Powers end up being too much like an abstract "video-gamey" way of giving all of the classes the same level of utility in combat and balancing them across levels.
The problem is that there are a lot of choices, but they end up feeling all the same in the end. People want to feel unique. They want their character to feel distinct from the others in the party.
Also, some of the powers just feel weird, like obvious attempts to create advantage within a tactical table-top miniature game, and they don't come across as organic extensions of the mythic/symbolic role of the character, but rather as fantasy bumper cars™.
THIS.
@secretmantra, you've nailed it. This is what I would have wrote about 4e if I didn't always end up going on a diatribe and foaming at the mouth because I have so much contempt for this edition.
I am hopeful that 5th ed will correct some of these issues. Perhaps the Hasbro decision makers will have learned something about their audience. (HINT: We are smart, soulful people.)
@secretmantra Considering my Fighter trips dudes with his halberd and my Blackguard freezes people to death while simultaneously tearing their souls apart, I'd say 4E classes feel plenty different to me.
@secretmantra I played the second round of playtest material, and it is different, in all the ways I think 4E improved on over 3.5. Healing surges, giving Fighters more options besides just vanilla whacking stuff, and healers not needing to spend their standard action in order to heal all gone in favor of taking two steps back to appease 4E detractor's. There's little of value in 5E for 4E players, which seems like a slap in the face. Apparently, I'm not important enough to design for because 4E is my favorite.
@Schneidend - I don't think it is an intentional slight. I do however think that the perception was that more people disliked it than liked it. I'd bet that the decisions made were ones based on how many copies they intended to sell, not 'Necessarily' what worked better or who liked what.
For me, I like almost nothing of what I have read about 4E. But that is my tastes and my personal (if potentially ill informed) biases. If WoTC and Hasbro are catering to people like me, it is quite probably because they perceive that there are more of us than there are of you. I think given the choice they would prefer not to alienate any of their consumers. Failing that, they are attempting to placate the largest (or at least most vocal) subset. Just my opinion.
@secretmantra I played the second round of playtest material, and it is different, in all the ways I think 4E improved on over 3.5. Healing surges, giving Fighters more options besides just vanilla whacking stuff, and healers not needing to spend their standard action in order to heal all gone in favor of taking two steps back to appease 4E detractor's. There's little of value in 5E for 4E players, which seems like a slap in the face. Apparently, I'm not important enough to design for because 4E is my favorite.
Perhaps the truth of 4e players is that they'll play anything so there's no need to design with them in mind?
If this thread degenerates into an Edition Flame War, I'll close it immediately. I'd like to remind everyone that civility is one of the things that keeps this community strong. Keep the personal (or thinly veiled personal) attacks out of the debate, and we won't have any issues.
I hope nobody (specially @Schneidend, with whom I had a little debate a few pages ago) has taken any of my criticism on 4e personally. I'm not presumptuous enough to think anyone's opinion's going to change based on my views of the game.
I just like the whole 4e vs. 2e vs. 3e discussion, even though it might get a little intense sometimes. Anyway, point taken. Maybe we should take this to an off-topic thread, I don't know.
Debating the issue is one thing--insulting others for having a different view is another. The thread's been civil so far; just make sure it doesn't cross that line.
I've been reading that Edition Next is designed to be modular and customizable, in order to provide a highly flexible and customizable framework that uses a simple base set of rules, and modules that expand the game from there according to taste. It seems this edition thereby hopes to appeal to gamers with an affinity for earlier edition rulesets.
We are entering into this design with a real sense of modularity, letting people pick and choose what elements of D&D to use.
So this gives me optimism that a ruleset can be created by Beamdog for BG: Next (BG3) that uses elements we're familiar with from Inifinity, but also makes it an even better game. I would see this as tweaking the ruleset of Infinity, which is proven to work so well and has remained so popular. But that's just me.
That said, I haven't participated in the Edition Next playtest. If anyone here has done some playtesting with it, can you see how the core elements of ruleset of Infinity could form a foundation that is built upon in Edition Next's modular design to cobble together an awesome CRPG ruleset for BG: Next?
I hope nobody (specially @Schneidend, with whom I had a little debate a few pages ago) has taken any of my criticism on 4e personally. I'm not presumptuous enough to think anyone's opinion's going to change based on my views of the game.
