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5 years ago ::
Aug 24, 2008 - 8:45PM
#11
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Date Joined:
Feb 27, 2006
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Is there someplace I could sign up and maybe pay a small membership fee to get your tears mailed to me? I use them as reagents in my dark rituals.
1. Pinch of gold dust blended with diamons dust.
2. The tears shed by a forumite who is frustrated by progress and could just keep playing 3.5, but feels drawn to venting bile into the wrong forum.
3. The voice of a young girl.
Originally I thought that the second ingredient for my World Dominating Ritual would be hard to get, but it turns out it wasn't hard at all! Thanks!
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5 years ago ::
Aug 24, 2008 - 8:47PM
#12
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Date Joined:
Aug 23, 2008
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I am an old dnd player, first introduced to the game with the boxed sets (dnd for the unitiated). I have played every version since then: adnd, 2nd edition, 3rd edition, 3.5, just about every campaign setting (darksun, dragonlance, that other continent for dragonlance, grayhawk, forgotten realms, ravenloft, eberron, stuff I can't remember). Suffice it to say I have seen just about everything this game has offered. The 4.0 take on the wizard has me concerned.
I was in the exact same boat, and my first bit will be "Don't Panic". I've been a spell combo meta-magic pain in my DM's hind quarters for years and when I saw the 4e Wizard it kinda freaked me out too.
I have yet to play a game of 4th edition and I am sure anyone who doesn't like what I have to say will take that as grounds to ignore me. Never the less, the wizard is very blah. I have been a big wizard player for a long time. It has been years since I did anything with fireball and lightning bolt but leave them in a spell book. Generally I specialize in something so I can get evocation as a barred school in 3rd edition. Illusion, enchantment, alteration, conjuration and necromancy are good enough for me. Never got into divination (I wonder why) and abjuration didn't get much of a look either. Clerics could always do that stuff as well or better anyway.
Once you sit down and play through a few encounters you'll get what the Wizard does pretty much down pat. Which is basically "crowd control". I know what you're thinking and yes I miss "Flesh to Stone" and "Stone to Mud" just as much as the next transmuter, but Wizards are luckily still being expanded as far as the spell book is concerned. For now if you want a blaster Evoker just play a Warlock, it'll feel a little weird but it produces similar results.
The 4.0 wizard is very uninteresting to look at. Here is what concerns me.
1) Very few spell choices are given to me. 4 spells to pick from every few levels can't compare to the dozens of spells available in the past.
Just breathe, it's tough, but spells are on their way...I hope, otherwise it'll be right back to 3.5 for me until they do 
2) They play the same as every one else except that you can have a few powers that you switch around if you feel like it (utility and daily spells).
The game has mechanically changed and is more of a dynamic place for characters such as the party meat wagon who walks around hitting everything with a large object that happens to be in the shape of an axe. Now said character is more than Smash, Move, Take Damage, then rinse and repeat. If you ever got into the 3.5 Supplement "Tome of Battle: The Book of Nine Swords", it kinda already did something similar.
3) They are clearly not good at direct damage. This would be fine except so many of the spell choices are direct damage spells. If these spells are not good it reduces the effective spells they have to choose from very poor to abysmal. I know that they have a lot of multi-target spells and this helps the damage look a little better ... sometimes.
4) The only clearly effective thing I can see to do is cast sleep or combo thunderwave with stinkingcloud and other zone spells. The later seems unbeivably effective but incredibly boring and cheesy.
I have a feeling that the Wizard will get some more toys to play with as they continue to expand the 4e library. Until then if you want to blast it, hinder it, or just be plain mean to it, play a Warlock.
What did they do to my interesting wizard with his plethora of spells and options?
Don't panic, with any luck Mr. Wizard will be slowly put back into something the remotely feels like being a Wizard. Though functionally everyone at the table will have just as many options for things to do as you will, though they may lack the variety.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 24, 2008 - 8:53PM
#13
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Date Joined:
Aug 24, 2008
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I was in the exact same boat, and my first bit will be "Don't Panic". I've been a spell combo meta-magic pain in my DM's hind quarters for years and when I saw the 4e Wizard it kinda freaked me out too.
Don't panic, with any luck Mr. Wizard will be slowly put back into something the remotely feels like being a Wizard. Though functionally everyone at the table will have just as many options for things to do as you will, though they may lack the variety.
That was pretty helpful. Dispite my fear of progress. and communism.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 24, 2008 - 8:57PM
#14
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Date Joined:
Mar 15, 2008
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Is there someplace I could sign up and maybe pay a small membership fee to get your tears mailed to me? I use them as reagents in my dark rituals.
