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a player is not “stubborn” by playing a character that she wanted to play in the first place.

Certainly, but that's not what I'm saying here. You were speaking of a carbon copy of a character, not about playing the same class for a second character. There are dozens and dozens of ways in which you can play two different characters that would have the same tactical roles as far as combat is concerned. This is not playing a "carbon copy" of a character, to me.

Ah, but D&D isn’t real life, and isn’t a reality simulator.

Sure, but I'm not talking about "real life RPG" here. I'm talking about believability, suspension of disbelief, which is part of the interest/fun of playing an RPG in the first place. I'm speaking of the possibility of instant/random death making the game more believable and thus more fun to me.

You don't have to pull strawmen to disagree, you know? It's perfectly fine if you prefer your characters to die more sparsely, with deaths that wouldn't depend on a single decision or die roll. We just have two different levels of suspension of disbelief as far as death in a RPG is concerned.

I would be curious to see the proof about "many random scenarios being trackable". Kinda goes against the notion that they are random. Random death pretty much occurs from save-or-die effects.

This is probably a misunderstanding here, but that's not what I'm talking about either, here. When I say that random-death scenarios can in many cases be "traceable", I'm speaking of decisions of the players, of choices they made that have nothing to do with the rules per se. In other words, in many cases a player can avoid situations where SoD and instant deaths happen by being smart and make some cautious choices in the first place. Instant death still happens though. If it didn't happen, the game could potentially become a question of counting points and "using the rules right". That's a clear difference in feel for me between say AD&D and 4E, to me.

Also, do not forget that we're talking about a game where you can resurrect dead characters. Especially at mid-high levels, where most SoD effects pop up - that's obviously not a coincidence.

One thing is that the choices a player makes should have an impact on the game in some fashion, whether it’s the character or the outcome of the game, but those choices shouldn’t immediately lead to destruction: a player should have some chance to realize that a bad choice was made at the start and be able to alter it.

I think we're touching our real difference of opinion here. I don't think one has to provide chances to realize the choice was a bad choice after it was made, because part of the smarts of the game is to make right choices with the elements provided at some point or another.

I would much prefer adventures where you can smell, hear, see clues of what type of encounter is ahead of the PCs, and let the PCs make assumptions and prepare for this or that eventuality without the certainty of any outcome rather than just having the choice, then give the possibility to make another one just because "that's fair". It just makes any choice irrelevant to me: doesn't matter what you choose to do, you can always go back and do it differently. Not the way I like to play the game.

That's something that bothers me with 4E throughout, by the way, because this seems to be an underlying theme of the design, with things like, to give another example, "no sub-optimal choices" in character building. If there are no suboptimal choices, in the end, what I choose is just cosmetic. It doesn't really matter, because the outcome is always "balanced". Not the way I like to think of game mechanics.

And again, it's perfectly fine if you disagree. Just don't try to reformulate/caricature my opinions to make them say something you can ridicule, please.

PCs deaths are actually great role-playing events and opportunities (for victims and spectators) to take the game into new directions (by emotional role-playing, creation of new characters, giving NPC ammunition for the DM... and more).

This is the most common statement made by proponents of randomized death. I would prefer that a NPC dies and I get to avenge them as opposed to my character dying and I end up just making a carbon copy because I wanted to play a tiefling warlock.

The thing is, an NPC dying doesn't come anywhere close to a PC's death in terms of emotional involvement from the players around the table, at least IME.

As for the carbon copy thing: if a player is so stubborn as to want to play the same character with a different name, there's nothing stopping him/her from doing that, but that's precisely how you miss the opportunity presented by a character's death.

The majority of players I know actually welcome quirky randomness as something that moves things around and opens new horizons at the game table.

The majority of players I know dislike randomized death, as it mitigates the effectiveness of their choices and unfairly punishes them for no reason. I'm sorry that I used a CR 3 monster and you made a single bad roll that resulted in you being instantly killed! The lesson here is...I dunno, dont roll badly next time?
This is common knowledge if you take a game design course: dont randomly punish players. They should suffer from bad decisions, but it should rarely, if ever, just result in instant loss.

Random death happens. Not everything makes sense in real life, you know? The ability to re-create this kind of believable unpredictability is one of the ways we can differentiate lame fiction from good fiction, by the way.

Furthermore, in many random death scenarios happening in a RPG session, you can actually trace back strategic mistakes on the players' part. There are always lessons to be learned, like for instance not putting yourself in a situation where chance becomes a sine qua non condition for success.

