My gaming group has been playing 4e for a better part of a month or two and its fair time to write an opinion on the game. In short, 4e is starkly different than previous renditions. It can be stated that there are competitive games on the market that are now closer to D&D’s original roots than 4e is. That’s not to say its bad, just that its different. I’ll spare the in-depth and detailed analysis for others, just to say that this rendition, in my eyes, is no better than 3.5. Both versions have inherent strengths and weaknesses. In the end, it’s a wash; and if it’s a wash, why abandon the investment of the previous edition for a lateral move?
The biggest hang-up of this edition is the ridiculously long combats, even at the lowest levels. UUggghhhhhhh – make it stop!!! The official Wizards videocast of a 45 minute-long edited battle should have tipped us off to what was to come.
We played last Friday, and we invited the DM’s daughter to play with us. She’s 12 years old, plays DDR, has a chic cell phone…i.e. nothing out of the ordinary. She was skeptical of playing the game from the onset. Here’s her comments during gameplay (in chronological order):
“This is tiring.
Is this fun?
This fight is too long.
This game never ends.
Why is it I only get two options?
When are we gonna be done?
It’s been fun.”
Now, in defense of the game system, she did stick it out and play the entire session. I think we are going to continue playing 4e through 2008 and a portion of 2009. The group considers going back to 3.5 a better option than Iron Heroes, and haven’t really considered Pathfinder. In light of these events, we will be playing a home-brewed fantasy game now in production some time in 2009.
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The biggest hang-up of this edition is the ridiculously long combats, even at the lowest levels. UUggghhhhhhh – make it stop!!!
My question for you, because I have not had the opportunity to play 4E as much as I would have liked, is ... do the battles get LONGER as you level up, or does the timing remain about the same? I would expect as the lethality of the attacks vs. the increased efficiency of the defense would leave the timing about the same across the board, regardless of the level played at, but what has been your experience?
Aside from the negatives, what do you LIKE about 4E that's grown on you over time as a must-keep?
Thanks!
I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.
And really, combat hasn't taken that long in my experience. My groups have been able to get through roughly 3-5 encounters per game, which is just slightly higher than the number they usually got through in D&D 3.5.
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I find in 4e that our group may get through 2-3 encounters, and maybe a skill challenge or 2 through a session. This is slightly less than I found in 3.5. The battle seem to be taking a long time, and we are all used to the rules.
Is it a fun game to play? You bet. Is it easier to DM? oh yes, which is great for a guy like me. Does it take away from the roleplaying? Not that I have seen in the slightest, although I do miss my profession sailor:(
I think it is a good system, although I cannot say anything about high level as my group is all level 4 and close to 5. I haven't actually played more than one session as a PC.
Thats just my quick 2cp
I have a similiar but different question to what was posted earlier in this thread...
If you have played 4th Edition and originally liked it but have already moved on, what elements ultimately moved you away from it?
This is why I ask... I personally hate 4th edition (sorry) but I have to have the books and study the game (painful task for me) for side profession reasons. I'm a Pathfinder player but a multiplatform game designer in the freelance market. One of my publishers wanted me to get the core books so thus I have... I hate a great deal about the game itself so I don't have a particular bias for any singular aspect of 4th... but I understand that there are quite a few gamers that simply love the new edition.
A friend of mine and his fellow gamers started playing 4th when it came out... one of the gamers was really into 4th and liked it a whole lot... now, a little more than a couple of months later, this friend told me that they are already abandoning it and going with Pathfinder instead.... I've not had the chance to fully find out what burned them out so fast beyond the jokes that you can do most anything in the game and heal as a result (pass wind... healing surge for 2 points, jump up and clap your hands, heal for 1... that sort of thing.... pick nose.. heal for 5 points.... okay, I promise to stop)
Seriously though, I'm still vague as to what ultimately turned them away.
In your honest opinion, and I'm open to all input and promise not to get all anti-4th ravenous in response, I would sincerely like to know the things that pro-4th edition gamers that play 4th edition don't like about the edition, and what they think the ultimate weak points are...
so that I can avoid or repair those elements (if possible) in future game design ventures.
Polaris very succinctly brought up some of the various reasons why I didn't care much for 4e the times I played it. I'll admit first to being vehemently against 4e long before it came out (mainly due to how rudely I was treated by some WotC people). Then as time passed I just stopped worrying about it and realized that I might as well check it out.
Good Points
-Character Creation (very quick now)
I am seriously trying to think of something else.
Bad Points
-Combat was not really any faster (in my experience), even with Minions.
-Polaris' points about variety. That struck me rather fast and was the main deal-breaker. I like my wizards different thank you.
-Some very odd abilities for character classes. Like 'Blinding Barrage' for the Rogue. What exactly is this? An explosion of confetti or something? I don't like how a lot of classes are getting very mystical 'Special Attack' type maneuvers with no explanation.
Anyhow, I've run out of steam on this for now. For the record, I don't think 4e is a bad game, but I do think that the simplified character generation and system encourages more casual playing. This is fine in and of itself, but that also encourages more 'casual' characters. I.e. Character with less substance and depth. As someone who likes very heavy roleplay, this trend discouraged me.
