I guess the real problem here that you guys dont seem to groke is that the designers already tried a game where everyone gets powers and it turns out that not everyone likes having boring set powers that you spam fight after fight (which of course must last long enough for you to completely spam all your powers).
A stronger emphasis on improvisation is infinitely better then the same old boring power spam of old.
And you're ignoring the very large 4e playerbase that prefers exciting powers over the same damn "Make something up!" excuses of old.
4e apparently proved that D&D cannot stand on one half of the playerbase alone. So if you get your way and run all the 4e influence out of this game then you're going to end up with a failure of a game. A game you'll enjoy, but a failure nonetheless.
You cannot demand that 4e players play the same damn game they've already rejected. That is stupid. All we're asking for is the option to play the way we want. That's hardly unreasonable.
Absolutely right.
Which is why it is so stupid to see so many people who seem to be expecting the first public playtest of DnD Next to be a finished product that is all things to everyone.
And then right after water is turned into wine, they will start complaining about how they wanted white instead of red.
We are not expecting that.
We ARE expecting the playtest to be the simple 'core' that everything can be built upon. We just aren't seing how they are going to build AEDU onto vancian and sorcerer casting, while at the same time not feat taxing the fighter to get AEDU maneuvers...
That is a valid concern and one not easily answered.
But asking to build in AEDU may be less productive than attempting to find a solution that avoids both pitfalls.
Brave Knights of W.T.F. Gryphon Helm Winner.
Edition wars kill players, this will kill Dungeons and Dragons.
Somthing i might like to see is if they changed the action econemy for the fighter a bit.
so that in 5th you could do any attack that used to be a fighter at will attack in 4th. so you would not have enconter and dailyl powers yet, but instead would get access to all attacks that used to be at will powers.
and you could imptovice to chieve simular effects.
Themes are feat delivery, and fighters may be getting an extra theme, probably for just this reason.
Though themes are, as stated, optional, so themes can't be a balancing part of the Fighter. He has to be balanced before themes.
I can't recall who pointed this out, but the double theme idea just makes fighters into the new bards. Being able to brew potions and use cantrips doesn't make a character into more of a fighter, yet that's exactly what someone could use those themes for. A second theme is a decent way to make the fighter less dull for the playtest, so that's cool. But it's not a long-term answer.
Ed_Warlord, on what it takes to make a thread work: I think for it to be really constructive, everyone would have to be honest with each other, and with themselves.
Areleth: How does this help the problems we have with Fighters? Do you think that every time I thought I was playing D&D what I was actually doing was slamming my head in a car door and that if you just explain how to play without doing that then I'll finally enjoy the game?
Nopes! I'm completely getting the point, as always MANY people have claimed that wizards need lengthy spell descriptions written from an in-world perspective or else creativity is gone from casting. "4E spells just do damage + status. Casting is no longer creative - you just spam kewl powerz like a fighter" (except to a zone, or damage of a specific type, and with a brief description, and so on). In this atmosphere, I have come to learn that some players cannot be creative with abilities that merely have a name, an effect, and some fluff text. So why would anyone be able to be creative with just a basic attack?
Having abilities simply doesn't take away creativity. If that were true, we'd see old-E advocates demanding the removal of spells in order to free casters from their shackles.
Are you expecting logical consistency again Emwasick, back to the dog house for you!
This is actually a really key point IMHO. By having a variety of mechanical effects that you can fairly easily assign different flavor to and easily tweak in different ways depending on what you want the results can be quite rich. I've seen a FAR greater diversity of character concepts built on just basic choices in 4e than I ever did back in the day. I've also seen LOTS of creative uses of powers.
Every character can improvise. Every character can engage in contests. The only thing the fighter can do that others can't is hit things real good.
And once the Wizard gets her second Magic Missile at level 3, her average damage (no hit roll!) is close enough to the fighter that even that distinction seems less impressive.
Sure, and the wizard can shoot fire at multiple people, etc, as well.
We'll see if the fighter can stand up next to the wizard as an equal in combat once maneuver feats are available.