I just like the whole 4e vs. 2e vs. 3e discussion, even though it might get a little intense sometimes. Anyway, point taken. Maybe we should take this to an off-topic thread, I don't know.
I don't believe you said anything that would have upset me. I take offense only when 4th Edition is baselessly insulted, somehow equated with WoW, or if my character is attacked because I enjoy 4th Edition. Wowo did the latter.
I hope nobody (specially @Schneidend, with whom I had a little debate a few pages ago) has taken any of my criticism on 4e personally. I'm not presumptuous enough to think anyone's opinion's going to change based on my views of the game.
I just like the whole 4e vs. 2e vs. 3e discussion, even though it might get a little intense sometimes. Anyway, point taken. Maybe we should take this to an off-topic thread, I don't know.
I don't believe you said anything that would have upset me. I take offense only when 4th Edition is baselessly insulted, somehow equated with WoW, or if my character is attacked because I enjoy 4th Edition. Wowo did the latter.
Honestly it wasn't intended to be insulting. It was an offhand remark that could be interpreted multiple ways. I don't play pnp anymore so I'm an outsider looking in in many ways. Certainly 4e is a contributing factor to not playing pnp.
If anything, the comment was an observation that it is possible that a design consideration could be that 4e players show a willingness to adjust and move to new things even if its vastly different than what came before. In other words, they aren't as fussy as players of other editions.
That said, I should be more sensitive considering the rivalry between the editions.
Honestly it wasn't intended to be insulting. It was an offhand remark that could be interpreted multiple ways. I don't play pnp anymore so I'm an outsider looking in in many ways. Certainly 4e is a contributing factor to not playing pnp.
If anything, the comment was an observation that it is possible that a design consideration could be that 4e players show a willingness to adjust and move to new things even if its vastly different than what came before. In other words, they aren't as fussy as players of other editions.
That said, I should be more sensitive considering the rivalry between the editions.
Hrmmm. Well then, that seems reasonable enough. This is the Internet, and I'm used to receiving a disproportionate amount of vitriol on the Edition issue, so I assumed the worst. I don't think it's a matter of being more sensitive as just word choice. What you said was abrupt and too ambiguous, as evidenced by our completely different interpretations.
But, adaptability and lack of fussiness aside, I think what a lot of 4E fans appreciate is progressiveness in mechanics. At least, that's what I expect from a new development. I don't have a lot of experience with AD&D, but I feel as though the game really grew and evolved with each new edition when it comes to two through four. Design decisions were made in 3E, 3.5, and 4E that made me say "that totally makes sense and I am surprised nobody thought of it before." Mechanics that change to make my characters feel more like great heroes and villains that have an impact on the world and in combat rather than disposable hirelings for the King or Big Bad to go dungeon delving for them are always welcome.
For instance, one of my favorite 4E mechanics I mentioned earlier are the healing surges, which can be spent between encounters to recover HP during a short rest. Basically, I take a quick breather and my character recovers his resolve and has the strength to keep going. We see heroes do this all the time in movies, books, and television, and it felt so thematically right that going back to relying solely on the Cleric's number of Cure Light Wounds per day (a la 3E and now 5E) seems backwards to me.
And, on the topic of Clerics, 4E had the brilliant idea to fit the "healer" role into the power system beautifully. Rogues and Fighters get to trip/daze/grab/etc. people in addition to dealing damage, so healer or Leader classes like the Warlord and Cleric get to heal and buff in addition to dealing damage. A Cleric's standard actions were no longer reserved for healing spells, but instead he smites an enemy so hard that his god blesses the Fighter. I felt this was brilliant just as I thought Feats in 3E were brilliant.
I think you could do a pretty good job of mimicking IE-style rules with D&D Next. The only thing is that you'd need a much better AI scripting system that would allow for some automation of ability usage. Perhaps the one thing from 4e that Next is using is the idea that even Fighters should have some interesting decisions to make every round besides "which enemy should I swing at?" When you can't just point the Fighters at enemies and let them auto-attack until everything is dead, you need a system that will let you use some abilities automatically under the right conditions so that you don't have to pause every six seconds to use Expertise Dice (or whatever they're calling them in the latest packet).
i like 2nd edition but there are things that are not cool for example why charisma is so bad? why intel works only vs mindflayers?
i think the Icewind dale 2 (3rd? 3.5?) is the coool system to use everything adds up you get to specyfi more about your characters like feats and other skills. Charisma matters for paladins etc. wisdom dex conc gives bonus to St. Intel gives bonus to skills. Great multiclassing system where you can actually put 1 lvl of every class in your character if you want and use every possible skill/spell in the game ; D
every point of stats matters! thats why 2nd edition has it flaws
Comments
@secretmantra, you've nailed it. This is what I would have wrote about 4e if I didn't always end up going on a diatribe and foaming at the mouth because I have so much contempt for this edition.
