Found this at the bargain book store, Never heard of it and google

It's okay. I personally wouldn't recommend it, but it might suit your tastes.

The thing about roleplaying games is that the only real way to understand them is to play them and see how you personally feel about them, and whether or not they suit your needs or tastes.

Sure, there's a certain cutoff where the quality is so bad that the game shouldn't be recommended to anyone, but any of the flagship D&D products is pretty safe from that cutoff, and how good it is really ends up being a matter of personal experience and opinion.

Certainly a polarizing edition of the DnD, but as a Tactical Skirmish game, I don't think any edition has done a better job of making each class feel unique.

I personally miss the clear roles or Tank, Striker, Leader or Control, but I do completely understand those folks who don't like it, or think its' "Not DnD".

Its quite a departure from the 3.x formula.

>>54881334
>google doesn't have any results
literally the first result
http://cadwe.free.fr/cadr/DD4/Player's%20Handbook.pdf

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>>54881334
>google doesn't have any results

The best edition of D&D that nobody wants to play.

>>54881843
Are you brain dead? Or just autistic.

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>>54881334

It's a game which generated a lot of mixed feelings. I love it, but if you want to run it there's some important things to know.

D&D 4e isn't about adventurers. It's about Heroes. The default assumption the game makes is that you are grand, larger than life badasses who are already awesome and just keep getting better.

The system is, fundamentally, a game about telling stories of fantasy heroes. A huge amount of the work goes into the combat system, but that's kind of the point. It's a game about feeling awesome, about carving through enemies and taking on terrifying monsters and winning. You can lose, you can suffer, and there are real costs, but it's still generally less gritty than most other versions of D&D.

If you want to run it? First, get the offline character builder and get familiar with funin.space. The character builder makes making characters easy, funin.space is a compendium of literally all the content right at your fingertips. And unlike other editions of D&D, there's a lot of content and most of it is actually usable.

Most of it, because some of it isn't. Avoid Essentials classes like the plague. The feats and shit are okay, but the classes are dire.

The monster stats in the first and second monster manuals suck and make for slow, boring combat. Monster Manual 3 and the Monster Vault fix this, while pic related summarises the new math for making your own enemies.

Also, every PC will need an Expertise feat and Improved Defences. It's pretty easy to give them out for free with the builder, and they basically just fix the math scaling.

It's not a game for everybody, and it has a relatively narrow scope compared to other editions (although I'd argue other editions mostly failed at actually executing that scope), but if you like what it does there's very little that does it better.

>>54881334
Ah yes, the eternal hypocrisy.

Perhaps you'll want to warn him about the HIDEOUSLY BROKEN MATH IN COMBAT, the FEATS YOU NEED TO GET FOR FREE TO MAINTAIN VIABILITY, or perhaps tell him about THE FIVE WORTHLESS CLASSES? Maybe give him a heads up on COMBINING ESSENTIALS AND 4E BREAKS THE GAME BADLY?

No other game has such a deceptive fanbase.

>>54881938
Except for you, You're a cool guy.

>>54881986
Fucking what?

>>54881986

Dude, so many fucking games have way more deceptive fanbases than 4e. Just look at all the people who say 3.PF is a good system.

>>54881938
That card is actually pretty useful. I liked 4E for what it was, and if I ever run it again I'll def use that as a reference.

>>54881986
>No other game has such a deceptive fanbase.
3.5 holdouts are about the same so far as that goes.

If you ask me 3.5 shares some core flaws with 4e. Ultimately the biggest one, which also enables other irksome bits in both games, comes down to WotC using aggressive publishing schedules to attempt to fix parts of the game without fully acknowledging the problems were ever there.

>>54881986
What? Every thread about 4e mentions and accepts those. Most recommendations I've read make sure to mention them. If you want a deceptive fanbase look at how badly some people still deny caster supremacy in 3.x.

>>54881986
And that's on par with a fanbase that vehemently denies that CoDzilla exists and says that Fighters are good how?

>>54881986
Literally >>54881938

>>54881938
http://blogofholding.com/?p=782
MM3 math is still slightly off, it's not a big deal but the above article is a good additional modification to the formula.

>>54881986
>No other game has such a deceptive fanbase.

Y'know, I could accept being turned off at a little bit of beginning complexity.

But saying something like that when you have games with rancid shit level game design such as Pathinder or 3.5e invalidates your point.

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>>54881334
It's my favorite game, and I still regularly run it today.

The game genuinely feels like a fantasy novel in which the PC's are the protagonists, but the diminishing resource of healing surges still keeps the pressure on, especially when you realize that since surges represent protagonist plot-shield, non-combat encounters can cost surges too.

Also, be generous with the refluff. Because fluff and mechanics are largely seperated, it's easy to make a previously nonexistant, or mechanically unviable, character concept by taking the mechanics of an existing class and re-skinning it. For example, a "necromancer" could be a shaman who summons skeletons instead of "spirit companions."

If you try to run a game in a living breathing world in which the PC's are just unexceptional mercenaries trying to loot enough gold to retire before dying a horrible death, which mind you is a valid type of game too, look elsewhere, because this game will FAIL at that.

So... 4e general?

>>54883492
What's your game like anon?

>>54885942
It's very over the top Pulp-Fantasy.

Over the course of two campaigns, off of mostly improv, I've wound up creating a setting where the fey are extremely prominent, but more like the O.G. Grimm's Fairy Tales.

I let the players go wild with their concepts, so there's a lot of wackey variety in character concepts, but we play it up semi-seriously for pulpy fun.

It's a lot like John Carter meets old-school Fairy Tales.

The party consists of a tribal child warrior who drank the soul of a shapeshifter created by their witch-doctor-god as a part of his manhood ritual, a kung-fu wuxia-witch who escaped this world's equivalent of hiroshima by fleeing into fairy, a plowshares-to-swords orc who just wants to save his wife, and a 7-foot-tall half-fairy who is actively denying his destiny as a fey lord by living the grizzly-adams wild-man archetype.

They've been fighting the agents of the recently awoken "True Dragons" who are as far beyond regular dragons as dragons are beyond mortals. During heroic tier, they fought their agents, and liberated a city from their influence. During paragon tier they hunted the dragons down one by one, though each one got stronger with the death of the others. Finally, they just hit epic tier by killing the last dragon, but they used help from a mysterious stranger. It turns out the helper was a pshcyic manifestation of the dimension that the true-dragons come from: they were accidental splinters from its mass consciousness, and it does not yet have the concept of individual sapience.

>>54881334
Funny guy

Great game, not for everyone, doesn't try to be for everyone. Medieval Avengers the Marvel kind, not the class.
Have flaws, everyone knows it, doesn't try to hide and offer the fixes for it.

Really want a new edition that follows the concept and fixes the math while expanding on it.
No, Striker!, you don't appeal to me

>>54888181
:(

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>>54881930
>anon provides perfect suitable answer to OP's stupid question
>Another anon acts extremely hostile at with this solution to the problem
...Are you autistic?

>>54892023
>Bumping this trash thread to take obvious bait
:thinking:

>>54892023
Your search included "4e" you blathering retard.
Any person who found that book and searched for D&D Players Handbook wouldn't find such an unpopular result.

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>>54892481
..?

>>54892541
That's how you know it's bait.

>>54881865
>I don't think any edition has done a better job of making each class feel unique.
trying this hard

>>54881938
DnD 4E should have just been a super hero game

>not tied to iconic classes, can embrace the role system
>making teamwork necessary fits much better with the team based dynamic of super heroes
>power system makes much more sense for super abilities than for stuff like Fighters or Rogues without having to suck some meta-narrative cock

>>54892987

Eh, I think it works fine for what it is.

>>54881334
Second or third best edition behind BECMI and B/X.

Rolled 6, 11, 20 + 5 = 42 (3d20 + 5)

It's not D&D but it's not a terrible game. It's a tactical game really.

>>54893029

Can you qualify or explain that statement at all, or is it just as arbitrary and unfounded as every other time someone has tried to make that claim?

>>54893029
The cover disagrees with you. It is as much D&D as any other aberrant edition, like say 3.x.

>>54893004
Had they not slapped the name DnD on there, we wouldn't have to deal with the shitshow that is pathfinder and paizo.

I agree that the system itself is acceptable, but trying to turn DnD into fantasy super heroes was a bad idea.

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>>54892987
>DnD 4E should have been a super hero game
Hardly. While it tried its best to hype up the PCs as grand heroes in the chapter intros, the actual things PCs can do in 4e are quite limited. It does not suit the superhero genre at all.

>>54893066

But the name wasn't slapped on. It was D&D. Making something that wasn't D&D, even with the same design principles, would have resulted in a completely different game.

>>54893043
It's a tit-rattling temper tantrum brought to you by the "The rules forbid roleplaying" brigade who are part of the "Flimsy wooden doors get harder to kick down as you level up" cabal, which is the parent company of "I ignore the importance of defense stats, keywords, and damage types" and sons.

>>54893073
That's just a question of what powers they get though.

>>54893098
>Making something that wasn't D&D, even with the same design principles, would have resulted in a completely different game.
Of course, and it would have probably been for the better.

>>54893066

If it did not have the D&D name, 4e would never have gotten off the ground. The D&D brand is the most recognizable one in its industry, anything else would have hardly any new players at all.

>>54893073
Not really? I mean, okay, they aren't cosmis level superheroes like Supes (usually) but you get some pretty epic stuff going on by, well, epic.

I mean, just sort of wandering out of hell when you die and being able to steal people's thoughts, ambitions etc. are pretty superheroic.

