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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Neonchameleon" data-source="post: 8305575" data-attributes="member: 87792">So the difference isn't that the fighter is using a weapon and has to bring everyone in reach. And it isn't that the wizard is burning people from a distance. It's entirely separately, outside the game world, which person picks up the dice.That depends on interactions. You'd only feel like you were playing the exact same character if the designer of the game was completely boring and didn't have secondary effects to any of their spells.;Meanwhile if the fire mage routinely set people on fire while the ice mage chilled them, slowed them down, and made the ground slippery with ice then yes you'd feel that they were different characters.If I look at the 4e PHB there are both fire and ice spells.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Cantrips: Scorching burst burns an area, just doing damage, while Ray of Frost chills a target and mechanically slows them</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Encounter 1: Burning Hands burns a large area, while Icy Terrain covers a smaller area, knocking people down and making it difficult terrain briefly</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Daily 1: Flaming Sphere moves around and burns people, just doing damage while Freezing Cloud stays around, hurting people (this, unusually, could actually be reflavoured to a flaming cloud).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Encounter 3: Fire Shroud burns people in a wide area and literally sets them on fire with ongoing fire damage, while Icy Rays freezes people and immobilizes them</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Daily 5: Fireball, as ever, just does damage to people while Bigby's Icy Grasp is a literal conjured hand made of ice that grabs people</li> </ul>I think we can stop there. Lots of fire spells and lots of ice spells in the PHB - and the ice ones are not interchangeable with the fire ones.So in 4e ice and fire spells are not simply "the same 10 templates of powers but change the damage type and it would make a visual change". Meanwhile if we look at the pitiful number of ice-themed spells in the 3.5 PHB we find Ray of Frost (just does damage), Cone of Cold (just does damage), Freezing Sphere (just does damage unless it hits a lake - and for some reason is nothing to do with flaming sphere), Polar Ray (just does damage), Wall of Ice (OK, so this is a decent one), and Ice Storm (does damage, but also turns the ground into terrain that you move through at half speed). Oh and sleet storm which does no damage, but does have a nice obscuring and tripping effect.So I do see why if you were used to something as bland as 3.5 where "who rolls the dice" is a meaningful difference because there aren't many actual things that emphasise the damage type, and if you didn't bother to actually see what 4e was doing you might think that it had followed in the footsteps of blander previous editions where you really could just replace the word "fire" with the word "ice" and they'd be pretty much interchangeable. 5e has at least kept some of the 4e flavour where ray of frost slows people as well as damaging them and immolation sets them on fire.This is one of the many reasons why I find 3.5 and 5e spellcasting alike to be much blander than 4e. You care about who rolls the dice. I care about what the actions actually do - and fighters don't set people on fire with their swords or turn the ground to ice with them.I'm not sure what this is a reference to. Because (without a utility power) it's not a 4e reference that can be made both with knowledge and in good faith.So what you're saying is that non-4e fighters suck because that's all they do? 4e fighters have many more ways of hurting people - most of which work that way.Indeed. A lie can travel round the world before the truth can get its boots on. And the distortions you are making about 4e are old ones. What you described as 4e is very much not 4e.</blockquote>

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