D&D 4E The Best Thing from 4E

[Imaro]

You seem to be antagonistically conversing with 4e players about 5e, here. Did the 5e forums suddenly slow down?

My bad there was so much discussion about 5e going on in this thread I thought it was a 5e thread...

Any more questions?

 

[Tony Vargas]

No further questions. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

 

[Imaro]

No further questions. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

I'm sorry if I gave you the impression I was leaving but I'm in the middle of a discussion right now...

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Well IMO playing a musical instrument is doing something... it's the how and is just as important if not moreso than the intended result...

Its no different than the combat system, which weapon you swing is simply a detail, the weapon is the vehicle and the attack and its results are the important thing. You don't use a separate skill to attack with each weapon. At most you get a small bonus to attacks with specific weapons you are especially adept with. This is no different.

Now addressing your examples, If you're trying to influence someone but you're not a trained Diplomat (which encompasses a wide range of talents) but you can play extraordinary music that moves them, why would you roll Diplomacy? Why would a musician or even someone who plays as a hobby have to be a diplomat in order to influence someone through music... that makes no sense.

Why wouldn't you roll Diplomacy. CHA is the stat that deals with relating to other people, and this is a form of relationship to others, there's no better thing than a CHA check, and (at least in 4e) any CHA based skill is a CHA check, potentially with some modifiers. This fits with the concept that a limited skill list is a set of MOs, the character's approach to doing things, not a list of very specific knowledge.

Next your example goes even wider to Cha if I am trying to inspire them through music... so now instead of a musician I must also be naturally gifted in all ways of interacting with someone as well as naturally charming or commanding... why? There are plenty of examples of musicians with songs that move people who aren't necessarily any of those things. Then were back at Intimidate for trying to scare someone with a song... Again this is about how well I play an instrument not how threatening, hostile, etc. I personally am... or are the scariest songs always written by the scariest people?

Again, these make perfectly good sense, this is what you are accomplishing. The system is about supporting characterization. Still, who better to convey threat than someone adept at making threats? It all makes perfectly good sense. I guess you could turn them all into Insight checks if you are really determined, but Charisma really IS about connecting to people. That's what it is for. Does it REALLY matter what instrument you play or how well you play it? Is there really any doubt that a proficient player will play proficiently? Its not like this is a test of whether you're good at playing or not, your character can be as good as you wish to be, it is a matter of if you are EFFECTIVE.

Now swinging back to 4e... IMO it's not a feature that my character can't just be a musician by knowing an instrument or two but instead must be a master at Diplomacy, Intimidate as well as adept in Charisma to play anything inspiring, or that invokes emotions in others... YMMV of course and apparently it does. I also don't see how writing down "fiddler as a background in 4e is any different than 5e since in neither system is that an actual background with any type of mechanical backing to it...

Yes, to be successful you have to have good Charisma. Is that really not logical? What other characteristic of your character would be tied to success in a social endeavor?

4e allows you to construct 5 background elements from different categories for your character. Its an open-ended list, you can add anything you want, and the official background elements include plenty that reasonably allow for playing an instrument (including things like profession: musician). I'm not as familiar with the 5e backgrounds, but surely some of them now grant 'tool proficiency: instrument' do they not? How else do you get that?

I disagree... Intelligence measures mental acuity, accuracy of recall and the ability to reason... Only one of those is covered by the Investigate skill... ability to reason so I don't see how an overall increase in say memorization maps to Investigate but this would apply to an increase in overall Intelligence...

I don't think you can isolate specific mental skills and say only certain ones are good for doing something. Sherlock Holmes IIRC seems to have a very good memory, accuracy of recall, reasoning, and etc. In fact realistically the most critical factor in ALL these things seems to be short-term working memory, which arguably is the lynchpin of high intelligence. In any case a better memory would certainly make you a better investigator, IMHO.

My point was that it's not as crystal clear as you seem to be claiming...

