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

[Remathilis]

I think a better example would be Conan and Indy as your choices. Since Mr Hawking has disabilities and that makes it impossible for him to add anything to a fight. Conan is a much better fighter than Indy is so i think that is a better example. In that choice I would choose Indy.

See, that changes the dynamic. Conan is classically a brute warrior (abit a cunning one) but a noble savage and much more (in D&D terms) a warrior with a smattering of other odd skills. Indy is primarily a scientist who can also punch out Nazis. Stephen Hawking is a BRILLIANT mind who can mentally solve even the most difficult physics problems, but can't move out of his chair.

If I were at a quiz-bowl, I'd want Mr. Hawkings. If I were in a barfight, I'd want Conan. If I didn't know which I was walking into, I'd want Dr. Jones.

rapier-wielding fighter - had one was a noble concept, worked well and added a lot of flavor and RPing to the game as a whole.
pacifist cleric - had something similar, a cleric who refused to take the life of another ever. He would still hold person or use subdue damage ect.
diplomat rogue - had one the can work very well, he was a spy for a kingdom.
floofy bard - had one but was a noble class(from a 3rd party book) and worked much like the fighter above.

The rapier-wielding fighter is a great concept, but fails at its assigned role: dealing damage. It probably can't tank either, leaving his allies in an uncomfortable spot: he's a fighter thats not good at fighting (though technically better than his closest compatriot, the rogue) and effectively doesn't contribute to the group what a greatsword-wielding plate-armored gentry knight would.
The Pacifist Cleric starts out by cutting a huge swath out of his spell selection (flame strike, holy word, sound burst) and could theoretically extend beyond those direct damage spells depending on his ethos (bull strength on the fighter is aiding in killing, ditto hold person to attack a defenseless foe). In reality, a healer (mini's HB) is a worse example of this: a cleric who has crippled spell access (healing spells, that's all) and poor combat ability to boot.
The Diviner (a stretch, I'll give you it) should represent the mage who fills his spell slots with neat utility magic (fly, grease, rope trick) but lacks any offensive magic to harm foes the fighter is incapable of (fireball, magic missile). Against foes with high AC and DR, the wizard is a great equalizer, a wizard who cannot harm those foes are effectively crippling their party, no matter how useful having Knock memorized is...
The diplomacy rogue (and really, the floofy bard) are the non-aggressive skill masters who focus on an out of combat role (social skills, performance, con-artistry, etc) at the expense of any real ability to work in combat (run a social-heavy rogue in a tomb-based dungeon to feel the power of uselessness).

non-combat builds does not make them useless in combat. And while DnD might emphasize dungeons, monsters and exploration that is far from the only style that can or should be played with it. Many styles can work it is only a matter of what the group enjoys. So what you see as a problem I see as a strength as it caters to more people.

If your game is built around the premise that non-combat characters are viable and indeed preferable (see Lizard's post) I agree. The problem comes with the mixed bag element of most D&D. This week we're solving the murder mystery du jour, next week we're sacking the old catacombs near town. I want a group of PCs that have something to say in BOTH those adventures, not a bored fighter sitting around while the rogue rolls skill checks only to have next week watch the fighter rocking hard against some monstrous foes while the rogue is sitting there praying for a twenty.

Once more disagree, it limits what a player might want to play and it limits certain game types that might not be heavy combat focused. Which yes most DnD games are but they don't have to be.

I've played SW Saga. Its nearly IMPOSSIBLE to make a character that sucks in combat (well, its possible, but you have to work at it). However, most of our SW games don't involve a lot of combat. Even my PC (a solider working the mandelorian/Boba Fett angle) is a great pilot, field medic, and steely-eyed scout. The scoundrel (a verpine tech mechanic) has all sorts of abilities out of combat from fixing the hyperdrive to modifying equipment, but he can also knock a foe on his butt with a well-aimed blaster-bolt. The closest we have no a non-combatant is our Noble/healer PC, and she can still hit with her pistol with some regularity. We all add something to combat, we all add something out of combat. No one feels useless.

