D&D 4E Just played my first 4E game

[Amphimir Míriel]

I see a pattern emerging in some of this give-and-take

So do I! It goes more or less like this:

Citizen: Well, it seems that 4e is a fun game...
Grognard-ist: Heresy! Get outta here and go back to your videogames!

Citizen: I am excited that I can now play a martial-only campaign...
Grognard-ist: Heresy! Gygax intended us all to play wizards! Fighters and Rogues are not meant to be played past level 10! They should be hirelings or henchmen!

Citizen: I like that my wizard can cast Magic Missile all day long!
Grognard-ist: Heresy! Magic Missiles should be memorized, just like any other spell! And they should auto-hit for 1d4+1 too!

Citizen: I like that I don't need to spend points on craft and profession
Grognard-ist: Heresy! The skill system is videogamy and stupid!

Citizen: I think I'm not going to run any more 3.5 games... I like 4th edition better...
Grognard-ist: Heresy! Everybody who has half a brain will abandon WotC and embrace Pathfinder!

...and so on and so forth

 

[AllisterH]

Who says that?! Most games have no skill system, and those that do, it's often a "buy it from a skill tree or don't have it at all" kind of deal that's more exclusive to people not trained in it that even 3E, let alone 4E.

Um, the OP referred to the skill system of 4E as akin to videogame controls. Like I said, I'm wondering how the 4E skill system is akin to a videogame myself.

:re Feel of the game.

I do wonder about this claim that 4E feels like it models a videogame and not literature.

The thing is, I've read a lot of the influences for D&D (Fahrd, Conan, LotR, Elric) and I actually find 4E closer in feel/better match for them.

Take something like healing. I've read Conan novels and LotR where basically the heroes have their version of healing surges and the ability to recover after battle without healing (How many combats does Conan face for example? He always seems to start fresh unless it is an extended encounter).

I've NEVER ONCE read fiction that follows the pre 4E healing paradigm of healing wands or the cleric blowing all their healing spells after every encounter. Sure, after a MAJOR climatic fight, there might be healing but after every encounter? Hell no. You don't see the protoganists from the novels returning to home and resting up for weeks on end just to recover unless it's a major plot they had received a grievous wound.

I mean, a 4E videogame is one where you don't actually have to put healing potions in boxes or have the character carry a portable hole filled with healing potions.

Same thing with minions. Elric definitely has minion scenes (a.k.a, he cuts them down with 1 slash, yet they are still a threat to Elric) and so does LotR. Yet, this was not supported by the rules pre-4E. In fiction, both movies and books, minions are standard fare

 

[Korgoth]

...and so on and so forth

Although I haven't seen that, it may well be happening.

My only objection is that you associated Grognards with Pathfinder. You can't be a Grognard of 3.5! Buncha Johnny-Come-Latelys.

 

[Xyxox]

Edited because it's just not worth it.

 

[MrApothecary]

I've been DM for a session of 4th for my group and if someone would have made these comments while we were playing I would have warned them once and then asked them to leave the table if they persisted. Luckily no one did, we had fun and we plan on playing again. In my opinion, you had pre-conceived negative opinions about the game and you voiced them at the table which colour (or is it discolour?) the light in which I regard your playtest report.

What?

Why is it every time someone expresses their dislike of 4e, it's automatically assumed they had pre-conceived negative assumptions. What is it about 4e that makes it so that we can't dislike it in peace?

 

[phloog]

In this thread and others something that has finally caused me to comment. It's not a version war or anything...

I have seen TONS of comments about 3.0 and 3.5 talking about how wizards were overpowered and basically took the glory from all other classes. They had too many spells that did too many different 'utility' things. This was stated as a terrible problem with 3.x

Then I see not quite as many, but still large numbers of comments stating that ANOTHER flaw of 3.x wizards is the idea of selecting your spells - that unless you knew exactly what you were going to run up against you had to basically choose generic spells or attack spells of a general type.

I guess I'm not seeing how both can be a problem. It sounds to me like Problem #2 was a balancing factor on Problem #1...which might be why our group never saw wizards as show-stealers.

I'm not suggesting any one individual simultaneously claimed both as problems, but in my experience two contradictory 'problems' is generally a sign of no problem other than in perception/attitude.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

So do I! It goes more or less like this:

I've yet to see this. Anywhere on ENWorld. Not once.

