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Dumpshock Forums _ General Gaming _ I got a chance to play D&D 4th edition today
Posted by: spica2501 Jun 6 2008, 01:41 AM
Some of my friends were able to get there hands on PDFs of the 4th edition D&D rulebooks. I was excited to get a chance to play it, if only because the product has not yet been officially released yet.
As the topic description states 4th ed. is awful. It can be summed up in a series of three points:
1) Everyone is a variant of the 3rd edition Warlock.
2) There is no fluff anymore.
3) It is WoW.
I blame Keith Baker, one of the chief designers and the creater of the terrible Eberon campaign setting. Everything he comes up with is stupid and 4th ed is no exception. My question is why WOTC put the designer of a campaign setting that has not been selling well in charge of creating their new rules set?
Posted by: Alex Jun 6 2008, 03:00 AM
Because that is what WOTC does. They have never really moved beyond the CCG business mindset - that is to say, more revisions make for a better product. Honestly, I was surprised that it took them this long to self destruct.
Anyone know if there is any truth to the rumor I heard about Hasbro looking to sell of WOTC and all their assets due to poor performance? (Poor performance should - in this case - be measured against Hasbro's bottom line, not the RPG industry.)
Posted by: Aaron Jun 6 2008, 03:50 AM
I just rolled up a wizard for the game I'll be playing in, and I concur with the CCG thing. The encounter and daily powers kinda have the same feel as a hand of cards you play and then discard.
Posted by: Nigel Jun 6 2008, 03:56 AM
I've looked at all the PDFs, and I agree about the Warlock = all classes thing. Oh, and the part where the entire game is crap. I liked Eberron a lot, but that's his only work that I enjoyed even a little.
Cards are a perfect analogy.
Oh, and my wizard casting 2d4 Magic Missile as much as s/he wants ALL DAY LONG? At first level? I don't think so, Keith Baker. Good job, you've designed the Windows Vista of D&D (I'd say Windows ME, but that was 3.0).
Posted by: imperialus Jun 6 2008, 04:13 PM
I'm going to be picking up the core books today (though I've had PDF's for a little more than a week now) and I'm going to go against the grain here and say I'm fairly impressed. I can see why it isn't everyones cup of tea but, keeping in mind I haven't actually played yet I think I'll enjoy it.
No one is ever useless (at least in combat). We all know how it was in 3.X. Go off into the dungeon (this was 3E's rallying cry), fight some monsters. After 3 or 4 encounters the party was drained... At least the spellcasters were. Then the group would turn around, leave the dungeon and rest after having been awake for 4 hours. If a DM started forcing the PC's into situations where they couldn't rest then the spellcasters became pretty useless.
Of course on the flip side, the only class that had real staying power in the 3.X core books (I don't think it's fair to count splats) was the fighter and they got boring as hell to play after the first couple levels.
In 4E every class will always have something to bring to the table, even if it's their 5th encounter of the day, they've all burnt their daily powers, they're at half hitpoints and they're otherwise roughed up. I guess this is what people complain about when they say it's turning into an MMO. I wouldn't know. I played the free trial of Anarchy Online... that the extent of my MMO experience.
I expect they will be coming out with power cards pretty quick here. I for one welcome them. I've always used cards as gaming aids, I use those handy Hacker Cards that were available from... well someones site on here. I used to collect those TSR trading cards that had the magic weapons and NPC's on them, I stat up monsters on index cards, all sorts of stuff like that.
Vancian magic has always iritated me in D&D. Unfortunatly most of the solutions have been even worse (check out the Black Company magic system for an example). By giving each class its own set of powers to choose from it will avoid situations like this.
Wizard: "I cast Evisards Black Tenticals and annihilate the orc warriors."
DM: *rolls reflex save* "All but one are dead. Fighter, you're up."
Figher: "I hit him."
Posted by: bishop186 Jun 6 2008, 04:42 PM
My group got our hands on the PDFs a week ago and we've rolled up characters and run a trial encounter. It wasn't bad. Different, sure, but not completely in a bad way. It's playable and fun while playing. To those complaining about fluff: come on. D&D has always been notorious for bad fluff. This isn't any different. The idea of powers in general is silly but it works well enough and the game really feels balanced quite well.
As for complaints, my biggest complaints are that wizards are much less fun to make. All wizards seem to be the same anymore. In fact, that's my complaint with all of the classes: they all seem too similar and it gives the feel of less variety. Character creation isn't very fun anymore either; I for one loved skill points because of the flexibility it gave the character (though I do like some of the changes like combining Hide and Move Silently into Stealth or whatever). My two favorite core classes are right out, as well: bard and monk.
On the whole, I enjoy the 4e experience.
Posted by: Aaron Jun 6 2008, 05:11 PM
I don't think the idea of cards as a game aid is a bad thing (obviously). However, when the game mechanics could be replaced by cards, or indeed are for all intents and purposes cards, then characters become a hand of cards and not people with skills. I'm withholding judgment until I actually play the game, but if I really wanted to play a CCG RPG, I'd have bought RuinsWorld.
Posted by: imperialus Jun 6 2008, 05:19 PM
I'm hoping that as more books start rolling out this will change. Compare a fighter created using the 3.0 PHB alone to one created with a library of 3.5 books.
Monk and Bard will likely be reappearing in future books too. Just like the Druid. I think it was a nice trade off for some of the new races/classes. I'm developing a campaign setting around Dragonborn personally.
Right now my biggest disappointment is the horrible crap they've been putting out for D&D insider. It's the release day of the books, the biggest day in D&D history since the release of 3rd edition and D&D insider says:
As a matter of fact I was hoping to see something different from yesterdays website. They want me to pay 15 bucks a month and they can't even put up more than a splash screen? Nevermind the fact that their 'issues' of Dungeon and Dragon magazine feel like something coming out of a 12th grade computer course.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 6 2008, 05:54 PM
Nisarg/RPGPundit always has fun things to say about 4e:
Its early and I'm still processing, but on the whole I think that its not too early to say "I told you so" about a few things:
1. No Rule 0. Yes, GMs can create house rules, but it does not appear that they can make rulings on the spot. In fact, in the section on how to deal with Rules Lawyers, one of the things that is most notable is that it DOESN'T tell you that you can just tell him to shut up or fuck off, or that you as GM overrule his knowledge of the rules. No, apparently you're supposed to apologize if you've made an error, or you're allowed to put off discussion till the end of the session, and the rules lawyer is allowed to take all the time he wants to look up the rule while his character exists in a limbo (and cannot be harmed by the monsters or anything else).
2. No treasure tables or random tables for magic items. Apparently the only random tables in the entire DMG are the random tables for generating dungeon maps and two d20-tables for NPC personalities.
3. The Encounter system seems to be set up as more than just "guidelines" or something just for beginners. Unless you essentially create a new, substitute encounter system; its such an essential structure of "how D&D works" in this edition, that you really can't just have the PCs wandering around encountering monsters at your own whim.
I'm sure there's lots of other stuff to talk about 4e, good and bad, and it'll come in time. But for starters, I just wanted to get my first I Told You So in there.
One should note, on the overall impression of this edition, that its a telling fact that when the gang of fuckers over at Storygames are all pissing their pants with joy at this new D&D, and people on regular RPG sites are upset about it. The designers of 4e have made no effort to hide what their real inspiration for this new edition was.
RPGPundit
Currently Smoking: Savinelli Autograph + Hearth & Home's Mt.Marcy
The highlites:
1. It confirms what was one of my primary concerns: power creep. 1st level characters each start with what the poster describes as about 8 "superpowers". Apparently, in the demo none of the player characters ever bothered to make a regular attack, not even once. Why bother, when their "at will" powers were always better? When something called "Mighty Cleaving" or "Lance of Faith" are first level at-will abilities, you kind of know the game is going to be a powergaming monstrosity.
2. The game certainly does seem to encourage "team" tactics; from the description it seems that players depended on one another immensely. But again, from the description it sounded like certain players (including the writer of the thread) spent most of their time doing some kind of "aid" role to the other players. This isn't necessarily bad, but it doesn't entirely resolve the supposed problem of "someone has to bite the bullet and play the cleric".
3. The game will apparently be impossible to play without some kind of miniatures. Everything depends on positioning, on "squares", and if you're one of those gaming groups that doesn't like using a battlemat and squares and minis, then you're shit out of luck. But hey, we all knew that one was coming.
So to be fair, let's look at the ultimate good and bad from that post:
The ultimate good: "Overall, I enjoyed myself quite a bit"
The ultimate bad: "I did feel that the system took me out of character somewhat. I felt I was moving a piece in a minis game and not playing a character in a fight for his life."
RPGPundit
Currently Smoking: Lorenzetti Solitario Rhodesian + Burlington's Lapis
or Here Starts the Rebellion
For those of you who are unfamiliar, in other words, you were spared having to read it in junior high school english class, Harrison Bergeron is a science-fiction short story about a society where everyone is "equal". This equality has been achieved by taking great dancers and hobbling them with heavy weights so they won't be better than anyone else; taking people with high intelligence and implanting little shock-devices in their skulls so that they won't be able to think better than anyone else, etc etc.
In other words, it was the equality of the mediocre: anyone who was talented or skilled in any way was artificially restrained, to prevent them from being able to be better than the rest of the world.
4e design has reminded me of that short story, that I hadn't thought about in decades.
It is meant to hobble players who are good at roleplaying. "Give XP for Roleplaying? Why would we ever do that, it would just encourage the good roleplayers and make the bad ones feel bad!"
Instead, let's create a mechanics system that encourages everyone to pursue the utter mediocrity of "character build"; that any pathetic little obsessive can come to master by incessant hours of reading the books and figuring out all the tricks (utterly unrelated to emulation or immersion) by which you can manipulate the rules, bending them like pretzels, in order to get the "perfect" character.
And of course, its meant to hobble GMs more than anyone. Why should we have to count on having good GMs for a good experience? Sure, if we create a set of restrictive rules that railroad GMs into having to follow a kind of "campaign development Plan", where the designers TELL the GM what type of monsters he's ALLOWED to use, what type of treasure he MUST give them, what he's allowed to throw at them and what he most certainly isn't, regardless of the setting or the campaign or the particular tastes of the player that the GM knows well and the Game Designers don't fucking know at all, it means that we'll never end up with truly great GMs. The great GMs wouldn't be able to be great with 4e; not without changing so many rules that it will essentially be a different game. Most of them won't bother, they'll go off and play other things altogether.
But its a small price to pay! Because it means that bad GMs might just be almost mediocre. And mediocre GMs... well, they'll get to absolutely shine in their mediocrity! And without any of those truly good or great GMs to steal their spotlight!
After all, we can't have people just making of the game whatever they want to make of it, the way they used to in every other edition of the game! What would be the point of that??
No! We must create balance! We must create equality! Everyone must have the same mediocre experience! So that you will all bow under the Game Designer's genius! You will obey us! Unlimited rice pudding! Exterminate! Exterminate!
You gang of motherfucking fascists.
The goal was very clearly (and haplessly) expressed by Storygames Swine TonyLB on theRPGsite recently: The plan is that the game will drive away the good GMs, and bring in a new generation of young GMs that will be trained from the start to accept being neutered by the Game Designers, so they will never develop the "bad habits" of believing that they can overrule the players or the rules or, especially, so that they won't ever think that they can take an RPG and make it their own. These youngsters will, theoretically, be trained from the start to understand that RPGs are whatever the Game Designer wants them to be, and must stick to their system as written.
I guess the theory is that if D&D is made into the "gamist game" that the GNS Forge crowd always claimed it was, and people can be trained to enjoy it, then they will open up to buying other Forge-based games, and the sales of said games might actually beat the double-digits.
The real problem with this, the best laid plans of mice and men and the mediocrity-pushing fascists out there, is that I don't see anyone just bending over and enjoying it. The kids won't. Why the fuck would they? What self-respecting 14 year old will take up the job of being a GM when its like being the banker in Monopoly with the added unfun of not actually getting to be a player too (at least in monopoly, the banker actually gets to play)?
No. The 14 year old will rebel, and will demand the authority of a GM. This will only create strife in gaming groups, especially gaming groups of young players.
Hopefully, there will also be enough of the old crowd around to infect all those young minds with random charts and tables, with ideas about GMs being able to run games with authority, and to create worlds that make sense as worlds, not just as backdrops for a game where only system and game balance matter.
In the end, D&D 4e as written will suck ass to just about everybody apart from the character-build-obsessives, the Game Designers themselves, and the Swine who despise D&D (and of course, the latter won't actually play D&D, they'll just be very pleased that D&D is finally like they always tried to pretend it was). But when a game of this magnitude sucks, people will end up taking it and making it into something that is their own: with house rules, and underground rules, and unlicensed products, and rebel movements of all kinds. People will find ways to play it in a way totally different than the fascist Game Designers intended; they will make it theirs.
And in time, the corporate overlords who govern over the fascist Game Designers will be forced to change the game to fit what people actually want, and throw these asshole game designers out on their asses. Because they'll realize, sooner or later (I'm betting on relatively sooner) that they're not making the money they could be making on the game, and its the Game Designer's fault (theirs, and the Swine ideologies which pushed them to it). God bless capitalism.
RPGPundit
Currently Smoking: Ashton Old Church Rhodesian + Ashton III
or "Does Rolling for Random Gem Type Ruin "THE PLAN""?
I think it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that 4e is not working out for me as far as the previews are concerned. At this point I can probably safely say that unless they've been misleading us at every turn and the game is utterly different than they led on, there's practically no chance I'll enjoy the game.
But beyond that, I think that in many areas there's no question they are making MISTAKES with the rules. They're making choices that appeal to the nerds, the hardcore power-builders, and the GNS-types that want to imagine D&D is a "Gamist" game. And no where is this more evident to me than in the near-total apparent absence of random tables.
I'm the type of gamer that loves random tables. The more that you find in a game, the better the chance that game will be liked. Random results create an upredictability that lead to good emulation, when guided by the GM's judgment calls. My own upcoming FtA!GN! book is going to be chalk-full of random tables.
Random tables were a hallmark of every previous D&D edition. Even 3e, which did move away from randomization, had random tables pretty well all over the place. The position in 3.x appeared to be that the authors preferred that people used fixed values for things, so that their precious CR and "balance" weren't disrupted, but the tables were there for those who chose it. In 4e, on the other hand, it seems that all such choice has been lost in the Authors' zeal to believe that THEIR WAY is the "right" way, and their way should be imposed on the players.
In 4e, any and all randomization is seen as The Enemy. You don't even have random rolls for hit points. Are there even random rolls for attributes anymore? Is anything random?! Or can nothing be permitted to interfere with the precious "Game Balance"?
Look at what they've done now with treasure. Before, rolling random treasure results was one of the most entertaining elements of the D&D game; at least in my opinion. I'm sure that there were people who may never have used random tables. But I'm willing to bet they were far less than those who did.
Now, that too has to be scrapped: treasure must be assigned in neat little pre-determined "parcels" that will always be basically the same, because to alter them would alter "GAME BALANCE". It doesn't matter what you're fighting, you'll get what treasure you're meant to get anyways, because that's what the carefully tuned March Into Progress that is the new D&D game demands: it has planned everything out for you ahead of time. There can be no surprises to deviate from The Plan.
I mean shit, I don't get why they don't just get rid of dice rolls altogether? They're far too unpredictable. They might result in something that does not fit with the concept of Game Balance, like a PC dying or something. That must be avoided because then you wouldn't get the parcel of 550 gp, or two 250 gp art objects + 50 gp, or one 500 gp gem + 50 gp that you need to get in order to march lock-step into level 6.
And you know, until now people have been saying: "you know, all these Encounters and Skill Encounters and other sorts of things, they're set up for the beginner, you won't be FORCED to use them, you can just ignore them". Some of my pro-4e friends have been trying to claim that at every turn. Only, sorry, as of now I don't see that. Because for example, to do that with treasure would require that there be an alternative. And as far as I know, there isn't. You're going to get those "treasure parcel" tables in the DMG, but you aren't going to also get random treasure tables, are you?
So you're pretty much limited to either doing things their way, or just winging it altogether.
No random treasure tables, no random monster tables, no random dungeon tables, no random traps, no random hit dice, no random spells, no random anything.
Like Jrients said in response to this: "Just reading the description of it feels like a collar round my neck, stifling my breathing."
This isn't D&D. Its risk-less, surprise-less, utterly pre-fab busywork that sucks all the life and marrow out of the idea of adventure. And that's why its a Mistake. Apart from some nerds who are bored of it, and D&D-haters who never liked it, random tables are a feature, not a bug. They're something that makes the game more exciting for all concerned. Get rid of randomness, and you get a game that becomes predictable; and thus less playable to all but those few aspergers-retards who start to scream uncontrollably when they are confronted with something they can't predict, and just want a pseudo-game where everything is mapped out for you from the moment you start.
RPGPundit
Currently Smoking: Stanwell Pipe of the Year + Esoterica's Penzance
I saved my favorite one, with my favorite part bolded, for last.
With 3e, between the system and the overall artistic style inferred by the book's art, it made it very hard to imagine that traditional fantasy "look", the LoTR or even the 1e/2e Forgotten Realms look.
Its like, you can't really imagine with 3e a bar scene where you have a ranger in rusty chain mail, his scimitar leaning by his chair, smoking a clay churchwarden pipe sitting across from a gandalf-esque long-bearded wizard, getting ready to go on expedition to the orcish mines.
You'd have trouble imagining that because the "ranger" would in fact be a Ranger2/Thief3/Fighter3/Prestige Master3/Pipedude 2/Acrobat1/circus clown1/sportsman1; and the Wizard would actually be a Wizard4/sorceror3/thief1/barbarian1/shadow dancer3/Jedi2/pharmacist1.
You'd have trouble imagining it because the Ranger wouldn't be in rusty chain mail, he'd be in some kind of gold-green coloured spiky bulby armour and have a giant flametongue +4 runesword with Dragonmarks ™. And of course he wouldn't be smoking a pipe, that's politically incorrect.
You'd have trouble imagining it because the Wizard would in fact be a short half-tiefling chick in a revealing leather bikini (along with a bunch of buckles and straps in places where they're not really needed for anything) covered in tattoos with purple eyes and spiky green hair.
And of course, they wouldn't be going to the Orcish mines; they'd be going to the Dire Gargantuan Orcs who have the half-draconic AND the half-celestial AND the half-infernal templates (that's right, that's 200% of orcs per orc: each orc is one-quarter dragon, one-quarter angel, one-quarter demon and one-quarter orc).
And they probably wouldn't be in mines either, they'd be in motherfucking Mario's Palace.
Does anyone really believe that 4e will be any better at capturing the more classic fantasy feel?
Is it not the height of retarded that, given the massive success of traditional fantasy in recent years (LoTR, the upcoming hobbit movie, narnia, all the blockbuster fantasy movies, not ONE of which has featured dungeonpunk or WoW-esque styles), the people at Wizards would be doing everything they possibly can to try to make D&D as un-mainstream-fantasy as possible?
I mean shit, its like these guys are a bunch of 30something idiots who're utterly clueless about current trends and actually feel embarrassed about D&D's traditional look, and are trying everything they can (ending up in predictable utter overkill) to try to make D&D "hip" for "the kids", without having a fucking clue that what the kids are hip to these days IS traditional fantasy.
RPGPundit
That last blog entry cracks me up every time, because frankly speaking it's true and has been true for a while. Me, I'm always happy just playing "a fighter", or "a cleric", or even "an elf" which automatically means I have a sword but also spells. But I look around and I get the feeling that everyone is running around with their fighter/mage/cleric/masseuse/C programmer/butler Tiefling.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 6 2008, 07:45 PM
Hehe, yes, true, it's always funny to read about nerd-rage on the Internet. Ah, those good old comic-book-shop guys who always yell that something new is the worst thing ever... 
Without them, we wouldn't know what is the newest most terrible thing, and we would have to make our own opinion. 
Thank you, Simpsons, for providing us with memorable stereotypes who are even true.
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jun 6 2008, 08:50 PM
I'm actually a fan of the multi-classing.. If only because it allowed me to get a character that was more unique and had the abilities and combinations to make what I wanted. (It's also why I like shadowrun, which doesn't have classes.. or levels.) But as far as I can tell 4e got rid of this, and we'll just have to rely on it providing enough distinction for Sword Fighter not to be exactly like Axe Fighter, with the only difference being weapons. Everything seems pretty much cookie cutter, thats why I ended up with all the additional class books so that I had the prestige classes, and starting classes to do what I wanted. Only character I've done that didn't multi-class (horribly) was a Knight (PHB2), but he still had one level of Purple Dragon Knight (Complete Warrior I think).
I haven't had a chance to actually look at 4e books though, just glancing through things right now. Hopefully my books are here by tmr.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 6 2008, 09:30 PM
Multiclassing got changed, once more. In D&D 2nd edition, you leveled up two or more classes simultaneously, in D&D 3rd edition, you took one level by level, and in 4th edition, you pick up feats to swap one power from your class with another power from the class you took the multiclass-feat for (don't worry, you get more feats in 4th edition than in 3rd).
Your amount of powers is finite in D&D, for every class. And yes, they're different. Even a moron can see that in 4th edition, a Fighter is meant to be at melee, and the wizard is supposed to stay behind, while rogues and rangers use their many movement-and-strike-abilities to go around.
No more people just standing around and trying to do full-attacks whenever possible (because that was really the only thing that was good for the mundane types, until the AC of the enemy was super-high, then only the very first attack counted, because the additonal ones wouldn't hit at all).
If you were incapable back then in D&D 3rd edition to play without minis and battle-grid if anybody had spring-attack, then you will remain incapable to do so. But I'm pretty sure that the absolute total majority had no problem with Spring-Attack.
Posted by: tete Jun 6 2008, 09:39 PM
As the topic description states 4th ed. is awful. It can be summed up in a series of three points:
1) Everyone is a variant of the 3rd edition Warlock.
2) There is no fluff anymore.
3) It is WoW.
I blame Keith Baker, one of the chief designers and the creater of the terrible Eberon campaign setting. Everything he comes up with is stupid and 4th ed is no exception. My question is why WOTC put the designer of a campaign setting that has not been selling well in charge of creating their new rules set?
Thank god! If they tried to make D&D any more GURPS like I think I would never buy another WOTC product. I want quick character generation and endless magic missles... I also want the rules not to get in the way of the story, I doubt that happend but 99% of the stuff I've seen they finally moved out of 1980s RPGs.
