4e thoughts

Harbinger · Site Admin

I looked over the rules and talked to some friends and here are some more thoughts on the 4th edition of Dungeons and Dragons. This will probably be more of a stream of consciousness type post so things are in a sort of random order.

My overall mood is cautiously optimistic. I am excited about it and want to play, but there are enough changes and things “missing” that I haven’t fully embraced it yet.

The game feels like a narrative board game rather than a role-playing game even more than 3.x. This doesn’t mean it is bad, it just has a different focus.

It might be a good idea to write your character on a stack of index cards rather than a character sheet. this is especially true of the powers.

There is no subtraction. I had a friend say this about 3.x before he became proficient with it so he was being prophetic, but he was a version early.

I miss the druid.

The only normal animal in the monster manual is a horse. There are no lions, tigers or bears. Oh My! I suppose this goes along with the druid not existing yet and the ranger not having an animal companion, but it seems strange to me.

Characters seem really pigeonholed into their “roles”. For example if you want to be an archer you pretty much have to be a ranger, you can’t build a fighter who is skilled at ranged combat. The wizard is the evoker, fire slinging guy. No illusionists, necromancers, diviners, summoners…..etc.

I like the new monster stat blocks and how monsters don’t have to be made using the same rules as the PCs.

I like that some of the complexity has been shifted away from the DM and towards the players.

The art is pretty good although I could use more Wayne Reynolds character art. I have pathfinder for this though.

I’ll post more as I think of stuff and read more.
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We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Harbinger · Site Admin

the MMO as RPG comparison seems to pretty strong. It remains to be seen if this is good or bad though.

I like that a third of the players handbook is not devoted to spells.

I also like that they moved all the magic items and experience and such to the player's handbook.
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We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Morak100 · Interrogator

I think the standardized magic items is going to make things easier as well
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Watch it, I think you stepped in Cleric.

Harbinger · Site Admin

the gray wolf is also listed in the monster manual.
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We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

chrynoble · Interrogator

Harbinger · Site Admin

that ring is very bad. Also, is it even useful outside of combat. suppose the rogue is following someone down the street and wants to remain unseen. how does that work.

one bad thing about DnD 4th is the assumption that the entire game takes place in combat. Very few powers or items are useful outside combat encounters.
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We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Harbinger · Site Admin

OK, after looking at it some more.

I think the +2 to stealth checks is the non-combat advantage to being invisible so it is only sort of invisible. This is a small bonus for an 18th level character.

Then once per day during an encounter you can gain some specific benefits related to combat for one turn.

It is still a lot less powerful than the previous version, and possibly way underpowered for an 18th level magic item worth 85,000gp.
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We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Morak100 · Interrogator

that does look weak, also I don't like the healing potion, it should give the full benefit of a healing surge, instead of just 10hp
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Watch it, I think you stepped in Cleric.

Harbinger · Site Admin

The answer I got over on RPG.net

Harbinger · Site Admin

I like that alignment has little to no actual mechanical effects.
_________________
We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Harbinger · Site Admin

architecture got big. most hallways are now 10ft wide and a normal room is something like 40' X 50'. This combined with diagonal movement being the same as all other movement makes me think that the whole time-space thing is extremely flexible and relative to the observer in DnD. Rooms change shape depending on where you are standing inside it. (a 15' X 15' square room would appear as a 15' diameter circle to a person standing in the center of it. whil if he moved to an edge, the close edge becomes flat while the other side becomes more oval shaped.

A person from a universe that works like our real world would find the spatial distortions in a dnd world to be very unsettling.
_________________
We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Hudson · Site Admin

Harbinger · Site Admin

counting diagonals isn't too bad as long as you aren't doing a whole bunch of them, but I to don't really like it. The only real solution would be to go to a map made of hexagons rather than squares.

(or to just do away with the battlemat, but that is hard to do with DnD
_________________
We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Harbinger · Site Admin

the ranger is a brutal damage dealer now.
_________________
We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

Harbinger · Site Admin

4e is a powers based fantasy superhero game system.

I can see how they are going to port this over to a modern superhero sytem already.

Basically just create a new set of classes for the archetypal superheroes, brick, blaster, flyer, skilled normal....etc and provide a list of powers. customizing keywords allows you to tailor the power to the character.

this won't be as flexible or as powerful as mutants and masterminds or Hero, but it could be a good fun superhero game.
_________________
We had it rough. Back when I started gaming, we had to roll 21 on a D20 to hit, Magic Missile did 2-5 damage to the caster and the undead could turn our clerics. Players weren't even allowed to use the bathroom until their character was 3rd level.

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