D&D 4E Got to play 4E today

[Kzach]

1977. You do the math.

I confused you with someone else who specifically said 80's. Apologies.

I might, in fact, say that you have some bug up your ass that anything that is not completely fawning in praise of 4E is a target for attack.

No.

I'll admit that I'm in favour of 4e from what I've seen so far. However, the reason I get upset and probably forceful in my responses is because I'm tired of constantly seeing vague and inaccurate and misrepresentative arguments about 4e thrown out there as fact rather than just opinion.

If someone says they hate 4e, good for them, I really don't care. Each to their own and all of that, they're welcome to their opinion.

If someone says they hate 4e because it's turned into M:tG or WoW or a miniatures game, etc. then that pisses me off. I'm forced to defend 4e simply on the basis of representing the truth rather than some disingenuous argument presented as fact.

So I'm sorry if I came across as too harsh. I do have a bug up my butt. But then, from my point of view, I wasn't the one to put it there.

 

[Zil]

No, you've just mistakenly assumed that as a stance within which you can criticize a new edition from.

In AD&D, you had no tools with which to be challenged as a player in combat. There was no real tactical aspect to it. So how you can possible proclaim that AD&D is superior because it challenges the players, I have no idea.

4e gives you more tools and a greater level of detail in combat. This enables players to get more actively involved in complex tactics. This challenges the players, not the characters.

4e gives you more tools and a greater level of detail in non-combat. Again, it is up to the player and their imagination as to how they use those tools.

Sure, in either situation you can sit there and just dumbly roll dice and say, "I use X ability," but you know what? Surprise, surprise, that was the ONLY option you had in AD&D.

So tell me, how is it that AD&D challenged the players rather than the characters when you had no options in or out of combat that were represented in the system?

And don't give me that "roleplaying vs. rules" bunk either. You can roleplay just as much or just as little in 4e as you can in AD&D. That is a personal and group decision, not a system one.

Originally Posted by Thulcondar
Have you, by the way, actually played 4E yet?

Neither have you, so what's your point?

I have to ask... how can you be so certain about the tools that 4E gives you and how great everything is, yet you've seen less of 4E than what the original poster did. At least he played in some kind of official demo game. What gives you your insight?

As for what version of D&D is best, I don't think that was the purpose of the original post. He was just trying to post his impressions of the official demo game he played from the perspective of someone who missed out on the 3E years of D&D. He wasn't trolling or any such thing, nor was he up on a platform saying that D&D Version X is better than version Y. He was just giving his impressions of what he experienced. And frankly, I consider his impressions very interesting. It's always nice to hear what fellow old-timers think when they experience the new game first hand, no matter what they think (pro, nay or somewhere in between).

 

[FadedC]

I never used miniatures in 1e or 2e either, though there is little question that the 1e books assumed that you were using minis. But it was fairly easy to ignore that assumption, other then AoE spells little in that edition required you to carefully track where people were.

Regarding all the powers, a big part of it is just an attempt to make melee combat as interesting as spellcasting. Many found playing fighters to be a bit boring and limited when there only option was "attack". Is it really that awful that a melee priest gives a +1 to ac to an ally when he smacks somebody or that a fighter can choose between pushing someone back or cleaving into one of their allies?

 

[Zil]

I never used miniatures in 1e or 2e either, though there is little question that the 1e books assumed that you were using minis. But it was fairly easy to ignore that assumption, other then AoE spells little in that edition required you to carefully track where people were.

Yea, I certainly remember some of the arguments that could arise from Area of Effect spells and Area of Effect traps... "there's no way I was within 10 feet of that chest the thief was poking around with" and such. I suppose if we had been diligently using miniatures, or writing our positions on the map (anyone remember that the AD&D rules used to recommend one person be the official mapper) we might have won more of those arguments.

Then again, if someone lobbed a fireball at you in those days while you were in your typical AD&D dungeon, odds are you were gonna be affected because you were encouraged to think through the effects of putting a large volume spell in a confined area so the fireball would stretch quite far up long hallways and such. I don't remember when that was done away with - certainly by third edition. Perhaps by second edition?

 

[PeterWeller]

I can play 1E without miniatures or a battlemat, and have for decades (I hesitate to give a specific number, for fear that you will turn that against me). I was explicitly told by a WotC rep (and my own personal experience confirmed) that the system is infinitely easier to use with minis and a battlemat.

1E, 2E, and BECMI, even, were also infinitely easier when you used miniatures. Using miniatures makes combat easier to resolve in almost any system.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Joe,

You and I agree entirely on 1E's superiority to 3.x. However, I LOVE 4E.

I've ran 13 demos of it so far, and my last one was a long, complicated fight that I ran WITHOUT miniatures. (See the thread "An Insane Encounter" for details.)

I've run D&D weekly (or so) for 22 years. 4E is a step backwards in the right ways. (I'll grant, not ALL, but enough to be IMO the best version to date.)