>>54893066
I mean, 3e was very different from previous editions, just because 5e went back and committed to doing very little new and just refining and streamlining a previous edition doesn't mean D&D shouln't try to do something different. And it is still very much D&D, if it was released under a different name it would be called a D&D clone. It would have gone better had they called it something else of course, but that's something we can say with hindsight - they should have playtested and all that but they couldn't know there would be such a backlash.

>>54893043
>Can you qualify or explain that statement at all.
Yes. It came out in 2008 and here we are nine years later, it's successor edition has already been out for 3 years. The D&D community rejected it. They tried to rework it but failed and threw in the towel to pump out 5e. WotC can slap a D&D logo on a product but that doesn't mean the community is going to buy into their shit.

>>54893181

So your argument boils down to 'I didn't like it', got it. That doesn't actually stop it being D&D, y'know.

>>54893130
>anything else would have hardly any new players at all.
not if it was good. 4E was released in 2007. that's already the age of the startup. make a quality product and it will gain traction.
otherwise how do you explain shit like mutants and masterminds?

>>54893145
>I mean, 3e was very different from previous editions, just because 5e went back and committed to doing very little new and just refining and streamlining a previous edition doesn't mean D&D shouln't try to do something different
there's a difference between experimenting mechanically and changing the basic design assumptions.

>they should have playtested and all that but they couldn't know there would be such a backlash
Had they had any clue about their demographic, they could have. changing basic elements of your game is a stupid idea 99% of the time.

>>54881986
>post right above him does all of those things
???

>>54893066
>trying to turn DnD into fantasy super heroes was a bad idea.
So you dislike 3e then?
Because that is when the game became fantasy superheroes.

>>54893202
No, the argument boils down to the community doesn't like it and said fuck you to WotC.

Star Trek fucking Discovery sure as shit isn't fucking Star Trek either despite what name gets slapped on it. Same thing.

>>54893217
>changing basic elements of your game is a stupid idea 99% of the time.
So 3e is stupid then?
Because it radically changed how almost every subsystem worked with the exception of how casting worked.
>>54893220
>does all those things
>says outright that Essentials is a poor choice for classes, MM1+2 are to avoided, 2 tax feats should be given for free to fix the math and then forgotten

>>54893265

And the chunk of community who enjoyed 4e? While it was still being published it sold really well and was widely played.

>>54893140
>but you get some pretty epic stuff going on by, well, epic.
You really can't, though. Take a serious look at the epic powers. Even the most powerful, level 29 daily attack powers are just "do a bit more damage than your lower-level powers and put a status effect for six seconds (that is, one round)". Even low-power supes like spider-man outgun level 30 D&D 4e characters.

>>54893295

So you have no idea how the system actually works, got it.

Taking combat abstractions out of context to try and make a point is really, really stupid.

>>54893276
as I elaborated earlier, mechanical changes aren't necessarily changes of design assumptions, no matter how sweeping. You could change DnD to a D100 system and it could remain DnD.

3.5 changed a lot, but generally scaled up as much as it scaled up characters.

4E changed how the party dynamic and resources worked, both of which are integral to the identity of the game.

>>54893276
That's what I meant. The post above madanon explicitly laid out everything he implied 4e fans pretend don't exist.

Only thing it didn't mention was the broken classes, and Runepriest/Seeker/Assassin are still serviceable, they're just bad. It's like tier 3 versus tier 5.

4e needed another year or so in development. It needed people to kick the shit out of anyone who said "Hey we should take fan favorites out of the first PHB and put it in future supplements!" or "How the current gear and magic item and rituals are handled is okay for a finalized product." or "Skill challenges lmao!"

I liked what they were proposing, but they did it all at once and it seemed at the time we were losing a ton of old favorites. The whole release was a chaotic mess that could have easily been avoided by dialing back the treadmill a good amount.
D&D players weren't ready for total integration with online yet. And WotC's hyperfocus on that for the first three years of the edition sank it.

>>54893343

Runepriest doesn't deserve to be in the same category. Or Seeker, really. They're all different.

Runepriests can be good leaders, their only flaw is a lack of options.

Seekers are just utterly mediocre by design, and are generally not worth using.

Assassin is raw garbage that just does not fucking work.

>>54893365

Being fair, I'd say it was WotC's hyperfocus combined with the utter failure of their digital side after their lead programmer murdered his wife and then killed himself.

>>54893365
DnD players wanted DnD and not something using the DnD-name to launch a game with very different assumptions about how adventuring, party roles, combat and character growth works.
If they really are just tasteless sheep following the brand, people wouldn't be making the switch from 3.5 or Pathfinder to 5E now.

>>54893402

But 4e really didn't change that much.

It changed how things looked, and was honest about how some things worked, but there's very little present in 4e that wasn't present in 3.5, it's just presented differently and more honestly.

>>54893420
Stop deluding yourself and you might understand why 3.5 got a sequel in the end and 4E didn't.

>>54893420
It looked like it was changing everything though. And those first six months sank the edition

>>54893402
If they weren't tasteless sheep then Pathfinder wouldn't exist.

>>54893470

I'm fully aware why 3.5 got a sequel. It's entirely unrelated to the actual design of the game.

>>54893476

Yeah. Perception is very important, and as much as I like 4e WotC did utterly fuck up their launch and marketing.

>>54893402
4e took the same assumptions 3.5 had, and made them work.

It did standardize resources, but that just means that the management that was focused on one character is now spread out amongst the party. It didn't change the nature of the adventure.

Of course everyone is entitled to feeling how they want about it.

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>>54893402

>DnD players wanted DnD

Tell me anon what IS DnD?

>>54893217
You're underestimating the sheer amount of material that it took to make 4e.

>>54893328
>4E changed how the party dynamic and resources worked
Party dynamic was actually changed far less compared to 3e, where class niche protection virtually disappeared entirely. I'm not even sure how you typed such a bald lie out and expect it to be believed.
>resource management
This did change. It turned into most games on the market where every class works on the same chassis, rather than trying to balance a number of different subsystems (and failing since Basic to achieve it).
I've noticed it was only a problem if your gaming experience was primarily 3.PF.

>>54893490
It's not that they don't have taste but rather that they have bad taste. Still lying about yourself about how 4Es problem was in presentation only and that scared everybody is just retarded. People had a taste and it definitely was not 4E.

>>54893506
>I'm fully aware why 3.5 got a sequel. It's entirely unrelated to the actual design of the game.
You're an idiot. If it were, 4E would have succeeded, and Pathfinder, which by the way had as much aesthetic changes as 4E would have failed.

>>54893507
>4e took the same assumptions 3.5 had, and made them work.
It absolutely did not. You can't build a generalist in 4E, you have your role and are dependent on your team. in earlier editions, you were much more like a band of wolves, capable on your own.
Having mechanics reflect fluff is important for mechanic heavy games, and especially with the simulations roots of DnD resorting to this meta-narrative cop out was lazy.
Adventure scaling was much more expected. In early editions, ending a boss battle with a single spell was ok, it was just another stat bock. 4E advises you to prevent that with predetermined encounters per day to be able to play through your scripted dragon fight. It's a different approach.

>Of course everyone is entitled to feeling how they want about it.
There's no feeling about it, these are the facts. DnD players at large didn't like 4E. Most people did not.
3.5 and Pathfinder have 10 times 4Es number of games and 5 times the players on roll20, do you think that's just 'feelings'?

>>54893518
To crush your d12s, see them driven before you... er what was the question?

>>54893528
wut?

>>54893529
class niche protection wasn't a thing after chainmail though, because the niches were so fucking broad as to be meaningless.
Look at the biggest RPGs.
DnD 3.5 and 5 have mechanical seperation
Shadowrun tends into this direction with hacking
WoD Disciplines do wildly different and nebulous things
the biggest games do that m8

>>54883492
4e is the perfect game for over the top pulp stuff. To get my players in the mood I generally have them read a R. E. Howard short story a week before. It's kind of what you ought to be going for, really. You're not gonna get Lord of the Rings, you're gonna get Conan.

4e does succeed extremely well at doing pulp stuff, but it fails trying to be anything else. Which is not a bad thing at all, it takes a special kind of game to pull off "trying to be everything at once", like GURPS, which is explicitly designed to be the sort of game that can pull that off.

>>54893721
Conan can bisect a dude more than once a day though

>>54893711
I have missed this style of edition wars retardation.

>>54893711
>Shadowrun tends into this direction with hacking
>WoD Disciplines do wildly different and nebulous things
Are also both well known for having HORRENDOUS internal balance issues. Using them as an example of good game design is flawed on face.
>class niche protection wasn't a thing after chainmail though, because the niches were so fucking broad as to be meaningless
>rogue being the only one with a strong breadth of skills
>fighter gaining multiple attacks, more hp, autoslaying mooks
>wizard, cleric both holding reign over their respective fields

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>>54893711

>To crush your d12s, see them driven before you... er what was the question?

Nice way to avoid the question because you're too much of a retard to answer it.

retard.

>>54893711

The funny thing is, 3.x was designed around the idea of class roles. They just screwed it up.

The playtests were all run with tank fighters, blaster wizards, healbot clerics and backstabber rogues. It's why the system ended up so shitty, because rather than figuring out how the mechanics actually worked in practice, they only tested it in the way they intended it to work.

>>54893732
>implying that's how stuff goes
You know attacks don't have to be word for word what they're written, right? And bisecting is just a death, not a daily.

>>54893711
>You can't build a generalist in 4E

False.

>you have your role and are dependent on your team

3rd assumed this. Do you really think 3rd didn't assume the cleric will heal and the wizard will blast? That's how their playtests went, even (that's partly why those classes are bonkers).

>in earlier editions, you were much more like a band of wolves, capable on your own.