I don't doubt that there are many players who dislike that kind of randomness, but I bet this is a vocal minority rather than a majority. Just my two cents.

Actually, since the designers went with this change, I think its more accurate to say that the minority are those who like the ability to randomly drop dead.

Yeah, that's why so many people are oh-so-happy with 4E right now, because the designers "know what's best for us", right? Right... I'm going to wait till I have a look through the final product before passing judgment on that one.

You don't have any proof of your statement, and I don't have any proof to back mine. Let's just agree to disagree on this.

I don't know the answer, but I think it's fair to say that a lot of players don't like "quirky randomness."

(...) I suppose this is part of 4e's problem with many long-time players. Having played D&D since well before computer games were widespread, I'm quite accustomed to the effects of the dice -- death can come at any time, and be lurking around any corner. Not only am I used to it, I prefer that style of play.

PCs deaths are actually great role-playing events and opportunities (for victims and spectators) to take the game into new directions (by emotional role-playing, creation of new characters, giving NPC ammunition for the DM... and more).

The majority of players I know actually welcome quirky randomness as something that moves things around and opens new horizons at the game table.

I don't doubt that there are many players who dislike that kind of randomness, but I bet this is a vocal minority rather than a majority. Just my two cents.

SirUrza wrote:

Vic, aren't you guys working on a way to put a logo on product that is compatible with PRPG though? :)

We are planning such a thing, but it will require compatibility with the finished RPG, so nobody will be able to use it until summer 2009.

Sorry for the noob question, but does that mean that third-party publishers will be able to contribute their own products to Pathfinder if properly licensed?

Will the Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting repeat (expand?) the information provided in the 64-page Pathfinder Chronicles Gazetteer, or are the contents completely different? Are they complementary?

The parcel idea is cool on a management point of view, but as many other aspects of 4E, it frames the DM's choices. This will surely come back to haunt many trying to run their home games.

If one ever chooses to give a different array of items and treasure, I can hear some players who have read the DMG (which is to say, most players of the game) whining they didn't get the "right" amount of treasure at this or that level.

It's cool to develop Quests as part of the rules themselves rather than an option that would throw off XP balance in the game.

The basic implication of handing Quests to PC (here: that's the direction you want to go) really brushes me the wrong way. That's not the type of gaming I like. I prefer to investigate on my own, to find out what's important and what's not by using my brains, rather than being told "this way's the right way to complete the adventure".

I'm perfectly aware this is still possible to play the way I like by not revealing quests to players. This is not the default assumption the excerpt suggests to new players of the game though.

This IMO frames the action field of a tabletop RPG for newbies to the game. It makes it feel more like the "follow the yellow brick road" logic of quest triggers in computer RPGs. I don't like that aspect of it.

The item's powers scaling with its level is a cool default addition to the core rules.

The 1/5 sell prices kind of shocked me. This is so low, one wonders if it wouldn't be better to pile up stuff just in case rather than selling or disenchanting items. That seems to counter the "less Christmas tree" intent of the new rules. *shrug*

Does this mean you have to be at GenCon to be part of Season 0?

Paizoians, I need your advice...

Is it possible for a lycan to become undead? More specifically, intelligent undead [Vampire, Lich]?

I would make it an incredibly rare occurrence similar to the existence of Abominations (Vampire Werewolves) in the Old World of Darkness. Most of the time, the embrace/contamination of a lycan by a vampire would result in death.

The Lich ritual performed on a lycan would automatically fail (inflicting curse upon curse willingly defeats the concept of utter damnation I would want to emphasize for the concept, IMO).

Basically, this allows you to come up with interesting villains without having some clear-cut definition PCs can exploit to their (unbalanced) advantage.

You could have all three variant forms with the Vampire template added. Or you could rule that the unholy combination results in an undead lycanthrope "stuck" in hybrid form. Would make it more monstrous -it's cool, fits the concept, and is easier to manage stats-wise.

I join the chorus of brains exploding, OMFG et cetera...

Seriously. The news of Monte getting involved just gave me a gamer-gasm.

Thank you, Monte Cook and Paizo Team for making this happen!

And if you took the opportunity of reading Worlds & Monsters... Shadowfell/Feywild/Elemental Chaos rock! They have enormous diversity and complexity inside them, rather than being a mere representation of a certain idea or alignment. You can make an entire campaign within each of them. I doubt anyone made an entire 3.5E campaign set on, for instance, Acheron, or Nirvana, or the Elemental Plane of Air, or the Para-Elemental Plane of Steam. Some planes received a bit more attention, like Nine Hells and the Abyss, but it seems that most planes were included for the sake of simmetry, not versatility.

