D&D 4E Help me understand 4e

[Saeviomagy]

First up: powers work just fine outside of combat. Also don't feel bound by stuff like them restricting targets to creatures or things like that. If your wizard wants to fireball/thunderwave a door down, or your rogue wants to use steel shards to blow out a roomful of candles, you as a DM have the power to say "yes". OTOH, unlike 3e, it's made a lot more clear that a player can't say "I dig a hole through the stone wall by hitting it with my greatsword: I go at 10 feet per round according to the damage I can deal" and expect you to suck it up.

In situations that the rules weren't written for, feel free to say "yes that works" if it makes sense.

As for essentials: in part, it's errata. The rules compendium contains pretty much everything you need to DM the game, and includes basic rules errata (skill DCs, stealth/perception etc).

Heroes of the fallen lands has a bunch of new stuff that your players can use, some of which is errata, but it's mixed in with all the new classes, so it's not really a good reference for existing characters.

 

[Bagpuss]

...you don't need any more of an elaborate set-up than you did for 2e. I say this because my combat setup hasn't changed! A battlemap or a gridded flipchart from Staples, a pen, and a hodgepodge of painted miniatures, unpainted miniatures, glass beads in different colors, 2D tokens, and plastic kid's toys. Combat is still a blast even without the accessories.

Well if your set up in 2e was like mine, just describing combat with occasionally a hand drawn map (without grid) if people weren't clear on positions. No miniatures, no battlemats, no counters, then I think 3e and even more so 4e has required a more elaborate set-up, or at least it is very difficult to play using purely descriptive combat.

There is a jarring change from the game being purely descriptive and in your head to then being, miniatures on a battlemat. There isn't that transition if everything remains descriptive and in your imagination as it did when I use to play 2nd Ed, so I can totally see what the original poster was talking about.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

My answer to the jarring transition is not to really have one. As per ancient tradition passed down from the 70's everyone supplies a mini for their character. The minis go on the map, there's no point in time where they aren't there in the center of the table. As the action advances the minis serve several purposes. They lay out a marching order for the party whenever they're moving or exploring. If they say go into a town and the PCs split up then someone moves their mini off a bit to the side and says "I'm going to the bar to spend some of this gold! Anyone else coming?" and if someone else comes they slide their mini over there too. Maybe the rest go to the temple and their minis get slid ever THERE. The figures really act as an aid to visualizing things even at a fairly abstract level.

If one of those two groups gets into a fight, well, the DM can just draw in the tap room of the bar and supply some minis/spare dice/coins/m&ms and away we go. It doesn't really feel all that jarring and I always make sure not to overdo setup for the encounter too much. Pacing is definitely important as the OP points out, so I find having the battlemat pretty much ready to go at all times is good. It also ends the awkward "he's getting out the minis, it is going to be a fight!" syndrome. In our group at least we have always used minis in all editions of the game, so I don't find 4e exceptionally different, but that is just our style of play.

One of the main things that I think players really have to be able to do consistently is just step out of the rules. I think this is one place where having played in the early days of the game is great, nobody thought much of the rules back then. What I mean is players need to learn to think about the in-game world they are in and not worry about if it is a good idea to use Tide of Iron instead of just leaping on the hated evil bad guy. I don't mean you should play stupid, but the mechanics should just be applied to explain what you did and make it work, not to decide your choices for you.

I think with 4e giving players so many choices it has turned out that this tends to make them think too much in mechanical terms. That can make combats seem a little disjoint, etc.

My solution basically is to amp things up a bit. Make everything a bit larger than life in the game. Use a lot of description and vary the pace and tension a lot. That will keep the players focused on the story. Keep the minis on the table. If say the party is exploring a building then let them move the figures around to show what they do, draw in a bit of the area, even if there is no combat. It means the group is already in the space they're exploring and when a monster pops out or whatever then the flow of things is more natural.

Overall I think 4e is the best edition yet. It isn't perfect, and for some people it works against itself I guess, but it sure does make it easier for me to be a DM. I don't think I could stand to go back to 2e now.