Note that I am not saying the system can't be roleplayed in, just that the way the system is set up 'encourages' less roleplay and requires a great deal less investiture in the characters as they are generated. Those of you out there with good roleplaying groups who like 4e, thats great, but I still see this trend.
Thanks,
Yasha
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My question for you, because I have not had the opportunity to play 4E as much as I would have liked, is ... do the battles get LONGER as you level up, or does the timing remain about the same? I would expect as the lethality of the attacks vs. the increased efficiency of the defense would leave the timing about the same across the board, regardless of the level played at, but what has been your experience?
Looking at the various numbers, even in low level play, I think it is clear that lethality of PC powers does not increase as fast as monster hit points.
Combined with the chance of hitting remaining highly static, that would suggest that combats become longer as levels increase.I have too little interest in 4E to bother testing this, but a person in one of my gaming groups who is interested in 4E and has looked at building characters agrees with that general analysis. I expect the best way to test it would be to simply create some 20th level groups and run through a few encounters.
I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.
And really, combat hasn't taken that long in my experience. My groups have been able to get through roughly 3-5 encounters per game, which is just slightly higher than the number they usually got through in D&D 3.5.
If the combats are taking longer than you like, bring the HP's down. The DM decides how many HP's, what Attack bonus is, what Damage is etc...he runs the game, not WOTC.
I have been running True20 games, and other variation rules and have actively changed the rules, ignored some, added new to make the game more fun and flowing.The player says 'can I draw out a dagger and still attack in a charge' asks a player 'Yes you can' I answere but you need to make a Reflex Save DC 15 to do it because you havn't got quickdraw. If the same character tries to do the same thing a level on but draw a greatsword I'll set the DC to 30.
The rules are yours, use them, change them to fit the game YOU WANT. WOTC aren't Microsoft!!!
I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.
No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.
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I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.
Disagree. It is that age-group that WotC need to create their next generation of players from. I started at age 11, and I'm of the opinion that WotC missed a trick in not splitting the 4ed books out along the tiers of play, similar to how the old coloured boxed sets used to be. 10$ for levels 1-10 of the PHB makes it an easy impulse buy.
WotC certainly need to do something to get new players after alienating a lot of the old guard who just used to collect everything they put out. Especially the FR fans after they gutted the setting, killed all the existing characters, jumped 100 years forward and make a boatload of arbitrary changes the the cosmology and feel of the setting. There are a lot of good tales that the authors and designers had saved up that will never see the light of day now because they would conflict with 4ed canon.
Currently looking at giving my players their FR fix using Pathfinder and/or Fantasycraft (from Crafty Games).
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As some posters before me I agree with Polaris' evaluation.
There seem to be a lot of choices. But the synergies of Class Abilities, Powers, Feats/Skills and Equipment makes for a very narrow path in which you can create a PC that works an can use all of its abilities.
In 3rd edition we had a lot more real choices to create working PCs. Of course a lot of these choices were sub-optimal and could create a PC that was sub-par powerwise to other PCs of the same rcae and/or Class.
Nontheless I think 4th is a good game. Due to the straight path my PC has to take to be effective (I play a 2 handed weapon fighter with a heavy maul*) I can concentrate much more on RP and do not have to worry about Feat choices, Multi- or PRClassing.
*I had to take this combination due to my good STR and CON and average DEX.
My experience has not been that combat is really any faster - what is faster is that your turn rolls around more quickly. Combats have more rounds but those rounds run quicker.
Another aspect that I find really speeds up play is organization. Thats obvously true in any game of D&D but in 4E its very easy to stick your powers on cards.
I have all my powers on cards. When a combat starts up I organize my cards as the DM is setting things up. I deal out all the cards I'm not expecting to use. So if I don't think I'm going to go for my dailys in this combat I discard them, they are also discarded if I've already used them. I'll also discard cards that I don't think apply - so if there are no undead I discard powers aimed at undead etc.
I keep my cards in four piles. One pile is the main deck. Stuff I can still use and will be making my turns choices from. One pile is cards I still have access to but just don't think I'll use this fight. I can add them back into my hand if things change - the combat is much harder then expected and I want to use my dailys, or maybe undead just came out of the walls (as some spectres did last session) and suddenly I need my turn undead power. One pile is for stuff thats ongoing. My healing powers spend a lot of time here because I can use them multiple times in an encounter. The final pile is cards that I no longer can use this encounter.
I've found that using this system makes the rounds just zip by. I'm sorting through my powers and picking one when its not my turn. When my turn comes around I've almost always already chosen my power and know exactly what I'm going to do. I simply announce what I'm doing. I grab a die throw out some melee speak while vigorously shaking the die, roll, and adjudicate the results. Then its the next players turn. If everyone is doing this then the rounds just fly by.
One area we have found thats a problem in this is the rules that no one remembers or knows the answer too. In 3.5 (which I DM) I delegate finding out the answer to one of the players that has just gone and usually we have an answer before his turn comes up again. in 4E there is not enough time for a player to do this and the annoying DM keeps stopping the game to look the rules up. Despite the players complaining time and again that he should just make a call or roll a die to decide and look them up later.