I claimed that 5e's skill system was muddled in parts, you came back with 4e's system was too and gave this example. I referenced the compendium for all of 10 seconds and found a definitive answer. No, it isn't AT ALL UNCLEAR in 4e, you get a +2 bonus for using thieves tools, period, end of report.

What exactly would a "locks" or "traps" proficiency do that another proficiency or the tools don't cover?... I think the most important reasoning for the the tools proficiencies in 5e is because they make it clear that tools are necessary to perform the actions covered by them... I'm not a fan of the Fonzy school of picking locks.

There can't be any knowledge or understanding about locks and such things? Talk to a locksmith sometime. Sure they know how to open locks, and its a fairly significant part of their skill set, but it is FAR from all there is to the subject.

I thought you said you could produce actual quotes??

Dungeoneering...RC P.143

The dungeoneering skill represents knowledge and skills related to dungeon exploration, including finding one's way through underground complexes, navigating winding caverns, recognizing subterranean hazards, and foraging for food in the Underdark.
Training in this skill also represents formalized study or extensive experience . Those that have training in the skill can also identify creatures of the Far Realm...

There is nothing in this skill description about psionics... and this is from the RC, which was supposed to be an updated rules reference produced after PHB 3...

We're talking about what skill clearly is associated with what. 4e associates psionics with the Far Realm (and thus with monsters having the Aberration keyword), which is a clear part of the system and makes Dungeoneering the go-to skill for this kind of thing. Its pretty clear, even if its not relegated to one specific sentence somewhere in the rules, ask ANY 4e person on this thread, they'll all tell you the same thing. That didn't happen by accident.

But the whole point of your argument was that these skills and what they covered were precisely spelled out...

Please provide a quote because I am looking at the write p for the religion skill and it doesn't mention the Shadowfell or shadow magic at all...

Rules Compendium page 130. And I'm sorry, 'shadow' falls under Arcana, although the related topic of 'undead' falls under Religion.

"The Religion skill encompasses knowledge about gods, sacred writings, religious ceremonies, holy symbols, and theology. This knowledge extends to information about the undead and about the Astral Sea, including the creatures of that plane."

Again I am not seeing this precision you were claiming...

I don't know about simpler but it certainly would have backed up your claims of precision much better...

4e breaks all areas of knowledge down using certain keywords and topics which are applied to creatures, as well as any other objects as desired. The inhabitants of each of the other planes of existence, and each of the major types of monster, are allocated to one of the knowledge skills. In EVERY CASE where such a topic exists you can determine which knowledge skill is supposed to be primary for that topic. Obviously its possible to introduce material outside of that design, and its possible to introduce later material that isn't referenced within the skill descriptions presented in EARLIER material, but the design is quite clear.

Religion deals with the Astral and Divine, as well as the Undead. Arcana deals with the planes of existence more generally (all but the Astral and its domains). Dungeoneering covers the Far Realm. Nature covers the normal world in as much as something in it is natural/primal. It really is pretty darn clear and you can map every single creature to a knowledge skill for a check, and every plane. How much clearer can it get?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

You seem to be antagonistically conversing with 4e players about 5e, here. Did the 5e forums suddenly slow down?

4e also has the +1/2 level bonus. You need a proficiency for your level to matter to something in 5e, so there'd better be a proficiency for anything you might get better at - including reasoning in the context of solving mysteries or otherwise putting together details of the environment.

I get that you prefer a shorter, fixed skill list to a larger - with tool proficiencies, even open-ended - one, and I don't disagree with that preference. I find that exhaustive and/or open-ended skill lists 'create incompetence,' as it were. But aside from SCs or a short, fixed skill list being something to like about 4e, it's a tangent that'd make more sense in the 5e forum.

In fact, there's a thread for it.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?433679-Perception-vs-Investigation

Well, lets leave it at 4e's skill system kicks butt and its a big reason I'll keep running 4e, or some derivative thereof. I don't even really care about the 5e skill system except inasmuch as it provides a contrast and our problems with it were illustrative. On the whole I don't actually HATE 5e's skill system, but I do think they could have thought about it more, and the whole proficiency bonus only to certain things design is one of those things....

