I'm ready for Fourth Edition now (a brief manifesto)

[Piratecat]

Cool! As long as it's not opposite Arisia, I'd love to come

Send me an email when you have the date.

We'll set it for the weekend after Arisia, January 29th. I'll start a thread. It's linked in my sig - sign up fast!

 

[WizarDru]

The point would be to force the players to use strategy in coming up with options that _would_ work against the monster, not just sitting in the corner and waiting for the other party members to handle it.

Those options already exist under 3e, though. But some options, by design, are less useful to some players than others. For your players, clearly, they all simply want a direct piece of the BBEG, and only through direct action. That isn't how some players want it, nor is the system designed for it. I would posit that the majority aren't interested in seeing the class-system completely dismantled and a new one take it's place.

I can envision different ways that those scenarios could be made more interesting and involving for individuals, too, but the issue is one of core competency. It sounds like you're advocating removing salient features of the core classes, or rendering them equal in the Diablo II sense, where a paladin and necromancer are equally good combatants, in their own way. I'm not sure if that's what you're advocating, but I wouldn't look forward to that approach, myself. Any character accepts that he has certain weaknesses, as part of the game's design.

3e provides you with plenty of choices, and that includes not needing a specific character class to successfully adventure. The game may play differently without a cleric, but he isn't absolutely necessary....just good to have around. A zombie can be killed without being turned...but it's harder. A bodak may not kill you if you make your save...but it's a lot easier if you have a death ward running. The same applies for a rogue, fighter or wizard. It sounds like the issues you're having are with published adventures more than anything else.

Which more and more leads me to think that either Grim Tales or Unearthed Arcana is what you're after. Grim Tales isn't a book of house rules, it's a completely different take on D&D, incorporating an entirely different mindset. Unearthed Arcana is all about tinkering with core D&D, with things like spell points, reducing all classes down to their cores and erasing the lines between them, alternate damage systems and ways to change the very fabric of D&D (not to be confused with Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed).

Diaglo has shown amazing restraint here in not advocating his system of choice: original D&D. It sounds like what you might be saying is that you want your players to be able to do any option that comes in their head, such as the wizard fighting with the torch, or the fighter grabbing a holy symbol and driving the skeleton back or more unusual solutions that you feel the system doesn't promote. I'd agree that it doesn't...but that it'd be easier for you, as an indivdual, to do that than for the entire system to change to find a way to provide you that option.

 

[Belen]

I agree with just about everything that BD has said. The "options" of 3e have become a serious problem. Most options either grant a plus to some ability or break the core mechanics in favor of the feat. Equipment is also a problem, especially magical weapons.

I really do not like the prices for magic weapons, especially when you look at the golfbag approach needed for 3.5. The prices almost nullify two-weapon fighters as much as the rules themselves.

One thing that I really enjoy are the Heroic Paths and Covenant items from Midnight. I fully recommend using these rules in your normal 3e game. Heroic Paths really help make a PC more unique and since they choose one at first level, you do not have the PrC issue.

Covenant items make magic items more flavorful again.

Just my thoughts.

Dave

 

[Nisarg]

I don't understand why, when people say they're 'burned' out on the game, they blame the rules as opposed to the way they've been running their game.

Amen.

I've never had a problem running D20.. though I would say that I may have more and more of a problem with D20 players. Fortunately my players are the exception, but when we get someone new coming along, I sometimes have to guide them away from the "how many feats/prestige classes can I use to have the BEST POWERGUY EVAR???" complex.
If anything is wrong with D20 it is the growing power-creep. But a good DM can slam the door down on that pretty quick by limiting which books and rules are used.

All that said, I am taking a kind of break from D20, though not by conscious plan so much as a series of coincidences.
Getting the complete set of gazeteers, plus the rules cyclopedia and box sets for D&D "basic" means I'm now running OD&D, I decided that for my next Cthulhu game the original rules would be easier to work with my campaign concept than the D20 rules; and my other two campaigns are Amber and "Capitan Alatriste" (a Spanish RPG); meaning that for the first time since D20's inception I am currently running NO D20 campaigns.

Still playing in one, though. Pulp Heroes, run by my friend Jong. I'm playing a German version of Batman. Good fun.

Nisarg

 

[Foundry of Decay]

If this were a new edition that was being done for market, I'd say you have lost half of your audience (being conservative in my estimates) just with the first rule you posted.

There are a few reasons you would lose half of gamers with the first rule. First would be that people don't like being railroaded by the rules. There should never be a set design or gospel of how many encounters that a GM would be allowed to have per game session. Even the worst RPG's would steer very clear of that landmine.