Capable _in your own role_. The Thief wasn't a capable warrior. The Wizard had to prepare and couldn't improvise, the Fighter only had mundane approaches and his weapons, etc.

D&D always used well defined niches until 3rd. 3rd tried to, but fucked up.

>mechanics fluff stuff

has nothing to do with what you are replying to, but I understand that your immersion is easily shattered.

>Shadowrun tends into this direction with hacking

Hacking and the Matrix was made to work the same as Astral (i.e. magic) in later editions.

>WoD Disciplines do wildly different and nebulous things

Disciples are not classes. They are like powers, which are plenty diverse mechanically.

>>54893779
why? I don't even think 3.5 is better, nowadays I mostly play Runequest modded and houseruled to fuck and GURPS.

However, it's delusional to blame presentation and customer anxiety on 4Es fundamental failure to replicate core concepts present in DnD so far. As I said, the mechanics aren't even that bad, had it tried to be its own thing and not tried to ride the coattail of something very different, it would have fared better.

>>54893788
>Are also both well known for having HORRENDOUS internal balance issues. Using them as an example of good game design is flawed on face.
They're among the most successful RPGs out there, though. Maybe most people don't care about the things you perceive to be massive balance issues as much as you think.

>>54893816
Basically open class niches, simulationist approach to world building, character options, medium to high lethality depending on level
there's more, but these are the important ones for discussing 4E

>>54893825
And bunnyhopping was a bug in the physics engine. A good dev knows, when to roll with it.

>>54893844
If 4E really is the best and does everything ADnD did and is so much better than 3.5, then why did it die? Oh, right because it couldn't and wasn't.
It's dead, you lost.
We could now have an actual discussion about the reason or you could continue being a retard, up to you m8

>>54893913

You really are good at ignoring the broader context of the market to cling to your prejudices. It's kinda sad. Especially when the actual financial situation that led to the 3.PF/4e split is actually really interesting in and of itself.

>>54893913
So D&D is defined by the things that are unique to 3.x?

>>54893913
I hope to god you are trolling, for your sake.

>>54893913
>They're among the most successful RPGs out there, though
Not only are you applying sales to quality, somehow, after already previously acknowledging that strength of brand power to get something to sell, you are ignoring how the same applies to SR and WoD.
Especially since all of the games, D&D included, find themselves hamstrung by mechanical ideas from the late 80's/early 90's that they refuse to do anything about because people consider the poor mechanics "part of the game".
People ate shit till they liked it, and now demand shit on their plate. Anyway, this has turned into a Virt style thread, and I'm out.
The rest of you ought to do the same.

>>54893913

>Basically open class niches,

They were more narrow in AD&D and earlier editions than they are in 4e.

>simulationist approach to world building,

What does "simulationist" mean?

>character options,

which 4e has

>medium to high lethality depending on level
there's more,

4e is more lethal than 3.5 in a lot of respects

>but these are the important ones for discussing 4E

These are a lot of empty meaningless words you're throwing out. Any examples? Instances? Specific quotes or comparisons you wish to make?

>>54893934
Then enlighten me, what was the reason for the split?

>>54893941
How the fuck did you play 2nd ed if you think these things are unique to 3.5?

>>54893996
>my mechanical taste is objectively better, these people just have no taste!
Keep rejecting reality, you autist, that will sure revitalize your dead game

>>54894002
You never played ADnD
Simulationist means not level scaling
4E doesn't even have multiclassing
It scaled down saveordies and saveorsucks, it scaled down early game lethality

What are you trying to argue anyway?

>>54894159

>4E doesn't even have multiclassing

Lying makes you look like an idiot

>>54894159

>Simulationist means not level scaling

PFHAH wow okay that's your only definition for that huh

>4E doesn't even have multiclassing

That's because each class has 400% more options than most base classes in 3.x do.

>It scaled down saveordies and saveorsucks, it scaled down early game lethality

That's not a bad thing? Save or dies and save or sucks boiled down to whether you lived or died to a fucking roll. There's no strategy there other than get your fucking save or die off first and hope you're lucky.

4e has actual depth to its lethality.

>What are you trying to argue anyway?

Initially that D&D has no definitive values or ideas because it's a conglomeration of random shit a bunch of nerds made in their basement but now it's just you're an idiot.

>>54894159
>Simulationist means not level scaling
So you're saying that in 3.X and older characters didn't go to more dangerous environments and face harder challenges? Because that's all the "level scaling" that there is in 4e.

>>54894159
>4E doesn't even have multiclassing

Multiclass feats and hybrids disagree. Level by level multiclassing was a mistake.

>>54894250
I think what he means is that older editions didn't push balanced encounters, instead focusing on what makes sense. If you encounter some trolls, that's 1d6+1 trolls no matter your level. If you go into the lair of a dragon, you're not going to just find some kobolds because you're level 2. However, I have no idea how this is the case in 3e, that was the edition that changed it IIRC.

>>54881689
Personally, I think if they just went a little deeper into tactical skirmish, and added a subtitle like "DnD: Tactics" the game would have been massively more accepted than it was.

>>54894565
It also doesn't take into account that in 4e if you were level 2 and decided to go into a dragon lair, you'd still find dangerous stuff and die because it's a dangerous place you shouldn't be at yet. All the advice on balanced encounters is for is to stop a DM sending the party to the dragon cave as part of his plot.

>>54894671
Of course it depends on the gm the most, but you know how challenging a monster is in later editions because they are suggested to be put in balanced encounters. In old monster manuals there's no CR, and with wildly varying numbers it's not really possible, and not really intended, to have entirely balanced encounters.

B8

>>54894617

I really don't get that idea at all. That 4e was somehow 'Not a roleplaying game'. Finally being able to do stuff out of combat with a martial character was a fucking relief after years of 3e bullshit.

This is 4e general, right?
What class can I use for the feel of "unnaturally sturdy undead/magically enhanced 'monster' that spews curses and ill effects at those nearby, and uses this to their advantage"? Are debuff runepriests a thing?

>>54881938
>but it's still generally less gritty than most other versions of D&D.
Arguable. The way healing surges work and the disease track make it much better for survival games than 3.PF at least, and for how much people like to bring up how many hit points PCs have in 4e, the monster math is designed assuming you're at full for every fight.

I've ended up have having way more PC deaths and party wipes in 4e than in 3.PF. It still feels really strange when people call 4e PCs basically invincible.

>>54895774

I could actually see a refluffed Warden working well for that

>>54895774
Bard and Cleric come to mind.

>>54881986
>HIDEOUSLY BROKEN MATH IN COMBAT
It was pre-MM3. It's pretty much fixed now, which is more than some other editions can say.

>FEATS YOU NEED TO GET FOR FREE TO MAINTAIN VIABILITY
Expertise and the defense feats help and are very much worth taking, but they're far from mandatory.

>THE FIVE WORTHLESS CLASSES
Cavalier and Binder are the only real worthless classes. All of the others are at least functional. Vampires just suffer from no real choices and Bladesingers are only worthless if you build them like shittier Wizards like the book tries to trick you into doing.

>COMBINING ESSENTIALS AND 4E BREAKS THE GAME BADLY
I legitimately have no idea what you even mean here. 4e and Essentials work fine together, seeing as Essentials is just 4e material.

>>54882298
>Every thread about 4e mentions and accepts those.
It's bizarre. The ones I hear the most legitimate complaints and problems about 4e tend to be 4e fans. Besides that it's usually just buzzwords and dead memes.

>>54893181
>The D&D community rejected it.
Where? The only people who rejected it were the diehard 3.PF fans, most of which have never played any edition before that, and still have yet to touch 5e because it's not 3.PF.

Even all the 2e people I met at worst are indifferent to it.

>>54895990
Generally 4e fans are the ones that understand the system and know the failures that it has and consistently discuss it. 4e has a lot of minor issues because of how tight its math is, but other than that it does its job extremely well. Comparatively people that complain about it tend to not entirely understand the system and just go off "feeling".

>>54893721
I've used it to create a number of different genres, just not "le classic fantasy as defined by experiences playing older versions of D&D" meme. I've run.
>Magical Girls
>Anime Mecha
>Howard-esque fantasy
>Barsoom
>Scott Pilgrim
The things, is most games are SETTING neutral, they just aren't TONE neutral. The same goes for GURPS as well. Before picking a system, don't ask yourself what setting you want to run; ask yourself what tone you want your game to have. House-ruling a system into a certain setting takes WAY less effort than altering the way in which core mechanics inform tone.

4E, thanks to fluff-crunch separation can run almost any setting, but the tone it informs is "HIGH HEROISM," and changing that is almost impossible.

GURPS has subsystems for almost any setting, and so can run basically any setting, but the TONE it informs is gritty realism/simulatuionism

Savage Worlds, again, is quite versatile in setting, but the TONE it informs is a bit of a balance between the two above tones, but with faster gameplay that's extremely steamlined (some would say to the point of boring simplicity, but I feel it has its place.)

GM determines SETTING.
System heavily informs TONE.

>>54896061
Honestly, that does make a lot of sense. That said:
>using 4e to run a Scott Pilgrim-like setting
I am very interested.

>>54895975
>COMBINING ESSENTIALS AND 4E BREAKS THE GAME BADLY
>I legitimately have no idea what you even mean here. 4e and Essentials work fine together, seeing as Essentials is just 4e material.
I will concede that it's a bit silly allowing a class to take powers from a different role essentials version of their class that just happens to share a name. For example, controllers tend to not have class features, and instead their powers are their features, and allowing a Leader Druid to take Controller Druid powers results in a Leader that sacrifices no leader-ness to be a complete controller in addition to being a leader.

