D&D 4E Is 4E doing it for you?

[Benimoto]

The WOTC folks have stated many times that 4E was designed/written so that in-game, you don't actually have to crack open the books.

Everything you should need or want for a DM is either on the DM-screen or in the adventure itself. Same goes for the players (and why we have power-cards).

For me, this is one of my favorite features of 4e. I just recently GMed a session of 4e that was as fun as the most fun sessions I've had in 8 years of 3e playing, and when I was done, I realized that I didn't look in a book even once. That never happened in my 3e days, and I'm the kind of obsessive memorizer that can tell you what Awesome Blow does right off the top of my head (-4 to hit, knocks a smaller target back 10 feet and prone, Reflex DC to avoid knockback = damage dealt).

The ability to run sessions without constantly looking up rules is a big step towards making things run faster, smoother, and in my opinion, better.

 

[malraux]

The thing I've noticed with 4e is that even with rules disputes, because there are so many more monsters in a combat, unless the next person in the init is either that monster or going to attack that monster, its much easier to tell the person to look up the relevant rule themselves while combat proceeds forward.

 

[Wormwood]

IMO (as well as IME) anyone who finds this "burden" to be more than they can manage will never be a great DM. Or at least has a long way to go yet and will never get there without playing robust systems.
Whereas the payoff of that "burden" is even more ability for great DMs to shine.

I will cheerfully admit that my boredom with rote memorization hindered my ability---and willingness---to be a 'great' 3.5 DM.

I remain, however, a great BECMI and 4e DM.

 

[Wormwood]

[nothing to see here]

 

[The Little Raven]

But lack of Rules Mastery is an invitation to a poor DM.

My friend Tim is about as far from a Rules Master as you can get (I'm our group's go-to guy for rules and interpretations), but he is one of the finest DMs I have ever played under.

The inability to keep your campaign moving is an invitation to a poor DM, regardless of whether that inability stems from being bogged down by poor rule knowledge or inability to adapt to rapidly changing circumstances.

 

[greyscale1]

To OP: yes.

 

[Henry]

Can 4th be run without reading the Monster Manual? Serious question -- not trying to be snarky. I haven't run or played 4th, just read the books.

As a serious question, yes I have, and you can in two ways: (1) is the standard way, and you could do it with 3e too, it just takes longer -- pre-writing the whole monster stat block into your notes, so you don't have to open it. With 4e, it's been easier because the stat blocks are vastly simplified -- "dumbed down", perhaps.

(2) is my favorite -- use the charts from pages 184 and 185 from the DMG. I love 'em so much I've copied them and clipped them to my DM screen. With them I can create a monster on the fly, or duplicate an existing monster from the MM, making him level appropriate for my players. I create a monster, give him 1 or 2 special abilities, one of which is per encounter, and let 'er rip. The players I don't think have ever figured out the difference. They could DEFINITELY tell when I was fudging up a 3e monster's stats, because I would sometimes over or underestimate the AC, or saves, or attack bonus, or damage.

 

[Simon Atavax]

For folks who say there's no roll playing - it's there if you WANT it, and it always will be. Talk in silly voices and have elabrate plots, and in that way roll playing cannot be taken out of paper-n-pencil DnD. I think the issue is how it's under-emphasized in the book. (oh don't get me started on that book - one page for an index? you're f'ing kidding me. But 3.5 indexes never had what I was looking for either. It's a wash.)

I'm sure someone is going to politely point out that there is far, far more to role-playing than "talking in silly voices", and I'm also sure someone is going to point out the unintended irony of your typo ("roll" instead of "role" in a sentence which seems to trivialize role-playing) but it won't be me.

 

[Ahzad]

My group has been mired in apathy for a while, prolly mostly my fault b/c I'm the DM and have kind of been burnt out on D&D 3.x and new players. I'm in the habit of canceling a game in a moment b/c I'm tired of dealing w/ new player questions and many of them are the same questions over and over and tired of them not contributing anything back to the game except for a few of them. It sucks b/c ideally I should cut some of the players and replace them, but I like them all as friends and would feel bad about losing some of them, since that's the only time some of us really hang out.

I've been playing D&D in each incarnation for 30+ years now, and most of that time has been behind the screen. Every edition has it pluses and minuses and 4e is no exception. When it was announced I was dead set against it b/c I just didn't want to continue to spend my money on this game when I've got so much stuff I've yet to use. Anyway I got a retailer demo package (I'm the manager at the local comics/game store) and thought I'd better at least give it a run through so I would know what the heck I was selling. So I got the group together and we played the first few encounters of Shadowfell Keep with the pre-gens that they sent with it. The group all seemed to really enjoy it, most being players that have less than 3 years experience at playing D&D, even the one guy I've been playing with for 20 years enjoyed it. I then had the opportunity to play in another guy's game, 4e got him interested to play again and he hadn't played since 2e. So he asked if I would play in his game and give him DM pointers and what-not until he got comfortable I said yes and I'll be damned if I'm not having a blast playing my eladrin wizard, who's now 2nd level.

I didn't want to like this game and was very resistant to it, but the more I've played it the more I've liked it enough now that I'm going to convert our Ptolus game into 4e in hopes that it will inject some new excitement into the game. There still a couple of things I don't like, mainly the lack of skill points I like having skill points I like to choose to be bad at something to be good at something else, and the lack of depth for the spells. I've seen the arguments for and against the spell issue and I can see both sides but to me IMO there is a lack of depth/versatility, but then there hasn't been an edition that hasn't had it's faults for me. It's still not my favorite edition or even MY D&D, but it is a fun D&D game and one that I think will hopefully bring a new generation of RPGers and that's what's most important.

Now if I had my druthers I'd rather run a game under the Spycraft/Fantasycraft system b/c personally I like a lot of crunch in my games and that system is the crunchiest but with my newer players I think the 4e will be a lot more fun for them based on our playtest of it.

 

[evileeyore]

So I do not believe "overly complex" rules make for a better game and DMs who have mastered every flipping detail are the best DMs. If it was true, we'd all be GURPS DMs.

No... just that all GURPS STs are better...




I'm evileeyore and as a GURPS ST I approve this message.