When did I stop being WotC's target audience?

[Vyvyan Basterd]

1) And one big effect that Perform (Haiku) had in 3e if I was a fighter was that I could roll to see how well I did, and have a "mortal baseline" to compare it against.

2) I could challenge wandering minstrels to Haiku contests in exchange for precious information.

3) I could roll well and deliver a well-crafted Haiku in the presence of the suspicious baron who thinks that all adventurers are trashy vagabonds who make a mess.

4) And if I multiclassed into Bard, I could use it for my Bardic Music.

5) And if it was a big part of my character, maybe my DM and I could synch up on some Haikunomancer PrC that helped me multiclass Bard and Fighter without being too gimped.

6) I could gain (and quest for!) several Perform or Cha-enhancing magic items, many of which I could use with much more skill than any other fighter.

7) But perhaps the most significant thing I could do with Perform (Haiku) in 3e that I can't do out-of-the-box in 4e is actually have and use a Perform (Haiku) skill.

8) 3e's system might not have been amazing, but, compared to 4e's system, it gets the job done better.

1) I would inform you as a player in my game that your ability to perform haikus is covered as a Cha check. If you wrote a solid background that incorporated the use of haikus in an interesting way I would give you anywhere between a +2 to +5 bonus depending on their imporatance in your background. I couldn't have done this in 3E without you having to devote one of your two skill points to Perform (haiku) or you would have never improved in your haiku-spouting.

2) Goal: Gather information. You would use an appropriate skill to gather the information. By tying the skill into an important piece of your background under appropriate circumstances I would give you a +2 bonus to your roll.

3) Goal: Diplomacy (or Bluff if you really are trashy vagabonds). Again with a possible +2.

4) I specified Fighter, not Bard.

5) You could co-develop a Paragon Path and/or Epic Destiny based on haikus with me.

6) Most published 3E magic items that required perform skills required a specific one. I feel safe saying that Perform (haiku) was not a requirement of any published one. So, you and your DM would have to develop one. We could do the same in 4E.

7) See #1.

8) We obviously disagree.

Now to answer my own question:

I would have my fighter spout haikus in battle to try to demoralize enemies. I'd want my enemies to wonder who this wacko is spouting ominous poetry in the midst of warfare.

Goal: Initimidation. I'd tie my haikus into my skill to initmidate.

 

[Psion]

Just checked my post and
noticed I quoted the wrong post.
My apologies.

Not a haiku!

 

[Fifth Element]

Not a haiku!

Oh, but so close and unintentional at that.

Just checked my post and
saw I quoted the wrong post
my apologies.

 

[firesnakearies]

And there was very little we disliked about 3e. At first. With the more interesting combats came more complication. A lot more complication. There were SO many different options that it took hours to make characters. We had to search through 10 different books for feats, for spells, for new weapons, for PrC, and so on. We had to consider each level completely separately since 9th level might be better to be taken as a Fighter level, followed by a Rogue level at 10 and a PrC at level 11. And rules worked together in weird, unforeseen ways. If you allowed a player to get the Dark template from one book, suddenly he was able to Hide in Plain Sight, allowing him to essentially stay invisible continuously with no way of stopping it. He got sneak attacks on every one of his attacks(Or did he? Does hiding go away after you attack even if it is in plain sight? What if someone has Darkvision so there was no concealment for darkness? And how did that work with other classes powers and some PrC powers and some feats? And...so on).

It started causing some other problems. Now that the game was more balanced, we started noticing the imbalances. Wizards are too powerful, Clerics are way too powerful, Bards suck. Frenzied Berzerkers could outperform most other characters.

Creating a monster that could challenge PCs who spent 6-7 hours making up their characters was difficult. You needed to pick and choose feats just as carefully as they did. You needed to spend 6-7 hours making a monster to counter it. And the monster would still die in 2 rounds of combat. Also, players could come up with spells that would completely bypass all the interesting challenges I'd come up for them. They'd use Scrye and Teleport in order to skip 6 encounters I had carefully planned. They'd use Dispel Magic to disable an interesting magic trap instead of solving the puzzle I planned.

