I think that covers a good variety of opinions. But just curious how people actually feel about the new edition of D&D.

There is no vote for those who plan on checking it out, but haven't yet. Because you should wait till you actually look into it before you vote.

I got the books last week (PDFs a bit before that) and started playing three days ago. Having played most of my "career" in 2nd Edition and never really liking the 3.x variants (although I did play in a campaign over a year long), I've really liked the new edition. I've also been playing WoW for about two years, so I enjoy some of the similarities between the two.

After one session, I'm hooked and look forward to our bi-weekly campaign. If you've been looking for a time to give it a try, now is a good time to get in. Its pretty easy to DM and is a lot of fun at the table. A battle grid is pretty much required for combat, as there are a ton of powers that factor in movement and relative proximity to your target. The grid makes that a whole lot easier!

No matter what, I think we can all agree that playing it still gives you cancer.

i've actualy never had an interest in playing D&D, however, 4th edition has managed to make me curious. i'll probably give it a go at some point, but i know i don't have the money to buy all the minatures needed, much less the rulebooks.

It's like every other D&D - differently broken than a prior edition upon release. Not more broken, just differently broken.

I'm actually really surprised at 4e. It's slick and they clearly gave it a lot of work.

But they didn't put any work into making the system work. I'm seriously offended at how incredibly shitty the skill challenges are. With the amount of money they threw at this project, they couldn't play through it once? They couldn't be bothered to tweak it the slightest little bit so that the show stopping failures of the system would be the slightest bit hidden from view.

Having Class A bugs in the final release accessible and unavoidable from 1st level for all classes is completely unacceptable. That's beyond unprofessional, that's jaw droppingly insulting.

-Frank

It's like 80% of the way there, but once they built a good framework for having everyone on the same page, they screwed it by making the page really boring (the majority of abilities) or just completely unworkable (Skill challenges)

They really need a 4.5 where they re-tool all the abilities to be actually cool, and fix the bugs, and then it will probably be quite good.

Wait, what's wrong with skill challenges? What's a class A bug? Is that like where a glitch gives you infinite rolls to gain experience or something?

1st edition remains the best, especially Oriental Adventures.

I agree with Wounded Ronin. I gave 4e a look at my local book store. A very brief look, so I can't speak to the system or rules; for all I know, it may be terrific. But I'm just too attached to 1st to make the transition. Plus I resent the manner in which WoC handled the 3/3.5 switch, and I think they may pull the same stunt again.

I didn't touch 2nd for ages and then really only dabbled into 3, so when 3.5 came out, that's when I really started playing again. At that point it wasn't too bad, but now I don't plan on going to 4th, invested too much into 3.5 so not gonna make the jump. Especially from what I've seen, no interest.

They are a complete disaster start to finish.

• At the listed DCs, a party composed entirely of characters with appropriate skills linked to attributes that they have an 18 attribute in complete challenges only slightly more than 11 percent of the time at all levels. Parties composed of less singularly devoted characters fail at these challenges substantially more often. This is a Class A bug.
• Even if you adjust the DCs to something that players are capable of actually passing by handwaving in new DCs that match the bonuses that PCs actualy have, there's still the fact that Complexity has exactly the opposite effect as it is supposed to have. A Complexity 1 challenge is failed if you get more than 20% failures, while a Complexity 5 challenge is only failed if you get more than 29% failures. A Complexity 5 challenge is almost half again as forgiving as a Complexity 1 challenge! This is a Class B bug.
• Despite flowery words in the DMG to the contrary, there is no incentive whatsoever for "every character" to contribute to skill challenges. Indeed, you are just as able to get that giant 1 in 10 chance of succeeding at a challenge by having just one appropriately skilled character and demanding that all other characters stop contributing as by having the entire party be at maximum skill for the task. The total number of skill attempts that the party can make is essentially fixed by Complexity, and every attempt made by a character with medium or low skill removes a potential attempt by one of the character's with high skill at a ratio of 1:1. This is a Class B bug.
• Despite flowery words to the contrary, there is no incentive or meaning behind trying different tactics. Since you have a fixed number of attempts and most DCs are pretty much identical (being as they are based on your level rater than the challenge at hand), the correct choice in almost all circumstances is to simply choose your bestest skill and roll it 5 times in a row. Roleplaying and reacting to the ongoing story of the skill challenge is basically discouraged unless your roleplayed reaction is "I do exactly what I just did again!" This is a Class C bug.

