Roles - do they work?

[AngeltheTechrat]

Really? Horrible? He's playing the character he wants to play, and he's very effective at it. A couple of people (didn't mean a universal "we" there) ragged on him about the idea, but the DM went along with it and now he has a character he's satisfied with. I, personally, find the "dark and brooding hero that channels the powers of Darkness to fight evil!" thing kinda cliche. But he wants to do it, and came up with a not-entirely-terrible backstory for the character, so I say more power to him.

Nah, it works seamlessly. He includes the "real" name of the power on the bottom of the card (he uses power cards), and the mechanics are right there anyway. Remember, this is just a name and SFX change, no actual mechanics (even damage type) are changed. But now he's effectively a Death Knight, using the same mechanics as the Paladin.

Fluff change is awesome like that. I'd definitely use it whenever I had a concept the rules didn't provide, and I'm happy that my DM is amenable to it.

Huh.. A death knight "hero". Well.. alright. I mean.. I like vampire characters, so I certainly have no right to wag my finger.

 

[tyrlaan]

Whatevs. You're still a thuggish Rogue, so concept fulfilled. Like I said, if you specifically want to have low Dex, be a Ranger and take Chain.

I don't believe it's as dismissible as you think. Playing a character that uses strength to hit for both straight up (fighter) attacks and sneaky (rogue) attacks is very different than someone who has no choice but to use str to hit for fighter attacks and dex for rogue attacks. And it's not just a fluff difference. This is a very real game mechanics difference in how it plays.

In the same vein, a rogue's melee basic attack uses Str to hit. Huh? How does this make sense?

These limitations are arbitrary in 4e. In 4e, it was decided that rogue's use Dex to attack and fighters use Str. It's not a balance concern, because I could play a paladin/cleric that both rely on one stat based on RAW. It makes individual classes work very well, but certain class combos will inevitably run into snags. 4e may have solved the problem of martial classes dipping into caster classes, but it introduced a different problem.

Now if you want to make an archer that's different. Then you play a ranger.

Now you're just arguing semantics instead of responding to my concerns/statements. Aside from the fact that when I state "bow fighter" it should be safe to assume I mean someone who is known for their bow use, aka an archer, the ranger comes with his own mechanics in addition to fluff. Refer to my comments in response to yesnomu on this.

Flexibility is achieved via options. 3e started out proving concept options via a couple of generic classes and the multiclassing rules, but that broke down with time as it became apparent that certain concepts (the duelist/swashbuckler being a popular example) still couldn't be effectively realized. 4e provides concept options primarily via class & power selection, which right now is limited.

I'm not sure how that qualifies as a breakdown in the game system, but I'm not really interested in arguing the point either way. However, this does provide a useful springboard for another notion worth mentioning.

Short of an impressively robust points based system, it's exceedingly difficult to make a remotely elegant system that allows you to model all character concepts. Class based systems just can't measure up to point based, at least in my experience, in this regard. That said, if you look at 3e vs 4e, it is clear that 3e provided the tools, in just the PHB, to create vastly more mechanically and thematically diverse characters than what the 4ePHB provides.

I'm not saying that 3e was all that and a +1 bag of chips, but theme takes a back seat when it comes to 4e class design. 4e classes are highly tuned for balance and role at the expense of flexibility. Sure the multiclass mechanics address this somewhat, but the same can be said of 3e multiclassing. Both rulesets exist to allow people to play concepts that a single class cannot provide.

This is all inherently obvious in the nature of the 4e splatbooks. Case in point, an answer to one of my character concepts was "domains will be released in Divine Power." So basically what we're saying here is that, while in 3e, splatbooks gave me new options I never really thought about, 4e splatbooks give me the tools I /need/ to build characters.

 

[Mallus]

...3e, splatbooks gave me new options I never really thought about...

You means like swashbucklers and effective fighter-magic users

 

[korjik]

Though by the same token, I have found 4e multiclassing allows for me to be more flexible with my character concept. I found 3e multiclassing too forceful in shoving aspects of that multiclass into your character. I have found myself on more then one ocassion having to ignore half of my multiclass content to fit my character concept and gods help me if what I want from that class is a number of levels up.

I find that with 4e multiclassing there is more ease at picking and choosing. I have a number of different initial multiclass-choices for each class I can pick what Powers I choose, I can continue to develop my initial class while still multiclassing.

So even if someone has the same tastes I think it can be satisfied differently.

4e multiclassing is smoother than 3e, and it will work better at high levels, but it is still greatly restricted by the mechanics of the game.

There are only certain class combos that will effectively function without having to have a stat or two that is worthless to the original class. You are effectively taking a -1 to -4 penalty to hit with 1/4 of your powers due to a lower stat that the power is based on. With to hits based around approximately a 50% chance to hit, you end up with a 10-40% penalty.