1. Pinch of gold dust blended with diamons dust.
2. The tears shed by a forumite who is frustrated by progress and could just keep playing 3.5, but feels drawn to venting bile into the wrong forum.
3. The voice of a young girl.
Originally I thought that the second ingredient for my World Dominating Ritual would be hard to get, but it turns out it wasn't hard at all! Thanks!
Flawless Victory.
"Not only are you wrong, but I even created an Excel spreadsheet to show you how wrong you are." --James Wyatt, May 2006
Dilige, et quod vis fac
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5 years ago ::
Aug 24, 2008 - 9:01PM
#15
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Date Joined:
Aug 23, 2008
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That was pretty helpful. Dispite my fear of progress. and communism.
Well, I think this may be WoTC's attempt to improve their foreign policy and expand the fan base to include China, Russia, and North Korea 
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5 years ago ::
Aug 25, 2008 - 12:28AM
#16
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I absolutely agree with most peoples opinions of this 4.0 abomination.
When in history of any history did beings stand on equal fotting. I agree the wizards of 3.5 were an absolute overly powerful class. They were capable of anything and shaped the battle grounds like no other. That was a problem.
I firmly believe players should have options to CUSTOMIZE! This book tells me how to whipe after heading to the toilet. There is no rolling, no decisions, its a big mathematical equasion and the answer is always the same. Wizard Class = X and X is on equal footing as Fighter Class. etc.
This is even more cookie cutter than 3.5. I complained back then about meta gaming and now its even worse! I should not be capable of guessing someones AC # afeter a few strike attempts.
FREEDOM TO CUSTOMIZE IS THE KEY TO A GOOD SOLID GAME.
People - open your yes - the problem is not 4.0 but in my opinion the constant evolution of the Wizards of the Coast Brand. I have played a number of games outside of this brand where people have choice in thier characters and it is up to you to make whatever character you wish. Options where even a fighter can have spells and specializiations, supernatural or physical. A rogue can heal and a wizard can fight in heavy plate. Its all to where and how much you are willing to forgo to make your character something unieque.
I have personally begun work 6 months ago on a new system - a classless system. I dont see why a human fighter is restricted to only fighting, or a human wizard is restricted to only casting. A character cant be great at everything and that is a restriction on its own.
So I say be a combat oriented character, and if you want to be able to cast the spell fly than go ahead and learn it. Be a caster oriented character and specialize in healing and mind control while carrying a shield.
A time will come when people will abandon Wizards of the Coast and embrace a system that doesnt limit them to a cookie cutter versions that someone at a desk thousands of miles away decides for them.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 25, 2008 - 12:38AM
#17
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Oh but I do enjoy your miniatures - very solid quality and with paint jobs! Keep them comming.
I enjoy using them in my alternative game systems.
They come at quite reasonable costs on Ebay may I add.
AND AGAIN... I ACTUALY HAVE CHOICE THERE! CAN YOU IMAGINE!
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5 years ago ::
Aug 25, 2008 - 1:53AM
#18
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Date Joined:
Mar 16, 2004
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1) Very few spell choices are given to me. 4 spells to pick from every few levels can't compare to the dozens of spells available in the past.
I'm sure there will be more on the way, but don't expect anything radically different in nature to what you already see. The role of wizard has been redefined to be much tighter and probably gone are the days when you could play all sorts of different styles of magic user. Wizards in 4e are devoted to battlefield control - i.e. things that effect an encounter on a tactical level.
As is the same for everyone in 4e, there is little support for doing things outside of combat - the game is more of a tactical miniatures game now. However, Wizards do get more of a shot at doing things outside of combat than most other character types because they get rituals. So they have slightly more variety, but nobody has a lot.
2) They play the same as every one else except that you can have a few powers that you switch around if you feel like it (utility and daily spells).
This isn't the case and your impression wont last past your first few 4e battles. 4e places a great deal of importance on positioning and movement and what may seem minor on paper, such as Thunderwave knocking people back a couple of squares will leap out at you as tactically powerful when you use it, if you have any imagination in using it, anyway. Wizards play very differently to other character types in a battle and are very useful to a party in a unique fashion.
3) They are clearly not good at direct damage. This would be fine except so many of the spell choices are direct damage spells. If these spells are not good it reduces the effective spells they have to choose from very poor to abysmal. I know that they have a lot of multi-target spells and this helps the damage look a little better ... sometimes.
