D&D 4E Mike Mearls on how D&D 4E could have looked

OK on this "I would’ve much preferred the ability to adopt any role within the core 4 by giving players a big choice at level 1, an option that placed an overlay on every power you used or that gave you a new way to use them."
Basically have Source Specific Powers and less class powers. But I think combining that with having BIG differing stances to dynamically switch role might be a better idea so that your hero can adjust role to circumstance. I have to defend this NPC right now vs I have to take down the big bad right now vs I have to do minion cleaning right now, I am inspiring allies in my interesting way, who need it right now.

and the obligatory
Argghhhh on this. " I wanted classes to have different power acquisition schedules"

And thematic differences seemed to have been carried fine.

 

[Sadras]

The zero change in ac while levelling could be perceptually fixed if people accepted that some of those hits were really misses because of the abstraction of hit points -- but we cannot have that no never that.

Personally I have never had an issue with damage being - pushes, bumps, fatigue, losing positioning, bruising, being winded, distracted...etc

 

[Garthanos]

Agreed. There's no shortage of interesting ways to do "encounter" powers without actually saying "once per encounter".


Yeah. Something like that could easily be handled by just saying "once an enemy has seen you use this maneuver/exploit they cannot be targeted by it".
Honestly, that's pretty elegant. I might have to incorporate that into some of my 5e design.

I dunno. They seem pretty simple to adjudicate at the table.

Coming back to this

Note - I do not like the 5e short rest mechanic I find it harder to visualize than what we were discussing or the 5 minute one in 4e - I always visualized a short rest being what you do after a decent distance sprint in athletics activity, The sprint is an exertion that takes a hit on you cannot manage it again immediately but it don't have to have an hours break to redo 5,10 or 15 maybe but an hour and only a couple of times a day?...nyeh not unless you pulled a muscle which also seems closer to a daily kind of limit/although heros being heros? who knows.

 

[Sadras]

Note - I do not like the 5e short rest mechanic I find it harder to visualize than what we were discussing or the 5 minute one in 4e - I always visualized a short rest being what you do after a decent distance sprint in athletics activity, The sprint is an exertion that takes a hit on you cannot manage it again immediately but it don't have to have an hours break to redo 5,10 or 15 maybe but an hour and only a couple of times a day?...nyeh not unless you pulled a muscle which also seems closer to a daily kind of limit/although heros being heros? who knows.

We changed up rests and tied it to the exhaustion mechanic per suggestion by a poster on Enworld. Your abilities recharge whenever you wish but you roll to see if exhaustion kicks in. It is a little more complicated than that but that is the basic premise.

 

[Imaro]

If there is going to be an implicit DC-by-level table, then I would prefer it be explicit.

The difference is that because they don't autoscale in everything like PC's in 4e...5e PC's can still be challenged by lower level DC's, foes, hazards, etc... so why create an unnecessary & artificial division by level for DC's as opposed to just having difficulty based on the in-game fiction? This requires much less overhead on the DM's part and also avoids the confusion we saw with some DM's around 4e and assuming that everything auto scaled even when the fiction didn't change. The fact that lower DC challenges stay relevant and that auto scaling for PC's in everything doesn't happen along with less overhead makes this DC methodology a better fit IMO.

 

[Garthanos]

and also avoids the confusion we saw with some DM's around 4e and assuming that everything auto scaled even when the fiction didn't change.

The fiction was very much supposed to change by level ie you are right it was a confusion but always seemed an intentional one from people playing the game "Edition war".

 

[Garthanos]

The difference is that because they don't autoscale in everything like PC's in 4e...5e PC's can still be challenged by lower level DC's, foes, hazards, etc.

i do not want my Paragon PCs to feel challenged by things that challenged them 10 levels ago.

 

[Jester David]

This seems an obvious non-sequitur.

The best moments in a sporting match, or a sporting season, can be entirely related to the game as played by the rules of that game. (Eg they needn't involve external elements llike, say, a crowd pouring onto the pitch.)

The best moments in a performance can be entirely related to the performance as a performance. (Eg they needn't involve eternal elements like, say, someone forgetting his/her lines or a string on an instrument breaking.)

I have no idea why you would think or assert that the performance of any system cannot involve change, or variation, or highs and lows, or better or worse examples. That's not true in sport. It's not true in music. It's not true in spaceflight. Why would it be true in RPGing?

Are you seriously suggesting the experience of playing a game of Dungeons & Dragons is directly comparable and analogous to playing a game of football? Or watching a performance of Les Misérables ?
And, by extension, that playing that game of football is the same as performing Les Mis?

However... to answer your question... YES! The best moments in a sporting match or performance aren't "entirely related to the game as played by the rules" or, in the case of a performance, related to the text as written in the play (which is more analogous than the performance itself).
These actually give great examples. Because think about the most textbook game of <sportsball> in history. No surprises and everything goes as expected. Routine play after routine play. Is that exciting? Not really. The greatest sports moments in history come not from textbook following of the rules—after all, junior high kids can play a game following all the rules—but from the intersection of the rules with exceptional talent at the right moment. The amazing odds defying pass, or spectacular breakaway goal, or gravity defying catch.
Ditto performances. Again, a High School Musical can put on Shakespeare. They can recite the words line-for-line and emphasise all the best bits. And it can be good. But when you get an exceptional, captivating performer who knows how to read the audience, then the performance comes to life in a way that transcendence the written lines. The play is important: the performance wouldn't be as good without the foundation of the play. But the combination of the play and the performer makes something exceptional.

Regardless... I've said my bit and you will likely still do not get it. After all, you continued to misrepresent my arguments in my last post, insisting that I was advocating "ignoring" the rules. I can't imagine this explanation being different.
So I think I'm out of this side conversation...

 

[Garthanos]

We changed up rests and tied it to the exhaustion mechanic per suggestion by a poster on Enworld. Your abilities recharge whenever you wish but you roll to see if exhaustion kicks in. It is a little more complicated than that but that is the basic premise.

That might work, my sons group just ignored the 5e limit and time on short rests and kept flanking and similar things. My son is playing a noble now (aka 4e princess build/lazylord)

 

[Parmandur]

i do not want my Paragon PCs to feel challenged by things that challenged them 10 levels ago.

That's a genre preference, really: I don't want max level characters who feel no fear when being surrounded and outnumbered, or who cannot be flummoxed by social and environmental limitations.

There is a certain exaggeration of how the 5E system works here. For the CR 20 cellar door, the 12 dex Level 1 Fighter with thieves tools from his Background will have to roll a 17 or higher. The Level 11 Rogue with 18 Dex and Expertise in thieves tool will not have to roll, because she can't roll lower than 20 (no critical failures or successes in 5E Skills, Reliable Taken means the lowest possible base roll is 10).

There is a very real difference in the narrative capabilities of pow and high level 5E PCs, it just isn't the same huge range of 4E. For you, that may be a con,for me it is a pro.

 

[Sadras]

i do not want my Paragon PCs to feel challenged by things that challenged them 10 levels ago.

But is that not what the minion mechanic does? It allows monsters/creatures in the MM to stay relevant longer. The two editions just have a different way of doing that due to the base engine of each system.