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);)
Yep. Pretty much what I am seeing in my neck of the woods. I might be mistaken about the reasons (athough I think I am close on a couple of points), but not about what I've observed.
-Polaris
Well at least now it makes it easier to explain D&D4 to newcomers:
-"So, how is that playing?"
-"Well,simply: "KKKAAAAAAABOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!" / "....plop....""
-"Ah ok thanks now I understand...."
-"Anytime, buddy..."
So, yeah, if you're into the character building, 4E won't be your cup o joe.
Well, a certain kind of character building...I think 4e provides the same amount of room to build what a consider a character--that is motivation, background, mannerisms, appearence, and other such aspects of role-playing. There is a little going to be a little loss of mechanical options because that's the nature of a new edition. I dearly love David Chart's brilliant 5th edition of Ars Magica, but it is sorrly lacking in clear guidelines to create new monsters, as well as lacking a good range of beasties. Similarily, 3rd ed. Legend of the Five Rings suffered a lack of information about the culture of the setting and role-playing advice, something that the 1st edition game had in spades (I paraphrase John Wick: L5R shouldn't be about playing in a different history, but a different culture). I haven't read the new ed of Shadowrun, but that game always lacked for monsters in the corebook.
The point being any game limited to its core book(s) is limiting. Or on the other hand, freeing in the sense that your imagination does the work...that's in part why I stopped using a lot of supplements in 3e and part of why I'm enjoying 4e. I'm looking forward to Adventurer's Vault though, as there's far too many arms and armors in the PH and too few potions and wondrous items.
As an aside, this was a very polite conversation before some disruptions above. Could we avoid such things? I'd be interesting on hearing how people are speeding up their games and if DMs currently running 4e games have any interesting experiences they'd like to share.
The trickiness of comparing abilities is something I find works out well in 4e. I like the division of attack and utility powers. This way characters always have a relatively equal and wide range of combat options and non-combat options. Sure, a lot of utilities work in combat, but generally only to assist the PC or an ally and don't do damage directly. The mix of combat-non-combat powers in other games can be a bit dodgy (say, a wizard vs. a companion in Ars Magica, although that is the admitted goal of that game).
So, yeah, if you're into the character building, 4E won't be your cup o joe.As an aside, this was a very polite conversation before some disruptions above. Could we avoid such things? I'd be interesting on hearing how people are speeding up their games and if DMs currently running 4e games have any interesting experiences they'd like to share.
I'm really sorry, but I didn't disrupt anything at all. FYI, I have been reading this thread from start to bottom, with a lot of interest, and my comments were just purely humoristic, yet an attempt to synthesise what was being said and the general feedback.
If it's forbidden to have some humor, then please state at the beginning of your messages.
Thanks, and I guess you misunderstood my intentions
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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.
While I haven't read much of the 4e forums in a long time, this doesn't seem to be the prevailing experience.
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.
CAN and WILL. Unless you think it's appropriate to compare a new game that they want us to buy with something 4 or 5 years old.... That's like saying "Hey, check out this new office application!" and when criticized for its lack of functionality and options saying "yah, but compare it with WordPerfect 4. It rocks, then."
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.
Starting at level 1, or higher?
The kid test doesn't really mean a lot to me, and only has any relevance because of what we were told by WotC about their target demographic. D&D has always been primarily adopted by a small subset of kids (honestly, stereotypes come from somewhere). To take a "normal" little girl who likes chic cellphones and see if she likes D&D4... well, that doesn't really seem like a fair test. :) Now, if it was a 12-year old who played WoW a lot, then I'd be interested to see a sampling of that crowd and how they like the thought of playing P&P D&D4.
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I think that a lot of players will go back to Pathfinder. I am looking forward to buying it when it is released.
I think you need to pull your hood a little tighter Leafer - the WotC hate is seeping through.
That didn't sound like WotC hate at all. It's the flipside of the coin that constantly gets thrown in the face of Pathfinder supporters that "eventually you'll all come to your senses and play 4e".
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I think that a lot of players will go back to Pathfinder. I am looking forward to buying it when it is released.I think you need to pull your hood a little tighter Leafer - the WotC hate is seeping through.