No, I haven't read Worlds and Monsters for ethical reasons that have nothing to do with the topic (I don't pay for ads, basically).

I read and own all old and new World of Darkness games (which use really close concepts, if you know them), all the bits and pieces we've had for free, and I agree with you, Shadowfell/Feywild etc can certainly be awesome themselves, no question about it.

It's strange though, because I never considered any plane to be a "mere representation of an alignment". I sure would use some planes as center-pieces of an entire campaign. There's nothing I think I couldn't do there. Weird to me that you would think of this much broader multiverse as something of a limitation, really.

As to the wider argument Mike Mearls uses here: basically, what he says amounts to "people criticize 4E because they think the tradition of the game overrides any improvement of the fun, interest and enjoyment values the game provides."

This is a flawed argument, because it defines "fun", "interest" and "enjoyment" as objective values that you could objectively "improve" with alternate game designs.

This is inaccurate.

The truth of the matter lies in the way (the HOW) a game provides fun, interest and/or enjoyment to its users. The "HOW" is what truly matters here. Each and every player of the game enjoys different elements of the game itself. Of course, one can deduce some tendencies among a pool of users of the game, but there are always exceptions.

No Vancian magic, for instance, is not an objective way of making the game more fun. It makes the game more fun for the players who find the Vancian management of resources unfun to begin with. So this is a change that will cater to a particular type of user.

Any change introduced in a game can be determined as such (i.e. catering to particular users of the product who yearned for the change). This is why the notion of objective improvement of any game is flawed. "Improvements" are relative to the person considering said changes. It depends on the time, circumstances, and particular opinions of particular users when these changes are introduced.

My bottom line really is that different people find different aspects of a game "fun". Changing this or that mechanical element of a game is not an objective improvement in and of itself. It will make some users have more fun, and others will find the resulting game less fun.

That's what's happening here, as far as the game mechanics are concerned. WotC believes that the changes introduced cater to the majority of its costumers, and thus will improve the standing of the game as far as these customers are concerned. I hope they're right, as far as the revenues are concerned.

"There are no holes in the rules, because even if there is one, I can make something up."

Of course, the reasoning also works whenever 3rd edition (or any tabletop role-playing game really) is concerned. It's a moot argument, in and of itself.

Since it was brought up before, I'm curious as to what kinds of limitations people think that 4th Edition has over 3rd Edition in terms of storytelling.

Huge differences. The most important one being the shrinkage of the planes to the Shadowfell, Feywild etc. This takes off a great deal of variety and versatility in the name of straightforwardness. Same thing about the modifications of demons, angels and the like (which of course is linked to the modification of the structure of the planes).

The alignment consideration does affect countless D&D modules that were built around the concept of Good vs. Evil, Chaos vs. Law.

The modifications of the basic array of classes influences the types of NPCs any particular DM will imagine and put to use at his table.

The notion that creatures/NPCs and Player Characters do not work according to the same rules does have an effect on the storytelling as well by putting an emphasis of a psychological "us" and "them" attitude in meta-game. There's us, PCs, then the rest of the world around us.

The lesser lethality of the system affects the storytelling of course, as well as the power sources, at-will powers and such, which make for a "higher" default fantasy game.

The limitations on multiclassing compared to 3rd edition influence the feel of the character in the game (like any mechanical change would, in any case) and how a player represents his alter ego in his/her own mind, since what it does and can do are handled differently by the game mechanics. Here, for instance, I'm not a fighter-thief. I'm either a fighter dabbling in roguish ways, or a rogue with a some modicum of a fighter training.

There is more, of course, but these examples should give an idea as to the impact of the changes on the game itself that would make some think it is more limited with 4E.

I think that its one of 4E's greatest strengths is that they are setting out to make D&D that isnt a rehash of what we've already been playing. I mean, if people want the old D&D reloaded, they already have 3rd Edition. I think they retain a lot of the good concepts and story about elves, dwarves, and whatnot, but arent religiously adhering to the old stuff when they dont think they should be.

Basically, if you want 1000 year elves, Great Wheel, and the other sacred cows, you have 3rd Edition.

You've got a point.

Some would object, however, that if you make another RPG that isn't based on the D&D tropes, then you can do so by just not calling it "D&D" (the reason WotC doesn't do this is because of the IP's value, i.e. the revenue it generates by name only).