Posted by: Aaron Jun 7 2008, 05:15 AM
Good news. The rules do not get in the way of the story.
Posted by: Mercer Jun 7 2008, 03:17 PM
I agree. Unfettered multiclassing is the closest you can get to not having levels or classes, which as an SR player naturally appeals to me when I have to play in a class/level based system. I was actually remarking to my D&D group this past Thursday that other than a couple of casters and one uber-rogue, I don't think I've ever played a single class character in 3+. (I didn't play that many in 2e either, as I tended towards Fighter/Thieves.)
My D&D group is phasing in 4e. We've played a couple of test sessions and we're looking at starting up the first campaign at the end of this month. I have reservations about the new system, but I have reservations about the old one and the one before that too. Maybe I'm just too jaded, but I really don't see a system coming in and making the game perfect, or wrecking it either. Most of what my group does-- the getting together, snacking, cracking jokes, ec.-- is all but impervious to systems.
Posted by: Smed Jun 7 2008, 04:13 PM
I haven't seen the 4th edition stuff yet, and don't really have any plan on picking it up anytime soon, but I do have a couple of comments on some of what's been said:
Multi-classing: This is one of things I liked about 3.x edition. You can make a character with the abilities that you want. Not every mage has to be old with a long beard. If you want to play on, great, but you don't have to. I've never had a problem with separating the game mechanics and the story and don't see how playing a single class stereotype is somehow better.
Eberron: The only D&D setting I actually like.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 7 2008, 09:09 PM
Also, LOL at how this thread with its little negative tagline is much longer than the "positive" thread, http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=22362
Posted by: Adam Jun 7 2008, 10:07 PM
I don't see Keith's name in the credits of any of the fourth edition books; certainly not in a prominent place.
Posted by: Aaron Jun 7 2008, 10:27 PM
To be fair, compare the ages of those threads.
Posted by: Alex Jun 8 2008, 12:54 AM
Personally, when I need a my fix of a game using a 20-sided die, I would rather play Spycraft 2.0 (imagine d20 Modern done RIGHT) or True20 (by Green Ronnin).
Just my 2 nuyen ... uh ... copper pieces.
Posted by: Snow_Fox Jun 8 2008, 02:20 AM
Personally we never really felt a need to 'upgrade' our AD&D stuff beyond 2nd ed but I gave up on TSR when they did the Dark Sun and that issue of Dragon was little more than an advertisment for the game world.
Posted by: Fabe Jun 8 2008, 02:55 AM
Eberron: The only D&D setting I actually like.
I like the Eberron setting too,got a bunch of the books but haven't gotten around to running a game yet.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 8 2008, 03:42 AM
Just my 2 nuyen ... uh ... copper pieces.
ELECTRUM PIECES BIYATCH!
Posted by: apollo124 Jun 8 2008, 04:34 AM
So for you who already have the new PHB, did it come with some special dndinsider website with extra support? The main site talks about a character builder, character visualizer, and some other stuff but none of it is working yet.
I don't have the books yet, but I have to say I'm leaning towards probably not liking it just on the basis of what I've read on the main website dealing with my beloved Forgotten Realms. Floating islands and warforged running around is just not right. And don't even get me started on Tieflings and Warlocks. How many years did we Rp'ers spend trying to convince family that we weren't dealing with demons? Thanks a hell of a lot WoTC.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 8 2008, 04:58 AM
Ehr, you're not really going to tell us that you have a problem with playing some (really ugly) half-demon bastard in a pen-and-paper game, do you? Because, there is one console game where people play a (not so ugly) half-demon bastard slicing other (really ugly) full demons. You know, that game called Devil May Cry...
If today's people don't rally against video-games with half-demon protagonists anymore, they won't do that for old D&D either.
As for the Forgotten Realms, just continue using your old source books.
Posted by: Fortune Jun 8 2008, 05:56 AM
Nope! You have to pay extra for all that crap. I think it's around $15 US per month or so.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 8 2008, 12:42 PM
This is true. The rules in fact scarcely interact with the story.
While the rules say that you can use Diplomacy to influence the attitude of NPCs, there are literally no rules for that anywhere. The actual "rule" is:
or unfriendly, peaceful or hostile) and other conditional modifiers (such as what you might be seeking to accomplish or what you’re asking for) might apply to the DC. Diplomacy is usually used in a skill challenge that requires a number of successes, but the DM might call for a Diplomacy check in other situations.
That's it. That's the whole rule. There are no sample DCs in the DMG for convincing a "hostile" or "unfriendly" NPC to do something or anything. In fact, the only guidelines in the book for setting skill DCs for anything at all are based on the power of the character performing the action. So apparently as you get higher level your Diplomacy modifier raises, but the assumed DCs to accomplish the same tasks raise by the same amount, so really nothing whatever has changed.
The DM "might" let you make a Diplomacy check and he "might" choose to set a DC that is something you could achieve and he "might" allow your proposal or the situation to have any bearing on any of this. Basically whether you have a Diplomacy modifier or not, your attempts to convince NPCs to do or believe anything are essentially just an extended game of Magical Teaparty or Cops and Robbers. Non-combat interactions are so "rules light" that they may as well be diceless. You have numbers on your sheet for Diplomacy, but those numbers don't mean anything at all.
-Frank
Posted by: Dumori Jun 8 2008, 01:25 PM
I hate the way D&D 4e has become you want to do something out of combat *shug* ok then. No rules no skills my crfting chars are just useless and I've heard gnomes have gone. those two thing have lost the system to me. then the warforged in FR how why they'll need a bloody good reason why because just playing the city of shade card wont work.
Posted by: imperialus Jun 8 2008, 04:02 PM
Well in a lot of ways that's also a return to older editions. 1st ed didn't even have Non Weapon Proficiencies. If your character wanted to lead the peasants in an Army of Darkness style training montage, good luck. Non Weapon Proficiencies in 2nd ed were a half baked afterthought. 3rd edition had a much more developed skill system but most classes had so few skill points I think I could count on one hand the number of PC's I saw with more than a rank or two in any crafting skill. I agree the diplomacy/human relations aspect of 4E is lacking but then again D&D has at it's core always been a game about killing monsters and taking their stuff. Groups who developed highly involved political campaigns regardless of edition have done so despite the system, not because of it.
I'm curious to hear what you mean by 'crafting chars'? Did you seriously develop PC's that focused on blacksmithing, basket weaving or other tradeskills? If that's the direction you want the game to take I can't imagine it's too difficult to add a few new skills to create your vision. You're probably a fairly small minority though so I can see why WoTC didn't devote much space in the core books to it.
Gnomes are in the Monstrous Manual with rules for how to make them PC's. So not gone, just not a 'core' race. Warforged I agree with, but unless I end up with a player who desperately wants to play a steampunk robot they're easy enough to ignore. Right now the only PC writeup they have is in a web supplement (that incidentally is available for free).
D&D has never been about anything but combat, and I kinda like it that way. Does it suit every possible campaign? Not at all, but if I want to play some heavy political game chronicling the rise of the PC's from minor noblemen to some of the most influential peers in the kingdom with a little bit of combat to spice things up I'd run Burning Wheel. The system is designed with that in mind. On the flip side, if I wanted to run a combat heavy 'save the kingdom from invading X' with a strong dose of politics in the background I'd run D&D. It can handle the politics well enough to add flavor and the combat system is (imo) a million times better than BW.
Posted by: imperialus Jun 8 2008, 04:17 PM
I agree this is the most disappointing aspect of the new edition. I had great hopes for D&D insider, the virtual tabletop, and stuff like that. My gaming group has had a few members scatter across the globe so it would give us a chance to get everyone together again. D&D insider will be running an open Beta until the end of July however so you will have a chance to 'try before you buy' and the PHB, comes packaged with a code that gives you a free 10 day subscription.
Two big problems with insider (as of yesterday when I last checked)
1) There is nothing up yet. Last Friday, biggest day to hit D&D since 3rd edition and D&D insider is nothing but a splash page. Colour me disappointed. If it doesn't get sorted right quick they'll be loosing my business.
2) 15 dollars/mo (or 120 a year) is a stupid price point.* This gets you access to Dungeon and Dragon magazines, their V-tabletop, character builder, character visualizer, and dungeon designer. The software I could see getting packaged for around 60 bucks for everything, I'd pay that. As for the web-zines, someone on the Wizard boards posted a breakdown of the cost to get the most popular print magazines delivered to your door every month (or once a week) for a year. A 120 dollar DDI subscription would get you (I think) 11 of the 12 most popular print magazines in the US. The average cost was something like 2 bucks an issue. So if the DDI gets us two magazines online I'd expect to pay max 4 bucks for them. Even if we tack on a few extra bucks a month for the cost of Wizards maintaining their servers for the V-Tabletop, it's not like they're running something on the scale of WoW. There is no reason their servers should cost so much. For the service they are providing I think that a one time payment of 60 bucks for the software and 6 bucks a month is reasonable. Unless the price point gets dealt with I'm afraid they won't be getting my business either.
*There are rumors that this 15 dollars a month will mean that you also get access to PDF's/online versions of all the books as they are released. That would probably convince me that it's worth it. I have a lot of 3.X books that I like a single class/race/monster whatever from and having access to a PDF version would save me needing to buy the whole book if I'm only using a dozen pages from it.
Posted by: Fabe Jun 8 2008, 05:34 PM
Your talking as if that attitude has changed ,well it hasn't there as still plenty of folks who still think D&D is the spawn of the devil. Having or not having Tieflings and warlocks aren't going to have any real affect on peoples misconception of RPGs. Besides this isn't the 80s no one pays any attention the Pat Pullings of world any more.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 8 2008, 05:38 PM
Yeah, nobody believes in the devil anymore. We never see the influence of such thinking in American politics.
Posted by: Fabe Jun 8 2008, 06:22 PM
Well OK people still believe in the devil and like to blame every thing they don't like on him I'll admit that. But I still feel that anti gaming advocates like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patricia_Pulling aren't given as much attention as they were in the 80s durning the hight of the anti D&D hysteria.
Posted by: Dumori Jun 8 2008, 07:37 PM
@ imperialus by crafting chars I mean my warforged aritifcer (im not against warforged they juts don't fit in FR) who in the time the rest of that party resting fixes their gear and works on magic items and builds his own weapons. He has at second level 4 ranks in all related crafting skill and still fits in to his role in the party with no fuss.
Extra rules could fix the problem but i also dislike the way DCs scale with level so your really playing the same game as at level 2 when your at level 30. These rules make the game seam very unrealsitc as in my current 5.3 game
we're often pitted again much much weaker or stronger foes. This lead the game to feel real as there is no sense in everything being the same challenge.
As I dont own any of the books and are going off what I've been told and read some thing may be doable. By limiting most rules to combat and giving no or few examples of the none-combat ones the game lack the third dimension as all interaction is up to the GM full stop.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jun 8 2008, 11:04 PM
...after slugging through this thread (BTW, what is it's total CR, maybe I can make level 
) looks like I'm staying with 3.5. Never got into the MMORPG style of play and don't intend to either. I like it when wizards, sorcerers, and clerics have to manage their spells, that means the NPC oppos have do the same.
...and fighters, boring...? meh...it's what you put into them personality wise that makes them interesting.
Posted by: apollo124 Jun 9 2008, 01:36 AM
(Leaning on wood cane) "Why, back in my day sonny, back in the '80's we only had the second edition, and we liked it! Golems was something the evil wizard had, demons was what we fought, and dang it, the castles stayed where they was all the time! "(spits into spittoon)
And as far as Devil May Cry goes, well obviously you should kill ugly demons. I know standards have changed. Hell, I love playing Diablo, and with all the inverted pentacles and demons in that game, you never heard much of anything about it from the Evangelist crowd.
Posted by: Larme Jun 9 2008, 01:45 AM
I got a chance to play too. And despite the radical restructuring of the system, it plays like the exact same game, only faster and more interesting. Fighters no longer have to choose between hitting and hitting, they have options. Wizards no longer shoot their whole wad within the first few rounds. It's a good thing.
There's only one important question when looking at an RPG, and that is: is it fun? Obviously the OP didn't think so. Does that make the game objectively bad? Of course not. But can people who want a more casual, fast paced experience out of D&D still have a good time playing it? Yep.
Posted by: spica2501 Jun 9 2008, 04:15 AM
As for complaints, my biggest complaints are that wizards are much less fun to make. All wizards seem to be the same anymore. In fact, that's my complaint with all of the classes: they all seem too similar and it gives the feel of less variety. Character creation isn't very fun anymore either; I for one loved skill points because of the flexibility it gave the character (though I do like some of the changes like combining Hide and Move Silently into Stealth or whatever). My two favorite core classes are right out, as well: bard and monk.
On the whole, I enjoy the 4e experience.
If you think that D&D always had bad fluff, then you never played any of the good second edition campaign settings (Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, and, my personal favorite, Planescape).
I tried playing 4th edition again at world wide gaming day on Saturday, and I have a few more points of complaint to add. The first is that the entire system seems very watered down. The second that every feature of every class is all about combat, even spells/abilities that would have been considered buffs or support spells in previous editions do damage. The third is the flier they were handing out advertizing the new edition of the forgotten realms. It basically states that they are planning to shove dragonborn and eladrin down the realm's throaght, they are killing of the established NPCs (it doesn't say who, but I doubt even fanboy favorite Drizzt or Elminster have survived), and that "Kingdoms have risen and fallen." This basically translates to the realms no longer being the realms and indicates that Ed Greenwood has been striped of all creative control. I find this so disapointing because I was hoping that even if the core fluff sucked at least we would still have the realms to play in if we choose to do so.
And to those who like Eberron, actually play a game in it before you say its good. If you still like it, get you hands on the 2nd ed source books of the settings I mentioned previously, read them, and then reconsider whether Eberron is actually as good as you thought it was, or if it is a hollow, souless setting that leaves you with the same aftertaste as an artificial sweetner.
Posted by: imperialus Jun 9 2008, 05:38 AM
A lot of the old fluff was pretty hit or miss though, and it was very scattered. The Dragonlance Chronicles is still arguably one of the worst adventure designs ever and even Darksun (my personal favorite) was pretty spotty, and could be very difficult to play a campaign of any real length. Some of it was just weird too. I mean really, what were they smoking when they came up with Spelljammer?
"Yeah, and there could be some ships that were like shaped like fish and crazy shit like that."
"Hey, guys... have you ever looked at your hand? Like really looked at it? It's like awesome."
Just to address the FR comments. The last Podcast by the Wizards team talked quite a bit about how they are dealing with the Realms.
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4arch/pod
First, they are advancing the timeline by 100 years or something. They're using the spellplauge to explain the changes in magic sorta like how the 2nd crash changed the matrix. Mystiria is dead, I can assume that Elminster is probably a lot less powerful, but this is also addressing the #1 complaint about FR. It scales back the NPC dominance of the setting. I mean lets face it, Elminster is the ultimate DMPC and a lot of groups hated that.
I can't remember how they talked about integrating Eldran but the Dragonborn at least I can give a coles notes version of, and it was actually Greenwoods idea so it doesn't seem like he's being removed from the picture. Also keep in mind I'm no FR guru, I played in an old grey box campaign but that was it. Hopefully my mangling of cannon and half remembered quotes don't confuse things too much.
Anyhow, it's never actually been explained what exactly is 'forgotten' about the Forgotten Realms. Greenwood has always had that in the back of his mind though (after all he named the world after it). It turns out there is another whole continent that has been until now unexplored. Now apparently there was a period of Realms history where there was a huge dragon empire running... well everything.
The same empire existed on the other continent and after the 'realms' (ferun?) overthrew the dragons contact between the two continents was cut off. The dragon empire remained strong on the second continent however and developed independently of Ferun. That's where Dragonborn come from.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 9 2008, 06:02 AM
This is objectively false. Fighters choose between hitting and hitting. They have two different at-will abilities which are both "I hit a dude" one of them additionally kills a minion if they are adjacent to the monster you are attacking, one of them pushes the monster you are attacking backwards. But they are both hitting a dude. It's an option I suppose, but it's not a really meaningful option. Once all the minions have been cleaned out you're just going to use Tide of Iron over and over again until you run out of opponents.
A Wizard, or any character for that matter, runs out of Encounter and Daily powers in just a couple of round, and there is almost no reason to ever save them for later in a battle. Then you're down to using your basic powers over and over again. Yes, people are no longer using "the attack action" - they are using one of their super special powers. One of their two special powers. That don't change until 30th level. Literally from 1st to 29th level you will fall back on the same general purpose power over and over again in every single fight. Saying "Tide of Iron! Tide of Iron! Tide of Iron!" gets just as boring as saying "Full Attack! Full Attack! Full Attack!" There's a certain novelty to it for a while because it's a different phrase, but after 10 or 20 levels of doing the same thing every single combat all the novelty is long departed.
When Wizards run out of their super spells they no longer are forced to rely on quarterstaves and crossbows. Now they just cast Ray of Frost every single round for ever. It's just like someone gave every Wizard a Reserve Feat at first level. Except that unlike a Wizard from previous editions, they end up forced to their reserve power every fight. Where a high level Wizard used to eventually get enough Daily powers to get him through every round of every combat, the 4e Wizard will always run dry before the enemy is quite half dead. At higher levels he has some more use-limited super spells, but enemies have even more hit points than the extra rounds of casting Meteor Swarm and Prismatic Spray will do. Indeed, the number of rounds he spends per combat casting Magic Missile over and over again increases as levels increase.
-Frank
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 9 2008, 10:57 AM
A level 1 Fighter has far more things to chose from in 4th edition than in prior. Two at-will powers, one encounter power, one daily power, and possibly some racial power add up to your battle prowess. Should you be that desperate for having a absolute normal attack, you can still use basic-attack at will too. And of course, it's not like you're fighting the good fight alone. That's what you get your wizard buddy for, the cleric dude (or the warlord guy), the rogue, the ranger, warlock, or the paladin helping you beat u, who are all using their own encounter powers, at will powers, daily powers, racial powers... All that at level 1.
At higher levels, everybody has more encounter powers, more daily powers, and magic items also grant more powers. And as already said, a group of 5 level 30 guys can beat up a level 30 monster with 1450 hit point in 7 rounds. If you're reducing yourself to only at-will powers for an encounter, you deserve to let the battle drag on. Archwizards even get the ability to turn one of their daily powers into an encounter power. Other epic destinies allow you to regain all your spent daily powers (or encounter powers, if you're a little bit unlucky). 4th edition works at higher level, far better than it does in 3rd edition.
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 9 2008, 11:08 AM
I am intrigued by the "rituals". I'll have to check them out, they might be a better way of doing something that I was using in my 3E campaign already.
Posted by: Caine Hazen Jun 9 2008, 12:46 PM
And to those who like Eberron, actually play a game in it before you say its good. If you still like it, get you hands on the 2nd ed source books of the settings I mentioned previously, read them, and then reconsider whether Eberron is actually as good as you thought it was, or if it is a hollow, souless setting that leaves you with the same aftertaste as an artificial sweetner.
Probably a personal taste thing, as the campaigns you mention are ones I thought were complete crap. Of those I'd play FR cause its what most of our GMs were running, but mostly with ported Greyhawk adventures anyway. For the most part I thought most of the fluff from those worlds was shite though.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 9 2008, 12:54 PM
They are one-shot magic items that you purchase that require a skill check to activate.
Would you spend 50 gp to send forth an animal messenger? If you roll high enough on your Nature check, the animal will continue messenging for more than six hours.
A first level 3e Fighter can strike, disarm, grapple or trip. Also he has feats that give him additional real abilities like Cleave rather than just having feats that give static bonuses like Weapon Focus.
While I will admit that the races of 4e have slightly more special abilities, the fact is that a 3e Fighter inherently has actually more options than a 4e Fighter does. Recall that in 4e Disarms and Sunders aren't even possible without using up one of your Encounter powers, and Disarming requires a near-Epic power to attempt.
-Frank
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 9 2008, 01:10 PM
Would you spend 50 gp to send forth an animal messenger? If you roll high enough on your Nature check, the animal will continue messenging for more than six hours.
That's not a question I have to pose myself, or my players, since we do not play with gold coins, but use an abstract wealth system. And such rituals seem like a good way to add more options to our swordsman (who already meditated regularily), our priest (who already did "rituals" to commune with her deity, since she has no actual cleric levels) and even our barbarian might use such rituals to commune with acnestro spirits, or deities.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 9 2008, 02:09 PM
Disarm, Grapple and Trip only got used when you had the feat for it, as so, you got rid of the bloody counter-attacks-of-opportunity and had a much better chance to succeed thanks to your +4 bonus. And those options still suck against enemies who are massively larger than you, have Improved Grab (nearly every grappling monster did, and it's leagues better than your measly Improved Grapple-Feat), and tripping got impossible against more advanced enemies who had massive strenght, several legs, got some balancing boni like the dwarf or could fly. You didn't disarm the goblin dirt warrior at level 1. You simply killed him. One blow with your weapon, combined with your damage bonus from your strenght made it always better to simply hit the enemy with a regular attack than trying something flashy like disarming. Without the Improved Disarm Feat, you got an Attack of Opportunity, risked to get disarmed yourself, and all that you accomplished was that the weapon was at the ground of the enemy. Then, he picked up the weapon, got an AoO from you, and he attacked you with his own attack action. So, you wasted a turn doing nothing. Brilliant.
Or wait, Trip. You get an AoO, you risk being tripped yourself if you fail, and then the enemy lies on the ground. Then, the enemy tries to get up, get's an AoO from you, and then he attacks with his own attack action. Fantastic, you wasted your action doing nothing again.
Grab. Forget it. Without Improved Unarmed Combat and Improved Grapple, the moment you an AoO hits you, your grapple attempt has been stopped, and you wasted your turn for nothing, except taking damage. And if you do have those feats, then you do your meager unarmed damage... If you aren't a monk, stop doing it, right now, because you're only embarassing yourself, in front of everybody else. 
That's utterly brilliant. A 1st level 3rd edition Fighter gets the ability to delay the combat and waste his turn. Horray. That's a big improvement over the 1st level 2nd edition Fighter, who hit people with his one attack per round... 
Nope, no, it wasn't. 
The googles do nothing. And the Internet breaks so many times, dammit. 