I think a lot of people will play both. I hope a lot of people will introduce their children, nieces, nephews and friends to their favorite. Thus far, I like Pathfinder. It seems Mr. CWM likes 4E. Well, there is a Pathfinder and there is a 4E, so with both win. Honestly, how many times in life do we get to say everyone wins. Everyone has a fun game to play...everyone wins!
*throws confetti and silly string*
CWM, this post isn't directed at you, I'm just responding to you. I agree with you that we should all play our games without taking pot-shots at the "other side".
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.While I haven't read much of the 4e forums in a long time, this doesn't seem to be the prevailing experience.
Well, then let me give you the expirences of the three groups I know, because we have seen combat smooth out significantly after a few games.
The first game is rough. The first combat takes quite a while, as folks figure out what their options are.
New players have little trouble if they write down each power before hand, including things like charge, grab, etc, giving them a list of actions they can take.
Old hat players have trouble figuring out the changes in the flow of play, as 4th edition has a lot of tactical options that are very different from 3rd edition. (Charging can get you a great distance across the board, shifting greatly changes the way tactical movement works, and the minion/wizard dynamics are very intresting.)
The second game goes much smoother, and faster, as folks get their own powers under control.
By about game four, the players are moving quite quickly thru their turns, as everyone has figured out what their characters can do, and are forming tactical strategies and combinding their powers in rather complex fashions.
Once folks start looking at their powers, and combining them with the powers of people around them, the game becomes very complex and yet extreamly fast since everyone know what they are doing by now, they are just using the tools they know in new ways. (The warlord class has been a huge part of this kind of tactical flow.)
This has been the expirence of the group I am DMing (four players), the group one of my player's is running (six players), and the group running parrallel to ours my circle of friends (five players).
We are all running Keep on the Shadowfell, and advancing through the module at roughly the same speed. In fact, all three groups nearly had a TPK at Irontooth at the kobald caves. In all three cases, the enrage ability the goblin has proved very, very powerful and two of the groups failed to take a short rest between the inside and outside of the caverns, and nearly died because of that alone.
If your players have skipped any encounters going into this fight and are not yet 2nd level, I would suggest removing the enrage power from Irontooth to compensate for the reduced hit points of the group.
Four sessions to full proficiency seems good for a RPG. That was about the time my players started to work out combos (one of my favorites is the rogues Set-up Strike, Action Point, Sly Flourish sequence which is great).
One of the nice things is that with only a little effort on the DMs part, everyone get proficient about the same time, rather than the casual players getting left behind...although there are still clear benefits to being an involved player.
IMHO this is a direct result of the "balance uber alles" approach -Polaris
there actually is an "uber alles" phrase in english ???
I´m German (where it is pronounced "über alles", by the way)and i didn´t know that (still laughing). Have to tell my class, seriously...
As for English, in colloquial english you will find any number of words and short phases quite literally stolen from other languages....and yes this is one of them.
i know many german phrases in english, but that one was new to me(althoug the term "uber" is used quite extensive)
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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.
While I haven't read much of the 4e forums in a long time, this doesn't seem to be the prevailing experience.
Well, then let me give you the expirences of the three groups I know, because we have seen combat smooth out significantly after a few games.
[good info about how it smooths out after about 4 sessions]
That's pretty good. It makes sense that starting out things will go more slowly since nobody really knows what he or she is doing. :) Maybe the ones I've been reading about are all giving their impressions after only one or two sessions.
That's pretty good. It makes sense that starting out things will go more slowly since nobody really knows what he or she is doing. :) Maybe the ones I've been reading about are all giving their impressions after only one or two sessions.
My group took about 3~4 session to really gel up and come together. I had never played with most of them before, so I can't say how much was just newness among players and how much was newness among mechanics though.
The first two nights combats took REALLY long, no matter their size. By the third night we started to see some speedup and by the fourth I'd say we were about as fast (maybe a bit faster) than in 3E (in a different group I play with, at least). Note that while roughly the same amount of RL time passes per combat, in game time the combats take longer, which is a satisfying dynamic for me. I always felt 3E combats were a bit too fast, in game time.
Cheers! :)
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Note that while roughly the same amount of RL time passes per combat, in game time the combats take longer, which is a satisfying dynamic for me. I always felt 3E combats were a bit too fast, in game time.
