D&D 4E Inquiry: How do 4E fans feel about 4E Essentials?

[Deekin]

Everything else about Essentials was pretty dire. The (deliberately?) incoherent marketing, the pointless pandering to presumed grognard tastes -- as soon as I saw the change to Magic Missile, I knew we were doomed and I knew Mearls was killing 4e.

Not to mention the pointless class variants. The Bladesinger stands out as being pretty dire example, being a wizard that's trying to be a swordmage, but doing a terrible job of being a controller, striker, or defender.

 

[Joshua Randall]

pointless class variants

"Pointless class variants that suck at what they do" was a very 3e thing -- arguably a 2e thing with "kits" -- and therefor sufficiently "old school" for Mearls' tastes, I'm sure.

In a broader sense: game design full of traps for non-min-maxers is a very 3e thing, too. Something that 4e almost expunged (it's very hard to build a bad non-essentials 4e character unless you really try or are a complete idiot), but I would guess 5e has brought back.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Re: Pointless class variants

D&D across all editions has historically been haunted by a concept I call 'now shut up' items.

Basically concepts that the fans clamor for loudly and vehemently that the company or design team have little passion or desire to entertain. So what gets pushed out is something between a passionless attempt and malicious compliance. Exactly what is a simple lackluster effort and actual 'now shut up' is clearly debatable, but I feel that's a bigger reason for kludge than simply making having a lot of trap options on purpose.

I'm less savvy on classes like this (though things like the Beguiler and 4e's 4 (4!!!!) versions of playable vampires and especially the Battlemaster are suspect), races are the biggest ones I've observed. Raptorians were Now Shut Up to players who wanted flying PCs in a time when the design team and most DMs had fear of flying, Dragonborn still feel like a Now Shut up to people who wanted playable dragons that manage to at least minimally satisfy

 

[Garthanos]

D&D across all editions has historically been haunted by a concept I call 'now shut up' items.

Basically concepts that the fans clamor for loudly and vehemently that the company or design team have little passion or desire to entertain. So what gets pushed out is something between a passionless attempt and malicious compliance. Exactly what is a simple lackluster effort and actual 'now shut up' is clearly debatable, but I feel that's a bigger reason for kludge than simply making having a lot of trap options on purpose.

I'm less savvy on classes like this (though things like the Beguiler and 4e's 4 (4!!!!) versions of playable vampires

they didnt build that Vampire theme yet did they? see one is missing. LOL

and especially the Battlemaster are suspect), races are the biggest ones I've observed. Raptorians were Now Shut Up to players who wanted flying PCs in a time when the design team and most DMs had fear of flying, Dragonborn still feel like a Now Shut up to people who wanted playable dragons that manage to at least minimally satisfy

 

[Aldarc]

Monster Vault and MV: Threats to the Nentir Vale are the best D&D monster books ever made for any edition as monster books that you use in a game rather that just interesting fluff. (Although Nentir Vale has plenty of fluff.) These books show off the way to design 4e monsters right, drawing on lessons learned over the lifespan of the game. Sadly, they came at what we now know was the tale end of that game's lifespan, when its death warrant had already been signed by Mearls & Co.

As you say, this was probably one of the best D&D monster books ever made for any edition. The monsters and foes were not devoid of context, but situated within the context of the setting alongside factions. So the book also gave the monsters a real sense of place, function, and meaning. If I were to write up a monster book for a setting, I would probably use Threats to the Nentir Vale as my model.

 

[S'mon]

"Pointless class variants that suck at what they do" was a very 3e thing -- arguably a 2e thing with "kits" -- and therefor sufficiently "old school" for Mearls' tastes, I'm sure.

In a broader sense: game design full of traps for non-min-maxers is a very 3e thing, too. Something that 4e almost expunged (it's very hard to build a bad non-essentials 4e character unless you really try or are a complete idiot), but I would guess 5e has brought back.

I don't think 5e is anything like 3e with 'traps'.

 

[Joshua Randall]

D&D across all editions has historically been haunted by a concept I call 'now shut up' items.

'Now shut up' is a great name for it.

