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Apr 19, 2012 -- 5:51AM, Gnarl wrote:

That's exactly my point! As you said, it's the mechanical part that is important, not the fluffy part. The spell does what the mechanics section says and nothing else. If you want to use web to create some kind of net over a pit, you can't. 

You always misinterpret how it is supposed to play out. I know, this is one playstyle and everything, but please, remember that 4E does not, in fact, work that way. Not for those it is thought for.

It's true, the important part is the mechanical one. However, if you want to use web to create some kind of net over a pit, you totally can.

When people who are not used to reflavoring talk about it, they always take it one step too far. You take a spell, change its flavor as needed because the important part is the mechanical aspect, and that to you means the part you changed has no effect in the actual gameplay. That much is false. Flavor always has an effect. What doesn't change is the mechanical resolution of the power / spell.

I guess it's difficult to understand, but here's a few examples.
If you reflavor the web spell to a time stasis zone, you can use it to help your party pass through a classic mechanical trap with bladed pendulums. It's a time stasis zone, the DM makes a call sure but it's very likely to work.
If you have the default flavor, you can totally use web to pass over a pit. Again, the DM makes a ruling, but so does he do in every other edition. There's no explicit rule that mentions using web to cross pits, it's just something many sane DMs would allow. And so would they allow it in 4E.
When we say that "the mechanics are what is important", what we mean is the following. If you reflavor web into a time stasis zone, you could argue that it slows blood in the veins and therefore increases the chances for a heart failure. You could then ask the DM to roll a percentile die every time you cast the spell to see if someone has a heart failure due to that (substitute this with any other kind of rules lawyering on the mechanical impact of the spell on the game). This doesn't work: the mechanics of the spell are the same as the Web spell.
Some say "but that way you don't reward ingenuity: what if I want to burn the web to gain an unfair advantage? That's not balanced!" and that's false yet again. It's page 42, it is incentivated by 4E. And you can't burn a time stasis zone for sure, so don't even try that argument. What you have is a different spell, which has the same implementation. The mechanics are used as a mean towards conflict resolution: the flavor is used and has an impact, but that impact is limited to what happens in the game world rather than how easy it is to overcome a challenge. And player ingenuity is still rewarded through improvised actions and DM judgement - as in every edition.

Ok thanks for the answers so far. Here are some suggestions for next.

1) People seem to not realize you can use your spells creatively in ways that are not in the spell description (ie a web to make a net over a pit or grease to make a ogre drop his club). I think putting page 42 in the PHB with many examples of both martial and magical tricks is the way to go.

2) wizards (but hopefully not sorcerers and warlocks) need to have spell books mean something. This includes the ability to collect more spells. Perhaps spells and rituals can be placed in spell books and wizards can learn them all. The number of spells they can cast would need to be kept at a reasonable level though. Move wizards away from AEDU to a pure Vancian or encounter based Vancian system. Perhaps wizard spells require reading from a spell book or tracing arcane sigils in mid air so their spells do not take effect until the start of their next turn (this could help separate and balance wizards with their versatility from sorcerers spontaneous casting).

3) rituals need some work. The costs need to be lowered and more focus needs to be given to them. People should want to use rituals to solve problems that were normally solved exclusively by wizards. At the same time, skills should allow you to compensate if you play a non magical party.

4) martial caster separation. I want to see separate mechanics for martial characters and casters. Hell, I want to see separate mechanics for clerics and wizards. I think Tome of Battle did very well with the war blade at making a non magical, non daily, exciting martial character. I also liked the stances provided by essential martial characters. I think some combination here would make for an interesting martial characters with distinct mechanics from the casters. I think balance both in and out of combat should be looked at thoroughly.

Note: I almost never played a caster in 3e because I found spell slots just never suited my tastes. It wasn't til 4e where I made a sorcerer barbarian hybrid that I played a caster for more than a few levels. It was a blast. At will ability to create blasts of flame and some really cool tricks I could pull off every fight made this character shine. I made the character follow a theme with all his spells and rages so almost every attack he made did fire damage. I hope that sorcerers at least continue to follow some of the trends started in 4e. I want to be able to play and feel ok that I took flame spiral and burning spray instead of sleep and charm person. I want the theme I have for my character to mean something and be achievable by the rules. I don't want to let the party down because my caster does not have a solution to every problem, in fact I don't want my party to expect that, ever. I very much support casters being toned down, but I want D&D next to work. Thanks everyone for participating in this tread.

As mentioned by others the narrow spells were my main issue, I prefer powers with alot of applications. I undertsand what the Mormegil is getting at with the fact that you CAN use stuff like web creatively, but the way the rules are presented and written its very dm dependant what you can and cant do.

As a wizard in say 3.x I could pick web and have a pretty good idea what I can and cant do without even talking to the dm. In 4th edition I always felt like I had to prepare an essay with reasons why I could do X with a power to convince the dm.
Which is kindof funny in a way because when I played a martial class in 3.x I always tried to do crazy stuff other than the basic attack that required the dm to ok...

Another part as people mentioned was the ritual system had alot of potential but fell short for me. One house rule we played with that helped is in a low wealth darksun campaign (we were slaves) we said anyone with the ritua casting feat could subsitute a utility power for a once a day ritual (for free)

Apr 19, 2012 -- 9:00AM, Arcane_Guyver wrote:

Apr 19, 2012 -- 7:58AM, flamepheonix182 wrote:

As mentioned by others the narrow spells were my main issue, I prefer powers with alot of applications. I undertsand what the Mormegil is getting at with the fact that you CAN use stuff like web creatively, but the way the rules are presented and written its very dm dependant what you can and cant do.

Heh, y'know, quite a few people talk about how previous editions felt like a game of "Mother May I?" or whatever that is. But I guess 4e had that aspect as well; the only difference is that in 4e damage, condition & movement effects became hard-coded while other effects were relegated to DM fiat status (with the mantra "Say Yes" & p.42 in the DMG in hopes that these latter effects wouldn't necessarily go away).

For as good as the DMGs were in 4e, I suppose they needed to be EVEN BETTER or much more up-front and clear about these things. Someone said p.42 probably needed to be in the PH1 is also correct, since players feel they are restricted to basic actions and powers.

As I said its only a feeling I got from 4th. I'm not claiming 3.x was any better (I even mentioned that I did the mother may I with martial classes alot in 3.x).

When I was playing 4th I always felt like well I could try and do X in combat by why bother I could just use this power and it will end up being better in the long run. Once again this is only my personal experience. I think its more with the presentation. When I see these swarms of printed out powers in front of me I'm more more likely to just pick one and move on, instead of thinking outside the box.

This ties in with the open ended powers, that maybe arent so mechanially grounded (3.x web vs 4th web). I feel like personally I need "inspired creativity" if I see a really cool spell like 3.x web I'll start coming up with cool ways to use it but if I see web (dont know exactly what the power is off the top of my head but say Int vs Reflex immobilized) I'll just do that, even though I could be thinking of ways ot use it exactly as the 3.x web works.

Actually after this little mini rant I think I've realized that its not 4th edition powers I dont like its the presentation im not on board with.