[Menchi]

To be blunt, it seems to me that the reviewer forgets that not everyone roleplays the same way, and not everyone is good at getting into character.

There are many solutions to this problem - D&D's way is to provide rewards for the mechanical side of things and then let individual DMs decide how they want to house rule the rest. Remember, that page long discussion in the DMG that promotes the DM consider house ruling to suit play preference.

At the core of it, a lot of these D&D 4e reviews - both good and bad - seem to be boiling down to arguments about how it should suit one style of play. The reviewer's.

Now that is reasonable to a point - but to criticise the game for trying to find a middle ground seems a bit much.

I've found the new 4e does improve the kick-in-the-door style of play, but it is working much harder at promoting DMs create their own fantasy settings and to think beyond just one style of play. It gives advice on everything from one-offs to super-campaigns.

Hardly the one-style play that the reviewer seems to think it has. XP are only one way to promote certain playstyles in a game. Good GMing is a far more potent and effective method - and the DMG aims at helping with that more. I point to page 28 on improvising, with the section called "saying yes" - the book is full of gems like this that expressly advise how to promote roleplaying in a game without relying on some cheesy reward based system.

Conan