So I stopped writing adventures. I would only run published adventures, since I no longer wanted to do that amount of work for so little payoff. Only there were still problems with that. Whenever a monster had spell-like abilities, I'd need to have the full text of those powers memorized or I'd have to look them up at the table. Otherwise, if I tried to work from memory, my players would notice. I'd forget the range of Dispel Magic or I'd forget that the area version only effects one spell on each target in the area. I'd forget SOMETHING and have my players remind me. Since their pool of knowledge amongst the 5 of them was greater than mine. I'd need to know what all the feats in the game did since the monster could have any of them. I'd often forget what one did and just not use it to avoid slowing down the game. Then find out afterwords that without the feat, the monster was a lot less powerful.

I really missed the ability to improvise. If I attempted to add a unique magic trap to the game to provide a bit of a change of pace, my players would be wondering why they can't Dispel it, why they can't just teleport to the other side, why their special ability didn't seem to stop it, how someone could build a trap like that when it seemed more powerful than 9th level spells, how someone could afford to make an epic spell that did it and why would an epic level wizard be creating traps in the first place. The game was consistent, the rules were the same for players and monsters, so if the players had to be 26th level and pay 2.7 million gp in order to create a trap, so did the monsters or NPCs. If Dispel Magic could dispel an effect, it had to work on ALL effects, not just ones the DM wanted the PCs to pass that easily. If a spell didn't exist for something, then it couldn't be done(or at least it couldn't be done without complaining from my players who thought it was unfair that NPCs had spells that they didn't).

I took so many steps to speed up combat because each round was an exercise in math. Which effects ran out this round? What effects were added this round? How does my increase of strength increase my to hit and damage? Did you remember the Righteous Wrath of the Faithful, Bard Song, Prayer, Heroes Feast, Bull's Strength, Bless, and Marshal Aura? What does that make the total modifier on your attacks? Which ones stack?

This.


I started with Basic D&D and 2nd edition AD&D, and I liked them, but even at the time, I felt that they were pretty flawed and messy.

When 3rd edition came out, I was astounded and amazed and in love. I wanted to kiss everyone at Wizards of the Coast, I was calling them geniuses and gods. (And prior to this, I was a big-time WotC hater, having always despised Magic and feeling like they were a bad thing for D&D.)

3.5 also made me really happy. I remember the day I got my 3.5 core books, and I just spent all day looking through them with awe and glee. What a perfect, elegant, wonderful system! The best ever, made EVEN BETTER!

And it was, at low levels. And at mid levels. And at ANY level, really, if you were PCing. But it was when I finally got to the point where I was DMing high-level 3.5 play that I began to really feel bogged down by the system, and ultimately stopped playing.

4E has rejuvenated my interest in D&D again, and seems, thus far, to have done away with most, if not all, of the logistical nightmares which high-level 3.5 D&D play presented. All of the things that Majoru Oakheart stated are exactly the issues and feelings that I struggled with eventually when DMing the previous edition.

4th edition isn't perfect, and there are things I'll probably tweak and house rule, but I'm as amazed and impressed at how it managed to smooth out some of the big, glaring obstacles to fun from the prior edition as I was when 3.0 did the same thing compared to 2nd edition.

 

[Shroomy]

I would inform you as a player in my game that your ability to perform haikus is covered as a Cha check. If you wrote a solid background that incorporated the use of haikus in an interesting way I would give you anywhere between a +2 to +5 bonus depending on their imporatance in your background. I couldn't have done this in 3E without you having to devote one of your two skill points to Perform (haiku) or you would have never improved in your haiku-spouting.

I would also allow an Int-based check (or maybe a Dex-based check for performing a musical instrument) in this type of situation, my point being that a narrative (DMG p11) and ability check (DMG pg 42) based system IMO is much more flexible and conducive to mechanically modelling non-combat abilities not directly covered by the rules than a nebulous set of skills tied to a specific attribute (for example, I've met many people who were very skilled at building things but who were complete idiots). In addition to 4e ability checks with a +2/-2 circumstance modifier, the three tier DCs, while not unique to 4e, also adds an additional level of detail that can mechanically model these situations (at 1st level, sitting around the fire coming up with haikus DC 5, trying to impress a girl DC 10, trying to win a poetry contest DC 15, etc.).