I generally have the house rule of "if they are different roles, they are different classes, with separate power-pools; the fact that they share a name is inconsequential."

Even then, I'll sometimes allow someone to take a power that has become off-list, but, like every other homebrew, that requires GM approval.

Why didn't the put a monk class in this edition?

>>54896309
They did. What are you talking about?

>>54896309
They did, Player's Handbook 3. Best supported class from that handbook.

>>54896309
...they did?

>>54895425
To quote the last 4e thread :
>in 4e you play as a narrator /writer, not directly as the character.
The elements of that in 3e are the elements I see the most complaints in the real world, so when they made an edition where that was house the whole game worked, it killed the interest of a not insignificant portion of the fanbase.

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>>54895774
>>54895939

Revenant Bard. You clawed your way back for an encore.

>>54896627

I've never really seen it that way. I'm still playing my character, I'm just playing my character in the context of a story rather than a world. I know some peoples immersion can't survive that, but it's never been a problem for me.

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>>54896627
>The elements of that in 3e are the elements I see the most complaints in the real world, so when they made an edition where that was house the whole game worked, it killed the interest of a not insignificant portion of the fanbase.

>>54896627
>The elements of that in 3e are the elements I see the most complaints in the real world, so when they made an edition where that was house the whole game worked

Can I get that in english?

>>54896122
Seconding. I can see the general gist of how and why but I'd love to see the nitty-gritty of it.

>>54895990
Here are some complaints 4e players never make that are not just buzzwords.

>#1. you play as the narrator, rather than as the character./"dissociative mechanics"./ "feels like a boardgame"/whatever.
>#2. They butchered forgotten realms and released a bad joke of a parody of it instead (FR fans).
>#3. It's crappy for running classic 2e AD&D settings like regular forgotten realms, Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Spelljammer, or Planescape, simply because of the large changes mechanically which correspond to changes in the fluff, with no good mechanics that would match the old fluff.

There's a reason lots of people liked 5e more than 4e.

4e wasn't a bad game, but it's not a game I'd ever pull out if I "want to play d&d"

>>54896662
>>54896686
Has Anyone Really Been Far Even as Decided to Use Even Go Want to do Look More Like?

>>54896662
>>54896686

He's one of those people with an incredibly fragile sense of immersion. They deserve compassion and sympathy.

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Found OPs book a few weeks ago in my attic and played one game last week. I quickly realized this is more a tactical hero simulator.

Anywho, why does dual classing suck so much ass? You forego your possible "epic" class just for 4 powers?

>>54896717
>>54896686 #1.
In 4e you basically play as the narrator. In other editions of the game, you play more directly as your character. This was a large departure in playstyle, and not everyone liked it.

I was more or less indifferent to it, but that's the reason most of the people I know dropped it in favor of pathfinder or shadowrun or nwod or wh40krpg, or old stuff like role master.

>>54896892
4e lasted a year or so in my area (where there were already a lot of gamers with a lot of other games) before it became very hard to find a 4e game outside the lgs. My regular group dropped it after one 4 month campaign.

>>54896885
Hybrids solved that and were true dual-classing. PHB3. Decently balanced. Some stuff could be really strong; others were a trap, most were mediocre unless you knew what you were doing.

>>54897147

What's the difference between duals and hybrids?

>>54896717
>"dissociative mechanics"./ "feels like a boardgame"
Vague buzzwords.
Any chance you could explain what either of those terms actually mean? Everytime someone makes this complaint and I ask for elaboration, I just get silence in response, or "stupid 4rry, you wouldn't understand" to avoid actually having to back up their stance.

>>54897244
You're thinking of Paragon Multiclassing when you say "dual-classing". It's a bit more complex than that.

Multiclassing is basically picking up a feat for benefits. Some of them are quite useful - Swordmage multiclasses get to use Light and Heavy Blades as implements; certain Fighter multiclasses basically gain an attack for free... Anyhow, having a Multiclass feat means you count as that class for Epic Destinies, Paragon Paths and feats, but nothing else. Most people multiclass.

Paragon Multiclassing sacrifices four feat slots (your multiclass feat, plus the three "Multiclass Power" feats) and your Paragon Path (but not your Epic Destiny) for having 2 of every type of power from one class, and the rest from your main class. It's really dated, but you can do some interesting stuff with it if you've time in your hands. You start as a class and slowly add things from the other. Certain Paragon Multiclasses have a nifty thing where they open up a feat to pick up a class feature from the class you PMCed. You only get to pick on powers from your main class, though it's possible to "dodge the system" through feat retraining.

Hybrids are... weird. Essentially, you start as two half classes. You pick the worst option for AC, the best one for weapon proficiency, proficiency on both types of implements, have the delineated features that the rulebook says you have, and can pick up another extra feature with a feat.

Right. After all that's said and done, you have "full" access to both lists of powers. You need to have at least one power from each class as soon as possible but other than that, it's just that.

>>54897557
>Swordmage multiclasses get to use Light and Heavy Blades as implements;
Probably my favorite one personally. I had quite a few Bards take this and a Far reach weapon, to allow my chosen weapon to count as a melee weapon, ranged weapon, and implement, and basically pick any powers I wanted from then on.

>>54897557
>>54897603

I actually really like Multiclass Feats, at least in concept. A lot of them are great, although some are very meh. It made a lot more sense to me than level by level multiclassing, letting me express another facet of my character and add some uniqueness to their capabilities, along with the theme/pp/ed, without it being an annoying mess that threatened to make me useless as was the case with a lot of level by level stuff.

>>54897666
4e's multiclassing was a whole lot cleaner imho. You could balance the feature(s?) you got a lot easier by having a feat-dip, and the ability to spend feats to power-swap powers to other level-appropriate powers, than you could by trying to balance class features at every level (trying to make a class feature useful at both LV1, and at a 1-level-dip at LV5, or 10, or 20, etc).

>>54897557

The book was kinda worded weird or something. Thanks for a better understanding of that.

>>54881334
2e>BECMI/RC>4e>5e>1e>OD&D>3.P

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>>54896885
>this is more a tactical hero simulator.
Quick question from an old man who remembers when D&D was a tactical wargame adapted to include more individual focus on heroes. What is D&D if not a "tactical hero simulator?" I'm genuinely curious.

>>54897935

Nostalgia and rose tinted glasses

4e taught me that RPGs outside of the OGL exist and for that I will forever love it.

Like or hate the system itself, it broke the stranglehold OGL had on the entire market. OGL is still dominant, but it isn't the all-consuming black hole it used to be. And it's better for everyone without that black hole converting everything into a 3.5 clone, even fans of 3.5

>>54897935
The tactical wargame shit started with 4e. Stop trying to pretend it was anything like that before.

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>>54898545
Go and google what the "T" is "TSR" stands for.

Go and google the "Chainmail" system and how it evolved into D&D.

Go ahead. I'll wait.

>>54898676
>TSR
>Chainmail

These 4rry defense memes are just getting silly.

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>>54898545
>The tactical wargame shit started with 4e
>>54898694
Please tell me more about how 4e is like a tactical wargame, but TSR-editions and Chainmail aren't.

>>54898752
>kids pretending they know what real D&D is.

Sad.

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>>54898760
>Millenials who started with OGL WoTC garbage pretending they know what real D&D is.
Genuinely sad

>>54898775
Kid, I've probably been DMing 3.5 since before you were born. If you think you know more about what D&D is than I am, you're sorely mistaken. People like you are why 4e is the laughing stock is /tg/.

>>54898785
>3.5
>Real D&D

>>54898785
>I know real D&D
>I play 3.5 exclusively

And the brain damage in your arguments finally make sense.

>>54881938
I really like that card. Very useful for on-the-fly monster creation.

>>54896717
It feelin like a board game is honestly why I like 4e so much, though I honestly feel Gamma World did that part better (and an indie game called Last Stand did even better than that).

MOST Roleplaying games go "here are the tools your have to roleplay with. Other classes get other tools", boiling down to basically just restricting what you can roleplay as. 4e and Gamma World go "Here are tools for fighting." And takes a hands off approach to the actual roleplaying. The result is a system that is very well balanced when it comes time to trade blows, without becoming cumbersome when just hanging out in a town.

A lot of people don't like that level of freedom, which ironically enough causes those people to feel MORE restricted by the rules, not less, because it doesn't give them tools to build off of outside of combat. For me, 4e feels like it knows when it's wanted and when it's not, taking a very minimalist approach to anything where it's not wanted.

Then again, I'm well aware that my view on it is not how he majority feels.

>>54898801
>implying it's less real than the superhero shitshow 4e tried to turn D&D into

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>>54898785
>3.5 since before you were born.

Bwahahahaha. That'd be quite a feat in temporal mechanics.

I was unironically strawmanning, but I'm starting to think that you ACTUALLY believe that "real D&D" is defined by WoTC OGL DiabloShit edition?

>>54898839
>trying to turn imply anything was more video game than D&D WoW edition

>>54898854
You mean the 3e splatbook they put out?

>>54898863
>comparing a single optional splatbook to an entire fucking video game edition

>>54892987
It is a super hero game. Just with a medieval fantasy setting.

>>54898874
>I know I have the WoW edition, but I'm going to keep projecting.

>>54898891
>N-no, YOU'RE the 4rry

This is just getting sad.

>>54898854
hmmm, which edition's culture is more like a toxic pit of MMO /v/irgins.... let's look at the parallels.