Posted by: last_of_the_great_mikeys Jun 9 2008, 07:26 PM
I only wish they'd strip Ed Greenwood of all his creative power! That guy... 
He never understood balanced classes! All his stuff was "Wizards rock, everything else sucks rocks! Magic must be everywhere and in everything!" Seriously, killing off all his freaking "Chosen" and immortal NPC's of Doom, getting rid of all that deus ex machina is a good thing. A complete revamp of the Forgotten Realms can only improve it. May Ed Greenwood forever have writer's block!
As for fourth edition, well, I reserve judgement until I actually play it, but I did buy the books and it is quite a change. I imagine such a drastic change can be quite a shock, especially to older gamers. My only suggestion (for what it's worth after alienating all Forgotten Realms fans) is to imagine it not as new D&D, but a new game entirely. Set aside your ideas of how D&D is "supposed to be" and try the game. If it still sucks for you, well, then you were right all along. If it changes your perception and because of that you can enjoy it, then yay!
Posted by: Fortune Jun 9 2008, 09:54 PM
Shrug. To each their own. I quite like most of Ed Greenwood's stuff. I have even played in a couple of games that he GMed way back about 12 or 13 years ago, and had a great time.
He used to complain (probably still does) about how he'd often submit something for publication to TSR, and then could hardly recognize the final release of that work.
Posted by: Dumori Jun 9 2008, 10:06 PM
Ed Greenwood has all ways been a story teller the FR setting works but not if people over do the NPCs like they're going to much with your average low level PCs any way.
Posted by: hyzmarca Jun 9 2008, 11:41 PM
My question is, does the http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?p=14637649#post14637649 build still work?
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 10 2008, 06:29 AM
Dude, skill based anything in 4e http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=229919&page=1&pp=15
-Frank
Posted by: bishop186 Jun 10 2008, 11:05 AM
Okay, I agree. I LOVED the Dark Sun setting. It was awesome. The Dark Sun setting was also not in the core books, now was it? Oh, and wasn't it dropped after 2nd edition (unless you count the mock-ups that people did for 3rd)? Great job there, TSR/Wizards. Perhaps I went a tad bit overzealous with my generalization but on the whole D&D always has had bad fluff. Things like Dark Sun were always the exception rather than rule.
Skills, man, I really miss them. I am one of the people that will miss professions and crafts, but I'm not going to miss use rope, that's for damn sure. Nobody ever got used rope unless they were a swashbuckling pirate or something, anyway, and seriously, did it make sense that you could be Profession(Sailor) and not have any skill points in Use Rope, anyway? Honestly, the faster-lighter ruleset for everything else aside from combat (especially social situations) is quite frustrating. I'm definitely on board there, I mean my favorite core character was the bard for Pelor's sake! I really hope they roll out some expanded ruleset books but if they don't and I want to DM a game with social interactions, I'll bite the bullet and come up the the DCs myself. After all, it does give a handy table on what's good for what level. If I want my socialites to be higher level than the PCs, I'll probably just adjust their DC up for higher level encounters (which the characters probably won't make but nuts to them, he's higher level dammit!). It is quite sad to see craft go, though.
Craft Magic/Wondrous Item is still there, it's just a ritual now. So all you wondrous item crafters, go a-ritual hunting!
Speaking of rituals, they aren't quite one-shot. They're like spells in every way except their reagents cost something and they take a little time to prepare. I am a bit dismayed with the selection of Rituals in the core three (I want a demon-summoning ritual, dammit, and I want it before level 20!) but I'll either wait for the inevitable magic book to come out (which better have charm spells or I'm going to fall down, cry, and piss myself!) or just make them as needed. I think I might also houserule rituals so that several people of lower level can cast a higher level ritual (whether or not it will be as well casted as one person of the proper level is yet to be determined).
Posted by: raphabonelli Jun 10 2008, 12:04 PM
Darksun was an amazing setting (i GM'ed it for almost 5 years)... fluffy wise. As any good (A)D&D seting, the rules don't do justice to the setting (the same happens with another great setting: Iron Kingdoms). It's boring try to create a mood of urgency, despair and mortality when the players are almost gods with quase-infinity hitpoints, and need dozens of hits to die. The mood got much better after my group adapted the setting to the Roll&Keep system of Legends of the Five Rings.
This happens a lot with D&D (and i guess that will be even worse with the 4th edition). You read the fluff and novels, and discover that you can't get the same mood and feeling with the ruleset.
Posted by: Fortune Jun 10 2008, 09:14 PM
To each his own. I hated Dark Sun!
Posted by: spica2501 Jun 10 2008, 11:01 PM
Wow, I didn't know about that dragon thing in the new version of the realms. I guess I really was right when I told all my friends that Wizards is turning the realms into Eberron without the trains.
As for people complaining about high level NPCs being used for Deus Ex Machina; if your DM ever did that, that just means you had a bad DM. The high level NPCs of the realms have better things to do than help out PCs with their quests. Elminster is a crotchety 5000+ year old man, he would just tell the PCs to solve their own problems if they asked him for help, or at most tell them some story of partial relevance to the current situation.
And is wizards payed any attention to the fluff they would know that without someone taking the place of Mistra, there is no arcane magic in the realms at all (except for shadow weave magic). If they have Mistra perminantly dead then there is no magic in the realms and without magic there is no reason for the realms to even exist as a campaign setting (Just like planescape has no reason to exist as a setting without the factions, and therefore after the faction war, the setting was more or less retired).
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jun 11 2008, 06:14 AM
...of all the settings I liked Forgotten Realms the best. Lots of good fluff, lots of campaign opportunities.
One of my best D&D characters next to Father Tel, came form the realms (Silverymoon) - a Fighter/Monk turned Paladin of Lathander (after discovering a relic holy sword of her patron in Myth Drannor) named Brennah.
...and ya sure ya betcha, does she have a history behind her.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 11 2008, 06:45 AM
Meh, your average hack'neyed fantasy setting where everything got thrown into a huge hodgepot of ridicoulus gestalt-mixing. The one thing that defines the Forgotten Realms is the change to the pantheon when a new rule-edition appears, and the consequent death of that magic-gal, Mystra. How many times did she die? 3 times? 4 times? A hundred times? She'll probably be reborn and die again, when 5th edition comes up.
Last times, all assassins died, before they got retconned into existence back again. Now, some thousand magicians go the way of Mystra, the Ever-Dying. I bet that in 5th edition, all rogues will spontaneously combust, and in the 6 edition, all clerics explode due to Terminators killing the newest incarnation of Mystra.
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 11 2008, 07:18 AM
I'd not call the Realms a "hodgepot of ridicoulus gestalt-mixing". If we take a look at our own world ca. 1400, then we'd see the same "hodgepot" of cultures spanning the globe - and many of the realms have a historical role model they seem to be shaped after (Dalelands=swiss cantons, for example). I mean the earlier realms, not the mess left after countless trashy novels were written, and almost every one featuring, for lack of any even semi-intelligent plot, a RSE (Realm shaking event) so the readers would have to buy it to stay current on canon. The 3E FR ended up a mess due to that, even though the FRCS had good parts - notably, not the ones taken after novels. At least it convinced me to stop bothering about the novels.
What is wrecking the realms are the novels - even good authors like Cunningham who isn't into RSEs repeatedly fail when they try to write a D&D novel because they simply don't get the realms as a RPG setting. (Cunningham obviously either played with a house rule of "we don't have raise dead", or never played at all, but contrary to other authors, she didn't even spare a "and the raise dead attempt failed" line, or something similar to explain why some of the most powerful, or best connected people would not have a loved one raised or resurrected.)
If one cuts out all the shit from the novels, the realms are a decent setting, 2E or 3E (if one can stand the more high magic stuff like shade). Good plot hooks adventuring possibilities of all kinds, from social intrigue to dungeoneering. Unfortunately, every FRCS will end up wrecked by the trash sold as novels in short order (I don't see what use a campaign setting book has if 6 months afterwards, canon is rewritten according to the latest author's whim who just had to have a civil war for his star wars prequel rip off).
Personally, after cutting back the modern stuff that seeped in (culture/attitudes as well as technology and "magic used as tech"), and adding some travel time by dropping teleport, the realms make a fine setting for my campaigns, especially since they offer so many different regions, cultures and possibilities, and not just one gimmick.
Posted by: Hatspur Jun 11 2008, 04:31 PM
I just hope that the majority of the old d20 books take a massive dive in price within a year of 4e's release.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 11 2008, 05:41 PM
Duurh, what happens when you use Raise Dead on someone who died of age?
Posted by: Aaron Jun 11 2008, 06:16 PM
I'm guessing that "you can’t restore life to ... a creature that died of old age." (Heinsoo et al.)
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 11 2008, 06:23 PM
Normally, you can't raise somebody from the dead when they died of old age...
But there is a rumor that using the crimson feather of a phoenix might overcome that obstacle and grant 1 year of life for the ressurected.... That's written in the Monster Manual as part of the background lore.
Happy Phoenix hunting...
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 11 2008, 09:05 PM
LOL, watch pheonixes become endangered speices.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 11 2008, 09:10 PM
Meh. Hardly any of the "Nature" rituals are in the basic book because the "Primal" power source is waiting for the PHB2. You'll be able to reset ages with Reincarnation just like you've always been able to do. Bringing back the dead when they died of old age is a problem only for Clerics.
-Frank
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 11 2008, 10:26 PM
Perhaps. And perhaps the theoretical Reincarnation Ritual only lets you be reborn as a stag beetle. If the Nature check is better, you might chose between a snake, a dog, or at best, deer...
And phoenix feathers might once again overcome the restrictions and make you reborn as your younger self... for one year, before you die again or get turned into a stag beetle.
Phoenix hunters will be rich... if they manage to hunt these beasts down in the Elemental Chaos, that is...
Posted by: GrepZen Jun 13 2008, 12:39 PM
The "Council of Wyrms" (CW) setting was introduced in 94 and was its own separate thing from FR. It didn't really go anywhere as it suffered from the same RP limiting factors as "Oriental Adventures". I can see them folding in CW to FR as there was always an over abundance of dragons in the FR setting and it plays in nicely with the Half-dragon / red dragon disciple munchkin evolution. I have to give it to them though, dragon-kin a a PC race has been a popular idea since Dragon Lance intorduced the Draconians and seems to have progressed rules wise through the settings until this point. WoTC is nothing if not customer oriented.
What was wrong with Spelljammer? It even got its own comic book series (as did FR) which was cut off way to early (the art did start to suffer thought).
As to the thread topic...4th ED is a another natural progression for the company as they have been looking & testing for a way to combine their CCG & RPG lines, in some respects, for a while. Mark my words, we will be seeing "Battle Cards", "Mini-Rules", and "Dragon Dice" "Optional" rule sets to improve / quicken the gaming experience.
Posted by: paws2sky Jun 13 2008, 02:17 PM
Spelljammer rocked. I'm still kicking myself for selling off that part of my collection years ago when I was out of work...
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 14 2008, 12:04 AM
Oriental Adventures was the ultimate expression of RPGs, though. There's not much you can do to expand upon the most sophisticated concepts of role playing as a whole once you've played a sohei who stabs people with chopsticks for 1d3 damage and who has karate chops that do 1d6 damage per hit. Except maybe role play a ninja.
Oriental Adventures was all we really needed, after all...
Posted by: hyzmarca Jun 14 2008, 12:21 AM
Very few people got Spelljammer, which was all about John Carter of Mars style planetary romance and low-tech mystical pseudo-science fiction space opera. It gave sword-and-sorcery purists cerebral aneurysms. It didn't help much that it was released during the time when TSR was overextending itself.
Posted by: GrepZen Jun 14 2008, 03:01 PM
OA was fantastic for what it was and the book was written so well that you couldn't help but learn a little slice of history. I just didn't like the restrictions placed on characters by the honor code (which in retrospect was a vital part of the "society" back then). It always seemed like it forced everyone in the party to have a hidden agenda which would be sprung at the most in-opportune moment. That and everyone wanted to play Ninjas which got old after a while.
Bringing this back to topic, I with Frank in that all the "new" stuff seems to reduce the game to munchkin paradise. 3rd ED wasn't much better but, it could be tuned to make things fit without the basis being "kill the monster". I may have to read a bit more about 4th ED but, I'm not liking the changes so far. If D&D is going to follow the Intel model of release (which should have been evident towards the end of 2nd ED) I'm not taking the bait.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 14 2008, 05:03 PM
"Kill the monster" has always been the basis to balance the game in D&D, since 1st edition. It's just the idea how that balancing should be that differentiates the different D&D-editions. In older editions, making wizards, paladins and rangers advancing much much slower was thought to be a good idea (it pissed off the player's who wanted to play such classes). In 3rd edition, it was thought to make everyone level up the same way and give out feats at specific levels. It brought us the uber-wizard, who was only bested by the terrible Cleric-or-Druid-Zilla, especially then when the player refused to be a walking band-aid, fighters who got mocked by everyone at level 12, and turkey feats like dodge, toughness and skill focus, which were even meant as traps for n00bs (no joke). And let's be honest. Roleplaying restrictions and abilities are not a way to balance combat-capabilities. People are respectful to the Arch-Wizard, not the Arch-Bard, or the Arch-Fighter... The only guys on par are the High Priest and the Arch-Druid.
Go away from the mentality that combat prowes determines AND reduces your entire social abilities. It's not a zero-sum thing. Combat roles are not your social roles, and never should have been in the first place.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 14 2008, 08:11 PM
The problem for me isn't that they took the first 8 levels of D&D and spread them out over 30 levels. The fact that high end characters really aren't that powerful is just a stylistic thing. A 21st level Fighter is about on par with like 10-15 first level Wizards. Whatever. My problem is that the new math that they were so proud of and ranting at me about for the last nine months is really atrociously bad.
A 1st level Wizard can do a small but perceptible amount of damage to any target without rolling dice. This means that a moderate handful of them can grind down a Fighter of virtually any level because Fighters take a very long time to hack through groups of enemies. It also means that they can clear out "minions" of literally any level because even epic level minions go down to even one point of automatic damage. On the flip side, a Fighter has to roll attack rolls, and d20 rolls scale off the RNG with surprising speed when characters are of disparate levels. If you have a sword you can't hurt an enemy who happens to be 10 levels higher than you. So while a Fighter to Wizard comparison converts 20 character levels to a dozen opponents, an Apples to Apples comparison of Fighters shows a discrepancy of 10 levels being equivalent to virtually unlimited enemies.
The 4e Skill Challenge rules are that you fail. Badly and horrendously at standard challenges of minimum complexity. You are seriously supposed to succeed at skill tests that you are good at 50% of the time or less at all levels, and you fail a simple challenge if you can't succeed 4 times out of 5. Characters have a less than 20% chance of successfully completing a Complexity 1 challenge at all levels. I don't understand how that one ever got through playtesting. Didn't playtesters call attention to the fact that they didn't ever succeed when faced with the new Skill Challenges rules?
Combats become longer as characters rise in level. By a lot. But a high level Wizard can still use his Orb Mastery to straight up permalock enemies in one shot - once per encounter. It's just everyone else who has to sit there and slog through doing 20 points of damage a round to an enemy with 500 hit points.
-Frank
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 14 2008, 11:58 PM
Oh man, FrankTrollmann, if you're still adamant on using your simulationist whims on a game that clearly admits to not care for that and rather emphasizes playability and fun, you will always fail with any attempts of simulating some weird-ass situation where a bajillion wizards of level 1 will try to fry a level bajillion fighter, when the game tells to not try such assinine theories. Next, you're going to complain once more about minions and how they interact with the game world and so fort. And yes, even a Fighter gets abilities to deal automatic damage, like his stance "Rain of Steel", which makes every minion die instantly if it begins it turns adjacent to him. And you're again spouting that nonsense about high-level fights going so long because everybody else deals so much damage.
My respect for you has diminished so much, I'm simply going to put you on ignore forever, because it grates my nerves, and I frankly don't need to waste anymore time reading the same disputed arguments ever and ever.
Oh well, that's what that button is good for. Better to ignore somebody than to start insulting him because you got tired out and start to think badly about the person on the other side of the discussion. Every message board should have an ignore feature.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 15 2008, 12:13 AM
My respect for you has diminished so much, I'm simply going to put you on ignore forever, because it grates my nerves, and I frankly don't need to waste anymore time reading the same disputed arguments ever and ever.
Oh well, that's what that button is good for. Better to ignore somebody than to start insulting him because you got tired out and start to think badly about the person on the other side of the discussion. Every message board should have an ignore feature.
This from the man who suggested that perhaps *I* have got a psychological complex relating to D&D.
Posted by: Particle_Beam Jun 15 2008, 12:43 AM
Yes, perhaps, if you feel threatened to it. However, I don't feel the need to post a superlong rant from another site... http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=22344&st=0&p=689658&#entry689658
Oh well, if we're going down to that level, it's proof enough that there isn't anything more to say...
Posted by: hyzmarca Jun 15 2008, 01:51 AM
It is a basic fact of gaming that if the rules allow an extremely effective tactic then someone is going to do it. In fact, most people are going to do it.
Posted by: bishop186 Jun 15 2008, 05:59 AM
I'm sorry, I might just be missing it, but what is this mystical 4th Edition spell that doesn't need a roll to hit? If you think it's Magic Missile, I suggest you look again because Magic Missile now requires a Int vs. Reflex roll to hit.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 15 2008, 06:18 AM
Oh well, if we're going down to that level, it's proof enough that there isn't anything more to say...
That's actually a collection of rants from an amusing and semi-well-known ranter living in Urugay. Many people don't agree with him 100% but I like his style. Again, you're the only person on this website who has repeatedly called attention to that one set of exerpts, and perhaps one of the quickest I've seen to start with the ad homienems.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 15 2008, 06:46 AM
No. It's Cloud of Daggers. You roll to-hit to inflict d6+Int Mod damage. But then if your opponents move into or start their turn in the area of it before the end of your next turn, they take your Wisdom Modifier in damage with no attack roll. Since that's not a "miss" effect but merely an effect contingent on their actions, it automagically slays minions. It is contingent on enemy actions, except that he enemy action in question is one he has no choice about - during your turn you already know what square the enemy is going to begin his next turn.
As for Particle Beam flipping out because he doesn't like the message I bring about D&D 4e, that's perfectly fine. Particle Beam: now that I'm on ignore I find it perfectly acceptable to gloat. Even Mike Mearls has admitted that their Skill Challenges system is totally fucked and their math doesn't work:
We had a meeting about skill challenges on (cue creepy music) Friday the 13th. We came to a few conclusions on what happened, what our intent is, and what we're going to do about it.
The system went through several permutations as we worked on it, and I think there are some disconnects between the final text, our intentions, and how playtesters and internal designers use skill challenges.
So, we've been listening and reading threads and figuring out some stuff on our end.
So yeah, they admitted that they screwed it up mathematically. Why on Earth would I hold back from saying that they screwed it up mathematically? Unlike them, I can do math.
-Frank
Posted by: Bull Jun 15 2008, 06:51 AM
Ok kids, chill out. THere's a whole bunch of comments flying about that are borderline personal attacks. Scale it back, keep it civil, and play nice, or I let loose the rabid woodchucks.
Bull
Posted by: bishop186 Jun 15 2008, 02:12 PM
Ah, I see. Well, that's not an autoslay for minions: a missed attack never damages a minion, so if you miss with the actual attack the cloud of daggers is rendered useless on minions anyway. Even if that weren't the case there are many creatures with powers that enable them to shift allies a square or allow them to shift themselves under certain contingencies.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 15 2008, 03:41 PM
No.
It doesn't cause damage on a missed attack. It creates a contingency where they will take damage if they don't move before their turn. It's different, and yes it means that it autoslays minions unless someone else uses a power to shift them out of the way. Of course, you can also use it to kill minions by shifting them into the column whether you do it with a missed attack or not.
So Minions are not killed by a miss from Acid Orb because they take no damage from the "miss effect." But they are killed by a miss from Cloud of Daggers because the damage is not a miss effect and does not trigger their keyword immunity.
-Frank
Posted by: Malicant Jun 16 2008, 01:19 PM
Frank, it might come as a suprise, but "autoslay minion" is kind of the shtick of a controller. So you are basically saying "the game sucks because it does what it intended to do, I just spin it so it sounds like they did not intend that".
In theory a gazillion level 1 wizards can slay anything, no matter how powerful, but not without some serious leaps of faith and a lot damage to the suspension of disbelief. This might be another surprise, but a game is more then just rules and numbers. You might not know that, but it is true, I've have seen it myself.
So, do you have any real critisicm beside "it seems characters are getting better, but they are not" and "wizards are the borked ones"? Like, real math based on actual gameplay, not some weird ass situations you need to create to prove some point?
What is you point anyway? Every system can be broken?
Posted by: bishop186 Jun 16 2008, 02:55 PM
Okay, I'll give you that, then. I don't find it very game-breaking, though our Wizard doesn't have it anyway and I thus haven't seen it in action.
Indeed! Just yesterday we ran our 4e game, and the DM let us throw (by which I mean that the fighter, who is statted like a 3.5 barbarian, rolled a strength check and heaved over the railing) the rogue 15 feet down to death-from-above a goblin. Oh, did hilarity ensue. Especially because the round before the fighter had knocked the goblin down there.
Some things are taking some getting used to, for example flat-footedness becoming a rogue power instead of a "hey, you reacted quicker than him" kind of thing. You know, I really like minions though. A ton of them can kick your ass even with the 1 HP drawback and they're alot of fun.
We're second level and thus far our encounters have lasted between 4 and 12 rounds each with between 3 and 20 monsters. Combat does seem to go more quickly, or at least fluidly, in this edition and that's a good thing.
Posted by: deek Jun 17 2008, 06:05 PM
I have to agree with you, combat does seem to last just as long but has a lot more fluidity. We played our first session last night and have a blast! We didn't have any rules issues, although our fighter didn't like a minion using a double move to shift then run, but oh well...we caught him anyways.
As for skill challenges...that's really the part I love about 4th edition. I guess I am not clear enough on the math problem side, but the theory behind the whole challenge system is really good. I mean, instead of a DM creating yet another combat encounter, you can set up a scene with a few key skills, set the DC and difficulty level of the challenge and let the players take turns using skills until you fail due to bad choice of skills or bad rolls or succeed due to having good, relevant skills or using high skills creatively. I think its a good system...now if there is a mathematical flaw that I am missing, I will certainly be on the lookout for errata. I'd think that the simple fix is either to lower the suggested DC's at each level or perhaps increase the amount of allowable failures through the challenge. Both seem like relatively easy fixes while still allowing the system to keep its innovative feel.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 17 2008, 06:30 PM
The problem is that you can't fucking do them under any circumstances.
