Something 3E and 4E lost (that 2E had)

[Mercurius]

In a recent binge phase in which I've been going back and purchasing old books I used to own, I just got a copy of the 2E DMG in the mail a few days ago, the earlier one with the awful blue-and-black theme (shivers in horror). While browsing through it I was struck by how familiar it all seemed even though I hadn't looked at this book for ten or more years (I think I sold my 2E books when 3E came out, or even before).

Then I came to page 22, or rather the gloriousness that is page 22 and 23: Character class creation guidelines. And I felt a sense of loss, realizing that something is missing with later editions of D&D.

Don't get me wrong: I liked 3E a helluva lot more than 2E; and I like 4E more than 3E. I am seemingly one of the few, or at least within the minority, of serious fans that believe that D&D has gotten better with each edition, that AD&D was better than OD&D, that 3E was better than 2E, and that 4E is the best edition so far. Yes, it is "best for me" but I also think it is the best in terms of RPGs as an aesthetic form. So shoot me.

But something has been lost, and it could be called encouraged customization. Sure, there are options for customization in 4E, and DM's Fiat applies no matter what edition that you play--and 4E certainly encourages it. But there are no character class creation rules, no race creation rules, no options in Character Builder for porting in custom-made classes or races or feats.

This bothers me. To me this is where D&D is veering dangerously close to video games. One of the main differences between computer games and RPGs is that the former are programmed; they are finite--you can only go where a pre-determined program allows you to go. 1s and 0s. But with RPGs there is no limit, or rather the limit is the imagination of the people playing it. And that, my friends, makes all the difference in the world.

Certainly in 4E there is still no limit to where the imagination can go. I am one who believes that "fluff" trumps "crunch." I also think that the supposed lack of non-combat oriented rules actually frees non-combat situations to be what they should be: role-playing, not roll-playing (not counting skill challenges, of course ). But the rules of 4E, and the platform fo D&D Insider, leave little to no opening for customization. Sure, I can make whatever races or classes that I want. But why not provide guidelines for them? Why not give me pointers on how to make a race that is balanced with the others? A class that isn't too powerful or too weak?

Customizing monsters -- great. Encounter design -- very helpful. 4E is terrific at making a DM's job easier with the nitty gritty stuff. But there is still little to no guidance on how to get below the surface of the rules, on how to not only build structures with blocks but how to make building blocks, with interesting and unique shapes.

In other words, what is lackingi s a DM's toolkit--not only for adventure and campaign design, but for game design. In many ways 2E is the least "sexy" of the editions: it doesn't have the classic simplicity of OD&D; it doesn't have the Gygaxian madness of 1E; it doesn't have the depth and quality of supplementation that 3E has; and it doesn't have the sleek gameyness of 4E. It does have tons of great and often innovative (at the time) settings, though, and it does have page 22 and 23 of the DMG.

 

[The Little Raven]

Then I came to page 22, or rather the gloriousness that is page 22 and 23: Character class creation guidelines.

I remember those rules... and that's not a good thing. They basically boiled down to 'anything you make will be worse than the standard classes,' which in my mind is not encouragement to use them. Every person I knew, including myself, that made 2e classes never used those guidelines, because they were dross.

I think 4e's class transparency is far superior from a custom design perspective than 2e's weak system design coupled with even worse custom design guidelines.

I find it amusing that you lament 4e not having guidelines to help guide you in the creation of classes and races balanced with the official ones, yet praise 2e's guidelines which openly state they will not create classes and races balanced with the official ones.

Bad advice is worse than no advice.

 

[Korgoth]

But something has been lost, and it could be called encouraged customization.

Much of the essence of the 1974 OD&D lies in this: its essence is that it has no essence. By which I only mean that the barest skeleton is provided, and each Referee will judge it differently. Supplement I: Greyhawk is only the Gygax house rules; other supplements by other authors could be their house rules. The OD&D of Mercurius will be different from the OD&D of Korgoth. And that is how it should be.

According to this hermeneutic, D&D started to morph into something else with AD&D, when Gary's house rules started to become a standard, and the game was considered open to tournament play. OD&D (1974) is not amenable to tournament play... it could be played at a convention, but each Ref will have his own house rules. He must have them, because without them there is not a useable game.

 

[Mercurius]

I can agree that the 2E class creation rules weren't great, but at least they had them--that is my main point. By "gloriousness" I mean fun. 1E charts were glorious, even though they were largely primitive in their design.