Yes, there have been many times where, after a huge fight that takes an hour or so, we look back and think "wow, that took all of 42 seconds in game time..."
Yes, there have been many times where, after a huge fight that takes an hour or so, we look back and think "wow, that took all of 42 seconds in game time..."
Heh, and 42 seconds are the LONG combats! :P
But yeah, that's totally what I meant. I once read someone's description of a 3E fight against a red dragon and it went something like "the Fighter and Rogue become a vague blur as they shoot towards the dragon in a bristly swirl of weapons while the room explodes in fire and then ice as the dragon and Wizard release their respective attacks. Seconds later the dragon is vanquished and the Cleric begins healing the wounded." It's funny 'cause it's true. ;)
Cheers! :)
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Well, unfamiliarity with the rules, may be some of it, but if the monsters have load of hit points compared to your damage output, and high defenses compared to your attack bonuses, that fight is going to take a long time to resovle, barring some pretty spectacular die rolls. I believe its more a factor of the underlying math not working right. It's way to skewed towards having monsters survive way too long.
Well, unfamiliarity with the rules, may be some of it, but if the monsters have load of hit points compared to your damage output, and high defenses compared to your attack bonuses, that fight is going to take a long time to resovle, barring some pretty spectacular die rolls. I believe its more a factor of the underlying math not working right. It's way to skewed towards having monsters survive way too long.
I don't know... for fights where the monsters' level is the same as the players', the math seems to work out pretty well. One of the problems I see is that fights that are supposed to be more difficult can just end up as longer.
That is, the minor increase in damage doesn't overwhelm the defenders or leaders much, but it makes things harder for the weaker strikers and controllers. Thus, the party ends up doing less damage, which when combined with the higher ACs and more HPs of higher level monsters, makes the combat last significantly longer. But, since half the party isn't much more threatened, it just ends up as a longer combat for them without much other difference.
Really, I like the 4e math and I think it seems to be working very well. It could use some minor tweaks, which could even just take the form of better encounter building advice.
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False choice especially with retraining. There are basically only two valid meta-builds for rogues.
And if you play a straight rogue in 3.5 (just using the PHB) you also have very few options. In both systems you can use multiclassing to widen your options but even then you are limited.
I don't see any real difference between 3e and 4e on this issue.
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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);)
... or not. I know of at least two groups that have been running 4e since its release and they show no signs of stopping. I also know that the RPGA group at my FLGS is getting ready for LFR.
I have no doubt that some will try it and drop it but only time (and sales) will tell how many will stick with it.
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CAN and WILL. Unless you think it's appropriate to compare a new game that they want us to buy with something 4 or 5 years old.... That's like saying "Hey, check out this new office application!" and when criticized for its lack of functionality and options saying "yah, but compare it with WordPerfect 4. It rocks, then."
Well, if that is what you want to do then there is zero possibility that 4e would have ever met your approval no matter how good the core system. Unless you compare PHB to PHB you will be making an unfair comparison.
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I think that a lot of players will go back to Pathfinder. I am looking forward to buying it when it is released.I think you need to pull your hood a little tighter Leafer - the WotC hate is seeping through.I think a lot of people will play both. I hope a lot of people will introduce their children, nieces, nephews and friends to their favorite. Thus far, I like Pathfinder. It seems Mr. CWM likes 4E. Well, there is a Pathfinder and there is a 4E, so with both win. Honestly, how many times in life do we get to say everyone wins. Everyone has a fun game to play...everyone wins!
*throws confetti and silly string*
CWM, this post isn't directed at you, I'm just responding to you. I agree with you that we should all play our games without taking pot-shots at the "other side".
A truly awesome sentiment. The pot shot I made above was to Leafer who is using the alias of Anonymous User 143. Leafer has stated that he is happy that WotC employees have been laid off since they apparently deserved it for making 4e.
I am sorry that the context did not carry over. The pot shot was not for the choice of 3e over 4e but the desire to see WotC employees lose their jobs because they dared to make a new edition of D&D.
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I am running a table of 4.0 for the nieghborhood kids. We play about three wekends a month now that school is back in session. It's been great for me to DM for them and they really enjoy it. The concepts are relatively simple for them and they really love the use of maps and minis.