They better not have to spend feats just to have the narrative control that the other classes get for free. That is the return of the feat tax.
Themes are feat delivery, and fighters may be getting an extra theme, probably for just this reason.
Though themes are, as stated, optional, so themes can't be a balancing part of the Fighter. He has to be balanced before themes.
Not necessarily. It looks to me like they're balancing the game on the class/theme/background level of complexity, and providing "hard mode"/"old school" by the removal of theme and background. The fighter is roughly balanced (or can be) with just attacks, and getting more of them. It's close enough for the old school style game. As long as what is held within the class is roughly balanced, it should work. But the stripped down version of the game just won't be as balanced as the core assumption, which is class/theme/background.
More sex and gender equality and racial equality shouldn't even be an argument--it should simply be an assumption for any RPG that wants to stay relevant in the 21st century.
Themes are feat delivery, and fighters may be getting an extra theme, probably for just this reason.
Though themes are, as stated, optional, so themes can't be a balancing part of the Fighter. He has to be balanced before themes.
I can't recall who pointed this out, but the double theme idea just makes fighters into the new bards. Being able to brew potions and use cantrips doesn't make a character into more of a fighter, yet that's exactly what someone could use those themes for. A second theme is a decent way to make the fighter less dull for the playtest, so that's cool. But it's not a long-term answer.
It is if the extra theme provides a way to have powers without being behind anyone else in character resources, without forcing powers into the basic class chassis, since a large segment of the community doesn't want them. It's a solution that does everything that needs to be done.
More sex and gender equality and racial equality shouldn't even be an argument--it should simply be an assumption for any RPG that wants to stay relevant in the 21st century.
I have some problems with Improvisation = Martial Techniques that basically are: Assuming that all of them can be done by all characters and all of them can done all the time. Both statements are wrong. There is plenty stuff out there to martials characters do. However, I think that there's room for both complex and simple fighter.
There is one advantage in class design that it’s not mentioned very often. The short version is: being a Wizard actually means something. I will try to explain this. A class is formed by several parts: It has the mechanics, which is obvious. But it also has fluff, flavor, description and legacy. Basically there are the stories about characters of that class, the class’s identity and all of such. To better represent my opinion, I shall bring to the discussion another commercial franchise: Final Fantasy. In many FFs there exists the Job system, which is really just a class system. Many times the Final Fantasy’s games uses a system different from that, but usually it’s a system unique to the game, and even so references to the Job system exist, so the Job system wins as most common system used by FF. Thing is, many people recognize FF Jobs, from classical Jobs such as Black Mage, White Mage, Warrior, Ninja, Paladin, Dragoon to less iconic Jobs such as, I don’t know, Jobs that only appeared in one to three games. Thing is, with considered time, these Jobs have all sort of Fluff and Legacy with then. Many characters not only use one Job, but also marked the series. When people talk about the Black Mage, for instance, not only they will remember the concept itself, but they will also remember all the appearances made in Job based games (which, in that specific case, are many) and also many characters like Palom from FFIV or Vivi from FFIX or Lulu from FFX. Things is, these Jobs marked the series and being one of them actually has meaning, because this Jobs have strong identities attached to them. The problem with classless systems is that, they are classless. What is a Wizard in a classless system? This really matter? In a classless system, is there some meaning in being a Wizard? The problem with classless systems is that these identities are kinda of lost, because being a Wizard is not so important, because being a Wizard does not have any mechanical marks and basically in a classless system, there is no Wizard by default, this doesn’t have meaning in a practical way. With class bases D&D, however, that is different. Being a Wizard in D&D has meaning, an when people talk about Wizards in D&D they will not only remember the current version of the Wizard, they will also remember all versions of the Wizard, and all characters and NPCs that are Wizards, and now, they will also remember the mechanical difference and the flavor, identity difference between the Wizard and the other spellcasting classes. This is something really hard to put in words, there is my best shot.
