PHB Book Layout - Good or No so Good

[Mouseferatu]

Its not that the Wall is daunting, its just that its placement is inconvenient for quickly comparing the classes themselves. The 1Ed book? The description of classes is, what...18 pages? And that doubled by 3Ed, perhaps. But at the end of that, most people know the class roles and which one they want to play, even though they don't know what the spells some classes actually do.

True. Which goes back to what I said about the 4E PHB being good, IMO, for referencing things, but not good for getting the feel of the game just by reading through it. You're exactly right that, if you're looking for the feel of each class on an initial flip-through, the older set-up is better.

We'll just have to agree to disagree on this one.

I can live with that.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

A better index in general would be great.

I noticed that I really love the DM Screen for 4E. It contains most of the information I need at the table - unfortunately, I don't have it when I am running my online campaign, so I reference the PHB, and that is fast, but not as fast as the DM Screen.

Sometimes I think that for better reference use, it makes sense to provide the same information twice, in different layouts. The "learning the rules layout" where you move through it step by step, and the "quick reference layout", where you have all conditions and options layed out on one or two double pages. Of course, that might "anger" some people because they feel like they paying twice or something, but.. people will always find something to complain.

Regarding the "learn to play" - I think it would be helpful to have a few more gameplay examples. The problem of course - when used as a reference, these make the rules harder to find since some random amount of gameplay examples are spread through. But then - repeating information like I mentioned could help this. The gameplay examples would be spread between the combat rules chapter, and maybe at the start or end of the power explanation stuff.

I am not sure what (else) would be useful for better "reading" (vs. referencing). I guess I am not the kind of guy that reads rulebooks that way most of the time. Maybe a little more space reserved for fluff? For example, one could have the classes chapter started with a short overview of the classes and follow that with a section of these classes acting in the gameworld - a party running through an encounter, without referencing the rules. At a later point, when using a game example, one could refer back to the party.

I kinda miss the "iconic" party, too. Or rather "iconic parties". 2 parties, covering all classes and races in between. The party is described by names, classes, and a short introduction who they are, how they got together, what they are going to do. (One could reference the KotS and the DMG adventure as "hooks"). It would also be cool to have these party reappear with illustrations describing them at paragon and epic tier. This could also happen in supplements. Martial Power 1 describes the martial heroes at paragon tier, and Martial Power 2 at epic tier. And their storyline could also continue, perhaps refering to adventures that have been released since then (avoding too many spoilers), or just some made up stuff.

All this stuff is mostly useless at the gametable, but it is nice "fluff" and makes it more entertaining to read, I think. It's give some time to "relax" from learning the rules and understanding the game to just think about what kind of adventurers these guys could make.

I am actually tempted to write such a "iconic party" up.

Of course, all that would blow up the PHB by a few pages, and especially the iconic party would require additional illustrations, probably by the same illustrator, if the iconics are to be repeated in different contexts.

 

[vagabundo]

Count me in as a fan of the PHB layout, a nice go-to book and easy to find stuff during the game - not that I need to much in 4e, CB character sheets, the DM screen and the MM are all I need.

Some gripes though:

- Could have used better indexes and glossaries, as mentioned by other posters.
- MI's in the PHB was definitely the right decision, but I think some of the choices were off and there are some 'holes' in what was picked.
- I like power right next to class are fine, but more fluff or side topic's on advice needed to be given to break it up the wall of text. I've noticed they are starting to do this in the newer books. And the choice of powers was poor in some cases, but that is another thread all-together.

I like the direction on playability over readability.

 

[CapnZapp]

Magical Items in PHB
I suppose my other gripe at the time was that MIs (magical items) were in the PHB. This is something that I still think should never have happened. However, what gets put in to fill in the gap? More Classes or Class Builds?

I feel putting magical items in the PHB (instead of the DMG) is a good change.

For players, that is - it means they only need one book (called the Player's Handbook, duh).

More controversial is the meager selection of items. Handing out only the bare-bones items in the PHB and selling the rest in AV is a money-grubbing scheme pure and simple.

However, I still like that the PHB stuff exists, and is decidedly vanilla. This allows me to hand out Enchant Magic Item rituals and the players can create (or buy) whatever from the PHB. The magic item economy along with the fact that nearly all CharOp recommendations come from AV (which I keep from my players) is great.

So in the end my answer is:

I like the PHB magic items just as they are, but I would have wanted a second helping of items in the DMG to make the selection of PHB-DMG-MM items much more "complete". (The AV could still contain lots of the more exotic stuff, not to mention the broken, selling-to-powergamers stuff).