3e and MMO /v/
>Intentional trap options enshrined as sacred cows because learning to avoid them is seen as a rite of passage
>Any suggestion of re-balancing is met with angry players of the currently good options, accusing everyone else of needing to "get gud"
>Character-building and perfecting is the real game, and playing is more of a "proof of concept" to show off your "build."
>Any attempt by the DM/Developer to house-rule/patch the game is met with indignation, feeling that their time spent mastering the game are now wasted.

4e and MMO /v/
>Distinct party roles clearly labeled
and for the record, party roles always existed, 4e was just the first time they took away the obfuscation and labeled them,

>>54898967
>Any attempt by the DM/Developer to house-rule/patch the game is met with indignation, feeling that their time spent mastering the game are now wasted.
To be fair, that is literally any game. Homebrew in general typically frowned down upon by the more "hardcore" players.

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I don't get why all the 4e vs 3.pf shitflinging exists now that the undisputed Best Edition is here.

And It's getting a new splatbook in November. You're all going to buy it right? You better.

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>>54899029
>To be fair, that is literally any [OGL] game. Homebrew in general typically frowned down upon by the more [3.PF] players.

That is very much a cultural artifact of 3.PF and the OGL. It is in-fact one of the things that drove my friends and I away from the torrent of OGL [insert IP]D20 games that came out in the early 2000's

>>54899030
Necause 5e is, for the most part, 3.PF with some duct-tape thrown over it. Don't get me wrong, all of the changes are universally improvements, but they're so minute, that it's still basically 3.PF. I can understand how people who have played only/predominantly OGLd20 games for their entire lives can see it as a major departure, but once you've genuinely branched out, or if started before 3e, this just looks like more 3e. I didn't like 3e the first time it came out 17 years ago, and now I'm just underwhelmed.

>>54899096
5e is more 2e with a dash of the better/more compatible 4e/3e ideas than 3.x's newest spawn.

Of course I'm really comparing it more with Balder's Gate and Icewind Dale as I wasn't into TTRPGs during 2e's reign.

I know it doesn't use tables or THAC0 so it has to be 3e, right? Not like the games are all still mostly the same despite the label, and these edition wars are so pointless as to be pathetic.

>>54893043
Absolutely. DnD had a focus of verisimilitude since it's days as a wargame. It was simulationist first. Which led to 3.p class imbalance.

To try to solve this, 4e abandoned that for a heavier focus on gamist elements.

Having completely shifted core philosophy, it no longer provided the same kind of experience, much like how original and modern Resident Evil are completely different games despite technically having the same brand and setting. Or Super Metroid and Metroid Federation Force.

4e was again, still a good game. But the focus shifted, now more about equal opportunity (balanced classes and Enchant/Disenchant ritual assuring you get something related to your class regardless of random drops); positioning, respositioning, and tactics; and game mechanics that players use to directly affect the narrative, rather than tools that characters use to work within the narrative.
For instance, the infamous "Come And Get It" lets the player, as a narrator, declare that "here the enemies got overconfident and made a mistake by charging towards my character, who was actually ready and struck preemptively."

It's a very neat and at the time unique system. But with how much its focus changed, I would not call it a true sequel in any form.

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>>54899139
>5e is more 2e
Nope. Sorry. But speaking as someone who began during the reign of AD&D 2nd, 5e has more to do with an imagined version of 2e that exists only in the minds of kids who started with 3e (admittedly still the largest demographic in the market) constructed from the rose-tinted musings of 2e grogs such as myself during the early internet when we were railing against how "video-gamey," "anime" and "super-hero" we saw 3e as. Even then, it's MUCH closer to 3e/OGL than anything else. That's what the market asked for, and given that people who started with and became, in a way, addicted to, the OGL RPG format, form the largest money-spending block in the market, that makes sense.

>I'm really comparing it more with Balder's Gate and Icewind Dale as I wasn't into TTRPGs during 2e's reign.
You see, that actually makes sense, and actually I grew up on those games as well, though as someone who grew up on those games while ALSO playing 2e, I can tell you the big difference: most of the RAW enshrined sacred cows of the OSR were largely ignored and house-ruled away by actual DM's when the game was in its ascendancy.

>>54893312
>So you have no idea how the system actually works, got it
Comes up every 4e discussion.
Yet to hear an actual breakdown of why the person is wrong once.

>>54894002
>What does "simulationist" mean?
You need to edumacate yo'self, mah nigga.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNS_theory

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>>54899245
>DnD had a focus of verisimilitude since it's days as a wargame. It was simulationist first. Which led to 3.p class imbalance.

It would certainly LOOK this way if you started during 3e, and ate forum stories of 2e grogs like myself waxing poetic about how "hardcore" gaming used to be. In truth, AD&D played a lot like fantasy GURPS, where there were some core rules, and a SHITLOAD of optional subsystems, and the majority of us who played it grew up on fantasy novels and cartoons long before we bought our PHB. Barring a few tables that learned to play with all the subsystems RAW, the majority of DM's learned which subsystems allowed them to run games that accurately recreated the feels of our favorite fantasy novels, and cherry picked those.

>>54899355
>GNS Theory
Argument invalid.

>>54894002
>>Basically open class niches,
>They were more narrow in AD&D and earlier editions than they are in 4e.
Only because mechanics and fluff are completely divorced.
Any class can be anything in 4e, with enough paintjob. It doesn't really matter what you call them. Green Arrow-esque utility belt archer? Wizard? What's the difference, really, they’re both controllers. Refluff the implement as a special bow and you're already halfway there.

>>54894250
It's most obvious in skill challenges.
Why raise the stat by 1/2 level if you're also gonna raise DC by 1/2 level just as fast?

>>54896061
>GURPS has subsystems for almost any setting, and so can run basically any setting, but the TONE it informs is gritty realism/simulatuionism
Gritty in the way chewing broken glass is gritty, that crunch is atrocious.

>>54899405
>Any class can be anything in 4e, with enough paintjob. It doesn't really matter what you call them. Green Arrow-esque utility belt archer? Wizard? What's the difference, really, they’re both controllers. Refluff the implement as a special bow and you're already halfway there.
I'm confused. Are you trying to say this is a bad thing? At my table, this has allowed many players to create a vast array of wild character concepts that either didn't have rules for them in other editions, or DID have rules for them in some obscure 3.PF splatbook but were shit in that splatbook.

When players get to play the characters they want, they get invested in their characters internal drives.

When players are invested in their internal drives, they pursue them, instead of the murderhobo monty haul that players tend to default to when they don't have other motivations.

This fluff-crunch separation and re-fluff-ability has been nothing but a boon to my table.

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So I want to start a 4e game where the players are trapped in a fantasy mmo. What books do i need to start with? Should I just use the essentials or avoid them? This system has 12 thousand books and I don't know which ones to get.

The group is experienced and has played 5e and pathfinder. They just want something more gamey for a while.

Pic unrelated.

>>54896309
It was psionic even. Finally acknowledged that "Hey it works by training the mind right? And it uses a point system, right? Must be psionic."

>>54896627
3e has those? At all? Where?

>>54899514
Literally people complaining about martial classes having compels that are themed as the enemy rushing towards you.

>>54899497
Get the core book so they can learn the rules.

Then forget it exists and use CBLoader/funin.space.

As a DM, get and read/skim over DMG1&2, then forget it exists and use the rules compendium/funin.space.

>>54895425
Yeah and 5e did the polar opposite of that by making it so that casters have almost all the utility again.

>>54899288
Because there's no need for a breakdown.

He is making a claim that a cursory glance at the high level powers, rituals, magic items and class abilities available to epic characters disproves instantly.

Do you really think that high level powers are only damage? When the core rulebook, that had the most plain powers overall, had things like the wizard summoning an extraplanar mansion in the middle of a fight?

>>54897935
How many spaces did a wizard's encounter spell push you? Did the fighter's attack let him reposition an enemy? How many Burst radius was a rogue's taunt?
By tactics he means similar to tactics vidya. Fire Emblem. FFTactics. The kind of reasons 4e is hard to theater of the mind. Not impossible. But definitely hard.

>>54898545
False Flag bait please leave

>>54899096
Third party is just homebrew you pay for.

>>54899585
>CBLoader/funin.space
I don't really understand what that means.

>>54898967
Also, 3e mandates fucktons of crafting to stay ahead of the curve

>>54899710
CBLoader is the offline character builder that had been updated after WotC stopped supporting it.

funin.space is a site. It has all the shit from WotC's site ripped.

>>54898839
>implying you aren't underage

>>54899689
>Hard to theater of the mind
>Converting squares to feet/meter is hard
I see where you're coming from, but still

>>54899502
Hell, weren't monks psychic in an earlier edition as well?

>>54897493
Not him, but I'll explain. Bear in mind that I do like 4e, I just get the argument.

I'll use spells as an example. In 5e, spells are written in the handbook in a more "immersive" way, if less concise. 4e's spells are written as if they were stat-blocks, or in the same style as an MMO ability. Its very concise, and quite quick to read once you understand the notation, but when you read the spell description it doesn't have the same immersive qualities as the 5th ed version.

That's basically the difference, and it extends from spells to most of the system. It exchanges immersion for more clarity and precision in item, equipment and ability descriptions.

>>54898967
Don't forget aggro.

>>54899718
This seems like a lot of extra work.

>>54899735
Not really?

Instead of downloading 20 books, you download 1 character builder (that then does all the math for you) and use a site (that has basically all the crunch).

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Hey, since this is basically a generic 4e thread, here is a custom set of inherent bonuses I use in my game. I folded a number of feats and assumptions about increasing armor quality from later DM books into a single chart. Naturally these don't stack with the numerical bonuses from feats that give feat bonuses to attack, damage, or defenses. (though players are often free to take these feats to get the other bonuses: see essentials era expertise feats.)