My implied question, maybe a tad rhetorical, is: Why doesn't 4E have class/race/feat/power design rules?

 

[Mercurius]

Much of the essence of the 1974 OD&D lies in this: its essence is that it has no essence. By which I only mean that the barest skeleton is provided, and each Referee will judge it differently. Supplement I: Greyhawk is only the Gygax house rules; other supplements by other authors could be their house rules. The OD&D of Mercurius will be different from the OD&D of Korgoth. And that is how it should be.

According to this hermeneutic, D&D started to morph into something else with AD&D, when Gary's house rules started to become a standard, and the game was considered open to tournament play. OD&D (1974) is not amenable to tournament play... it could be played at a convention, but each Ref will have his own house rules. He must have them, because without them there is not a useable game.

Nice point. My "perfect world" D&D would have a core ideology and openness similar to OD&D, but with a simplified 4E-like rules set; there would be countless "Advanced" rules options, with guidelines for rules customizations.

This would allow tournament play to be either of the Basic (core) or Advanced variety. If there were good guidelines for rules customizations, new classes, races, feats, and powers could be ported in because they fit certain criteria. "System mastery"--the ability to optimize within the given system--would be replaced by "system creativity"--the ability to create in harmony with the core rules. D&D would become more fully participatory, a furthering of the OGL rather than a backing away from it ala the GSL.

 

[The Little Raven]

I can agree that the 2E class creation rules weren't great, but at least they had them--that is my main point.

And my main point is that it would have been better for them to not provide them, because they were so poor. Using that system to design 2e classes would give the designer some very bad habits, and as someone who has worked in several design fields in the past, I'd rather have someone who is a blank slate than one who has picked up bad habits that have to be unlearned before good ones can be learned.

My implied question, maybe a tad rhetorical, is: Why doesn't 4E have class/race/feat/power design rules?

Because design isn't a static beast. As we've seen by the evolving design of classes, powers, races and the like, it's constantly changing. Compare a Skill Challenge created by the DMG1 guidelines, then compare one that takes into account DMG2's advice plus all the articles in Dungeon by Mearls. Plus, eventually they'd suffer the 2e DMG problem... they would be guidelines that do not balance with the standard classes, because they would fall behind the design philosophy evolution.

I think the best way to provide "guidelines" is to provide a good system with solid design elements that are transparent, not providing a few pages of "rules" that will become obsolete as you gain a greater understanding of the system and new elements are released.

I remember flipping to those pages you're talking about when I was a kid and being excited... until I read them. I understood more about the system by dissecting the standard classes myself at age 11 than by using those "rules."

 

[BryonD]

But something has been lost, and it could be called encouraged customization.
...
In other words, what is lacking is a DM's toolkit--not only for adventure and campaign design, but for game design.

I'll leave 4E defense for others, but the claim that 3E, the game that founded the OGL, doesn't feature these concepts is boggling. Do you also think that Golf's main problem is a lack of holes in the ground? Do you think air would be better if it contained some nitrogen?

The very heart of D20 was: "here are the pieces, now build."

Just to be really picky, guidelines for modifying classes and creating new classes (granted, the latter is less than a column) ARE present in the 3E DMG. But that is just a drop of chocolate on the cherry on the whipped cream on the sundae awesomeness of encouraged customization that is the d20 system.

Other than that, I agree.

 

[MrMyth]

Then I came to page 22, or rather the gloriousness that is page 22 and 23: Character class creation guidelines. And I felt a sense of loss, realizing that something is missing with later editions of D&D.

While they haven't put out official rules for customizing, I've found 4E to be hands-down the easiest edition for homebrewing material, in terms of races, classes, feats and powers. Largely due to the balancing of the classes and the common elements that make the creation process relatively transparent. I'm not saying that the designers aren't needed and homebrew material will be perfect every time, but it is simply much more feasible than it used to be, at least in my experience.

 

[Mercurius]

I think the best way to provide "guidelines" is to provide a good system with solid design elements that are transparent, not providing a few pages of "rules" that will become obsolete as you gain a greater understanding of the system and new elements are released.

OK, I can buy that if there was a way to port new classes and such into Insider, particularly Character Builder. I can agree with your points as valid refutations of the surface of what I'm saying, but there is an underlying subtlety that you're not getting at: which is that the more recent D&D systems, or 4E at least, has a kind of "fixity" to it because of the inability to port customizations into Insider tools. In other words, because D&DI is a good thing people like to use it, but using it requires that you follow the rules it provides, which don't really allow for customization.