There does, however, seem to be a bit of hp bloat. We can have the enemies down to the last guy and know that we'll need to land 5 good hits to kill him. We are out of encounter powers so its down to the weaker at will type stuff and no ones scared of this guy since all his buddies are dead. However since everyone misses half the time in this game it can be three rounds to kill the baddie. They are fast rounds but its not very fun. This sometimes comes up in 3.5 but in my experience if the monster is so weak that its not scarring the players then they are going to kill it in one round unless its AC is off the Richter Scale.
If I DM this I'm going to go back to some of the concepts in 2nd edition were moral was played up much more and have bad guys that like to run away to get friends or fall back to new positions etc. when they are obvously beaten in the combat. I think trying to chase down a baddie before he sets off the alarm or calls in reinforcements would add spice to an aspect of the game that does not really work well. This however is, IMO, an adventure design issue. The ends of fights are not interesting enough - the solution is to have more dynamic dungeons with denizens that like to run away and get their friends or race off to grab their treasure and flee the adventure. That'd help keep things interesting. In fact it'd just help the game in general, dynamic adventure locales are more interesting then static ones but, so far, most of the adventures being made for the system are very static.
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I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.
I've played two 4E games so far, and I felt exactly like this twelve year old. Seriously, a first level encounter should not take one and half to two hours to resolve, but that is what happens in 4E. I'd expect this from a 3.5 encounter with 5 11th + level PC's, but the first encounter in a campaign? That is just ridiculous. Considering that monster hit points scale faster than PC's damage capability, I'd hate to see how long a high level combat takes. Everything I have experienced contradicts the selling points of 4E.
Character generation is easier and faster: Aside from spending skill points, not really.
You have more interesting options. Maybe, but I didn't really see more meaningful options than I would have had in 3.5.
There is less time between rounds: Wrong! It was more difficult to decide what to do each round leading to longer rounds.
Combat is faster: Extremely wrong! Low-level combats take as much as five times as long as 3.5.
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This however is, IMO, an adventure design issue. The ends of fights are not interesting enough - the solution is to have more dynamic dungeons with denizens that like to run away and get their friends or race off to grab their treasure and flee the adventure. That'd help keep things interesting. In fact it'd just help the game in general, dynamic adventure locales are more interesting then static ones but, so far, most of the adventures being made for the system are very static.
Adventures with Static encounters are much easier to handle. If the PCs mess it up and have to fight the Guards in Area 1 they can do so without also having to fight the Guards in Area 2 and the barracks.
With dynamic encounters the PCs coul suddenly face an overwhelming force of guards as one from Area 1 alerted Area 2 and the Barracks.The above is a trivial example of what can become a really complicated encounter with various allies arriving.
The complication is for the DM to coordinate all these creatures and for the PCs to simply survive.
Experienced DMs and Players can do this but it might overwhelm an inexperienced gaming group.
IMO the adventures so far are clearly intended to introduce DMs and Players to 4th and avoid "complicated" long drawn out encounters with multiple arrivals.
I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.
I disagree with both these statements.
In my opinion, if a kid is not having fun playing a game, then the game might have a problem.
I was browsing Pazio's 4E message board last Friday, and I invited my son to browse with me. He’s 9 years old, loves his Playstation 2, has expensive tennis shoes, i.e. nothing out of the ordinary. He was skeptical of browsing this forum from the onset. Here are his comments during browsing (in chronological order):
"This is tiring.
Is this fun?
This fight is too long.
This thread never ends.
Why is it I only get two different topics re-hashed 500 times?
When are we gonna be done?
It’s been fun.”
I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.I disagree with both these statements.
In my opinion, if a kid is not having fun playing a game, then the game might have a problem.
Darn it. Better let those rugby players know their game is flawed because their 12 year old daughters don't enjoy it.
Darn it. Better let those rugby players know their game is flawed because their 12 year old daughters don't enjoy it.
Okay, the example is a bit radical, but fair enough...
You are right.Let me rephrase my point :
If a kid is not having fun playing the game, then the game might have a problem, or was not introduced the right way to him.
In the case of a roleplaying game, it's up to the DM to entertain and captivate the players, providing atmosphere and excitement to each and every of them, according to their personalities and interests.
Whatever the edition.
Hey, to be honest, i wasn't really thrilled or hooked the first time i tried D&D. Until i tried again with a good DM...
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I too agree that combat takes waaaaaaaaay to long, and a lot of the really "cool" and interesting concepts that you start out with kind of lose their luster by the third campaign. My first 4e PC was a warlock who took that Far Realm "I talk to the stars" type path and I played him like a person out of a Lovecraft story who was playing with forces beyond his understanding and was slowly fading into the Void due to that. It was fun and interesting as each I unlocked each new ability and we got to laugh at their epic sounding names.
But after a while we realized that I had taken option 1 of 3. That if we played four campaigns each with a warlock we were going to start seeing repeats of the same character, maybe it would be role-played differently but its role in the party would always end up being the same. That's something you don't see frequently in 3e, every Wizard IS different in 3e. While you might see some of the same spells repeated over and over, you hardly see them used in the same ways.
