When did I stop being WotC's target audience?

[The_Gneech]

And this is an excellent illustration of why the pro 4e and anti 4e camps will never get along. The antis see this as a reasonable opinion, while the pros see it as being a crank.

I certainly didn't intend it as a crank, just calling it as I see it. As with all subjective things, the presence or absence of such an attitude is going to be a matter of opinion.

You can certainly feel free to prefer the RP strengths of 3rd Edition over those of 4E - but if you genuinely think it somehow looks down on roleplaying, I really think you are viewing it through a biased lens and giving an extraordinarily incorrect description of the game.

Well, one of the annoying things about bias is that by its nature it's almost impossible to tell if you've got it or not. It may be definition of terms -- one of the truisms of gaming is that "you can roleplay in 'Monopoly' if you really want to," but what does that mean? Pretending you're a little boot going around a track? Pretending you're a 1920s mogul buying and selling property? Haggling with other 1920s moguls "in character?"

4E caters to the method actor, not the technical actor. That's why a whole chapter is devoted to "finding your character" before the chapters on choosing character mechanics. For my part, the 4E PHB goes leaps and bounds beyond 3.x in cultivating good roleplay. It simply does so without mechanical props.

But why not do both? For me, the mechanics and the roleplay are inseparable. I mean, if you roleplay a flighty elf archer, but the character sheet is a dwarf berserker, isn't there some fundamental disconnect there? That was one of the reasons I used to hate 2E so much. I was constantly coming up with what I thought were neat ideas, but which mechanically just couldn't fly. (And granted, some of them still didn't fly in 3E -- I never did get a "warrior mage" to work the way I wanted. But at least the system was trying, so to speak.)

If the chapter devoted to "finding your character" was then followed up by mechanics that supported that character, I would be a lot more 4E-friendly. Instead, what I see is "find your character -- and then shove him into one of six pre-made slots from which there is little derivation."

A lot of this is the "you are your role in combat" thing coming up again. For me there should be just as much "roleplaying" in combat as out of it. So when I wanted to create a fighter who kicked down the door, ran across the room, and lopped the head off the enemy boss, and was told "your job is to defend your teammates while the ranger or the wizard do damage," it really stuck in my craw. To me, a "fighter" is "someone who fights." It's not "someone who is and always shall be the meatshield."

-The Gneech

 

[ProfessorCirno]

You know, I feel the need to refer back to myself. This thread just helps so much in proving my own point that it wasn't Wizards that made the divide as wide and painful as it is, it's the legion of 4e fanboys that cannot abide anyone saying anything bad about the game.

This whole thread started as "Why aren't I your target audience?" and was quickly answered with "Because something is wrong with you."

As for the idea that 4e caters to everyone if they'd just make up their own rules, no. No, it doesn't, and that's a stupid argument, and it wouldn't work for any other game. I can alter any game and any system in existence to do what I want so long as I just BS it enough; that hardly speaks out in that game's favor. The crafting thing just blows my mind - the actual argument here is "4e has crafting if you put it in." Well, Deadlands can be played to take place in outer space if I put that in, but last I checked nobody cared because that's not an official part of the game.

Crafting is not an official part of the game. Dialogue skills are not an official part of the game. The vast majority of spells having a use outside of combat is not an official part of the game. It doesn't matter how much you houserule it, it's still not a part of the game, and that's what people are refering to regarding the modularity. And before someone gets mad at me, that isn't inherently a bad thing. Some people love that non-combat spells are 100% rituals. We had a whole thread of someone talking about how happy they were that there were no crafting rules. 4e knows exactly what it wants to be, devil take the rest. Some people like what 4e wants to be. But some people don't, and the problem is that those people are left behind.

 

[Fifth Element]

I think it was mentioned before in this thread that, among other things, what put people off playing 4E was the rabid fans on the net who deteriorated into personal attacks and feeble ad hominem argumentation in response to arguments that were neither. You might want to consider that.

And you might want to read my sig.

 

[Mallus]

IIt may be definition of terms -- one of the truisms of gaming is that "you can roleplay in 'Monopoly' if you really want to," but what does that mean?