The challenges are broken.
Let's say that you want to complete the Negotiation example as 1st level characters. The whole deal ends as soon as your entire team accumulates 8 successes or 4 failures. The DCs involved are 20 whether your team is using Diplomacy, Bluff, or Insight. Let's say just for yucks that every single character in the party has a Charisma or Wisdom of 18, and they all have Bluff, Diplomacy, or Insight as a trained skill. That gives you a +9 bonus on your skill check. Then you each make your attempts against a DC of 20. You succeed half the time.
And do you know what your chances are of getting to 8 successes before you get more than 3 failures?
11.3%!
You're a frickin min/maxed party with all the right skills and your over all success rate is just over one in ten. Go ahead and try it. Try it ten times. Don't even bother having people generating extra automatic failures with social faux pas or the like. Just straight have every single member of the party come to the table with high end characters for the specific task at hand and have them all contribute to the fullest for the 4-11 attempts that can happen before you ultimately succeed or fail. And come back and tell me how many times you succeed. Because I will laugh at you.
-Frank
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 17 2008, 06:34 PM
So adjust the difficulty.
Posted by: deek Jun 17 2008, 07:00 PM
Ummm...yeah, Frank, why is the DC a 20 at first level?. An easy difficulty challenge has the DC set at 10. DC 20 would be for a difficulty challenge and first level. IIRC, the moderate difficulty is set at DC 15, so I think you are misreading or misunderstanding something about DC levels in these challenges...
I do agree with your math with a DC 20, but I think that is only going to come up at the most difficult of levels, or if the DM believes the skill being used is almost impossible to succeed with. There is a whole lot of text covering how to set up these challenges and I've read over them many times, as I think they are great for the game. Especially if you are in a group of hack and slashers...it really gets them to use their skills and not always rely on combat to solve problems or gain experience!
Note: Not that it will make THAT much difference in your scenario, Frank, but some skill checks just grant a bonus to another character's roll, (i.e. a successful Insight may contribute a +2 to the next Diplomacy roll).
Posted by: last_of_the_great_mikeys Jun 17 2008, 07:41 PM
But we CAN hack and slash! So, when we fail that skill challenge (if we bother with it) we use our collective poers to kick the butt of whatever had the gall to challenge us like a nerd with non combat stuff!
Posted by: deek Jun 17 2008, 08:00 PM
Hack and Slash = roll dice, use predetermined powers in creative ways until monsters hp equal zero before yours do.
Skill Challenge = roll dice, use predetermined skills in creative ways until you get x successes before y failures.
Its really the same thing, just expanded to use that chunk of skills you picked up. They both award experience.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 17 2008, 08:59 PM
Because the base DC for a medium first level challenge is 15, and if it is a skill DC it is increased by 5 - to 20. Page 42, lower left hand corner.
And the Negotiation always has a difficulty based on the character's level so you don't succeed at any level with any characters.
--
And you know what this means? It means that they didn't play test these rules at all. Because if they had, they would have noticed straight off that no one ever succeeds.
-Frank
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 17 2008, 11:22 PM
The challenges are broken.
Let's say that you want to complete the Negotiation example as 1st level characters. The whole deal ends as soon as your entire team accumulates 8 successes or 4 failures. The DCs involved are 20 whether your team is using Diplomacy, Bluff, or Insight. Let's say just for yucks that every single character in the party has a Charisma or Wisdom of 18, and they all have Bluff, Diplomacy, or Insight as a trained skill. That gives you a +9 bonus on your skill check. Then you each make your attempts against a DC of 20. You succeed half the time.
And do you know what your chances are of getting to 8 successes before you get more than 3 failures?
11.3%!
You're a frickin min/maxed party with all the right skills and your over all success rate is just over one in ten. Go ahead and try it. Try it ten times. Don't even bother having people generating extra automatic failures with social faux pas or the like. Just straight have every single member of the party come to the table with high end characters for the specific task at hand and have them all contribute to the fullest for the 4-11 attempts that can happen before you ultimately succeed or fail. And come back and tell me how many times you succeed. Because I will laugh at you.
-Frank
Yeah, I was going to say, based on the math it seems like if anyone says the skill challenges are great that they haven't actually dealt with them yet.
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 18 2008, 07:17 AM
Well, as I said - lower the DC. People did the math before, and from what I recall, not applying the +5 for skill use more or less fixes it.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 18 2008, 07:34 AM
Depends upon what you mean by "fixes" it. If you don't apply the +5 that the rules actually say that you are supposed to apply:
- Ability tests in challenges are still off-the-charts impossible. Better hope there are no feats of strength or anything up in here.
- Higher complexity challenges (the ones which are worth more XP) become easier than lower complexity challenges (the ones which are worth less XP).
- Having characters in the party who aren't min/maxed towards whatever the goal of the scenario happens to be still drags the party down to failure. If you aren't a diplomancer then attempting to contribute to the scene in any way actively harms the party's chances of success, directly contrary to the stated goals of the rules.
- Higher level characters are still confronted with higher DCs to do literally the same things and thus becoming more powerful has no effect on your character's ability to do anything.
- The system is still deathly dull - instead of rolling Diplomacy and getting a result, you roll Diplomacy nine times and get a result. But honestly there's no strategy or anything to the exercise, you just pick your best allowed skill and roll it over and over again.
It's a bad system. There is no easy fix, because it's not a good system with minor problems. It's a slap-dash piece of crap that no one ever bothered to give more than the vaguest once over on. Not a single person gave this part of the rules a play through once they had it written. The final copy is essentially written by Hamlet monkeys with typewriters.
It is all sizzle and no steak. Someone made a cool sounding skill system pitch and then... they just printed it without giving it any thought or effort whatsoever. You'd think that such a monumental failure would get people fired, but actually the same people will be paid actual money to write an expanded skill system for the DMG 2. And they probably won't put any more effort into it the second time.
-Frank
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 18 2008, 08:35 AM
The way I see it, it's a more codified system than what I am using (which is: rp the scene, and make appropriate skill checks at the appropriate points).
So, let's say the goal is to convince the king that he should grant the party a boon. Introduction scene - diplomacy roll, if failed, the character does a gaffe, king is slightly irked. Preparing the pitch - bluff or diplomacy, if won the king is intrigued. If failed, the king is bored. RPed out. Additionally, history knowledge can be used here in additon to it, mentioning precendences or flattering the king by bringing up his heroic past. Then comes the pitch, players rps it, then rolls. Might need more rolls if he failed too much before.
Frankly, the idea of chaining skill checks is not new, and not bad. The execution is faulty, but that can be fixed.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 18 2008, 08:59 AM
Granted. Chaining skills together to make a system of out-of-combat interactions that has depth and tactics is indeed both obvious and would be well received by many people.
No.
The execution in this case is a total unmitigated failure. You can scrap the entire system and write a new one that actually accomplishes any goals at all. But that's entirely on the shoulders of whomever takes it upon themselves to write a completely new system for Skill Challenges. It isn't just that the math is so atrociously bad in this system that even attempting to use it once would prove to even those who are completely unschooled in mathematics that it had gone horribly awry. It isn't just that the system includes no rules or meaningful guidelines to actually chain skills together. It's that the entire system, top to bottom is completely without redeeming feature or silver lining.
I would love a system that genuinely encouraged characters to work together using bluff, diplomacy, insight, past heroic deeds, and background knowledges to piece together a proposition that would sway a king to make concessions in an ongoing boundary dispute. That would be great. But this system is not that system. The players just look at their character sheets and consider who has the biggest bonus to one skill on a short list, everyone else leaves the room and the guy with the biggest skill rolls a d20 up to 11 times. And he fails miserably anyway, because even the math behind "roll it nine times" has failed badly.
-Frank
Posted by: Wolfx Jun 18 2008, 10:21 AM
Frank,
I greatly appreciat the fact that you have taken the time to show the problems with the skill challenges. Since I am just now reading 4th edition, it gives me a heads up. I would suggest that you write up a better system, but you haven't provided much in the way of positive remarks for 4th edition.
I understand your issues, but why bother continuing to bash the game. It doesn't appear that you have any intention of using 4th.
Aric
Posted by: Critias Jun 18 2008, 10:28 AM
Aric
Your registratation date just doesn't make any sense followed by a question like that. You've been registered here for there years, but you ask a question like that, which makes it sound like this is perhaps your very first time being logged on to Dumpshock.
Posted by: deek Jun 18 2008, 12:49 PM
I'd have to agree with Fuchs...chaining together skills is good. Frank says it obvious, but I never really saw it in this context, which is probably why I think it is a great idea. Also, I thank Frank for pointing out the probability issue. Seeing I have been harping to my DM to use these challenges, you will be sure that I will have a talk with him about this so its not impossible to succeed.
As to the rules in general...uh, don't we all end up tweaking things to meet our group's taste? After two years of SR4, I had two pages of house rules that made the game better for our group. If we have to do the same with DnD4, so be it... I don't know any RPG that we haven't altered something.
And I don't see skill challenges as being one guy looking for his biggest skill and rolling it 11 times. If you look at the actual examples, the whole point is to facilitate group roleplay. Each player is taking a turn and if they have low numbers in the key skills, you can try and convince the DM that your unorthodox use of another skill would work in the scene. Some groups won't use this at all because they roleplay all the time anyways.
But for those groups that rollplay, this gives the DM a bridge to get some roleplaying out of some players, as they have to look at their skills, and in some way, explain how they are using their skill. If you strip it down to just letting one character do the entire skill challenge, I think you are misusing the rules and would be better served to just give them one roll. The challenge is for the group, not individual.
Also, we are only talking here about social skill challenges. Take a look at the examples about pursuit or traps/puzzles. The same system can be used to simulate there. Not to mention legwork in town...I mean, if you take the frequency from one check per round to one check per hour, then you have a skill challenge that is overlayed on top of other activities going on.
If the math is bad, its bad. I believe Frank in that regard. But, its not like it can't be fixed by just changing some DCs and pass/fail numbers up. I think its a lot easier to do that then spend hours bitching about how wretched it is and how the authors should be axed. And you know what? If you don't like the skill challenges, don't use them. Go back to single roles.
The other comment about difficulties scaling with level...I actually like that. From a "fun" perspective, its nice to know that level 15 will be just as challenging as level 1. Our DM figured out at our current pace, we would be progressing about 4 levels per year or playing. And we all agreed that if each session was as fun and engaging as our first battle, then none of us would have a problem. We've never played a game where there was a good challenge at all levels. We've retired so many characters (from many different games) because they've become so overpowered that it was no longer fun.
The idea that DnD 4th Edition may have solved that issue...well, that is very intriguing to me and well worth playing to find out!
Posted by: Aaron Jun 18 2008, 01:27 PM
Any thoughts on using the system they use for disease for challenges?
Posted by: Cheops Jun 18 2008, 03:12 PM
I'd like to point out that all the math I have seen does not include Group Checks or the Bonus Successes both of which are intended to make it easier.
Bonus Successes are tests where a success/failure doesn't matter to win/lose but a success provides a bonus (usually +2) to the next guy's check. they are also usually Easy (15) tests as opposed to Moderate (20) tests.
Group Checks are specifically mentioned in the text but no example of their use is given. Basically you make your Aid Another test (DC 10 or 15 I believe) and if you succeed you give +2 to the acting character. At most you can add +8.
One of the players in my SR/ED group is in a 4th campaign right now and he has succeeded in 2 solo challenges but the DM didn't add the +5 to the difficulty. So they seem to work if you use the above 2 properly or if you get rid of the +5. Especially since the +5 is quoted as for Skill Checks not Skill Challenges.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 18 2008, 03:24 PM
Well, the Disease rules are another thing where "you fail." So inherently I'm not much in favor of them. Basically the vast majority of characters have an Endurance bonus of about 1/2 their character level, and the DC to improve your lot is generally set at about 1/2 Level + 22. So the majority of people can't actually recover at all and just slide down to the end. Even people with an 18 Con and trained Endurance find that when they get to 9th level and get exposed to Blinding Sickness that they improve on a 13+ and their condition degrades on a 9 or less, meaning that slightly more than half the time they march down to end stage and go blind.
Your Dwarf's chances improve substantially to about 4 in 5 of not going blind if you lie down and have a Heal specialist of your level attend you. His chance is actually no better than yours at beating the disease, but since you both roll and take the better result at least you have the odds on your side.
The real problem with the diseases is that it's just a calc function to see where it's going. That is, there's a single track, a single die roll type, and you just roll dice until successes or failures get a certain amount ahead of the other. Basically it's the same deal as Skill Challenges, and you basically don't win for much the same reason: bad math. Only this time it's even worse because it's always "Endurance" that you need maxed out to get a 50/50 shot instead of taking your pick of 3 or more skills.
That was apparently the intent, but that's not anything like what it does. The big problem here is that everyone is sharing the same successes and the same failures. That is, you have exactly 11 die rolls on a Complexity 3 challenge. You have exactly 5 die rolls on a Complexity 1 Challenge. For the whole party. If someone comes in and makes a half-hearted attempt to accomplish something with a midling to low chance of success, they are hurting the party. The "correct" choice is to take the d20s away from whoever doesn't have the absolute best relevant bonus, and then have them make all 5, or 11, or whatever checks.
If you really wanted to facilitate people contributing to the team efforts, you'd have everyone share the same success pile and give each player their own limit of failures. Then having the party Dwarven Inferlock or the party Elven Ranger give his input into social endeavors or having the party Wizard give a trapped hallway an inspection would be a sensible and beneficial thing. The current rules don't just have bad math, they are also structurally problematic because any time the Inferlock attempts to contribute to a social encounter in any way the party Half Elven Diplomancer feels genuinely annoyed because that Inferlock just took one of the limited die rolls that the Diplomancer could have used and blew it on a long shot that was unlikely to accomplish anything.
I'm all for giving everyone something to do when dealing with noncombat scenarios. But the 4e Skill Challenge system really spectacularly does not do that. Since the limit is on how many times the party rolls dice rather than how many times each individual rolls dice, there is no incentive whatsoever to engage more than one player at the table. I mean, you can radically alter the prospective inputs of DCs and required successes such that you can complete tasks and higher complexity tasks aren't mysteriously easier than lower complexity ones (currently a Complexity 1 challenge fails if more than 20% of skill attempts come up failures, while a Complexity 5 challenge fails if more than 29% of skill attempts come up failures). In fact, someone already did that http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?p=4278599. But while that fixes the basic math so that you can in fact succeed, it does not change the fact that the preferred method of doing that is the rather uninspiring one of sending the diplomancer forward to talk until the king tells him to shut up and have all the other players pretend to be deaf mutes during that time.
Encouraging teamwork would be built on a similar basis as combat, where an individual character getting eliminated from the challenge didn't eliminate anyone else. Encouraging tactics and cooperation might come in the form of giving a penalty to whatever test was the last type that a character succeeded with. That way other players would come in and attempt to use skills like Insight or whatever to keep the character's Diplomancy penalties from getting too high.
I've never seen a truly perfect skill system. But I've seen better skill systems than 4e's in http://forum.rpg.net/showpost.php?p=2426637&postcount=99. Given the amount of hype and promise this skill system was released with, I'm genuinely offended. Not just disappointed, but actually offended. I can literally see the lack of care and utter contempt for the players and paying customers in every page of it. This isn't something like Shadowrun's Bloodzilla, where it's an obscure rules problem that shouldn't have happened but frankly doesn't matter. This is a supposedly major part of the game and it's so crocked as to be usable in even the most casual context. There's no clever combos or obscure rules interactions to put together to make the game break here, it takes Herculean effort just to make the current festering corpse be merely slightly more cumbersome than the admittedly hole-filled 3rd edition system.
-Frank
Posted by: deek Jun 18 2008, 03:51 PM
You know, if I played at a table that had a bunch of strangers, the DM described nothing besides "you hit, you miss" and I was more interested in getting to 30th level than having any fun, all of what you (Frank) say, would be true. I mean, I understand what you are saying and where you come from, but realize, a lot of us actually come to the table with friends and just want to have fun.
Take away the +5 for skill checks, and I think the tests run pretty well. Take away the fact that the best chance to succeed is to only utilize the strongest links in every encounter, whether combat or skills, and yes, you end up with just one person sitting there rolling a bunch of dice.
I know you come from a perspective of only black and white when it comes to rules. That's your thing. You have a talent for pulling anything out of the context of the game and focus solely on the numbers...and if its not "right" in print, then its wrong. And we need that...in moderate doses of course.
But is removing that +5 and having a good laugh when the halfling in your group attempts a Acrobat check in front of the king, with much lower chance of success than the Diplomancer? And if he succeeds, do we not have a wild story to share with each other and friends? I mean, it even says in the core rules how many skill challenges shouldn't come down to such a failure that the party is stuck. Often times, it should just make the next encounter/quest a little harder or take a bit longer. Heck, even the one talking about a failed skill challenge when trying to trek through the woods has a failure result in everyone having to lose a healing surge until the next encounter or extended rest. Its not like a failed challenge equals death of the DM gets to take on of your magic items away...
Posted by: paws2sky Jun 18 2008, 05:05 PM
In an effort to keep that other thread positive, I'll post this over here...
Somehow this reminds me of Syndrome from The Incredibles.
"Oh, I'm real. Real enough to defeat you! And I did it without your precious gifts, your oh-so-special powers. I'll give them heroics. I'll give them the most spectacular heroics the world has ever seen! And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so that *everyone* can have powers. *Everyone* can be Super! And when everyone's Super... No one will be."
I've had a few days now to digest 4e. Simply put, I don't care for it. I suppose I could go on about why, but others have said it before me and probably with more skill.
I will say one thing positive about it though: Its motivational. In fact, it spurred me a bit to work on my 3xM system (a 3.x and Modern hybrid) last night. I set it aside a year or so ago and haven't been motivated to mess with it until now. Of course, in looking at it again, I almost want to scrap it and do a SR4 conversion instead.
-paws
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 18 2008, 05:15 PM
But insofar as they're selling you a book of rules, it doesn't make sense to say that rules shouldn't be discussed because you don't care about rules.
By that logic instead of shelling out all this cash for lots of RPG rule books you should just take a stack of books by your favorite fantasy author, sit around with friends, and make up collaborative fan fiction. If you claim it's 100% about social interaction and 0% about whether or not the rules fail.
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jun 18 2008, 05:44 PM
"Oh, I'm real. Real enough to defeat you! And I did it without your precious gifts, your oh-so-special powers. I'll give them heroics. I'll give them the most spectacular heroics the world has ever seen! And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so that *everyone* can have powers. *Everyone* can be Super! And when everyone's Super... No one will be."
Actually this reminds me of 3.5 where a Level 10 fighter, goes up against the magically equipped commoner. It doesn't matter what you can do in 3.5, if you don't have all the magical equipment. Usually descriptions of 3.5 characters are 10% character 90% equipment.
I like this change in 4.0, where the equipment matters less than your characters actual skills and abilities. And the fighter class no longer breaks down to "Full Attack" or "Move, then Attack".
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 18 2008, 05:47 PM
By that logic instead of shelling out all this cash for lots of RPG rule books you should just take a stack of books by your favorite fantasy author, sit around with friends, and make up collaborative fan fiction. If you claim it's 100% about social interaction and 0% about whether or not the rules fail.
Agree. If you want to play Magical Fairy Princess Teaparty with your friends, that's fine. That game, along with Cops and Robbers, House, and Cowboys and Indians are of course venerable and exciting games that people have been playing to vast amusement for generations, and I wouldn't begin to take that away from people.
But I think that if sitting around with your friends discussing which of your imaginary princesses is the prettiest is what you actually want, then you don't want or need a game system at all. If you want to play a game that has success and failure and you want the halfling to jump around doing a fool' performance or whatever, then you probably shouldn't be playing a game where doing that makes the entire team lose, and you certainly shouldn't be playing a game where your entire team loses regardless of what you do.
-Frank
Posted by: deek Jun 18 2008, 06:03 PM
Ummm...yeah...magical fairy princess teaparty...
C'mon now, in a typical group, how long does it normally take to find a problem in a rule? Usually not more than one or two encounters using it. Does everyone just ditch the game and say this is the most awful set of core rules known to man, burn their books and bash it every chance they get?
I didn't say the rules didn't matter or that I didn't care, I simply said that, yeah, okay, several people have pointed out a flaw. Let's correct it, unofficial or not, really doesn't matter at the table. I mean, yeah, it matters in the grand scheme of game development. WotC is responsible for what they print. They are responsible for fixing it as well. But, to say that because the rules don't give the intended result (and we are talking about one game mechanic here, that is flawed, and at least two ways mentioned to fix it), that we scrap everything is ridiculous. I mean, anytime a DM/GM has said xyz is in the book, page abc, and it seemed horribly unbalanced, we've fixed it and moved on, not bashed the game to everyone that would listen and then give up on it.
I agree with you Frank, if the whole goal of the group is to win, yeah, you probably don't want to bring a character to a table that has any quirks, bad judgment, less then optimized stats or frankly, any personality. And there are some groups that do that...and that's cool if they have fun. But if you are just trying to play a GAME and have fun...well, barring the annoying gamer that takes it to an extreme, little failures are part of the fun. And I still don't think there is more than way to run a skill challenge, because the group doesn't always lose, even if they fail the challenge.
Here's a straight question, Frank. Do you think the skill challenges are more or less fixed (without doing an entire rewrite) by simply removing the +5 to the DC? I mean, mathematically, what does that bring the probabilities to? Do you think it needs more/less than that to bring it back to good use?
Posted by: Drogos Jun 18 2008, 06:05 PM
I feel this adds an enormous amount to the conversation
Main article http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/commentary/alttext/2008/06/alttext_0618.
Cookbooks are a lot like Dungeons & Dragons and other role-playing games.
They contain seemingly rigid rules that, in practice, require a certain
amount of adaptation for your own tastes.
So how come cooking gets its own TV channel and role-playing games don't
even get a show on G4? Maybe the population at large doesn't want to pretend
to be a half-elf. Maybe RPGs take more imagination than most people have.
However, it just might have something to do with the role-playing community.
