and combat.

But we've wandered away from it. When 4E came out, we played it for about 16 months. Since then, we've played Mage and now 7th Sea. We've done one-shots of 4th (Revenge of the Iron Lich - great module) and a handful of 3.5 (for Red Hand of Doom).

I was asked to play in a 4E game recently, and I discovered my true problem with the game. One player was running down the list of roles (the ideal party config is 1 defender, 2 strikers, and a leader for this four man group). I stroll over to the Compedium and start shifting through feats, class, and powers. I buy stats to fit the mechanics of the class. I'm reminded to think about Themes as they are now important. I look at what magic items to buy. And I realize what I'm doing, I'm making a Magic Deck, not a character to Roleplay.

This isn't really 4th Edition's fault. It's my fault. I've allowed myself to become lost in the mechanics.

 

[DEFCON 1]

This is why I cannot stress enough you should play other RPGs too. If you can. Any game will grow stale after a while if you aren't able to cleanse your palette once in a while... even if the one game has several different "versions" like D&D does. And I'm even including the other d20 games in this. Don't switch from D&D to d20 Modern, or Mutants & Masterminds. Go completely across the field.

Play a small campaign of Shadowrun. Maybe some Vampire. Or Call of Cthulu. Burning Wheel, Champions, Toon, Paranoia, Fading Suns, Dragon Age. Anything. Any games with their own individual game mechanics, their own individual methods for storytelling, their own individual reward systems. You might think you know how to roleplay right now... but in truth, once you start playing all different types and styles of games, you'll see just how narrow a view D&D actually has in the whole gaming landscape.

Let yourself be opened to the world of RPGs. And once you do... you'll be able to come back to D&D with fresh eyes and a refreshed feeling towards what is actually fun and great about the game.

 

[Dragonblade]

I'd love to see your house rules for 4E. Like you, I enjoy 4E and consider it a game with many strengths but also some glaring flaws.

I'm still reviewing some of them with my players to make sure they do what I want to do, but I'll post them over in the 4e or the 4e house rule forum on Monday.

I work in software QA, so its my job to spot flaws in systems and work with the engineers on coming up with solutions. I've found it translates well to RPG house ruling. I wish WotC would invite me into the 5e beta test.

It also helps that as a player I tend to be a powergamer, so one of the first questions I always ask myself when evaluating a power or rule is whether this is something I would always want to take, never want to take, or would allow me to break the game.

 

[Stormonu]

I had always thought there would be folks who would leave 4E for Pathfinder, only to eventually find themselves not satisfied with Pathfinder as well. And I was curious to see where they would go from there.

I'm glad to see that at least so far in this thread, it isn't a complete abandonment of D&D but sort of a hybrid of "the best of D&Ds".

 

[Connorsrpg]

Hey, I too like a bit of both.

Delved into 4E and loved it. A lot of 3E had become irksome.

After time you realise that some of the old is still good. I like the 4E Powers, but sometimes wish for the old great spell lists some wizards had. Books were important.

Initially liked the push for 'fun' of 4E, but soon found being able to do everything all the time isn't actually that fun.

Do love GMing the monsters for 4E . No big lists of feats and spells to sift through and check what they actually do.

Also played a lot of Savage Worlds. So in a way the division of the market has certainly helped me diversify my gaming. Up til recently I only ever made time for d&d. Now I enjoy a range of games. 4E helped me to diversify, but I still like it and come back to it. In fact I mesh a lot of the games together - like having the Power Sources and creature origins from 4E in our Savage Worlds games. My creature creation (even for Savage Worlds) is influenced by 4E.

One thing in all this 4E and PF (not wars, just comparisons) is that Star Wars Saga barely rates a mention. Was it the ultimate 'in-between' game? I certainly loved the condition track and standard rate for penalties (something 4E considered un-fun, though I liked penalties) and talent trees. I still love talent trees as being a great medium b/w the siloed powers of 4E and the 'you get this at this level' of 3E.

In all, it is great to have another express the positives of all games without the snark

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

From 1977 to 1990, the RPGs I played were:

1. AD&D (1Ed, 2Ed)
2. Traveller (multiple editions)
3. Champions (which became HERO)
4. The Fantasy Trip/In the Labyrinth
5. Gamma World
6. Boot Hill

(plus I bought a few others.)

But in 1990, I hooked up with a Group in Austin that played few of those games, and over the course of the next 4 years, added several dozen RPGs to my repertoire, and bought even more.

That experience changed every aspect of my gaming for the better.

So my advice: experiment. Try out game systems of all genres, crunchiness, abstraction and so forth.

You might find 5ed is perfect for you...or utterly irrelevant.

 

[PeelSeel2]

Our group really liked 4e when it first came out. We played for a solid year, then drifted into the OSR, which was quite fun (and very deadly!). Our group has come full circle again and it is at 4th edition, with most of the gamers re-subscribed to DDI, and the campaign is feeling really good from RP'ing to storyline to combat.