That being said, I am DMing a 3.P table of COCT. This is going pretty well. It's a table of folks from about 22 to 44, equal mix of genders. They are all having fun.
The 4.0 game I am playing in with all adults, has kind of stalled. About half of the players are unhappy with 4.0. There are various reasons for this. We are still playing but are now down to about once a month. I like playing 4.0.
Really 3.5 & 4.0 are different games. I really think 4.0 is easier to teach newbs than 3.5. 4.0 is easier to prep and DM. I see them as different tools to tell stories in different ways and I use them that way.
I save my ire for the way WoTC runs its business and not for other players. Just have fun folks.
Am I understanding this correctly? Is someone actually prepared to defend the notion that meaningful choices must involve the potential for sub-par outcomes? In other words, choices can't just be different, but some must be objectively better than others, lest they aren't "meaningful?" So if I make a choice that changes how my character feels and plays (including the play style required for optimal effectiveness), and as a result I have more fun, yet I'm still balanced with someone who made different choices, then my choice was meaningless?
D&D isn't intended to be a character-building competition; it isn't "he who makes the best character wins." And lest anyone jump on the "who are you to tell me how to play" high horse, I have no problem with people having fun however they like: What I have a problem with is trying to use that to pass off the idea that choice and balance are mutually exclusive.
Am I understanding this correctly? Is someone actually prepared to defend the notion that meaningful choices must involve the potential for sub-par outcomes?
I'll not only defend it but endorse it. This fact has been known in game design (especially computer game design) since basically forever. If a choice is meaningful then it offers distinct postive and negative utility over the other choices. The more choices there are, the more positive utility will potentially overlap and negative utility wash out (or the reverse).
Basically, the only way to have a perfectly balanced game is to remove all meaningful choice, i.e. tic-tac-toe or rock-paper-sissors.
-Polaris
So...is chess unbalanced, or is it devoid of meaningful choice?
So...is chess unbalanced, or full of meaningless choices?
Actually chess is unbalanced in two ways: first, white always goes first. Second, the pieces move in a number of different ways. While the composition of both players chess pieces is the same (8 pawns, 2 rooks, 2 knights, 2 bishops, 1 queen, and 1 king) the challenge of chess derives from making the right choices from a range of deliberately sub-optimal pieces. You have to move your weakest pieces to reveal the power of your army. The imbalance between pieces in a contained environment (8x8 board, equal armies, same goal) makes chess full of meaningful choices.
Polaris is dead on. This is why decks of playing cards work the way they do--a random range creates an unbalanced set of hands. Same with TCGs. Magic: The Gathering has prospered by maintaining a solid mix of optimal:average:suboptimal cards. Same with L5R.
Game balance is often an illusion, and RPGs rely upon a sense of cooperation between players and between the DM and players to guide the balance of a game. That's why a group can play a fun low magic D&D game, and the group next door can Monty Haul it up.
So...is chess unbalanced, or full of meaningless choices?Actually chess is unbalanced in two ways: first, white always goes first. Second, the pieces move in a number of different ways. While the composition of both players chess pieces is the same (8 pawns, 2 rooks, 2 knights, 2 bishops, 1 queen, and 1 king) the challenge of chess derives from making the right choices from a range of deliberately sub-optimal pieces. You have to move your weakest pieces to reveal the power of your army.
Polaris is dead on. This is why decks of playing cards work the way they do--a random range creates an unbalanced set of hands. Same with TCGs. Magic: The Gathering has prospered by maintaining a solid mix of optimal:average:suboptimal cards. Same with L5R.
Game balance is often an illusion, and RPGs rely upon a sense of cooperation between players and between the DM and players to guide the balance of a game. That's why a group can play a fun low magic D&D game, and the group next door can Monty Haul it up.
White always moves first; which could be solved by a coin toss. Other than that calling chess "unbalanced" is an oxymoron. Balance in chess is between players on opposite sides of the board, not between various made during a player's turn. Likewise, you guys are fundamentally misunderstanding the nature of conflict in D&D. D&D isn't a character optimization competition...the chance for sub-par choices needn't come in character design. They come in play. In good tactics vs. poor. You don't have to build in chances for people to make crappy characters to have a well-designed game.