 

[nutluck]

Not ALL non-combat builds make them useless in combat. However, say you take the concept of a dexterous fighter who wields a rapier. He doesn't know how to use it well, however. He has the concept of a noble who carries around a rapier because its custom to do so. Plus, he isn't very diplomatic or able to cast spells or very sneaky or rogue like so fighter was the best class fit. He keeps his con low because he's a pampered noble who isn't very tough. He spends all his feats on skill focus(knowledge(nobility)) and negotiator and such.

Now, any game where there is a high focus on diplomacy and out of combat stuff, his is at a mechanical disadvantage to someone playing a bard with the same concept, since the bard has those things as class skills. Anything he can do the bard or rogue can likely do better. No point in him being around other than having an interesting personality.

Meanwhile, any game that has a high focus on combat now has a fighter who has no strength modifier who can only do 1d6 points of damage per hit. Which is a useless fighter at first level, nevermind 10th or 20th. He is complete dead weight.

So, now you have a character whose only purpose is for the player to make witty remarks and act like a noble. Which you can do even if you are an 18 strength fighter with a greatsword.

Yet 4e COULD have made rules to make both work. There is no reason they couldn't, the work in other systems. They could have had a talent tree for light armed warriors, they could have had a general social talent tree anyone could take to make them good at social stuff. There is no reason at all 4e couldn't have acomidated this.

Frankly, since every D&D game I've ever played in ended up having at least two combats every 4 hours we played, I always considered it absolute madness to make a character who would drop dead at the first sign of an enemy with a CR higher than its own level.

Just because that is how YOU played DnD every time does NOT make it the only way it can be played. Nor does it make it the only way DnD can be FUN. I have personally played in DnD games where there was zero combat and not a single dice was rolled the whole night. yet everyone had a blast and enjoyed it, in fact it is one of the most talked about game sessions when I get with my old group to hang out.

My point was and still is, there is many ways to play DnD and they can all be just as fun. People do like different things, 4e is catering to a certain style, that doesn't make said style the only one that people played or the only one 4e should have. 3e accomidated other styles of play better.

If you like 4e I am glad for you, if you love it's play style great. i hope 4e turns out to be the game of your dreams. But that doesn't make Lizards or my style or thoughts on DnD any less valid, because we see things differently and played the game obviously very differently than yourself.

 

[Spatula]

True. However, the parts that weren't all that crunch heavy DID put people on a more even playing field. It was likely just as easy for everyone to climb a cliff in 1st Ed because there wasn't any crunch saying "Fighters are better at climbing".

Only thieves had rules for climbing. The implication there would be that everyone else was worse at it than the thief (by how much, who knows, unless you use the WSG), or simply couldn't climb difficult surfaces.

Everyone was just as good at diplomacy since there was no real crunch for being better at it than "Charisma means people like you."

Charisma had specific bonuses/penalties for NPC reactions to your character, to be rolled on the NPC reaction table (not at all dissimilar from the Diplomacy table in 3e, actually). Furthermore, there were plenty of spells that made (and make) diplomacy somewhat irrelevant, like the 1st level charm person. Magic trumps pretty much any non-combat situation, which is great for the spellcasters but doesn't really help the fighter be useful out of combat.

 

[nutluck]

See, that changes the dynamic. Conan is classically a brute warrior (abit a cunning one) but a noble savage and much more (in D&D terms) a warrior with a smattering of other odd skills. Indy is primarily a scientist who can also punch out Nazis. Stephen Hawking is a BRILLIANT mind who can mentally solve even the most difficult physics problems, but can't move out of his chair.

If I were at a quiz-bowl, I'd want Mr. Hawkings. If I were in a barfight, I'd want Conan. If I didn't know which I was walking into, I'd want Dr. Jones.

yes it does but I thought Hawking wasn't a fair example. Since he is confined to a wheel chair. His mind would be the same if he didn't have his disabilities, for all we know he might have become a athlete as well if he didn't have them and still be brilliant mind.

