D&D 4E Is 4E winning you or losing you?

[Stormtower]

Huh. One of the first three articles in print after The Announcement - pretty much that same day - was that straight conversion was not going to be possible or something to bother with. So I'd assume that was either from someone pre-interview, or info taken from the various Q&A sessions that day.

I agree that WotC did communicate quickly about this after the initial rollout. The day of The Announcment, as you put it, was pretty emotional and I felt left hanging in the breeze without a clear answer on this during the presentation in the Sagimore. :\

I think it was just some of the language they used rubbed me the wrong way, but to be fair to WotC (or any other company that markets stuff in a cycle) there is no easy way to address the issue of re-buying everything and planned obsolescence.

 

[Doug McCrae]

I agree totally. Monsters need more or less the same stats as PCs, so as to interface with the action resolution system. But there is no reason at all for them to follow the same build rules. (And it's worth noting that in RQ monsters aren't built as PCs, although they are statted out in the same way.)

Good point. It seems 4e will have the best of both worlds. Monsters will still have stats such as strength scores. (That used to bug me the most about previous editions - there was no way to know how strong a bulette was, for example.) But they won't be built in the same time consuming fashion as PCs. 4e is not, then, a return to the way previous editions handled monsters, and a good thing too.

 

[wingsandsword]

Does anyone really not check what bases are covered? "We've got two fighters, and a paladin, a mage and a cleric, shall I play a rogue or a bard?"

More often than not in my experience.

I've always seen it as a fallacy that you "need" a certain party composition, I've played in way too many D&D games where there was no magical healing at all, or no heavy fighters, or no primary arcane casters, and had lots of fun, to believe that you "must" have a wizard/sorcerer, a rogue, a cleric/other healer and a fighter-type.

The first D&D game I ever played in, I was the 10th PC and joined the game after it had been running for over a year (playing monthly, starting with 4 PC's, most of those quitting, so 8 of those PC's joined after the campaign was in progress). I was just learning D&D and decided to try a Cleric, and I was playing the only cleric. Every other PC was was a Wizard, a Fighter/Wizard, a Rogue, a Paladin, a Ranger, or a Psionicist. That game was lots of fun, and from what I was told was doing fine without a cleric.

Another campaign I was in was 6 PC's and the only healing was one Paladin, and no single-classed fighters (all were either hexblades, or fighters with PrC's that weren't combat oriented), and it was just fine.

I played in a 3.0 Oriental Adventures campaign where every PC except for one was a Samurai , Fighter, or Monk, and the one other PC was a Fire Shugenja (so very little healing), and the game went just fine with very little healing and no rogue-type characters

One 3.0 campaign I was in that I still hear stories of to this day was all bards, druids and monks. They had fun and played the game just fine without any rogues or clerics or wizards/sorcerers.

Designing 4e from the ground up to not work right if you don't have certain niches is a design flaw, because no prior edition of D&D, and that includes 3.x is like that, I've played in too many D&D games where there was no/minimal healing, or no arcane magic, or no primary melee combat characters and everybody had fun and nobody felt like the game was "broken" without them.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Designing 4e from the ground up to not work right if you don't have certain niches is a design flaw, because no prior edition of D&D, and that includes 3.x is like that, I've played in too many D&D games where there was no/minimal healing, or no arcane magic, or no primary melee combat characters and everybody had fun and nobody felt like the game was "broken" without them.

It would indeed be a design flaw, if they were doing it that way.

But they've already said that while a party with all roles filled is more optimal, the game can be played with roles missing, or duplicated.

Just like, you know, prior editions.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

More often than not in my experience.

I've always seen it as a fallacy that you "need" a certain party composition, I've played in way too many D&D games where there was no magical healing at all, or no heavy fighters, or no primary arcane casters, and had lots of fun, to believe that you "must" have a wizard/sorcerer, a rogue, a cleric/other healer and a fighter-type.

This might depend on the group. I've been in groups without fighter-types or healers, for instance, and the former left us weak. The latter was frankly unfun (for me and the group).

But then, different tastes, and all that...

 

[BluSponge]

4e CAN'T lose me. 3.5 already did that. And while I've continued to play through the RPGA on a sporadic basis, I haven't been interested in running or playing DnD in the home game, nor are a number of members of my group. By dropping Living Greyhawk, the RPGA has lost me. I'll probably take a look at 4e when it comes out, but more than likely I'll skip this time around.