 

[Tony Vargas]

I don't think you can isolate specific mental skills and say only certain ones are good for doing something. Sherlock Holmes IIRC seems to have a very good memory, accuracy of recall, reasoning, and etc. In fact realistically the most critical factor in ALL these things seems to be short-term working memory, which arguably is the lynchpin of high intelligence. In any case a better memory would certainly make you a better investigator, IMHO.

There's the line between INT and an int-based skill, of course. In 4e, IIRC, that line was exposure to specific information (history, arcana, religion). Not a bad place to draw it. Not the only place.

There can't be any knowledge or understanding about locks and such things? Talk to a locksmith sometime. Sure they know how to open locks, and its a fairly significant part of their skill set, but it is FAR from all there is to the subject.

That'd be an argument in favor of 5e's optional stat-independent proficiencies (or other systems like it in that sense, such as Storyteller). If you had a proficiency 'locksmith,' you'd roll INT to remember information about locks, DEX to pick or repair a lock, WIS to settle on the most suitable lock for a given purpose, CHA to sell a customer a more expensive lock, and so forth... proficiency would apply each time.

In 4e, oddly, it'd be a matter of where (what plane) the lock was made, or the keyword of the creature making it. Dwarven lock in the natural world: History. Lock made by Quom to secure a vault containing sparks of their destroyed deity: Religion. Etc...

Well, lets leave it at 4e's skill system kicks butt and its a big reason I'll keep running 4e, or some derivative thereof.

It wouldn't be one of my favorite things about the system, but it's not a glaring negative, and certainly better than ranks or non-weapon proficiencies in both concept and implementation.

I feel like skills should be more thoroughly rolled into class (or background or theme) and level, rather than broken out quite the way they have been. One of the merits of a class system is that you usually only need class/level and perhaps a few modifiers to determine what a character can do. While systems like feats and skills and so forth add customizeability, they detract from that, a bit.

I don't even really care about the 5e skill system except inasmuch as it provides a contrast and our problems with it were illustrative. On the whole I don't actually HATE 5e's skill system, but I do think they could have thought about it more, and the whole proficiency bonus only to certain things design is one of those things....

Nod. It's not that it's a bad or unworkable system, it just emphasizes training over experience, in that you can't benefit from the latter without the former. The differences among modern eds' skill systems are really more in the realm of what you're bad at than what you're good it. In 4e, you get better even at the things you're bad at; in 3.x, you can get better at the things you're bad at, if you really want to, but you give up becoming better at some things you're good at in a resource-distribution trade-off; in 5e, you only get better at things you're good at, (or suddenly get much better when you become proficient at a later level).

 

[JamesonCourage]

Where's the illusion? If the players know that they are going to be confronted by (say) Orcus cultists whether they choose the right or left path, then the choice of path is mere colour.

That's *if* the players know that. If you tell them ahead of time, then yup, you're 100% right, no illusionism.

If they don't know, and they're simply exploring, and you think "that way is boring, thus I'll just make it the other way," I'd consider that illusionism. Their "choice" didn't matter.

In fact I don't think the scenario you've described has ever come up in my 4e game - as best I can recall I've run two dungeons of any meaningful scale in the campaign, both at heroic tier. One combined elements of Night's Dark Terror, Sceptre Tower of Spellgard, and maybe some other stuff that I either made up or found somewhere else. The other was the Well of Demons from module P2.

Yeah, I'm really hazy on it (because I don't use modules), but I thought I vaguely recalled this happening once when they were exploring a tower, or something? Thunder-something? I might be getting this mixed up, though. And it was around the time that I first recall hearing about the dwarf using his Come And Get It on water, but I don't think in the same location... but again, I'm unsure about pretty much all of this.

