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Message: <blockquote data-quote="justrob" data-source="post: 5372195" data-attributes="member: 90783">As the title says, I'd like some help in "getting" 4e. First, a little background to the question.I first started playing D&D back in '94. Some of the older kids in school were playing it at lunch. They let me join in one day and that was that.This was 2nd edition. Most of my history with the game is with that edition, though I ended up in a lot of very loose and freewheeling (with the rules) 3e games.I fell out of the hobby for a little bit just before 4e was released. What I read about it as it came out and the months following made me feel like the game was no longer the game I remembered. I was angered by the way WotC had changed the game so much to cater to the WoW crowd, at the expense of several things that I held dear about D&D; Vancian magic, freedom of combat versus "time bubble" encounters. etc. I was firmly in the 4e is THE DEVIL camp for awhile. I still wanted to actually play the thing, as I was well aware of the fact that all my prejudices against it were formed without having played it yet. I was on the fence about investing in the books when my girlfriend surprised me for christmas 08 with the 3 book starter set and from there I just said screw it and went all in.My experience with running 4e is running a home campaign and setting for two years for my girlfriend and some of her friends as my players. I did run a couple of Encounters sessions as a fill-in DM at Pax East when they were in need of help, but that's about it. Nothing beyond that small sampling.Now, as to the understanding of the game, there are a few things that always irked me and have given rise to my not really wanting to use 4e anymore. Hopefully someone can help me see things differently as I still have a little leftover 4e is the devil in me...I'm not sure if I'm just a crappy DM in the grand scheme of things or if there is something to my thoughts.- 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. - 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.- 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.Uhm...I guess that's all I can think of for now. Don't get me wrong, this isn't supposed to be about edition bashing. There are TONS that I absolutely love about 4e. I've been going the older editions, trying to think of one I would rather jump back to but it all leads me back to seeing the progression of things that were fixed with newer editions. Stats, skills, defenses, conflict resolution, I LOVE their 4e incarnations. Status effects kind of piss me off, but that leads back to the tactical video game nature of combat etc. So, can anyone help me wrap my head around the way 4e handles the things I mentioned above? The streamlining of the core rules really impresses me but the base mechanics of the edition being skewed towards combat and enhancing encounters just pisses me off. I'd like to be able to say 4e is all I need, but I really need some help in seeing these bad things from a different perspective.</blockquote>

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