ZSutherland
First Post
These are some extrapolations from my early experience with SWSE, and hunches I'm making about things we'll see in 4E given the comments that SWSE is a sort of preview of 4E.
1) Protection against bad DMs - I think it was Mearls who originally remarked on this concept, but 3E at times seemed overly structured to protect players from bad DMs. Now, I'm all for advice and guidelines to help turn bad DMs into better DMs and mediocre to good DMs into great DMs. However, things like the wealth-by-level rules and all the assumptions that came with it, CR/EL being based on a 4 PC party with all 4 major roles covered, and the stark disparity between skills that you trained and those that you didn't seemed to really get in the way at times. In my ~8 hours of running a SWSE game for 3 players, this is much less problematic. It's a lot harder to accidentally kill a PC, even at 1st level, than in 3E because Force Points are a limited but relatively plentiful resource to salvage such a situation. This doesn't translate to boring/unchallenging combat, it just gives me and my players room to experiment, to stretch and try things out. Our last session ended with the players (still 1st level) being ambushed in a docking bay by 6 attackers with blaster rifles. While the NPC pilot, co-pilot, and the party's cowardly astromech droid high-tailed it aboard the ship to get it prepped, the PCs had an exciting and tense battle with the riflemen. Second-winds were taken, force points were spent, cover was put to good use, and smart tactical decisions were made by both players and NPCs. While the encounter was, technically, only EL2, that many combatants is something I've always been hesitant to attempt w/ 1st level characters in D&D, because 1 PC is so likely to die, and a TPK isn't hard to imagine. Here, I just shrugged my shoulders, assumed that they'd use Force Points to save their bacon if there was a bad roll, and unloaded on them. It was great!
2) Combat takes just as long, but each players turn is much shorter. I'm sure that this is partially because they're still low-level, but the Saga writers have done a great job of providing even low-level characters with useful choices to be made in combat each round. They're simple, though. Should I auto-fire that group over there, to do a little damage to several enemies or target a specific one and hope to take him down? Where's the most advantageous spot on the board I can get to for purposes of cover? Should I charge that guy with my lightsaber, or use Move Object to take away his cover so the Soldier can put him away? This keeps the rounds short, but the focus on multiple opponent encounters means that rounds are shorter, but there are more of them, so combat has a good heroic feeling without feeling dragged out and clunky. I secretly believe that this has a lot to do with the very specific 1 standard, 1 move, 1 swift action (and the large number of actions that used to be free that are now swift) and the removal of the 5 foot step.
3) Leveling up is easy. My PCs finally leveled to 2 at the end of our last session, and even though we only had one book, it took all of about 20 minutes for everyone to level up.
4) Assuming that the Saga skill system is adopted for 4E, the Skill Focus Feat will have to change. The Wiz-Os on the WotC forums suggested the other day, that a good house-rule, for people who thought an additional +5 at first level was too much, would be to change the feat to "Your level based bonus in this skill is equal to your level, instead of the normal 1/2 level." I'd be willing to wager that's exactly how it works in 4E.
5) Making NPCs is quick and easy. With no skill ranks, making even higher level characters never takes more than 15-20 minutes, and most of that time is deciding what feats and talents are appropriate, not clunky math.
Anyone notice anything about SWSE that they think is likely to show up in 4E and positively affect how the game is played?
1) Protection against bad DMs - I think it was Mearls who originally remarked on this concept, but 3E at times seemed overly structured to protect players from bad DMs. Now, I'm all for advice and guidelines to help turn bad DMs into better DMs and mediocre to good DMs into great DMs. However, things like the wealth-by-level rules and all the assumptions that came with it, CR/EL being based on a 4 PC party with all 4 major roles covered, and the stark disparity between skills that you trained and those that you didn't seemed to really get in the way at times. In my ~8 hours of running a SWSE game for 3 players, this is much less problematic. It's a lot harder to accidentally kill a PC, even at 1st level, than in 3E because Force Points are a limited but relatively plentiful resource to salvage such a situation. This doesn't translate to boring/unchallenging combat, it just gives me and my players room to experiment, to stretch and try things out. Our last session ended with the players (still 1st level) being ambushed in a docking bay by 6 attackers with blaster rifles. While the NPC pilot, co-pilot, and the party's cowardly astromech droid high-tailed it aboard the ship to get it prepped, the PCs had an exciting and tense battle with the riflemen. Second-winds were taken, force points were spent, cover was put to good use, and smart tactical decisions were made by both players and NPCs. While the encounter was, technically, only EL2, that many combatants is something I've always been hesitant to attempt w/ 1st level characters in D&D, because 1 PC is so likely to die, and a TPK isn't hard to imagine. Here, I just shrugged my shoulders, assumed that they'd use Force Points to save their bacon if there was a bad roll, and unloaded on them. It was great!
2) Combat takes just as long, but each players turn is much shorter. I'm sure that this is partially because they're still low-level, but the Saga writers have done a great job of providing even low-level characters with useful choices to be made in combat each round. They're simple, though. Should I auto-fire that group over there, to do a little damage to several enemies or target a specific one and hope to take him down? Where's the most advantageous spot on the board I can get to for purposes of cover? Should I charge that guy with my lightsaber, or use Move Object to take away his cover so the Soldier can put him away? This keeps the rounds short, but the focus on multiple opponent encounters means that rounds are shorter, but there are more of them, so combat has a good heroic feeling without feeling dragged out and clunky. I secretly believe that this has a lot to do with the very specific 1 standard, 1 move, 1 swift action (and the large number of actions that used to be free that are now swift) and the removal of the 5 foot step.
3) Leveling up is easy. My PCs finally leveled to 2 at the end of our last session, and even though we only had one book, it took all of about 20 minutes for everyone to level up.
4) Assuming that the Saga skill system is adopted for 4E, the Skill Focus Feat will have to change. The Wiz-Os on the WotC forums suggested the other day, that a good house-rule, for people who thought an additional +5 at first level was too much, would be to change the feat to "Your level based bonus in this skill is equal to your level, instead of the normal 1/2 level." I'd be willing to wager that's exactly how it works in 4E.
5) Making NPCs is quick and easy. With no skill ranks, making even higher level characters never takes more than 15-20 minutes, and most of that time is deciding what feats and talents are appropriate, not clunky math.
Anyone notice anything about SWSE that they think is likely to show up in 4E and positively affect how the game is played?