Darn it. Better let those rugby players know their game is flawed because their 12 year old daughters don't enjoy it.Okay, the example is a bit radical, but fair enough...
You are right.Let me rephrase my point :
If a kid is not having fun playing the game, then the game might have a problem, or was not introduced the right way to him.
In the case of a roleplaying game, it's up to the DM to entertain and captivate the players, providing atmosphere and excitement to each and every of them, according to their personalities and interests.
Whatever the edition.Hey, to be honest, i wasn't really thrilled or hooked the first time i tried D&D. Until i tried again with a good DM...
Thanks for taking the time to post a measured response to an admittedly snarky post...sorry about that.
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I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.I disagree with both these statements.
In my opinion, if a kid is not having fun playing a game, then the game might have a problem.
Regardless of the game - kids that play with adults have less fun then they do playing with thier peers. Face it - adults are boring.
I have all my powers on cards.
If the above doesn't prove lack of variety.........
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My experience is that combat move swiftly after the first few games. The rounds are much shorter and as the players learn the game, their characters, and the capabilities of the party it really smoothes out.
As for the lack of variety - not a problem. Compare the options available in the 4e PHB and the 3.5 PHB. The 3.5 PHB does have more options for wizards but the 4e PHB has more options for every other class.
You cannot compare the options available in 4e to 3.5 with its multitudinous splat book and support material.
As for the reaction of a 12 year old - my beta Pathfinder group will have a 13 year old in it so we will see how 3.5/OGL hold up to the kid test.
Regardless of the game - kids that play with adults have less fun then they do playing with thier peers. Face it - adults are boring.I have some difficulty accepting that the attitude of the average reluctant 12 year-old towards D&D is representative of how much the average D&D player will enjoy playing D&D.No kidding. Using a 12-year-old's attention span as an indicator of a fight's length is plain silly. I played 4E with adults and we had no trouble focusing. I'd say our fights took no more or less time than in 3E.I disagree with both these statements.
In my opinion, if a kid is not having fun playing a game, then the game might have a problem.
Speak for yourself; I've been boring since childhood. ;-)
I have a 14 and 17 your old in my 3.5 group seems to hold up just fine with em both.
My experience is that combat move swiftly after the first few games. The rounds are much shorter and as the players learn the game, their characters, and the capabilities of the party it really smoothes out.
A DM's primary role in a new system is to teach it. I've been trying out different models to familiarize ourselves (of course, the basic of advice that one should play any game three times in a row--same characters if its a narrative like an RP, or three times over three weeks for a card/board game).
To this end, I designed our first two adventures to be short, without too much linked combat. This allowed the players to digest their new round-to-round options. My more casual players have taken a while to adjust to the new options becuase there are simply more of them. The shorter adventures also allowed me to learn how to design encounters in 4e better. It really made me realize how encounter design is more prosaic, that is, benefiting from a mixture of monster roles.
After those two adventures, we proceeded into a longer one, with a more extensive "dungeon." I deliberately used goblins as a classic villain and found we can move quite quickly through encounters. Some battles take longer than others, but what I find rewarding is that I have been able to reliably design them as such--smaller, lighter encounters go fast, while the major set-piece battles are satisfyingly difficult. From a narrative point of view, there's less randomness in how an encounter goes and I can build up tension nicely. I also find the overall pacing of an adventure's action sequences go well. Depending on the pace I've set, we can get through 4-6 battles in a combat heavy night and with a normal 3 hour session.
This week we played a 2.5 hour session, in which 1.25 hour was just straight RP between the PCs and NPCs, as well as travelouge details. The two combats were: a battle against 13 bandits on the road, which lasted two rounds while the PCs used a combination of skills (Intimidate, mostly) and well-placed strikes (the rogue and wizard proving very effective) to cow the ruffians; and a second battle against an Oni Night Haunter--a battle I deliberately wanted to be tough. The fight lasted 9 or 10 rounds, flowed around the battlefield nicely, saw PCs being knocked unconscious (one even suffered the Oni's powerful Devour Soul power), and was generally an awesome, big encounter. I estimate the bandits took about .5 of an hour (mostly due to pre-attack planning--the cleric wanted to intimidate, the wizard just wanted to charge), and the Oni took .75/hour. I consider this reasonable.
I've finished the next major dungeon, and am excited about running it. I've also prepared my first mega-adventure, or at least mega-to-my-mind, that will take the PCs from 6th to 10th level. It's going to be a lot of fun!
My question for you, because I have not had the opportunity to play 4E as much as I would have liked, is ... do the battles get LONGER as you level up, or does the timing remain about the same? I would expect as the lethality of the attacks vs. the increased efficiency of the defense would leave the timing about the same across the board, regardless of the level played at, but what has been your experience?
This is a really good question; of course, my party has only just reached 5th level. We do play once a week, and have played 4e since it came out. I can only say that it appears to progressing smoothly. I don't notice any combats taking longer, in fact the more basic encounters seem to be going quicker--say some goblin cutters mixed with a few archers and a skullcleaver--while the elite and solo encounters are getting more and more interesting.
