Speculation about "the feelz" of D&D 4th Edition

[Garthanos]

Has anyone mentioned that because of the Open Gaming license 4E represented more change than it might have strictly needed in an intentional need to divorce itself from the past?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Has anyone mentioned that because of the Open Gaming license 4E represented more change than it might have strictly needed in an intentional need to divorce itself from the past?

Well, that's been a hypothesis, that WotC wanted to make it distinctive enough that a 4e clone or non-GSL 4e supporting product would run afoul of copyright, or at least fall into a grey area they can enforce. Its hard to say because nobody seems to have ever run into that issue. There are quite a few things that have no GSL on them that work with 4e, and WotC has generally only objected when it was software that leveraged DDI data, and that would likely never have been subsumed in any hypothetical 4e OGL anyway.

I personally doubt they were driven by that logic in any significant way. It certainly doesn't apply to any setting or background material because none of that is covered by OGL anyway, and that's where a lot of the changes that seem fairly arbitrary from a "make a better D&D" standpoint are anyway. In other words, they didn't invent the World Axis to replace the Great Wheel, because the Great Wheel isn't GSL anyway, its product identity (aside from possibly some generic locations that could be construed to be drawn from actual mythology like perhaps the City of Brass, some elements of Hell/Baator, etc). The rest of 4e seems pretty self-coherent, and in any case has plenty of stuff in it that would scare away cloners in all likelihood anyway (like power names, block formats, etc).

 

[Garthanos]

Well, that's been a hypothesis, that WotC wanted to make it distinctive enough that a 4e clone or non-GSL 4e supporting product would run afoul of copyright, or at least fall into a grey area they can enforce. Its hard to say because nobody seems to have ever run into that issue.

Hard to be certain what choices they "might" not have been willing to make if they didnt have to disconnect with the previous version. It is kind of a neither here nor there question I suppose. Another way of seeing it is that the business decision freed them to do the coherent and dramatic design differences.

 

[MwaO]

Well, that's been a hypothesis, that WotC wanted to make it distinctive enough that a 4e clone or non-GSL 4e supporting product would run afoul of copyright, or at least fall into a grey area they can enforce. Its hard to say because nobody seems to have ever run into that issue.

That in itself says something. There are no clones in part because it is a grey area.

 

[Igwilly]

Well, I’m no lawyer but, as far as I know, you could “clone” 4e; but, in order to do that, you actually need to create your own system that looks like 4e. It’s a great amount of work just for a clone, especially when the original wasn’t received with golden crowns by its fanbase, so to speak.
All people who would work in such a game would pile huge amounts of changes just to reflect their personal preferences – I speak from personal experience. And every 4e fan has his/her own ideas about what to change.
Plus, even if it is completely legal to do what I said, WotC would sue him/her, and this would cost much more money just to defend himself/herself, even if the defendant is right!
It’s too much risk and work for something which wouldn’t be that worthy – this seems to be the designers’ opinion.

 

[MwaO]

Right. If I were going to clone 4e, I'd make a bare-boned system that made it extremely easy to slot 4e options into it because it would be freaking obvious that the options were of the right power level.

As an example, the power generation system might give a 1W(or I)+stat+minor option as at-wills. Then a 2w+stat+minor option as a level 1 encounter power with an option of trading a W in for a medium option. Then level 3 would be a 2w+stat+medium option with an option to make it a 3W+stat+minor option or a 1w+stat+major option. An Arcane controller might get the option to turn a specific power into a area burst 1 or a close blast 3 where a Divine controller might get to multi target 2 opponents or close burst 2. A Martial Leader might get to move allies around or grant a benefit. A Defender might get to toss in some sort of control effect to prevent movement(such as say slow)

I'd need to work out the exact math. But it wouldn't be too hard to get approximately the right level of options.

Etc...

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Well, I’m no lawyer but, as far as I know, you could “clone” 4e; but, in order to do that, you actually need to create your own system that looks like 4e. It’s a great amount of work just for a clone, especially when the original wasn’t received with golden crowns by its fanbase, so to speak.
All people who would work in such a game would pile huge amounts of changes just to reflect their personal preferences – I speak from personal experience. And every 4e fan has his/her own ideas about what to change.
Plus, even if it is completely legal to do what I said, WotC would sue him/her, and this would cost much more money just to defend himself/herself, even if the defendant is right!
It’s too much risk and work for something which wouldn’t be that worthy – this seems to be the designers’ opinion.

Its hard to see why WotC would sue. Its hard to say that they would lose if someone actually took it to court either, it depends on the specifics and there are a number of complex points.

However, I don't really think WotC WOULD sue you. Not unless you really seriously wholesale copied from 4e in a big way, so that your game really wasn't at all distinct.