If geeks talked about cookbooks the way they talk about RPG books, the
results would not be pretty:
*Posted: 12:15 a.m. by LordOrcus* I'm so mad that there's a new edition of The
Better Joy Cookbook out. Thanks for making my old copy obsolete, you greedy
hacks! For five years now, my friends have been coming over for my eggplant
Parmesan, and now I'm never going to be able serve it again unless I shell
out 35 bucks for the latest version.
*Posted: 12:42 a.m. by Kathraxis*Hey, I have a question! When you preheat
the oven, can you start it before you measure out the ingredients, or do you
have to do it afterward? Please answer quickly, my friends and I have been
arguing about it for four hours and we're getting pretty hungry.
*Posted: 12:48 a.m. by Goku1440* I found an *awesome loophole*! On page 242
it says "Add oregano to taste!" It doesn't say how much oregano, or what
sort of taste! You can add as much oregano as you want! I'm going to make my
friends eat *infinite oregano* and they'll have to do it because the recipe
says so!
*Posted: 1:02 a.m. by barrybarrybarry* I can't believe I spent 35 dollars on
a cookbook that doesn't have a recipe for peanut butter and jelly
sandwiches. When I buy a cookbook, I expect it to *tell me how to cook*. And
don't tell me to just make a PBJ myself, I'm not some sort of hippy artist
pretentious "freeform cook."
*Posted: 1:08 a.m. by jvmkanelly* Where are the recipes for chatting with
friends while cooking? Where are the recipes for conversation over the meal?
When I throw a dinner party, I want it to be a PARTY. I guess the idiots who
use the Better Joy Cookbook just cook and eat in stony silence, never saying
a word or even looking each other in the eye.
*Posted: 1:23 a.m. by LordOrcus* Hey, guess what? They're coming out with The
Better Joy Book of Hors D'oeuvres. It just goes to show that the publishers
are a bunch of corporate greedheads who care more about money than they do
about cooking. Is it too much to ask for a single cookbook that contains all
possible recipes?
*Posted: 1:48 a.m. by specsheet*Hey, everyone. I can tell just by reading
the recipe that if you prepare eggs benedict as written, the sauce will
separate. My mom always said the other kids made fun of me because they were
jealous of my intelligence, so I must be right. Everyone who's saying that
they followed the recipe and it came out perfect is either lying, or loves
greasy separated hollandaise sauce.
*Posted: 1:52 a.m. by IAmEd*As I have pointed out MANY TIMES, several of
these recipes contain raisins, and I, like most people, am ALLERGIC to
raisins! And before you tell me to substitute dried cranberries, I will
reiterate that I am discussing the recipes AS WRITTEN. I do not appreciate
your ATTACKING ME with helpful suggestions!
*Posted: 2:12 a.m. by Herodotus*I just have to laugh at the recipe for Beef
Wellington. In Wellington's day, ovens didn't have temperature settings! And
pate de foie gras *certainly* didn't come in cans. It's like the authors
didn't even *care* about replicating authentic early 19th century cooking
techniques!
*Posted: 2:17 a.m. by LordOrcus* I have read the new Better Joy Cookbook and
I am devastated to my very core. Their macaroni and cheese recipe, the very
macaroni and cheese I've been making since I was in college, has been
ravaged and disfigured and left bleeding on the page. Where once it
contained only cheddar cheese, now the recipe calls for a mix of cheddar and
Colby. It may contain macaroni, and it may contain cheese, but it is
*not*macaroni and cheese. This is a slap in the face and a knife in
the gut. You
have lost me, Better Joy Cookbook. I would bid you goodbye, but I wish you
nothing but the pain and rage you have delivered unto me.
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jun 18 2008, 06:16 PM
That's awesome Drogos...
I have one complaint about 4th, that has nothing to do with rules, or races, or classes.
The DMG has parts that are pretty much just strictly advertisements for their other merchandise. I'll post the quote when I get a chance, but reading through it I had to stop and double check what I just read. It of course has to do with the grids and minitures, but it just annoyed me.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 18 2008, 06:25 PM
No.
Here's what that brings it for a solo character with an 18 in the stat and training in the skill:
- Complexity 1: 63.3%
- Complexity 3: 71.3%
So already you note that there is a straight negative correlation between actual difficulty of tasks and the amount of XP you are awarded for them. That sinks it right there. Of course it's entirely possible that people will want to contribute to the challenge if they are not a min/maxed character with exactly the right skill. That's supposedly the whole point of the system.
If a character is not a perfect min/max match for the task, say he has only the 18 in the appropriate stat and doesn't have the relevant skill as one of his four tag skills - then he's back to the 11 percent ratio we were talking about before. And any contribution from the peanut gallery of non min/maxed characters averages in overall probability. For example, one character who has "only" a +4 modifier attempting to contribute once on a Complexity 1 challenge drops your chances of success from 63.3% to 52.7%.
I have deep reservations about the 3rd edition skill system. But honestly "every player tries to roll a DC 15 Diplomacy check to give +2 to the party Master Debater and then he rolls a single check against a static target number" is a much better system. You would seriously be better off just rolling back to the 3rd edition skill system. Every single part of the 4e Skill system is crap. Every numerical input, every check, every player choice, every DM judgement call, every part of it is defined incorrectly. Almost every single part of it has exactly the inverse effects as it is supposedly created to produce. There is no quick fix, because it is completely wrong all the way down to the little wiggly bits.
-Frank
Posted by: paws2sky Jun 18 2008, 06:34 PM
Huh.
Sounds like we've had very different experiences with 3.5
Posted by: deek Jun 18 2008, 06:45 PM
I've found 19+ pages on ENWorld (that Frank posted earlier) that has plenty more discussion, so I will drop my discussion of mathematical fixes from this thread. It has been an eye opener though and a ton of good information to work with.
I still like the idea of chaining key skills, allowing the whole group to participate, and having secondary skills give a bonus or unlocks the use of another skill. Obviously, the initial execution is mathematically flawed.
Also, in 4E, aiding a party member is a 50/50 chance to give them +2, so its a bit easier than 3.5's DC 15.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 18 2008, 09:00 PM
Main article http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/commentary/alttext/2008/06/alttext_0618.
Cookbooks are a lot like Dungeons & Dragons and other role-playing games.
They contain seemingly rigid rules that, in practice, require a certain
amount of adaptation for your own tastes.
So how come cooking gets its own TV channel and role-playing games don't
even get a show on G4? Maybe the population at large doesn't want to pretend
to be a half-elf. Maybe RPGs take more imagination than most people have.
However, it just might have something to do with the role-playing community.
If geeks talked about cookbooks the way they talk about RPG books, the
results would not be pretty:
*Posted: 12:15 a.m. by LordOrcus* I'm so mad that there's a new edition of The
Better Joy Cookbook out. Thanks for making my old copy obsolete, you greedy
hacks! For five years now, my friends have been coming over for my eggplant
Parmesan, and now I'm never going to be able serve it again unless I shell
out 35 bucks for the latest version.
*Posted: 12:42 a.m. by Kathraxis*Hey, I have a question! When you preheat
the oven, can you start it before you measure out the ingredients, or do you
have to do it afterward? Please answer quickly, my friends and I have been
arguing about it for four hours and we're getting pretty hungry.
*Posted: 12:48 a.m. by Goku1440* I found an *awesome loophole*! On page 242
it says "Add oregano to taste!" It doesn't say how much oregano, or what
sort of taste! You can add as much oregano as you want! I'm going to make my
friends eat *infinite oregano* and they'll have to do it because the recipe
says so!
*Posted: 1:02 a.m. by barrybarrybarry* I can't believe I spent 35 dollars on
a cookbook that doesn't have a recipe for peanut butter and jelly
sandwiches. When I buy a cookbook, I expect it to *tell me how to cook*. And
don't tell me to just make a PBJ myself, I'm not some sort of hippy artist
pretentious "freeform cook."
*Posted: 1:08 a.m. by jvmkanelly* Where are the recipes for chatting with
friends while cooking? Where are the recipes for conversation over the meal?
When I throw a dinner party, I want it to be a PARTY. I guess the idiots who
use the Better Joy Cookbook just cook and eat in stony silence, never saying
a word or even looking each other in the eye.
*Posted: 1:23 a.m. by LordOrcus* Hey, guess what? They're coming out with The
Better Joy Book of Hors D'oeuvres. It just goes to show that the publishers
are a bunch of corporate greedheads who care more about money than they do
about cooking. Is it too much to ask for a single cookbook that contains all
possible recipes?
*Posted: 1:48 a.m. by specsheet*Hey, everyone. I can tell just by reading
the recipe that if you prepare eggs benedict as written, the sauce will
separate. My mom always said the other kids made fun of me because they were
jealous of my intelligence, so I must be right. Everyone who's saying that
they followed the recipe and it came out perfect is either lying, or loves
greasy separated hollandaise sauce.
*Posted: 1:52 a.m. by IAmEd*As I have pointed out MANY TIMES, several of
these recipes contain raisins, and I, like most people, am ALLERGIC to
raisins! And before you tell me to substitute dried cranberries, I will
reiterate that I am discussing the recipes AS WRITTEN. I do not appreciate
your ATTACKING ME with helpful suggestions!
*Posted: 2:12 a.m. by Herodotus*I just have to laugh at the recipe for Beef
Wellington. In Wellington's day, ovens didn't have temperature settings! And
pate de foie gras *certainly* didn't come in cans. It's like the authors
didn't even *care* about replicating authentic early 19th century cooking
techniques!
*Posted: 2:17 a.m. by LordOrcus* I have read the new Better Joy Cookbook and
I am devastated to my very core. Their macaroni and cheese recipe, the very
macaroni and cheese I've been making since I was in college, has been
ravaged and disfigured and left bleeding on the page. Where once it
contained only cheddar cheese, now the recipe calls for a mix of cheddar and
Colby. It may contain macaroni, and it may contain cheese, but it is
*not*macaroni and cheese. This is a slap in the face and a knife in
the gut. You
have lost me, Better Joy Cookbook. I would bid you goodbye, but I wish you
nothing but the pain and rage you have delivered unto me.
It was funny, and I identify with Herodotus, but this is the thing. There are still good cookbooks and bad cookbooks. Cooking is a big hobby of mine and if we went to a bookstore together I could go through the shelf and give you my opinion about whether a given cookbook is good and for what reasons, or if the cookbook is bad. We can even imagine or occasionally find a cookbook which is flawed in certain ways such that most people would not be able to use the recepies as written to make palatable food. We can more realistically find cookbooks where the recpies weren't actually tested by the authors so while a few of them work OK the majority of them produce bad tasting dishes. I am not even kidding about this.
Therefore, it's possible for RPG rules to be so flawed that they cannot, on their own, make a game that anybody would want to play.
As someone who takes cooking seriously I feel offended when I crack open a cookbook that has lots of pretty pictures but then the recepies were obviously never tested. The publishers and authors obviously sought to sell the book to people who don't usually cook who would be entranced by the pretty pictures but who wouldn't know the recepies were crap until it was too late. The same principle can be extended to RPG rules.
Posted by: raphabonelli Jun 18 2008, 09:08 PM
Besides that... you can change some ingredients of your recipe book to make the recipe taste betters... but the recipe in the book will still taste bad, no matter what. No matter how much you "house-rule" your recipe... the recipe on the book don't change at all.
Posted by: deek Jun 19 2008, 01:30 PM
I was reading some more on this...there are several different system overhauls that keep to the spirit of the skill challenge rules.
But what has been more interesting is one of the developers commenting on giving +/- 2 for good/bad creative use of skills on their checks, as well as building in some skills that give an automatic success on their first use. All of which, completely changes the probablilities.
So, just to anyone that read this thread and thought there was no hope, there is hope. And its not really that bad as long as the DM is aware of the published issues!
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 19 2008, 02:33 PM
deek, that's retarded. Giving people a +2 changes their chances from less than 20% to less than 1 in 3. You do creative crap and the DM shines on you and you all have min/maxed characters and you still don't even complete level appropriate challenges even half the time.
I don't know why you are so very anxious to drink this particular Koolaid, but don't. There are lots of incredibly bad skill systems that are still kilometers ahead of the crap that was put out in 4e. It is quite simply the worst skill system ever produced for a mass market game, bar none. Even the raw percentages system of Palladium was better. There are halfway decent skill systems in a dozen sources that you could use instead.
---
Actually deploying the 4e skill system is math intensive, because it relies heavily on probabilities and combinatorials. If you aren't good enough at math to see that the system is horrible on first read through, you aren't good enough at math to actually use it in play. If you are good enough at math to see the ridiculous crock of shit that it is on first read through, you will have no desire to actually use it in play.
The only hope is that people will some day write a better system that 4e players will be willing to use. That's it. There is nothing inside the 4e Skill Challenges rules that is in any way good. And there are no easy fixes for that horrendous piece of crap.
-Frank
Posted by: Cheops Jun 19 2008, 02:35 PM
I've also finally come across the Skill Challenge in KotSF and it was done very differently in there than in the RAW. It was 4 successes before 4 failures and the DC was 15 for skill uses. By my calculations that gives a skilled groups with a +1 from stats a 42% chance of success. That rockets up to 76% if you play Frank style and no one makes fun builds - just efficient ones.
Seems that they changed how it worked somewhere between the intro adventure and the RAW.
Posted by: Aaron Jun 19 2008, 02:41 PM
Someone at my FLGS made an interesting point. He had been looking to buy a set of 4e products so he and his friends to get into a game. After doing some comparison, he bought Descent and its supplements. He had come to the conclusion that buying everything in Descent would get him more game than spending the same amount on D&D products.
Posted by: deek Jun 19 2008, 03:30 PM
I'd buy that. I know several people that dropped hundreds of dollars in DnD 3.x. Luckily, I only ever bought a PHB. But even going back to 2nd edition, which I loved to DM, my collection of books, including a few 1st edition hardbacks, was well over $1500...and I was in high school!
Just looking at core books, I'd easily invest the $35 retail price to run with SR4 (even with its flaws) over the $115 for the DnD4 core books needed to play. And I am sure there are other games that are less than that for an all-in-one book.
Yeah, I don't know why I am drinking that koolaid either Frank. I will admit that I didn't playtest or see the mathematical probabilities when reading through the skill challenges. I was intrigued by the encounter setup and really just skipped over the tables with DCs and Complexities. I just really liked what I read and I'm apparently trying to defend a broken system.
Granted, I have read so much in the past few days and seen so many methods to flip things around or make small adjustments... I mean, I can take my pick between the RAW 11% success rate for first level moderate challenges, change a couple thing to get about a 60-65% success rate or got to something that gives me over 75% success rate. I've read things to change the complexity so the more complex challenges are actualy harder, instead of just take more time...I've read of people focusing on group challenges instead of solo challenges, discussing variance among groups with mean score deviation...
Just a lot of stuff. But when it came back around, I read something from Keith Baker that shows he is very liberal with the +2 reward for interesting uses, plant in a few skill checks that don't cause success/failure count to change and give automatic successes when a 20 is rolled. I'll admit, the RAW is broken, specifically making it very hard to succeed at 1st level. But I don't think is beyond salvageable with a couple tweaks. Its supposed to be a challenge...many times you are getting XP for not fighting. And if you look at higher levels, its not just an 11% success chance...
We're gonna give it a shot though. And if it really does suck donkey, then I have plenty of resources to fix it. Should there not be a reason for the fix, sure. It should work out of the box. And when one of the staff uses two house-rules in his own games...well...call that what you will.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jun 19 2008, 03:48 PM
Seems that they changed how it worked somewhere between the intro adventure and the RAW.
It's been said, it can not be used as written, and must be changed. There are some ways to make them better.
Setting the number of successes and number of failures equal is a good start. That will get rid of odd effects of challenges getting easier as they become more complex, depending on the initial DC. As I understand it, if the number of successes and failures are equal, then the difficulty of the test should not vary with complexity at all. The outcome will become more reliable, but the actual chances of success or failure shouldn't change. The mean doesn't change, but the variance goes down. Which, to me, sounds about right. It's complexity, not difficulty, and a high-complexity task rewards more experience, not because it's harder, but because it occupied a larger percentage of your time at the gaming table. It also means the chance of success or failure is the same as it would be for a single test at that DC, which means the GM can have a reasonable chance at estimating how hard the task will actually be without being able to do fancy math. It's still turning one roll into several, with no change in the resulting chance of success, but as I said, the variance will drop so that you're less likely to succeed or fail based on a single lucky roll, and more likely to perform predictably. I'm not saying this is good or bad, it's just a result, and it's a result which may be found to be desirable by some people.
Frank also points out the issue of one person doing everything, and I like his fix. Split the number of failures evenly across every member of the party, and one way or another they're knocked out of the challenge when they hit that. Find a fluff reason to explain why they're knocked out of the challenge. Easy explanation if the challenge is a chase scene, more difficult if it's social, but do-able.
There's still the possibility of one person doing all the work. You might want to limit the number of successes contributed by each person. Say, in a 5 person group no one is able to contribute more than 50% of the total successes. They can certainly exceed their share, but they can't do it all.
You can similarly limit the number of successes which come from a certain skill. You may be able to use 5 primary skills for a challenge, but Diplomacy can't contribute more than half of them. Diplomacy can only get you so far.
And of course there's the issue of whether or not to add +5.
The idea of everyone rolling skill checks until something happens is good. The execution in the DMG is abysmal. But set the number of successes and failures equal, divide the failure between the party, and cap the successes from each character and skill (much higher than their share, but still below 100%), and the system is, I believe, workable.
Thoughts?
Posted by: deek Jun 19 2008, 03:59 PM
On the surface, I think that is workable as well.
I've also heard the variant of just flipping the success/failure numbers. So, instead of 4 success before 2 failures, you just do 2 successes before 4 failures. Now, that makes things really easy, but assuming anything published will be using these types of encounters, it makes it a very quick option.
Also, all the debate has been on the math at first level. I've read a lot about at the higher levels and its not even close to being as difficult at the numbers show at first level. It begs the question, should skill challenges be easier at low level?
And the other thing I keep pointing out is the resulting effect. A failure does not equal death here. It may mean you have to spend a healing surge. It may mean instead of getting the magic sword now, you have to fulfill a quest objective first. It may also mean instead of the duke giving you 30 of his men to help, you only get 3. A failure result, normally means you will have a tougher path, not that you die.
And if our first level party only has an 11% chance of getting a magic sword without having to do anything but skill checks...well, that does actually seem appropriate.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 19 2008, 05:12 PM
Sort of. With the number of hits and misses required to win or lose being equal, then of course you have an exactly 50/50 shot of succeeding or failing in an ultimate sense when you run out of attempts at the end if each individual roll had a 50% chance of succeeding. So if your individual tests pass on an 11+, there is no change in overall chances with higher complexities. However, if you pass on a 10+ or better, then increasing complexity is good for you, while as if you pass on a 12+ or worse increasing complexity is bad for you.
Let's consider the simple case where you need either 4 hits/failures (complexity 1) or 6 hits/failures (complexity 2). If you pass on an 11+ on each die roll, it's a 50% chance to succeed or fail either way. On the other hand, if you have a 10+ to pass (and thus 55% of your rolls succeed), then you succeed overall 60.8% of the time at complexity 1, and 63.3% at complexity 2. On the flip side, a team that needs a 12+ (and thus 45% of their rolls succeed) is looking at success 39.2% of the time at complexity 1, and 36.7% at complexity 2. Basically what you've made happen is that min/maxing is more heavily rewarded by higher complexities. Every tiny bonus you accumulate has its effects magnified by the increase in complexity.
I think that what you are attempting to say here is a true statement, but the thing you actually said is not true. Increasing the iterations without giving weight to successes or failures does increase the chances of success or failure. It won't push you over the 50% mark, but it will change probabilities. A team which is likely to succeed will become more likely to succeed, while a team which was likely to fail will become more likely to fail. Although admittedly you don't need to do fancy math to determine whether they are likely to succeed or fail. Actually determining how likely you are to succeed or fail at such a task does require some slightly fancy math - you have to add up all the tiny probabilities of all 462 different ways that you can roll 6 successes and 5 failures on 11 attempts.
So while it would in general be kind of user friendly, fine tuning it would not be. Especially when you get up to 12/12 successes/failures figuring exact probabilities becomes time consuming even on a calculator.
Basically, the DCs set themselves to your level. What this means is that you get a level bonus to your skill check and the DC gets the same bonus so you don't pull ahead or fall behind. What doesn't stay the same is your attributes. Every couple of levels, your stats go up, but mostly just your prime stats. By 21st level you'll be a demi-god, your prime attributes (for example: Intelligence and Wisdom for a Wizard) will have increased by 8. This gives you +4 to your biggest skills that are above and beyond the increases to the DCs that you suffer through for gaining levels. But your other attributes only go up by 2, so the rest of your skill checks are only +1, which as previously noted doesn't really change thing.
So the long and the short of it is that at higher levels the difference between a min/max character in their element and everyone else has increased. And since the rules presently encourage taking min/max characters and shaking them a problems solo-style for as long as it takes - that does mean that things become more plausible at epic levels. But if we were intending people to actually do the things described in the challenge descriptions where everyone contributed and did stuff and such, then the effect would be pretty minor.
-Frank
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jun 19 2008, 06:00 PM
So while it would in general be kind of user friendly, fine tuning it would not be. Especially when you get up to 12/12 successes/failures figuring exact probabilities becomes time consuming even on a calculator.
Ah yes. I'm not entirely sure what I was trying to say, but you may be giving me too much credit.
That's what I get for trying to whip out a solution between subjects while at work without really thinking. However, I did bust out my fancy math just to double check, and I agree with you 100%; the thing which I said was not true. The things which you are saying is true.
Posted by: deek Jun 19 2008, 06:59 PM
Another thing to make note of, is that there are class powers as well as a feat (skill focus) that can be used to push you out front against probability.
I think what all of this discussion does is make a huge point to DMs to not have the result of a failed skill challenge equate to death or an ultimate stop in the adventure. Skill challenges are best if used to reward PCs a lot if successful and have them face an obstacle if failed...
Posted by: deek Jun 19 2008, 08:37 PM
Looks like someone found out the mathematical foundation for these skill challenges are based on Paschal's Triangle and WotC only used a third of the triangle instead of half, thus reducing all probablility. It seems all that needs to be done is get successes back to half the triangle...and the least obtrusive way is to allow players the ability to remove remove failures.