I whipped up a Dark One Master Spy to be a solo encounter. He was a hit-and-run assassin who could generate fields of darkness (adding a bit of controller instead of just increasing his ability to attack). He was great, effective in paralysing the party's heavy hitters by remaining hidden, trapping PCs in darkness, and attacking from the shadows. It took a while for the PCs to take him down, and they had to regroup at one point and seriously considered retreat as an option.
For better or for worse, the wizards attempts to use Thunderwave to blast him out of his darkness field kepts failing, but it was a sound plan (darned luck o' the dice). They eventually took to hurling lit oil canisters into the field he was currently hiding in. We randomized the hit locations as that seemed most fair, but it did force him out of the field and into the waiting swords of the ranger and paladin. Of course, with classic tradecraft, the Master Spy killed himself rather than be captured. But the battle went very well.
Well the learning curve is a factor that people need to consider when they are talking about how long their combats are taking. I've been running Rise of the Runelords in 4th and we are at the bottom half of Skinsaw Murders. Burnt Offerings took 4 sessions (Goblin Raid + Glassworks, Catacombs of Wrath, Thistletop part 1, Thistletop part 2) and Skinsaw has been 3 sessions so far (Investigation + Scarecrow Farm, Manor part 1, Manor part 2). Our sessions run 4-6 hours, I think that this is pretty much in line with how we'd be doing in 3e (from my experience with the previous APs).
The first few combats ran a little slow (though we had played two sessions of Keep on the Shadowfell already so that helped), people familiarizing themselves with new characters and all. Since then things have picked up. The primary complaint that I would level at the system is that it seems to be more vulnerable to poor rolls on the part of the players (no autohit spells), if the group misses with the majority of their encounter/daily powers it definitely extends the length of the combats (our second session in the Manor suffered from this a LOT).
We did play one session with 11th level characters as a one-off. The first combat ran slow for sure (parsing all the new abilities of higher level unfamiliar characters all at once) but the rest ran plenty quick. Certainly not any slower than the lower level fights. I don't think that just generating a party of 20th level characters is a good way to see how 20th level plays though...that's a lot of choices being made without a proper play experience and a lot of abilities to figure out at once. It's going to play slow if you go that route, but it may not have anything to do with the game.
As for the lack of character creation options in 4th. This is an absolutely valid criticism. It's not a failing of the system though, despite what people seem to think. It's actually a failing of the editorial choices of Wizards and the publishing schedule. Lack of viable feat choices is a very real problem....which will be addressed through future releases. Lack of appropriately varied monsters at a given level of play is a real problem...which will be addressed through future releases. Lack of magic item options is a HUGE problem...which will be addressed through future releases.
This is not the standard "compare core to core" comment. Sure 4e isn't going to compare in any of these areas to 3e due to lack of published content...but the fact of the matter is that they willfully withheld content from the core books so that their later books would have greater value. Adventurer's Vault is going to be a must have book for any campaign...the Magic Item Compendium (it's 3e equiv) is ok, but it's hardly required. Player's Handbook 2 for 3e is one of the stronger releases that they had, but the 4e PHB2 will be required if you want to play a number of classes that have become (or have always been) core DnD classes. The Lore series (Martial, Divine, and especially Arcane) are going to be required if you want to have a meaningful number of feat choices available to your character, unlike the "Complete" series which were hit and miss at best. I know why they went this route, but I think it was a serious error on their part as it's created the impression that the system has less options because, right now, we aren't seeing the whole picture.
Hell, even the Paizo guys have said that one of their main reasons for not using the 4e system was that there weren't any gnomes, barbarians, bards etc. That's not a failing of the system it's a failing of the release schedule.
I have all my powers on cards.
If the above doesn't prove lack of variety.........
Umm, that's a perfectly valid organizational choice in 3rd edition as well for every single core class but the Cleric and Druid (and Wizard if Boccob's Blessed Book of Cheese is in play). Further, most of the classes will have far fewer cards.
The problem with power cards is that they seem to make people forget about their other options (grapple, bull rush, environmental interaction, etc)...but maybe that's just my crew.
I want to thank everyone thus far for the insightful comments. I appreciate also the fact that you accept my standing as disliking the edition but wanting to know frankly from those who do play it and thus probably like it where the flaws lie.
Special thanks to Polaris too for starting the discussion... thanks Polaris!
Okay, on to my observations...
I think the lack of diversity was something that I myself have noticed as well when looking over the rules, particularly the aspect of the "false diversity". There is alot of differences, yes, but in many aspects it appears that it is little more than a cosmetic trait. In all honesty, what made me such a hardcore 3.x fan to begin with was the approach to flexibility and diversity in the D&D game. I had grown ultimately bored and disappointed with 2nd edition and went with GURPS for a short while purely on the basis that I wanted to create a more flexible character... particularly one with a side interest or profession beyond being a heroic wizard or swordhand. My greatest disgust I guess with 4th was when I learned that professions and so forth had been removed and it was back to the "its the DM's and the Players' freedom (aka responsibility) to touch on these role playing elements" (actually, I don't think anyone said that in such exact words but that was more or less my personal sum of what was said about the shelling away of craft and profession and so forth)
Anyways, back to the lack of diversity... one of the things that my friend was discussing was that a cleric no longer had a true sense of difference within the party... granted, he had more ability to keep the characters alive but with all the healing, the old feel was gone. I don't know if this is truly an issue or the fact that the player his own self played clerics and paladins traditionally in former editions. So, there could be some bias there.