The rapier-wielding fighter is a great concept, but fails at its assigned role: dealing damage. It probably can't tank either, leaving his allies in an uncomfortable spot: he's a fighter thats not good at fighting (though technically better than his closest compatriot, the rogue) and effectively doesn't contribute to the group what a greatsword-wielding plate-armored gentry knight would.
The Pacifist Cleric starts out by cutting a huge swath out of his spell selection (flame strike, holy word, sound burst) and could theoretically extend beyond those direct damage spells depending on his ethos (bull strength on the fighter is aiding in killing, ditto hold person to attack a defenseless foe). In reality, a healer (mini's HB) is a worse example of this: a cleric who has crippled spell access (healing spells, that's all) and poor combat ability to boot.
The Diviner (a stretch, I'll give you it) should represent the mage who fills his spell slots with neat utility magic (fly, grease, rope trick) but lacks any offensive magic to harm foes the fighter is incapable of (fireball, magic missile). Against foes with high AC and DR, the wizard is a great equalizer, a wizard who cannot harm those foes are effectively crippling their party, no matter how useful having Knock memorized is...
The diplomacy rogue (and really, the floofy bard) are the non-aggressive skill masters who focus on an out of combat role (social skills, performance, con-artistry, etc) at the expense of any real ability to work in combat (run a social-heavy rogue in a tomb-based dungeon to feel the power of uselessness).

They don't work great in core DnD no and if your game runs more along the lines of dungeon crawls they can suck. But as I mentioned you don't have to play DnD that way. Some people just like to RP and don't care about how effective they are. If the GM makes the encounters fits the group they can still be challanging and winable. That has more to do with the GM making the game fit the characters and assuming the GM allowed the characters in the first place then obviously she should be making changes to fit them.

If your game is built around the premise that non-combat characters are viable and indeed preferable (see Lizard's post) I agree. The problem comes with the mixed bag element of most D&D. This week we're solving the murder mystery du jour, next week we're sacking the old catacombs near town. I want a group of PCs that have something to say in BOTH those adventures, not a bored fighter sitting around while the rogue rolls skill checks only to have next week watch the fighter rocking hard against some monstrous foes while the rogue is sitting there praying for a twenty.

A good GM can make sure everyone has a part to play in most scenes. No everyone doesn't have to be involved in every little thing. But it is fairly easy to keep most of them engaged and often at least in my games, people like the fighter would engage in social RP with other PC's or a NPC around. Much like Jayne from firefly as a example who had no social skills to speak of.

And as I mentioned you don't have to have a all or nothing build. If a player really wants that and realises the limits then who am i to say they can't play it if thats what THEY enjoy and have fun playing?

I've played SW Saga. Its nearly IMPOSSIBLE to make a character that sucks in combat (well, its possible, but you have to work at it). However, most of our SW games don't involve a lot of combat. Even my PC (a solider working the mandelorian/Boba Fett angle) is a great pilot, field medic, and steely-eyed scout. The scoundrel (a verpine tech mechanic) has all sorts of abilities out of combat from fixing the hyperdrive to modifying equipment, but he can also knock a foe on his butt with a well-aimed blaster-bolt. The closest we have no a non-combatant is our Noble/healer PC, and she can still hit with her pistol with some regularity. We all add something to combat, we all add something out of combat. No one feels useless.

Which is fine, nothing wrong with it. I just don't see why a game has to force players to be good at combat or good at something else. most players I know never build perfect specialized builds. most of them have a focus yes but are also pretty well rounded like... most real people are. I just want to have the option and not be told, no sorry you can't do that. To me the strength of RPG's over MMORPG's is they give us many many choices to do what we want and tell the stories and adventures WE want to tell and play in. Online games say this is how it is, now pick the class that most fits that and play.

I am not saying 4e is a MMORPG, I was simple using that as a example of their weakness next to RPG's.

 

[Hellcow]

they could have had a general social talent tree anyone could take to make them good at social stuff. There is no reason at all 4e couldn't have acomidated this.

