Steely Dan said:
Cause I got nowhere else to go! *in the voice of Richard Gere*
In every class, there's always one joker who thinks that he's smarter than me. In this class, that happens to be you. Isn't it, Mayonnaise?
Taking Rel's comment above to heart:
I absolutely despise splatbooks and rule bloat, but often the first iteration of a game system has some intriguing and wonderful ideas. In many cases, I've been adopting what I've heard about 4E to my homebrew game... 1 square diagonal movement, consolidation of skills... There is certainly a lot of good things going on with the design of 4E. I am here to see what those ideas are and listen to the participation.
I am more interested in what the dissenters have to say, as they often have very useful counterpoints to the proposed 4E changes from a design perspective. 4E is supposed to make combat go faster, but the rules for dying certainly don't appear any easier to me. Giving each character a huge number of abilities also does not seem to simplify combat. Some posters here have talked about alternate systems in which combat is resolved by a single skill roll... while that is too simple for me, I am very interested in alternatives.
I don't have access to a FLGS, so if I am interested in discussions of game design philosophy, this seems to be the best place to get it. I managed to go through 3E buying only the core rules. I am actually very likely to buy the core rules for 4E, just to see things firsthand instead of second hand.
What I absolutely will NOT do is buy supplements or the Digital D&D. My fear is that the system will have a built in requirement that you must continue to purchase add-ons to play the game. In the past this was accomplished by power creep. I am not sure what plans WoTC will use to insure future sales, but perhaps I will be forewarned if I continue to read these forums.
I am aware that WoTC has assured people that the digital initiative is not necessary, I haven't actually heard anyone come out and say that the first 3 books would be complete... in fact, it sounds more like the yearly PHB2, MM2, DMG2 are going to be necessary. For a recent example, look at Sinister Spire reviewed by Marmell and Cordell: I haven't actually bought it but I've read the reviews on Enworld. It would appear to be a stand-alone adventure, but it actually seems to be VERY tied to the previous adventure in the series, and it seems to assume that you already own and are familiar with the various monster supplements. This greatly concerns me... that 4E may continue on this path with product tie-ins that heavy-handedly encourage you to continue purchasing more of their products.
