And you are flogging the same horse. You apparently know that 5E won't be 4E in whatever nebulous "feeling" you get from 4E... and yet you still continue to comment on it. So you're banging your head against a wall advocating for things that you apparently already know aren't going to happen... the same way that we bang our heads against a wall telling you that we think many of your complaints are possibly without merit because you're expecting too much from the playtest too soon.
I am not expecting "too much" from the playtest "too soon." Unless you interpret what I want as some half-baked tack-on module, which isn't what I want at all, nor is it what I'm talking about. And most comments downplaying the concerns of 4e advocates run along this route;
"don't worry, you'll get your precious tactical module. There, there."
That's not what I'm asking for. How many times does this point need reiterating before it sinks in?
I know what I want isn't forthcoming because the things that I feel made 4e great are things baked in at the core system level, which Next doesn't seem to have. I like that 4e has mechanics that lend themselves to light narrativist drift. Nothing I've seen in Next really supports this even half as well; they're very consciously distancing themselves from that approach. If that's what they want to do, then fine, but at least be straight up about it instead of repackaging the same old flavour of D&D and trying to sell me on the fact that
"it'll still play like 4e, because tactical module is coming!!!" Sorry, not buying it.
The structure of martial classes is a good example. The manoeuvres system might be mechanically balanced in terms of crunch, but it is sorely lacking in terms of mechanical and especially
narrative equivalence. They're bland and unappealing so far. And I'm not even talking about necessitating an AEDU-power structure or a combat grid. I don't need either of those things to get the effect I'm after.
Peripheral to this, I
liked roles. I liked power source. I
liked the specificity of it. I liked how class features and the game's rules came together to allow you to make decisions about your character at a metagame level that reinforced the kind of character you want to play. Yet, I understand that it was not wholly popular and why they feel some need to distance themselves from it, even though I feel it's not the direction I want the game going. But I
have to say so, or I have no right to complain if it doesn't turn out the way I want.
Case in point to this, I popped into a thread started by a PF GM asking for advice in his/her game, and it was still basic, basic stuff like players not building to cover all the roles that most PF/3.x players and the Next designers keep telling me aren't necessary. Okay. I remember having those kinds of conversations (years ago now) and seeing it again really underscored to me a lot of what 4e did right. And they want to un-do that? That's just one example.
Now it may be that when the 4e-ish module comes out, I may change my mind, but for now, all I can do is judge what I see, and what I see, I don't like as much as what I have, so I will keep advocating for something more to my liking. If I get it eventually, great (if it comes in a timely enough fashion), if not, then I have a game that I do like already. You're happy with Next? Great. Why criticize others for wanting to be happy as well?
So, you are just recommending that we all throw up our hands and walk out of Mike's 'big tent' eh? I guess the question is why do you even read threads like this one? WHAT ELSE would be posted here except "here's what we have problems with" statements? Glowing praise for how all us 4e fans have been shown the light by Mike & Co and have decided that DDN is the best thing ever? You know THAT isn't going to happen, and if we all do as you say then there will be nothing but an empty room here. That's fine, it probably isn't worth posting in these threads in the 1st place in terms of changing anything, but it would be a pretty meaningless discussion without us.
Yep. I almost didn't respond because this pretty much covers it.
I was talking about the comments on the article on the D&D site. The first several comments were [and these are exact quotes]: "Dear Mearls, just quit already," "Where's my kewl powers?" "Yet again another article to gives me reason not to buy or even play D&DN," "Well I guess 5E is doing a great job if the design goal is making jilted 4E haters feel vindicated," etc.
Each with a lot of likes/thumbs up.
So what does that tell you? It tells me that they're risking the 3.x backlash all over again with this by "burning" their current customer base.
Now you could argue, and others have, that they're not doing that (or even that they didn't do that before) but it doesn't matter. Customer relations is all about
perception. Right now, the perception is that 4e has been tossed in front of a bus or perhaps a train, depending on your exact level of vitriol. You could argue that this isn't accurate, but it's hard to ignore the derogatory comments they've made on things like skill challenges, "scream-heals," and
any number of other 4e-isms.
Personally, I think this is all a very calculated move on their part, and probably one they think is necessary; publicly trash all the things that drove the 3.x and earlier crowd away while 4e fans are still finishing up their campaigns (after all, we're probably still grinding our way through Heroic tier, pfft *eyeroll*), and then, once the older crowd is "won back" into the fold, that's when they release details about the Tactical Module and start talking about how Awesome(tm) everything about 4e was and Still Is in Next.
I picture it like a caricature of a corporate manager having a conversation in two phones at once (probably played by Mel Brooks), where he has one phone in each hand and tells one group one thing while holding the other phone to his chest, then switches off, except that we aren't really on the end of either phone, we're in the room and we can hear everything.
