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yrogerg wrote:

If you're the DM in both of them? Sure you could. It would be just the same as if you came up with an NPC for a homebrewed setting, or if you were one of a set of rotating DMs that share a particular adventure world.

There are some players though, such as myself when I get the chance to sit in front of the screen, that know when some things are not canon. I'm a big stickler for canon, behind and in front of the screen. This effects the rules as well, which is a large reason why one DM I played with dind't see eye to eye, when we went back and forth. Some people see the rules as a base, and like to disregard them when it's convenient, or makes the story better. I on the other hand like having rules there, and deviating only when they are absent.

*Shrug* Style of play.

To clarify, part of the reason why it's a pet peeve is that D&D as a whole thrives on homebrew, on customization, on improvization. Were it not for these qualities, it never would have gotten off the ground, truth be told- the very first campaign setting was nothing but Arnesen's home game. What I see is that the designers were aware of this, and put a lot of the focus in 4e on providing the tools and framework to support these things. It is true that for people who like the more granular, somewhat less abstract system that 3e gave us, this has the potential to be a bit of a stinker, and I can understand that, but that revamped framework isn't really something appropriately dismissed with a "I don't want houserules (in the broadest sense possible, where it applies even to modifying non-mechanical flavor) to accomplish this".

I'm sorry if that was the impression I gave. I simply think house rules have a time and place, and that generally for me isn't overwriting rules that exist, and work fine.

That said, I often feel like things that don't work (deviating from the NPC for a second), should be corrected with Errata, as I know rule debates come up from time to time, often with the line between the two coming down to RAW vs RA Interpreted/ intended.

This reaction strikes me as akin to being given a state-of-the-art racing bike, one appropriate for the Tour de France, and complaining about it with a "But I don't want to have to use my legs to get around!" You're not only failing to appreciate what exactly you have in front of you, but missing the fact that this a fundamental aspect of getting around.

I see the complaint more akin to being given a state-of-the-art racing bike, only to get on it, and find it pales in comparison in all aspects to the one you had before. This is for the NPC, not the rules now.

-RW

shrewfish wrote:

My main issue with 3.x wizards is that sure, at extreme high levels they become godly, but I always wondered how they got there in the first place. They are horrible to level because they die so easy and are so limited till they have a good amount of level under their belt, that only the luckiest of wizards would make it to maturity. This didnt make sense to me, wizards would have been weeded out from the gene pool. This is not the case with 4.0 wizards, they are a species that wouldnt have been eradicated like 3.x wizard would have should have been.

Not true. Most wizards attend a college/ school, or are apprenticed out to a more powerful wizard. This generally brings a wizard to about 5th level by the end of his tutoring, at which point he is competent enough to go out and study on his own. With this in mind, wizards that study progress slower than their adventuring counterparts. This accounts for a scarcity of competent non adventuring wizards, and the high levels wizards achieve in a elatively short time adventuring.

Additionally, the scale was balanced, just in a manner few like to see. I have always played a wizard, with very little exception. I have always been willing to bite the bullet at low levels, to be able to rock the socks off most things at high. A fighter starts out good, remains good, and finishes good. A Wizard starts out as the biggest piece of shite, this side of religion, becomes good, and then finishes great. My qualm has never been a balance thing, personally I hated the fighters who complained at high levels. If I have always been willing to take a back seat to every other character, often for months on end in RL, I don't see why when suddenly I get a little spot light, everyone cries broken.

But maybe that's just me.

Whats worse 3.x wizard was not fun to level at all.

I know many people who loved playing a caster.

I remember when i ran a group at lvl 1 no one wanted to be the wizard.

I find this consensus mixed. There were several such as myself, who were willing to start weak, and finish strong.

At higher levels everyone and their housecat wanted to be a spell slinger of one kind or another.

This is more due to a sense of poor sportsmanship. As I said, everyone should get their turn in the limelight. Just because you get it all as a fighter to begin with, doesn't mean you should get it later as well. 4e makes everyone the same, so this doesn't happen. That doesn't mean it wasn't balanced before, or people didn't like the way it stacked up.

Because they had 0 survivability and 0 fun starting out

Maybe if you didn't/ don't know how to RP. I've made characters on story alone, sacrificing personal power for flavour, and never once regretted it. I think it's a very case by case situation, and one shouldn't assume their preferences, as the preferences of the whole.

Unless wizards were born powerful, or always multiclassed i cant see how any of them managed to stay around to become powerful. (Elminster 3.x made sense to me for example since he was fighter/rogue/cleric etc.)

He was a poorly built character, as many of the epic level ones were, though his levels were for story not mechanical sense. I've never died as a low level wizard, often surviving multiple TPK's. This annoyed some people, and ended some groups, but I've never played a dumb wizard, so surviving was never an issue.

And yeah you can say a high level wizard in 3.x was more powerful relative to 4.0 wizard (mainly because spell selection got to be ridiculous), but he was also more powerful than most all other classes in 3.x and 4.0.

At high levels, as was the trade off. That said, not everyone went past 12th-16th level. So the full potential isn't always realized, often making the Wizard a poor choice for anyone looking for instant and constant power, and who're unable to RP decently.

Finally, 3.x wizard could deal with more stuff but for less time having to burn through his memed spells until he was impotent;

The threat was often enough to keep most from messing with him. I rarely resorted to blasting everything, and overshadowing the group. Only if my life depended on a big show, or I felt safe in expending energy I would. The rest of the time, flexing the old mental muscle, was enough for me.

4.0 archmage (high level wizard) has more staying power through an adventure and is more useful (fun) always. The argument that the 3.x wizard is better against the 4.x wizard because of his having many more spells means squat because the duel between them wont last that long in the first place. Action point owns 3.x wizard. (I think pathfinder has action points, though)

biased demi-rant over.

You're right the fight would not last long. In a matter of seconds, the 4e wizard would be little more than a scuff mark on the memory of old father time. This isn't true for all levels, but at the high ones in question, there is no contest.

Also, AP were a 3.x option, so they existed in the rules then. Much of the stuff we see now was play tested in 3.x, unless of course you forget the Warlock, or ignore Complete Mage.

-RW