In the absence of divination spells or rumours of the classic D&D variety, the sequence in this sort of dungeon has little narrative/play integrity: when the players are choosing to go down corridor X rather than Y, they are generally not making a meaningful choice.

I guess I disagree with this overall, but I understand where you're coming from. Their choice can be very important, even if they don't know it yet. But that leads us to...

The reason for respecting the pre-mapping and stocking of rooms is to preserve the integrity of the backstory that it represents (and for all I can remember, I may have made changes along the way to strengthen that backstory prior to its revelation).

I greatly respect backstory, and find it important to the type of game I want to run (though I'll play in either type of game). I see taking away that choice (even if they don't know its importance yet) akin to illusionism. It screams "working my magic behind the scenes to invalidate PC choices to get the result I want" to me. But I do understand how the lack of the players making an informed decision (on, say, right vs left) could make the issue cloudy for some people.

But this issue is probably at the root of why I said I might put an argument out that you engage in some form of illusionism. You don't see it as the case, obviously. And while this form of illusionism is softer and more understandable to me, I still can't help but see it the way I described, above.

This is more than four years ago, so also somewhat faded from my memory, but I remember that this is where the drow PC acquired the demonskins to make his robes as part of the process of becoming a Demonskin Adept. But the big finish was the main thing, and it involved rescuing villagers who had been sold to the gnolls by duergar slavers, and were to be used as sacrificial victims. I remember that the players were very cautious, their PCs lingering in the doorway and taking it slow while the gnoll leader tried to complete his ritual - and as a result one of the villagers was killed.

This was also the one where -if I recall correctly- you held off on the sacrifice already being completely for dramatic reasons. That even though the players might be going slow, you wouldn't have them show up to all the villagers being sacrificed already, because that's not interesting.

This, again, is something I'd argue is illusionism. Though, again, I understand it: it's more dramatic and thus more interesting. But I think that's what most illusionist GMs think.

Most of the travel in my game that is not just handwaved is handled via skill challenges (through the wilderness, at heroic tier; through the underdark, for the second half of paragon tier and again at epic in pursuit of Torog; through the Abyss in early epic tier). In the skill challenges, turning left or right is not to the fore - the decision points are framed via the skill challenge, and are resolved non-illusionistically.

I agree that the examples of skill challenges from you that I've seen definitely read as non-illusionist.

Not too far upthread I described a recent episode of play (and have written a fuller account on another thread). Why did the PCs find themselves fighting Lolth? Because they travelled through a portal to the Abyss with that express objective - one of the PCs was built by his player to be an anti-Lolth crusading drow. The scene-setting was not illusionistic: everyone at the table knows why (at a meta-level) I happened to have the dwarf who missed his attempt to leap onto Ygorl fall down to a githzerai earthmote with an Abyssal portal on it.

I didn't read it, so I can't comment on it.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Illusionism is fundamentally a very simple concept:

If the ruleset alleges to cultivate or outright prescribes an experience whereby when the input of players (PC build choices, action declarations) meets system play procedures (the action resolution mechanics + the system-canvassed type and kind of situation framing and player adversity), play will propel forward inexorably as an outgrowth of those practices...but if at the table it is actually subordinated by GM force (rendering irrelevant the aforementioned inputs), and it is done so covertly, then that is illusionism.

You're going to have to speak to me like I'm twelve, or I'm not going to be able to respond to this as well as I'd like to.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

The differences among modern eds' skill systems are really more in the realm of what you're bad at than what you're good it. In 4e, you get better even at the things you're bad at; in 3.x, you can get better at the things you're bad at, if you really want to, but you give up becoming better at some things you're good at in a resource-distribution trade-off; in 5e, you only get better at things you're good at, (or suddenly get much better when you become proficient at a later level).

