Aluvial
Explorer
Hey there crowd. I'll begin by saying that I mostly lurk and pick brains about rules and such around here... Not much of a poster, don't really think about it much.
So, I'm writing this as much as a way to organize my own thinking about the new edition as anything else.
To begin, I'm 36 and have been the DM for two different groups, one going back 18 years, the other more recent and going back about 3. I was a fan of the new conventions in 3.0 and 3.5, really loved the cycling initiative and the loss of THAC0. Many other things about the new versions are tough to love, for example, too specific rulesets.
Anyhow, I got an invite from one of my regular gamers to go to game day in Charlotte, NC, Game Headquarters I believe, off of Wilkenson Blvd... nice shop, nicer owners. Me and another of my players went down to meet him.
They took about 50 or so players, although only some of us got the free mini. I played the Wizard, Althaea, while my two buddies played the Rogue/Thief (whichever) and the Fighter. A married couple sat down to fill our table, the woman, a brand new first time player, played the Dwarf fighter/warlord... not sure which. She will be important later in this story.
Anyhow, our DM was a real nice guy, asked us if we had ever played, I told him the same story I just told you, and he said "fine, let's start."
Ok, no rules, let's do it. "Blah, blah, blah, you're in town, find the two boys in the tomb, don't get killed, and we're off. Wait, we did manage to talk the DM into giving us more money then the module allowed for with some nice rolls from the human fighter.... also some background for the tale, something about a line of barons or some such... ok let's go.
Anyway we get to the tomb, the DM takes out the color printed map, and we sneak in... there are some sarchophoguses... you would think I would know how to spell that after reading it so many years.... and we encounter the shadow. The shadow gives us some cryptic poem... and we ignore it, and actually open up the wrong casket on purpose...
First encounter. Here we go. Initiative is rolled, I, the wizard, am first. I look at the sheet, and throw my light spell (a free/minor action, sweet!) onto the coffin. Umm, the miniature is on the other side of the room.... so I target a bad square, and nothing happens. In fact, I don't even realize at the time that I could do anything else...
Ok, so everyone moves around throws there at will powers around and the shadow closes on me a hits. I'm weakened until the END of the shadow's next turn... no problem, whatever that means.
I manage to take a 5' step/shift into a square away as the fighters pound away at it with their cool hacks. No miss chance here, just half damage. In fact, did one of the fighters miss his attack and do damage anyway? Yes! Ok, cool, we want to kill it, who cares if you missed but hit. I use my one useful per encounter power (I save the Acid Arrow for later) and miss.
Hack, hack, hack... we are ticking off the points...
Which then brings me to my first negative thought... the DM says, "ok, it is the wizard's turn." and I say what? Go ahead and guess?
I say, "I guess I'll cast/use power Magic Missile." In fact, for the rest of the day, I would say, I use Magic Missile. And why wouldn't I. It rolls against Reflex defense... which took no time to get used to, and it does the most damage... 2d4+4... so, why wouldn't I use it. I even tried to think of it as purely a ranged attack... but that was the problem... it was Magic Missile. It did better damage then my regular version of Magic Missile, and I could do it, FOREVER! I never ran out of them. You could cast it over, and over, and over... in fact that's basically all I could do.
And I started to notice the same thing with the other characters too. After one or two special per encounter or even at will powers, they all resorted to the one thing that did the best damage, over and over again. In fact, by the time we got downstairs for the encounter with the hobgoblins guarding the hall (there were two of them), then we were right back to the same pattern...
I even tried to change it up some by using my fey step to teleport 5 squares as a move... again cool, but then I started thinking about what a nice feature that is... especially if you think on the Z axis....
Anyhow, after that second encounter, we realized that we needed to take a break. No sweat. The DM just allowed us to do it, take 5 minutes... and then we all used our healing surges to get right back up to full. I thought to myself right then that this was too much like taking a health potion in a video game... Then I tried to put out of mind that it was like a video game at all and have an open mind.
Next encounter.... we antimate some statues while trying to rescue the two VERY uncooperative boys... was the DM trying to tell us something or was that in the module... Anyhow, we retreat having grappled/grabbed the boys (grab is so much easier....) and then the cave fell apart... we managed to escape in the nick of time (the group next to us lost two characters in that cave-in so I know that we were just faster/smarter to get the heck out of there....
Anyhow, we get back to more solid foundations and rest again.... we use a few healing surges.... I have 7 I think and I used 3 by the end of this rest... I keep thinking that there really hasn't been much danger to our characters yet... I look over at the fighter, and he has used 5 of his healing surges by now, but still has 5 left! He's fine. We leave and get to the final encounter...