Dividing items between PHB and DMG would also send a strong message along the lines of "just because you have the ritual doesn't mean you're entitled to select stuff from just about every book you purchase". The ritual would be truly great if it explicitly said "you can create PHB items of your level as well as any other item (such as from the DMG) with your DMs permission only."

 

[Mouseferatu]

Regarding the "learn to play" - I think it would be helpful to have a few more gameplay examples.

Oh, yes. I really miss those. (I still want to know what happened to the halfling thief taken by ghouls in the 1E example. )

 

[vagabundo]

Oh, yes. I really miss those. (I still want to know what happened to the halfling thief taken by ghouls in the 1E example. )

You know what happened. You just want the grisly details...

 

[Jan van Leyden]

The PHB's layout is utilitarian, pragmatic and supportive to its role as reference work. Sadly, this underlines the movement away from a book one might want to read for pleasure to a reference text you avoid as much as possible.

Organisation and layout of the combat chapter is a catastrophic failure IMHO. This chapter mixes explanation and definition up, while giving the reader no help to orient himself. If you have to look up some detial, you can only hope that said detail is listed in the index, otherwise you functionally polymorph the PHB into a fan by furiously turning pages.

All those descriptions of powers and magical items (which I'm glad are included in the PHB), feel like a card collector's album. The stuff is there, but why should you reference it, with all those power cards and item cards?

With this role as reference text, the 4e PHBs will probably be the end of an era. From 5e on, all reference material will be delivered electronically. A much smaller PHB will give you explanations, definitions of terms and examples.

 

[Nikosandros]

In contrast to Henry, I find the utility of the design appalling. Every time someone attempts a grab or a bull rush or one of the other conditions or actions scattered through the combat chapter we spend ages paging backwards and forwards trying to find the right place.

Admittedly we rarely have to look up grab now because it has proved so useless that it is rarely attempted! (and FWIW we never had any problem with 3e grapple which seemed straightforward and understandable to us, so I'm guessing this is primarily a layout problem).

I hate having to look something up in the PHB at the table, because it always takes longer than expected. It is also the only RPG rules I possess which is too boring to sit down and just read through.

I would have liked better arranging of material, better index(!), smaller type face and a bunch of other changes to layout.

That's me.

Cheers

Full agreement here. I hate the large font and the enormous amount of white space. I find the meager index to be rather poorly done and I find it very inconvenient to look up something during a game... IMVHO it doesn't work well at all as a reference book.

 

[Nebulous]

Only thing I do feel negatively about as you say is the magic items - I still think for a game that encourages an older school style of "give magic items rather than making them", including MI's in the book was not a good move. Being in the equipment chapter, or right next to it, makes it even more a subconscious "entitlement."

But as far as power layout? In-game, I just can't find fault with the PHB's reference power.

Yes, until you mentioned it, i think players do feel "entitled" to have cool magic items, and not just a backpack, rope and a tindertwig starting out like in past editions. Everyone wants their implement +2 and sword of shockingthunderfireburst pretty much off the bat. As a DM it bothers me, but i think players like it this way, so i guess it's ok.

Actually, i'd love to see a poll on this...ARE there players that don't like the magic items in the PHB? I might just start a new post.

 

[Nebulous]

Full agreement here. I hate the large font and the enormous amount of white space. I find the meager index to be rather poorly done and I find it very inconvenient to look up something during a game... IMVHO it doesn't work well at all as a reference book.

We don't crack the PHB open very often, but particular powers are a pain in the ass to look up, as are magic items, and figuring out grab (which isn't too bad and we like it better than Grapple), but there are still some vague rules that really, really could have been explained with more examples. All that white space and BIG FONT could have been replaced with clear examples of gameplay elements, that would have been excellent. It would also have made the PHB more fun to read.

For example, in the Concealment part of the combat chapter:

DM (Dave): "You enter a room that is roughly 30 feet wide by 30 feet long, but it is hard to tell the exact dimensions because of the thick gray mist hanging in the air. It is cold and clammy to the touch and seems to clog in your lungs." (The DM checks everyone's Passive Perception, knowing that they need a 25 or higher to see the wraith in the middle of the room. It has full concealment).

FIGHTER (Shannon): "I want to listen for any sounds before we go in here."

CLERIC (Bob): "I'm going to wave my torch around and see if it dissipates any of this mist. Is it hurting us in any way?" etc...


Or something like that, i could go on but i'm not. Corner cases could have been addressed, and abjudicating certain powers. Yeah, i would have done the PHB very differently, but that huge block of powers is vital to the core of 4e and i'm not sure how to get around that. A friggin index would have helped, sheesh. I wonder if they just wanted everyone to use the online venue to look stuff up so left out the hardcopy index on purpose.