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3 years ago ::
Aug 22, 2010 - 11:23PM
#1
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Date Joined:
Jun 15, 2008
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For those of us who haven't seen the article yet, it's here: www.wizards.com/DND/Article.aspx?x=dnd/d...Mike Mearls explains the new Magic Item Rarity rules more in depth than I've seen before (and hey look, it's from an official source, not some random poster's theory). Personally I love it, and one of the things I didn't like about 4E out of the gate as a DM was Magic Items in the Player's Handbook, the Create Magic ritual and the sense of entitlement the current generation of DnD player's seemed to exhibit because of both. I know I'm in the minority here, but I really don't give a ****. So feel free to argue amongst yourselves about the changes. (If you sense a level of aggression in this post, it's because I'm dog tired of all the complaining, but am willing to forge "once more into the breach" on behalf of changes that I personally believe make the game better . . . for me.)
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3 years ago ::
Aug 22, 2010 - 11:45PM
#2
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Date Joined:
Nov 29, 2001
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So we now have official word that Uncommon is uncraftable. Queue all the posters previously defending the system by insisting "only rare will be uncraftable, WotC wouldn't make uncommon uncraftable" coming in and saying "I knew they'd make uncommon uncraftable all along, and this system is great!"
Personally, I think this is a bad idea, and a step backwards. The original daily item limit placed a hard rules-enforced limit on spamming items to preserve balance. The new rule just says "If they spam items it's the DM's fault for giving out the wrong ones". Rare items make this even worse... balance used to be in the realm of the designers and authors, but now it's being entirely put on the DM's shoulders, so that the designers have free reign to create overpowered and imbalanced items without having to worry about later errata-ing them when they're found to be too powerful. All this new system does is make it so that when one person says "This item is broken", another person can say "Well then don't give it to your players" and have the rules back them on it, since players can no longer decide what to craft or buy on their own.
This is a bad idea. The only thing this accomplishes is making the DM responsible for maintaining the balance of broken items instead of the designers and errata. If people were honestly concered that new players were too dumb/new to figure out daily item uses, or at-will powers, then there should be a much bigger concern that new DM's will be unable to figure out the intricacies of game balance with little to guide them. The only problem that's being "fixed" if you really read the article, is that the designers have a hard time balancing items and now they don't have to. This is a fix for them and their errata, not really a fix for DM's.
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3 years ago ::
Aug 22, 2010 - 11:52PM
#3
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Date Joined:
Aug 11, 2006
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As a (mostly) DM, I *liked* magic items being in the PHB and the Enchant Magic Item ritual, and I didn't (and still don't) put any stock in entitlement rants.
My experience with "you must go out and collect rare reagents" systems, from Basic/1E days onward, is that they fall flat on their face as a game element, since they effectively demand that whatever other story threads are being followed be tossed out while the PCs go off to do another round of reagent-grinding.
It might work in a game where you expect to see no more than one or two magic items EVER and creating an item is thus actually main-plot-worthy, but no version of D&D has ever approached that degree of scarcity.
So, this is a 'solution' that I'll happily ignore.
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3 years ago ::
Aug 22, 2010 - 11:59PM
#4
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As a (mostly) DM, I *liked* magic items being in the PHB and the Enchant Magic Item ritual, and I didn't (and still don't) put any stock in entitlement rants. My experience with "you must go out and collect rare reagents" systems, from Basic/1E days onward, is that they fall flat on their face as a game element, since they effectively demand that whatever other story threads are being followed be tossed out while the PCs go off to do another round of reagent-grinding. It might work in a game where you expect to see no more than one or two magic items EVER and creating an item is thus actually main-plot-worthy, but no version of D&D has ever approached that degree of scarcity. So, this is a 'solution' that I'll happily ignore.
Agreed.
Another day, another three or four entries to my Ignore List.
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3 years ago ::
Aug 23, 2010 - 12:04AM
#5
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Date Joined:
Nov 29, 2001
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As a (mostly) DM, I *liked* magic items being in the PHB and the Enchant Magic Item ritual, and I didn't (and still don't) put any stock in entitlement rants. My experience with "you must go out and collect rare reagents" systems, from Basic/1E days onward, is that they fall flat on their face as a game element, since they effectively demand that whatever other story threads are being followed be tossed out while the PCs go off to do another round of reagent-grinding. It might work in a game where you expect to see no more than one or two magic items EVER and creating an item is thus actually main-plot-worthy, but no version of D&D has ever approached that degree of scarcity. So, this is a 'solution' that I'll happily ignore.