Tom
Happy among the Savages.

 

[Sunderstone]

Lost me entirely.

I was getting kind of excited for 4E Forgotten Realms for a short while, but with the new changes in the 4E core it wont make a difference to me.

The changes to casting, the changes to Fiends, no Gnomes, including Eladrin,Tieflings and Warlocks in the core, heroic first level PCs, sacred cow wholesale slaughtering, the blogs from the designers themselves, the DDI pay-to get-updates, charging for previews (still an absurd idea), etc. etc.
There's so much I dont like (core book-wise) that I dont really consider this D&D anymore.

Im predicting 4E will get bloated even faster than 3E did starting with so much high-powered munchkinism when they add too many character options/PrCs again.

Ill stay with 3.5 for now till I burn out and stop tabletop RPGing. I will take a look at the PH though mostly out of morbid curiousity.

 

[Cbas_10]

4E has (for now) lost me.

I've been reading about it and will continue to do so (hoping that I'll return to a bit of optimistic anticipation); however, there are many elements of the new version and missing elements of the current version that all add up to a game I'm not really interested in. I could be wrong, but I'll hit a few points that I've either read about or think about after putting what I've read into context.

Character Customization: I'm not really sure what all of this means when they say characters will have defined roles, players will know their place in the game, and all that. To me, it feels like we are telling players, "You play a fighter - you kill stuff. You play a cleric - you heal us. You play a rogue - you find stuff." I may be oversimplifying things, but this is how 4E sounds to me. Skills and feats play a LARGE role in my games and my player characters. Those items are what mechanically separates the archer from the tank; the thief from the scout; the healer from the warpriest. (yeah, yeah....there are tons of prestige classes and alternate base classes for all that, but our group likes to stay with the basic stuff - it works just fine for us) I just get a bad vibe about what characters are going to be. At what level will we have creative freedom over the customization of characters in 4E?

Monster Customization: The ability to add templates, mix in class levels, advance Hit Dice, and tweak an individual monster's feats and skills....those points are what sold me on 3E and continue to be one of the most exciting parts of the rules for me today. That stuff might be in 4E, but the people at WotC keep touting the ideas that specific monsters will have specific roles and be at specific power levels. What if the theme of my adventure is goblinoids? I can fill hundreds of encounters through every CR with various goblins, goblinoids, and related critters (worgs, tauric templated things, and more!). Do I still have this creative freedom in 4E?

There are no sacred cows that I'm afraid of losing. The beholder change is irritating (not because of the change; rather the reason: to make it simpler to run. If a DM cannot run 11 different eye rays on a monster, I guess he never runs NPC wizards?....), but games change...things are gained and lost. Life goes on. The only thing that seems to have been lost that I really will miss....and is something that some call a Sacred Cow....is the social dynamic of the game. Characters have strengths, and they have weaknesses. Some things they excell at, and other things they are totally inept at dealing with. Thus, you have a group that cooperates, stands together, helps each other out, and behaves more maturely than a gaggle of MMORPG icons on a screen doing the best to get more loot than the icon right next to them. It seems that aspect is being sapped out of the game.

Everyone is equal...no more inherent weaknesses...you know your role...the situations you face will be properly constructed for you...you will advance faster and need not depend upon anything beyond your own power to thrive....

Ew.....seems like an Orwellian nightmare to me.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

4E has (for now) lost me.

I've been reading about it and will continue to do so (hoping that I'll return to a bit of optimistic anticipation); however, there are many elements of the new version and missing elements of the current version that all add up to a game I'm not really interested in. I could be wrong, but I'll hit a few points that I've either read about or think about after putting what I've read into context.

Character Customization: I'm not really sure what all of this means when they say characters will have defined roles, players will know their place in the game, and all that. To me, it feels like we are telling players, "You play a fighter - you kill stuff. You play a cleric - you heal us. You play a rogue - you find stuff." I may be oversimplifying things, but this is how 4E sounds to me. Skills and feats play a LARGE role in my games and my player characters. Those items are what mechanically separates the archer from the tank; the thief from the scout; the healer from the warpriest. (yeah, yeah....there are tons of prestige classes and alternate base classes for all that, but our group likes to stay with the basic stuff - it works just fine for us) I just get a bad vibe about what characters are going to be. At what level will we have creative freedom over the customization of characters in 4E?

