[X] My Assistant

[Bull]

It's a video game version of D&D based off MMOGs.

WHich were based on CRPGs, which were based on D&D, which were based on miniatures gaming.

Your argument is flawed, though your opinion is not (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Bull

[Whipstitch]

Yeah, saying it's genuinely video game and MMO based is not really true at all. There's obvious roles in place, but it's really just a and RPG w/ minis combat more than anything else. I'd make a more direct comparison to stuff like clix games. Limited number of abilities per character, often dependent on bloodied status or healing surges, sorta like how clix abilities change up as the unit takes damage etc. Gygax and crew really were just building upon a legacy of kill-the-dudes-and-raid-the-castle skirmish rules, so it's not all that strange to see things come around full circle.

Personally, I think there's room in gaming for a franchise that's rather combat heavy but systemically light in other areas. Roleplaying doesn't necessarily need much dice support to happen, after all, and some people aren't really that much into getting in character to begin with. If I were to criticize 4th ED, I would complain more about how the Powers system lends a rather predictable mindset to most battles: You burn your encounter powers then resort to daily powers if necessary and then just stick with at-will. I'll grant you that it's actually not all that much less interesting in practice than most systems (I would argue that it's better than most and some fun stuff can happen when players set things up for each other well), but when your system is so predicated on combat it'd be nice if it was a cut above what it currently is. With that said, it's a good enough game that I'm hard pressed to come up with ideas to fix that. So, overall, I think it's a pretty good game and most of the criticisms I see tend to be of the apples to oranges variety and stem from irreconcilable differences in taste.

[Dwight]

Why we chose not to go to 4e

Complaining about the D&D rules being combat centric is like complaining water is wet. Reading that post I picture the author saying "This new glass of water? It is wet!" Like it is some sort of discovery, some sort of surprise that a glass of water is wet....implying prior ones weren't.

[Kovu Muphasa]

It's a video game version of D&D based off MMOGs.

Nobody has ever answerd this question

And what is wrong with that?

[Mesh]

WHich were based on CRPGs, which were based on D&D, which were based on miniatures gaming.

Your argument is flawed, though your opinion is not (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Bull

Actually, that's exactly the point I was making, circular and ludicrous as it may be. MMOGs copy the combat aspect of D&D which sees how popular MMOGs are and ditches the RP and setting for a table top version of the MMOG. Laaaaame.

Regardless of your mechanics rules in Shadowrun, it is a much richer world with a cool history with greater potential for world influence, RP, and things other than hack'n'slash... which is fun and fun in Shadowrun, too. It's just not the whole game.

Mesh

[Ol' Scratch]

As I stated in another thread, for me, it's totally cool that they tried to define roles and give players a reason to build their characters a specific way. The problem is that they force you to pick a role and build your character around it no matter how silly or unlikely that may be. Character stats revolve around combat with non-combat situations (which is totally different than just roleplaying situations) being a pain in the ass to figure out or fit into your character. Hell, just being able to talk to people with Comprehend Languages, for example, is a struggle. You have to spend a small fortune and waste a ton of time to perform that "ritual." If it's not an ability to be used in combat, it's delegated to rituals, and nearly every single ritual has ridiculous pricetags and mandatory downtime associated with them.

It's one thing to have a game system that focused on combat, it's quite another to have a system that only focuses on combat.

The game also constrains characters so much in the name of game balance, but in reality it's just as broken and prone to abuse as any other system. The things you can do with a polearm and a not-even-intentionally-munched-out character build, for instance, is sickening. Some classes (which I dislike on general principle) are way overpowered while others are overly constrained. If you're going to cripple players and their ability to be as creative as they'd like, you should at least make sure the payoff for doing that is worthwhile. 4e doesn't deliver in that regard at all.

I'm not saying that I liked 3e any better, either. The rules bloat that game developed was even worse than 2nd edition. But the point remains.

[Kovu Muphasa]

Hell, just being able to talk to people with Comprehend Languages, for example, is a struggle. You have to spend a small fortune and waste a ton of time to perform that "ritual."

10gp is a fortune???
5th level: "That is a small amout of cash."
10th level: "Thats pocket change."
15th Level: "I don't carry any thing that small!"
[Yes I know its residium not GP]

[Ol' Scratch]

It is if you prefer low level games, and that's one of the dirt cheap rituals, too.

[Delta]

I have only played only low level 4E games so far, actually I've never played or dm'd anything beyond level 3 yet, and I do not agree that 10gp would be a fortune.