 

[Spatula]

Now you're just arguing semantics instead of responding to my concerns/statements. Aside from the fact that when I state "bow fighter" it should be safe to assume I mean someone who is known for their bow use, aka an archer

Why should an archer be of the fighter class?

Short of an impressively robust points based system, it's exceedingly difficult to make a remotely elegant system that allows you to model all character concepts. Class based systems just can't measure up to point based, at least in my experience, in this regard.

Agreed.

That said, if you look at 3e vs 4e, it is clear that 3e provided the tools, in just the PHB, to create vastly more mechanically and thematically diverse characters than what the 4ePHB provides.

Sure. It also contained more classes and more flexible multiclassing. Not sure what "mechanical diversity" has to do with anything.

I'm not saying that 3e was all that and a +1 bag of chips, but theme takes a back seat when it comes to 4e class design.

On the contrary, theme is very important for 4e classes, definitely moreso than 3e's generic classes, which have no set theme (the fighter chief among them; it's basically just a bag of combat feats and IME used only for that purpose).

This is all inherently obvious in the nature of the 4e splatbooks. Case in point, an answer to one of my character concepts was "domains will be released in Divine Power." So basically what we're saying here is that, while in 3e, splatbooks gave me new options I never really thought about, 4e splatbooks give me the tools I /need/ to build characters.

Depends on what kind of character you want to create. There's plenty of concepts in the 3e splatbooks that exist because they allow people to create concepts that just weren't possible with just the PHB. Swashbucklers, ninjas, psionicists, etc. And it goes beyond classes. The core set of cleric domains is a pretty good list, but there are plenty of concepts that it doesn't cover, and hence the splats are full of new domains that aren't present in the PHB but that are necessary for certain kinds of clerics.

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

Depends on what kind of character you want to create. There's plenty of concepts in the 3e splatbooks that exist because they allow people to create concepts that just weren't possible with just the PHB. Swashbucklers, ninjas, psionicists, etc. And it goes beyond classes. The core set of cleric domains is a pretty good list, but there are plenty of concepts that it doesn't cover, and hence the splats are full of new domains that aren't present in the PHB but that are necessary for certain kinds of clerics.

3.5 Shaman was such a wonderful class...

But anyway.. more to the point of the thread..

I just asked a question on the possibility of a 3rd-party source in another thread. http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/250496-drawbacks-feats.html


And I think it connects to the discussion this thread has turned into in this fashion-- Why is it that everyone's answer to trying to build a character to concept now is for me to "Ask my DM if I can break some more rules"?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

And I think it connects to the discussion this thread has turned into in this fashion-- Why is it that everyone's answer to trying to build a character to concept now is for me to "Ask my DM if I can break some more rules"?

Because you're a special snowflake?

I think it has a lot to do with the fact that you want very specific things, and not just the general theme.

3E sometimes made this easier. You want cantrip - multiclass with Wizard. Maybe your character was a little gimped afterwards, but you got your Cantrips out of the deal (oh, and some 1st level spells).

Want some more skills? Multiclass with Rogue. Oh, and you also get sneak attack. Neat, but maybe not what you _really_ needed to make your concept work. (Rogue/Paladin anyone? Sure, Sneak Attack doesn't violate the Code or anything, but if I could just get some skills, I'd be fine with it, too.)
Want Fast Movement? Pick up a level of Barbarian. You didn't want to rage, but okay, now you can.

And of course, this could also be used for some nice "optimized" combos. Pick up a level of Barbarian to get Rage for cheap and then take levels in Fighter and/or Range, use one of your regular feats for Extra Rage.

These extreme aspects are gone in 4E. Of course, mostly because of the latter, getting benefits from the front-loaded classes. 4E still has a lot of front-loading, and the designers recognized that this front-loading just doesn't work with the 3E multiclassing system, but it is required to make classes different from each other. (Especially if they all use the same resource management system. Though that is also incompatible with the 3E multiclassing system, at least with the Core Systems...)

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

Snowflake?

 

[FireLance]

Snowflake?

Well, build a man a fire, and he's warm for a day. Build a special snowflake a fire, and he'll complain that he's beautiful and unique and can't possibly be treated in the same way as everybody else.

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

Well, build a man a fire, and he's warm for a day. Build a special snowflake a fire, and he'll complain that he's beautiful and unique and can't possibly be treated in the same way as everybody else.

I'm sorry.

I never claimed to be "beautiful" or "special". I'm only a sub-human wretch.

People are saying I should ask for favors, and I've only been saying I have no right to.

I'm sorry.

I only thought I could maybe talk to people here. About the game.

I'm sorry.

Please.. I'm sorry.