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Message: <blockquote data-quote="eamon" data-source="post: 5524414" data-attributes="member: 51942">Fair enough.  I kindof like off-label use; but 4e spider climb is nice enough as it is - it's naturally flexible and easily used creatively. Yeah, a return to 3e classes isn't a good idea.  But why shouldn't a fighter have some unique abilities too?  E.g. a 3e fighter was almost by definition mundane and that imposed limitations - but really, why?  Barring the lacking explanation, something "weird" like Come and Get It is perfectly cool - I just wish there's be some consistent fluff that might inspire other fitting things such a fighter might be able to do.A little more risky would be a set up that encourages teamwork; e.g. spells permitting stunts are enablers, but require physical skills and simply another set of hands to pull off - kind of like rituals, but then in which someone else does the skill check (and without the cost and casting time problems).  Say, a leap of the storms trick that lets an ally roll twice on a jump check, double it, and then drag along others in his wake (say, close blast 3).There is no "problem".  It's a just a different game.  You can't do as many crazy things out of combat - but then combat is much more complex, so you spend more time doing that.  And of course NPC interactions and that kind of "personality" roleplaying hasn't really changed at all. The question of this thread (to me, anyhow) was whether and how 4e damaged "simulationism" - and I feel that it has.  Some people hate that, but they're probably not playing 4e anymore.  Others like that (I'm guessing such as yourself).  I like the wordbuilding everything-makes-sense kind of simulationism, and the "problem" - or rather challenge - is whether that loss was a necessary loss to achieve 4e's plot-balance and tactical combat, and I think it would be possible to construct a more thought out in-game explanation for powers without actually taking away the balance.I don't want casters running the show either.  And have a spell simply "solve" a problem is boring and stealing others' show (I think rituals like knock still do that, incidentally - though the noise fortunately leaves at least some limitation).  But having a spell be a part of the solution - I'm OK with that - and if that means others also get superhuman tricks to use creatively to maintain balance, sure!  E.g., I fondly remember a 3e monk whose trick was jumping over, oh, small villages. It was useful only once, but it was fun.  And monks in 3e (including this guy) weren't serious competition to casters, but that's only part of the story.  Or, when a fire-deity (and resisting) worshipper grappled a too-powerful dragon with a necklace of fireballs round his neck, screaming for the sorcerer to target him...  It's just fun to work around a plot obstacle in a ludicrously fantastic way.  The trick would be to find spells and abilities that aren't one-push "I win" buttons, but usable to partially tackle problems in their own unique way nevertheless.I mean, some 3e stuff was just borked (wild shape), or too annoying (scry+teleport meant every BBEG needed some kind of suppression, the details of which got way to intricate), and I could go on for ages (oh, say divine meta-magic and persist spell, or stat-boosters in general, etc...), but many of those problematic things were also rather boring - pure combat or 1 push button "I win" things - no loss there!  Looking back at what I just wrote - I think 4e turned the dial towards mundane one notch too far for me.  And there's nothing fundamentally hard about adding that stuff to 4e - most of this stuff hardly impacts combat, and in any case, combat in 4e isn't mundane at all anyhow...</blockquote>

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