New Design & Development: Feats

[The Little Raven]

It's all about what you study in. A summoner indeed will know how and be able to summon as easily as the rogue sneaks about. After all, he's trained to do it his whole career.

The problem is the scale of the comparison.

Summoning is the whole of what a summoner does, especially since summoned creatures can theoretically be used to fill any role.

Sneaking is just one part of what a rogue does.

 

[neceros]

The problem is the scale of the comparison.

Summoning is the whole of what a summoner does, especially since summoned creatures can theoretically be used to fill any role.

Sneaking is just one part of what a rogue does.

I agree. In that regard, a summoner can use a summoned creature to fill almost any other role. It requires balance in order to keep the classes sane with each other.

At the same time, a rogue would theoretically use Sneak almost as often, if that is the method he wished to use his skills. In the end, though, the balance would be that the wizard can summon really well, but not much else could be said about him. He is a summoner point in fact. Whereas the rogue would have many talents, as sneaking is useful, but not entirely life-consuming to learn.

 

[The Little Raven]

At the same time, a rogue would theoretically use Sneak almost as often, if that is the method he wished to use his skills. In the end, though, the balance would be that the wizard can summon really well, but not much else could be said about him. He is a summoner point in fact. Whereas the rogue would have many talents, as sneaking is useful, but not entirely life-consuming to learn.

Exactly!

 

[Ahglock]

Keep in mind that there are more classes than just spellcasters. Before the introduction of the Sorcerer class, the 3e PHB would have had 1/3 of it's full page count devoted to the ability of ONE CLASS out of TEN (eleven with Sorcerer).

Now, since they decided "Hey, let's stop giving wizards 100x more options than EVERYONE ELSE," obviously some of that content has to be put somewhere else.

A bit inaccurate since the spell lists were jumbled, that 1/3 was for all spell casting classes. Further more its somewhat irrelevant. If a spell takes 4 paragraphs to describe like many do and a feat takes 1 it doesn't mean more content was put towards the spells, just more page count. Further more I'd say wizards got about as much use from pages 57-140 as rangers got from the spell lists.

So, you're saying that calling creatures from other realms of existence, binding them to your service, and controlling them against your foes is just as easy as walking slowly and softly? I'm afraid I don't see it.

No I'm saying summoning is about as important a role to spell casters as sneaking is to a rogue. So it really isn't something you should punt down field.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

No I'm saying summoning is about as important a role to spell casters as sneaking is to a rogue. So it really isn't something you should punt down field.

Perhaps, but if it's a really tricky system to balance properly given its historical difficulties, you have limited resources due to a perhaps hastily chosen publication date, and a limited page count in the first core books, it might be prudent to set it aside for purely logistical reasons.

Not that I'm happy it won't be included in the PHB. I'm actually kind of bummed about that. But if something's gotta go, I can see why they put off summoning. (And druids, and monks, and psions, and...)

 

[neceros]

Perhaps, but if it's a really tricky system to balance properly given its historical difficulties, you have limited resources due to a perhaps hastily chosen publication date...

Haven't they been play testing 4e since 2006? I wonder how hastily two years is...

 

[Ahglock]

Perhaps, but if it's a really tricky system to balance properly given its historical difficulties, you have limited resources due to a perhaps hastily chosen publication date, and a limited page count in the first core books, it might be prudent to set it aside for purely logistical reasons.

Not that I'm happy it won't be included in the PHB. I'm actually kind of bummed about that. But if something's gotta go, I can see why they put off summoning. (And druids, and monks, and psions, and...)

1. It appears summoning is in so this is just a arguing for arguings sake.

2. I can agree but serious effort should of been made to anything they cut that seems fairly core to make it work before they cut it.

3. If it ended up just being summoning I'd deal. Its the and, and, and I'm worried about. There comes a point where enough ands are removed for a later date and the core 3 books really don't provide you what you see as a full game. Sure it has rules for beating people to death and some skills so you can play it, but it isn't a full enough D&D experience.

I have no idea if that will happen but it is a concern, I don't want my fancy collectors edition PH ending up being an book end for the role playing books I use.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Haven't they been play testing 4e since 2006? I wonder how hastily two years is...

My understanding is that they broke ground on 4E in 2006. Playtesting seems to have been integrated into the core development cycle a lot more than last edition, but they're still making major revisions to the rules to the extent that they do not feel that they can yet release a draft to the 3rd party publishers.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Perhaps the reasons for "punting" summoning have less to do with it being tricky to design, and more to do with it

A) being complex mechanically, and

B) taking up a lot of space.

Those two being the case, I can certainly see them wanting to focus on other aspects in the first PHB, and saving summoning for later, even if I'd like to see it sooner.

 

[Stogoe]

Dr. Akward, that's wrong. They were designing 4e for over two years before the announcement.

People just think it's 'hasty' because WotC kept it so tight a secret for those entire two years.