WFRP 4th Edition - How the game has evolved.

[Neonchameleon]

I'm not sure I like that career paths now have an absolute default (other than for casters) because it encouraged everyone to take a different path rather than stick to their class. But interesting thank you. And Resolve and Fortune look good.

 

[Crusadius]

I'm not sure I like that career paths now have an absolute default (other than for casters) because it encouraged everyone to take a different path rather than stick to their class. But interesting thank you. And Resolve and Fortune look good.

There may be a "default" path (i.e. moving from Level 1 to Level 4 of a single Career), but you can move to any other Career rather than sticking to a small list Career Exits.

There are some higher XP costs involved (and maybe a bit of fast talking to the GM) if the Career is not within the same Class, or if the Career Level is something other than the first level.

 

[TheSword]

I'm not sure I like that career paths now have an absolute default (other than for casters) because it encouraged everyone to take a different path rather than stick to their class. But interesting thank you. And Resolve and Fortune look good.

So in 2e there were 58 starter careers and 53 advance careers.

In 4e there are around 100 careers each of which have 4 levels. So there isn’t so much a default path as their is the option to stay in the same career for much longer.

You can still jump between careers to pick up new skills and talents and then return back as appropriate.

For instance I have a player who is a river warden (level 2) and will be leaving the Reik behind in three or four sessions time to head to Middenheim. He might end up switching to Road Warden in which case I would let him go straight in at level 2 or 3 once he’s picked up riding and got the trappings. Or he might switch to bounty hunter on the basis that he’s actively hunting a cult… that would probably progress quite quickly because he already has quite a few talents and skills. Or because he is really into his blunderbuss and wants to tinker and improve that he might go into engineer. I know later on the party will probably return to the river so at that point he can probably return to the later levels of riverwarden if he wanted to and advance to Captain and oversee his upgraded, steam powered - experimental weapon riverwarden barge!

 

[thullgrim]

The career system is as flexible or binding as you want. I generally let my players move between careers as long as there is a sliver of narrative sense to be had. I’m other cases restrict movement into careers or between careers if it didn’t make any sense for the narrative.

You can also choose to enforce trappings. By default trappings aren’t required to advance within a career or into a new one. They form a set of skills expectations within the world though. A cavalryman without a horse is likely to suffer some noc reaction penalties as they don’t ‘look’ the part.

 

[TheSword]

Out of interest. The River Warden player ended up switching to the Scryer Career for their 3rd level on the justification that they have been around a lot of magic and daemons and they could have picked up the sight. This is a good way of getting some magic investigation into the party without a witch getting burnt by our Witch Hunter! The character is already pretty effective in combat so this adds some much needed investigation talents and skills.

 

[aramis erak]

For me, the biggest changes are in advancement...

The raising of profile scores being 1 point at a time, instead of 1st's 10 or 2nd's 5 points at a time was an "Ugh" for me.
That 4e's careers are much more linear, and all are 4 ranks... was where I realized I was not going to run it.
Aside from the switch to opposed rolls, combat looks fairly familiar to me, being clearly grounded in 1E.
The magic is using the colors of magic; that approach was in WFB 5 IIRC, and was introduced in WFRP 1E in Realms of Sorcery.

 

[TheSword]

For me, the biggest changes are in advancement...

The raising of profile scores being 1 point at a time, instead of 1st's 10 or 2nd's 5 points at a time was an "Ugh" for me.
That 4e's careers are much more linear, and all are 4 ranks... was where I realized I was not going to run it.
Aside from the switch to opposed rolls, combat looks fairly familiar to me, being clearly grounded in 1E.
The magic is using the colors of magic; that approach was in WFB 5 IIRC, and was introduced in WFRP 1E in Realms of Sorcery.

Why did the 4 ranks per career put you off? Plenty of the careers in 2e had multiple ranks anyway, they’ve just given that option to everyone without taking away variety?

You could just bundle advances into 5’s if you wanted to. The charts are grouped in steps of 5 so you could tell the players they need to do that.

 

[macd21]

I'm not sure I like that career paths now have an absolute default (other than for casters) because it encouraged everyone to take a different path rather than stick to their class. But interesting thank you. And Resolve and Fortune look good.

In my current campaign only two of five players have stuck with their original careers (an engineer and a wizard) and I wouldn’t be surprised if one or both of those switched at some point. One has gone Smuggler-Boatman, and is now considering a third career. Another has gone Beggar-Rat Catcher-Duelist. The last has gone Nun-Witch Hunter.

The career system is actually more like the 1st and 2nd ed systems than might initially be apparent. In the older editions, your career exit options were usually 1 Advanced career and about 6-7 Basic careers, IIRC. In 4ed your standard options are generally to go up one “tier” in your current career, or jump to one of the seven other careers in your class (so apprentice wizard to wizard, or to (say) an apprentice engineer, student, or apprentice apothecary. It amounts to the same thing really. You can jump to a career outside your class, but it will cost you an extra 100xp.

 

[aramis erak]

Why did the 4 ranks per career put you off? Plenty of the careers in 2e had multiple ranks anyway, they’ve just given that option to everyone without taking away variety?

You could just bundle advances into 5’s if you wanted to. The charts are grouped in steps of 5 so you could tell the players they need to do that.

The few multi-level careers outside magic (___ Slayer, Wardancer, Merc Sgt/Capt, Naval Mate/Captain) are very narrow and a very tiny part. The layout method used to convey the information about what raises when is also not a great choice.

I think even 2e's 5 points per were too narrow.

I wasn't a fan of the color magic, either.

1st ed, one almost always has multiple paths, 4E ditches the flexibility, at least RAW. And if I find a game has multple major issues in RAW, i'm not going to enjoy fixing it on the fly.

The one area were WFRP 4E gets it right, tho' it's not an area that makes my purchase decisions, is the art.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Why did the 4 ranks per career put you off?

Because it encourages you to do the boring thing, which is continue in your career. By having every class have four separate ranks you effectively have a class-and-level based system in the style of D&D 5e where the default the game points you at is you continue in your class although it's possible to break out of it the way you can multiclass in D&D 5e.

I don't actually expect this to change the experience of anyone who's been playing previous editions because how you learned to play matters more than how the game coaxes you to play. But I would expect any new WFRP 4e players who pick up the game out of nowhere to not just advance their career about as often as 5e players multiclass. And game and setting alike are harmed by this default expectation of play.

Plenty of the careers in 2e had multiple ranks anyway, they’ve just given that option to everyone without taking away variety?

Not that I recall? (I can't currently find my copy of 2e). The ones that had multiple ranks were ones that for specific reasons you weren't supposed to break out of; wizardry's the study of a lifetime, priesthood is a calling, and being a Slayer normally lasts for the rest of your life.

And e.g. a Tier 4 roadwarden just feels weird as a concept, while a Tier 4 ratcatcher in WFRP isn't an expert in hunting rat-rats but something that officially doesn't exist that's likely to say "rat-rats", and as such should definitely have a different class title and probably multiple explicit ways in.

And that the WFRP 4e designers chose to make this change that feels as if it harms worldbuilding in two directions and will harm the way anyone coming to the books cold is likely to play the game gives me very little confidence in changes they made elsewhere.