A/D means bonus to attack and defense

NAD means bonus to non-AC-Defense

LAC means bonus to AC for someone wearing light armor

HAC means bonus to AC for someone wearing Heavy armor

OTH is the number that you use for anything that patterns off of "the enchantment bonus on the weapon/implement" such as critical hits.

I've posted this before, but this is a newer version that folds in "improved defenses"

>>54899743
Alright anon. I'm putting my faith in you on this one. Don't let me down.

>>54899096
>>To be fair, that is literally any [OGL] game. Homebrew in general typically frowned down upon by the more [3.PF] players.
>That is very much a cultural artifact of 3.PF and the OGL. It is in-fact one of the things that drove my friends and I away from the torrent of OGL [insert IP]D20 games that came out in the early 2000's

You're telling me that other than for OGL product you don't see that 9/10 of all homebrew material to be cringely bad and half-baked?

>>54899757
Here, take this: http://pastebin.com/paPzDyS4

Given the sheer volume of material folded into a single statement
>>54898967
>Intentional trap option

It's kind of safe to fold "aggro" into
>Distinct party roles clearly labeled
Since one of those roles was defender

Also, defenders didn't so much aggro, as they punished for attacking OTHERS, which monsters still had the freedom of choice to do. No single defender literally FORCES a target to attack it.

>>54899796
Meant to reply to>>54899731

>>54899399
Nice comeback. Very informative. Sturdy grounding. Very original.

>>54899766
I'm saying that for almost a decade, when you walked into a game store, practically ALL of the books there were based off of the same mediocre system, and they all felt the same, and now over half of the market (who started gaming during that erra) don't consider any other feel "true TTRPG" and as such, 5e is carefully designed to be as close as possible to 3e, while not TECHNICALLY being under the OGL, so they don't have to share their king of the hill spot anymore.

>>54899571
That was in 4e. "Come and Get It."

Unless you mean Robilar's Gambit, which doesn't actually force them, just lures them in with an easy hit. They still get to choose whether to risk it.

Though paladins do get compelled duel. But that's explicitly a mind-affecting spell, so it's fine.

>>54899842
>5e is carefully designed to be as close as possible to 3e

To give 5e credit where credit's due, it's designed to FEEL like 3e. Thank fucking god it's ahead of it in everything but being bloated.

>>54899863
But... come and get it is also mind affecting?

>>54899724
It's not just squares to feet. It's figuring out what's in range when the ability is meant to be made of square shapes. Do you just convert them all to rounded shapes with radii? Does blast go from being a box to a cone? How much of a character has to be in the effect for it to count?

It's harder than you'd think.

>>54899926
Don't you use ToM so you DON'T have to deal with that autistic bullshit?

>>54899925
Does not have the keyword. Ergo is not.
http://dnd4.wikia.com/wiki/Come_and_Get_It

Martial, Weapon. That's it. It doesn't magically compel the enemy. Instead it just rewrites the story so the enemy chooses to do it.

>>54899954
>Does not have the keyword. Ergo is not.
You're right
But it does target Will

>>54899971
This was what I meant when I said "mind affecting", yeah.

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>>54897877
> 4e better than 5e

I'm fuckin triggered matey

>>54900031
>A step forward in the right direction is not better than a step backward to go back to the wrong direction

>>54899971
Because it's ability to "hit" depends on your ability to bait your enemies. This is not a magical mind altering effect, so does not have any magical keywords.

If you were to think of it in 3.PF terms, it'd be a maneuver that requires you to successfully feint first. Because this is 4e, the maneuver and the feint were folded into one action.

>>54899620
5e has martials get the most ASI's and Feats. Feats often confer a lot of utility.

The WIZARD class is still pretty crazy in 5e, but is limited by the DM giving out scrolls or enemy wizards ect. With just Spell Selection, a Fighter or Rouge will have much more damage output than any wizard, and with good feat selection almost as much Utility. Rouges especially are super viable in 5e. Fighters suffer from Front Loading and being THE dip class, but so do Clerics and Warlocks so that's not a Martial only issue.

Are casters kings in 5e? Eh, maybe. It's easier to be a reality warper than a grunt, for sure. But to compare 5e to 3e in terms of Caster/Martial Balance is insane. Casters are Kings, sure, but in 3e they were gods.

I play a Fighter in 5e, and my character does more than any of my caster party members in terms of both Damage and Tactical battle stuff.

>>54900062
>what I like is right and what other people like is wrong

kay

>>54900084
Whoever is playing your caster must be an idiot, then. Martial classes are good at having more HP than casters, and that's about it.

>>54900074
>Because it's ability to "hit" depends on your ability to bait your enemies. This is not a magical mind altering effect, so does not have any magical keywords.
Yes, but how does that goes against my point?

>>54900084
>>what I like is right and what other people like is wrong
>Repeating mistakes can be considered right in any way

>>54900119
>everything I don't like is a mistake

Of course repeating mistakes can't be right, that's why they didn't just updated 4th edition.

>>54900084
>5e has martials get the most ASI's and Feats. Feats often confer a lot of utility.

You usually have to spend your feats on damage shit to keep up with the HP bloat as a martial and your stats.

And the utility feats confer is usually a (pale) imitation of spells anyway.

>>54900107
Casters in 5e are better at cleave than martials, but unless it's a sorlock martials will be better at single-target damage

>>54900149
Save-or-suck spells are excellent against single targets though, and casters get so many of those.

>>54900143
>You usually have to spend your feats on damage shit to keep up with the HP bloat as a martial and your stats.

I'm not him, but what I recall of 4th is that you really only "have" to spend on your weapon feat, and there aren't really a lot of other options for boosting damage.

>>54900158
5th, not 4th.

>>54900140
>4e is a mistake
>>54900119
>5e is a mistake, in the same veins than 3/3.PF

>WotC's D&D is a mistake
Why did we have an edition war again?

>>54900158
>>54900169

Yeah, but in 4e you get 15 feats, in 5e you get like 5-9.

And you usually have 2 weapon feats to spend on (crossbow master+sharpshooter or polearm and heavy weapons).

Besides that, literally everyone takes lucky.

>>54900107
They are more casual, yes, but Martials, spesifically Fighters, have access to Grapple and Shove attacks and Maneuvers. Rouges and Barbarians have access to this stuff too. TECHNICALLY casters can do this, but Maritals will always be better at it. Bards are really the only caster that can take up that role.

And in 5e Martials will ALWAYS have better DPS than casters. Casters excel against lots of minions or stacking debuffs on the BBEG, but its the Martial that will be putting a sword through his Bane'd, Restained, Blinded ect, face.

>>54900143
This is just false. There's only a few damage feats in 5e, (GWM/Sharpshooter, and PAM) and while they are good, you only need one. And you really don't NEED them at all, though they do help. My Fighter has neither of them and is doing GOBs of damage.

>>54900171
>>54900119
Be specific. What were the mistakes? If Everything WotC is a mistake, why aren;t you playing 2e? The books still exist?

>>54899938
Other editions aren't in boxes. So you can just use it as-is. If anything you have to convert it TO a grid.

4e starts with grid. Converting back gets... weird. And unlike other editions, which had graphs for illustrating how to convert to grid, made no concessions in the rules whatsoever for converting back and forth.

Much like 3.5 was awfully balanced because they never considered people would play classes outside their intended roles, 4e can be restrictive in the kind of play experience it provides because they didn't imagine people would want to play it any other way than specifically what they designed it for.

Wizards is just sort of bad about making assumptions about player behavior as a company. At least with 5e they let players playtest it themselves and give feedback.
If only fewer of them had grown up on 3e...

Ya know, I bet that's why AD&D worked out so well. Gygax personally playtested it to heck and back, and had actual players not development team who designed the features playing.

>>54900171
>WotC D&D is a mistake

Not as big of a mistake as AD&D, which in turn isn't as big of a mistake as basic, which in turn wasn't as big of a mistake as not using the Chainmail combat rules.

>>54899971
>>54900027

3.p Intimidate check targets Will. You're not saying the Intimidate skill is mind control magic are you?

>>54900194
>And you really don't NEED them at all, though they do help.

It's literally one third to half your damage, mate. Look at damage calculations with or without it feats. They are so warping that there's no fucking way the game is balanced for both having and not having them.

>>54900084
IT'S "ROUGE" GUY AGAIN! HI HOW YA DOING COME TO INTENTIONALLY START FIGHTS IN ANOTHER THREAD?

>>54900189
Sure but 4e feats do less, and also often have other feats as prerequisites.

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>>54900119
>Yes, but how does that goes against my point?
The reply chain is too long at this point for me to be able to decipher which point I am meant to be supporting or denouncing. I just really like 4e, and was genuinely answering a question about it. Cheers.

>>54900208
If they can't use feats they have higher stats ergo higher bonuses to hit, damage, ac, and hp.

>>54900246
Those cap out at 20.

>>54900223
They don't do that much less. Yeah, a bunch are more situational, but then you get good stuff like multiclass feats.

>>54900257
>>54900246
Feats are also only a requirement for martials, casters can function just fine with 0 feats and all stat boosts, which is pretty ridiculous.

>>54900208
Well, you have to take a -5 to hit to get an admittedly large damage boost of +10. This means that it's really only viable once your STR is 20 or you get a +1 or better sword. Something you're not guaranteed on either side. The raw numbers aren't all there is to the game. Context matters.

My point is that, with or without feats, a Fighter Rouge or Barbarian is going to be out damaging a Wizard in 5e. And that's nothing against the Wizard. Wizards are kinda overtuned in 5e, IMO, especially at high levels, but that doesn't make the Fighter bad and it doesn't make 5e's balance the same as 3e's.