Meanwhile, the general approach to "Hey, I just played 4e" threads tend to go along the lines of "Here's a bunch of positive things and ONE negative thing!" followed be the entire thread devoting itself to insulting and blasting away at the poster for having that one negative thing.

 

[Raven Crowking]

So do I! It goes more or less like this:

Citizen: Well, it seems that 4e is a fun game...
Grognard-ist: Heresy! Get outta here and go back to your videogames!

There are a number of things about 4e that I am unhappy about, but I don't tell people that they cannot be happy about them. Perhaps it's just a matter of perspective, but it seems to me that a lot of folks are offended that some people don't like 4e, whereas those who don't like 4e don't seem to be particularly offended that others do.

I have argued in a lot of threads that 3e has problems. Heck, just before 4e was announced saying that 3e had problems was treated as the same sort of crazy-talk that claiming 4e has problems is treated as now. Often by the very same people. Often the very same people denied problems with 3e existed that now they are crowing that 4e fixed.

And 4e did fix some of those problems. Some it fixed well, and others at too high a cost (IMHO). Other problems they put a coat of glossy paint on and hoped that the shininess would make us think the problems were solved (an effective gambit, at least in the short term, apparently).

These problems people are talking about with 4e? My bet is that, when 5e is coming out, WotC is going to claim that they are obvious.......and so are a lot of the folks claiming that they don't exist right now.


RC

 

[AllisterH]

Hmm?

Do people think my comments were unreasonable then Raven Crowking? For example, the OP said it feels like a videogame, but the absence of things like the ubitquitous healing potions/wands to me is much closer to what I read in books.

Am I wrong to state that?

 

[Celtavian]

re

Um, the OP referred to the skill system of 4E as akin to videogame controls. Like I said, I'm wondering how the 4E skill system is akin to a videogame myself.

:re Feel of the game.

I do wonder about this claim that 4E feels like it models a videogame and not literature.

The thing is, I've read a lot of the influences for D&D (Fahrd, Conan, LotR, Elric) and I actually find 4E closer in feel/better match for them.

Take something like healing. I've read Conan novels and LotR where basically the heroes have their version of healing surges and the ability to recover after battle without healing (How many combats does Conan face for example? He always seems to start fresh unless it is an extended encounter).

I've NEVER ONCE read fiction that follows the pre 4E healing paradigm of healing wands or the cleric blowing all their healing spells after every encounter. Sure, after a MAJOR climatic fight, there might be healing but after every encounter? Hell no. You don't see the protoganists from the novels returning to home and resting up for weeks on end just to recover unless it's a major plot they had received a grievous wound.

I mean, a 4E videogame is one where you don't actually have to put healing potions in boxes or have the character carry a portable hole filled with healing potions.

Same thing with minions. Elric definitely has minion scenes (a.k.a, he cuts them down with 1 slash, yet they are still a threat to Elric) and so does LotR. Yet, this was not supported by the rules pre-4E. In fiction, both movies and books, minions are standard fare

The healing is true about books. The fluff may be true too.

But as far as once a days and encounters, you don't see Elric and Conan limiting their attacks because they already used their "specials". The 4E melees do not feel like fighting styles to me, they feel like melees with magic powers.

I much prefer a melee class with a fighting style than a melee class with magic powers rendered as melee abilities.

3E felt more like fighting styles. If you had Whirlwind attack, you could use it whenever conditions presented themselves for its use. That is how a fighter or any melee class should work. They don't train to use a fighting technique one time and be unable to use it until it "recharges". They train to use it whenever conditions present themselves for its use.

That is the one thing about 4E that is troublesome to me from a literary standpoint. They get something like healing right, then they don't bother to build on that concept by thinking of fighting styles in the same manner.

It's great that everyone can heal without a pocket cleric now, but encounter and daily powers don't seem very fighter-like to me. The classes do feel alike because they are all limited in the same way and all fundamentally function in the same way as far as the limits on their powers.

Balancing every class off the same mechanic makes every class feel similar. I just don't think a fighter and a wizard should play the same way in terms of being limited to dailies and the like. It takes me out of the fantasy.

A fighter having to sit on his dailies and encounters for the right time like a wizard had to do just seems is just as lacking as you claim 3.5 healing was in terms of rendering fantasy characters.