One could add, moreover, that there are already zillions of fantasy tabletop RPGs exploring many, many different ways of playing these kinds of games (WFRP, RuneQuest, all OGL variants out there, RoleMaster, Exalted, LOTR RPG, Cadwallon, GURPS Fantasy and so many, many others). If you're making a "new" version of D&D, then you might as well stick to D&D's core assumptions and history.

No, really. 4E doesn't come out to make a "better game", nor is it coming to build "something different", just for the sake of it. It's coming out for bottom-line reasons for WotC. Revenues. Marketing.

After, anyone's free to like the changes or not.

Having now played the game I can honestly tell you that it may not be as lethal as 3e but you can still kill PCs quite easily.

We are dotted of a great human gift called "empathy". Maybe we could avoid zillions of arguments if we used it to understand what people actually mean rather than how they write it.

That would be, IMHO, a great deal more constructive than bickering about paraphrases, how this or that word is defined in a dictionary, and whether the intent of a previous poster is nefarious, ignorant, stupid or not.

When people say that "4E is not lethal", what they really mean, for instance, is that really 4E is less lethal than 3E/previous editions of the game. Which you just confirm here.

After, whether that is something that hurts the feel of the game for one particular player is something totally subjective. That's something you might not experience yourself, but that is undeniable as a fact as it relates to the player feeling that way.

4e takes the lessons of the body of fantasy gaming knowledge collected over the past 35 years and applies them. PRPG/3.5 does not. (...)

It's not a competition, really.

I smell contradiction here.

Why compare one and the other, and pretend one is such a "powerful improvement"* over the other, if you don't think there's some sort of competition between the two?

I personally think there is no competition. PRPG/3E and 4E are based on radically different design principles. They will therefore each attract their own audiences, with the occasional gamer who happens to enjoy changes of pace and likes both.

Pretending that Paizo is going after WotC or trying to compete against 4E couldn't be farther from the truth, really.

* PS: the notion of "improvement" of game mechanics is ludicrous, really. The audience of a game like D&D changes over time. There are also marketing decisions influencing the design as far as the target audience is concerned. What we have here is an attempt to adapt a game to new targets. It's not "better" or "worse". 4E is deemed necessary by WotC because the needs and interests of current users change first, because of marketing patterns in the industry second (multiple editions to keep selling core books over time) and because the company tries to adapt to the demands of the market (and thus tries to cater to potential new targets) third. Any reason put forward speaking of "improvement" and "coolness" of the new system is just marketing placement for the product. Let's smell the coffee, here.

I don't fear that 3.p will be too "4e-ish".

When it comes to the rogue, I am in favour of a completely "magic-less" rogue.

Agreed. I don't feel anybody's talking about PF being "like 4E". Rogue and Wizards share a good synergy in the original system. I feel, however, that there are ways to make the Rogue "more Roguish" without resorting to magical abilities and such.

Using a Luck rating like the Book of Roguish Luck for instance with abilities powered by it would just be one of many potential variants. Maneuvers and acrobatics, possible Merchant specializations... tons of others are possible.

I guess what I'm trying to say is: a rogue is a rogue. If I want to play a Wizard, I play a Wizard and may multiclass/PrC to provide me with the concept I desire.

I'd largely prefer to provide the Rogue with more roguish options rather than flash-bang abilities.

I'd love to see a Pathfinder Starter Set eventually. Great way to bring new and young players into the game.

If it's self-sufficient (i.e. with complete rules, contrarily to WotC's 3.X starter sets), simple and affordable, I would seriously consider getting Starter Sets for little nephews and cousins, personally.

A "basic boxed set" for Pathfinder? That'd be awesome.

My understanding is that the SRD is OGL, and the epic rules are in the SRD which has made my efforts to rebalance them much easier.

Man, this is correct. My apologies for the inaccuracy there.

For some time, I've been wondering if D&D was truly "D&D". I defined the latter as a complementarity of characters, a search for treasures and accomplishments, a management of resources... lots of things.

The more I read about 4E, the more I believe it is "D&D".

Is it the "D&D" I want to play, though?

And there, we are stepping away from any reasoned argument towards personal definitions and experiences of what "D&D" may mean to one or the other.

One definition is not better than the other, much like one gaming experience is no better than another.

We are gamers. We make different choices based not on what is mechanically "sound" or not, but on what we like, feel we are able to use and tweak, or not.