I believe this is going to be the official fix, allowing players to recoup failures in some form, whether that be side challenges, bribes, action points or healing surges...
Hehe...assuming anyone here cares:)
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 19 2008, 09:18 PM
I believe this is going to be the official fix, allowing players to recoup failures in some form, whether that be side challenges, bribes, action points or healing surges...
Hehe...assuming anyone here cares:)
Uh... no.
Pascal's Triangle is a useful and efficient method of memorizing and generating combinatorials. Since you're dealing with dice series, you are perforce using combinatorials in great abundance. If you choose to use the Triangle, that's fine. Personally I just do all my combinatorials in my head out to about 11 or so. For example, there a 11 ways to get 10 successes and 1 failure, 55 ways to get 9 successes and 2 failures, 165 ways to get 8 successes and 3 failures, 330 ways to get 7 successes and 4 failures, and 462 ways to get 6 successes and 5 failures. Now 11 attempts is the model for any set where the number of successes and number of failures allowed together equal 12, so in the basic rules it models a Complexity 3 challenge (and you disregard the possibility of 4 or 5 failures when calculating your chances of overall success). With the revision Moon Hawk was talking about earlier it models a Complexity 2 challenge (and 4 or 5 failures is OK).
But there's nothing magical that happens when you grab the 330 combinations of 7/4 and 462 combinations of 6/5. They are just combinations. It's... just faces of the dice and nothing more.
I mean yeah, the probability is busted, but going "Bam! Pascal's Triangle!" isn't going to solve anything. Pascal's Triangle is just a way for people with middle school mathematics to calculate probability in long form. If you can't do it any other way I guess that pulling out the triangle as a study aid isn't the worst thing you could do, but starting to look at the real probabilities generated and required by the system is the beginning of making a decent system, not a magic panacea for the broken system already in place.
-Frank
Posted by: raphabonelli Jun 19 2008, 09:26 PM
Hey Frank. Did you read Keith Baker's answer to Skill Challenge problems?
http://gloomforge.livejournal.com/12135.html
A long story short... even he use house rules to this system. ^_^
Posted by: deek Jun 19 2008, 09:34 PM
Maybe I am explaining it wrong, but here is the discussion: http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=231832
"For me, the big breakthrough was realizing that the permutation distribution for the possible rolls fell on Pascal's Triangle.
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal's_triangle )
Once you spot this, you see that you can get your players back to even odds (if their individual skill checks are even odds) by giving them the remaining half of the triangle, rather than just a 3rd off to one wing."
There's a quote. So, I'm not saying bam, its solved. I was trying to say the distribution was modeled after Pascal's Triangle and knowing that, you can bring the distribution back to a fair level (assuming 50/50 is fair given his other assumptions) rather easily.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jun 19 2008, 09:54 PM
"For me, the big breakthrough was realizing that the permutation distribution for the possible rolls fell on Pascal's Triangle.
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal's_triangle )
Once you spot this, you see that you can get your players back to even odds (if their individual skill checks are even odds) by giving them the remaining half of the triangle, rather than just a 3rd off to one wing."
There's a quote. So, I'm not saying bam, its solved. I was trying to say the distribution was modeled after Pascal's Triangle and knowing that, you can bring the distribution back to a fair level (assuming 50/50 is fair given his other assumptions) rather easily.
Actually, I think he's explaining it wrong.
The distribution isn't modeled after Pascal's Triangle. Pascal's Triangle can be a handy way of coming up with the coefficients of a binoimal distribution, I guess, if you don't know how to calculate n-choose-k, iterative addition is certainly simpler (although much slower) than factorials, but, but, it's not like anyone sat down and said, "Hey, i think we should make our binomial distribution coefficients use Pascal's Triangle, that'll be great." It's just how it is.
It's as if, um, as if you're trying to show how to integrate the sin function and then spend an hour ranting about how you had to realize that tangent = sin/cos. Yeah, it's true, but what does that have to do with anything? Maybe that's a bad example.
He seems to be making a big deal about Pascal's triangle, but the fact that rows of Pascal's Triangle correspond to the coefficients of a binomial distribution....that's not news.
So either he doesn't know what he's trying to say, you don't know what he's trying to say, or I don't know what you're trying to say. Or something like that. Know what I'm sayin'?
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 19 2008, 10:07 PM
Yeah, watching baudot flail around over there is pretty sad. The fact that permutations can be generated with Pascal's Triangle is no basis for an epiphany. Basically he's so far lost into minutiae that he isn't abstracting this problem in any meaningful fashion. It's just a multiple coin flip problem where the individual coins are weighted by the chance of an individual skill test succeeding or failing. The fact that you need more successes to get the good result than you need failures to get the bad result isn't the source of the low number of positive outcomes. It's that you need more successes and you don't actually get more successes because characters actually have bonuses of +7 to +10 and they set the DCs so high that barely gets each roll into coin flip territory. So yeah, if you wanted to fix the math up to coin flip land, you could set the required successes and failures equal. Or you could raise skill bonuses or lower DCs such that the prospective number of successes required was the actual expected number generated. Or some combination.
Or hell, you could just reduce it to a single roll or even a coin flip.
Ha ha ha ha!
Holy shit. That is some funny stuff. He gives out up to +10 in extra bonuses (literally half the die that people aren't supposed to expect), and he gives people extra bonus free successes from time to time. And he insists that he doesn't consider the system to be broken. He isn't playing anything vaguely recognizable as the packaged system, how would he even know?
-Frank
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 20 2008, 07:42 AM
It does offer a lot of advice though that should make running a game easier. Most of that many of us already do, but a newer GM might not think of that.
Posted by: deek Jun 20 2008, 12:41 PM
I am probably saying it wrong then. The distrubtion DOES match up to that 1 5 10 10 5 1 row of Pacal's Triangle. Using that as the example, it can bee seen that all that is needed is to get the successes higher...which I think everyone who sees a problem with the current probabilities is saying, just in different ways.
I mean, we all have pointed out the probability for success is too low. So, this is just another way to compare a model to the system and use it as a basis to fix it.
I do agree with Fuchs. I mean, any DM that has run these challenges enough, found that everyone is failing at an alarming rate and then decides he wants to fix that, will do so by either lowering DCs, giving more bonus to rolls, giving automatic successes, allowing players to erase failures or adjusting the failure count.
I think by that, yes, the system is "broken". I don't think that means doing the above makes the system not even vaguely resemble the current system or is grounds to state its wretched and start crucifying people. But I think this is a fundamental philosophy difference and maybe why I am more lenient that some other posters. I don't want a system that doesn't allow the DM to alter the variance, give a bonus here or there. I want that built in so he can award some tremendous roleplaying. And maybe that should go without saying and the system should have been built to at least allow a 50/50 change out of the gate and at all levels.
I still go back to saying that the ultimate failure of a skill challenge is not an ultimate failure in the game. It should be designed as a setback. If you are using it to fail the party at each challenge, than yeah, at 1st level, the 11% success rate is way too low!
Posted by: raphabonelli Jun 20 2008, 02:58 PM
@Frank: I didn't read the PHB entirely... reading some Shadowrun Missions right new... but aren't those bônus (teamwork bônus and so on) that he said on the rules? Or he house ruled everything?
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jun 20 2008, 03:12 PM
I haven't messed with the calculations on skill challenges myself yet. But here's an interesting way to fix it.
If they beat the base DC (before +5 for skill check is added) it counts as neither a failure or a success. So it gives them that "stalling" window. Instead of straight up pass or fail.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 20 2008, 03:36 PM
If they beat the base DC (before +5 for skill check is added) it counts as neither a failure or a success. So it gives them that "stalling" window. Instead of straight up pass or fail.
Yeah, because that would make you succeed 46.1% of the time at Complexity 1 and 47.3% at complexity 3 with a +9 bonus. Also it would make every single +/-1 to your roll even larger because only 15 spots on the die actually matter.
I've got an idea: how about if you haven't looked at the math, you don't post your fixes for it? I know this may seem novel, maybe even rude, but if you seriously have no idea how the math works, your suggestions on how to fix it have at least an equal chance of making things worse as they do of making things better. It's like offering people medical advice or car mechanics when you have no basis in the field at all.
First figure out what the problem is, then come up with something to address that problem, then check your answer mathematically, and then post it. Writing down random mathematical gibberish and then selling it for real money is what got us into this situation in the first place.
-Frank
Posted by: Aaron Jun 20 2008, 03:38 PM
I'm not convinced that improves the system. I mean, it takes away fail states, so it improves the overall chance of success, but at the cost of drawing the process out even longer. I think that'd only be worth the cost if you've seriously got your drama on at the table.
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 20 2008, 03:45 PM
Well, while I didn't study maths, I am perfectly capable to calculate the odds of succeeding with a single die roll vs. a set DC.
So, pardon me while I forget all the stuff about sequences and triangles, and just do skill challenges one test a time, one test after another, and eyeballing the general situation and the resulting DC and modifiers for each test when it is time to roll it, not before.
That will work out exactly like I want it to, enable me to run an encounter very smoothly, and change it on the spot, avoid the "ok, just let the high mod guy roll all 11 checks" mentality, and generally make a social encounter run more like combat is run, where you don't set out each attack in advance, but decide on actions round after round.
It's not as if we particularly need skill challenges to be presented as a set number of rolls for an encounter, that looks too much like railroading anyway.
Problem solved, without any higher math to boot.
Oh, that's how I have been running skill use already, what a surprise.
Posted by: deek Jun 20 2008, 05:30 PM
So, pardon me while I forget all the stuff about sequences and triangles, and just do skill challenges one test a time, one test after another, and eyeballing the general situation and the resulting DC and modifiers for each test when it is time to roll it, not before.
That will work out exactly like I want it to, enable me to run an encounter very smoothly, and change it on the spot, avoid the "ok, just let the high mod guy roll all 11 checks" mentality, and generally make a social encounter run more like combat is run, where you don't set out each attack in advance, but decide on actions round after round.
It's not as if we particularly need skill challenges to be presented as a set number of rolls for an encounter, that looks too much like railroading anyway.
Problem solved, without any higher math to boot.
Oh, that's how I have been running skill use already, what a surprise.
Yeah, you can certainly break it back down to a series of individual checks and feel out the encounter round to round. I guess I just fell in love with the initial concept.
The DM picks 3 or 4 primary skills to start. He also chooses one or two secondary skills with a higher DC than the primary. Then plant a couple of those skills that either open up a new secondary skill, provide a bonus, or automatically succeed/fail. All ahead of time. That part of it I really, really like, because the DM can consistently design encounters using that method and the players have a few choices and a reason to try an outlandish use of a skill (again, assuming some level of predictability at your table). And obviously, they are modular, so you can reuse (wholesale or with a tweak) many times for the same scenario.
As a DM, I could create, say 20 or 30 of these ahead of time, and then use them whenever the situation calls for it. Now, you can replicate that with a series of individual checks, but from a planning standpoint, I think having this "web" of skills for the encounter ends up being more fun.
Posted by: Cheops Jun 21 2008, 05:35 AM
@Deek:
and what you just said is the crux of why the Skill Challenge rule is so different and new. I can think of very few systems that actually present a rules method and guidelines for how to run a non-combat encounter. The only one I can think of that comes close is Exalted but that is still Social COMBAT and mechanically works the same as combat but with a different charm set.
nWoD did some interesting things with Extended Tests but never really fleshed it out to try and include the whole party or make it much more than one dice pool vs. another. I'm honestly very surprised that SR didn't rip it off (must have been after they'd already made the system).
Using the D&D Skill Challenge system, here's a SR4 chase sequence:
Complexity 12/6, Initiative is Driver and then by roll.
Pilot: Driver makes an Opposed Pilot Roll (Opposing pilot +1 per extra vehicle).
Navigation: Anyone makes a Intuition + Navigation roll. Success adds +Hits dice to the next character if they Pilot or Attack.
Attack: A successful attack (Physical, Drone, Matrix, or Magical) removes one pursuit from the chase. Failure is nothing but a glitch or critical glitch could mean collateral damage or penalty to next character to act.
Command: Someone with drones subscribed can use a drone to distract the pursuit. Roll Pilot + Con (whatever resists Con) opposed test. Each Hit removes one extra pursuit from the chase (min 0) for one action. Hits can instead be used to make pursuits stay out longer at 1 hit = 1 pursuit/round.
Spoof: Take a Spoof test against one pursuit. If you successfully spoof a command you may give the Pilot +1 to his next Pilot check. Multiple people can take Spoof test prior to the Pilot test to a maximum = Extra vehicle bonus for pursuit.
If the PCs win the challenge then they evade pursuit without any penalties. If they fail then they arrive at their destination but must fight a combat against their foes and gain 1 Public Awareness.
that's off the top of my head so you can probably refine it and make it work mechanically a bit better but as you see it gives everyone in the team a role to play in the chase. makes it much easier to play. and adds excitment.
D&D has thought outside the box on this one and I don't think they should be penalized because they = no good math.
Posted by: Wolfx Jun 21 2008, 07:36 AM
and what you just said is the crux of why the Skill Challenge rule is so different and new. I can think of very few systems that actually present a rules method and guidelines for how to run a non-combat encounter. The only one I can think of that comes close is Exalted but that is still Social COMBAT and mechanically works the same as combat but with a different charm set.
nWoD did some interesting things with Extended Tests but never really fleshed it out to try and include the whole party or make it much more than one dice pool vs. another. I'm honestly very surprised that SR didn't rip it off (must have been after they'd already made the system).
Using the D&D Skill Challenge system, here's a SR4 chase sequence:
Complexity 12/6, Initiative is Driver and then by roll.
Pilot: Driver makes an Opposed Pilot Roll (Opposing pilot +1 per extra vehicle).
Navigation: Anyone makes a Intuition + Navigation roll. Success adds +Hits dice to the next character if they Pilot or Attack.
Attack: A successful attack (Physical, Drone, Matrix, or Magical) removes one pursuit from the chase. Failure is nothing but a glitch or critical glitch could mean collateral damage or penalty to next character to act.
Command: Someone with drones subscribed can use a drone to distract the pursuit. Roll Pilot + Con (whatever resists Con) opposed test. Each Hit removes one extra pursuit from the chase (min 0) for one action. Hits can instead be used to make pursuits stay out longer at 1 hit = 1 pursuit/round.
Spoof: Take a Spoof test against one pursuit. If you successfully spoof a command you may give the Pilot +1 to his next Pilot check. Multiple people can take Spoof test prior to the Pilot test to a maximum = Extra vehicle bonus for pursuit.
If the PCs win the challenge then they evade pursuit without any penalties. If they fail then they arrive at their destination but must fight a combat against their foes and gain 1 Public Awareness.
that's off the top of my head so you can probably refine it and make it work mechanically a bit better but as you see it gives everyone in the team a role to play in the chase. makes it much easier to play. and adds excitment.
D&D has thought outside the box on this one and I don't think they should be penalized because they = no good math.
Just want to say that this is awesome. I really like the way it is laid out. I will have to remember this for my games. Now I just need to set it to paper in a format that lets me plug in what I need when I need it.
Aric
Posted by: Cheops Jun 21 2008, 02:33 PM
Here's another one.
Quick and Dirty Shadowrun: for those times when you need to simulate a run against a facility but don't want to have to Mission: Impossible it
Climb: (Group Test) Get your fat arses over the fence.
Infiltration: Opposed versus Patrolman, Critter, Drone, or Sensor. First success counts as success for challenge. Only characters that have made a successful Infiltration test may take further actions against the facility.
Exploit: (Group Test) Can only be done once. In addition to a success you can now use other matrix actions in the challenge.
Edit: Does not add successes to challenge. However, may remove a failure that resulted from an Infiltration or Social test. You hacker erases the incriminating evidence from the camera feeds.
Spoof: The hacker provides overwatch for the group and magically doors open for you. Adds +Hits to any targeted PC's next action.
Intercept Wireless: The rigger listens in on the opposing radio freqs. Adds +2*Hits to any targeted PC's next Inflitration or Social action.
Crash Program/OS or Matrix Attack: Counts as automatic failure no matter what as you alert security.
Astral Combat or Astral Spellcasting: The mage reduces the Ward to Mana Motes. $Counts as automatic failure for challenge but the Mage can now use all his foci etc during run.
Spellcasting: The mage casts an appropriate spell to befuddle the opposition. A failure doesn't count against the total in the challenge. However, any Spell that deals damage (S or P) to a target adds a failure regardless of success or not as the target's biomonitor alerts security.
Etiquette: Does not count as a success but a failure still adds to total. Success allows you to use other social actions in the challenge. As if he actually works for the corp the Face blends in and uses its own social rules to take it down.
Con: The Face bluffs his way past the fierce guardians. A success adds to the total. Failure does not add to total but forces PC to make another Etiquette test before using Social skills again.
Attack: Your Sam takes down a guard to give better access to the facility. A successful attack adds to the total but regardless of success/failure make a Perception test for a Patrolman/Sensor/Drone/Critter. A success on their test also adds a failure to the total as Security is alerted to your presence.
Those are examples for the actual run. There are plenty more that you can come up with and as usual if they have a good idea give them some dice or lower the threshold. However, for the Run Challenge to succeed, their LAST SUCCESS must be from one of the following tests:
Assassination: With a final strike you fell the target. A successful attack knocks the fucker on the head.
Extraction: Make some sort of attack, social roll, or whatever to coerce the target into following you. A successful roll that enables you to leave the facility with the target ends the challenge.
Data Steal: Your last success must be a Hack + Edit test. Beware! Sneaky GMs may put Data Bombs or Encryption that will ruin the file if you don't remove them first as Free Actions.
Robbery: Make an Agility + Palming test against the Patrolman/Drone/Sensor/Critter as you sneak the targeted item past.
Of course you can modify these based on the job (ie. Data Steal + Prototype Robbery).
Posted by: last_of_the_great_mikeys Jun 21 2008, 02:48 PM
Goddam, I hate math!
I get the point, Frank. You are clearly upset about the skill system and skill challenge rules. This is assuredly understood by all. You have made strong, clear points about how and why it is fundamentally flawed. You can stop pointing it out now.
Everybody else, please stop riling up Frank. It is obvious this is a passionate issue for him. There is no need to challenge his viewpoint or logic anymore on this issue. He has clearly and repeatedly stated and defended his position. Let him find other parts of the game to comment on, good or bad. I'm getting the (hopefully false) impression that a couple of people (not even most) are just trying to get under his skin which is sucky.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 21 2008, 05:51 PM
The last of the great mikeys has caught t3h corr3ct. People keep busting out mathematically flawed "solutions". Just stop with the mathematically flawed "solutions" and that aspect of the conversation need not continue.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 21 2008, 09:24 PM
That is where we disagree. They have been working on this system for 3 years and are charging people $105 for their "final" product. If it doesn't work out of the box they have serious explaining to do.
The design concept is awesome. I can clearly see why they would have gone with the concept work of whoever came up with this stuff. Not just on skill challenges, but at every level of design in 4e. But it's not done. The math doesn't work. It doesn't look like a playtested and edited product, and the fact that they went to print with it anyway is something that they should be penalized for.
-Frank
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jun 21 2008, 10:31 PM
...105$ just for the core rules? Crikey, I can get a .5 TB external HDD for less than that.
Posted by: Cheops Jun 22 2008, 04:31 AM
The design concept is awesome. I can clearly see why they would have gone with the concept work of whoever came up with this stuff. Not just on skill challenges, but at every level of design in 4e. But it's not done. The math doesn't work. It doesn't look like a playtested and edited product, and the fact that they went to print with it anyway is something that they should be penalized for.
-Frank
And yet you still play SR?
Posted by: apollo124 Jun 22 2008, 05:46 AM
Yup, just in case all the D+D bashing around here has you wanting to plunk down $105 American for this stuff, here's the link.
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=products/dndacc/222127600
That's $35 each for the Player's Handbook, DMG, and Monster Manual. Truly the bare minimum needed to run a game, although of course players can get away with just getting the PHB, or like my friends did, just bumming mine off of me. Not even a group discount for buying all 3 at once.
Note that I haven't even seen any of these books, much less read or played them. I'll leave the higher math to those who care about such things. Honestly, I wasn't ever even thinking of buying the new D+D, although I was hoping to maybe give a demo a shot if I make it to GenCon Indy.
Posted by: Bull Jun 22 2008, 10:05 AM
I should note that D&D4 isn't any expensive tahn any other edition of AD&D or D&D3.0. The game has always had 3 "Core Books", each priced the same as what an equivelant "core rulebook" for any other game would run.
3.0 Came out initially at $20 each, whichw as a little cheaper than the average book ran then (Most were $25-30), but that only lasted through the first print run, and bumped to $30 with th second and subsequant print runs. 3.5 was likewise $30 per book.
$35 is actually a pretty good price per book for 4e, considering the size of the books, the quality, the full color and high quality paper, etc.
<shrug> Whether it's worth it or not is up to individual tastes, of course. But with everyone having some sticker shock here, I felt it necessary to note that this is not significantly more expensive than 3.5 was. At least this time it's all new material, and not just 95% recycled material that they just sold you a few years prior to that.
Bull
Posted by: Eugene Jun 22 2008, 01:35 PM
I think that Savage Worlds (Chase System & Mass Battles) and Spycraft (Dramatic Conflicts) had decent ways of doing a "skill challenge". Instead of x successes vs. y failures, there was a track (called Lead in Spycraft) that represented how close/far you were from success. In a chase, for example, the lead represented how far apart the participants were. In a manhunt challenge in Spycraft, it was how close you were to finding someone who'd "gone to ground." The one negative about it is that it assumes that the PCs are a single entity and the opponents are a second, single entity. My players didn't like the chase systems for that reason (they all wanted to roll separately; the fast didn't want to be hindered by the slow, etc.)
Posted by: Cheops Jun 22 2008, 02:01 PM
They had similar systems in 7th Sea and d10 Legend of the Five Rings but again they were just for Mass Combat and Chases and not a general application. Exalted has a Mass Combat system that is more Miniatures Gaming level than even D&D has for tactical combat. I still can't think of anyone who has tried to make a skill system for resolving ANYTHING in game.
Posted by: apollo124 Jun 22 2008, 03:11 PM
3.0 Came out initially at $20 each, whichw as a little cheaper than the average book ran then (Most were $25-30), but that only lasted through the first print run, and bumped to $30 with th second and subsequant print runs. 3.5 was likewise $30 per book.