However I will disagree that 4e dragonborn were a 'now shut up' race. They are well integrated into the 4e setting, and playing one feels awesome. The 4e 'now shut up' races were, like, the pixie (don't even get me started on my absolute hatred for this) and the hamadryad and satyr (for whom the 'just why?' meme were invented, I think).

But as you say -- we can argue the specifics while acknowledging the general. 'Now shut up' is definitely "a thing" in D&D, as you said.

 

[Neonchameleon]

There was a lot I liked about Essentials as a splatbook for baseline 4e but on its own it lacked a lot of what made 4e engaging. And I think that that (and most of the rest of what I'm going to say) is not out of line with most of the other respondents.

Anyway. Highlights:

• Monster Vault and Monster Vault: Threats to the Nentir Vale are the two best monster books in any edition of D&D. They've as much fluff as any book but you can use them directl at the table in ways you can't any other non-4e monster book.
• The slayer and to a lesser extent the scout opened up the game for mechanically not very adept players. (The hunter did at low levels but really scald badly).
• The Elementalist Sorcerer enabled those same players to play a caster. In particular every version of D&D should have a simple pyromancer "I burn it" to go alongside the simple barbarian "I smash it".
• The thief was a small gem of a rogue class
• Enchanters, invokers, and nethermancers are just more inspiring than staff wizards, orb wizards, and wand wizards
• The vampire and especially the multiclass vampire were both fun twists (even if the class didn't scale well at higher levels).
• The berserker with its switching from defender to striker gives nice options.
• Themes added an extra layer to characters.

I'm also in the "4e dragonborn were awesome". I don't think the 4e dryad and satyr were "now shut up" so much as "we need stuff with mechanics to fill the pagecount" - a related issue and one of the things 5e does right is that it has little of this.

Oh, and lowlights for Essentials:

• Wizards have dailies, fighters don't. And other things that separated the mages from the muggles.
• Forced movement being either large (enchanter wizards...) or rare. Neither emphasises the teamwork as much.
• Balance. It sucked by the standards of baseline 4e. Many classes didn't scale properly out of heroic tier.
• Roughly 75% of the mechanics of Heroes of Shadow. (The Nethermancy* specialisation was good and the multiclass vampire was cool)
• The Dungeon Delver's Handbook was literally 50% advertising for other adventures and the most OP book in 4e.
• Theme balance was kinda bad and they were too complex for what they were at times.
• "Spite" mechanics. The worst was probably True Portable Hole; the original 4e Portable Hole was a portable hole that you put on something and walked through bugs bunny style, not a bag of holding variant. So Mearls called the other version the True Portable Hole.
• The lack of rituals.

* Nethermancy = shadow magic/the parts of the necromancy school not dedicated to raising dead, plus a couple of spells like Black Tentacle. Mostly cursing and debuffing. And a Nethermancy specialist wizard could easily be added to 5e.

I'll defend the bladesinger as being much better than it looked on paper - although honestly that's a low bar.

 

[Weiley31]

I'll defend the bladesinger as being much better than it looked on paper - although honestly that's a low bar.

I say just straight up replacing Instinctive Attack with an auto-granting of the Intelligent Blademaster feat would be a better start for it. And probably making it more of a Arcane Striker instead of a Controller.

Or one just says Bugger it all and just follow the 5E refluff approach by just changing your Swordmage class name into Bladesinger instead. I mean heck, Swordmage Warding literally screams Bladesinger Fighting Style. Just homebrew add on the Bladespells and your all set. Even the Swordmage 4E art literally shows it on the tin in that regards.

 

[Joshua Randall]

In a full-4e game where you can cherry pick the Essentialized stuff you want? Fine. Great. Bring it on. I'll ignore the terrible stuff and some of the lame fluff in the later books.

As its own game line, just Essentials? NOT 4E. Not even 4.5e. More a bastardized game made by someone who neither understood nor appreciated 4e's design.

(But on that note... was there really a big group of people out there who came into the game and bought nothing but Essentials and played that? Given their terrible marketing fail, I doubt it. So my complaint about Essentials as standalone game is mostly hypothetical.)

Oh, and I forgot to add: the dungeon tiles that for some reason had the word 'Essentials' on them? Yes please. Great gameplay aid.