In revising and streamlining the game, I'm fearful that the designers may have lost sight of what made Third Edition D&D what it was. My chief concern in studying Fourth Edition is that it's just a new fun toy for the Internet generation that is to 3E D&D what Linkin Park is to the Ring of the Nibelung.
Re: [RPG]: [Fantasy Week] Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition, reviewed by Belisarius
Hey, Belisarius999, thanks for the review.
I can sympathise with your point that 4th edition doesn't feel like DnD, with things like vancian Spell casting out the window, the balance issues between fighters and wizards, etc...
I think though that these things needed to change, as they have been problems with the game since day one.
My question is, how would you have reacted to 4th edition, if these things didn't change?
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Re: [RPG]: [Fantasy Week] Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition, reviewed by Belisarius
Interesting review. In terms of vitriol I don't understand why you rated it a 4/4? or did I read that wrong.
However you did highlight a lot of issues that I had questions about. In light of which - you're review has helped me weigh in on my decision to purchase 4e.
Re: [RPG]: [Fantasy Week] Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition, reviewed by Belisarius
That was a tremendous review, good info and fun to read. I checked out Insider to see the video, and you are absolutely correct. "RAR!"?? That's ... embarrassing.
Re: [RPG]: [Fantasy Week] Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition, reviewed by Belisarius
Quote:
Originally Posted by Coglio
That was a tremendous review, good info and fun to read. I checked out Insider to see the video, and you are absolutely correct. "RAR!"?? That's ... embarrassing.
No, it's a short clip from the hilarious promo video for 4e in which they interviewed a Tiefling and a Gnome. You can watch it here:
Re: [RPG]: [Fantasy Week] Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition, reviewed by Belisarius
Tremendous review, and you hit a lot of points that have been on my mind about 4E. I want to give 4E a shot, and I'm doing my best to approach it with an open mind. But, as you pointed out, it changes a lot of things that gave D&D its distinctively dank flavor. I've played a ton of different systems (for awhile I completely gave up on D&D and played Rolemaster for my fantasy campaigns, for example), so it's not like I'm dismayed by the idea of different rules. I guess it's more the idea that WotC replaced a distinctive and clearly successful (commercially-speaking) ruleset with... something else.
I must admit, what catches me the most off-guard are the powers, so I'm glad you touched on their mere existence as an issue. Although, I must also admit I never fully adjusted to feats in 3E. They seem too "super-powery" to me, and I have trouble conceptualizing them in the pseudo-medieval setting otherwise assumed in the rules. On a more practical level, I want to DM something, but I wonder if I can keep track of all these powers and such. As complicated and restrictive as a lot of the 1E and 2E rules were, they seemed remarkably streamlined to me in terms of DMing.
Well, my 4E PH comes in the mail, soon. In spite of what I say here, I'm still looking forward to checking it out.
Re: [RPG]: [Fantasy Week] Dungeons and Dragons Fourth Edition, reviewed by Belisarius
I'm tired of seeing reviews and forum posts that aren't bothering to review whether or not D&D 4 is a good game, but rather are chosing to focus on the "how dare they call this D&D" attitude. It's not 3.6, but it is D&D because the company that owns the title decided that this is now what D&D is. If grognards are upset that it's a new game and not a simple evolution of 3.5 (which you would have bitched about because not enough stuff changed to make a new edition worthwhile) and choose to play Pathfinder or some other game because of it, more power to them. I doubt WotC cared that certain grognards that were stuck in AD&D didn't like the change to 3.0 and chose to stick with AD&D or play Hackmaster or C&C because "it's what D&D 3.0 should have been." I think they attracted enough new business to offset the loss of a few grognards.
I don't say this to get into a flame war about what makes a game D&D. I own and have played every edition from B/X D&D, AD&D1, D&D Rules Cyclopedia, AD&D2, and D&D 3, but I never really liked the game that much and other systems proved to be more to my liking. D&D 4 is the first version that I'm actually excited about playing from what I've read so far. I never liked the Vancian magic system and think Powers is a great improvement. I like that everybody gets to do cool stuff. I like that even 1st level Heroes are just that, heroes, rather than Joe Farmer that have to be afraid of accidently getting killed by a house cat or else load up on so many magic items to compensate that they're a walking wizard's shop. In every way that 4e is not like the older versions, I'm pleased. I also think that they do stand a good chance of picking up quite a few new players from the MMO crowd, which if it allows WotC to keep D&D going, is a great thing. So if some of you grognards don't want to make the change, so be it. None of the new players will care a wit that it's different than some older version that they never played. This will be the only D&D they know and if it is fun, they'll keep playing and coming back for more.
If it's not for you and you'd rather play something else, that's cool too. It's what I ended up doing through all the previous editions. I and many others will be happily playing 4e while you play something else. Just don't try to tell me that I'm not really playing D&D.
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