I have myself noticed the balance... I will admit that indeed the game does balance the classes fairly well... but as stated before, it blurs options to the point that there seems to be an ultimate lack of diversity... you can flavor it up however you like but in the end it all seems to be the same.
Now, as far as my own insights, I particularly worry about the future of D&D not as much in the sense of the core books (even though I don't care for the actual game) as in the accessory products that WOTC is currently putting out. There has been quite a bit of anger in regards to the Character Sheets product, even from otherwise die hard 4th edition fans, and I do not understand all the hacking and slashing that the Forgotten Realms campaign had to suffer in order to make it in this edition... I realize that with the radical changes to some classes, particularly wizards, that adjustments had to be made but why certain geographic regions altogether had to go did not make alot of sense to me. Perhaps to emphasize the change of history but this still seems to be a questionable move.
As much as the anti-4th edition in me wants to see the industry move beyond this edition to something else (perhaps 5th edition if not Pathfinder), there is the dread of what could happen to the D&D product name and rpg table top gaming in general if an utter commerical collapse of the product was to happen in the next couple of years. While WOTC is doing well with the sale of the core books I understand that it is the accessory products in which the long term money is to be made... and I wish they wouldn't play hardball with these products.
Thanks for the insights so far, keep them rolling!
The problem with power cards is that they seem to make people forget about their other options (grapple, bull rush, environmental interaction, etc)...but maybe that's just my crew.
I actually found they'd do the opposite, especially the casual players, they'd forget the variety of powers and fall back on the ol' I attack with my sword kind of situations and not use their encounter and daily powers. So we stopped using cards and listed all their powers on their sheets (I did up a setting-specific sheet for us). I do give out magic items on card (because I think its fun), and those were being forgotten about by some of the players...so I also started a little "training" program now that they're 5th level and have a new daily power. It goes like this:
Each character has a checklist of all the special options they can do, such as their powers, class abilities (hunter's quarry, etc), and general combat options (action point, second wind, trip, etc) and when they use the option they check it off. If they get to 5 different options used in a linked combat, or 8 in an isolated one, they add a small XP bonus to the encounter. At first there were cries of "more bookkeeping!" but after last session they all agreed it helped them get a sense of the game and reminded them to use the special magic item powers they had. One PC managed to get up to 4 different checks in a round (hunter's quarry for minor, move, Shadowwasp Strike for standard, use Elven Accuracy to avoid a miss (free), activate weapon power (free) (fear attack; even better because the weapon is called the waspblade and hums like a wasp and themes nicely with the special attack). I still think she should have blown an action point and used another attack, but the PC was excited, and she's a reliable, long-running casual player.
Admittedly, the character sheets were a big fumble, but I didn't by them anyway. Wizards really hasn't put out a good set of sheets since the orginal 3e sheets in 2000, which were nice. I have no clue as to why WotC can't get a good sheet made when so many fans seem to whip one up...anyway, I tended to house rule 3e around so much it didn't matter, and I like having setting themed sheets anyway.
The DM screen however, is excellent. I'm pleased with that purchase and even more pleased by the speed with which WotC errated one small section. The pdf they provided was a very quick fix. I'm pretty neutral about the art and the info is laid out logically.
One thing I have noticed is how responsive WotC has been about products. Players complained about "setting-like" feats like "Golden Wyvern Adept" and they were dropped from the PH. Player's complained about the cover of the 4e PH, so they got a new cover (neither cover was/is good in my opinion, but not for the reason player's complained about). Back when Eberron was released a lot of players complained about the mixture of DM knowledge and player knowledge. Now all setting books are being divided into a DM-book and a Player-book. That's good news. Now, I don't use their settings, but it seems that they are responsive...And the product seems a bit better. I bought 2 3.5 books beyond the core and some setting material for the Eberron game I ran (MMIII and Heroes of Battle), but I thought very little of WotC's offerings from around 2004-2008. The 4e material seems to be stronger, with more clarity and room for individual DMs to do their thing.
I actually got to play 4E in the RPGA Tournament this year at GenCon. The tournaments consist of 4 hours. In the first round we had 5 9th level characters. Keep in mind during tournament play there is little if any roleplay, it’s mostly just the DM reading flavor text to set the scene for the players.
Our first round of combat was against two owlbears and a couple of rounds into the combat two satyrs attacked us as well. This combat lasted about 2 hours. Our DM was very organized and and knew the rules inside and out. It was literally trying to bash the owlbears and satyrs down that took so long. We thought we would never chew through the owlbears hitpoints, and the combat was taking forever.
Our second combat consisted of two treant like creatures, a couple of vine horrors and two other creatures I am unfamiliar with. We strategized this combat a bit better but it took us a little under 2 hours to complete.