Sure, there's a lot of little movement effects that are certainly there for miniature play. WotC decided that if they were going to sell minis, they might as well make using them cool, rather than pushing them across the board until they meet and then rolling dice until you tip one of them over. But that doesn't mean you HAVE to use them. There are many threads on the subject of tricks on how.

I don't agree with many of your other critisisms, but the big one is the RP vs Combat arguement, and that 4E encourages one over the other. There are many, many tools and articles in the 4E stuff specifically designed to help make bad role-players better. Unfortunatly, good roleplayers (I'm going to assume like yourself) see them and basically go "Don't tell me how to rele-play!" ignore them, and then complain that they're not there.

BESIDES, I'm sure you'd agree, you don't really need any RULES to role-play (you need guildelines). You need rules for combat, which is what they provide, and personally, I think the combat rules push players TOWARDS role-playing rather than away from them.

On the one hand you say that you like 1E's lack of explicitly stated rules, giving power to the DM... and then you complain that the system's not explaining why dailies are daily. That's role-playing. Personally I don't even like them putting flavor text on the powers, because I'd describe them differently, but I recognise that the flavor text is there as an example for less experienced players to get a feel for descripition.

Anyway, that's my two bits.

Fitz

 

[GSHamster]

However, to turn your snarky remark into an opportunity to make a real point, there really has been a change in the definition of what an RPG is. Back in the day, the DM would design encounters that would challenge the players. Nowadays, the DM designs encounters to challenge the characters. A very real, and in some ways subtle, difference.

I'd just like to comment that there are more ramifications to this than you give it credit. For example, how often did you have an encounter that actually challenged the physical strength of the player?

Most DMs would shy away from that as being "unfair". How is challenging the charisma of the player any less unfair?

I've DMed with actors before. The more weight you put on roleplaying, the harder it is to keep them from dominating the game, which is unfair to the other players. Their personal skill makes up for their character's deficiencies, and that is unbalancing.

4E appears to allow for an open-ended skill system, where you can choose how you will attempt to solve the problem. But at the end of the day, success or failure should depend on the character. Allowing a charismatic player an advantage in roleplaying is just as unfair as allowing a strong player an advantage in combat.

 

[FadedC]

Then again, if someone lobbed a fireball at you in those days while you were in your typical AD&D dungeon, odds are you were gonna be affected because you were encouraged to think through the effects of putting a large volume spell in a confined area so the fireball would stretch quite far up long hallways and such. I don't remember when that was done away with - certainly by third edition. Perhaps by second edition?

Ah good old 1e fireball, sometimes I miss it. I had one adventure at a con that ended early when the party miscalculated and fireballed themselves. A second adventure degenerated into a half hour argument/geometry calculation. Ok maybe there are some parts I don't miss so much, lol.

Back in 1st edition wizards rarely had con bonuses and fireball did d6 a level but wizards only had d4 a level. So mistakes were usually fatal.

 

[Kzach]

I have to ask... how can you be so certain about the tools that 4E gives you and how great everything is, yet you've seen less of 4E than what the original poster did. At least he played in some kind of official demo game. What gives you your insight?

If anything I've had more experience than him with the 4e rules that are known about to date. He's just done a delve with no more information than anyone else has access to here on these boards and elsewhere on the internet.

And just for the record, you've totally and completely missed pretty much every one of my points. On the main one, I never stated that 1e REQUIRED miniatures. I simply said that 4e doesn't require miniatures any more than 1e did.

Personally I don't even like them putting flavor text on the powers, because I'd describe them differently, but I recognise that the flavor text is there as an example for less experienced players to get a feel for descripition.

In all honesty I think the flavour text of the powers are much like hit points and damage. They are badly named/worded and give entirely the wrong impression which is then taken to the extreme and thought of in absolute, literal terms.

The naming conventions and flavour text are doing far more harm than good. I agree, leave the flavour text out of it and let us make up our own minds and be imaginative and creative about their application.

 

[mach1.9pants]

Well said, Fitz.
Apart from 1E bein betterer than 3E, rubbish! Just randomly opening the DMG at a couple of pages brings back the reason why I disagree (I haven't played it for years)...Pg70 Monk stunning/killing by opponents height and weight (at level 8 7'8" or 650lb); Pg35 a table for the effectiveness of finding henchmen IAW what you did to get them (hiring a crier 1-10% effective, apparently); Pg 192 apparently 2% of Harlots are Aged Madams, whereas 15% are Saucy Tarts LOL. It makes me realise that 1E often I just ignored the rules in the DMG, there were a lot of situations that were massively over 'ruled' . IMO, the most important part of this statement is the bold bit

AD&D had the advantage of giving the DM an enormous amount of leeway because of its vagueness in certain areas.

I wholeheartedly admit that DMing 3E was a chore sometimes, with ad-lib DMing being a lot harder than any edition before.

Back to something near the topic I think (hope) 4E will encourage more flexible DMing/play because of the unified mechanic (ie roll dex vs save or str vs skill or skill vs defence or whatever).