Bugs are classed A, B, and C. A bugs are ones which destroy the game or stop play; B bugs are ones which disrupt the game; and C bugs are annoying but can be worked around/ignored. There are also "D" Bugs which are simply preferential stuff like "I think halflings should be shorter/taller/hairier/whatever."

The Skill Challenge system of 4th edition is a complete and unmitigated disaster. Every part of it is a major bug, and the only way to fix it is to tear it out stump and root and make a completely new skill challenge system that doesn't work like that at all.

-Frank

Or you just take the base idea behind the system - solve a task by using skill checks chained together - and run scenes with that in mind. From what I can tell, I already did such stuff in my games (make players RP their actions, roll for results, adjust the situation according to the result) so I'll probably mine the section for ideas for situations, and simply ditch the math.

The example that was talked about prior to release, about how to escape from a city while hunted by guards, was showcasing the different ways one could use skills such as history, athletics, diplomacy, stealth etc. to achieve the same goal. History knowledge might let one discover an old escape tunnel, athletics makes the roof escape, diplomacy calls in a favor, stealth or disguise goes through the gate undetected, etc.

I would dare to say that you don't really need a system, as long as the DM can pick DCs for the tests on the fly and adjust accordingly, and the rules give him enough ideas for that.

Yes Fuchs, you can in fact completely ignore the system and happen to be one of the people for whom the tirades on how the system was supposed to work and what it was supposed to accomplish inspires them to imagine up a functional system that uses essentially none of the actual mechanics in the presented 4e D&D skill challenges and ends up with something workable. Go you. That is what most people would call "Tearing it out stump and root and making a completely new skill challenge system that doesn't work like the original at all in its place."

So yes, we agree. It's entirely within your personal capabilities to design a system that allows and encourages multiple party members to use multiple skills together to achieve campaign goals in a cooperative and dynamic fashion. But the presented 4e Skill Challenge system is not that system.

-Frank

I'd not say that "just doing skill checks and adjusting the situation according to their result" is "designing a new system", I think it's just using basic skill mechanics, and taking the skill challenge description as inspiration to chain them together.

The way I see it, it's dropping the crunch part of the skill challenge system, and keeping the intent/goal.

That IS designing a new skill system. It's a very simple and rudimentary skill system, but the point is that your system:

1. All the players describe what they want to do.
2. Every player rolls a die.
3. The Dungeon Master ad hocs something together based on how he feels about the die rolls and the plausibility of the action.

...is a much better system than the one in the 4e DMG. It's a perfectly workable system whose only real failing is the Cops and Robbers dilemma where if one player thiks that a plan of action should work and another person at the table doesn't think it should work, then it is very hard to get them to agree on whether it ends up working or not if the roll is something like a 9 or a 13 that is kind of "in the middle."

The presented system in the DMG has several key factors:

• Limited chances for the team rather than the individual.
• Very specific DCs for use in all circumstances.
• Specific numbers of successes/failures for the team to succeed or fail.
• Specific effects on the number of rolls and overall difficulty based on the complexity of the task.

If you aren't using any of those rules, and you are not, then whatever it is you have done is making a completely new system. Whether it's "inspired by" the steaming piece of crap that was the pre-packaged 4e rules or not, the fact remains that your system is a unique system to itself. The fact that it is so very simple and yet so very much better than the packaged rules is about as bitter an indictment of what they sold as anything could be. You're running with virtually no rules at all, and that's still better than what they wrote.

-Frank

But I am just using the basic skill checks, which are also in the rules.

Frank, I really need to ask you a question here. Pure curiosity, I'm not trying to be a dick and not playing mod or anything...

But if you really hate D&D 4e so much, why do you relentlessly post in every thread about it?