I wanted to agree with this too. Despite the fact that all the previous versions of D&D talked about the "go out on a quest and get the reagents" thing for magic items, it always worked terribly in practive any time I've seen it tried. Especially as I've gotten older and I don't have time to play D&D for hundreds of hours. Most people I know play once a week for a few hours, and that time is best spent playing your actual campaign and trying to follow the most interesting points of the story. Taking a random side adventure to go find magic acorns for your wand +2 can waste an entire session or two (or three) if you make it an actual quest, when we hardly have time to just follow the main plot line. That kind of thing works great in a video game where you are playing by yourself and you can do the sidequest in a half hour... it doesn't work so well in a social game where you need to schedule a bunch of people getting together and every "side quest" takes several hours.
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3 years ago ::
Aug 23, 2010 - 12:05AM
#6
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Date Joined:
Jul 30, 2002
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Looks good to me. Especially the no arbitrary daily limit on magic items. Although, I have a feeling that WotC is going to release some deck of cards, similar to the power cards, but each one describes a unique and powerful rare item with accompaning art...
-I got ran over my a squirrel the other day.
-I'm going to steal my own idea.
-My fruits of labor are not fruits... *sniff* they're vegetables. *sobs*
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3 years ago ::
Aug 23, 2010 - 1:34AM
#7
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Date Joined:
Jun 27, 2004
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The only problem that's being "fixed" if you really read the article, is that the designers have a hard time balancing items and now they don't have to. This is a fix for them and their errata, not really a fix for DM's.
Heh. That was my impression too.
EDIT: I'm presuming that the "No daily item use limit" rule will become a part of the errata - it kind of has to to keep the game uniform. /EDIT
I find myself completely apathetic at this point, though. At the point of "Y'know what? You do whatever you want. I'm not buying it. I'm not using it. I'll check out what changes to slap into the errata, and see if I like those. But at this point, I think I'm going to implement my original 4th Edition plan early, and call it quits with new products. I'll collect what's already come out. I'll use the hell out of it. And I'll have a self-contained game that I like. If I, or players, see something 'new' that comes out that we like, we'll just be treating it like we do any other house rules."
So really, it's back to how we treated "official" products in 3.5. Groovy.
Feedback Disclaimer
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Yes, I am expressing my opinions (even complaints - le gasp!) about the current iteration of the play-test that we actually have in front of us.
No, I'm not going to wait for you to tell me when it's okay to start expressing my concerns (unless you are WotC).
(And no, my comments on this forum are not of the same tone or quality as my actual survey feedback.)
A Psion for Next (Playable Draft)A Barbarian for Next (Brainstorming Still)My 4e Projects
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3 years ago ::
Aug 23, 2010 - 1:45AM
#8
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Yup...I'm with 'Frito.
I didn't really care for 3rd all that much. Bought the core, and very little else. Bought 3.5 because it seemed it would "fix" the problems I had. While it made some progress in toning down flagrant abuse, it did nothing to change the design paradigm that I discovered was the root of my dislike of the system. 3.X was a bunch of supplements with poor design and little appeal.
Essentials seems the same. I've seen that song and dance before, and I'm not buying. I reserve the right to be blown away by post-Essentials products, but I'm not counting on it.
As I said a few days ago: "Plan for the worst, and hope for the best".
Essentials zigged, when I wanted to continue zagging.
Roll dice, not cars.
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3 years ago ::
Aug 23, 2010 - 1:47AM
#9
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Date Joined:
Jan 24, 2010
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So, I get to have a Flaming Burst Flame-Tongue Longsword again? Hmm. As usual, I'm ambivalent about Essentials rules til I actually have them in print in my hands, but I will say that it the Uncommon 50% sale value thing is an improvement, looks like they're finally doing something about the (really rather limiting) character expected wealth.
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3 years ago ::
Aug 23, 2010 - 1:52AM
#10
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Date Joined:
Jun 19, 2008
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Well, we use 50% resale value in the current system anyway, so that is not an issue for us.
I suspect this new system will work the best in my planned dark sun game(s), where I would limit magic item enchanting anyway. It is not really needed, as I could have done the limiting myself just as easily, but it does not hurt either.
What I don't want is for it to affect character builder in any way. If it causes limitations on what I could equip on a given character, then I am against it. Otherwise it makes absolutely no difference.
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