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*Dungeons & Dragons
Telling a story with 4th Edition
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<blockquote data-quote="brehobit" data-source="post: 4570317" data-attributes="member: 12032"><p>Well...</p><p></p><p>It's a bit weird in that the characters gain very little in the way of non-combat abilities outside of rituals. I'm a world builder, so I think of world design and story design as being closely intertwined. Keep that bias in mind.</p><p></p><p>Things you need to think about:</p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> The use of magic circles to travel is important and should be accounted for in the world and in the story.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> A weird money system. That the money per level is exponential (literally) makes things, well, weird. That one sword, which doesn't actually do much (say +6 sword) could be worth more than enough magic items to feed 100,000 people forever is just weird. Who's paying this much for stuff? I'm not saying previous editions didn't have that problem, but it's there and you need to deal with it. An obvious option is to "change the setting" at each tier. Go from "Small Valley" (say RHoD setting) to "Big City" (Greyhawk or the like) to "plane-spanning". But the story will _need_ that. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> I personally find the 4e encounter system a bit limiting to the story. Large battles end up needing to have minions. Small fights need elites and solos. And combining two "scheduled" fights into one is just instant death. Story needs to account for all this. (Others don't seem to have the same problem, so it might just be me).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> There is no "1st level scrub" state for the PCs. Some plots really require this (my main world/plot line I like to run starts the PCs off as pretty much "off the farm". 4e just doesn't allow that.) Stories need to _start_ more epic. </li> </ul><p></p><p>Other than that last point (which kills certain plot lines), I think 4e is actually easier to write for than 3e. 1e was probably the easiest and 2e only slightly harder. This was mainly because no one really expected to break level 7-9 for the most part and so the "epic" issues (teliport, etc.) rarely came up. In 3e the epic stuff hit early in (say session 15 or so), and in 4e it hits early too but is much more limited.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="brehobit, post: 4570317, member: 12032"] Well... It's a bit weird in that the characters gain very little in the way of non-combat abilities outside of rituals. I'm a world builder, so I think of world design and story design as being closely intertwined. Keep that bias in mind. Things you need to think about: [LIST] [*] The use of magic circles to travel is important and should be accounted for in the world and in the story. [*] A weird money system. That the money per level is exponential (literally) makes things, well, weird. That one sword, which doesn't actually do much (say +6 sword) could be worth more than enough magic items to feed 100,000 people forever is just weird. Who's paying this much for stuff? I'm not saying previous editions didn't have that problem, but it's there and you need to deal with it. An obvious option is to "change the setting" at each tier. Go from "Small Valley" (say RHoD setting) to "Big City" (Greyhawk or the like) to "plane-spanning". But the story will _need_ that. [*] I personally find the 4e encounter system a bit limiting to the story. Large battles end up needing to have minions. Small fights need elites and solos. And combining two "scheduled" fights into one is just instant death. Story needs to account for all this. (Others don't seem to have the same problem, so it might just be me). [*] There is no "1st level scrub" state for the PCs. Some plots really require this (my main world/plot line I like to run starts the PCs off as pretty much "off the farm". 4e just doesn't allow that.) Stories need to _start_ more epic. [/LIST] Other than that last point (which kills certain plot lines), I think 4e is actually easier to write for than 3e. 1e was probably the easiest and 2e only slightly harder. This was mainly because no one really expected to break level 7-9 for the most part and so the "epic" issues (teliport, etc.) rarely came up. In 3e the epic stuff hit early in (say session 15 or so), and in 4e it hits early too but is much more limited. [/QUOTE]
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