Implicit comparisons between 4e and Monopoly aren't helpful.

For me, the mechanics and the roleplay are inseparable.

For certain definitions of role-playing, you're absolutely right. But there are other ways of looking at RP. For example, if you consider role-playing primarily in terms of creating personalities, then mechanics and role-playing are almost completely unrelated (at least as far a D&D is concerned, since it doesn't really rules that describe the psychological makeup of characters).

That was one of the reasons I used to hate 2E so much. I was constantly coming up with what I thought were neat ideas, but which mechanically just couldn't fly. (And granted, some of them still didn't fly in 3E -- I never did get a "warrior mage" to work the way I wanted. But at least the system was trying, so to speak.)

The only way to really fix this is to adopt a full-fledged effects-based point-buy system like HERO/Champions or M&M. Anything else is going to be a kludge (as 3e's various attempts at a fighter-mage demonstrate).

If the chapter devoted to "finding your character" was then followed up by mechanics that supported that character, I would be a lot more 4E-friendly.

4e is definitely a more rigid class-based system (though I believe it's a lot more flexible that it appears initially).

Instead, what I see is "find your character -- and then shove him into one of six pre-made slots from which there is little derivation."

For people who define role-playing in terms of characterization (in the fictional sense), in terms of personality, this isn't so important.

 

[Fifth Element]

Instead, what I see is "find your character -- and then shove him into one of six pre-made slots from which there is little derivation."

Not sure why you picked the number six, but regardless this is symptomatic of any class-based system, not just 4E.

 

[Lacyon]

This whole thread started as "Why aren't I your target audience?" and was quickly answered with "Because something is wrong with you."

You and I must be reading different threads.

Dialogue skills are not an official part of the game.

???

 

[The_Gneech]

Implicit comparisons between 4e and Monopoly aren't helpful.

I was getting at the definition of roleplaying, not whether 4E was like Monopoly. Other than a frantic desire to collect treasure, the two games are only superficially similar!

The only way to really fix this is to adopt a full-fledged effects-based point-buy system like HERO/Champions or M&M. Anything else is going to be a kludge (as 3e's various attempts at a fighter-mage demonstrate).

Well, no, not really. 3E worked more often than it didn't, in this regard, it just had a few notable holes. Saga Edition, with its free multiclassing and closer class balancing, works better still. 4E could have gone this way, but the designers made a point of choosing not to, for whatever reason.

I've said before, and I'll say again, if 4E had been a Saga-ized D&D, it would have been a huge win, instead of leaving me (and several others, as evidenced by these recurring threads) feeling like we got kicked out for liking an unfashionable play style.

-The Gneech

 

[DaveMage]

Yep, that was a great adventure.

But how well did it sell? Is a worthy revenue-generator for a company like WotC?

Certainly there are great ideas and great books that could still be written. That's sort of not my point. Great new products can still be written for an old game. But it will still probably generate less sales than the product before it, as a variable independent from quality.

If what you are saying is correct, then should we expect that a D&D product life cycle for each new edition at this point is only 4 years or so? I have trouble accepting that - especially since Paizo is *still* going strong today - a year after WotC essentially stopped producing 3.5 stuff.

And yes, I realize Paizo is magnitudes smaller, but to me it means that the D&D brand is in the wrong hands if it can't sustain its acceptable profitability for more than 4 years.

 

[The_Gneech]

Not sure why you picked the number six, but regardless this is symptomatic of any class-based system, not just 4E.

Again, not necessarily. See my comments re: Saga Edition above. When the class is a building block, not a straightjacket, it makes all the difference in the world.

And the number six was pulled largely out of the air because I didn't want to make an exact inventory of the number of classes and sub-builds without a book handy to reference. Call it "a handful" if you prefer.

-The Gneech

 

[Fifth Element]

Again, not necessarily. See my comments re: Saga Edition above. When the class is a building block, not a straightjacket, it makes all the difference in the world.

But to extend your thought, you would have to conclude that OD&D is no good for roleplaying either. Because if you think 4E's classes are restrictive, you should see OD&D. But I think those who enjoy playing OD&D would vociferously disagree.

I used to play OD&D, and I certainly disagree.