$35 is actually a pretty good price per book for 4e, considering the size of the books, the quality, the full color and high quality paper, etc.
<shrug> Whether it's worth it or not is up to individual tastes, of course. But with everyone having some sticker shock here, I felt it necessary to note that this is not significantly more expensive than 3.5 was. At least this time it's all new material, and not just 95% recycled material that they just sold you a few years prior to that.
Bull
Yet another reason to like SR. One BBB, then the extra books if you want to get into further depth, but it's still playable from the one book.
Posted by: deek Jun 23 2008, 12:46 PM
Should have pre-ordered...I got all three core books for $57 including shipping off Amazon. The books are really nice though and the gift set came with a heavy cardboard "sleeve" where all three can be stored.
I do have to agree with a prior post, using the basic skill challenge template in other games is pretty easy to do and I think would be fun. Those couple of SR4 examples are pretty sweet!
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 23 2008, 02:41 PM
I think it important to note that the License for 3rd party 4e D&D stuff is so heinous that it might as well simply not exist. In the words of Admiral Akbar: "It's a Trap!"
It's http://www.wizards.com/d20/files/GSL_20080617.pdf
The long and the short of it is that if you ever release anything under that license they have the right to take your IP, sue you for violating what s now "their" intellectual property, and force you to settle out of court with you paying their legal fees. And no, that's not hyperbole, that's seriously what it actually says. They can terminate your license at any time and you are still bound by the contract afterwards and they are not. Furthermore you can't ever publish anything OGL for 3rd edition D&D ever again if you print anything under the 4th edition license ever.
Basically no one is taking it. All the major 3rd party d20 companies are emphatically not jumping on board. Sword & Sorcery, Crafty Games, Paizo, etc. have all taken a giant step away and told WotC to stuff it. Even Necromancer Games, which had already started up a proposed 4e product line took a hard look at the GSL and shook their head in terror and disgust.
-Frank
Posted by: deek Jun 23 2008, 03:17 PM
Frank, why is that important to any of us in this thread?
Maybe I am underestimating the numbers, but I didn't think the majority of gamers try to publish their house-rules, cool content or adventures.
I'm curious. Have you even played 4th Edition DnD? Every other post in these few DnD thread is you bringing up another reason that the new edition is horrid and should not be played. I'm always eagerly anticipating what you will bring up next to take the system down. I for one, am continue to check this area of the forum just to read what you have to say next.
Posted by: Bull Jun 23 2008, 03:27 PM
Agreed. Though sadly, I consider all the... "Class Books", for lack of a better term (Maybe "Expanded Core"?) to be necessary
Which means for me, SR Clocks in at around $190
I also would consider D&D to be a cheaper investment in the long run as well. Because All I've ever needed for D&D was the three core books. I like some of the expansion settings, but outside of a very short Dragonlance game, and a Forgotten Realms game that ended up using nothing but the map of the realm, I've never really used any of the expansion material for it. Never cared for the "Complete X Guides" from 2nd ed, didn't have the money or access to the stuff from 1st ed (Unearthed Arcana, etc), and while some of the last group I played with used the class splatbooks, my 3.X character were all pretty vanilla out of the core books. I never felt any of it was necessary in the slightest, since the core game is "Generic Fantasy World X", and I tailor it to my own needs pretty fast.
Ok, I lied. I've used my Keep on the Borderlands modules (I currently own 3 versions, and have owned about 7 or 8 copies of it over the years
) a lot. But that also was a Basic D&D book, and came in the box set. I just keep adapting it to the new editions.But for SR and it's evolving world, I consider almost all of the books "necessary", to some degree. The Place books and adventures are definitely less so, but they're still a part of the entire experience, and something I want to add to my collection.
<shrug> Don;t get me wrong, I'm not disagreeing with you. In the short term, D&D is much more expensive, and that can definately be daunting to a new player. But really, how many SR groups play with just the core books? And how many SR groups play with *just* the BBB?
For experienced gamers, I don't think cost is really going to be a factor, other than for a handful of folks who might have picked it up on sheer whim if it was cheaper but never planned to really play it. For anyone who's a fan of D&D style gaming, it's not gonna stop them in the least.
Posted by: Bull Jun 23 2008, 03:53 PM
It's http://www.wizards.com/d20/files/GSL_20080617.pdf
The long and the short of it is that if you ever release anything under that license they have the right to take your IP, sue you for violating what s now "their" intellectual property, and force you to settle out of court with you paying their legal fees. And no, that's not hyperbole, that's seriously what it actually says. They can terminate your license at any time and you are still bound by the contract afterwards and they are not. Furthermore you can't ever publish anything OGL for 3rd edition D&D ever again if you print anything under the 4th edition license ever.
Basically no one is taking it. All the major 3rd party d20 companies are emphatically not jumping on board. Sword & Sorcery, Crafty Games, Paizo, etc. have all taken a giant step away and told WotC to stuff it. Even Necromancer Games, which had already started up a proposed 4e product line took a hard look at the GSL and shook their head in terror and disgust.
-Frank
Interestingly enough, Red Brick Games announced yesterday that they have signed on as the first person to use the new GSL. They haven't stated whether or not they plan to adapt Earthdawn to it or not (I suspect not, myself), but... It'll be something to watch.
Chris Pramas at Green Ronin has said they will likely do some GSL stuff in the future, though they're wagons are still tied pretty heavily to both OGL/D20, with their Freeport, true 20, and Mutants & Masterminds stuff.
Sword & Sorcery is a bit of a surprise, but not by much. Outside of their licensed stuff (Warcraft, EQ. Which it's in their own interests not to switch systems for), I'm not even certain we'll see much, if anything from them.
No clue who Crafty Games are. Some Google, and... Ahh, Spycraft. Makes sense. DId they leave Alderac, or is this an imprint like SSS is for White Wolf? ANyways, again, no real surpise. Especially since I can;t see this working with a non-D&D setting.
Paizo's no real shock, after WotC cut them off. Honestly, the whole Pathfinder thing comes off as a tantrum on their part. WotC took their ball away, so now they're throwing a balled up rag around and refusing to go home
The thing is, many of these companies are pretty entrenched in what they're doing. The SSS stuff, especially Monet Cook's Malhavoc stuff, Ronin's True 20 and M&M, and SPycraft all diverged pretty heavily from standard D20, to the point where they bascially created a whole new game using the bare bones of the original. It's nice they showed that initiative, and riding the wave of lemming-like borg collective of D20 players helped give them their start, but I think with a bit of effort all of these could have been accomplished just as well, if not better, without the D20 logo and the OGL. Frankly, there's no way to adapt any of these to 4e without scrapping everything and starting from scratch. It's not in their best interests to do so in the least.
Paizo, meanwhile, it trying to pick up with WotC is leaving off with 3.5. I have my doubts as to how well they'll manage, personally. It'll be something to watch, but I suspect most D&D players that don't switch to 4e will either stick with the "classic" WotC material, or are already using Monte Cook's stuff or the True 20 stuff. At best they may pick up a book here or there as supllemental material.
I should note here as well that of the half dozen or so D&D groups I know of, the only one who allowed any non-WotC sourcebooks to be used was a group running Cook's stuff, and they were running the game using those as their primary books, and only allowed Malhavoc stuff, in additionto WotC material. I know some groups went nuts with the "Non-official" material, but I suspect they were pretty few and far between.
So honestly, I'd be surprised to see any of the big names in 3.X announce they were switching over. And frankly, I doubt WotC really cares. OUtside of the buzz that the D20 Zombie Attack caused, I don't think the D20 business really helped WotC at all, especially financially. The vast majority of the D20 stuff was utter crap and reflected poorly on D&D, and the stuff taht was decent went from D20 to OGL pretty fast and splintered off to the point where WotC's core books weren't needed, or weren't even compatible.
And it would be stupid for the OGL guys to drop their successful lines to try and work up something new from scratch for 4e. And yes, I agree, the GSL is kinda silly and very restrictive. But I think that's because WotC would like to actually get a piece of the action this time. And I can't really blame them too much.
As I keep saying, it'll be something to watch. It's a new development and a new direction for the hobby, and as always, the effects it has will be pretty far reaching.
Posted by: Adam Jun 23 2008, 03:54 PM
Because you're likely going to see a lot less 3rd party support from rocking companies like Paizo & Green Ronin for 4th Edition, compared to the support for 3rd edition and the continuing support for OGL-derived games like Pathfinder, True 20, etc.
The GSL prompted a lot of laughter when I read it.
Posted by: Bull Jun 23 2008, 04:00 PM
Please, don't taunt the Frank.
He's like bear in the zoo. He likes to growl, but he's harmless as long as you don't poke him with a stick (Kidding Frank
)I'm curious. Have you even played 4th Edition DnD? Every other post in these few DnD thread is you bringing up another reason that the new edition is horrid and should not be played. I'm always eagerly anticipating what you will bring up next to take the system down. I for one, am continue to check this area of the forum just to read what you have to say next.
In this instance, he wasn't talking about house rules and the like. See my post above. Several companies managed to really make a name for themselves and carve out a niche by adapting and evolving the OGL. It'll be interesting to see the long term effects of this.
To expand on my other post, from what I gather very few folks outside WotC got a look at 4e ahead of time (I know Chris Pramas talked about that a couple times). So most of them are being cautious regardingg the GSL. Between their stake in the current product they're producing, and the fact they need time to digest the new rules and see what's possible for them to create and market, it's gonna be a bit before any of the major 3.X companies dives in. Add to that the restrictive nature of the GSL, and I suspect most will be taking a "wait and see" attitude and see what happens with early adopters (Like Red Brick).
Bull
Posted by: Bull Jun 23 2008, 04:01 PM
The GSL prompted a lot of laughter when I read it.
You're always so much more concise than me, Adam
Must be the White Jesus in ya
Posted by: deek Jun 23 2008, 04:37 PM
Sorry...this stick of mine sometimes has a mind of its own. And maybe its just me, but sometimes Frank acts like a bully and that often causes me to not let him get away without at least a little rebuttal, no matter how weak my own may be. I respect that man to no end and the majority of his posts are worth reading, even if I vehemently disagree... He just comes from a completely different angle and it seems to often encourage a response...anyways...
As to the third-party support, my experience has been similar to Bull's post. I really haven't played in a group where we used much else than the core books in DnD. Even back to 2nd Edition, while a lot of players picked up some of them, the vast majority was simply not allowed in the campaigns we played in. I've pretty much always played with just the core... So, while the license may be restrictive, I don't see that impacting our games, and that is the only real experience I have to pull from.
All I know is in the past three years, I've played four different table-top games: DnD 3.5, Hero System, SR4 and DnD 4.0. Both DnD versions were quick to pick up, play and have fun. There was relatively little needed to get started, chargen was under an hour and while there was still plenty to learn after a first session, it was not needed to keep playing.
Hero System took a solid 6-8 hours to chargen and that was using a paid-for piece of software. I think the system is the most mathematically sounds, but even after months of playing it, we still had to look up about every little thing...it just didn't play all that well.
SR4 took 2-4 hours to chargen and the first 2 months of playing were still relatively slow. All characters have a lot to do right out of the gate and that often slows the game down. It wasn't until we got into our 3rd or 4th month that we really started to hit the sweet spot of having fun each session with a good pace...
My only point is, for a system, fun is not the sum of its math. And fun is the purpose of any game...
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jun 23 2008, 04:43 PM
And yet, I'm not the one going around "rebutting" people with attacks on their person. What is up with that?
-Frank
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 23 2008, 04:44 PM
-Frank
Frank is NOT acting like a bully! Mathematical reasoning = the antithesis of bullying, which tends to be emotinally-fueled physical aggression.
Posted by: eidolon Jun 23 2008, 05:04 PM
Guys, knock off the baiting and bullying debate and such. Back to gaming/games. Thanks.
Posted by: deek Jun 23 2008, 05:13 PM
My apologies, Frank, for thinking you to be a bully in some of your posts. I did not mean to offend you or anyone else by my own posts.
I still think that one should play a system before making a determination whether its fun or a disaster. As I have said in SR4-related forums several times, I love to come here and pick apart rules but when it actually comes to the game table, I think I use a total of like 2 or 3 house rules, most of which have come from these forums.
Posted by: hyzmarca Jun 23 2008, 05:21 PM
It's http://www.wizards.com/d20/files/GSL_20080617.pdf
The long and the short of it is that if you ever release anything under that license they have the right to take your IP, sue you for violating what s now "their" intellectual property, and force you to settle out of court with you paying their legal fees. And no, that's not hyperbole, that's seriously what it actually says. They can terminate your license at any time and you are still bound by the contract afterwards and they are not. Furthermore you can't ever publish anything OGL for 3rd edition D&D ever again if you print anything under the 4th edition license ever.
Basically no one is taking it. All the major 3rd party d20 companies are emphatically not jumping on board. Sword & Sorcery, Crafty Games, Paizo, etc. have all taken a giant step away and told WotC to stuff it. Even Necromancer Games, which had already started up a proposed 4e product line took a hard look at the GSL and shook their head in terror and disgust.
-Frank
From the pov of pure copyright law, the GSL is sort of superfluous. One cannot copyright rules or tables. They can only copyright setting, characters, unique monsters, the fluff, and the books as written. There is really no law stopping anyone from stripping out the fluff and the setting details, rewriting the rules in their own words, and publishing them. Likewise, there is nothing stopping anyone from writing and publishing compatible material, so long as it doesn't steal fluff from WOTC.
Except, of course, for the threat of frivilous lawshits that will take a couple decades to work through the courts and cost millions of dollars to both parties before WOTC loses its final appeal and actually has to pay a portion of the defendant's court costs by which time the defendant is already bankrupt and has had its assets and IP bought by WOTC.
Posted by: apollo124 Jun 30 2008, 03:26 AM
Which means for me, SR Clocks in at around $190
But for SR and it's evolving world, I consider almost all of the books "necessary", to some degree. The Place books and adventures are definitely less so, but they're still a part of the entire experience, and something I want to add to my collection.
<shrug> Don;t get me wrong, I'm not disagreeing with you. In the short term, D&D is much more expensive, and that can definitely be daunting to a new player. But really, how many SR groups play with just the core books? And how many SR groups play with *just* the BBB?
For experienced gamers, I don't think cost is really going to be a factor, other than for a handful of folks who might have picked it up on sheer whim if it was cheaper but never planned to really play it. For anyone who's a fan of D&D style gaming, it's not gonna stop them in the least.
You're right, Bull. I said that you "could" play with just the BBB, but if you look on my bookshelf, I've got a whole shelf of SR books, and some overflow. It's just the initial cost to "get your foot in the door" of the game that I find a little prohibitive.
When I did play D+D back in the day, I had a whole other shelf of 2nd ed books (and some 1st), Realms, Dragonlance, Spelljammer, Dark Sun, the Complete's and more that I can't remember right now. I had a lot of disposable income back then. Gas wasn't $4.15 a fraggin' gallon. So I also agree with your point that the hardcore fan (usually the DM and maybe some of the players) isn't going to be put off by the price.
And that GSL is just nuts, IMO. I mean they actually wrote in that you can't sue Wizards for anything covered under the GSL! I don't speak lawyer, but damn!
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 30 2008, 04:57 AM
Is it can it be Mad Max time please?
Posted by: Grinder Jun 30 2008, 08:26 AM
I'm no lawyer either, but this seems to be more "wishful thinking" on WotC's part then actual fact.
Posted by: Fuchs Jun 30 2008, 11:39 AM
We're paying more than double this for gas over here in Switzerland.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jun 30 2008, 08:35 PM
I think the real question is what they're paying in Australia. When will the price of gas hit a critical point where people will have no choice but to drive up and down the desert all day in giant handmade muscle roadsters while wearing tight spikey leather?
Posted by: Bull Jun 30 2008, 10:58 PM
No, there are parts of the GSL that really aren't enforceable. But I think this is mainly an attempt by WotC to maintain some quality control.
The OGL wasn't a bad idea, but it didn't do what WotC wanted it to do: Sell more D&D books. Sure, early on when it was the "Big THing", it probably did, but in the long run you ended up with three core groups of OGL d20 product:
1) Stuff like the Freeport books from Green Ronin, and some of the classic style adventures that were put out by various companies. These were supplemental, tended to be very good products, but weren't heavily used. And I think they're the few products that got produced that were basically what the OGL was intended to encourage.
2) A massive glut of mediocre to crap books that seemed to be, by and large, ignored by the D20 community and disallowed from most home games because they were badly written and broken as all hell. There were a LOT of D&D groups that after a while said "No more third party crap, we're only using the official WotC books". I know we had a guy who kept bringing in feats and powers for his Paladin he found in various 3rd party books, and wow. Broken.
3) Stuff like True 20, Monte Cooks books, Mutants & Masterminds, etc. Stuff that circumvented the core D&D rules, and basically either didn't need the official WotC books at all, or changed the rules to the point where the WotC books were incompatible. Don;t get me wrong, there was some terrific stuff, and it was interesting to see how game designers could tweak the d20 ruleset. But at the end of the day, this didn't help WotC move any product.
So to me, the GSL is mainly a way to keep the lid on what the rules get used for in products that they're not involved with. Possibly some degree of quality (and content) control, and a way to ensure that any 4e D20 product will require you to spend at least a little money on WotC product first.
Sucks for the 3rd party companies, but really, I can't say I blame WotC for wanting to make some money off their rules
Bull
Posted by: hyzmarca Jul 1 2008, 02:16 AM
The OGL was in very large part a response to TSR's absurdly litigious death throws. It was Wizards of the Coast's promise to not sue people for publishing their house rules on the internet, which was a very real possible in the last days of TSR's independence. It served to dispel the fear and enmity earned by TSR's business practices and did so well.
The real question is if fans have been sufficiently lulled by the years of the OGL or if they will see this change as dangerous backpedaling to the bad old days of T$R.
Posted by: apollo124 Jul 1 2008, 04:07 PM
Is that in American dollars, Kroner(?), or Euro's? I don't know the exchange rates, since I don't travel to Europe much anymore.
Posted by: Cantankerous Jul 1 2008, 06:04 PM
It's not so bad here in Austria where we have our own, albeit tiny, oil industry. Here we are merely paying around Euro1.50 per LITER, or more than $6.00 per gallon.
Isshia
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jul 2 2008, 04:43 AM
So Mearls responds to skill challenge criticisms:
A: Skill challenges are interesting, since they are not reflected in the written rules as they were intended. They started as more “combat� with intiative, etc., but eventually moved them to be more freeform. They were intended as more of a framework, not strictly mechanical. When planning a non-combat encounter, try to come up with options, different ways to play out while not stopping the game. (i.e. don’t build in a roadblock if they don’t succeed at the skill challenge.)
Translation: we fucked up completely, and we refuse to admit it or errata our mistakes. Go figure something out for now, and we'll have some expanded rules for you to buy in the DMG 2 that may or may not work.
-Frank
Posted by: Fuchs Jul 2 2008, 06:54 AM
It is in dollars since I am comparing it to the quoted dollar price.
Posted by: Malicant Jul 2 2008, 08:22 AM
Translation: we fucked up completely, and we refuse to admit it or errata our mistakes. Go figure something out for now, and we'll have some expanded rules for you to buy in the DMG 2 that may or may not work.
-Frank
Did you ever use a skill challenge in actual gameplay? We did, it worked ok and was IMO more fun then one guy doing all the work with a simple skill check. Not the holy grail of non-combat conflict resolution, but not as bad as some people claim it to be.
Posted by: Grinder Jul 2 2008, 09:49 AM
But, but, but the math is broken! 
Posted by: Malicant Jul 2 2008, 09:52 AM
Because everyone who went to school knows that math equals fun and you cannot have fun without math.
Hm... I actually had fun doing math...
Posted by: Caine Hazen Jul 2 2008, 02:13 PM
You then, are a mutant
But yeah, as noted, math is not the be all and end all of gaming, they'll get over it.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jul 2 2008, 11:41 PM
This arguement always bugs me. My group played syndicate for a while, which was a free RPG on the internet, and I'm pretty sure its still out there. It had the most simple resolution system in the universe (roll a d6, GM makes up outcome). We had fun. However lets just say that the price was right.
I have no doubt that a good GM and significant house ruling can make skill challenges fun, but I'm not paying money for a good GM. I'm paying for solid rules, which I'm not getting.
Posted by: FrankTrollman Jul 3 2008, 05:44 PM
Our original intention was to make a system where the players would do things in non-combat situations. As it turns out we completely failed at that and produced a system in which players fail to do things in non-combat situations with great regularity. Our suggestion is to move the goal posts and run a campaign in which failure is expected and rewarded so that the game doesn't collapse when people run afoul of the fact that we can't predict the results of rolling a die five times.
-Frank
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jul 4 2008, 06:03 AM
3.0 Came out initially at $20 each, whichw as a little cheaper than the average book ran then (Most were $25-30), but that only lasted through the first print run, and bumped to $30 with th second and subsequant print runs. 3.5 was likewise $30 per book.
$35 is actually a pretty good price per book for 4e, considering the size of the books, the quality, the full color and high quality paper, etc.
<shrug> Whether it's worth it or not is up to individual tastes, of course. But with everyone having some sticker shock here, I felt it necessary to note that this is not significantly more expensive than 3.5 was. At least this time it's all new material, and not just 95% recycled material that they just sold you a few years prior to that.
Bull
...however, with the old Open Source policy I was able to obtain the core 3.0 --> 3.5 updates as RTF file DLs. Yeah, no pretty pictures or bookmarks/indexing, but all the important stuff was there.
Now OS is no more.
Posted by: Halabis Jul 8 2008, 07:07 PM
Does this part say that Wizards now owns whatever you publish and it becomes thier IP?
Posted by: DireRadiant Jul 8 2008, 07:13 PM
Sure looks like it.
Posted by: Eugene Jul 9 2008, 02:27 PM
We did and it wasn't a lot of fun. Since you need twice as many successes as failures, it can be pretty depressing when you've got 2 out of 3 failures but only 1 out of 6 successes, and you're going to have to make 5 rolls in a row or fail the skill challenge.
Posted by: Malicant Jul 9 2008, 02:47 PM
There might actually be a reason why it was called skill challenge. Just saying. 
Posted by: deek Jul 9 2008, 08:55 PM
Yeah, you can spin it either way, really.