And giving examples of well-designed games that aren't balanced doesn't prove the point that *all* well-designed games must be unbalanced. On the other hand, a single counter example (chess) disproves it completely.
Are you sure you want to go down with this ship? Is "chess is unbalanced" really your final answer?
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False choice especially with retraining. There are basically only two valid meta-builds for rogues.
While that may be true for a certain class of players (and I am not saying that class of players is wrong in any sort of aspect) it isn't indicative of the only builds available.
Case in point - my Eladrin Paladin to the Raven Queen is neither Avenging or Protective, the two "common" builds. Instead, he's an odd build, walking the line somewhere between the two. He may not be winning a GenCon LFR tournament champion trophy any time soon, but he's fun to play, and his powers supplement his story just fine.
While I do think the game is limited (I expect options will expand character creation in the future) I feel that, on this 3d month since the release of the game, having a smaller pallet of blues to select from isn't all that bad. There's enough options in there right now for me to build at least four "template" characters, not just the two "common builds" and really should be enough for any player with a Level 1 character.
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Really 3.5 & 4.0 are different games. I really think 4.0 is easier to teach newbs than 3.5. 4.0 is easier to prep and DM. I see them as different tools to tell stories in different ways and I use them that way.
Ah. This is exactly what I keep coming back to, but I tend to use the painting metaphor. I blame it on my lead guitarist when we talk about different techniques and he gets all 'Rob Ross' on me about "different ways to paint the musical picture."
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I've been running 4E since release, and I also helped run Game Day at my FLGS. I've been taking notes each session on combats, powers, etc. This would be my review.
Character creation is quicker by far. Cleaner in a manner of speaking. Builds are few, but I think with patience that will change. I've seen some interesting combination, especially if you allow for the races written up in the back of the MM.
The races are well-written and they allow for a lot of variety if you allow them to. Taking one or two of the racial feats rather than class-specific feats is a build in and of itself my players discovered. Most of my players took a class-specific boosting feat as their first level feat, and it works out well, but a dragonborn with extended breath was pretty useful as well.
The classes are actually pretty good. Play to the role, and you'll be fine. More builds will show up over time and so will more options. If you notice, each class has roughly 77 powers spread across the 30 levels. At most, a player will have 18 to use in combat on any given turn. They read mechanically similar, but in play you can see the differences. I've noticed that specializing is possible for the spellcasters. The cold themed wizard in our party is devastating with his cold spells. He has yet to cast a single magic missle.
Personally, I love the new skill system. I don't think it takes away from the game, but I will admit, I would like to see a bit more specialization. I suspect that we'll see feats that grant new and unique uses for the skills.
Feats are okay. There's about as many in the core as 3.5 had. They'll just increase over time, so I'm not worried about it. What's there is good enough for what we currently have in the game.
Equipment is something I've noticed very little said on. The list is smaller, but I like that simply because a variant spear is still a spear. Yeah, I know, those who think there's a huge difference between a ranseur and a spear is being a bit too simulationist, IMHO.
Combat is something I've taken a lot of notes on. The first few combats were slow and required some adjustment by essentially "forgetting" 3.5 mechanics. But I've noticed that the average number of rounds in all of our combat's is 5 rounds with a suprise round roughly 50% of the time. They're getting faster with experience.
Power cards have been exceedingly useful for my players and they were writing them up on the first session of play. Rather than forget about extra options from skills or actions, most of my players have a combat crib sheet to reference. Overall, the encounter time shortens over levels slightly from early levels, and then steadies to roughly 15 to 20 minutes an encounter. It can vary, though, and we did have a "marathon" encounter once when no one could roll anything higher than a 5 for over 30 minutes. Just bad rolls. It had nothing to do with the system.
Those who think roleplaying is out, I don't understand where you're coming from. Not everything out of combat needs rolls. Skill challenges don't need to be set up, and you give out XP to your RP encounters in the same fashion as a skill challenge or quest reward.
As a DM, my favorite parts are quick set up. Less prep time on my part. I love having a solid set of guidelines for quests, quest rewards, and with some of the great info they've put into the books and in Dragon, I have found design to very quick, intuitive, and easy.
I've been using battlemats, tiles, and minis for years. No adjustment was required.
