Sacred Cows You Hope Die?

[Lonely Tylenol]

My big ones are:

• The mechanical dependency on alignment
• The 15 minute adventure/rest cycle
• The frequency and ease with which characters are brought back to life

Fortunately, all of these seem to have been addressed to some extent.

I really don't like the way that dying and being brought back are practically a given, especially at high levels when one failed save or one full attack can completely snuff out a character. I don't mind there being death. I also don't mind there being ways to reverse it. I just wish it were possible to get through a mid-to-high level campaign without it being an essential feature. I actually do expect 4th ed. to remedy this to some extent. With the altered resource management, I expect that it'll be harder to just suddenly go down, and there may be more chances to save a downed character, who probably won't simply be dead thanks to some random effect.

 

[WayneLigon]

If they actually listen to all of you guys, the only "sacred cow" that remains is the Dungeons & Dragons brand name.

Eventually, that being the point.

 

[WayneLigon]

Cards instead of dice...

Part of me would like to see that. I love dice, but more and more I've come to think of them as a barrier to entry. Either use six-sided-dice only, or cards; either are much cheaper and vastly easier to find than polyhedral dice.

Unfortunately, it's also much, much easier to cheat with cards than it is with dice. And if you lose even one, you throw the rest of the deck off probability-wise. Granted it's easier and cheaper to replace a deck of cards, but it's still a problem.

 

[Nebulous]

Unrationalizied level advancement. It's great if you kill someone and get infused with their energies highlander-style, or if you train and increase your level, or if you get blessed by a god and increase your level.... but just rising in levels (and very often too) doesn't make sense. I wish the game would include in-built ways and rationale to increase your levels, rather than let your level increases when you defeat X monsters.

I like how Warhammer does it: you level up incrementally, spending your points piecemeal on skills (which, i think, include hitpoints as a skill; you train to get tougher.) However, i seriously doubt this will make it into D&D; it is a level based game and always will be, and you'll get all your goodies at one time, whether logical or not. It IS simpler though.

 

[Yair]

I like how Warhammer does it: you level up incrementally, spending your points piecemeal on skills (which, i think, include hitpoints as a skill; you train to get tougher.) However, i seriously doubt this will make it into D&D; it is a level based game and always will be, and you'll get all your goodies at one time, whether logical or not. It IS simpler though.

The problem remains with skill-based advancement. In Ars Magica, for example, you also increase skills with XP, instead of rising in levels - but you TRAIN to increase these skills, spending (a lot of!) time and effort trying to improve your skills is what improves them. (To a small degree the tension of adventure will increase your skills too, but primarily the means to increase skills is - shockingly enough - to train in them.)

I actually like the levels of D&D. Keeps your character well-rounded and a the proper power-level, which is nearly impossible with a point-buy system.

 

[Dinkeldog]

In the middle ground is Earthdawn, where there are levels and talents. You train the talents using XP and when you have enough trained to a specified point, you gain a level, which opens up new talents.

 

[Szatany]

Sounds similar to Oblivion where you gain level after advancing skills important to your class by a certain number.

 

[GreatLemur]

A dichotomy between 'PC races' and 'monster races' based on which ones were in the Fellowship of the Ring. Obvious.

Ha. Nice. Very nice.

 

[Fifth Element]

First off, I don't think anything that originated in 3E can be called a "sacred cow". Sacred cow implies a mechanic that remains in the game from earlier editions, just because it was in earlier editions (ie, there are clearly desirable alternatives).

Armour adding to AC, rather than giving DR? That can be called a sacred cow. Confirming crits cannot, since there were no official crits before 3E. Call it a mechanic you'd like to see changed, sure, but sacred cow it is not. Not yet, anyway. If it's still around in 5E, you can start calling it that.

I don't really have an issue with armour adding to AC, since the whole thing's an abstraction...until you get to effects that ignore armour, I guess. I wouldn't be sad to see that cow pass away, certainly.

Random-rolled hit points absolutely need to go.

Random-rolled attributes as well, though to illustrate how personal experiences differ, I don't know anyone who still uses them anyway. Everyone I know uses point-buy. And yes, just use the modifiers.

I'm tempted to say Vancian magic, with its thousands of individual spells. But I'm not sure about it.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

Eventually, that being the point.

Weird...and I thought making a new edition of a game means trying to keep the game as intact as possible while polishing up some of the rough spots, not simply turning it into a totally different game. Why not simply have a big poll among all D&D players which game system they actually like most, buy that with a huge chunk of cash, and slap the D&D logo on, then, since the brand name seems to be the most important thing? And WotC should have cash enough, if they can successfully sell that idea to Hasbro.