[KnightRunner]

Complaining about the D&D rules being combat centric is like complaining water is wet. Reading that post I picture the author saying "This new glass of water? It is wet!" Like it is some sort of discovery, some sort of surprise that a glass of water is wet....implying prior ones weren't.

This made me laugh, because it is so true.

One couple I game with (D&D 3.5). They are not much into RP but they love a good dungeon crawl and epic combat. And hey so do I sometimes, that's why I play with them. They are also serious WoW junkies. One night we were in the middle of a very nasty combat during a Gygaxian dungeon crawl. Both of them were wearing shirts that said "Eat,Sleep, WoW". Anyway the topic of switching to 4e came up. That both stating vehemently that they would never play 4E. I asked why. Their answer? "Because it is too much like WoW, and turns it into nothing but a minis combat game." They are good friends, but sometimes I can only shake my head.

[Delta]

Exactly my opinion on 4E. Is it combat-centric? Sure. Is it dungeon crawl-focused? Hell yes. Because, you know, this is what D&D is about. Just because they tried to make it into a kind of universal rules set with d20 (failing miserably, in my opinion) doesn't mean it always has to be this way. 4E is a great game for the kind of campaign it was created for, and that's a lot more than I can say about many other games out there.

[Synner667]

Exactly my opinion on 4E. Is it combat-centric? Sure. Is it dungeon crawl-focused? Hell yes. Because, you know, this is what D&D is about. Just because they tried to make it into a kind of universal rules set with d20 (failing miserably, in my opinion) doesn't mean it always has to be this way. 4E is a great game for the kind of campaign it was created for, and that's a lot more than I can say about many other games out there.

That's the thing...
...D&D is a product of its time - and that time was for dungeon crawling adventures and wargame variants.

When you play a boardgame, you rarely complain about the focus on combat, and inability to sweettalk the opposition...
...Because that's the way the game is played.

D&D4E, in many ways, has just gone back to its roots.
The people complaining have spent time playing RPGs where characters can do other things, and want D&D4E to have caught up - in which case it's not the game for them.

[Warlordtheft]

When you play a boardgame, you rarely complain about the focus on combat, and inability to sweettalk the opposition...
...Because that's the way the game is played.

Hey there are boardgames games that allow for that. Conquest of the empire, Samauri Swords, Settlers of Cataan.....etc..etc...

[Ol' Scratch]

D&D4E, in many ways, has just gone back to its roots.
The people complaining have spent time playing RPGs where characters can do other things, and want D&D4E to have caught up - in which case it's not the game for them.

When a game promotes itself and is identified as the pinnacle of the RPG scene, one might actually expect roleplaying to be a viable and important option thereof. D&D 4e is not a roleplaying game. It's a combat simulator with roleplaying scenarios handled as obtuse and asinine "skill challenges" that, surprise surprise, rely entirely upon the luck of d20 rolls and, for all intents and purposes, appears to have been specifically crafted to be so annoying that no one would want to bother using them. "Here, roll d20 100 times. If you succeed 75 times, you win!"

/suicideattempt

[Belvidere]

I've been playing D&D since second edition and I've loved it the entire way along. People complain the 4.0 is too combat based and the rules only apply to fighting and in my opinion that is a GREAT thing. If you look back at 1st and 2nd edtion D&D, there were very few rules for social situations and it was up to the players and their role-playing to come out of a social situation successful. Around 3e, which I still love. It began to suck the role-playing out of it and replaced it with roll-playing. I understand the need for that, because not everyone can talk the way they want their character too, but it just take alot away to me. So as a DM for 4e, I don't use skill challenges(which ticks off a few of my players, but oh well) and I take social situations and strategies back to what they were, role-playing. The rules only need to be their for combat anyway. At least that's my opinion. I shouldn;t need to roll to lie to the gaurd, my DM and I should know my character well enough to know whether or not the gaurd believes me, and actually role-play out the scenario. I hate the fact thatyou can spin the perfect lie, then it all falls apart because of a bad roll. it just seems silly.

[Kovu Muphasa]

When a game promotes itself and is identified as the pinnacle of the RPG scene, one might actually expect roleplaying to be a viable and important option thereof. D&D 4e is not a roleplaying game. It's a combat simulator with roleplaying scenarios handled as obtuse and asinine "skill challenges" that, surprise surprise, rely entirely upon the luck of d20 rolls and, for all intents and purposes, appears to have been specifically crafted to be so annoying that no one would want to bother using them. "Here, roll d20 100 times. If you succeed 75 times, you win!"