 

[Danzauker]

I had an amazingly long reply typed up, hitting on every single one of you with an individual reply...and then the power went out. Yep. Wiped the whole damn thing. Spent over two hours typing it all up.

Probably it was a daily. You should have taken an extended rest.

Boom cha boom!!!

 

[UnknownAtThisTime]

I spend the next 2 hours drinking beer waiting for the fight to finish up.

You say that like it's a bad thing ....

 

[whearp]

So, I have a few things to add to this conversation that I hope will help.

I really think you should look at the essentials line for so many reasons.

-There is very much an old-school flavor about it. In fluff, in class and race design, and in play.

-Powers have more of the verisimilitude I think you're looking for. Only spellcasters have big-boom daily powers, and the martial classes are built to be able to consistently do the things that make them awesome.

-Great utility powers and class abilities. While core 4e has tons of out of combat abilities that can add to Roleplay, the essential classes have even more of them. I'm particularly fond of the woodsy abilities of the essentials Druid and Ranger.

-Way improved monsters. The most iconic of the D&D foes have been redone in the essentials books to make them more fun to run, and less likely to drag combat on.

-Essentials does not natively include rituals... and doesn't really need them. The essentials versions of the classes naturally get many of the abilities that were put into rituals in core 4e.

-And this might be one of the best things for you... The essentials monsters come with tokens. If a monster appears in an essentials product, there is one or more tokens for it included as well. The DM kit alone comes with tons of great tokens just for Player characters and NPCs, but the monster vault is the real prize with hundreds of correctly-sized tokens with the awesome 4e art.

-The price is just awesome. Over the past couple months I have acquired the entire essentials line, enough supplies to run D&D for as long as I like for just over 100 bucks. Just add dice and doritos!

My essentials game is going awesome, it's fluid and fun. My players are creative and my encounters are cinematic and seamlessly woven into the story. 4e (and essentials especially) is easily my favorite roleplaying system, and the best I've seen in nearly 20 years of tabletop gaming.

 

[TikkchikFenTikktikk]

Should I look at essentials as an errata printing of the core books? I have the 3 PHBs and DMGs and MMs. Is essentials...essential as an errata reprint of the books, or can I ignore changes and just keep using the books as printed?

In my opinion, the rules updates--especially to the PHB and DMGs--are worth adopting almost entirely across the board. For the most part they clarify intent and fix broken things.

* As such, I highly recommend everyone who plays 4E pick up the new Rules Compendium. It is a great book. It doesn't have **everything** in the original PHBs and DMGS, but enough that when I run games at my FLGS I just take the RC instead of the massive library I used to haul.

Owning almost all of the pre-Essentials stuff, I could take or leave the rest of Essentials except for a few things:

* I wouldn't own the the Heroes books if I weren't DMing Encounters which mandates their use and I use it as a table copy. Having played with weekly it for several weeks now I prefer the pre-essentials characters, but have to admit everyone is still having fun.

* The DM kit is OK. In your case, the biggest reason to buy it, the Red Box, and the Monster kit would be for the tokens. I've become a huge advocate of these tokens ever since I got my first set of generic tokens for DMing Encounters. Having matching art on the token and in the monster book will be nice.

 

[Neonchameleon]

- The time bubble thing. 4e is the only edition where I felt like encounters existed in a time bubble, and not part of the overall experience. I feel like planning sessions is all about the encounters and how to fit them into the story I want to tell.

One playstyle that works well is to work 4e like a TV show - in scenes. The daily power is the great power used at the end of the episode to decide things. Encounter powers are signature moves. And at wills are when that person is in the background because the camera is elsewhere. (This doesn't stop e.g. a Warlord with Brash Assault doing quite spectacular things on an at will).

- The way powers and rituals work in 4e is, I think, what brings this one to mind. The whole concept of powers that can only be used during combat just flies in the face of what I'm used to as someone who grew up with the earlier editions from a young age.