Frank likes to argue, plain and simple. He is more excited when he can pull math in to back up a point...

He also takes things a little out of perspective, at times. He posted a link to an ENWorld thread and I spent about 2 hours reading through a ton of posts. Then there was a link to a post by a DnD dev that put everything back into perspective.

If you listen to Frank's arguments, he's 100% right. That is, unless you factor in DMs giving +/- 2 mods to good/bad use of a skill. Or the fact that some skills, when used the first time, grant an automatic success (which greatly changes that 11% figure he always talks about). Or the fact that higher complexity, per RAW, does not equate to higher difficulty...it equates to more complex and many times a longer investment in the character's time.

So yeah, only a 11% chance to succeed, when you ignore important features of the RAW...

Well, I can't speak for him, but if I were in his position, able to use mathematics to examine RPG rules I mean, I suppose I'd feel an imperative to do something like what he's doing on the grounds that very poorly done RPG rules represent cynical commercialism, which has ruined many a hobby.

Remember, this always explains everything for me...

True...I mean, I like the fact that he is so passionate about pointing out mathematical flaws in RPGs. I'd actually pay money to get that type of analysis of the games I play, so I know where the weak points are and have a way to improve game play.

I'd also think he'd have a good foundation to create his own system that is mathematically sounds. Granted, it likely wouldn't sell unless it was attached to a big name in RPGs, but that could happen.

I think my biggest issue is having someone find a flaw and then rant about how worthless and terrible the whole system is. I mean, I had so much fun with our new DnD4 campaign, to hear someone say its all horrible...well, I just can't agree because I've played it and its fun.

As a side note, I've played Heroes System and it had so much math (which i assume is quite sounds, since that's the focus) and frankly, I never got into it because of all the calcs...

You know what? I'm not even going to click on that link because I stopped reading after .http://xkcd and I already know exactly which comic you're referring to.

edit: ahh, it made a link out of my fragment. Bad link! Bad, bad link! (fixed with an unobtrusive period)
Also, I haven't voted yet because I haven't made up my mind yet.

Complex maths is not the same as a good system. For example, aside from the retarded hitpoints issue, combat in D&D 4th is actually pretty solidly balanced. Everyone stays on the random number generator, combats are usually 'fair' and it all hangs together. It's a mathematically strong system.

It's a bit bland ability wise, but there you go. It is mathematically sound (aside from retarded hitpoints issue)

If you want to see what Frank did for D&D 3.5 edition in terms of 'new matrix' style rules overhauls, you can check it out http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=48453 It includes flavour text, class descriptions and other material, and probably could have been sold as a D20 sourcebook if you had someone print it and provide art. It does change the feel of the game, and makes it fiercely more complex because of the range of abilities that each character has.

I suspect part of the reason that he's so vigorous about it is that he has a significant emotional investment into it

The thing is, he's made his point. He's explained it all very clearly about a dozen times now. Obviously not everyone agrees with him, or agrees that the game has to be played strictly by the book. I know that this doesn't effect me, my interest in the game, or how I'm going to run the game in the slightest.

It's not that he's making the argument that has me baffled, it's the fact that he is just relentlessly defending his opinion, despite the fact that pretty much no one is really arguing with him anymore. Even when folks say "Well, yeah, you're right, but I can fix that" he continues to argue.

I realize this is the internet, and the internet is all about pointless argument (sadly), but Frank seems like a somewhat intelligent guy. And I just don't personally understand how he can be so single minded, so critical, and so disrespectful to other people and their opinions, because he's simply not willing to allow other people to have opinions or disagree with him, at least on this subject.

I disagree with folks all the time, but I make my case, respond when necessary for clarification or correction, but there quickly comes a point in a point of discourse when I realize any further discussion is pointless, and walk away.

<shrug> Like I said, it was mostly curiosity on my part. From a mod standpoint, as long as he stays civil, he can disagree until his fingers fall off from typing. But from a personal standpoint, folks who do this really baffle me.

Bull

Bull, what's your deal?

People keep coming back with rebuttals to my points which are mathematically flawed, and I keep defending my thesis with objective maths.