Add that to my list of favorite things about 4th edition. If my character is bad at something, then there's no reason why he or she needs to get (relatively) even worse at it over time. My low-level Pathfinder character is unlikely to succeed at an untrained skill check while at low levels, but there's no reason to guarantee an absolute zero chance of success for high levels. (Or worse, with checks so hard that even an optimized character needs to roll well, so my character who merely has maximum ranks in the skill is still guaranteed to fail.)

 

[JamesonCourage]

So, no extemporizing at all, nothing like @pemerton's narrative of near-godlike PCs blasting through the demonweb in their tower or killing Lolth at the last instant with what amounts to plot? It just all seems very stultified and formulaic, and TO ME that's the opposite of what Pemerton's story is about. I've had similar experiences myself, the mechanics just can't hold sway over the plot at level 30. If you try to do that you have some very dull epic play, which in fact is something that was reported by quite a few people who said that "epic was broken."

Just as an example, the combats in my system have included much more dramatic fight scenes than I'd ever experienced in the other systems I've run (outside of maybe my 4-page superhero RPG), and it's precisely because of the rules and the narrative possibilities those rules open up. Things like called shots, the hit chart, rules for climbing large creatures, taking blows for other creatures, etc. all build up towards a whole. Then, when we play combat out, these rules get used, tension rises, and amazing things happen.

Is it every fight? Nope. But there are so many different things that have happened that I find interesting that I just can't believe that I wouldn't be able to emulate godlike powers as well and have similar results. That's just not feasible to me.

Actually, I think the 4e skills are quite precisely defined.

I know you do.

If you go back and read them now you will see what I mean. Read my last post, 5e doesn't even come close to the same level of precision. 3.x didn't come close either, but for different reasons. I'd be happy to talk about my theories of skill systems, but its probably a long post...

I think both of those games didn't have near enough either. I'm not saying 4e is in a club by itself here. I'm saying that its rules aren't precise. They're intentionally broad and vague.

I just find it hard to imagine how you 'codify' those things.

I know you do.

My players are incredibly creative. They blow past anything I anticipate or consider at the drop of a hat, usually in the first 5 minutes of a session. I could squelch them, but I can hardly believe that would be in the interests of 'empowerment'. It would certainly be predictable!

Predictable rules is player empowerment. So you have two approaches, in my opinion. Define a lot, then hold them to it (my RPG, 4e, etc.); you cannot jump to the moon because you want to, you follow the rules for jumping, etc.

The other way is leaving it incredibly open but having very broad rules for actions and resolution (for 4-page superhero RPG). Can you jump to the moon? Well, if your character can, then yes. If he can't, then no. Do regular bullets hurt him? Again, if it hurts the character yes, if not, then no. These are decided by GM-player agreement (much like a GM might set guidelines on setting in the last type of game system). Then, once a general outline for characters is set, the players are given rules on how to accomplish tasks.

Well, I'm not talking about that either, I'm talking about what 4e captures at Epic, particularly high Epic. The PCs mechanically have some crazy abilities, but they're still quite bounded in what they can do. Narratively however the game should be quite open at this point. I know many people don't manage that though.

I just hear this (not that you're saying it, but it strikes me, personally, this way) as "the PCs should have rules, and those rules keep them in a certain sphere, but those rules should be broken often, with the balance left to the GM." I did in 3.X at epic. Never again.

Yeah, for actual divinities doing fully divine things I'd expect some sort of mechanical framework to exist like that. It certainly hasn't been covered in any mainstream D&D product, maybe Birthright? I've sadly never read Birthright, but if I had a hankering for 'Mythic Tier' play in 4e I'd maybe take a look at that and the Immortals rules, maybe some other games as well.

Honestly though, I'm very happy that 4e doesn't codify all that kind of stuff, or most lesser stuff either that isn't action-related. It makes for a system that is both very complete in one sense, but very open in another.

Haha. That reads as "incomplete" to me, if the rules are indeed supposed to handle it. But that's my view.

They don't involve the DM fudging things or RE-arranging things in a way that results in his predetermined outcome resulting.

If you value backstory, and have backstory established, this is exactly what is happening.