>>54900194
>And in 5e Martials will ALWAYS have better DPS than casters.
ONLY if you ban multiclassing, which will have the 3.PF-spawn up in arms.

By "ban" I of course mean simply not using the optional rule, but the degree to which 3.PF-spawn demand its inclusion makes it practically a core rule you have to ban.

>>54900283
Multiclassing is the only decent way to keep martials enjoyable when compared to casters later on.

>>54900119
Because Feint's go against Will too.

In 3.5 it would be "Feint, if fail Will they rush you stab"

In 4e it's "if fail Will they rush you stab"

The only difference is making it a new option for a pre-existing feature or just a new feature for clarity sake.

>>54899434
You're setting DCs wrong if you're doing that. The rules for Easy/Medium/Hard DCs are suppossed to be guidelines for something that would be at a certain difficulty at a certain level. e.g. Haggling for more pay from the stubborn mayor would be Hard at level 1, but at higher levels it would still have the same DC, because it's a Hard level 1 skill check, not a "Hard skill check" like it would be in (for example) 5e.

>>54900283
>>54900292
Every class CAN cast spells in 5e. With or without feats or multiclassing.

Totem Barbarians have some utility ritual spells. Fighter and Rouge have 1/3rd wizard subclasses. Rangers and Paladins are 1/2 casters.

Magic is part of DnD. Spells are utility. If you want to be a Martial with utility, Play an EK or a AT. If you don't want to cast spells or deal with magic, don't complain when you don't have much utility. Or be a Rouge, they have great utility and damage.

>>54900338
And that is the fatal flaw of DnD, spells are an absolute requirement to be versatile. The rogue has tons of skills, but a mage can always just cast a spell to have a guaranteed success on something.

>>54900378
I mean the principle is that the rogue can pick locks and climb forever, but the mage is inherently limited by spell slots.

That being said, the whole "long rest recharges all spells" this kind of invalidates that.

>>54900292
What about casting martials like bow eldritch knight?
All your damage is coming from weapons. You just happen to have things like Shield, Expeditious Retreat, Misty Step, Darkness, Invisibility, Haste, and Fly as your maneuvers instead of like Rallying Cry or Menacing Attack.

>>54900462
They're pretty shit.

>>54900189
>Besides that, literally everyone takes lucky.
No? Do you play exclusively with powergamers?

>>54900378
>And that is the fatal flaw of DnD
>why is this game about magic about magic?

>>54900503
By that logic there shouldn't be any class other than Wizard.

>>54900485
It doesn't take one to be a powergamer to realize "my bonuses are actually shit, and there's no way to stack advantage, so I need to take lucky to stop the dice screwing me over" just from playing the game for a decent amount of time.

>>54900526
>literally every class in the game can have spells
>multiclassing exists
>magic items exist

>>54900539
>It doesn't take one to be a powergamer to realize "my bonuses are actually shit, and there's no way to stack advantage, so I need to take lucky to stop the dice screwing me over" just from playing the game for a decent amount of time.
Only a power gamer feels the need to optimize every last aspect of a character, especially using optional rules.

>>54900526
Don't be silly, there's also Cleric and Druid.

>>54900559
Fair point.

The most OP class in 5e is the Bard actually, but Bard is so fun that it doesn't really matter.

>>54900550
>Only a power gamer feels the need to optimize every last aspect of a character, especially using optional rules.

The "optional" for feats is a bold faced lie.

Even besides that, I think you don1t have to be a powergamer to want your character to succeed at what you want him to succeed at.

>>54899689

Fuck theater of the mind.

War games use models for a reason

>>54900572
> I think you don1t have to be a powergamer to want your character to succeed at what you want him to succeed at.
That's because you're a power gamer in denial.

>The "optional" for feats is a bold faced lie.
I'm sure you know about the dev's intent fetter than the devs themselves, dumbass

>>54900582
Devs intended 3e's classes to be balanced, but that didn't happen now did it?

>>54900582
>I'm sure you know about the dev's intent fetter than the devs themselves, dumbass

I think I'm experienced enough to know when they lie.

>That's because you're a power gamer in denial.

is this a joke?

>>54900595
>I think I'm experienced enough to know when they lie.
>Literally printed in the book
>NUH UH, MY INTERPRETATION IS CORRECT
you're literally delusional

>is this a joke?
You:
>I can't leave this completely optional rule by the wayside because it makes my character more powerful
No, I'm not joking. Literally everyone I've met who wanted to use Lucky was an autist, WAAC or both.

>>54900618
>WAAC

Washington Alexandria Architecture Center ?

>>54900666
Win At All Costs, it's a term warhammerfags use to defend their broken ass system by shaming anyone who tries to win at a competitive game.

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>>54900378
>And that is the fatal flaw of DnD, spells are an absolute requirement to be versatile.

>And that is the fatal flaw of DnD [3e and 5e], spells are an absolute requirement to be versatile.

FTFY
You see all this shitfest up there with people arguing circles to try and justify certain clases being better and/or powerbuilding to try and make an underpowered class compete: that's the biggest argument for 4e. There's almost none of that: even some of the intentionally bad classes written later in the run by Mearls like the Vampire still function in the context of their party. On top of that, thanks to fluff-crunch separation and re-fluff-ability, if you come up with a character concept in a vacuum, there is a class that can make it viable, without all of this MTG-tourney-deck-building-tier shitstorm.

>>54900696
Yeah, if you play a martial in 5e you need to powergame pretty hard to stay relevant past level 7 or so, since casters start getting the really good shit around then.
I'm playing Paladin right now and I am dropping the class after level 6 for the Aura of Protection, my next 14 levels are all going into Bard since Bard+Paladin does Paladin stuff better than Paladin itself.

>>54900696
>4e is the EDH to 3e's Modern and 5e's Standard
It all makes sense now

>>54900714
>I can't stand my character dealing less than 200 damage a round, so I'm using class combos and feats that don't fit my character concept or build a concept that justifies power choices
Can all the CharOp retards fuck of please, unlike 4E this isn't a fucking boardgame.

>>54900194
>And in 5e Martials will ALWAYS have better DPS than casters.
This was also true in 3.5, in fact, 3.5 martial damage is like three times higher than 5E martials. I shouldn't have to tell you why that doesn't matter.

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>>54900734
That's actually not a terrible analogy. It's not perfect, but I'm too drunk to argue the finer points of an direct comparison between different version of one children's game and different versions of another children's game

>>54900750
Multiclasses can fit character concepts well, foolish 3aboo. Having a character that is actually effective in the game is an important part of playing the game.
Making everyone subservient to the whims of the wizard just because he's able to do everything is bad design.

>>54900750

I'm guessing to complete the !DND game you are describing, monsters have 1000s of hp?

How many player turns should it take to kill, cripple, or convince to clam down an enemy?

If it's like 10 for a basic enemy, prepare to be disengaged with the game.

>>54900378
>And that is the fatal flaw of DnD, spells are an absolute requirement to be versatile.
And that is a fatal flaw of x-men comics. Mutant powers are an absolute requirement to be versatile.
And that is a fatal flaw of Index. Being a magician or esper is an absolute requirement to be versatile.
And that is the flaw of Pokemon. Being a trainer is and absolute requirement to be versatile.

The issue here is that in a world of magic we have an entire category of classes that for some insane reason refuse to utilize or incorporate magic into their repertoire.
I would understand one Luddite Amish class. Probably have some abilities that work around or cancel out magic. An anti-mage of sorts.

But 1. That weirdly doesn't exist except arguably Monk and 2 The rest have no excuse, at the very least you should be learning spells that make you better at what you do, like a Fighter learning Bull's Strength and Swift Giddings, and a Rogue learning Knock, Charm Person, and Invisibility.

A lot of wizard spells don't even make sense for a wizard to have. What is he going to do with additional attacks of opportunity in a round considering he's who those attacks protect, or to sleep comfortably in armor, or wield a force effect weapon that disappears if it leaves your hand, or make an arrow deal damage equal to his unarmed strike, or to steal ki on a critical hit?

If I personally was designing classes, I would strip everything to their numbers, then give things with good base numbers a list of relevant spells with narrow scope, things with low numbers a wide scope, and then maybe convert spells I knew they would be super reliant on to permanent class features so they're not wasting resources on compotency tax actions.

Which is almost exactly what 4e did, except insisted some classes were still magicless. Still, mechanically they followed my solution so while it still pokes at my world believability autism, I can just ignore their clearly in denial fluff.

>>54900761
I know there's flaws in my comparison but I'm too busy with work to think about it further
At least, I'm sure 4e is EDH is the better one

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>>54900750
>Can all the CharOp retards fuck of please, unlike 4E this isn't a fucking boardgame.
>Implying CharOp was MORE prevalent in 4e
That's some next-level cognitive dissonance Anon.

>>54897935

I just imagine fire emblem and stuff. You battle on squares, heros level up and stuff, etc.

What's left to imagine?

>>54900761

I'd have called 4e limited. But that's because that's my favorite type of format.

... Don't need to read the current metagame, and assume a financial position

>>54900482
How so? Damage is fine, slightly less than Champion or BM but not egregiously so, and they make up for it with higher utility. None of those spells take Int so they can dump it just fine and not be MAD.

Seems alright to me.

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>>54900778
>I can't immagine a fantasy setting where non casters can compete

Please read any fantasy before commenting on the fantasy genre.

>>54900828
This. DnD intentionally gives all of the tools to the casters while gimping martial characters, because doing anything else will make grognards shit themselves endlessly.