/suicideattempt

So by that logic D&D and AD&D are not roleplaying games becouse thier are no rules for role playing at all, just sugestions.

[Ol' Scratch]

<shrugs>

Think whatever the hell you want. People are allowed to dislike D&D 4th Edition if they feel it does a shitty job of being an actual roleplaying game instead of just a video game simulator. A poor one at that. If you enjoy that sort of thing, more power to you. But I'm not going to call it an RPG when, after years of development and experience, they instead choose to embrace that one, tiny aspect of RPGs and all but completely ignore and outright annoy people who want to indulge in the brunt of it. It's called a "roleplaying game" for a reason.

For me, combat rules are there to help resolve conflicts that arise as part of the actual roleplaying experience. The world doesn't revolve around it in fantasy any more than it does in real life. This is not so in D&D. Practically all it is now is a dungeon/map experience where every move is resolved through combat. If you're not killing something, you may as well not even be playing the game. At best, you have one or two pages of "rules" (all designed to be annoying as Hell) to help you "rollplay" through those apparently inconsiderate moments where combat isn't practical. You know, like talking to the king so he can tell you where the next impossible dungeon filled to the brim with an idiotic array of random monsters is located. All so you can get the gold to buy that new Generic Weapon of Mechanical Bonus +3 so you can kill even bigger random monsters in even more stupid and completely unbelieveable dungeons.

If you like it, fine. I don't. I think it's absolute shit. And if Shadowrun ever adopts it as its core engine (which, by the way, is what the discussion is about), that'll very likely be the day I forever give up the greatest roleplaying game of all time. Because it'll no longer be a roleplaying game at all. Just like D&D 4e.

[Kovu Muphasa]

I play Battltech, Star Fleet Battles, and WH40k
In all three of them we roll play a little and they are not "RPGs"
I have seen Role Play playing Monopoly.
Both of the new books have whole sections deticated to Roleplaying.

As far as the Skill Chalages:
They are thier to encurage roleplay and interaction.
Each player takes a turn trying to get past the challage.
In the other systems if you had a player who sat in the background and did nothing out of combat he did nothing, now he must interact with the world other than smashing goblins.

[Ol' Scratch]

As far as the Skill Chalages:
They are thier to encurage roleplay and interaction.

No. You don't encourage anything through the use of tedium and repetitively useless rolling of the dice. Well, that's not accurate. You encourage people not to do it.

In the other systems if you had a player who sat in the background and did nothing out of combat he did nothing, now he must interact with the world other than smashing goblins.

No. Now all he does is roll some dice and ruin everyone's chances of succeeding because he was one of those douchebags who grew up only playing video games and so-called "RPGs" like D&D where roleplaying was something to be spat upon, so all he wanted to do was smash goblins. And in a game that revolves entirely around combat, it's no surprise that he doesn't have a single roleplaying-ish ability on his sheet to speak of. Well, unless you want to count the forced increase to all of his skills despite a complete and utter lack of attention (or even noticing that they exist due to their complete lack of uselessness).

Forcing him to roll dice doesn't do jack for changing any of that, except add to the tedium of the whole thing, and forcing someone who has no business being a part of something to be a part of it for... no real reason other than "don't just sit there, roll some dice because that's so much fun, honest"ness. Not that it matters, since the only time it comes up is, again, when you're trying to ask the king where to go get some more treasure for some random dungeon, or trying to save the princess (which, incidently, is only there so the GM can show how awesome he is by "proving" that roleplaying really is a part of the game, omg!) without having to do anything other than roll a couple of dice so you can get that sweet new magic item that lets you kill even bettererer.

[Kovu Muphasa]

Forcing him to roll dice doesn't do jack for changing any of that, except add to the tedium of the whole thing, and forcing someone who has no business being a part of something to be a part of it for... no real reason other than "don't just sit there, roll some dice because that's so much fun, honest"ness. Not that it matters, since the only time it comes up is, again, when you're trying to ask the king where to go get some more treasure for some random dungeon, or trying to save the princess (which, incidently, is only there so the GM can show how awesome he is by "proving" that roleplaying really is a part of the game, omg!) without having to do anything other than roll a couple of dice so you can get that sweet new magic item that lets you kill even bettererer.