D&D 4E does not seem to be the "D&D" I want to keep playing. But others may make a different choice. And it may still be "D&D".

The bottom line here is that we may not agree on WotC's choices, modus operandi, PR, ways of belittling previous editions of the games, its fans, and so on, so forth, but this has nothing to do with the actual mechanics of the game and whether it "feels like D&D" or not.

Let's separate experiences and opinions from ethical disagreements with WotC. That's what I mean. And before anyone asks, yes, I anticipate to stay with 3.X, PRPG, whatever OGL material is out there, for a long, long time.

Maybe this article help shed a little light.

Click Me

Unlike Chris Pramas, I do not think that the conclusion to be drawn is "fairly positive overall", but his analysis is totally on the spot.

It deserves a QFT. Read this link!

By "fantasy" I assume here you meant "medieval fantasy" or close to that.

It really depends on the type of system and universe you want. Many do their job extremely well.

If you want something close to 3.X in complexity and versatility, you can go with Rolemaster. It's actually one of the systems that inspired 3E (since Monte Cook worked on it extensively before working for TSR).

If you want some Dark Fantasy, you can go with Stormbringer for the epic aspects it provides, or Cthulhu Dark Ages if you want something even more horrific and mundane/historical.

If you want to go full speed ahead with fantasy, magic, faeries but still want some believability to it, Ars Magica is a great change of pace.

If you want myth, if you want a full-fledged world with a nearly unmatched depth to it, you go for RuneQuest with Glorantha for a setting. If you want steampunk style fantasy with an epic sound to it, you go for RuneQuest/Hawkmoon.

The list could go on and on. Really. There are many great games out there.

I hope Pathfinder RPG proposes some rules for "epic" levels. I do not want it to use the Epic Level Handbook rules, however (regardless of the fact these aren't OGL). These suck. Royally.

I would rather look at what Monte did with Arcana Evolved and levels above 20, for instance, for inspiration on that regard. Something that develops the capacities of 20+ level characters based on the base rules principles rather than create a whole new paradigm for them.

If they make high level play easier to run and manage, there's no reason not to go the whole nine yards and go for simpler, more coherent rules for epic level play. That's my hope, anyway.

I do not plan to switch to 4E as my main gaming system (3.X OGL is my way) but yes, I have preordered the core books.

The OGL cannot run out. The OGL is perpetual, i.e. eternal. Wizards cannot scrap, erase, forbid to use, modify etc the OGL itself (important nuance, see penultimate paragraph).

They can, however, modify and/or delete the d20 System License, which allows you to use the d20 logo, which they are doing.

They can also prohibit the use of the OGL along with a new license they would be making available to the public. Which they are, through the 4E GSL. Smart marketing move at first glance, but I don't think anybody's fooled by this and sees it -rightfully- as an attempt to strangle any OGL competition to 4E some publishers on the fence would like to keep producing.

Instead of making the OGL a potential ally and booster of 4E and GSL sales, they're making it (or confirming it as) an opposite, a potential foe. That may not be so good as they think it is.

Anyone any experience running Runequest or incorporating elements of it into D&D? I'm intrigued by Glorantha and the mythological/metaphysical elements of the setting.

You know the details of the skill-based Basic system, so I won't go into that.

Glorantha, to put it mildly, is to tabletop role-playing games what Middle-earth is to fiction. It is easily one of the most detailed, mythical, coherent fantasy worlds out there. It's pure bliss.

Magic permeates everything, but it isn't the superhero, flash-bang kind of magic a D&D player is accustomed to. Or rather, it doesn't have to be. Ever read stuff like Joseph Campbell, Hero with a Thousand Faces and such? Well, you've got an entire fantasy world that's built around a love of mythologies and spiritual traditions. I should mention that Greg Stafford, the creator and main author of Glorantha, is a real-life Shaman.

Everything makes sense in Glorantha, and nothing really feels too "earthly". It has a life or its own. It's epic, but it allows for characters to be as mundane as you'd like to raise to the highest heroic destinies you could imagine.

... it's just awesome. You should learn more about it. Really.

Post Scriptum: building a d20 variant of Glorantha seems perfectly feasible. Using Gods, Myths, magical or even geographical/historical elements of the world in a D&D context seem totally feasible as well.

The newest information about 4E has changed my mind to some extent: it made me more curious about the details of the system. So I'm going to pick up the core rulebooks (I was not inclined to do it at first, since I am totally, morally opposed to WotC's management, PR, motivations, marketing and modus operandi regarding the whole thing. But this doesn't address the system itself, which may have its own merits. Since there are aspects of the design I may be opposed to as well, I feel it is not fair to the designers to criticize without knowing what I'm talking about, i.e. reading through the system at the very least).