The part I don't get is where you brought and demanded a positive happy discussion about the latest and (not) greatest D&D version on the biggest Shadowrun forum. Seriously, what's the deal with that? This is a place for fans of Shadowrun to congregate and discuss things, why would you be surprised that these very fans might be anti-fans of an entirely different game's latest edition?

Especially for 4th edition D&D. It moved in what is essentially the complete opposite direction of Shadowrun. The latest edition is so combat driven that the built-in rules for out-of-combat interaction don't work at all. In the name of balance, they've made everyone contribute and behave in combat in pretty much the same way. Pretty much everyone gets the same choices of whether to use a super move that does more damage or use a super move that Tekken juggles their opponent for a turn. That's your choice whether you're using Baffling Arrows or Color Sprays or whatever.

It's a fun game as long as what you want is a short duration brainless hack and slash where you kill some monsters and move on to doing something else. You'd be as well served with Warhammer Fantasy Battle as a "roleplaying system" (note: Fantasy Battle, not even Fantasy Roleplay). Why are you surprised that such an offering would genuinely offend Shadowrun players? The board consensus has been that playing D&D "gave you cancer" even back when the game pretended to cater to long campaigns and out-of-combat interactions.

You're wondering why Shadowrunners aren't happy with a new edition that expressly forbids you from using magic to turn invisible and sneak around an enemy castle. Take a step back for a moment: what Earthly reason do you have to express surprise in this situation?

-Frank

The only thing I have to say to this is that a lot of the fixes are mathematically flawed. So of course a math-minded guy is going to want to point out those mathematical flaws. Certainly if a fix is mathematically flawed then it is not truly a fix.

At some point I would think you would quit, is all I was saying. You don't like the game, clearly have no intention in playing, so I wonder why you bother? (I also wonder why everyone else bothers responding after a certain point, but generally your sparring partners seem to rotate out after a few posts).

<shurg>

Basically, I think the folks you're arguing with basically feel like you're telling them they're wrong if they're willing or able to have fun with this game. I know I do. And that irritates me to no end. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and as long as your opinion isn't insulting or inflammatory, you're welcome to post it. But once you start insinuating that *my* opinion is wrong, that's where I take offense.

I'll flat out admit... I don;t care about the numbers or the math. I've been gaming for 20 odd years, and been GMing since I was 8 years old. I can balance the game without knowing the percentages, and at the end of the day, the story and whether or not we're having fun is the only thing that matters.



Not surprised in the least. But we had 2 or 3 threads already that were nothing but bitch fests. I intended that to be a thread where folks could discuss the changes and new stuff without saying "This sucks!" or getting told that if they like the game, they were doing it wrong. Unfortunatly you ruined that pretty damned quick, since you feel it's necessary to respond to every single post that's not hating on the game, telling everyone how flawed the game is, how bad the math is, and how much you hate it.

It may surprise you to know that some folks around here play more than one game, and play more than one game style, and *gasp* enjoy more than one game style.



Wow, way to take things out of context, Frank. Good job.

Gonna let you in on a little secret here. Go back and reread my comments and questions here. I didn;t say a damn thing about anyone else. I called *you* out, and I did so politely, out of sheer curiosity. I didn't ask you why you didn't like the game. I simply asked why you post the same fucking thing 300 times, over and over again like a bloody parrot with tourettes.

The D20 gives you cancer thing was a joke, and had to do with D20, not D&D, because of the way D20 was "infecting" the gaming industry, and almost everyone but Shadowrun jumped on the bandwagon. D20 was a seriously flaweed system as well, and was hideously "crunchy", which was one reason I disliked it as much as I did. I was definately in the forefront of the crowd calling it cancer.

Know what? I also played more D&D 3.X than I did any other game during that period, and I had a lot of fun. Because that's why I game, to have fun.

I didn't expect everyone to like D&D4. But there are a few folks around here who did, and I wanted to discuss with them, rationally, civilly, what they thought of the new game. Because I usually consider the posters of this board to be intelligent, interesting, and a good bunch to hold a conversation with.

