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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Scurvy_Platypus" data-source="post: 5333592" data-attributes="member: 43283">So, I'm a big fan of E6. If you're not familiar with the premise, you can find it here:<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/206323-e6-game-inside-d-d.html" target="_blank">http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/206323-e6-game-inside-d-d.html</a>Now, before you go clicking the "reply" button, take a second to read the background so that the question (and therefore your answer) makes sense...Background: While a large chunk of folks dig E6 because they want to lock down magic/magic items, it's not the appeal for me. I dig E6 because it puts a ceiling on things and stops what I consider to be pointless inflations within the game (magic, HP, etc). You go along and level for a certain point and then you stop. The only character change that happens is a broadening of character capability through feats that are gained over time (xp).Ever since 4E has come about, people have talked about how to do E6 for 4E. My own personal answer has usually been, "Pick a level as the last one and then stop. Congratulations, you've done E6 for 4e. Pretty much the same as for 3.x".And by and large I still feel that's true.Idea: Of course, there's still an rather large element of the whole character building game that goes on in 4E and messing around with picking powers and what-not. I'm a pretty big fan of the "get in and go" style of games, where it takes a minimal amount of time to make a character (less than half an hour), doesn't rely on a computer (I don't care how "useful" DDI stuff is) and allows for characters that can be interesting and have some perks or whatnot given to them over time, without having to worry about the constant grind of levelling.I don't like Zero-to-Hero style play. I like characters showing up that are competent right off the bat, they rock hard, and they continue rocking hard. The question in my games is not "can your character succeed", but "how are you going to kick ass?"Now, I happen to be of the opinion that Essentials is the 4e version of 3.5. I don't care that others don't agree with me, that's my opinion and I'm not changing it. I mention this because up until now, I've considered Essentials to not be worth my time whatsoever; mainly targetted at getting lapsed 3.xers to try and give 4E a shot again.However, as I've been thinking about it, it occured to me that _maybe_ Essentials did have a point... it might be the first step towards slimming down some of the metagamey/minigamey elements of 4E and running a lower-capped set of rules. I do dig a number of aspects of 4E, but the rules-intensive nature of D&D for the past decade has been a turn-off. I won't run D&D without houserules.Question one: Is Essentials the starting point to hit 4E with the E6 bat? Not from the perspective of, "OMFG!!1!1! Characters are so over-powered and must be leashed!!1!". Instead from the perspective of, "OMFG, I'm sick of dealing with level-grind and all that other crap and just want to run cool stories about people kicking ass."So stuff like the Vlad Taltos series or Hawk & Fisher, or any number of other stories and media where the protaganists aren't necessarily out "saving the world", they're just kicking ass in their own respective ways. The characters don't change significantly in terms of their capabilities (leveling up), they just sort of kick ass at a constant level and maybe change the _style_ of ass-kicking over time.Question two: If the answer to question one is "yes", then once you cap the level (regardless of what that level might be) what is the "fill in" for stuff afterwards. E6's main thing was get a feat after [x amount of XP]. Feats are a huge deal in 3.x and a major source of customisation and character capability expansion. A chunk of the E6 folks have gone off all wild and crazy about "capstone" feats and whatnot, but I personally feel it just complicates things unnecessarily.In the case of 4E though, an awful lot of the customisation is in the form of the powers. Yeah there's feats there (and probably the usual D&D feat bloat too) but powers seem to be more where it's at. If that's the case, then what's a viable approach to handling powers (especially within the Essentials framework) that's not going to result in "breaking" the game, but still give players some toys to mess around with and tweak their characters as they go on one ass-kicking adventure after another?</blockquote>

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