What scale of changes and changes themselves would you find acceptable?

[wedgeski]

IMO, for 4e to be D&D it must have: classes, with unique abilities; the six Ability Scores (I would not be too bothered if they were changed to raw bonuses); Vancian magic (although I would like to see some kind of ability to scale spell effects on the fly, a-la Psionics); and Saving Throws. Those are the big ones for me. Everything else is up for grabs.

In terms of your poll that puts me firmly in the Miniscule to Moderate range.

 

[blargney the second]

Shouldn't the last two be gargantuan and collosal changes? ;>

Anyways, I went for ultimate/collosal. I think there's a lot of room for changing things in D&D, while still retaining its essential D&Dness.

Edit: I sort of enjoy that 3.5 will eventually be a prototype.

 

[glass]

I voted for small, moderate, and ability score changes, although (apart from ability scores) the catgories are not all that clearly defined.

I was considering changing the ability scores myself as a houserule, but it was too big a change for me to effect in isolation. However, it serves as a perfect example of the level of changes I think should be made in a fourth edition when it arrives:

The idea was there would be seven ability scores: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Intuition, Charisma, Perception. The first three would be considered physical, the next three mental, and Perception would be neither.

Initiative would be based on Charisma and Perception. Melee attacks would be based on Strength and Dex, while ranged attacks would be based on Dex and Perception. Casters would use two different stats for their casting. The idea being to reduce reliance on any one stat.

Similarly, there would be two base saves for each class, physical and mental, and any physical stat can be added to physical (and similarly with mental). Thus there would be six saves in total. The DM might call for a Health save to fight off a disease, or a Charisma save to avoid a charm effect. There would be no saves based on Perception, because the only thing I could think of for it was illusions, and prefer them under intelligence.


Now obviously, I don't expect the next edition to work exactly like this: Hopefully, full time professional game designers can come up with something better than I can. But, it illustrates the idea: Same general principals, but anything goes in the specifics.


glass.

 

[Seeker95]

Major Class Approach Change

Switch to four classes (template bases):
Warrior - Priest - Mage - Rogue

Let everything else be a combination of special abilities, feats, skills and roleplay.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

To get me to buy a new book the changes would have to be more than 1e to 2e, which I considered a Miniscule change. Taking splat material and making it core does not equal a new edition.

To call it 4th Edition I think they need to go farther than the change from 3.0 to 3.5, which I consider a Minor change.

Then again I wouldn't really want fundamental changes or an anything goes attitude towards a new edition.

 

[Aesthetic Monk]

The more I think about the alternate class features found for many of the classes in the PHBII, the more I'm inclined to want to seriously consider a *very* class-light system that has but a skeletal framework for various archetypes and a cluster of featlike options to flesh out various concepts. The featlike options wouldn't necessarily be limited to one of the archetypes, though some might logically fit in one place rather than another, and they would shape far more than the skeletal class outlines would. Thus, you'd still have the "comfort" of traditional classes but only as a baseline. Fighter/warrior (or whatever) would have, in the outline, the parameters for higher combat skills and maybe certain kinds of good saves, but, beyond that, most things would be filled in with player-chosen class features, which could include goosing up the base attack further than the standard warrior at the cost of some other option.

I honestly find the Vancian system so endemic to D&D that changing it would be more unsettling to me than losing classes. However, I do think a good XPH-like system makes a lot of sense, at least as an option.

Like others, I'd like to see higher-level options be easier to incorporate and NPCs easier to generate than they are. Some skills could be refined or made more sensible, and there are always small changes to be made, like making grappling, turning, and the like work within the same universal mechanic as other combat options.

So I said more or less just high-level changes only would make me run out and buy 4e. I'm happy enough with 3.5+ to be too moved by something minor-ly new (although I'd probably go for a "3.75" PHB and MM that incorporated errata and the various refinements over the last few years).

 

[Zimbel16]

4e changes

Personally, I feel that the magic system should be re-worked and re-balanced. Doing so even moderately well will ensure that I'll buy some or all of the core 4E books. Not doing so will reduce the chance that I'll do so.

This does not mean that the system can't be Vanacian in nature; I really don't care if it's Vanacian or not; I merely want the following:
1) Spells changed so that they don't make skills irrelevant (or, vice versa, skills changed so that they don't overlap much with spells).
2) Major spellcasters re-balanced against non-major spellcasters. I'm not expecting perfection here, but keeping them between, say 1/2 - 2x as powerful as a fighter-type in most ordinary situations would be nice.

As a side note, if you re-do this poll, I'd give fewer options with more distiction between the options. As is, I voted for multiple categories, because I'm not certain which category the above would fall under.

 

[Stalker0]

If 4E only does lesser changes than these, then it means it's another revision, and not a new edition, and as such it would be largely unnecessary (not that a new edition is necessary...).

Completely agree, if the changes are not very significant, there's no point to a new edition. I was willing to go with 3.5 because I felt the changes for the most part were positive, but its still very much 3rd edition. Unless 4e made some very significant changes, I would feel ripped off in buying new books.

 

[Odhanan]

Nothing short of a moderate/large change would justify a Fourth Edition to me as a customer.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

I think that they should only change the title, and perhaps add some raisins. Then it could be New & Improved D&D 3.5. Now with more Raisins!

Later
silver