Monster Customization: The ability to add templates, mix in class levels, advance Hit Dice, and tweak an individual monster's feats and skills....those points are what sold me on 3E and continue to be one of the most exciting parts of the rules for me today. That stuff might be in 4E, but the people at WotC keep touting the ideas that specific monsters will have specific roles and be at specific power levels. What if the theme of my adventure is goblinoids? I can fill hundreds of encounters through every CR with various goblins, goblinoids, and related critters (worgs, tauric templated things, and more!). Do I still have this creative freedom in 4E?

There are no sacred cows that I'm afraid of losing. The beholder change is irritating (not because of the change; rather the reason: to make it simpler to run. If a DM cannot run 11 different eye rays on a monster, I guess he never runs NPC wizards?....), but games change...things are gained and lost. Life goes on. The only thing that seems to have been lost that I really will miss....and is something that some call a Sacred Cow....is the social dynamic of the game. Characters have strengths, and they have weaknesses. Some things they excell at, and other things they are totally inept at dealing with. Thus, you have a group that cooperates, stands together, helps each other out, and behaves more maturely than a gaggle of MMORPG icons on a screen doing the best to get more loot than the icon right next to them. It seems that aspect is being sapped out of the game.

Everyone is equal...no more inherent weaknesses...you know your role...the situations you face will be properly constructed for you...you will advance faster and need not depend upon anything beyond your own power to thrive....

Ew.....seems like an Orwellian nightmare to me.

You know, they've said that the whole "character roles" thing is mostly a tool for newbies by which they can say "you're a wizard? Well, here's what you're good at. Fighter? You're good at this other thing," so that they know what to expect. I also don't really think that they've eliminated weaknesses. Wizards are probably not wearing much in the way of plate mail, and they probably also don't have the HP of a fighter. Fighters are probably not that great at teleporting around or attacking twelve enemies at once. I'm also not seeing why having characters that don't necessarily need a cleric in the group to survive makes the "social dynamic" any different. I expect that you will still need to operate as a party to survive, and I never put much stock in the standard four-member all-bases-covered party in 3.x anyway. It certainly wasn't necessary then. I don't see why it should be made necessary now. If anything, being able to choose a character without worrying about who else is in the party makes it so that you end up with a mixed bag, and you must work out the strategies for that particular combination.

Also, I'm not seeing much that indicates the level of freedom to design characters, in either direction. There have been a few things. First, fighters can customize their abilities based on what weapon they specialize in. Second, wizards have implements and traditions to mix & match. That's really all I can remember seeing so far, and if you throw feats on top of that you have quite a lot of customization for those two classes. I expect that we'll see something similar in most of the classes. I think that customization is one of the priorities of class design, based on what they've said and what I've seen.

As for encounter design...in 3.x the encounters were supposed to be balanced for the party level, so I don't see how that's a major change, except that they're describing what looks like a more forgiving system. So you may, in fact, have an easier time of challenging a party for many levels on the same monster. It might actually be a simpler task of putting together a goblinoid-focused campaign, if only because it's not so important to stick class levels on them in order to beef them up once the party has gone through the goblin-hobgoblin-bugbear trajectory.

I've been trying to stay out of this thread as much as possible, just to see what people have to say, but I have to wonder if some people have been reading the same previews as I have. While I don't think everything that's coming is super great (eg. PHB tieflings), I do think that most of the concerns above have actually been answered by the articles presented so far and supplementary comments on those articles. However, I keep seeing the same complaints over and over again.

I can understand a lot of the negative feedback. However, it seems weird when people complain about things they imagine might be in the game, on the chance that it'll turn out to contain elements that they are afraid it might contain, but there is no real basis for imagining that it'll contain those elements. It's also weird when people complain about potential problems that have been specifically mentioned as things the designers are trying to fix or avoid. I'll give 4E's detractors their criticisms of the fluff changes, the spellcasting mechanics, PHB races and classes, action points, the changes to saving throws, or a bunch of other things that might be good or might be bad, depending on who you ask. But so much of the criticism amounts to "I'm afraid it'll be bad, so I condemn the changes," that it's getting a little tired.

edit: Also, do you really, seriously believe that 4E will eliminate "the challenging encounter"?

 

[Ant]

While some of the things promised in 4e sound (mechanically) interesting I grow increasingly tired of the marketing ploys WotC are using as they ask us to strip naked and cavort around the sacrificed Sacred Cows with them.

After playing OD&D recently the scales have fallen from my eyes and I have learnt why the cows were made sacred.