I don't have a lot of negatives to say here. I've been roleplaying for 25 years. I'm patient enough to get more books and see the direction it goes. I haven't had any negative experiences using the system. Only negative experiences with haters.
Arovyn
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Taking one or two of the racial feats rather than class-specific feats is a build in and of itself my players discovered.
Woot! I took Eladrin soldier!
My paladin's backstory is that he was an Eladrin warrior, fighting a strange fomorian army in the feywild. Dark magics were used and his army lost, when they were supposed to win. Raven Queen wasn't too happy about that, and "chose" him to be her champion while he was busy bleeding to death. Kinda cheesy, but kinda fun too. I mean, think about it - a sparkly-shiney eldarin the paladin of Death? Too sweet!
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.
I can't see how you define 3rd edition characters by the character build, You can make up 3 bard, or 3 fighters or 3 rogues and generally unless you kicked the character class abilities around they were clones of each other. The fighter may slightly vary in his feat choices but very few would, the rogues would all be sneak attacking damage monsters, the bards would be EXACTLY THE SAME AS EACH OTHER. The only way around this was house rules( we allowed the rogue to swap the sneak attacks for fighter feats), the paladin would get feats when he gained spell levels etc. The skill system we broke all over the place, 'my fighter is a knight but it'd cost too many skill points for knowledge noble/nobility' so we allowed him to have it at no restriction to build the character.
The detail for putting 'character' into 4E characters is among the best I have seen yet, detailing the characters reactions to situations both good and bad, as it were. The alignment character system I will be using in future games because it made a lot more real sense than, LG, NG,LE,CE etc which has always been a bad pidgeon hole system at best.
That's pretty good. It makes sense that starting out things will go more slowly since nobody really knows what he or she is doing. :) Maybe the ones I've been reading about are all giving their impressions after only one or two sessions.
A big part of the confusion is due to the fact that we are talking about two different phenomena. How long does it take for the players to do their personal turn and How long does it take for a combat to run from start to finish. These are generally being mixed together in the discussion and leading to a fair bit of confusion.
My experience is 4E combats - once you know what you can do, and especially if your well organized, go through the individual players turns very quickly. However they are averaging at least 6 rounds per combat compared to 3-5 round for 3.5. Big combats can go a lot longer as well. When we fought a Young White Dragon at 1st that went 9 rounds. If we had fought an equally challenging fight but instead had 10 enemies instead of a single Dragon the number of rounds would probably have been a little higher and the actual clock time the combat took (originally a little over an hour - but we took two time outs 'cause the Dragon was kicking our ass) about an hour and a half would probably have taken significantly longer because the situation would have been more confusing (slowing the players down) and the DMs turns would have come up a lot.
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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.
That holds also true for 4th edition. Try to play a Dagger wielding light armored fighter in the company of a heavy armored shield and sword wielding fighter. Or better even, try to build a fighter using a ranged weapon as primary weapon. Of course you can use a rogue or ranger instead of a fighter, but so you could in 3rd. There are a lot of possible builds but only some that a good and a lot of sub-optimal ones.
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.
That is not true, you still have to plan your build carefully. If you play above Dagger Fighter the rogue out-damages you and the other fighter lasts longer than you as he has a better AC.
If you pick sub-optimal powers and/or feats for your fighters weapon you have a sub-otimal build and other classes out-damage you or do much cooler things than you in combat.BUT as 4th has less valid choices for a good build, you do not have to plan so far ahead as you had in 3rd (even without the splat books).
AND the powers and power synergies of different Races/Classes in 4th favor a much more tactical combat.
Therefore you are correct that 4th is more about how good you are using tactics in game while 3rd is more about how good you are at planning a build.
So, yeah, if you're into the character building, 4E won't be your cup o joe.Well, a certain kind of character building...I think 4e provides the same amount of room to build what a consider a character--that is motivation, background, mannerisms, appearence, and other such aspects of role-playing. There is a little going to be a little loss of mechanical options because that's the nature of a new edition. I dearly love David Chart's brilliant 5th edition of Ars Magica, but it is sorrly lacking in clear guidelines to create new monsters, as well as lacking a good range of beasties. Similarily, 3rd ed. Legend of the Five Rings suffered a lack of information about the culture of the setting and role-playing advice, something that the 1st edition game had in spades (I paraphrase John Wick: L5R shouldn't be about playing in a different history, but a different culture). I haven't read the new ed of Shadowrun, but that game always lacked for monsters in the corebook.
