Spiral of Doom Countdown
Personally, I am of the opinion that we are seeing signs of the coming apocalypse far sooner than anticipated. Let me explain.
The very first time I read the 4E Player's Handbook, I predicted that Hasbro would eventually sell us
"The Book of +2's," and this would be the harbinger of 4.5, just as 3.5's
Monster Manual V, Complete Arcane II, and
Complete Adventurer II were signs of the coming of 4E.
It looks to me like the
Player's Handbook II is The Book of +2's, and it's coming out
less than year after the PHB.
At some point, the
4E PHB (and DMG), as currently
printed, will become unplayable, and something will be
printed that will take its place. It could be called the
Revised Player's Handbook, D&D4.5, even
D&D5, whatever you call it, it
is coming, and much sooner than I had thought possible.
As great as many of the fundamental design decisions behind 4E are, the implementation is already showing signs of distress, after only ten months.
I see the situation as analogous to the original version of
Magic The Gathering. A fantastic idea, a really great game, but so, so horribly broken. In those first few years, the rules went through numerous revisions while mostly retaining backwards compatibility, but eventually the combination of power creep and the combinatoric explosion forced
Wizards to effectively
"age" old material out of the system, so that new material could be produced and sold, while stabilizing the effects of power creep and combinatoric excess.
I see the same thing happening to 4E. Because of human failing, it is impossible to stop power creep as a marketing tool.
Hasbro wants to sell new books, so they will be publishing new classes, paragon paths, powers, feats, races, abilities, and magic items. While in
theory,
Errata could be employed to tame individual powers, as the number of powers rises linearly with time
(with new books being published nearly every month), the number of power
combinations rises almost exponentially, and so also the amount of errata necessary tame those combinations.
What is the solution?
Hasbro has already found the solution and implemented it successfully with
Magic, in particular the
Type II Deck Construction Rules. Under those rules, only those cards published during the last two years are legal for tournament
(and hence public) play. Whenever a new block is published, the oldest legal block
"ages" out of play.
This accomplishes several important things:
- It allows Hasbro to continually publish new material.
- It accounts for power creep, intentional or not.
- It keeps the number of available powers nearly constant over time.
- It keeps the number of available power combinations nearly constant over time.
- It keeps the amount of applicable Errata nearly constant over time.
- It maintains backwards compatability with the maximum amount of material.
The same needs and pressures apply to 4E, and a similar solution would offer comparable advantages. Before you burst a blood vessel and rage against what an awful idea it is consider the following. The current
PHB will someday be unplayable as printed, and a replacement will be printed.
Under the classic version model, this would be a new edition, 4.5 or 5 or whatever, and you will be forced to choose either to remain with the old edition and keep using your older books, or jump to the new edition, and have all your old books obsolete, or at least not applicable to the new edition.
Under the
Magic Type II model, the new
PHB would be largely backward compatable, and most of your books would remain playable. Only the oldest, and generally most problematic material would become obselete. The books you had purchased in the last two or three years would all remain playable.
What would you really rather have happen when the inevitable transition to what is essentially a newer version happens? Have
all your old books become unplayable with the new version, or have
some of your old books become unplayable?
There are other costs to the classic version model. Anyone remember the last year of 3.5 material? They were uniformly
awful. Since
Wizards' best people were working on 4E, the 3.5 material was churned out by second stringers, some of whom, like
Richard Berlew, should
never have been allowed to write
"official" material. Game stores suffered, players suffered, and
Hasbro suffered.
In contrast, incremental revision with aging means that the publisher can always be putting out their best effort, sellers will experience more steady sales instead of spikes and drops, and the players can buy material knowing that it will serve them for years, regardless of where the product is in the version cycle.
It works
fabulously well for
Magic, and if successfully applied to
4E, D&D would become
"evergreen," just as
Magic is. If done properly, there might never be another
"edition" of
D&D, just a constant refinement over time.
I know the rage you must be feeling now.
Never!
But be realistic.
4E is already showing signs of strain, and it
will break. Since this is inevitable, the really adult question is, how should it be handled?
Smeelbo