Which we promptly finish in two rounds... the newcomer to gaming woman rolls the big crit and deals out 41 points of damage... no more evil wizard....
So... that's that. But then again, not quite. the cleric turned during the last battle, and I liked how it worked, sort-of.... I thought that the turning was faster, no charts to look up, but then again, didn't feel right. I like the new damage method, like Pathfinder, but then again, I didn't... I'm not sure if I want my low level clerics being able to damage (was there a roll to hit.... hmmm) every high level undead... I like the old idea that you better roll high to have a chance to turn the big nasty vampire, or he'll snicker at you and rip your arm off....
So we're done... I like the fact that you sell equipment at 20%.... I always thought that 50% was way too much.
I also like the new game. But it isn't DnD. It's a great miniature game. Like Descent, or Doom, but it just dosn't add up.... After I felt the video game thing, I wondered if there were potions out there that allowed you to re-up your daily or encounter power... like Mana potions... I couldn't shake the red bar (health), blue bar (mana) thing...
I couldn't shake the idea that I could Magic Missile over and over again.
I couldn't shake the idea that Magic Missile was the only thing I could do....
So at this point, I've kept close look at the time. We started at 1:30, and it was 4:20. We were pretty fast, but still 4 encounters was about 3 hours. Not quite as slow as 3.5, but definitely not fast either.
Then the married couple left. I want to talk about the newcomer.
She was awesome. She was extremely shy at first, I could barely hear her talking... she was nicely dressed compared to the plethora of overweight and black T-shirt wearing gamers... but after the second encounter, was really gettign into it. At first her husband would show her where things were on the sheet, but then she started to make the decisions for herself. And nice tactical ones at that. She picked up the game in NO TIME AT ALL.
That's when I overheard an older fellow at the next table over, whose group had just finished say, "You know what, I'm genuinely surprised. This is a good game... but it just isn't DnD."
I've been DMing for a long time. This version of the game, despite its boardgameishness, was super easy to pick up and learn. The woman at our table, I'm sorry I forgot her name, was sweet to indulge her husband for gameday and try out the game. It was a short time investment, and you could tell that she was WAY OUT of her comfort zone, kind-of like me when I go shopping with my wife for bathing suits.... (no really, you look good in that strip of nylon....)
Anyhow, she picked it up, and within three hours not only had the hang of the game, had picked it up, mastered her character, started to rollplay with a voice, and was genuinely having fun...
I've started up countless new players to the 3.5 system, men and women, and have never had that ease of use when trying to learn the rules. The 3.5 rules are a little daunting... they're not bad for a wargamer like me (I love Avalon Hill), but for a newcomer, they are clunky, too detailed, and broad. They cover TOO MUCH. Which is why my buddies and I like them so much... we want that experience. We love mixing and matching up the countless books we've bought. And I love the wide-reaching scope of the rules.
But I realize that the new version is just simpler. I don't like simple, so it isn't a game I will play, but it is a great new version of the hobby to get people interested. Let's face it guys, we're going to die. I'm 36, but I can see it. When we are gone, we will have only our children to inherit the thousands of dollars of game crap we've acquired...
I can see myself teaching my son this new version of the game. It has the elements of DnD, but again, isn't the game that I would want to play.
And this is where I find an unfortunate conclusion... It is the new version, for better or for worse. Luckily I have a complete set of 3.5 stuff to play with. I will always have it (save a big fire, perish the thought) and I will always be able to play it. BUT, this new version is the version that I always wanted to have to teach to a newcomer to the game. It's basic. It's funish... It's fast. It's easy. It's simple.
I like it, but it just isn't my thing. I bought the new books. I will teach my son (in just a few, so few, short years this new version). I might even teach older friends who are joining the old campaign this version (4e) first, before getting them into the GOOD stuff.
Anyhow, I think Wizards and the designers made one mistake, one that they couldn't possibly fix due to name recognition and such.... they called 4e "Dungeons and Dragons." They should have called it BASIC DnD instead. I feel that this new version is just too simplistic for many who have tasted the rich layers of multiclass goodness, too elementary for us who have piled on the HP damage on our players so bad, that they carry out their dead and NEED 4 days to recover, even with magic...
I won't miss that because my buddies and I agreed we wouldn't change systems. thank-goodness they appreciate the complexities of a good game. I think that 4e is a great game. Again, it's just not OUR game.
And by the way, we killed the white dragon in the tower too.... stupid dragon... didn't even take to the air.... a shame....
I think it was the rogue who took it down after my 10th magic missile.... or was it my 30th....
