The "real" reason the game has changed.

[Abraxas]

I think that a 3E GM who let Hussar's PC's trick with the spoon work wouldn't be doing the best to get the strengths out of 3E's character-build and action-resolution rules - for example, what is the point of having all those rules about skill selection, and skill use, and the difference between Ex/Su/Sp abilities, and the Arcane Trickster class, etc, if a player can just reskin Pick Locks as a knock spell. How is that meant to interact with anti-magic, for example.

What's the point of having those rules in 4E?

I think the deliberate looseness of fit between mechanics and ingame interpretation is a clear and deliberate difference between the design of 3E and 4e, and it is precisely this that Hussar is exploiting.

Perhaps the people I gamed with had a completely different experience than most, but we've been reskinning things for as long as I can remember

EDIT: Dannyalcatraz's reply seems to fit exactly what I had in mind in my comments about how 3E best handles this - in 3E terms, what Hussar is describing is a knock spell.

See, in my mind, it looks like he's describing the Knock ritual in 4E terms. This has to be a game experience thing. I haven't noticed a change in my own behavior WRT trying new things (in game) between the 3.xE and 4E games I've been in. I have, however, noticed that (at least with the people I am currently gaming with) others are less likely to try something that isn't listed on their character sheet. I really have no idea what it is about the rules presentation that cause such behavior - and it's puzzling.

 

[shadzar]

I really have no idea what it is about the rules presentation that cause such behavior - and it's puzzling.

While I can do what you do and ignore silly things within the rules as though they are the end all be all of what can be done, others see the mountains of rules and think it provides the best "balance" to just go with what is there.

I have a few miniature games and other types of combat based board games that have rules that look not too different from the 4th edition books in style of presentation.

Axis and Allies comes to mind. It just seems the 4th edition books are a bit dry.

Maybe there is just too much little things to track, but most playing it for a while now should have those little things down.

It really does give the feel of a miniature wargame with how it is presented, not only words and focus, but design.

We could play what if all day long about those you play with, but have you asked them, why they dont try things like you do, or the DM to see if it fits with him?

If not entirely new players, then getting more insight on why they are only using "options" from their character sheet might help all to understand what it is that is causing it. That would be the most helpful thing, for yourself and its inclusion in this thread as accounts of it happening, why they are only pulling things from the character sheet, rather than trying new things.

I would like to hear, if they offer an answer, at least.

 

[fumetti]

Actually, that wouldn't remotely ape the effect of healing surges.

[snip]

Simply quadrupling hit poits would in no sense replicate any of this.

I was being sarcastic.

 

[fumetti]

Healing surges are not a bigger abstract, they are a different abstract.

No, it's bigger. When you more than double the damage a character can receive in a day--and that repeats every day--you have certainly increased the abstract.

As for the snubbing of movies, come on. D&D is not some fantastic work of literary genius. It was formed from terrible 70's pulp with godawful prose and even worse 70's movies and TV shows. The monk didn't come about because Gygax wanted a complex examination of eastern aesthetics and the differences between Buddhism and greek mythology, he did it because he really liked Kung Fu. Paladins aren't in the game because he wanted a rich tapestry of morality and how it plays out in a medieval society, it's there because valiant knights in shining armor are cool. D&D has always been a mix of nerd culture and "gamist" fun.

If we're going to draw in Gygax, EGG always tried to have mechanics reflect some real world component in a reasonable way. Surges don't come close to that.

I don't think copying the structure of movies as making the campaign "fun." I see it as stripping it down to its most essential scenes (encounters), because that's what happens to stories that are made into movies. Movies don't have the luxury of their story going off on unrelated tangents because the characters got a wild hair. Nor do novels. That's why it's more fun to play DnD than just read a novel--you have control over narrative flow.

Let movies be movies and DnD be DnD.

 

[fumetti]

As my post above stated, this is just flat out incorrect. Surges offer a different mechanic for keeping track of a characters, life, fatigue, luck etc - nothing freebie about it - just different. Not to eveyone's tastes sure, but to mischaracterise it and call it silly is simplistic and dismissive.

A question - how is 4e less realistic than 3e due to surges. I'm not talking about the 6 hours and healed mechanic here (which btw is quite easy - don't like it throw it out or dump it, or better yet just introduce more long lasting conditions for grittiness, quite easy really), but strictly healing surges?