4E has focused on making D&D easier to play, on conveniences such as the tools provided by Insider, the stat blocks, tactics, and Powers in general. To re-use my own analogy, it has made it much easier to build with the blocks that are provided. But it hasn't made it easier to make your own blocks, at least if you want to use the conveniences that are provided. In other words, it seems that one has to make a choice: Either you play the game they provide and get all the fun conveniences, or you make it your own but you run the risk of making fun contraptions like Character Builder useless.

I haven't seen this complaint before, at least not quite in this way. It could also be that I'm just late coming to this observation and this is what the detractors of 4E have been saying all along, or maybe I'm just missing something and not "getting it."

I'll leave 4E defense for others, but the claim that 3E, the game that founded the OGL, doesn't feature these concepts is boggling. Do you also think that Golf's main problem is a lack of holes in the ground? Do you think air would be better if it contained some nitrogen?

The very heart of D20 was: "here are the pieces, now build."

Just to be really picky, guidelines for modifying classes and creating new classes (granted, the latter is less than a column) ARE present in the 3E DMG. But that is just a drop of chocolate on the cherry on the whipped cream on the sundae awesomeness of encouraged customization that is the d20 system.

Other than that, I agree.

That's kind of funny--what, exactly, do you agree with or are you, as I suspect, being dryly sarcastic?

But you are right, of course, d20 was a great big toolkit of rules options. But not as much rules customization, or more specifically, rules creation.This relates to my analogy above: 3E gave tons of options and ideas on how to build with different pieces, but it didn't give you tools to make your own pieces. The same with 4E, but now with the fancy new box of blocks called Insider, which makes it even more alluring to keep to the rules as written.

 

[Stuntman]

But something has been lost, and it could be called encouraged customization. Sure, there are options for customization in 4E, and DM's Fiat applies no matter what edition that you play--and 4E certainly encourages it. But there are no character class creation rules, no race creation rules, no options in Character Builder for porting in custom-made classes or races or feats.

This bothers me. To me this is where D&D is veering dangerously close to video games. One of the main differences between computer games and RPGs is that the former are programmed; they are finite--you can only go where a pre-determined program allows you to go. 1s and 0s. But with RPGs there is no limit, or rather the limit is the imagination of the people playing it. And that, my friends, makes all the difference in the world.

I'm afraid you lost me here. I don't understand how the lack of class creation guidelines mean that 4E is veering dangerously close to video games.

In 2E the class creation guidelines end up allowing you to create a class that is crappy compared to anything premade. They actually say this because if you tried to build one of the existing classes, you come up with something crappier. I think they are designed this way because class creation rules can be exploited by gamers to create something really broken.

I've played (tactical war) games where you have to choose the units for your side. Each unit is given a point value that represents the strength of the unit. In some games they had unit creation rules. Of all unit creation rules I have seen, it is simply too easy for someone to create a unit that is stronger than the point value as given in the guidelines. If you think min/maxing with premade classes are bad, min/maxing class creation is much worse.

The only true way of ensuring a unit or class is balanced with another is by play testing. Even with play testing, things can still fall through the cracks. That is why you see errata come out. For a game as complex as D&D, there is no class creation guidelines that you can make that would result in balanced classes. You either have to skew the rules so that most classes are really underpowered to prevent those powerful classes from being over powered or you allow for overpowered classes. Class creation guidelines will go against one of the design goals of 4E which is to create a game as balanced as possible.

I have seen many custom made classes people have posted up in homebrew forums. They have been able to come up with something without the need for explicit guidelines. Guidelines may even be a hindrence to creativity. A major aspect of a class is in the class features. I don't know how you can create guidelines that will balance out a defender's class feature with that of a controller. Even between different classes of the same role, the class features are very diverse. Look at a ranger compared to an avenger. The mechanics and how each performs their roles are so different. I don't know how you could come up with guidelines that can encompase such diverse class features and features yet to be created.

If you want to create a new class, just start making one and then compare it with an existing class via playtest. Then adjust and repeat the test and adjust until you reached something satisfactory. I'm sure that the designers have to go through this iterative process and do not have some guideline that allow them to pick stuff and come up wtih a balanced class.