D&D 4E I have seen the coming of 4e...

[Ebon Shar]

It sounds to me as if your complaints against 4E are, for the most part, mostly semantic. Though you have played the game and I have not, I would still encourage you to approach the game with an open mind. From your review, which I thank you for, it sounds as if you brought a lot of 3E baggage into the game. To me, 4E is D&D torn down and built from the ground up. As someone who never really loved 3.x, but played it because it was D&D, I'm greatly looking forward to something fresh and new. I will not miss much of the component of 3E that slowed the game or unnecesarily confused things.

To each his own, though. Thanks again for the review. I'm enjoying reading the various reviews posted so far.

 

[Ximenes088]

Personally, 4e feels a lot _more_ like OD&D than any recent editions have.

OD&D characters didn't have a sheet full of abilities to whip out in varying situations. Fighting men could swing their swords, magic users could cast one of their comparative handful of spells... and that was about it. Decision-making among PCs was relatively equal because even the wizard didn't have more than four or five spells that were useful in any given situation. And once everyone decided what they were doing, it was resolved in one or two die rolls apiece, and that was that.

By the time 3.x rolled around, fighters and clerics were playing two different games. The fighter was stacking feats and multiclasses and other esoterica to do one thing each turn, and do it surpassingly well. The spellcasters were broadening out into Swiss Army Knives that had a dozen different useful things they could do each turn, quite aside from being able to sub for the fighter as often as not. It felt like the fighters were playing OD&D with extra dice while the spellcasters were playing... something else at twice the power scale. 4e brings everybody back to the same table. You don't get a huge pile of additional useful options in combat based simply on the class you take.

 

[Remathilis]

Over all I feel exactly as JeffB put it in a closed thread
"It seems to me that the 3E and 4E design teams are just people who never much cared for the original games , the kids I used to play with who had to have 25 pages of house rules and whose tastes differed from the intent/spirit of those early versions. They (WOTC) have remade it to appeal to the younger generation and different style of gamer than I am, and they will do well with it."

You know, nostalgia is a funny thing. It makes people think a certain idea was good because it was first. Its the rose-tinted blinders of nostalgia that make people decry Lucas for "ruining" (usually another r word goes there) their childhood because Han shoots first, or refuse to listen to any music made before 1986 (or pick another decade) since all new music is crap. We're creatures of habit, and we think just because we do X and like it, X cannot be improved upon.

As an aside: I believe Monte, Johnathon and Skip had as much loving admiration for the D&D game as Moldvay, Cook, Holmes, and Gygax. I think Collins, Mearls and Rouse have just as much. Questioning someone's commitment of a particular entity is akin to questioning someone's patriotism; it only ever ends in a fight and nothing gets solved by it.

Castles and Crusades anyone?

No thanks, if I want my dose of nostaliga, I'll play BECMI (Rule's Cyclopedia edition) and remember what it REALLY was like to be 12 again.

 

[LowSpine]

No, it's not. It hasn't always been auto hitting. It wasn't in OD&D or in the Basic D&D Rules.

Not that I am agreeing with the general sentiment of the OP, because I'm not, but:


BASIC D&D (OD&D is more or less the same.)

Magic Missile
Range: 150’
Duration: 1 round
Effect: Creates 1 or more arrows

A Magic Missile is a glowing arrow, created and shot by magic, which inflicts 2-7 (ld6+ 1) points of damage to any creature it strikes.

After the spell is cast, the arrow appears next to the magicuser and hovers there until the magicuser causes it to shoot. When shot, it will automatically hit any visible target.

It will move with the magic-user until shot or until the duration ends. The Magic Missile actually has no solid form, and cannot be touched. A Magic Missile never misses its target and the target is not allowed a Saving Throw.

For every 5 levels of experience of the caster, two more missiles are created by the same spell. Thus a 6th Level Magicuser may create three missiles. The missiles may be shot at different targets.

 

[JeffB]

We're creatures of habit, and we think just because we do X and like it, X cannot be improved upon.