 

[MichaelSomething]

Call me a believer in the Free Market System. As long as WOTC gives people what they want, then they'll get customers. If no one was buying this stuff, would WOTC keep making it?

My opinion on the subject matters little since I tend not to buy a lot. I only get stuff I will use. It also helps that I game with people who tend to buy a lot of the splats.

Also, I can fork threads too!

 

[firesnakearies]

1. It is possible for a duck to be useful.
2. One can imagine a situation where a duck could be more useful than a map or a tire guage or a flashlight.
3. Therefore you should always have a duck in your glove box.

Ahahaha! Awesome. This made me happy, sir.

 

[Andor]

Te question this thread makes me ponder is: What is it about 4e that makes me dislike it?

It's not the 1-1-1 movement, I could are less.

It's not Dragonborn and tieflings although they do move the look-and-feel away from D&D as we knew it.

It is I think two things:

1) The characters experience never changes. This is the 'sweet spot' effet and was a deliberate design goal of 4e. But... the 'hero's journey' has always been about growth and change. The hero starts off a normal dude, maybe marked by destiny, maybe with a funny birthmark, but still a farm boy. Then he grows into a hero and does great deeds and experiences great victories and losses. And when he has ahieved greatness his role changes again and he becomes a leader or a teacher. - And this is what 4e takes away from the characters in pursuit of the 'sweet spot'.

2) Character classes in D&D have always varied wildly. Some had fixed abilities or limited choices (1e fighter, 3e Barbarian), some had weird and wacky abilities (1e and 3e monk), Some had awesome magical might and flexibility (1e wizard, 3e cleric). Now character classes are a fixed set of slotted silos. So many at-will, encounter, daily and utility powers. For everyone. Always. Sure the stuff in the slots varies somewhat within the limits of role and holy balance, but ... I think for me not having a range of 'class work loads' to choose from was one sacred cow too many.

just my 2¢.

 

[MrMyth]

1) The characters experience never changes. This is the 'sweet spot' effet and was a deliberate design goal of 4e. But... the 'hero's journey' has always been about growth and change. The hero starts off a normal dude, maybe marked by destiny, maybe with a funny birthmark, but still a farm boy. Then he grows into a hero and does great deeds and experiences great victories and losses. And when he has ahieved greatness his role changes again and he becomes a leader or a teacher. - And this is what 4e takes away from the characters in pursuit of the 'sweet spot'.

I think you are juxtaposing a mechanical 'sweet spot' with a thematic one.

My characters in third edition didn't transcend into advisors and leaders as they left the sweet spot - they transcended into combat slowing machines with complicated abilities or instant kill switches. If they did transcend into leaders or advisors, it wasn't due to any rule mechanics, but due to the story, the plot, the adventure itself.

4E may have shifted the 'sweet spot' to cover all levels, but that has nothing to do with a character's ability to progress through a story and grow as a character. Indeed, the game actually emphasizes that more than ever, with the progression from Heroic to Paragon to Epic tier.

Now, I'll concede that 4E does take a step back from the 'starting point' of characters as farm boys who might be a hero one day, or might die to the next orc they meet on the road. And, yes, that is going to be an area of preference from player to player, so that is a perfectly valid reason to prefer 3rd Edition to 4E. But I think claiming that making the game mechanically functional at all levels of play also removes any possible character development or growth... is a pretty absurd claim, just about any way I look at it.

If the character's experience isn't changing, that isn't due to the system, but the DM, the adventure, and the players themselves.

 

[The Little Raven]

The hero starts off a normal dude, maybe marked by destiny, maybe with a funny birthmark, but still a farm boy.

So, you started out as a farm boy... who was proficient in every type of armor and every martial weapon on the planet? A normal guy is able to pick up nearly any kind of axe, sword, bow, or polearm and use it with equal proficiency, despite having spent his young life farming corn? A kid who chases chickens and somehow knows the proper way to dress in and wear plate armor?

0-level, or maybe that apprentice-level stuff from 3e, is much closer to being a normal guy or farm boy. But when a 1st-level "farm boy" begins with more martial weapon training than a well-trained modern martial artist, or the ability to throw fire from his hands or mend wounds with a prayer, he's not really "just a farm boy."