I mean, seeing a skill challenge gains you experience if you succeed, some might think the 11% (or so) chance to succeed on a 1st level moderate challenge where everyone has optimized skills is satisfactory. Others feel that probability needs to be a lot higher, which I would agree with, as you should expect to have a lot better chance to succeed at first level.
Now, I don't think the 11% success rate is static as you gain levels...I think it does become easier at higher level and higher complexity, but its still a pretty bad chance to succeed. Even internal folks have stated they "tweak" the rules to let a natural 20 get an automatic success or two as well very liberally hand out +2 bonuses to good, creative skill use.
And I'm going to break down and say it yet again...the end result of a failed challenge (which players are much more likely to see than successful challenges) are not equal to dying in combat. A failed challenge sets up an added obstacle to the party's success. Such as only getting a 4 guard escort instead of 20 of the lord's best men. Or, perhaps instead of getting that magic sword immediately, you have to prove yourself to the king first, then you will be awarded it. I mean, its still a double-whammy, as you don't gain the experience and you get an added obstacle to boot, but failure, shouldn't normally mean death.
I view it more like getting captured during combat. You failed the encounter, but you are not dead. You now have to escape from imprisonment on top of completing you quest goals...
That's obviously a pretty big spin on the existing probabilities, but if your DM is aware of the issue and carefully plans accordingly, they can still be fun...
Posted by: Malicant Jul 9 2008, 08:57 PM
You still get xp for overcoming the obstacle, though. If the obstacle is not a simple penalty, of course.
Posted by: Eugene Jul 10 2008, 07:20 PM
Hah! If that were true, PCs would spend most of their time captured. Not a lot of fun, there; the argument's the same with the skill challenge.
Posted by: Adam Jul 10 2008, 07:48 PM
No.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jul 10 2008, 09:12 PM
Nonsense, having the PCs captured all the time is the making of a classic story: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bridge_on_the_River_Kwai
Posted by: hyzmarca Jul 10 2008, 09:47 PM
You don't need skill challenges. Any possible use of skill by the party can be avoided with practical application of violence.
For example, if a group of Paladins have learned that the Evil Kingdom of Unspeakable Evil is about to invade the Lawful Good Kingdom of Sugary Sweet Lawful Goodness and wishes to warn the Lawfully Good Lawful Good King the 4e conversation should go something like this.
Paladin: "Listen, The Evil King of the Evil Kingdom of Unspeakable Evilness is preparing his Unspeakably Evil Army of Evilness to invade your Lawful Good Lawful Good Kingdom of Sugary Sweet Lawful Goodness and you're not ready for it. You need to prepare your defenses and raise your army immediately. There is still time to put up a defense but you must act quickly. Of course, we have no proof of this other than the fact that we are Lawful Good Paladins and we could be lying through our teeth so you would be right to be skeptical and we understand that you will be reluctant to believe this unlikely tale. Under normal circumstances, we, the Paladins of Holy Lawful Goodness, Peaceful Cooperation, and Super Evil Smiting would use our diplomacy skills to convince you, wise and noble Lawfully Good Lawful Good King of the Lawful Good Kingdom of Sugary Sweet Lawful Goodness that we are telling the truth about this grave threat to your kingdom and the rest of the world. Unfortunately, we know that that won't work in this edition so instead we are going to simply kill you right here and right now, kill your heirs, take your throne, kill anyone who complains that the kingship can't Lawfully be transfered that way, and then pray to our Lawful Good God of Lawful Goodness for forgiveness, Hopefully we'll have all of the slaughtering finished in time to begin training the troops that we'll conscript from your kingdom by this afternoon." *splits the King's head open with a swift sword blow*
Edit: I just noticed that in 4e Paladins no longer have to follow any sort of code and can do whatever the hell they want without any sort of consequences.
Posted by: Cantankerous Jul 10 2008, 10:12 PM
Technically you don't NEED any part of the game engine...but certainly, it's back to early AD&D days for those who don't want the brokeness...they have little choice at this point but to delete them entirely from the game. Just like first edition, there will be no skills....except, you know, that'll imbalance certain races and classes and even monsters who are based partly around the idea of being strong at skills, but hey...
Isshia
Posted by: deek Jul 11 2008, 12:59 PM
My point is, a "falied" encounter, either skill or combat, normally does not end the night of adventuring. The majority of the arguments with the "math is broken" banner assume that a failed skill challenge equates to everyone packing up their books for the night and coming back to the table with new characters next session. At least that is the perception I am getting...
So far, I've played a total of 10 hours of 4th Edition...we've have 4 combat encounters and no skill challenges.
I still view a skill challenge in a different light than most...for example, I tried to get my DM to set one up in our first session when I tried to get discounted rooms for the party. The way I saw it, I was willing to take my 11% (or so) chance to get a discount and if I failed, I got to pay regular price... Now I'm not saying all challenges would be this way, as I suppose a failure to some DMs would be not getting a room at all, but again, we are not talking about extreme consequences for failure here.
Posted by: deek Jul 11 2008, 01:03 PM
Isshia
I still don't understand why you would think no skill challenges equal no skills...
In the two sessions I have played, thus far, we've used a ton of skills, in and out of combat, yet haven't got into a skill challenge yet. Each of the skills have quite a bit of use... So I don't think you can blanket delete skills from the game if you decide to throw out the challenges.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jul 11 2008, 03:18 PM
I'd just say this. When we say "a challenging test of skill for D&D characters", are we more likely to think of 1.) haggling for a 10% discount for a large group at a small countryside inn, or 2.) walking across a chasm of doom on a tightrope, where if you fall off the tightrope we roll a percentile die where you have a 99% chance of being forever destroyed or a 1% chance of surviving with 1d4 hitpoints remaining?
Posted by: Bull Jul 11 2008, 03:54 PM
Hrmm, honestly? I've haggled far more than I ever had to make tightrope walking tests in any edition of D&D
Really, I think the skill challenge issue is moot anyways. As I've said elsewhere, simply tweak the numbers a little to give the PCs more of a fighting chance if you want. Require fewer successes, a lower DC, whatever. Yes it sucks that it made it into the final rules, but Wizards has said this was a mistake, it's gonna get errata'd (May already have been, I never bothered to look). I mean, I know, an RPG book that needs errata? It's nearly unheard of!
Posted by: deek Jul 11 2008, 03:58 PM
When you say "a challenging test", well, yeah, is option 2. But, when you just say "a skill challenge", then I think both are valid options. Its anything outside of combat that you want to put together a set of skill tests to perform. Granted, sometimes the DM will say screw it, and give you a single roll, and that is fine too.
I think you shouldn't forget an option 3, which is something like:
3) Tracking a lone thief from your base camp, in the middle of the night, deep in the forest, where you have a "chance" to locate and confront him before he makes it back to the guild's cave hideout or a really good chance to only see him entering said cave hideout and decide what to do from there.
I'd almost say that your tightrope test is more of a set of individual tests than a skill challenge. I guess that's the conundrum...you can view any non-combat encounter as being individual only or a group effort. And that effort could be crossing a chasm, getting an item from the duke, getting a discount at the local inn, or trekking days in the woods tracking down a thief.
I would recommend thinking twice (or three or four more times) if the result of a failed skill challenge was being forever destroyed. Even if my chance of avoiding that was greater than 50%, I don't think I'd want to put my party in such peril with nothing but the dice determining the outcome.
Granted, as a DM/GM, I'm not the cold, cruel type that let's only the dice decide the outcome. I've rarely killed any player because of dice alone. I mean, even assuming the math worked in a skill challenge, meaning a better than 50% chance of success (some feel that 65% or better is more fair), I wouldn't want to set up these encounters to have fail = death. Now, I have played in campaigns where I have had to create 3 characters within the same dungeon, as the DM was strict and let the dice do the talking. But, it was just a dungeon crawl and after we finished, I didn't want to go back and play again with the same DM. I just didn't have as much fun...
Posted by: apollo124 Jul 12 2008, 05:33 AM
I just read an email from RPGNow store which was advertising the pdf's of the 4e books for about $25 each, a savings of about $10 each or $30 off for the set. That brings the big 3 core books down to a (somewhat) more reasonable $75 for the set.
Posted by: Critias Jul 12 2008, 05:54 AM
Amazon.com has actual hardcopy versions of all three core books, in a boxed set "gift pack," for $65.
Posted by: Bull Jul 12 2008, 06:31 AM
I've seen there were a lot of problems with folks getting their orders when they were supposed to, with Amazon bumping a lot of delivery dates up a month or two.
Not sure if this was just a problem with their initial orders (They took more pre-orders than they could fill maybe), or what. And dunno if this has since cleared up now that they've been out for a couple months.
Bull
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jul 12 2008, 07:05 AM
...they no longer have Monks.
That settles my opinion.
Posted by: Bull Jul 12 2008, 10:03 AM
That settles my opinion.
I never really liked Monks for some reason. They were never a part of the "core game" for me since they weren't in any of the core books until 3rd ed, and the couple players I had that went out and got the sourcebook (or the Dragon Magazine article) that had teh write up for them did so because they wanted to play a munchy, broken class
But I'd be willing to bet we'll see them in the next PHB. Along with Bards, Barbs, and Druids.
Bull
Posted by: Critias Jul 12 2008, 06:45 PM
Not sure if this was just a problem with their initial orders (They took more pre-orders than they could fill maybe), or what. And dunno if this has since cleared up now that they've been out for a couple months.
Bull
I ordered mine on July 5th, and got the box in the mail on the 9th.
Now, to be fair, they told me I wouldn't get it until the 30th. So technically their delivery date was still wrong. But I'm not complainin'.
Posted by: Caine Hazen Jul 12 2008, 07:18 PM
That settles my opinion.
Although they have already stated that they will be in next years Player's Handbook.
Posted by: Lordmalachdrim Jul 13 2008, 01:46 PM
Next year's PHB/MM/DMG. That's something that bugged the heck out of me. So now they'll have standard splat books (Martial Powers) and Core Splat Books (Yearly release of new PHB/MM/DMG).
No thanks.
I've read the books and I didn't like a lot of what I saw. It looked like it'd be a fun board game, and I know people who'd enjoy it but it's just not for me or my group. So we'll stick with other games (HackMaster, Alternity, Shadowrun, Palladium for example)
Posted by: apollo124 Jul 13 2008, 11:07 PM
But I'd be willing to bet we'll see them in the next PHB. Along with Bards, Barbs, and Druids.
Bull
No monks, bards, barbarians, druids, player half-orcs, or gnomes? I'm liking it less and less. What the hell do they have left? (Yeah, I actually do know, from the RPGNow ad/article about it, but damn). A price point like that and they're still talking about needing to buy the "new and improved" core books every year? Don't you guys get no ideas, 'cause that one sucks. Really, drop bear hit squads will be hired if you try to pull that one in SR. I know you wouldn't do that to us, but just sayin'.
By the way, is it just me saying "Oh no, we got ambushed by goblins. No, wait, whew! It's just a tribe of vicious gnomes."
Posted by: Adam Jul 14 2008, 12:10 AM
I'm not seeing an issue with the price point. $34.99 for full color books that are 318, 220, and 286 pages? I don't think that's an out of line price for the production quality of the books. I think there might be a perception issue that the books are more expensive simply because people are more likely to buy all three of them at once.
Of course, if you don't like the game or don't ever play it, then no price is going to satisfy you.
Posted by: apollo124 Jul 14 2008, 03:53 AM
I think you probably hit it on the head there, Adam. The price is comparable with other RPG books, but having to buy the new core rules every year doesn't sound like something I want to get in on again. And it is the additive effect of needing to buy all 3 at once that gets to me. But, like you said, this new D+D doesn't sound like a game I want to play. Good luck to those who do, though. Just give me SR and I'll be fine.
Posted by: Fuchs Jul 14 2008, 10:22 AM
In one of my groups, we discussed switching. Starting a new campaign (recommended by WotC) was not on the table - we all want to continue with our campaign. The key points in favor of not switching were:
- Not enough classes available (no sorcerer)
- Not enough enchantment/charm spells or social abilities available for some character concepts
Minor negatives were:
- No conversion manual/guidelines
- Combat is not that important in our campaign, so one of 4E's biggest selling point is not as important
- All PCs are spellcasters, so another big selling point of 4E is not as needed as in other campaigns
- We have no new players who never played D&D, so ease of starting the game has no importance.
All voted against switching. Once 4E has had some more options available, especially out of combat, we may reconsider.
Posted by: Malicant Jul 14 2008, 10:54 AM
How can someone with access to teh internets say this with a straight face? WotC has a even conversions for Monks and stuff like Hexblades...
Posted by: deek Jul 14 2008, 02:52 PM
Personally, I have never understood why people switch editions just because there is something new. I mean, if it is honestly better in more respects than not, then sure, go ahead.
I mean, if I were to start a DnD campaign today, I'd open up my second edition PHB, DMG and MM, and start playing. While I love 4th Edition and had some fun with 3.x, to me, DnD is 2nd Edition, with a little bit of 1st Edition sprinkled in (like OA). I didn't have any house-rules in 2nd edition and had a lot of fun.
I don't know, sometimes I just don't know why people that have a ton of fun playing in one edition, are compelled at all, to leave it all behind. Especially when a new edition almost always limits what you have available when compared to the "new" edition.
And really, that doesn't make a new edition bad. Just not worth it to switch when you like what you are playing.
Posted by: Adam Jul 14 2008, 03:10 PM
The question to me is: how usable is the game without buying the PHB2? A company releasing extra stuff that I don't want or need doesn't make their current games/books less valuable to me.
I'm not entirely sure how the PHB2 is supposed to work [I, ah, haven't had enough free time to do more than skim the 4e books, much less read scuttlebutt about them on the 'net, aside from the threads here] -- do they contain only additional material [IE, are they supplements?] or do they repeat the basic rules but substitute new races and classes in?
Posted by: deek Jul 14 2008, 04:57 PM
That's a really good point, Adam. Looking at both 4th edition games I actually like to play, I can make a really good case at playing the games and having a lot of fun without every buying another book. With SR4, flawed, house-ruled or whatever, the game can be played with just the core book. DnD4, you need three, but both systems, mainly just add to the content, not really change it (except for the optional rules).
I really don't see any DnD4 books after the core being REQUIRED to enjoy the game.
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jul 14 2008, 06:30 PM
Actually the DMG isn't even overly necessary. Yes theres some traps, poisons, diseases, and skill challenges (discussed enough). But 90% of the book is telling you how to handle running a game, and dealing with players. So with just the MM and PHB, your role-playing veteran should have more than enough to run a good campaign. And everything is simplified down, so its actually really easy to come up with your own classes/races/monsters whatever.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jul 14 2008, 07:00 PM
Hmmm, I think that's largely true. One question: The combat encounter building only appears in the DMG, correct? The limits on building easy and challenging combat encounters, as well as what levels of monsters can be in them, etc only appear in the DMG and would probably not be obvious, even to an experienced GM. It's only about 1% of the book, but it would be rough to try to put together a campaign without having seen it at least once, I think.
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jul 15 2008, 07:05 PM
Yah they have those tables. But it sums up pretty much in a paragraph.
*Spoiler!*
Level of Encounter * Number of Characters
So if you want a level 2 encounter of 4 characters look up the exp for a level 2 creature (125) and multiply it by the number of characters. You have 500 exp to spend on creating the encounter. Easy is lower then the character level, moderate is no more than 1 level higher, difficult is 2-4 levels higher. There you go, you have the essential part of the DMG.
The diseases, traps, and poisons add flavor and could be useful, but pretty much everything is really simple to throw together. If you're short on cash you can easily skip this book to start with (and maybe even figure out your own pretty easy once you get going).
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Jul 17 2008, 06:44 PM
I always felt that monks were essential to the late 70s-early 80s feel of D&D. The monks were there to remind everyone that oriential martial arts are superior to western martial arts, because Tallhoffer wasn't well known or popular at that time, and at the same time all the 70s creative types likely to get into fantasy RPGs were also probably getting high and trying to find the truth of their souls through krotty. One of the most poignant moments for me was reading a first edition rule book where Gygax said that "monks are not super men" when in fact looking at the statistics that's actually pretty much what they were. That implied that the super-powerful monks were considered "realistic" at that time.
As such, I always felt that the appropriate thing to do when not playing an oriental-setting D&D game was not to play as a monk, while still keeping the monks on the rulebook. That way in the abstract you could be a western elf or whatever, but at the same time you'd understand in the abstract that if you were asian you'd automatically be better, in keeping with the times. The monks weren't there to play. They were there for statistical purposes and to lay the parameters of period-appropriate orientalism.
Therefore, D&D 4th edition should have a monk class which you're not actually allowed to play, and which has ridiculously high stats all across the board. There should be a sample monk who is the highest statted entity in the whole D&D 4th ed system, and his name should be David Carradine.
Posted by: Caine Hazen Jul 17 2008, 11:43 PM
This is where we make the thread descend into chaos as I stand over in my corner here and scream BRUCE LEE!!!! And then the rest of the M.A. nerd an' wanna-bes float out and rumble and it looks like that scene in Anchorman
Although Mr. Carradine is pretty cool, got to share a whiskey with him a few years ago at GenCon, nice dude.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jul 18 2008, 12:06 AM
So, thanks to customer service, if a cleric wacks up a blade barrier and a wizard knocks a monster back through 5 squares of it, the monster takes damage 5 times.
Even if you didn't take damage 5 times, we have the new gold standard of 4th ed combat. Someone wacks up some sort of barrier effect, and the party tekken juggles the dude through it repeatedly getting huge damage. If you use something like wall of fire which doesn't exempt you for multiple damage on multiple entry, and use D&D's awesome non ecludian geometry, you can knock someone backwards in a zig zag fashion and push them through the fire multiple times.
Awesome! Actually a kinda fun tactic too, if a bit 'gamist'
Posted by: Reg06 Jul 18 2008, 07:17 PM
Wait! Hold the presses! If you push somebody through a shitload of blades multiple times that person gets hurt more than if it had just been the one pass through a wall of pain? Well screw that, 4e is obviously broken.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jul 18 2008, 08:57 PM
Whaaaat? That's just crazy talk. I'm gonna try it and see. Anybody know where I can get a huge wall of spinning blades? Preferably on the cheap. Oooh, and a box of band-aids. Just in case!
Posted by: Malicant Jul 19 2008, 08:55 AM
What?
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jul 21 2008, 03:29 AM
It's probably unbalanced actually because it allows you to use an at-will to hit someone 5+ times with a daily, and then you have another guy standing at the other end to bounce them right back.
However even at the once per turn end of the spectrum, its probably good.
Posted by: deek Jul 21 2008, 12:38 PM
That's like saying its unfair to be fighting near a bottomless chasm and shift/push an enemy into it. Its the terrain and strategy to use it to a benefit.
I mean, the PCs are just as open to these kinds of attacks as well.
I guess I wouldn't be surprised if we would see some sort of resistance to the forced movement, but I'd rather just allow it.
Posted by: DTFarstar Jul 22 2008, 10:17 PM
There is a save to resist being forced into hindering terrain or off cliffs, and I think it applies to forced movement into general damage at all.
Chris
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jul 25 2008, 04:40 AM
Well, it would only if you ignore the exception based design matra. In 4th ed things always work X unless specific exception Y is applied.
The exception Y only applies when being pushed into terrian type 'hindering terrain'
Posted by: apollo124 Aug 5 2008, 03:42 PM
I'm thinking that a "wall of lots of knives" would hinder my movement pretty well, so would a wall of fire, IMO.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Aug 6 2008, 01:07 AM
Sure, but its not actually 'hindering terrain' which is a special category of terrain as defined by the DMG and does not include walls of fire as they are defined as a combat spell... though it does include fires.
Edit: Its like the 'spike stones' spell in 3.5 didn't make the area difficult terrain, despite 'spiky stones' being obviously difficult terrain.
Posted by: Wounded Ronin Aug 6 2008, 04:34 PM
Pansy!
Posted by: Cang Aug 12 2008, 04:18 PM
I am GMing 4e right now (not by choice ) But i have to say it grew on me. Plus i see it as a good foundation to build up my own game. It is great for noobies because it is simple as flipping a switch. But it is a good foundation in which i am building up from.
1) i have added a feat that lets you specialize in a skill so you can put extra points in lets say pickpocket in the theivery group (so now trained just means you know it, now that you are great at it).
2) I have added a feat that lets you learn more ecounter powers (and prob gonna add one for at-will and dailies) You still can only use 2 encounter powers per encounter, but you can pick from a bigger base (no longer do you forget powers.. to me that was damn stupid)
3) I redid the death and healing.. its pretty much the same with alot more tacked on it. So now you get modifiers for how many surges you use, you have some damage that can only be healed by a ritual, and you have a limit on certain kinds of healings. I also put a weakend status if you hit under 0 hp. I had too many players going from 0 to fighting in one encounter.
So i plan to keep adding more things as we go. I am going to add a profession system and more feats. I plan to have most changes be added as feats and give out feats as rewards, instead of xp. That way i can keep everyone at the same level (because that is what the game wants really) and i can reward rp and ideas with feats and such.
On the fluff side, i really think it is crazy that they retconed so much fluff in 4e. Personally i dont care much because d&d isnt my game but i can see where the anger is coming from. But alot of it isnt that bad. The issue for alot of it is that you have to wait a while till the books come out. Druids barbarians and gnomes are going to be in the PhB2. And the Ebarron campaign isnt untill 2009. Also just because you can play a warforged or hobgoblin doesnt mean your game has to let it. I mean we can play damn free spirits and AIs in shadowrun but I aint gonna let just anyone play one of those.
Posted by: Reg06 Aug 13 2008, 08:55 PM
I'm glad you've given it a chance. And I'm seeing alot of what people hate about 4e isn't what it is, but what it isn't. Most people don't like the things that 4e changed, or dropped, from 3.5, rather than actually disliking 4e as a seperate entity that exists on its own.
Posted by: DTFarstar Aug 14 2008, 06:32 AM
I have noticed that myself, Reg06, and I can agree with them sometimes, but largely I like 4E, it hasn't replaced 3.5E for me yet, but that is largely because it just isn't developed enough. I love the hard tactical flavor of it, so the other minor nitpicks beyond what is missing so far don't really bother me.
Chris
EDIT: Shadowrun is still an insane amount better, of course, but my group wants a break from having to think during gaming sometimes so we move to a lighter game.
Posted by: Aaron Aug 18 2008, 05:00 AM
FROM: SR4
RE: PC Roles
I'll see your four and raise you nine.
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