Insert Fanboy Whining Here.

[featherynscale]

Soooo.... D&D 4th edition. triadruid asked me this morning, "So they said they'd make it simpler than 3.x. How much simpler could they possibly make it?". I couldn't let it rest, I had to find out.

As it turns out, in the Brave New World, apparently, one's choices of character class will be limited to four, with variants: a tank sort, a healing sort, a ranged weapons sort, and magic-using sort. Apparently, if you would like to know more, you could watch this video. (Disclaimer: I haven't done so yet, but will probably check it out later. I took the above assessment from the general feeling of the D&D board at wizards.com, which one has to subscribe to a service for now... when did that happen?)

Anyway. I don't imagine we'll convert any time soon. Aside from the general ...meh... factor, I own too many 3.x books.

And all of this doesn't answer the most burning D&D question currently on my mind: Why the hell do rangers even get spells? Where does their magic come from? (In most campaign settings, this probably wouldn't make a bit of difference, but in mine it will. Feh. Why can't we just build a medieval-fantasy-britain-world with wizards and dragons and nobody asks why anything exists in the way it does? You know, like everyone else does.)

Comments

[lilia-blackbear.livejournal.com]

"So they said they'd make it simpler than 3.x. How much simpler could they possibly make it?"

Right, I mean, gamers are such simple-minded gits who know little about mathematics, and simplifying things to only four classes will make things so much easier. Oops, I hit my sarcasm button, wait. What I meant to say is, D&D will never be the same since getting rid of THAC0.

Insert Fanboy Arguing Here! (RAWK)

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

I did a happy dance when I discovered that the 3e system did not include THAC0. Not because I found it particularly complicated, but because games go soooo much slower when you have to explain it to at least one person in the group every combat....

Re: Insert Fanboy Arguing Here! (RAWK)

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Everything being 'roll high' is much easier, conceptually, even though it does make loaded dice more worth it (if you're that type of player, of course; most of ours just blame the dice for BAD rolls and keep going).

Re: Insert Fanboy Arguing Here! (RAWK)

[liquidfun.livejournal.com]

One of the ugliest gaming events I've been witness to had the DM stop the game, walk around the table, remove a player's dice, and replace them with a new set ... upon which the player STILL rolled 16-20 twice as often as 1-15.

Some people defy odds.

[diermuid.livejournal.com]

They got rid of THAC0? No wonder I could never figure 2 and 3.5 out.

[liquidfun.livejournal.com]

I have no idea how reliable the information is, but I've heard through the 'net that they are going to a more World of Warcraft model for revenue ... a pay-by-the-month service with online character creation as well as online mapping, etc. No idea if those are "optional" features or if the new system will more-or-less depend on them.

Another of the big changes in the class "simplification" is the elimination of prestige classes and feats, replacing them with a talent tree (again similar to World of Warcraft). I may like this idea, I know I loved the skill tree in the first version of Paranoia and was sorry to see they removed it in later editions (apparently it was too hard for people to understand).

One of these days I'll have to do some reading on my own to see if that information is accurate.

[capriciouslass.livejournal.com]

Yes, but when I GM Paranoia, the skill tree is still used. I just convert any later edition modules to use the old skills.
But then again, I make it up as I go along anyway...

[celtic-elk.livejournal.com]

True confessions time: I stopped buying D&D rulebooks back in the 2nd Edition days. I've been much more interested lately in urban-fantastic settings (the White Wolf games and Shadowrun, for example). I read Order of the Stick, though, which really tells me everything I need to know about more recent incarnations of the game. =)

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

I enjoy urban fantasy, but I picked up an irrational fear of GMing anything with guns at some point, so we play lower-tech than that. :)

I'd like to play some Shadowrun at some point, though. I've picked up the book several times and utterly failed to grasp some of the rules, primarily the magic system.

[celtic-elk.livejournal.com]

In keeping with my "hi, I'm an out-of-date gamer!" theme, my only experience with Shadowrun has been with the 1.0/2.0 rules, so I may not be all that much help. It's an interesting setting, but combat resolution can take *forever*. (This was *not* helped by the fact that our campaign played about once every six months, and was largely made up of non-gamer-geek players.)

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think I have the Shadowrun 2nd ed. book. I thought surely if I had the book in my home, I would be able to sort out how to play. No. And I have played other FASA product before, mind you. Totally different systems. *sigh*

[kittenpants.livejournal.com]

White Wolf? ::headdesk:: ...Wait, I think we've discussed that.

