How All Powers Could be At-Will

[Fifth Element]

Even if there are options for fighters to pretty much follow an AEDU model, I hope they don't call their abilities "powers".

In a game where unarmoured wizards have an Armour Class, you can lose Hit Points even when you're not actually hit, and Cure Light Wounds can bring someone back from the brink of death, I can't see the choice in terminology being all that important.

 

[the Jester]

In a game where unarmoured wizards have an Armour Class, you can lose Hit Points even when you're not actually hit, and Cure Light Wounds can bring someone back from the brink of death, I can't see the choice in terminology being all that important.

The problem is that the term "powers" seems to alienate some D&D players. Personally, I don't find the term a dealbreaker but I do find it a bit too immersion-breaking for my taste. But since the phrase "fighter powers" alone is a dealbreaker to a certain segment of the fanbase- or at least I have seen quite a few people claim it is for them in threads here and on other sites- then I see no advantage to using it when there are less immersion-breaking terms equally available (stance, for instance, seems to mollify a lot of the no-powers crowd).

If the only advantage of the term "powers" is to piss off grongards, I don't see it as actually bringing anything positive to the game.

 

[Fifth Element]

If the only advantage of the term "powers" is to piss off grongards, I don't see it as actually bringing anything positive to the game.

Oh sure, so long as said grognards realize they're being very selective about the terminology they choose to be pissed off about.

If there's a better term, use it. The problem is, where does that stop? See the examples I used: if each of those were changed for something more descriptive, that would also piss off those grognards.

 

[steeldragons]

I'm a big fan of Mike Mearls, and in his Reddit Q&A he said they're aware of 4e fans dissatisfaction and are looking for ways to appease us.

Well, that's a damn shame...I mean that "we" have to "appease 4e players."

Until he gives me a reason to do otherwise, I'm going to keep faith in him to bring those like me things to make us happy.

I've read this sentence over and over...and I STILL have no idea what it is supposed to mean. Enjoy whatever Mike Mearls gives to you...?...I guess?

--SD

 

[the Jester]

Oh sure, so long as said grognards realize they're being very selective about the terminology they choose to be pissed off about.

If there's a better term, use it. The problem is, where does that stop? See the examples I used: if each of those were changed for something more descriptive, that would also piss off those grognards.

Absolutely. And that's an important consideration to revising a game with as much history as D&D.

Change for change's sake doesn't improve anything. Change that breaks immersion- and fighters using encounter and daily powers does that for a fair number of gamers, especially old skoolers- is bad unless it brings more to the table than the broken immersion takes away. Change that revises decades of game terminology had better make a substantial improvement to overcome the resistance of thousands of tons of nerdrage.

If you're arguing that we should change the terms "armor class" and "hit points" to something more accurate, I can't get behind that; those are terms with decades of tradition behind them and I don't see any real gain to changing them (and potentially confusing decades worth of gamers). What is the advantage of changing "armor class" to "damage difficulty" or something? How much does it improve the game? I'd say it's a negligible improvement at most. And it's just not worth the nerdrage generated.

 

[mkill]

Well, that's a damn shame...I mean that "we" have to "appease 4e players."

We really really really need to get rid of the strawmen players who only like one edition. Because that's nowhere near reality. Gamers have different preferences and D&D editions are crude representatives for that. Even if two people prefer the same edition they probably like completely different things about it and their respective groups play D&D in completely opposite ways.

TL;DR: Stop that crap, you're poisoning the discussion.

 

[Campbell]

Well, that's a damn shame...I mean that "we" have to "appease 4e players."

Honestly it shouldn't be about "appeasing" anyone. It's about finding the right mix of options to bring the most value to as many people as possible. Honestly, at this point the community isn't big enough for WotC to be able to afford the economic cost of leaving fans of any particular edition out of the equation. Personally I question if they can manage to produce a game that appeals to all the disparate elements of the community, but not considering possible customers in today's low consumer confidence economy is beyond stupid. Honestly, the initial release might not be that difficult, but marketing supplemental material to a divided fan base might prove to be fairly difficult.

 

[steeldragons]

TL;DR: Stop that crap, you're poisoning the discussion.

Fair enough. Wouldn't want to poison a fun discussion.

Just as an unrelated thing...I'm seeing more and more frequently this "TL;DR" popping up all over the place...What the F does that mean/stand for?

 

[Fifth Element]

Fair enough. Wouldn't want to poison a fun discussion.

Just as an unrelated thing...I'm seeing more and more frequently this "TL;DR" popping up all over the place...What the F does that mean/stand for?

Too long, didn't read. It's the precis version for someone who doesn't want to read the whole post.

 

[ren1999]

The problem with encounter and daily "powers" as one participant on ENWorld said was that players rely too much on them and usually use them at the very beginning of a fight to the exclusion of other interesting and potentially useful and creative powers.

The answer might be to make all the powers at-will by reducing the power or compound abilities of that power so that they are more or less equal in quality to another power.

A fire ball cast at one target might do 1d6.
An explosive rune burst might do 2 damage to all targets in the burst.

Hopefully this will add some variety and strategy to the game. The wizard could soften up the targets for other party members or focus on seriously hurting just one target.

I'm not saying that we need to totally balance all characters by making all powers at-will. All powers could be at-will while we remember the original game imbalance.
Fighter types should have more hit points and Wizard types should do more damage as a trade off.