Unfortunatly, too many folks just want to have arguments. <shrug> That's fine. But it's a sad fucking day when I feel I can find a better conversation about damn near anything on RPG.net than I can on Dumpshock.

Bull

I played SR since first edition, and D&D since 2E. Both are my preferred game systems - SR for anything modern, D&D for fantasy. That's talking about the rules, not the background. I even had some crossovers, mixing D&D and SR characters on whacky astral quests, and running both rules systems together.

And I'd like to discuss the new edition of D&D as well.

Seriously?

OK, let's take a step back. Andy Collins writes a brand new game system and charges you actual money to pick up a copy. Like a hundred real dollars of actual money. He promises you that he made a brand new skill challenge that is easy to use and works at all levels. Unfortunately, he never bothered to play this system or use the 7th grade algebra required to vet it, and it turns out that the system does not work at all.

Then I tell people "Yeah, the new skill challenge system? It doesn't live up to the hype. In fact, it doesn't work at all."
And when people come in new to the discussion and say "Yay! Andy Collins says that this new skill challenge system is easy to use and works at all levels! That's great!"
And then I tell them: "Dude, Andy Collins lied to you, that system doesn't work. Here's actual math that demonstrates this to be the case."

And you're mad at... me?

Andy Collins lied to you and sold you over a hundred dollars of merchandise on false pretenses. Why the fuck are you mad at me?

-Frank

I think everyone gets that the system is mathematically wrong. Even WotC admitted to that, and said it was very embarassing that it made it into the book past testing - not sure if it was a wrong version of the rules that got printed by mistake, or if they really didn't find the fault.

But, Frank, no need to repeat it again and again and again.

You just don't get it. *sigh*

I have one more in me, and then, as I said I do, I walk away. I put my mod hat back on, and I don;t discuss stuff anymore, because it's not worth the hassle, and it can only laughably be called a discussion.

Andy Collins, or whoever, is selling me a game. Not math. That game is there to facilitate storytelling, nothing more.

One very small portion of those rules has a flaw in it's math. Big fucking deal. I can fix that. Easily. I lower my target numbers, I reduce the number of successes need. Whatever. Hell, it's a test that tracks the numebr of success you get. That's a bloody Shadowrun style test right there! Holy crap! I think, somehow, I can manage.

<shrug> Like I said, I don;t see these flaws you're seeing. The entire game doesn't hinge on one set of dice rolls. And if it does, man, that GM sucks balls.

Besides, I'm gonna let you in on a secret, and it will probably make you and a few others around here cry, because they seem to hold this scared. But I have a motto. Two of them, actually. I learned it from my original SR GM, it's been passed on to everyone else I've gamed with and taught to GM.

"Dice are for sound effect only". The second one is "Put on a show, and Fate will smile".

Translated, these mean that I never let my dice (as GM) dictate the game and the story. I have a good idea of where I want to go, and I am telling a story. An interactive one that the players are playinga round in, and can effect. But I'm not going to let the dice ruin the game or that story.

The second one means that, conversely, the dice shouldn;t ruin the players side of the game or their story either. They're not always going to succeed, and if they're stupid, they can and will die. But if they're trying, if they're putting on a good show and having fun and making the game more fun for everyone else? I'm not going to penalize them for a shitty die roll.

And most gamers I know are like that.

So yeah, I'm mad at you. Because you are unwilling to let anyone else even try and enjoy this game. YOu insist on yelling at the top of your lungs over and over that "MATH IS BROKEN! OMG!!!! WTF!!!!!" The way you go on, you'd think that the WotC dev team personally shot you dog, raped your cat, and pissed in your cheerios.

Caine, me, and anyone else that are interested will be playing some D&D4 at Origins. If I can pin Mike Mearls down and he's not too busy, I'm gonna try and talk him into GMing a demo for us even. And I'd bet cash money, we'll have fun.

Even if the math is broken.

Bull

I am not mad at you. I even thanked you in a different post for pointing out the problem. I just wanted to give you some insight into your average gamer. Andy Collins didn't sell me shit. I didn't buy the game based on the skill challenges. Not all the books are ruined because of the skill challenges being broken, which means I can still play and have fun with the rest of the system.

