D&D 4E Star Wars Saga Edition as preview of 4e?

[Nyaricus]

I like it! I also seems like it would be a nice fit for D&D, since what you have in effect is an apprentice, journeyman, and master tier of skill competence.

Nice choice of words, haha.

 

[Plane Sailing]

That means D&D has more levels of dead than The Princess Bride

Funny!

I admit that 3e has settled on the archetypal party of fighter, mage, rogue and cleric. But IIRC, OD&D only had the fighting man, magic user, and thief. The "cleric" came along later as a hybrid between fighting man and magic user.

...snip...

The cleric was intended as a hybrid who had combat ability and lesser spellcasting talent.

Nearly right - OD&D had the fighting man, magic user and cleric (thief came in in supplement 1 - Greyhawk). The cleric was a hybrid of fighting man and magic user in a way though (back in those days clerics didn't even get their first spells until 2nd level, and you had to kill a heck of a lot of orcs to make it to 2nd level!)

Personally I agree with your premise though - I think that the division between arcane and divine magic is completely unnecessary. I much prefer systems with a single spell list and perhaps different people describe their magic as coming from different sources - so the priest chants, says the holy words and says 'my god sends divine fire from the heavens!", while the wizard chants, says the mystic words and says "I conjure fiery doom by unlocking the arcane wards!".

True20 is a nice example of distinguishing between Warrior, Expert and Adept, probably bringing it down to the most basic level of distinction possible in a class-based system.

FWIW I think that the most sacred of cows that make something "D&D" are class/level/xps. You could change everything else (even -gasp- hit points!) and still be recognisably D&D as long as you have classes, levels and xps.

Cheers

 

[iwatt]

Additionally, using 1.5m isn't hard. And we metric editions (like the German D&D) use it all the time. It's not hard at all, believe me.

Hey, I'm metric too. At least the french got one thing right...

I was just bringing up the fact that the RCR use of 2m squares always bothered me, since 1,5 m isn't really that hard to use.

 

[GreatLemur]

The flip side of all this is the time it takes the DM to "thoroughly" stat out a higher level NPC. Lots of posters here have advocated "faking it" by just generating what is needed at the moment then filling in later. One reasone "faking it" is often needed is playing around with all the skill points. A skill system like Star Wars Saga Edition (SWSE) allows higher level characters to be generated without fudging or having to spend inordinate time parsing skill ranks (and then synergies, race bonuses, etc.). I think it's desirable to give the GM a "time break" on character generation.

So to dovetail your post, GreatLemur, I think easier character generation regarding skills is a net positive for all parties involved.

This is a good point. Every argument about how much of a hassle character creation can be for players is multiplied immensely for DMs.

 

[Stalker0]

This is a good point. Every argument about how much of a hassle character creation can be for players is multiplied immensely for DMs.

Agreed. While most people's natural take is to look at a system from a player's standpoint, us dm's need love too

 

[Felon]

Because I disagree with you I'm just in a contrary frame of mind?

I qualified my assessment, and it wasn't simply because you disagreed with me. You had been expending a lot of energy on being dismissive of other folks' points of view, not just mine.

And I just did tell you about "these games where characters are just constantly getting takebacks"--it's a very common feature of Blood Bowl. Each team gets a certain amount of rerolls each half of the game, and there are a number of skills (although they're more like feats in d20) that allow individual characters to reroll all kinds of actions.

So in BBowl, the rerolls are a limited resource that get depleted. It's not a matter of "don't worry about this roll, because I always get rerolls on all checks of this type"?

In any case, you called it a takeback, not me. That's not how it works at all in Blood Bowl, and I'd wager not in Star Wars Saga either; if you wiff a dice roll, you can utilize the feat to roll it again, taking the second roll even if it's worse than the first is typically how it works. You don't get to change your mind and not to the action at all, though.

True, I meant "takeback" in a facetious sense. From a statistical perspective, rerolling provides a pretty substantial increase in one's chance of success. I don't think everyone is appreciating that at the moment. If you're even moderately competent at what you're attempting, your chances rise dramatically with a reroll.