The point being any game limited to its core book(s) is limiting. Or on the other hand, freeing in the sense that your imagination does the work...that's in part why I stopped using a lot of supplements in 3e and part of why I'm enjoying 4e. I'm looking forward to Adventurer's Vault though, as there's far too many arms and armors in the PH and too few potions and wondrous items.
Actually, I agree with this 100%. If anything 4E has fostered better role playing and more intricate character backgrounds for us, because we're not spending so much time in the numbers.
For Shadowfell, we played the pregens. At each level, we swapped characters around the table, and at each level, everyone had the same character have a totally different personality from the person who played it before, and do different things at different times.
From a role playing standpoint, both games are what you make them into.
Polaris, however, is talking about the underlying mathematics of the system; as choice and possiblities from a character building as deck building POV, where there are defined and hidden optimalities and synergies to find.
In this regard, he is correct in limitations of the smaller simpler ruleset; character creation isn't as mathematically intricate, there's not as much room for min-maxing, there's not as much cool synergy to find. (Thundering Dire Pick + Haste + Dolorous Blow + Weapon of Fire + Bull's Strength + Bardsong)
This is what he, and others, refer to as system mastery.
The way I see it, system mastery in 4E comes in on the small unit tactics level; how do we as a team come up with a solution to the problem at hand, how do we martial our resources and what do we expend now vs. save for a later encounter. There is no optimal choice for every situation.
And everything we accomplish depends on what everyone in the group can do, and how well we work together. Teamwork isn't "what buffing spells are we casting on the Bear Warrior?"
This is, of course, why they deride 4e as a board game or a war game.
That doesn't mean it's less of a Role Playing Game. Or even that it's less fun to Play. Or Run.
It just means the system has a different focus. And I can see that some people won't like the focus.
I happen to love the focus of 4E.
I can't see how you define 3rd edition characters by the character build, You can make up 3 bard, or 3 fighters or 3 rogues and generally unless you kicked the character class abilities around they were clones of each other. The fighter may slightly vary in his feat choices but very few would, the rogues would all be sneak attacking damage monsters, the bards would be EXACTLY THE SAME AS EACH OTHER. The...
Splatbooks: Spells, feats, prestige classes, alternate class features all chock full of crunchy mathematical min maxing. Have you checked out the WotC Character optimization board?
That holds also true for 4th edition. Try to play a Dagger wielding light armored fighter in the company of a heavy armored shield and sword wielding fighter. Or better even, try to build a fighter using a ranged weapon as primary weapon. Of course you can use a rogue or ranger instead of a fighter, but so you could in 3rd. There are a lot of possible builds but only some that a good and a lot of sub-optimal ones.
Ah, but you're not fitting into the role that the class is defined for, none of the fighter powers work at range. so, yeah, I'll concede that there are some suboptimal choices in 4E. Usually, they're easy to spot. And yeah, there are some optimal builds, but usually they're pretty easy to find.
And they're even easier to find if you've played a point based system with "reasoning from effect", where you look at what you want to build, and then break it down to it's most simple form, and build from there.
I want to play a lightly armored Fighter who uses daggers. replace the word Fighter with "guy with gets into melee combat" and you're perfectly described a Rogue. And the powers even work. Ditch the idea of Class as the limiter and go from there.
That is not true, you still have to plan your build carefully. If you play above Dagger Fighter the rogue out-damages you and the other fighter lasts longer than you as he has a better AC.
If you pick sub-optimal powers and/or feats for your fighters weapon you have a sub-otimal build and other classes out-damage you or do much cooler things than you in combat.BUT as 4th has less valid choices for a good build, you do not have to plan so far ahead as you had in 3rd (even without the splat books).
AND the powers and power synergies of different Races/Classes in 4th favor a much more tactical combat.
Therefore you are correct that 4th is more about how good you are using tactics in game while 3rd is more about how good you are at planning a build.
Yeah, true, I was oversimplifying for illustration sake.
