D&D 4E What changes aren't being made in 4E that you think should be

[mhacdebhandia]

I understand. Most D&D gamers reside in the US, where the metric system is not the norm.

I'm with Clive Cussler, though obviously he was a little optimistic.

 

[Steely Dan]

I really wish they would finally drop halflings, orcs/half-ocs and half-elves – too campaign specific (Middle-Earth) for my taste.

 

[Goblyn]

Auras. I don't dislike the idea of auras, but the more situational modifiers to keep track of when the situation(distance from aura-producer) can change quite frequently are annoying to keep track of.

So, rather, not so much auras, but small, obscure and fleeting situational modifiers.

And butt-loads of elves. Feel free to rail against this one, as I simply hate them because of the 2e elves handbook, but I still can't stand them.

 

[Fifth Element]

As for Armor, I'd really like to have seen a major differentiation between 'I'm hard to hit because i'm swift and agile' and 'I absorb damage because I'm in full plate'.

Mearls (I believe) already dicussed the mechanical reasons for not making the change. But if it hurts your immersion, just change how you think about it. Armour does make you harder to hit. If your opponent lands a blow that would have hit you if you had no armour on, the opponent simply hits your armour instead of you. This is particularly easy to think of when wearing plate armour. The opponent lands a blow, but your armour simply deflects it. If not for your armour, he would have hit you.

Stop thinking of misses as pure misses (hitting nothing but air), and start thinking that the blow has to both land on your opponent's person and penetrate his armour in order to be effective.

That being said, I'm not a big fan of the mutitudinous ways that you can avoid taking damage. Armour Class, Damage Reduction, Reflex saves, etc. With an abstract hit point system, it doesn't make a lot of sense to have several discrete ways to avoid taking damage.

 

[Vael]

Well, one thing I'd like is a simpler method of tracking encumberance. Adding everything up is a pain, so IME, encumberance is left to CRPGs.

Also, and this might happen anyway, I wouldn't mind seeing the Age of Worms and Savage Tide Paizo Adventure paths converted to 4e, but that's a Paizo thing.

 

[Mercule]

I really wish they would finally drop halflings, orcs/half-ocs and half-elves – too campaign specific (Middle-Earth) for my taste.

Agreed. Most of those will probably not be present in my 4E game.

 

[Set]

And this is the best reason for using squares instead of feet. Players around the world can convert squares to 5 feet, or 1.5 m, or whatever system they're using.

I've been known to use 3 foot squares in some instances, and 5 foot squares in others. I find it much more convenient.

Down with squares, I wish D&D used *hexes.*

Side-slip movement rules annoy the crap out of me.

As for the sound of metrics, I'd prefer if in-game measurements were in yards and 'tens of yards' or whatever, while out-of-came measurements were metric. Metric doesn't sound 'fantasy' enough for in-character descriptions, IMO.

 

[Cadfan]

Mearls (I believe) already dicussed the mechanical reasons for not making the change. But if it hurts your immersion, just change how you think about it. Armour does make you harder to hit. If your opponent lands a blow that would have hit you if you had no armour on, the opponent simply hits your armour instead of you. This is particularly easy to think of when wearing plate armour. The opponent lands a blow, but your armour simply deflects it. If not for your armour, he would have hit you.

Prepare for stream of consciousness!

It works like this in my imagination:

Suppose a fighter has an AC of 21.

That's made up of,
+8, plate armor
+2, heavy shield
+1 dexterity bonus

If his opponent rolls a 9 or below, he totally missed.
On a 10 to an 17, he hit the fighter's armor but didn't penetrate.
On an 18 or 19, the fighter blocked with his shield.
On a 20, the fighter ducked out of the way.
On 21+, the fighter got hit.

If I were a truly, truly great DM, I would have a little chart next to each character's AC in my notes, so that I could describe combat appropriately for each person. I really, really should do that for my next campaign. If 4e avoids too many temporary AC bonuses, it won't be so hard. In 3e it wasn't plausible because my PCs were too into buffing, and I'd have had to move all the numbers constantly.

The more I think about this, the more I think I should do it.

...I should probably reverse the order though. An attack that you completely dodge is a weak one. An attack that you block with a shield is a tougher one. An attack that you can't dodge, and can't block with your shield, but which is deflected by your armor is a pretty good attack. So I'll reverse the order, and my players can know from the description how close things were.

 

[Jayouzts]

Use of Metric System.

I'm tired of calculating back and forth from metric and outdated imperial units.

I am right there with you, but that is problem bigger than D&D. (Didn't D20 Future use imperial units? That's very sci-fi!)

 

[Steely Dan]

Agreed. Most of those will probably not be present in my 4E game.

Right on, usually I'm met with volume arguments about 'But they're a legacy, and how can you mess with 30 years of blah blah…'

I've been DMing for about 20 years, and in many settings (Toril, Krynn, Oerth, Athas, Ravenloft, Planescape, Al-Qadim etc), and my players have never come across an orc or a halfling and our D&D sessions have been just dandy.

When I run a Middle-Earth campaign (which I would love to do one day – 4th Age), then I will include halflings and orcs, just like I only include draconians in a Dragonlance campaign, or Muls in a Dark Sun campaign etc.