The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

[Hussar]

It's about as confusing as putting pineapple on pizza in the USA.

Which is to say, not all that confusing.

Well, I have had pizza that didn’t have pineapple on it but Mac and cheese with no ketchup?

I didn’t know you could do that.

 

[RealAlHazred]

WB cafe menu circa 1941
View attachment 271951

Contrast this to a menu from a Fred Harvey restaurant from 1943. These eateries were everywhere in the West!

I will note, you can get a cup of real coffee for 10 cents, but a whole pot of Postum (a caffeine-free roasted-grain beverage) for 15 cents! Mmmm-mmm! What a bargain!

 

[RealAlHazred]

So, I guess we're doing This again.

It was 2007.
A new edition was announced. Shortly after, an open playtest began, and consumer feedback was measured by online surveys. The feedback was mostly positive, but Hasbro was frustrated with the success of third-party publishing companies, and with the proliferation of electronic copies of their books on file-sharing networks. So, buoyed by the success of their customer satisfaction surveys, they announced they were ending the Open Gaming License. There was a massive outcry, and the popularity of their new edition rapidly diminished. They ended up publishing the new edition a year later under a different gaming license, but left the OGL alone as a peace offering. The new edition failed to meet margins, and the D&D brand fell out of 1st place in the TTRPG market for the first time ever.

Now it's 2023.
A new edition has been announced. Shortly after, an open playtest began, and consumer feedback is being measured by online surveys. The feedback is mostly positive, but Hasbro is frustrated with the success of third-party publishing companies, and with the proliferation of electronic copies of their books on VTT platforms. So, buoyed by the success of their customer satisfaction surveys, they announce they are ending the Open Gaming License. There is a massive outcry, and the popularity of their new edition rapidly diminishes.

So what happens next? Well, if history is any indicator:
They will publish the new edition under a different gaming license, but leave the OGL alone as a peace offering. The new edition will fail to meet margins, and the D&D brand will fall out of 1st place in the TTRPG market for the second time.

I will add one caveat. As a guy who playtested 4th, our group's consensus wasn't positive. Or even mostly positive. Or partially positive. It grew on me, but is still not what I consider "good."

 

[eyeheartawk]

I will add one caveat. As a guy who playtested 4th, our group's consensus wasn't positive. Or even mostly positive. Or partially positive. It grew on me, but is still not what I consider "good."

I only ever played 4e a handful of times. Never in a campaign. Maybe, after all this, I can convince one of my groups to give it an honest try. I think if you go in with the correct expectations it would be pretty fun.

 

[Ryujin]

I only ever played 4e a handful of times. Never in a campaign. Maybe, after all this, I can convince one of my groups to give it an honest try. I think if you go in with the correct expectations it would be pretty fun.

I played in a 4e campaign for two years and DMed one for more than two. It was a good time, though I was the only non min-maxxer in the player group. As DM I tossed the task resolution system in favour of straight role play.

 

[eyeheartawk]

I played in a 4e campaign for two years and DMed one for more than two. It was a good time, though I was the only non min-maxxer in the player group. As DM I tossed the task resolution system in favour of straight role play.

I would probably do the same. There's nothing in the structure of that game that would break if I got rid of skill challenges and just made people do ability checks when roleplaying situations called for it.

Neither here nor there, but I think that would make it feel more holistic? Like, a big complaint I hear alot is "This game spends virtually all of its time on combat stuff (both in game time terms and in space taken up in books) but for roleplaying it's like 2 pages summarized as idk, do a skill challenge". I think doing it via normal ability checks makes it feel more like D&D people are used to, which make it an easier sell?

 

[MarkB]

I would probably do the same. There's nothing in the structure of that game that would break if I got rid of skill challenges and just made people do ability checks when roleplaying situations called for it.

Neither here nor there, but I think that would make it feel more holistic? Like, a big complaint I hear alot is "This game spends virtually all of its time on combat stuff (both in game time terms and in space taken up in books) but for roleplaying it's like 2 pages summarized as idk, do a skill challenge". I think doing it via normal ability checks makes it feel more like D&D people are used to, which make it an easier sell?

I played and ran a lot of the organised play 4e content, and the quality and execution of skill challenges was widely variable. There was one really stand-out one about tracking down a specific location in a city in competition with other groups, which included little vignettes of RP scenes when specific skills were used successfully as well as narrated transitions through the city as the party cleared thresholds of successes - that one was a joy to run.

But just as often they were horrible rigidly-structured things where you absolutely could not progress without getting your X successful skill checks regardless of whether you came up with a brilliant plan to circumvent the whole thing or had the perfect magic item to bypass the obstacle - and no, you couldn't just let the rest of the team handle it if you had no useful skills, everyone had to contribute upon penalty of accumulating an automatic failure.

 

[RealAlHazred]

See, at the time 4th edition came out, a refrain among some games theorists was "if only D&D spent as much energy and time describing rules for social and other non-combat tasks as it did for combat!" So, the Skill Challenge was born, which tried to spend as much energy and time describing rules for social and other non-combat tasks as the game does for combat. And the same guys didn't like them, for some reason...

EDIT: I mean, I don't think it's the ideal solution for their complaint, but it was an attempt.

 

[Ryujin]

I played and ran a lot of the organised play 4e content, and the quality and execution of skill challenges was widely variable. There was one really stand-out one about tracking down a specific location in a city in competition with other groups, which included little vignettes of RP scenes when specific skills were used successfully as well as narrated transitions through the city as the party cleared thresholds of successes - that one was a joy to run.

But just as often they were horrible rigidly-structured things where you absolutely could not progress without getting your X successful skill checks regardless of whether you came up with a brilliant plan to circumvent the whole thing or had the perfect magic item to bypass the obstacle - and no, you couldn't just let the rest of the team handle it if you had no useful skills, everyone had to contribute upon penalty of accumulating an automatic failure.

As the party skill monkey (Feylock/Bard multi) I made it my job to find ways to circumvent the majority of skill challenges. I had a massive list of rituals. Why make the party go through the skill challenge to climb a cliff face, when more than half could barely climb a ladder, if I could just levitate everyone to the top?

 

[payn]

People don’t put ketchup on Mac and cheese? I’m…. Confused.

Yes, yes you are confused.