Y'now...assumptions are a funny thing.

MAYBE ....what you consider an improvement, I do not.

MAYBE.... I don't care for my combats to seem like a session of Squad Leader and last the better part of 3 hours. Or even one hour for that matter.

MAYBE.... "cool" to me is playing the part of a fragile 1st level elven wizard with a sleep spell, no armor ,and a dagger in his boot instead of 1st level eladrin wizard who can teleport around the battefield as a natural ability and packs as much punch as the fighter, ranger or paladin.

MAYBE.... instead of having to make sure all the classes have kewl things to do in combat in order to have fun (according to the designers, who know whats best for me ), I like to run games where each class in question gets a chance to shine in an adventure and use his skills/abilities the others do not have whether its a combat situation or not.

MAYBE.... some people need to get off their high horses and realize the game has changed very significantly in the past two editions despite the names remaining the same and just because some of us may not like all the changes does not make us "wrong", "grognards", or "nostalgic".

MAYBE.....just maybe...I happen to LIKE...no REALLY, IT'S NOT NOSTALGIA, BUT ACTUALLY LIKE (!) prior editions of the game. OMG-ZERS, IS THAT LIKE, POSSIBLE? (well, not according to the 3E or 4E designers it seems or a alot of people here on ENWORLD lately! All these years I THOUGHT I was having fun??? But it was just nostalgia. I really *wasn't* having any fun at all

MAYBE I really wanted to like 4E (and 3E) and its clear to me its not the kind of thing I consider an improvement or do not consider a better game. Despite other's assertions to the contrary.

 

[Morrus]

I find it hard to empathise with the POV that "I don't like that they changed X". 4E isn't supposed to be 3E with a few changes, it's a totally new game. They haven't changed anything; they've written a completely brand new game. Or rather - they've changed everything. That, to me, is what "new edition" means; I don't really want to buy 3E again because I already have it.

I certainly understand that people may not like the new game; that's cool. But not liking it simply for not being the same as 3E doesn't make sense to me. Were people hoping for 3E to be released with a new cover, perhaps? If you don't have it, pick up the leatherbound 3E collectors editions - they'll make a great 4E for you: exactly the same, but with a different cover!

It's a new game. Not the old game changed a bit.

 

[Morrus]

MAYBE.....just maybe...I happen to LIKE...no REALLY, IT'S NOT NOSTALGIA, BUT ACTUALLY LIKE (!) prior editions of the game. OMG-ZERS, IS THAT LIKE, POSSIBLE? (well, not according to the 3E or 4E designers it seems or a alot of people here on ENWORLD lately! All these years I THOUGHT I was having fun??? But it was just nostalgia. I really *wasn't* having any fun at all .

Tone down the aggression there, please, Jeff.

Nobody has ever suggested that you don't like prior editions; that's fine. So do I. I suspect I'm going to like both. It's damning a new game for not being the same as an old game that's riling people up. They're different games; they can co-exist peacefully, and they're not supposed to be the same.

 

[Imp]

They haven't changed anything; they've written a completely brand new game. Or rather - they've changed everything. That, to me, is what "new edition" means; I don't really want to buy 3E again because I already have it.

You can't blame people for not having those expectations. 1e -> 2e was not a very big jump at least initially. 2e -> 3e was, but a lot of stuff was kept, or an attempt to emulate it was made using the new rules. So there's not so much to support that point of view that it's obvious to all comers.

 

[WayneLigon]

Sometimes game history just needs to be done away with. Just because something has been there since the beginning isn't a good reason to keep it around forever; a lot of the assumptions and 'understructure' of earlier editions just doesn't stand up too well.

 

[Doug McCrae]

MAYBE.... instead of having to make sure all the classes have kewl things to do in combat in order to have fun (according to the designers, who know whats best for me ), I like to run games where each class in question gets a chance to shine in an adventure and use his skills/abilities the others do not have whether its a combat situation or not.

There is a better way than everyone-is-bored-most-of-the-time.

I don't want to shine, I want to participate.