Again, I have to say try it in practice. Wizards are intended to do high damage (that's the Warlock). But they are intended to do widespread damage and they excel at this. A lot of the AoE spells also have side effects that you may not have realised how useful they are yet. The Ray of Frost spell is a direct damage spell, but it also slows your opponent. On a large battlefield, that means a wizard could walk around Ray of Frosting an opponent for a long time, whittling away her hit points while the opponent had no choice but to stumble around unable to either close with the wizard or run away. Looks like a minor effect - turns out to be a major one.
4) The only clearly effective thing I can see to do is cast sleep or combo thunderwave with stinkingcloud and other zone spells. The later seems unbeivably effective but incredibly boring and cheesy.
So long as your DM is giving you interesting battle locations with a bit of terrain and some features, you can do a lot with your control powers. And so long as your party members are using sensible tactics rather than just each running up to their own opponent and bashing away until its dead (which will probably get them killed by superior enemy tactics via flanking, shifting, etc), then they'll appreciate your help in keeping superior positioning.
What did they do to my interesting wizard with his plethora of spells and options?
They killed it. It's dead. It's gone. It is no more. The 4e wizard plays well and is fun in the sense of tactical gaming. All the open ended, imaginative things you can do with it have been taken from you (or else will be snatched away in errata as soon as they are noticed). This is true of everyone but is most noticeable with the wizard because the wizard had by far the most open ended options. In previous editions, Wizards were the class of choice for players who wanted to use imaginative and unexpected tactics and strategies. In 4e, there is no such class.
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5 years ago ::
Aug 25, 2008 - 5:41AM
#19
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First off, though I never played 3.0 or 3.5 (well, I did, about 4 games as a Sorcerer and decided I didn't like it), I can match your experience previous to that.
1) Very few spell choices are given to me. 4 spells to pick from every few levels can't compare to the dozens of spells available in the past.
I shared the same exact concern, and from the first moment I decided that I wasn't going to even try 4th edition. I mean, "Fly" at best once a day for no more than 5 minutes?!? No flying if you decided to be Invisible that day?!?!? I started out despising the game. (needless to say, that has changed). The only reason I gave it a chance was because it was pointed out that I had an infinite number of Mage Hand castings per day, stacked with an infinite number of Magic Missiles. So... ok, gave it a chance.
2) They play the same as every one else except that you can have a few powers that you switch around if you feel like it (utility and daily spells).
This is where book-reading and experience become obvious. They can be like everyone else, no doubt about it. But they're not. In a team of players (something you can't know thinking or playing solo), he has a vital role for team survival. From insta walls, to minion bashing area effects, to the best Utility Powers in the game. They are as different as a WarLord is, and just as valuable to the entirety of the team.
3) They are clearly not good at direct damage. This would be fine except so many of the spell choices are direct damage spells. If these spells are not good it reduces the effective spells they have to choose from very poor to abysmal. I know that they have a lot of multi-target spells and this helps the damage look a little better ... sometimes.
Good. Direct Damage would make them too powerful, and nobody would want to play anything else. They're good at all the other things really. And due to their very high AC/Reflexes from the super-Int, they're not so hard to keep alive either.
4) The only clearly effective thing I can see to do is cast sleep or combo thunderwave with stinkingcloud and other zone spells. The later seems unbeivably effective but incredibly boring and cheesy.
That's kinda the point. And not nearly as effective as you might think, since you still have to overcome defenses in 4e, unlike previous editions where you cast a spell, and the effect happened regardless. Take out as many as you can via effects, make it easier for the combatants to handle the ones you were no effect against, and then they can work on the dazed/unconscious/etc ones. Your job is to make it easier for the warriors, not to do their jobs for them.
So I can be like everybody else!!! :D :D :D 
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5 years ago ::
Aug 25, 2008 - 6:30AM
#20
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Date Joined:
Oct 24, 2007
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There is only one big complaint I have with the new 4e. Spell preparation. Having to guess which spell will be useful on the next day adds nothing to the game. It's very frustrating to be unable to feather fall only because you decided to be able to shield beforehand.
Adding the ability to cast a spell on the fly, within the limits of the allowed spells, would add a bit of variety and "magic" to the class.
Sadly at the moment, when the entire group looks for you to save the day with that wonderfully appropriate spell, 50% of the time you can only shake the head and say "sorry guys today I'm able to turn water into wine".
This simple change would, in my opinion, be enough to restore the entire class concept.
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