Only if the character wold have died from damage, assuming he has a round to do the 2nd wind - what exactly is wrong with a mechanic that allows an extra round of survival - with a cost (time)?

There is a huge difference between realism and verisimilitude or for that matter realism and suspension of disbelief. To much realism in fantasy is not necessarily a good thing. And in a good movie suspension of disbelief tends to triumph over realism and make for a great experience - nothing wrong with that in a game too.

No matter how you spin it, surges are just a way of ramping up the amount of damage a character can absorb each day.

Whether it's a second wind, a fatigue issue, a bit of extra luck, those are just semantics. A character that used to have 50 HP with no easy means to replenish now can enjoy the de facto luxury of three to four times that much, and with daily restarts to boot.

 

[fumetti]

I'd like to see an example of "skipping past conflict" in any edition. Why would you ever skip over a conflict? Isn't the entire point of sitting down at the table to overcome conflicts, either combat or not?

Read for context. Clearly I was refering to combat.

Let's be honest here, do you actually play out what the characters ate at every meal? Do you insist on detailed accounting of cooking methodology? Do you require the PC's to get enough fiber in their diet?

More of this reductio ad absurdum bizness. YOu really want a response to an absurdity? Is proportionality so unavailable that the reasonable inbetween becomes invisible? Is characterizing my point that way really being "honest"?

Maybe you really can't tell the difference between selecting from a menu and dealing with the resource issues of adventuring. I cannot help you there. But others understand what I'm talking about. If I'm playing 5 hours of DnD, I would go totally crazy if it was all combat encounters one after another. And thanks to 4E's expansion of combat rules and the time it takes per battle, there's not much time left for anything else.

I align more closely with Gygax, that the game was intended to be a lot more than just the combat. Gygax's invention was about exploration, wandering monsters, randomness and uncertainty, all setting the stage for combat--all that "small stuff" that's getting tossed aside in this thread.

Encumbrance matters.
Food matters.
Water matters.
Shelter matters.
Party watch matters.
Wandering monsters matter.
Travel details matter.
Mapping matters.
Timekeeping matters.
Noncombat spells matter.

What used to be half of the major challenges in the game is now tossed aside as "small stuff," undiscernable from quibbling over menu selections.

No surprise, then, that DnD has been re-emphasized as an encounters game.

And I'd say, it's also no surprise that the farther WOTC takes DnD from its roots, the more sales they lose.

 

[Bluenose]

edit: double post

 

[Bluenose]

Wait... what? Where is the option to permanently blind a character in one eye at zero hit points in 4e? I'm not arguing with your main point, just with the whole... "pretending something happened that is not covered by the rules is easier in 4e..." example you gave...

Reducing someone to zero hit points 'puts them out of the fight'. That doesn't have to mean dead. I'm not sure whether it's in a PHB or DMG, or a Dragon article, but I'm sure I've seen something describing a variety of ways to do that. And I've certainly seen it done in a game, where a PC chose to finish off an enemy in a formal duel not by killing them but by cutting their hand off and leaving them helpless. And repeatedly we've knocked people unconscious to interrogate later rather than killing them outright. Whether taking someone's eye out would count as a 'finishing move' would be up to an individual GM, but I would allow it if it seemed genre-appropriate. Swashbucklers, or Norse heroes, and pirates, though it wouldn't seem right for Arthurian knights.

 

[Bluenose]

No, it's bigger. When you more than double the damage a character can receive in a day--and that repeats every day--you have certainly increased the abstract.

Ah yes. Damage. Do you take hit points to be solely a measure of the amount of physical punishment a character can take? If so, how do you explain the way this increases at higher levels, where a tenth level fighter can survive damage that would come close to killing them at lower levels? How does this ability to sustain extra damage interact with healing magic?

 

[pemerton]

What's the point of having those rules in 4E?

<snip>

See, in my mind, it looks like he's describing the Knock ritual in 4E terms.

Well, 4e doesn't have a significant mechanical distinciton between Ex/Su/Sp abilities, so the same sorts of things aren't at stake in 4e as 3E. The 4e knock ritual lets you use Arcana in place of Thievery, at a cost. But there is no mechanical crowding out of the ritual by letting Thievery play in the way Hussar describes.

Perhaps the people I gamed with had a completely different experience than most, but we've been reskinning things for as long as I can remember

And my group doesn't do a lot of reskinning even in 4e. I think different rulesets push in different directions, but group habits are probably just as important, if not more so.