And with numerical bonuses cast to the wayside altogether, we may very well be looking at multiple rerolls, becasue there's only so much you can do at increasing the chance of rolling high without getting additive.

 

[Desdichado]

So in BBowl, the rerolls are a limited resource that get depleted. It's not a matter of "don't worry about this roll, because I always get rerolls on all checks of this type"?

Yes and no. The "team rerolls" are limited; you get as many as you can afford each half. A starting team with more than 2-3 per half are very rare.

However, the rerolls that come from skills--say if you have the Pass skill you can reroll a throw attempt--you can use every turn if you want. The only caveat is that you can only re-roll an action one time, so if you, say, roll a 1 on your Pass attempt with your thrower, use his Pass skill to roll again and get another 1, then you can't spend a team reroll to attempt it yet again.

From a statistical perspective, rerolling provides a pretty substantial increase in one's chance of success. I don't think everyone is appreciating that at the moment. If you're even moderately competent at what you're attempting, your chances rise dramatically with a reroll.

Maybe not, but then again, we don't have much (any, really) detail on how this is supposed to work. I think the time to worry about whether or not it will work is still ahead of us when we've got more information. It certainly works well in Blood Bowl.

And with numerical bonuses cast to the wayside altogether, we may very well be looking at multiple rerolls, becasue there's only so much you can do at increasing the chance of rolling high without getting additive.

Maybe, but that's completely speculative.

 

[iwatt]

And with numerical bonuses cast to the wayside altogether, we may very well be looking at multiple rerolls, becasue there's only so much you can do at increasing the chance of rolling high without getting additive.

I doubt it's only going to be rerolls. I could see things like reduced DCs, always take 10, and probably a lot more that I just can't imagine. Without evidence, you're assuming that it will simply be rerolling all the time.

 

[nerfherder]

I doubt it's only going to be rerolls. I could see things like reduced DCs, always take 10, and probably a lot more that I just can't imagine. Without evidence, you're assuming that it will simply be rerolling all the time.

Here's what Preview #2 says: "Likewise, the scout class has a talent that allows scouts to reroll their Initiative check (yes, Initiative is now a skill) and take the result of the second roll. Other abilities might allow you to take 10 under pressure, or use one skill's modifier in the check for another skill"

I haven't seen anyone speculate about the third option given there.

 

[Felon]

I doubt it's only going to be rerolls. I could see things like reduced DCs, always take 10, and probably a lot more that I just can't imagine.

Reducing a check's DC is, for all meaningful purposes, the same thing as adding a bonus to the check. It's subtracting a number instead of adding a number. Actually, it's a little worse since the reduced DC is a separate thing to make a note of on your character sheet, rather than something you figure directly into your total modifier.

Letting folks take 10 has a big drawback: it's a one-time deal, so if you have two abilities like that, they don't synergize at all. Oh sure, we could make some rule that multiple "take 10" abilities have a cumulative effect, like letting you "take 12", but once you start getting into cumulative benefits, guess what we're back to doing now? I'll give you a hint: I've been told it's bad and boring and to be avoided at all costs.

Without evidence, you're assuming that it will simply be rerolling all the time.

Maybe, but that's completely speculative.

Look guys, our choices here seem to be: A) play the "I just can't imagine" card, or B) combine the info at hand with the power of reason and realize that it is possible to make educated guesses. I'm going with the latter, heedless of any scandalous accusations of "assuming" or "speculating". In fact I'll provide a simple exercise in the power of reason right now:

It ultimately doesn't matter whether or not you replace numerical bonuses with other benefits. Factoring in that you take 10, and then factoring in that you can go ahead and roll and then reroll if you don't like what you get, and then factoring in whatever other abilities you have, and so on...folks, this ain't really speeding things up. At the end of the day, as long as we have a pile of things that modify a character's ability to resolve a check, then we'll still have a bloated process for check resolution. You actually have to pare away the number of benefits you get, not just paint a smiley face on them to make them look more cuddly and no-brainerish.

I don't think may folks complain about Improved Initiative adding a numerical bonus to a character's initiative modifier. That's probably because there's currently so little that factors into it. See my point?