Right now, I would make Vancian the standard magic system for most classes in D&D (including Wizard and Cleric). What people complained is the fact that the Wizard was Vancian-Only. If it was Vancian-Default, that would be different. I've long advocated supporting both the Points of Light setting and settings full of magic items. I had some thought on one spellcasting system. Spoiler:Show
It is basically composed of three parts: 1. The Standard System: The standard system would be classic Vancian. Wizard: classic Vancian, have to learn spells first, and then prepare them. All the 9 spells levels. Cleric: It would be Vancian, but with some differences, The Cleric would carry on the tradition of choosing spells directly from the class’s spell list, but it would have some old school disadvantages to compensate, such as 7 spell-levels for Clerics and Druids (and even less for Paladins and Rangers), and most divine’s spells would be about healing and support (the Druid and the Ranger can have more offensive spells), and, in general, they would have less spells, perhaps even having divine spells (Cleric, Druid, Paladin and Ranger) be worse than arcane spells, as I’ve told that it was like this in pre-3rd Edition. 2. The Flagships The Flagships are classes that represent one alternative magic system in the standard system. They, by default, are not Vancian, they use another system (with the possibility of using Vancian or other systems). Sorcerer: This Sorcerer would be a little different than the other casters. They would have the same spell list as the Wizard (a la 3.X) and they will use, by default, flexible spell-slots spellcasting (the current system. Very like 3.X Sorcerer, but with class benefits that make then different, a la 4th Edition. With regards to other classes, I would make Bards Vancian, but the Warlock is also a good candidate to some different spellcasting mechanics. Possibly the Witch (4e post-Essentials subclass) somewhere? 3. Modular Magic Systems And there would be a module that changes the way that the spellcasting works. This would be a module that has guidelines about altering the default spellcasting mechanics. The guidelines would consist of how the quantity of spells cast can be ported over, and from which spells they prepare, etc... Let’s give a proper example: The Wizard would be classic Vancian. Thing is, for alternative casting systems, the Wizard would have guidelines that would be something on these lines: “They always prepare spells from the list of know spells. In alternative spellcasting modules, he can prepare a number of spells equal to 1+ Wizard’s level, and the number of spells slots or equivalent is equal to the number of spells per level per day.” This is not something that will have problems of text space. All that you need is some short guidelines about which spells they can chose to cast and how much spells they cast. The rest of these mechanics would be stated only once, in the module of alternative magic system. The good points: • Not only every Vancian class would have an option to be non-Vancian, but also the non-Vancian classes would have the options to be Vancian. Why some classes in default would be Vancian while others not? Add some variety for the new players and players of things like RPGA and Encounter. That and many of the editions of D&D had it like that. • It manages to both being classic with classic Vancian and satisfy the non-Vancian fans with flagships and modules. The bad points: • Using alternative magic systems do not raise your raw power but make casters more flexible. The classes that are already flexible (such as Sorcerer) would need some more flexibility to keep up. No idea how to handle martial characters, although.
We should get rid of at-will cantrips. Spoiler:Show
Okay, now that you’ve got the first panic reaction, let me explain it. Yes, many people like at-will cantrips and they are popular. They have everything that it takes to be popular. However, I think we should remove them from the game, at least as an assumption to all caster classes. First: At-will cantrips blur up the distinction between casters and martial characters, and makes being a gish useless. Basically in non at-will cantrips systems there is an advantage in martial characters: the fact that they have abilities that they can always use. But if we give every caster at-will cantrips this blurs up the difference between classes, take out a huge advantage of martial classes. There is also the gish issue. Basically in non at-will cantrips systems, there is a huge advantage of being a gish over being a full caster. The advantage of have some reliable action when out of spells. At-will cantrips weakens that advantage. Just for you to have some idea I was talking previously about the possibility of the Wizard being weaker than the Cleric (some time ago), and when I quoted the fact that the Cleric is a gish, people talked that this is not important, that it doesn’t have such impact because it will use its at-will cantrips. Being a gish should matter. Of course when being a gish actually matters, we can rebalance the classes but it should matter.