We just reached the 3rd encounter before time ran out. keep in mind this is not roleplaying any, just combat. In my opinion 4E should have been toned back a bit so that encounters did not run so long. It gets quite boring trying to kill a creature with hundreds of hit points. I can only imagine how long a combat at level 20 - 30 would last but I can see that you better have a weekend to fight something like a red dragon.
I am the DM of our groups weekly game, we only play four hours every Friday night and I certainly don't want to spend the entire four hours running a combat or two. Also the repetitiveness of 4E powers gets very boring after a while.
Sounds like many other people are starting to see this as well. I did have a lot of fun playing 4E in the tournaments, I like the strategy of combats in 4E. However combats take way to long and ultimately in campaign play would leave little time for roleplay, especially at the higher levels.
Just my opinion and experience.
Maybe i'm not gonna win any points with some of us... i am a big fan of 3.5, i was a huge fan of AD&D v.1, kind of 'eh' on 2 and 2.5 i've read the rules on 4, i've given it a bit of a shakedown, and i'm not as upset with it as i thought i would be from the feedback.
Does it feel different? yes. no less so than the way 3.5 feels from 1. some of the changes streamline things, some of them don't. The main thing i have a problem with is something that a lot of folks tensed up over, and that's the campaign 'points of light' approach. now to tell the truth, my own campaigns have always had a bit of a points of light approach. i happen to like that point of view. but greyhawk and forgotten realms and eberron were all fine where they were, they didn't need to be altered. in point of fact, in the 4 DMG there is a statement in campaign construction that admits that 'non points of light' points of view are just as valid
therefore, there was no need to change forgotten realms (or alter any other campaign settings). make new ones, encourage DMs to make their own, but don't mess with what was there. even if that means, leave those campaigns to convert or not.
balance? yes. i've heard that some feel this level of balance was like trying to make it flow like a video game, where the classes are different but have similar to identical effects in overall play. surprisingly, i don't have any problem with that, and at its core, it simplifies things a lot. multiclassing seems less viable than it used to be, i kind of liked the 'jack of all trades, master of none' compromise that multiclassers in 3.5 faced...but that's a small loss in the face of things.
the 'races in harmony' is good for the campaign setting overall, but as they say in the DMG, even that can be variable if the campaign and DM feels it is called for. Given the isolation of the points of light concept, i think we have room for the campaign base area to be tolerant, but a lot of the nearby regions to have very different points of view.
battles do tend to run a bit long, but if everyone approaches it right, it does flow. higher level battles tend to deal with similar complexity, so to my test experiences so far, they don't tend to get that much longer.
am i happy with all the changes? heck no. i kind of liked the symmetrical outer planes, and this new cosmology is going to take some adjusting to, a few of the rewritten monsters are making me pause, and some of the ones that 'made the cut' weren't ones i'd have chosen. but that's individual tastes.
is it going to be a long term success? don't know. but it's not as bad as the detractors are tending to be. Am i happy with the withdrawl of wotc support for 3.5 and the 3.5 point of view. no. but the books are still here on my shelf, a stack of them that comes up to my waist when they're stacked laying flat on top of each other. them going out of print bothers me. but those who want to play them still have them and can find them.
I'm willing to give it a fair try before closing the books and setting them down. but i've been playing d and d for a long time now (started playing the month Dragon #37 came out).....this is my last version i think. version 5 i think can go without me.
Anyways, back to the lack of diversity... one of the things that my friend was discussing was that a cleric no longer had a true sense of difference within the party... granted, he had more ability to keep the characters alive but with all the healing, the old feel was gone. I don't know if this is truly an issue or the fact that the player his own self played clerics and paladins traditionally in former editions. So, there could be some bias there.
My experience has been quite the opposite. I DM for a group that meets (roughly) weekly, and after 4 seesions, the party is 2nd level. I have found that there is a very real difference in feel and flavor between the ranger's Twin Strike, the wizard's Magic Missile, the warlock's Eyebite, and the rogue's Piercing Strike (as examples). The feel of the wizard waving is wand in one hand and holding aloft an orb in the other, blasting and pushing opponents around the battle, is very different than that of the ranger dashing in, smacking the baddies with his two warhammers, and then Yielding Ground as he takes a hit. Admittedly, the powers read as very similar when you're just looking at them in the PHB, and my group's experience may just be a result of good description and characterization, but in actual play we feel there is significant diversity between classes. YMMV.
O
My experience has been quite the opposite. I DM for a group that meets (roughly) weekly, and after 4 seesions, the party is 2nd level. I have found that there is a very real difference in feel and flavor between the ranger's Twin Strike, the wizard's Magic Missile, the warlock's Eyebite, and the rogue's Piercing Strike (as examples). The feel of the wizard waving is wand in one hand and holding aloft an orb in the other, blasting and pushing opponents around the battle, is very different than that of the ranger dashing in, smacking the baddies with his two warhammers, and then Yielding Ground as he takes a hit. Admittedly, the powers read as very similar when you're just looking at them in the PHB, and my group's experience may just be a result of good description and characterization, but in actual play we feel there is significant diversity between classes. YMMV.