It forces the Group to interact. At fist it is only to roll 1d20, then they start to think of ways to get a modifier in thier benifit, then when one of the groups figurs out that if they try to help the other guy, then they start talking to each other about making plans and then they start role playing with each other.
The other thing about the skill challages that I forgot for the longest was if they can come with a way to bypass the Skill Chalage without rolling a single die they can.
Soon Skill Challanges just a set up for the players to make them think and some times thay can be the most fun part of the game. especialy when mixed in with a combat.

[Ol' Scratch]

It forces the Group to interact.

No it doesn't. Being part of a group "forces" that by its nature. If a person doesn't want to sit on their ass, they can think of ways to contribute all on their own. Well, assuming the game actually encouraged that and had options outside of combat.

All skill challenges do is force everyone to be a part of the tedious, useless, repetitive rollplaying (that's not a typo, by the way). No actual roleplaying is required or expected. You just roll your dice a bunch of time and add the number. As long as you get some completely random threshold out of some equally random number of required rolls, you succeed. Yay! No thinking, no interaction, nothing. Hell, you get more damn interaction out of combat in D&D than you do skill challenges. There's no variation either. It's always the same thing over and over. One skill, one modifier, a bucket of dice, and that's it. "Hurry up," the game system screams, "get this over with so we can go kill some random dragon that's apparently trapped in this tiny room in a dungeon with no exits big enough for it and, honestly, has no logical reason for being here other than to give you a bunch of treasure so you can move down to the next level."

[Kovu Muphasa]

I don't know who you have been playing with, but I have had more than once spent more than a hour with a Skill Challenge that had a dozen rolls and all the rest was roleplay. One of my Players [after he was the one who made the challenge successful] now like the Skill Challenges more than monster smashing.
I guess it depends on how you run them.

[Ol' Scratch]

...which, incidently, is only there so the GM can show how awesome he is by "proving" that roleplaying really is a part of the game...

Skill challenges are totally inane. All they ever consist of is rolling the exact same die, using the exact same skill, and adding the exact same modifier X amounts of times. Because, apparently, just doing it once isn't enough for whatever stupid reason. It's much more important to make it "challenging" and "realistic" by adding another random bit of randomness to a completely random and asinine system which does nothing to encourage roleplaying (quite the opposite).

All your alleged example proves is that you can ignore the game system and roleplay despite it, which isn't proof at all. Quite the contrary, really. Skill challenges are neither required nor an encouragement thereof.

[Dumori]

I like 3.5 as in 4th you cant have as much fun. Full stop. Every time I've paled 4th I've gone 3.5 was more fun.

[Kovu Muphasa]

One of the examples of what I am talking about. [All of the Bracketed thing are how it has been before 3e or 4e]

The Party is trying to get information about the bandits

Player A [Rouge]: I go and talk to the local guild about the bandits. He goes and starts talking to locals about were the Thieves Guild is, after talking and we roleplay talking to a few of them he is given a Streetwise Check DC: 15 he has a +2 for his CHA, +5 for being Trained and I give him a +2 for some of the money he passed around. He rolls better than a 6 and find the location. [Earlier Edition: There is a 20% chance of him finding it that actually requires no roleplay and there is normally no way to improve it.]
-This takes 5-15 minutes of Roleplay.

Player B [Fighter]: Starts to talk to some of the local garrison. Once more we roll play him talking to them and also passes them a few coins. He makes his Streetwise DC: 15 and he has no bonus for CHA, but he is trained and giving him a +2 he needs a 8 or better. [Earlier Edition: There is a Reaction roll made that has a 50/50 chance of success and with no CHA adjustment is remains 50/50]
-This takes 5-15 minutes of Roleplay.

Player C [Warlord] and Player D [Wizard]: Both decide to go to hall of records to look for a map or something. After talking to the old lady that is in charge eventually getting their way into the records room and starts looking around. After a looking around for a while the Warlord decides that he has a worse roll, INT +1, Trained +5, he decides he is going to help the Wizard. {Aid Another Action Skill Check DC: 10} he succeeds and the Wizard now rolls his History, INT +4, Trained +5, and +2 for being an Eladrin, The Warlords Aid Another Action adds another +2 giving him a +13 on the roll.
[Earlier Edition: I don’t even know what the other editions did other than it was either their or not.]
-This takes 10-20 minutes of Roleplay.

Each players got to interact with NPCs and got to do something and feels that they contributed.

Yah I see where 4e destroyed Roleplaying.