All the information we've got has not changed my mind about switching systems though. I will keep on playing 3.X, PRPG, whatever you want to call it.

I spent time (and efforts, and money) to master the system. Now that I do, I intend to have more fun than ever with it. I may play 4E occasionally, who knows, but I expect to run Third Edition variants for a long, long time. Not to mention that my gaming dollar goes mostly to Pathfinder these days.

Hence my vote: "No - I was planning on staying with 3.5 and still expect to".

My point is that there's never been this "either/or" between the two editions that led to so many flame wars. I hope to play both in the same way I plan to play M&M, Iron Gauntlets, BRP, etc. I see both 3.x and 4E to be fun and don't see any reason -- short of the lack of players and groups -- to limit myself.

Aside from any emotional, ethic or moral belief that would affect my behavior as a customer, I totally agree with this. I don't know if the "either/or" existed before (maybe OD&D versus AD&D?), but I think the dichotomy can be clearly seen in this instance (which again, does not have to automatically polarize gamers on one side or the other - some can enjoy both - but I guess that the real objections from one side of the argument or the other are more ethical than one would first believe).

In fact, the DM is encouraged to allow the players to come up with creative uses of skills that he hasn't predicted himself.

If this is specifically worded in the Skills Challenges chapter of the DMG, then this defeats the potential scripting of dialogs or lack/railroad thereof in encounters. Awesome.

I certainly hope this will be part of the text.

Otherwise my objection to this type of mechanic would still stand. We'll see!

PS: I'm not criticizing the use of Skill checks in social encounters. I hope everyone understands this (I let players role-play at my game table, then ask them to roll something relevant, sometimes, adding/substracting RP modifiers as I see fit from my side of the screen, as DM). There seems to be a doubt when I read some posts: what I'm specifically concerned about is the possible scripting of how one has to role-play during an encounter by using this or that roll instead. How this concept here will turn out at the game table in practice.

The Negotiation
The duke sits at the head of his banquet table. Gesturing with a wine glass, he bids you to sit. “I’m told you have news from the borderlands.”

Failure: The characters are forced to act without the NPC’s assistance. They encounter more trouble, which may be sent by the NPC out of anger or antagonism.

I find really surprising that nobody pointed out the type of scripting of encounters this seems to suppose. In other words, how does one think this will be actually played out at the game table?

I roleplay my character so that I clearly use Diplomacy. I roleplay well and succeed my check. This unlocks the possible History check. How is that played at the table? The Game Master interrupts my RP and tells me "See now, you have the choice between going on with your line of thought, or you could make a historical allusion blabla". How am I supposed to know what historical reference to do in RP without the GM telling me what to say, or passing notes around the table, et cetera?

This is basically scripting the conversation and how it unfolds, UNLESS nothing about the encounter is written in advance and the DM builds it AS it unfolds: letting the RP flow naturally and the GM saying "you say that? Ok, make [this] check. Now [that] check" which is contrary to the intent of a design of the encounter prior to the game.

The answer to the dilemma will most certainly be that beyond the first check, the dialogs will actually not be role-played at all, because this makes this whole dialog management issue a lot easier on everyone.

No dialog, no practical problem.

Hence, less choices in the role-play, or less role-playing altogether.

Conclusion: I see this as a good idea with a terrible implementation so far. Maybe it'll turn out to be much better in the actual finished product. Who knows?

4E seems like it's going to be simpler to manage, especially at higher levels, but there is a price to pay for that: mainly, this means that, in some instances, the system becomes less universal and less versatile - Multiclassing, compartmentalization of PC builds vs. monsters and NPCs (not built with the same rules), and so on, so forth.

3E (and thus Pathfinder RPG) and 4E really cater to different types of audiences. Versatility and complexity seem to go for 3E, Straightforwardness and rigidity for 4E. In most instances at least. Or if you will, you choose between simple/rigid or complex/versatile.

If Paizo sticks to 3E, drawing some inspiration from 4E is a good idea, so long as the core differences remain (same rules for PCs and NPCs, Saving Throws remain as they are, Prestige Classes, Templates exist, etc).

It is not a good idea, however, to make Pathfinder be so similar to 4E as to be based on the same principles/premises. In that case, 4E is sure to "win", in terms of usability.