Second: At-will cantrips go into the opposite direction of trying to balance casters. Really when we are trying to balance classic or neo Vancian casters, why give to all of them at-will cantrips? Why we cannot use the absence of at-will cantrips to provide a drawback to balance casters? Third: At-will cantrips weaken the challenge of resource management. Really when you always have magic a great part of the challenge goes away. The possibility in being out of magic is not a bug, it is a feature It is part of the system, and this challenge don’t have to go away because it is fun. The challenge of running out of magic is part of the system, and fun. Fourth: At-will cantrips do not fit properly under every system. Really is not that I don’t like at-will magic, but I don’t think we should bake in every spellcasting system. In 4e it worked because it was part of AEDU, but now, they don’t feel part of anything. They seem to be an arbitrary addition to the game. The 3.5 Warlock was special because it was a class with at-will magic in a game where it doesn’t exist, otherwise, at-will magic. We can have at-will cantrips but it should be done it right, and not being a default assumption for every caster class. I’m worried if they are going to launch a mana spell-point based magic system for spellcasters. This system should not have at-will, no mana cost magic as default for every caster class, because running out of mana is part of the mana system. In Final Fantasy they even have no MP cost magic, but they do it right, and when they use no MP cost magic, it is special because it is in a game that is otherwise MP based.
The theme element is a feat delivery system not unlike 4E's "build" system. Two themes as a solution for the fighter is a return to the fighter's saving grace being Feat Man, able to take twice as many feats as the regular joe. Not every version of D&D had feats, and feats can be considered an optional element, even in 4E, should the DM say so. The moment feats & themes are removed, everyone would be shafted, but not as badly as the Feat ManFighter. 4E figter and 3.5E Warblade got it right, by granting class features that are uniquely martial and unique to the class that, even if you remove every other element except the class and maneuvers/powers, it still allows the class to be interesting in spite of the lack of world-rendering and world-rending capabilities.
I consider 4E powers to simply be selectable class features, just like martial maneuvers and caster spells. Except caster spells still scale better pre-4E, and depending on edition, would be a DM-granted player resource, in the form of "you can't get this spell until you find the scroll and put it in your spellbook".
Personally, I prefer the 4E method of "players can access these generally-doesn't-need-DM-adjudication spells, but the DM can always grant scrolls, tomes and other items that give players a whole different level of power, at a cost." Usually restricted to rituals, where the real magic in 4E occurs, but that's just me.
You are both rational and emotional. You value creation and discovery, and feel strongly about what you create. At best, you're innovative and intuitive. At worst, you're scattered and unpredictable.
If you're crossing the street and see a city bus barreling straight toward you with 'GIVE ME YOUR WALLET!' painted across its windshield, you probably won't be reaching for your wallet.
This is what I believe is the spirit of D&D 4E, and my deal breaker for D&D Next: equal opportunities, with distinct specializations, in areas where conflict happens the most often, without having to worry about heavy micromanagement or system mastery.
Themes are feat delivery, and fighters may be getting an extra theme, probably for just this reason.
Though themes are, as stated, optional, so themes can't be a balancing part of the Fighter. He has to be balanced before themes.
Depends. While it may be optional for all characters to have Themes, the fighter gaining a Theme as a class ability may not be optional (in this it would only gain one Theme as, like the other characters, it doesn't gain a starting Theme). This would be similar to rogues having their "Schemes".
Playtest or get off the playtest boards.
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I want justice for the voice that can't be heard Vindication for every suffering and hurt Let retribution hold dominion over earth --Nemesis, VNV Nation
MANY people have claimed that wizards need lengthy spell descriptions written from an in-world perspective or else creativity is gone from casting. "4E spells just do damage + status. Casting is no longer creative - you just spam kewl powerz like a fighter" (except to a zone, or damage of a specific type, and with a brief description, and so on). In this atmosphere, I have come to learn that some players cannot be creative with abilities that merely have a name, an effect, and some fluff text. So why would anyone be able to be creative with just a basic attack?