This one isn't true. As my Monk likes demonstrating with his wire-fu. (30' of water in the way? No problem.) Or bards and wizards demonstrate regularly with social interaction powers. Most powers are, granted, more like Burning Hands than they are like Silent Image - but you can still use them out of combat if you can find a way.

Does that help?

Yeah, that sounds as stupid to me after writing it as it does to you guys. It boils down to the transition from narrative to combat is just more jarring, to me, than in previous editions. Combat is simplified yes, streamlined etc, but it's so much more WORK at the table.

One thing that I find really helps is using paperclips for status effects. Also Essentials is less work. (I want to see a convertion of the PHB ranger with the Essentials extra damage mechanic).

I think the healing system is pure cheese. Yes yes, cinematic and all, but pure cheese. Taking a breather after watching the last bad guy fall dead is not a good explanation for instant healing or refreshing, even considering the vitality vs wounds perspective.

4e runs on action movie physics And try watching a boxing match with no break between rounds. (As for cheese, Wands of Cure Light Wounds, anyone? In 3e they were cheap and could heal you for free.)

Should I look at essentials as an errata printing of the core books? I have the 3 PHBs and DMGs and MMs. Is essentials...essential as an errata reprint of the books, or can I ignore changes and just keep using the books as printed?

The Rules Compendium is lovely. And Monster Vault is looking good. Other than that nothing's obselete.

 

[justrob]

From what I've been reading about essentials, despite the two camps of is it 4.5 or just a fix...I see it more like the black book revision of 2e. It's a fix and cleaned up presentation. Like it says in the intro to that revision, "This is NOT 3rd edition." I don't see essentials as 4.5 in the way that 3.5 was to 3rd.

I'll be picking up the compendium and DM/Monster kits. I'd rather actually use it and find that it's crap than speculate and never know for sure. I'm going on the assumption that it'll help fix my problems with 4e than hurt it more.

 

[I'm A Banana]

- The time bubble thing. 4e is the only edition where I felt like encounters existed in a time bubble, and not part of the overall experience. I feel like planning sessions is all about the encounters and how to fit them into the story I want to tell.

4e focuses a lot on the combat encounters, but you don't have to do this to play 4e. You can tell whatever story you want and, when combat breaks out, shift to "combat mode," and then back into the story.

That said, if you're having problems forcing your story into 4e's encounter-heavy style, 4e probably isn't the game for you, and will only continue to frustrate you. Stick with older editions, or try a new game system.

- The way powers and rituals work in 4e is, I think, what brings this one to mind. The whole concept of powers that can only be used during combat just flies in the face of what I'm used to as someone who grew up with the earlier editions from a young age.

Powers can be used outside of combat, they're just not that useful outside of combat (with the exception of some utility powers).

It seems that, like me, you'd like rules for things that characters can do that isn't "kill that guy." 4e currently lacks a robust, satisfying system for this. I don't think that earlier editions really had such a system, but chances are, whatever you were using in 3e or 2e is useful in 4e. 4e can certainly accommodate such a system, even if it doesn't have one right now.

- The tactical combat. Just...wow. I literally spent hundreds of dollars in minis, tile sets, battle mats (Until I discovered Gaming Paper. That stuff is AWESOME), etc to support the almost mandatory grid-based combat for miniatures. Yes, it's possible to run combats completely verbally "From the couch" as in the old days but, not really.

This is pretty accurate, too. 4e loves the grid + minis. There's a few mini-less combat systems floating around, but they all rely on various levels of DM trust and abstraction, so they're not for everyone. It's a cost and a playstyle change. If you don't have fun like that, 4e probably won't be very satisfying for you, but give it a whirl.

Your complaints are common ones, and they're pretty accurate to how 4e is. It's difficult to do a "from the couch", minis-less, combat-light, encounter-fluid style 4e game, and you're certainly working against the grain of the system when you do it. 4e isn't likely to ameliorate that problem anytime soon, so I'd keep playing what you like, or exploring different options.