You're right... and they DO (as shown by the three characters in that group I described with significant social talents). Not a talent TREE (and I can't speak to rules in any case) but what I've been saying all along is that it is possible for characters to shine in noncombat situations and that the system actually gives more weight to non-combat encounters. It's possible to make a fighter who's a diplomat; unless he's built up his Charisma he may not be the world's greatest diplomat, but a 1st-level 4E fighter can actually be a better diplomat than a 1st-level 3E fighter.

Likewise, there's nothing about the fighter class that requires you to wear heavy armor. The classic tank high-Strength and Constitution fighter is an easy build, but you could choose to make a high-Dex build instead, and there are powers that support this; though you might be better off making that character a ranger instead.

The fighter may not be as good a diplomat as the cleric (though he could be, depending on what you do). But you CAN MAKE a diplomatic fighter. Yes, the system sucks when it comes to making Stephen Hawking as a PC - a character who is completely lopsided. It's intended to provide balance; each character has something to offer in battle, and something to offer out of battle, not "I offer nothing in battle, but twice as much out of it". Given that the system itself is intended to encourage a more even distribution of combat and noncombat challenges, I think this was the right way to go.

I will say that I am biased in this in that I love Hero and played the heck out of 1E Fantasy Hero in high school. I've never expected D&D to become Hero. If I want to play the truly unusual character who doesn't fit any sort of D&D role - the crippled sage who's stuck in a magical wheelchair - I'll play FH. In fact, I've played characters not far from that in FH. When I play D&D, I'll play a dwarf fighter. For me, D&D has always been a game with strong class roles - Fighter-Cleric-Thief-Magic User. It doesn't need to become Fantasy Hero 35 years later... among other things because I can still play Fantasy Hero, and I WILL play Fantasy Hero when I want that style of game. For me, 4E does step back a little to some of those classic archetypes - although again, it still leaves more than enough room for the warlock archaeologist, the changeling priest trying to learn about corruption through personal experience, the fighter haunted by a brutal past and struggling for redemption, the warlord exiled for his soft-hearted views, and so on, and so on. Every fighter may clearly serve the party role of defender - but again, any three fighters can be very different from one another - far more so than you'd get in 1E. So I like that 4E is essentially still an evolution of D&D; when I want truly open character design and to step fully away from class roles, I'll play Fantasy Hero... as I've done for twenty years now.

Anyhow, now I'm actually heading out on travels and won't be checking the boards, so I really am signing off. Have fun!

 

[Cadfan]

Which is fine, nothing wrong with it. I just don't see why a game has to force players to be good at combat or good at something else. most players I know never build perfect specialized builds. most of them have a focus yes but are also pretty well rounded like... most real people are. I just want to have the option and not be told, no sorry you can't do that.

If I understand correctly, you are asking why the game requires you to be good at combat, and why you can't have the option of building a character who isn't good at combat, so that you can spend your resources making your character good at something else.

Here's the answer:

Doing that screws up the balance for everyone else by making it so that the only way to be good in non combat scenarios is to nerf yourself in combat.

 

[Dire Bare]

A shame they scheduled the DDXP for when they did, then, eh?

Not really. The 4e info at DDXP was nice, but still not much more than a tease. WotC has been teasing us with information since late last year, but won't go hardcore on the marketing until much closer to release. We'll get more teasers in April, and then come late May and early June we'll be inundated with 4e information. GenCon this year should be fun for fans of 4e. In fact, WotC has given us more information than they perhaps should have, but that's because all those geeky designers are just chomping at the bit to share their new baby with all of us fans. If you think the wait until release is hard on us players, it must be maddening to the designers!!!

 

[nutluck]

Hellcow yeah i knew that, to what degree it is true I don't know. I doubt it is to the point I want though from what I have read but we shall see.

Cadfan yes that is your answer but to me it doesn't do that. No in a adventuring party I don't expect anyone to make Hawkings who is useless in combat. But I also think people should be allowed to make people that can only add very little to combat.

