Indie Games Are Not More Focused. They Are Differently Focused.

[kenada]

Those characters weren’t meant to “act dumb”. It’s just that they didn’t follow conventional expectations, so they got labeled as such (or “crazy”).

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yeah, I find it super hard to make characters 'act dumb' unless I have a real structured way to do it, lol.

I suspect that this is one of the most significant disconnects in these discussions. I would probably value social mechanics with "teeth" more if I had a hard time acting against my character's best interests. But since I am perfectly willing to do so regardless of game, I find such things get in my way more than help me.

As I've said before, different preferences, experience, and expectations.

 

[aramis erak]

4e is likely a bit of a different fish from the rest of D&D and traditional play. I suspect that it's one reason a lot of the Story Now people on this forum are commonly singing its praises, while a fair number of posters more steeped in traditional play seem to eschew it and also complain about its mechanics in a similar way as you do here. On a recent Twitch stream, Matt Colville basically argued that 4e D&D may have been the only edition of D&D - and I suspect that he was overlooking B/X and procedural dungeon-crawling here - that was intentionally designed to be good at a particular style of play: i.e., high heroic. He also compared it to Exalted, which I found interesting given @Campbell's own experiences with both. So in some regards, D&D 4e does have more in common with "indie games."

I like Story Now! play... but not 4E. The RAW as released on day 1 was heavily ignoring its own advice, and the teaser modules I experienced (and later read) were little more than linking narrative with minis battles.

Once the 4E DMG2 rules came out, and included the good stuff... maybe. But I've never gone back and tried it again.

And it is, as you said, a different beastie than the other editions.

 

[Campbell]

I really only got into running a lot of 4e after DMG2. I loved my time with it (especially it's wonderful setting), but I probably won't ever go back. It's just way too focused on party oriented play for my tastes. Exalted Third Edition, Legend of the Five Rings Fifth Edition, and Pathfinder Second Edition provide me with a lot of what I loved about 4e without some of the more group oriented stuff I would rather do without.

 

[aramis erak]

I really only got into running a lot of 4e after DMG2. I loved my time with it (especially it's wonderful setting), but I probably won't ever go back. It's just way too focused on party oriented play for my tastes. Exalted Third Edition, Legend of the Five Rings Fifth Edition, and Pathfinder Second Edition provide me with a lot of what I loved about 4e without some of the more group oriented stuff I would rather do without.

While I much prefer group oriented games.

Still, 4E didn't do it for me. It was neither what I wanted, nor what I expected. That was, however, the height of my use of Burning Wheel.