Second would be that a great deal of people actually like combat encounters. This will vary wildly from group to group, and individual to individual. Rules can't dictate here at all. It should strictly be up to a GM and his group about how many or how few encounters would be needed.

I'll agree with a previous poster that this looks more like a manifest of how to change things to fit house rules. Too many 'how you should play' rules exist for this to be called an appealing edition.

Roleplay is also very hard to squeeze into a ruleset. This, again, is up to players and the GM. I can honestly say that my group and I have absolutely no problem roleplaying with the current edition whatsoever. We have sessions that don't include *any* combat, and are RP heavy. Other sessions involve both RP and several combat situations. We have handled this in our current game without a cleric or general healer as well, by the way.

In all honesty, if/when there is a 4th edition, it would have to include some VERY noticable changes for I and my group to even bother giving it a look. Right now the edition seems fine to us.

 

[jester47]

Save yourself the trouble of writing a new game. Play C&C.

Some things have been learned in 3.x: Higher should be better. You should only really have to roll the same number of dice each time. It helps if everything is resolved with the same kind of roll. There should not be a separate rule for everything.

C&C takes this further. There is a thread on it at Dragonsfoot that is a general FAQ that explains how the system mostly works.

Major selling points:

Shortened prep time? Yup. Less rules to remember? Yup. Get through adventures faster? Sure thing. No mat to clear room for? Right on! Really quick yet detailed combats? All done! I ONLY NEED ONE BOOK?! Uh-huh. All the functionality of 3.5? Sure. You can still use your 1e 2e and 3e source stuff with little or no hassle? Yes.

Sold! I am so looking forward to this.

Aaron.

 

[Umbran]

I don't think you can use published adventures as an indicator of what the norm is for encounter design. It's been noted in the industry that adventures don't sell well. That implies that most DMs are writing their own adventures, leaving the published ones as poor indicators of how folks actually play.

That aside, there's a major logical error in your design approach. You say that the rules stipulate adventure design that you don't like. I think that point is argueable, but let's take it as true for the moment. Is the best approach then to design a system that stipulates another specific adventure design?

I'd suggest that it would be more reasonable to try to rework the system so that there's no stipulation at all. Rebuild it so that it is robust enough to handle the full range between the D&D you don't like now through how you personally would like to see it, and everythign inbetween.

I'll be honest with you - I don't think that much reworking is required. A set of guidelines for GMs on how to design adventures, how to control proliferation of magic items, and how to pick and choose what feats are allowed in thier games would serve much better than a whole new ruleset.

I think this is a case where one should look to the Principle of Least Action for guidance. Don't do more work than you need to do to achieve the desired result. Don't write a whole new game when a supplement to a currently popular game will do the trick.

 

[Klaus]

BD,

Go to www.fierydragon.com and download the free adventure Quest for Amelia. It has a lot in common with what you wished your new system to do (including dealing with wounded sylvan protector, less smaller combats, lots of roleplaying). All within 3e.

 

[reanjr]

Rule 2: Give players options not plusses. A fighter, over the course of her 20 levels, gains 11 fighter feats (plus those for level and race). They can almost all be described as: feat a) get a plus, feat b) do this manuever without incurring an AOO. Now, one thing I have learned is that players will almost _never_ deliberately incur an AOO (unless it's from a vastly weaker opponent, see Rule 1). So the fighter ends up by 20th level with 5-6 options (bull rush, feint, etc...) and a bunch more plusses. In fourth edition, there will be many, many more options. A third level fighter will have 5-6 combat maneuvers that he can try out, with no AOO. Apply Rule 2 to magic as well. A 20th level wizard gets, what, 5 metamagic feats? If they don't take any item creation? The third level wizard in fourth edition will have at least five metamagic options right up front.

I agree with you, though there may already be some answers in Malhavoc's material, especially for the warrior types.

I agree with these sentiments overall. Though you can run a 3e game like these, it throws everything out of balance. The game's balance is too precariously balanced upon the pinhead of the standard dungeon crawl.

 

[The Horror]

But I'm ready to move on. D&D still has some major flaws, flaws which are keeping my fellow gamers from wanting to play as much as I do. Flaws which are beginning to keep me from wanting to play as well.

You definately need a new system.

I would recommend Talislanta. It is similar enough to D&D 3.5 that you can make all the monster conversions on the fly, and yet it is very much more streamlined. Definately look into it. Even if you don't like the setting you'll be able to use the system in any D&D setting you currently own.

The next recommendation I would make is HERO. Pick up a copy of Sidekick for $10 and decide if you like what you see. If you do, get yourself a copy of Fantasy Hero and possibly the new Hero 5th Edition Revised and go for it. A nice generic system that maintains it's internal consistency throughout any genre of play, and that handles Fantasy admirably well.


The Horror