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That's pretty good. It makes sense that starting out things will go more slowly since nobody really knows what he or she is doing. :) Maybe the ones I've been reading about are all giving their impressions after only one or two sessions.A big part of the confusion is due to the fact that we are talking about two different phenomena. How long does it take for the players to do their personal turn and How long does it take for a combat to run from start to finish. These are generally being mixed together in the discussion and leading to a fair bit of confusion.
My experience is 4E combats - once you know what you can do, and especially if your well organized, go through the individual players turns very quickly. However they are averaging at least 6 rounds per combat compared to 3-5 round for 3.5. Big combats can go a lot longer as well. When we fought a Young White Dragon at 1st that went 9 rounds. If we had fought an equally challenging fight but instead had 10 enemies instead of a single Dragon the number of rounds would probably have been a little higher and the actual clock time the combat took (originally a little over an hour - but we took two time outs 'cause the Dragon was kicking our ass) about an hour and a half would probably have taken significantly longer because the situation would have been more confusing (slowing the players down) and the DMs turns would have come up a lot.
It doesn't matter. At low levels, both turns and rounds take longer in 4E compared to 3.5 resulting in a slower, longer fight.
bugelyman,
Chess is unbalanced, and randomization does not insure balance. It just means that the advantage is unpredictable (in this case to determine who gets white). If randomization equaled balance, we'd still be rolling attribute scores because that would be balanced, but we all know that's not the case.
The fact is that Chess in intricate and there are out of literally billions of possible series of moves, perhaps a handful are perfectly optimal. This is why computers play chess so well (with sufficient computing power). The difference between a grand-master that knows the optimal moves in chess and a more ordinary person that does not is actually fairly extreme.
It won't be too long in the future with increased computing power that humans will be unable to compete with a computer at chess. We are nearly there now.
-Polaris
Edit PS: Chess like most "unbalanced" games greatly rewards system mastery. That is, the more experience you have with the rules and all possible permutations of it, the better you will play and the more often you will win. This is an important point: Unbalanced games reward system mastery. The Devs of 4E made it an explicit point to try to discourage system mastery hence their (over) emphasis on 'balance'. Basically chess is a bad example in many respects...including the key one that it doesn't show what you think it does.
Polaris:
You are obviously a bright and well-intentioned individual, and you are very focused on a civil conversation, which I appreciate and respect.
This thread has reminded me (again) to stay out of 4E edition wars, as there is simply nothing to be gained. With all due respect: Chess is unbalanced? I really don't have an response to that which improves on dumbfounded silence.
With all due respect: Chess is unbalanced? I really don't have an response to that which improves on dumbfounded silence.
I believe that Polaris is trying to make an important point here, because of how system mastery effects D&D, but he hasn’t adequately explained by what he means by ‘unbalanced’ in this context.
Chess, from the stand point of the board alone and within the context of a single game, is perfectly balanced. Both sides are exactly equal.
Step back however, and observe games in the real world, and that appearance of balance disappears. It is an illusion created by the fact that you are looking only at the board and a single game, and not the players as well.
A person who has played hundreds of games, mastered all the intricate strategies, and can think dozens of moves ahead, is going to posses an incredible advantage over a person who has just had the game explained to them. Their mastery of the system upsets the game's balance, and they are heavily favored becuase they can see and choose the most advantages move at all times.
Polaris’s point is that two people playing chess are never on an equal footing unless they possess the same degree of experience with the game. While the rules of the game may be perfectly balanced, the actual way the game plays out can be horribly unbalanced. This is always true in the case in games of skill, and often true in games of chance, such as blackjack, where people can work out the probabilties of the system to improve their odds.
This becomes important to D&D in situations where a choice made at character creation can massively effect the power of the character being created, especially if that leads to imbalnces in party compisition.
If a feat is so much more powerful then the other feats around it, such as power attack is in third edtion, then if one player does not take it but the rest do, then the power of that character is reduced compaired to the rest of the party, and this can lead to significant problems during roleplaying.
Sometimes it is fun to roleplay the weak character, the weak wizard or the foppish bard, who is totally useless and never really assists the party. But that should be a concious choice of a player, agreed upon by the whole group, not the inadvertant effect of how the class and feat systems work in play.