I disagree it screws up balance. It only screw up balance in certain styles of games which has been my point all along. Right now 4e looks like it is catering to one and only one style of game. Maybe it will and maybe it won't work with other styles we haven't seen enough to know. But if it does only cater to one then to me that is a bad design and makes the game not for me.

A good GM works with her players to make sure they make characters that fit and can work in the story she is telling. What that might be varies a lot form group to group and i think 4e could have and should have been flexible enough to cater to a wide range of playing styles.

Right now to me it looks like in 4e they have limits. In that you have to be X good at combat, you have to be X good at skills, ect. The problem is I think they set the mimium way to high.

I am not saying your play style is wrong or not fun, I am say there is more styles of play and they are just as fun and just as valid and work just as well. And 4e seems to be catering as I said to a single style, which IMHO is a mistake. But I am not going to cry about it,*shrug* plenty of other games can allow me to play that style. 3e might be one of them, don't know yet as i don't know what 4e will allow yet for sure.

It just bugs me when people say this or that won't work, or this or that ruins the fun ect. What works and doesn't work depends on the group and what is and is not fun depends on the group. What i find fun others might find boring and what others might find fun I might find boring. Nothing wrong with either.

 

[Hamburger Mary]

A good GM works with her players to make sure they make characters that fit and can work in the story she is telling.

But that's exactly the problem, Nutluck. A good DM does this. But what if she's NOT a good DM? What if she's never run a game before, and has just picked up an RPG for the first time in her life? What if she's running a published adventure? If I'm creating a social challenge for my group, I can take their skills into account. But say I'm writing an adventure to submit to Dungeon. What's a good difficulty for a Diplomatic challenge for second level characters? We can all agree that a +0 modifier is bad - or at least average. But what's "good" at second level? +8 - Five ranks, +3 Charisma? +18 - Five ranks, +4 Charisma, +6 in synergy bonuses, +5 from Skill Focus and Negotiator? Or the +28 you can get from the crazy optimized combo?

As an experienced DM, I can say "OK, my PCs have a +28 Diplomacy, I need to make some adjustments to make this work." But should the system be designed to expect that of the DM? As it stands, 4E allows you to make a character who is a dedicated diplomat, who is the clear champion of the group when it comes to a Diplomatic challenge - but the range of values at 2nd level is nowhere near that +0 to +28 you can get right now.

D&D is the best known RPG. It's the one the most people have access to. As a result, I think that it SHOULD be the game with the lowest bar to entry. Many other games provide a greater depth of simulation or character option, but they require a greater level of experience and skill on the part of both storyteller and player.

The problem is I think they set the mimium way to high.

While I think that 3E is too scattershot. Again, that range of +0 to +28 depending on your personal ability to game the system is just too extreme for me. The default 4E fighter isn't going to have skill in Diplomacy. But he still CAN become a diplomat, if you want - and actually be pretty good at it, better than his 3E counterpart. I've got that level of versatility available to me; I can make the fighter of noble birth with some knowledge of Diplomacy. I'm just not sacrificing my fighting skill in the process - aside from a feat which could have given me a slight advantage in combat, but which doesn't form the entire foundation of my class abilities.

 

[Ximenes088]

I disagree it screws up balance. It only screw up balance in certain styles of games which has been my point all along. Right now 4e looks like it is catering to one and only one style of game. Maybe it will and maybe it won't work with other styles we haven't seen enough to know. But if it does only cater to one then to me that is a bad design and makes the game not for me.

If an option exists such as allows a player to trade the great majority of their noncombat utiltiy for combat utility, or vice-versa, you destabilize the game automatically. There are certain inevitable consequences that come about from it, and you need a lot more communication and preference-matching with the rest of the group to overcome them.

If you make a Hawking, you either expect to dominate noncombat scenes or you expect to be in a party of Hawkings who share the noncombat limelight. The first expectation is something 4e explicitly dumps; they do not want to let one PC hog all the noncombat scene glory, no matter how useless they promise to be otherwise. The second expectation... well, if you're all skill peers, why not be skill peers at the baseline? If being combat-competent really bugs you, just forfeit abilities.