O
Ditto, Arc. The powers are each organized in a similar manner, but in play each class displays a quite different array of tactics. Heck, my first character, a Dwarven Warlord, played a lot differently than our current Tiefling Warlord, just because of different powers selected.
Cheers! :)
Anyways, back to the lack of diversity... one of the things that my friend was discussing was that a cleric no longer had a true sense of difference within the party... granted, he had more ability to keep the characters alive but with all the healing, the old feel was gone. I don't know if this is truly an issue or the fact that the player his own self played clerics and paladins traditionally in former editions. So, there could be some bias there.My experience has been quite the opposite. I DM for a group that meets (roughly) weekly, and after 4 seesions, the party is 2nd level. I have found that there is a very real difference in feel and flavor between the ranger's Twin Strike, the wizard's Magic Missile, the warlock's Eyebite, and the rogue's Piercing Strike (as examples). The feel of the wizard waving is wand in one hand and holding aloft an orb in the other, blasting and pushing opponents around the battle, is very different than that of the ranger dashing in, smacking the baddies with his two warhammers, and then Yielding Ground as he takes a hit. Admittedly, the powers read as very similar when you're just looking at them in the PHB, and my group's experience may just be a result of good description and characterization, but in actual play we feel there is significant diversity between classes. YMMV.
O
Perhaps there's an outlet where both WOTC and third party companies could benefit... books that particulary express differences through good sample character builds... I noticed that David also brought this up with the differences in the Warlords due to different power selections.... since companion books for the different classes have always been good sellers, this might be a redeeming strong point for WOTC to approach in regards to accessory products.
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Perhaps there's an outlet where both WOTC and third party companies could benefit... books that particulary express differences through good sample character builds... I noticed that David also brought this up with the differences in the Warlords due to different power selections.... since companion books for the different classes have always been good sellers, this might be a redeeming strong point for WOTC to approach in regards to accessory products.
Here's a suggestion Hallucniator. a book that focused on one class and provided several builds at key levels, as well as novel tactics for how each build's power can be used. Say three builds for fighter, with full stats for 1st level, the middle of each tier, and 30th level. Beyond the stat blocks, commentary on why the build was designed that way and then tactical examples of the build in use.
food for thought.
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Perhaps there's an outlet where both WOTC and third party companies could benefit... books that particulary express differences through good sample character builds... I noticed that David also brought this up with the differences in the Warlords due to different power selections.... since companion books for the different classes have always been good sellers, this might be a redeeming strong point for WOTC to approach in regards to accessory products.
Definitely. One of my favorite d20 product lines was the race books by Bad Axe Games. They took the limited options from the 3e PHB and multiplied them to give players some very cool character concepts.
Ok, let's voice the general consensus in stereo:
"KKKAAAAAAABOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
(Roaring noise of D&D4 breaking onto the worlwide RPG scene on its release)
"....plop...."
(general feedback expressed by RPG community after 1 or 2 games)
;)
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In my experience, low-level combats take longer in 4e than in 3.5, but higher level combats (have tested to 10th) are about the same in both systems and do not increase significantly in length between 1st to 10th in 4e unless you have a lot of creatures (but that could happen at any level)
I like both systems. I don't like that WotC is parceling out options so we have to wait until we bet the Treasure Book, the Arms guides and the PHB2 to have a complete system. But that does not have to do with the game play as much as WotC and its marketing practices.
The players I run for are different too. The 4e group comes from at Tabletop Wargame background and feel a kinship to the rules system.
The 3.5/PFinder group come from a Call of Cthulhu background and did not like the tactical feel of 4e.
For me the GM, I hope that the adventures written for 4e get better. I am using conversions of older material for my face-to-face 4e game.
Also, I run a lot of pbp games beside these two examples, and its easier to do Pathfinder/3.5 than 4e since the 4e is more graphics intensive.
Disagree all you like, but that's not going to change fundamental principles of system design, and one of these is that you can not have both meaningful choice and perfect balance in the same system. A system with meaningful choice is by definition unbalanced, and moreoever the more choice there is in a system, the larger the utility delta there will be between optimal and sub-optimal choices.
4E made it a point to try to solve what the devs perceived to be the utility delta issue....but did so at the price of reducing and elminating meaningful choice....although in many cases they disguised this wonderfully. In his latest interview Mike Mearls admits they did this and is proud of reducing choice in the game.
IMHO that's everything you need to know about 4E.
Yep. In 3rd edition everything was about the character build. The person with the best build did the most stuff during the session, usually over and over again, because he was optimized to the point of stupidity (my 10th level Gnome Bard did 92 points of damage in 1 round, and I'm quite proud of that.) The person with a bad build, or with even a not fully optimized build would sit around doing jack.
Now, with 4th edition, everything is about the play in game; Tactics, Strategy, and things that happen at the game table. Your ability to contribute is based on how well you play at that session, not how many splatbooks you bought and how many spells and feats and class features you managed to twink out.
So, yeah, if you're into the character building, 4E won't be your cup o joe.