I plan on playing DnD4 just like I play everygame I own, my way using the rules as needed. The goal is to have fun.

Aric

I'm pretty stubborn as well...and I feel partially responsible for continuing to respond to Frank. Don't know why I try to do that, but when I come into work in the morning and see a few new posts, I am somewhat disjointed to the prior discussions and go back on the wagon and defend some more...

Frank is relentless, that is for sure:)

Our first session, we had a blast. Didn't stumble over any rules or have to look any special rules up. Granted, we didn't get to any skill challenges, so maybe when we hit that, all six of us will decide the game is ruined and burn our books. I doubt it though...

If anything, I'd commend the new version with enabling new gamers to jump into the system and have fun right from the start. In fact, we had a brand new player have a character built within 30 minutes and started playing without issue. Only time will tell if this level of enjoyment will hold over the long term. I'll get back to you in 9-12 months...

What is the mathematically unsound retarded hitpoints issue?

As people go up in level their damage rises much slower than the hit points needed to kill enemies. As such, the number of rounds it takes to kill enemies goes up, and it goes up faster than the number of abilities you have increases. So as you get to higher levels you end up falling back on your primary abilities more and more. Your two primary abilities that you get at first level.

So high level play spends a lot of time with you using Ray of Frost every round, for a lot of rounds. Kind of stultifying in my opinion. But some people really like using their first or second standard attack mode over and over again. So unlike the "out of combat rules" (which are all shit), the time dilation of late game play is actually a feature for some people. It's not my cup of tea, but I don't think that I can say objectively that it is necessarily bad.

I can say objectively that I think that Mike Mearls' preview about how they had done away with Wizards firing a crossbow or a fighter using his basic attack every round for the new edition was a pack of lies, half truths, and also lies. High level play you are relegated to using one of your two attack powers every round for many many rounds. The fact that the 4e Wizard gets to spend 13 combat rounds shooting "magic missile" at his enemies isn't super different from a 3e Wizard getting to spend 13 rounds shooting crossbow bolts at his enemies. While it's technically not exactly the same thing, it is in my opinion essentially identical. The fact that a Fighter spends the vast majority of his combat rounds saying "I hit him with Tide of Iron" isn't especially different from the 3e Fighter spending the vast majority of the time saying "I hit him with my Longsword."

-Frank

I don't have the books yet, and I haven't had a chance to look at them, but I'm really only concerned with one thing; does 4th ed use all six basic dice?

Yes, but as always, the d12 gets very little love. Poor, lonely d12.

Pretty much the only thing I use a d12 for is as a turn counter in Warhammer.

As a Warlord (my choice of first character) you don't need any dice. One of your 1st level at-will powers is simple spending your standard action to give any ally a free basic melee attack. I probably used that 4 or 5 times in our first combat. It was all about moving to give my allies combat advantage and handing out extra attacks like they were candy:)

..chose "no intention" as my recreational toy budget is already spoken for by Shadowrun and my new passion of 3D CG. Besides I heard the core rules cost over 100$. That's more than the price of a .5TB external HDD which is a more pressing need right now.

Yup, retail is $115...pricey.

I got a pre-order in, which was only $57 for all three core books. If I wouldn't have gotten that, I doubt I would have bought anything but the PHB. The books are really nice though. Full color throughout.

Yep, let's put me in the camp of "I will never get back the time or money they stole from me." I'll add to that that this edition may well spell the end of visceral gaming in time. Even GURPS has it's head up it's fourth point of contact nowadays, a bit at least, with their emphasizing of the "Dungeon Fantasy" line and with the primary spokesperson for the game in their own forums stating blatantly that serious games want serious fluffiness and hate the visceral. It's sad, sad , sad.


Isshia

Oh, sure there is. When it keeps getting ignored, again and again and again, in defense of the system and how wonderful it is and how it improves gaming on all levels...which is the subtext of most of the pro 4E apologies.

It is VERY worth it to say, again and again and again, that the system doesn't do what it claims it does if it helps one person not to waste $100+ of their hard earned cash on it.


Isshia