Ah, once we all have that transporter technology, we have to get our groups together for a steampunk/gaslight fantasy sort of game.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Totally. And I'll run that. Because, you know, guns, but guns what shoot lightning and whatnot. Unreliably. Warms the rusted cockles of my little clockwork heart.

Steampunk!

[auraseer.livejournal.com]

GURPS Girl Genius is under development and should be done Any Time Now.

GURPS isn't my favorite system, but I'd put up with it for a game full of Jagermonsters, death-rays, and clockwork clanks.

Re: Steampunk!

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

For the win!! (We played our first game of GURPS the other day, and found it madly complicated in setup but fairly manageable and fun in gameplay. And I would totally play a Girl Genius mod.)

[auraseer.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to keep an open mind about the new system. I'm still annoyed at being lied to about this for the past three years, as WOTC repeatedly assured us that they were not working on a 4th Edition.

There are definitely things that could be simplified. The d20 system lends itself very well to straightforward actions (like Attack), but anything slightly unusual involves a set of tacked-on rules and special modifiers. Grapple is the poster child for this, but it affects all the other interesting combat actions (Disarm, Trip, etc) as well. Some players in my group still aren't comfortable with all that stuff, and we've been playing weekly for about seven years now.

[liquidfun.livejournal.com]

Yep, about the time you've got a Druid in the party who can shift into wolf form, gaining a free trip attempt on any successful hit, at the same time as a monk is using "stunning fist" (which among other things makes people drop what they are holding), attempting to grapple each other over possession of a book ...

You're in for about an hour of "combat rules" just to decide who has the book in their hands.

Actually, that isn't a made-up example.

And it was more like three hours. I went for snacks and drinks.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

In theory, I know all the rules for that. In practice, that sort of thing tends to get resolved with a simple opposed check. :)

I will postpone judgment until I can hold a book in my hands, but damn it, I really *like* 3.x.

[capriciouslass.livejournal.com]

I've had to be dragged kicking and screaming into each new edition. It turns out people have been playing in the new edition's system *at least* a year before I try it. I don't think this time will be any different.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

I think 3.x took off because
a) TSR was defunct, 2.x was long out of date, and people were hungry..
b) 3.0 really was simpler and more straightforward than 2.x in a lot of ways. I can't fathom how 4.0 will be an "improvement" that justifies buying all the new books, in that regard.
c) If they go to a Blizzard/Warcraft skills-based system like liquidfun mentioned, then they're abandoning one of the most successful things to come out of 3.x: d20 Open Gaming. There's lots of pure-skill systems that already exist, if people want to go that route...

I wonder if they haven't dominated themselves out of a market. But I'm probably wrong...

[auraseer.livejournal.com]

The Open Gaming license will reportedly continue. Other publishers will still be allowed to release sourcebooks and settings that use the 4E rules.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but I guess what I meant is, with all the books and OGL stuff out there for 3.x/d20, 4.0 is going to have to be REALLY different or REALLY snazzy to catch the attention of the gaming market. I think.

[project-becky.livejournal.com]

Happy Birthday!

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[druidevo.livejournal.com]

I think the idea of classes in general is obnoxious, people don't exist as one class or another, why should characters, I guess that's why I always multiclass.

I'f I could somehow make a classless 3.x mod or just get people to play a mortal World of Darkness game I would be happy. This of course would have to happen on Saturdays in Lawrence now because of work.

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

Happy Birthday!

Putting the Old in Old School

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

Me? I think it was the Advanced D&D that effed everything up.

FTW!

[diermuid.livejournal.com]

+1.

I still have my 4 original D&D boxed sets. I think the kids and I will play with those. HEaring that v4 is out when I've just started getting the 3.5 books a few years ago just depressed me into a 2000 calorie Sundae. (OR it could have been the Chaise search).

Either way... thanks go to E. for pointing out why combat seemed not to work for me in recent books. No THAC0!

[tryst-inn.livejournal.com]

Ack, we're still going to continue with 3.5 for the foreseeable future.

[pete3great.livejournal.com]

from the podcasts, and other evidence, i expect it's all just an excuse to redesign bards and the grappling rules.

thaz a joke, really, they just want you to buy more books.

[crookedface.livejournal.com]

The only version I play is 1st Edition AD&D, when I can be convinced to take it out for a spin. Too many better rules engines available to waste time with the newer stuff.