For instance I wrote my own game. It is quite '4e-like'. There are similarities at many levels, and I have called it a '4e hack' informally. Its still a distinct game, with distinct features of play and its own design goals. While it does things like grant characters 'powers', which conform to standardized block formats and are granted in ways roughly similar to what happens in 4e none of them duplicate 4e powers in name, exact format, etc. Likewise there is a monster stat block format, analogous to ones used in 4e, though the stats are somewhat different and the layout is different. The point is, its a game that 4e fans would probably say is "close to 4e, spiritually and mechanically", but it is also a distinct game. I don't really see any reason why WotC would care about it. Maybe if it proved to be a great commercial success they might care more, but I seriously doubt it, 5e seems to be all they had hoped for. It behooves them little to make a rep as jack booted IP enforcers in an industry where everyone is cribbing off each other a whole lot already.

Truthfully, I just don't see a huge business case for a 4e 'clone'. Even if it was modestly popular its a very material-intensive system that requires a LOT of development, and is unlikely to be more than modestly popular (like all 3PP games, maybe PF excepted, have been in the last 20 years). If I was going to write a game to make money, I'd aim at a much lighter-weight system, one that could be produced as a single book of modest size and aimed at covering some niche subject matter that happened to be current. Print a couple 1000 copies, sell as many PDFs as you can, do it all through kickstarter, and be done with it. You won't make loads of money, but its a fairly conservative and viable strategy if game design is your thing.

Paizo managed to pull off cloning 3.5 under very specific circumstances. That is VERY unlikely to be a generally successful strategy. I doubt we will see such a thing again any time soon.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Right. If I were going to clone 4e, I'd make a bare-boned system that made it extremely easy to slot 4e options into it because it would be freaking obvious that the options were of the right power level.

As an example, the power generation system might give a 1W(or I)+stat+minor option as at-wills. Then a 2w+stat+minor option as a level 1 encounter power with an option of trading a W in for a medium option. Then level 3 would be a 2w+stat+medium option with an option to make it a 3W+stat+minor option or a 1w+stat+major option. An Arcane controller might get the option to turn a specific power into a area burst 1 or a close blast 3 where a Divine controller might get to multi target 2 opponents or close burst 2. A Martial Leader might get to move allies around or grant a benefit. A Defender might get to toss in some sort of control effect to prevent movement(such as say slow)

I'd need to work out the exact math. But it wouldn't be too hard to get approximately the right level of options.

Etc...

I think you can kinda do this, but my experience with point systems is that there's ALWAYS loopholes. Any such system you can construct, I'll produce a power with it that will synergize with some class feature or simply sit at some corner of your math where it will create issues.

I just remember playing the old Champions game, was that it? The one where you could do stuff like invest your power into an item and it would be cheaper, etc. The guy running it was just crazy sure his tweaks to that thing would make every character work out to a decent power level. I seem to recall breaking it 2 ways. I made "the wizard" that was basically a D&D vancian caster with some items, he was stupid powerful as the various limitations made his 'spells' dirt cheap, but yet they were quite powerful in totality. The other one was Mold Man, who had tons of disabilities but which were all gameable. Of course any given system might not have THOSE specific pitfalls, but it WILL have some.

 

[MwaO]

I think you can kinda do this, but my experience with point systems is that there's ALWAYS loopholes. Any such system you can construct, I'll produce a power with it that will synergize with some class feature or simply sit at some corner of your math where it will create issues.

There might be a loophole, but any such loophole will be strictly worse than simply taking any of the sky blue 4e powers.

As an example, a ranged power that might result from level 3 encounter is a 1w/i+stat+Dazed on a hit. The Divine Controller could make it target 2 opponents. The Arcane Controller could make close blast 3. A Martial Striker could add their extra damage onto it or use it in melee.

This kind of ignores that Thunder of Judgment, Color Spray, or Dazing Strike are strictly better than it. If you're a Divine Controller, you just take Thunder of Judgment and cackle about how you've got 3 targets+push...

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

There might be a loophole, but any such loophole will be strictly worse than simply taking any of the sky blue 4e powers.

As an example, a ranged power that might result from level 3 encounter is a 1w/i+stat+Dazed on a hit. The Divine Controller could make it target 2 opponents. The Arcane Controller could make close blast 3. A Martial Striker could add their extra damage onto it or use it in melee.

This kind of ignores that Thunder of Judgment, Color Spray, or Dazing Strike are strictly better than it. If you're a Divine Controller, you just take Thunder of Judgment and cackle about how you've got 3 targets+push...

Maybe I'm not entirely grasping your overall methodology here. What happens if I buy your game? How would I have 'Thunder of Judgment' (since you obviously can't print it in your game as its a 4e power, and the point was to avoid duplication). Obviously I could treat your material as strictly a SUPPLEMENT to 4e, but doesn't that kind of miss the point? Granted, I could probably just play your stuff, and live with "some specific permutations are best", but I think that was what convinced WotC not to go down that path, its just simpler to name the best permutations you can find and call those the powers in your game! In a point based system the players are just tasked with doing that for themselves (which they might enjoy, I don't know that it is inherently bad).

Also, its possible that some point value calculations will be SO off that they exceed even sky blue.