/bow
I am hopeful that 5th ed will correct some of these issues. Perhaps the Hasbro decision makers will have learned something about their audience. (HINT: We are smart, soulful people.)
Considering my Fighter trips dudes with his halberd and my Blackguard freezes people to death while simultaneously tearing their souls apart, I'd say 4E classes feel plenty different to me.
Kaeloree and Aosaw are being facetious.
I am glad it works for you. Keep playing it. I am hoping 5e is different.
I played the second round of playtest material, and it is different, in all the ways I think 4E improved on over 3.5. Healing surges, giving Fighters more options besides just vanilla whacking stuff, and healers not needing to spend their standard action in order to heal all gone in favor of taking two steps back to appease 4E detractor's. There's little of value in 5E for 4E players, which seems like a slap in the face. Apparently, I'm not important enough to design for because 4E is my favorite.
For me, I like almost nothing of what I have read about 4E. But that is my tastes and my personal (if potentially ill informed) biases. If WoTC and Hasbro are catering to people like me, it is quite probably because they perceive that there are more of us than there are of you. I think given the choice they would prefer not to alienate any of their consumers. Failing that, they are attempting to placate the largest (or at least most vocal) subset. Just my opinion.
I just like the whole 4e vs. 2e vs. 3e discussion, even though it might get a little intense sometimes. Anyway, point taken. Maybe we should take this to an off-topic thread, I don't know.
Mike Mearls of WotC has said So this gives me optimism that a ruleset can be created by Beamdog for BG: Next (BG3) that uses elements we're familiar with from Inifinity, but also makes it an even better game. I would see this as tweaking the ruleset of Infinity, which is proven to work so well and has remained so popular. But that's just me.
That said, I haven't participated in the Edition Next playtest. If anyone here has done some playtesting with it, can you see how the core elements of ruleset of Infinity could form a foundation that is built upon in Edition Next's modular design to cobble together an awesome CRPG ruleset for BG: Next?
If anything, the comment was an observation that it is possible that a design consideration could be that 4e players show a willingness to adjust and move to new things even if its vastly different than what came before. In other words, they aren't as fussy as players of other editions.
That said, I should be more sensitive considering the rivalry between the editions.
But, adaptability and lack of fussiness aside, I think what a lot of 4E fans appreciate is progressiveness in mechanics. At least, that's what I expect from a new development. I don't have a lot of experience with AD&D, but I feel as though the game really grew and evolved with each new edition when it comes to two through four. Design decisions were made in 3E, 3.5, and 4E that made me say "that totally makes sense and I am surprised nobody thought of it before." Mechanics that change to make my characters feel more like great heroes and villains that have an impact on the world and in combat rather than disposable hirelings for the King or Big Bad to go dungeon delving for them are always welcome.
For instance, one of my favorite 4E mechanics I mentioned earlier are the healing surges, which can be spent between encounters to recover HP during a short rest. Basically, I take a quick breather and my character recovers his resolve and has the strength to keep going. We see heroes do this all the time in movies, books, and television, and it felt so thematically right that going back to relying solely on the Cleric's number of Cure Light Wounds per day (a la 3E and now 5E) seems backwards to me.
And, on the topic of Clerics, 4E had the brilliant idea to fit the "healer" role into the power system beautifully. Rogues and Fighters get to trip/daze/grab/etc. people in addition to dealing damage, so healer or Leader classes like the Warlord and Cleric get to heal and buff in addition to dealing damage. A Cleric's standard actions were no longer reserved for healing spells, but instead he smites an enemy so hard that his god blesses the Fighter. I felt this was brilliant just as I thought Feats in 3E were brilliant.
for example
why charisma is so bad? why intel works only vs mindflayers?
i think the Icewind dale 2 (3rd? 3.5?) is the coool system to use
every point of stats matters! thats why 2nd edition has it flaws