Sorry to ramble... this was pretty much unedited thought....
Aluvial
So, I'm writing this as much as a way to organize my own thinking about the new edition as anything else.
To begin, I'm 36 and have been the DM for two different groups, one going back 18 years, the other more recent and going back about 3. I was a fan of the new conventions in 3.0 and 3.5, really loved the cycling initiative and the loss of THAC0. Many other things about the new versions are tough to love, for example, too specific rulesets.
Anyhow, I got an invite from one of my regular gamers to go to game day in Charlotte, NC, Game Headquarters I believe, off of Wilkenson Blvd... nice shop, nicer owners. Me and another of my players went down to meet him.
They took about 50 or so players, although only some of us got the free mini. I played the Wizard, Althaea, while my two buddies played the Rogue/Thief (whichever) and the Fighter. A married couple sat down to fill our table, the woman, a brand new first time player, played the Dwarf fighter/warlord... not sure which. She will be important later in this story.
Anyhow, our DM was a real nice guy, asked us if we had ever played, I told him the same story I just told you, and he said "fine, let's start."
Ok, no rules, let's do it. "Blah, blah, blah, you're in town, find the two boys in the tomb, don't get killed, and we're off. Wait, we did manage to talk the DM into giving us more money then the module allowed for with some nice rolls from the human fighter.... also some background for the tale, something about a line of barons or some such... ok let's go.
Anyway we get to the tomb, the DM takes out the color printed map, and we sneak in... there are some sarchophoguses... you would think I would know how to spell that after reading it so many years.... and we encounter the shadow. The shadow gives us some cryptic poem... and we ignore it, and actually open up the wrong casket on purpose...
First encounter. Here we go. Initiative is rolled, I, the wizard, am first. I look at the sheet, and throw my light spell (a free/minor action, sweet!) onto the coffin. Umm, the miniature is on the other side of the room.... so I target a bad square, and nothing happens. In fact, I don't even realize at the time that I could do anything else...
Ok, so everyone moves around throws there at will powers around and the shadow closes on me a hits. I'm weakened until the END of the shadow's next turn... no problem, whatever that means.
I manage to take a 5' step/shift into a square away as the fighters pound away at it with their cool hacks. No miss chance here, just half damage. In fact, did one of the fighters miss his attack and do damage anyway? Yes! Ok, cool, we want to kill it, who cares if you missed but hit. I use my one useful per encounter power (I save the Acid Arrow for later) and miss.
Hack, hack, hack... we are ticking off the points...
Which then brings me to my first negative thought... the DM says, "ok, it is the wizard's turn." and I say what? Go ahead and guess?
I say, "I guess I'll cast/use power Magic Missile." In fact, for the rest of the day, I would say, I use Magic Missile. And why wouldn't I. It rolls against Reflex defense... which took no time to get used to, and it does the most damage... 2d4+4... so, why wouldn't I use it. I even tried to think of it as purely a ranged attack... but that was the problem... it was Magic Missile. It did better damage then my regular version of Magic Missile, and I could do it, FOREVER! I never ran out of them. You could cast it over, and over, and over... in fact that's basically all I could do.
And I started to notice the same thing with the other characters too. After one or two special per encounter or even at will powers, they all resorted to the one thing that did the best damage, over and over again. In fact, by the time we got downstairs for the encounter with the hobgoblins guarding the hall (there were two of them), then we were right back to the same pattern...
I even tried to change it up some by using my fey step to teleport 5 squares as a move... again cool, but then I started thinking about what a nice feature that is... especially if you think on the Z axis....
Anyhow, after that second encounter, we realized that we needed to take a break. No sweat. The DM just allowed us to do it, take 5 minutes... and then we all used our healing surges to get right back up to full. I thought to myself right then that this was too much like taking a health potion in a video game... Then I tried to put out of mind that it was like a video game at all and have an open mind.
Next encounter.... we antimate some statues while trying to rescue the two VERY uncooperative boys... was the DM trying to tell us something or was that in the module... Anyhow, we retreat having grappled/grabbed the boys (grab is so much easier....) and then the cave fell apart... we managed to escape in the nick of time (the group next to us lost two characters in that cave-in so I know that we were just faster/smarter to get the heck out of there....
Anyhow, we get back to more solid foundations and rest again.... we use a few healing surges.... I have 7 I think and I used 3 by the end of this rest... I keep thinking that there really hasn't been much danger to our characters yet... I look over at the fighter, and he has used 5 of his healing surges by now, but still has 5 left! He's fine. We leave and get to the final encounter...
