D&D 4E Keith Baker on 4E! (The Hellcow responds!)

[Lackhand]

Heh. That is actually a very useful book. Now, a good read? Well. To each his own.

AD

PS: Might not be good rules for gaming with, but perhaps an excellent guide for doing completely unnecessary and extremely nerdified statistical analyses of combats.

That's what he said -- roleplaying game.

It's a bit anime videogamey, though.

 

[lkj]

That's what he said -- roleplaying game.

It's a bit anime videogamey, though.

On the bright side though, there's already an advanced computer program (S-plus) to stat out all your needs for the game-- with graphics and everything. In fact it's an advantage of a design philosophy where the source book is designed around using the program! Eat your heart out E-tools and DDI!

AD

PS: Ok. I'll stop being off topic. My apologies. Couldn't resist.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Right. That makes me wonder if blowing away the structure is really serving anyone, or just a ground war with John Cooper.

If the structure doesn't really serve anyone, than what is lost by blowing it away (or rather, not implementing it in the first place for 4E)? Right now, the structure only seems to serve people who want to nitpick whether stat blocks are correct or not, and doesn't really serve any kind of game system or narrative purpose.

As a more general comment, not directed towards Psion, I am one of those DMs who likes to just use exception-based design for NPCs in 3E, and mostly ignores the rules as written. As such, why should I want there to be complicated rules in the DMG that I will never use? It is just a waste of space and money that could be spent making the exception-based design approach much more precise and functional. Saying that you can ignore a complicated system and use an easier design scheme is not an argument for having the more complicated design scheme exist in the first place.

 

[hong]

I said it before: those who think John Cooper was performing a valuable and important service to D&D gamers will not be happy with the 4E philosophy.

 

[amethal]

What's that supposed to mean?

If it means what it think it means, I agree.

If it doesn't, I might not.

Assuming you think I mean what I think you think I mean, then you are right

Monster Manual 3 has a lot of stat block errors. John Cooper points out hundreds of them in his review; there might be more.

Its one of my favourite monster books, and I run all of the monsters straight from the book just fine.

From things WotC designers have said since the 4th edition announcement (but never prior to it) they got a bit exasperated with people pointing out trivial errors in stat blocks that had minimal game impact - or even not quite so trivial errors; does it really matter if sometimes a monster makes a save when "strictly" it should have failed by one or two or vice versa?

If they'd cared, they could have spent resources getting stat blocks more accurate. They didn't, because they thought the game was just fine with a high level of stat block errors, and the resources were better spent somewhere else.

Fourth edition fixes this "problem" by having stat blocks you can't check. Presumably you can have a look to see that their monsters meet the new monster "guidelines" e.g. having an attack bonus within the range suggested for a monster of its type and level, but as far as I can tell that's intended to be an aid to design rather than a "rule" you can be criticised for "breaking".

Nothing in this post is intended as a criticism of WotC designers, John Cooper or any other fine people!

 

[Mephistopheles]

Beyond this, characters are strong and capable straight from first level. In 3E D&D, a first level character stands a decent chance of being rendered unconscious by one successful attack. A first level wizard stands a decent chance of being rendered unconscious if someone sneezes on him. And that wizard can cast one, maybe two magic missiles per day before he needs to go rest. It's hard to start like this and feel like you're Indiana Jones, or a hardened war veteran. Especially when after you kill a few goblins, your hit points and BAB double. If that's all it took, why didn't your war experience get you to that point?

By comparison, 4E characters begin tougher and progress a little more slowly. By the time you're fifth level, you may have doubled your hit points as opposed to quintupling them. But at first level you can take a few hits, and as that wizard you can always throw a magic missile (even if you need to catch your breath for a few minutes between casting your really impressive spells). You've got more options and abilities... it's easier to imagine that you are Indiana Jones, or Daine, early on - as opposed to feeling like an apprentice waiting to kill a goblin or to to get that "Ding".

This seems just like starting the PCs at 2nd or 3rd level if you want them to be more durable from the start of the campaign. Unfortunately in the process the option to run the style of game in which the PCs start out weaker has been removed. Unless they have some optional rules in there to hamstring 1st level PCs if desired but it does seem like that would be a backwards way to approach it.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I'll just note that I'm not trying to ATTACK 3E.

I thing you get me totally wrong, i didn´t want to suggest that you somehow attacked 3rd edition... the "defend 3rd editon and concerns about 4e" was not directly directed to you... I just felt oblieged to say something positive about the game i learned DMing with and had so much great time with...

and i am more curious than concerned about how well that adventure translates into 4e...

And really, i am sorry for joing that debate... i should have been more careful with my wordings...
I have neither played 4e nor eberron but what you say sounds great, and i hope you continue posting your impresiions in your blog when your mood is better!

 

[UngeheuerLich]

This seems just like starting the PCs at 2nd or 3rd level if you want them to be more durable from the start of the campaign. Unfortunately in the process the option to run the style of game in which the PCs start out weaker has been removed. Unless they have some optional rules in there to hamstring 1st level PCs if desired but it does seem like that would be a backwards way to approach it.

I don´t think so. I really enjoy adventures where you start out at Lvl 0. I think in 4th Edition this could work perfectly:

Just give your players hp = constitution +5, a simple weapon proficiency (or non at all), one or two background skills and begin play. If you are no superhero, why bother with having a class at all. Then you can give minor class features when they start learning: beginn with at will abilities usable once per day, then at will abilities per encounter, encounter abilities per day... and now you have got a nice low power PC.

 

[hong]

There'll always be people who, no matter how low your starting point, want to go lower. I remember a 1E module where you started as 0-level escaped slaves, with rocks for weapons. You didn't even have an alignment (that was determined by what you did in the adventure). If you survived, you got to the lofty heights of 1st level and could actually choose a class.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

There'll always be people who, no matter how low your starting point, want to go lower. I remember a 1E module where you started as 0-level escaped slaves, with rocks for weapons. You didn't even have an alignment (that was determined by what you did in the adventure). If you survived, you got to the lofty heights of 1st level and could actually choose a class.

those adventures are great, but somewhat deadly Especially in 3rd edition, because average damage is soo high... (at 1st level)