Which we promptly finish in two rounds... the newcomer to gaming woman rolls the big crit and deals out 41 points of damage... no more evil wizard....
So... that's that. But then again, not quite. the cleric turned during the last battle, and I liked how it worked, sort-of.... I thought that the turning was faster, no charts to look up, but then again, didn't feel right. I like the new damage method, like Pathfinder, but then again, I didn't... I'm not sure if I want my low level clerics being able to damage (was there a roll to hit.... hmmm) every high level undead... I like the old idea that you better roll high to have a chance to turn the big nasty vampire, or he'll snicker at you and rip your arm off....
So we're done... I like the fact that you sell equipment at 20%.... I always thought that 50% was way too much.
I also like the new game. But it isn't DnD. It's a great miniature game. Like Descent, or Doom, but it just dosn't add up.... After I felt the video game thing, I wondered if there were potions out there that allowed you to re-up your daily or encounter power... like Mana potions... I couldn't shake the red bar (health), blue bar (mana) thing...
I couldn't shake the idea that I could Magic Missile over and over again.
I couldn't shake the idea that Magic Missile was the only thing I could do....
So at this point, I've kept close look at the time. We started at 1:30, and it was 4:20. We were pretty fast, but still 4 encounters was about 3 hours. Not quite as slow as 3.5, but definitely not fast either.
Then the married couple left. I want to talk about the newcomer.
She was awesome. She was extremely shy at first, I could barely hear her talking... she was nicely dressed compared to the plethora of overweight and black T-shirt wearing gamers... but after the second encounter, was really gettign into it. At first her husband would show her where things were on the sheet, but then she started to make the decisions for herself. And nice tactical ones at that. She picked up the game in NO TIME AT ALL.
That's when I overheard an older fellow at the next table over, whose group had just finished say, "You know what, I'm genuinely surprised. This is a good game... but it just isn't DnD."
I've been DMing for a long time. This version of the game, despite its boardgameishness, was super easy to pick up and learn. The woman at our table, I'm sorry I forgot her name, was sweet to indulge her husband for gameday and try out the game. It was a short time investment, and you could tell that she was WAY OUT of her comfort zone, kind-of like me when I go shopping with my wife for bathing suits.... (no really, you look good in that strip of nylon....)
Anyhow, she picked it up, and within three hours not only had the hang of the game, had picked it up, mastered her character, started to rollplay with a voice, and was genuinely having fun...
I've started up countless new players to the 3.5 system, men and women, and have never had that ease of use when trying to learn the rules. The 3.5 rules are a little daunting... they're not bad for a wargamer like me (I love Avalon Hill), but for a newcomer, they are clunky, too detailed, and broad. They cover TOO MUCH. Which is why my buddies and I like them so much... we want that experience. We love mixing and matching up the countless books we've bought. And I love the wide-reaching scope of the rules.
But I realize that the new version is just simpler. I don't like simple, so it isn't a game I will play, but it is a great new version of the hobby to get people interested. Let's face it guys, we're going to die. I'm 36, but I can see it. When we are gone, we will have only our children to inherit the thousands of dollars of game crap we've acquired...
I can see myself teaching my son this new version of the game. It has the elements of DnD, but again, isn't the game that I would want to play.
And this is where I find an unfortunate conclusion... It is the new version, for better or for worse. Luckily I have a complete set of 3.5 stuff to play with. I will always have it (save a big fire, perish the thought) and I will always be able to play it. BUT, this new version is the version that I always wanted to have to teach to a newcomer to the game. It's basic. It's funish... It's fast. It's easy. It's simple.
I like it, but it just isn't my thing. I bought the new books. I will teach my son (in just a few, so few, short years this new version). I might even teach older friends who are joining the old campaign this version (4e) first, before getting them into the GOOD stuff.
Anyhow, I think Wizards and the designers made one mistake, one that they couldn't possibly fix due to name recognition and such.... they called 4e "Dungeons and Dragons." They should have called it BASIC DnD instead. I feel that this new version is just too simplistic for many who have tasted the rich layers of multiclass goodness, too elementary for us who have piled on the HP damage on our players so bad, that they carry out their dead and NEED 4 days to recover, even with magic...
I won't miss that because my buddies and I agreed we wouldn't change systems. thank-goodness they appreciate the complexities of a good game. I think that 4e is a great game. Again, it's just not OUR game.
And by the way, we killed the white dragon in the tower too.... stupid dragon... didn't even take to the air.... a shame....
I think it was the rogue who took it down after my 10th magic missile.... or was it my 30th....
Sorry to ramble... this was pretty much unedited thought....
Aluvial