>>54900526
Nonsense. Wizards don't use holy magic, hippie magic, spooky magic, sneaky magic, or fightan magic.
That's why you also need a Cleric, a Druid, a Psion, a Bard/Warlock, and a... huh. Where's that last one?

>>54900550
>magic items exist
Which require DM handouts to acquire, or a wizard.

>>54900762
>Multiclasses can fit character concepts well, foolish 3aboo
Yes, but not if its a cookie cutter bullshit Pala6/Bard 14.

>Having a character that is actually effective in the game is an important part of playing the game
But a Pala20 IS effective, it's just not the most effective. You're just screeching in autism because to your perception other classes get 'nicer' things.

>>54900770
Young Red Dragon: CR 10
178 hp
AC 18

Level 10 Paladin:
20 Str (+5)
+4 Profic
2 Attack

so 55% hit chance
2d6+5 damage per hit, on avg 12.5 per round

That's 14.25 rounds for a SINGLE 'weak' class to kill one of the strongest monsters for its CR, while not using any class features.
basic enemies die to a party in 2~3 rounds if the party isn't optimized, it's literally just mouthbreathers like you who can't deal with their precious netbuild snowflakes getting hurt that complain when they can't alpha strike everything.

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>>54900841
>This. DnD intentionally gives all of the tools to the casters while gimping martial characters, because doing anything else will make grognards shit themselves endlessly.
ONLY if you define kids who started with 3e as grognards, and maybe I'm being a grognard about what counts as a grognard, but if you didn't play when TSR was its own company, you don't get to call yourself a grognard.

In AD&D, thanks to the initiative rules,the casting time rules, and the fact that any damage at all canceled any spell being cast, meant that even at higher levels, a caster REALLY wanted martials around to protect them, and even if what they could accomplish in the end was different, the utility to the overall functioning of a party was indeed "balanced."

>>54900789
>3.5 is more simulation and RP focused, so the system is much broader and therefore easy to abuse as it assumes goodwill
>4E is restricted heavily to reign in autists and gives few options

guess which one attracts the CharOP crowd.

>>54900900
>and gives few options
thisiswhereyouarewrongkiddo.jpg

>>54900886
You seem to forget the part where dragons can fly, which paladins can not do.

Paladin also is extremely bad at later levels compared to what you get out of multiclassing into Sorc/Bard/Warlock, which makes you a Paladin that is actually capable of performing at a higher level instead of sitting around and waiting for the casters to finish locking down every enemy.
>>54900897
3aboos are the new grognards, since they hate change.

>>54900900
>3.5
>RP focused
Point at this anon and laugh.

>>54900930
>Here's 3 billion flavor options
>not RP focused
are you retarded?

>>54900911
>You seem to forget the part where dragons can fly, which paladins can not do.
>I ignore magic in a high magic game and wonder why my characters under-perform
where does this retarded line off thinking come from anyway? The paladin has 10 levels of class features, you can get flying somewhere, hell you can even use an item and you have 3 party members.

>>54900900
>4e
>Restricted heavily

>>54900886

A 4 basic enemy fight taking 12+ turns is a good time?

.. 5 minutes a round seems plausible... Is it really good to spend an hour on a fight with no emotional.stakes... or just in general.

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>>54900900
>3.5 is more simulation and RP focused
Literally LOL'd and stopped reading.


if anything...
>3e had massive amounts of material, most of which was garbage, and none of it is labeled honestly, forcing players to suffer through bad builds, or argue endlessly online for long periods of time, and the difference between high optimization and low/mid optimization is night and day. creating value for the system mastery because it was hard to achieve and made such a difference. The power options heavily inform your character fluff, limiting your role play options if you want to be mechanically viable.

>4e honestly tells you what different builds are meant to do, the power-builds are made plainly obvious, and the difference between mid-optimization and high-optimization is hardly worth it. Fluff-crunch separation means that you can adapt these "builds" to any number of role play concepts.

I don't know, which do YOU think attracts role-players vs optimizers.

>>54900955
>Here's 3 billion flavor options
>not RP focused
If you make none of them good, then foster a community that celebrates this as right and good, and considers learning to just play the very small spectrum of good classes part of "getting gud," then yeah.

>>54900990
>A 4 basic enemy fight taking 12+ turns is a good time?
are you dyslexic?

>>54900992
>3e had massive amounts of material, most of which was garbage, and none of it is labeled honestly
>crying because other options are better
a child's complaint

>>54901005
>If you make none of them good
>crying because other options are better
see above.

What's with autists being unable to play a suboptimal character? Is it because they want to 'succeed' in the game to compensate failing in real life? Is it their lack of empathy that prevents them from having a feeling for well rounded characters?

>>54900618
>Literally everyone I've met who wanted to use Lucky was an autist, WAAC or both.
I once used it because I was playing an 8 year old orphan girl, knew my DM had a tendency to create accidentally TPK surprise encounters, and felt the party moe dying 5 minutes in to WAY too many bandits was more grim than anybody really wanted the campaign to be.

Lucky ended up saving the party on innumerable occasions. Turned a horribly failed raid on a pirate HQ where I was last man standing and hidden as a treasure chest into me stealing their boat without any nautical knowledge as they chased our "2 commoners with spears" reinforcements, then successfully gunning down the captain with its broadside cannons as he barreled after us in the militia's rowboat after running both of them through with his cutlass.

The next week, at a celebratory banquet for having removed the pirates, I proceeded to charm and metal gear solid my way into the mayor's classified files without casting a single spell, by instigating a wrestling match between our "accept any challenge" paladin and the soon retiring captain of the guard, then hype-manning it to the rest of the security team til they just had to go see the hero they all admired wrestle an 8ft tall barrel-chested dragonman in his last real contest of strength.

It is a very useful feat. Especially for skill monkeys or those who, say, have an 8 wisdom score because children are gullible and there's no other way I can justify falling for my patron Aboleth's sob story.

>>54900955
>Here's 3 billion flavor options
None of them do anything or help you role play in any way. 3.Xfans are really retarded if they think taking +2 to Move Silently on their fighter instead of something potentially useful constitutes role playing.

>>54900886
Why wouldn't I complain about nerfing PC damage to shit? Why would you expect me to put up with papercutting an enemy to death instead of the traditional Fighter, or in 4E, a striker, taking enemies out in two rounds solo using no limited resources?

>>54901005
>Here's 3 billion flavor options
>not RP focused
I mean, 4e also has about as many flavor options, it's just that most of them are also good, and you don't need to give up your main class take them.

PPs/EDs are better at being flavorful than PrCs ever had any hope to be.

>>54901035
What's with retards not understanding that the gulf between a Monk and a Druid is not acceptable in any form?

>>54901035
There's a difference between "suboptimal" and "mathematically unable to meaningfuly contribute compared to the other options"

>>54901045
>None of them do anything
some don't, many do

>3.Xfans are really retarded if they think taking +2 to Move Silently on their fighter instead of something potentially useful constitutes role playing
>Every character option must yield maximum benefit
>Well adjusted, adult people aren't autistic charopers like me, that means 3.X is a bad system

>>54901055
>Why wouldn't I complain about nerfing PC damage to shit?
What are you even talking about?
>Why would you expect me to put up with papercutting an enemy to death instead of the traditional Fighter, or in 4E, a striker, taking enemies out in two rounds solo using no limited resources?
Probably because your class will have other things it can do that Fighter's can't.

>>54901072
> "mathematically unable to meaningfuly contribute compared to the other options"
that is the case for fer fewer options that 4rries try to make people think. Even the +2 skill feats can be worth it long campaigns, despite all the autistic screeching

>>54901108
>>3.Xfans are really retarded if they think taking +2 to Move Silently on their fighter instead of something potentially useful constitutes role playing
>>Every character option must yield maximum benefit
I would point out the straw man and dodging the question, but that would imply it's intentional. Instead I think I will congratulate you. You're doing a great job at using the internet despite your obvious mental handicap.

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>>54901035
>What's with autists being unable to play a suboptimal character?

When did anybody say they couldn't play a suboptimal character.

Optimizerfucks get off on being better than other players' characters, and value the effort it took to learn to optimize because of sunk cost falacy. Naturally, the game with the larger gap between optimized and not optimized, and the game where it takes more time to master optimization, is the game that's going to attract optimizers.

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>>54901061
>I mean, 4e also has about as many flavor options, it's just that most of them are also good, and you don't need to give up your main class take them.
>PPs/EDs are better at being flavorful than PrCs ever had any hope to be.
There is nothing in your reply I wish to argue with.

>>54901108
>that is the case for fer fewer options
So you admit that it's sometimes accurate? How is that in any way acceptable?

>>54901108
>Probably because your class will have other things it can do that Fighter's can't.
Way to miss the point and instead talk about something completely irrelevant.

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>>54901140
Well, considering you're the one who thinks translating a character concept into a build and being given a variety of tools to do that isn't part of RPing, the only handicap present in this discussion is your crippling autism. Is it that hard to understand people want a close mechanical representation of their character and not pick from 5 different [Weapon Damage]+status effect options?

>>54901061
I sure love that my divinely inspired Inquisitor/Exorcist works just the same as that demon summoning Heretic as that knife throwing scoundrel
Very flavorful

>>54901166
Because statistics, see pic related

>>54901176
Oh now I get what you mean.
You can't solo one-shot enemies anymore because barely anyone thinks like you mongoloid retards, so the options for that were taken because honestly what's the point, nobody likes playing with you anyway.
You're literally complaining about 'nerfing', go play fucking WoW

I can't understand why people say 4e is more gamist than 3.5

It isn't really, all DnD is super gamist, it's just less simulationist and more narrativist. Instead of rules being justified to work in the setting, they're justified to work in the story

>>54901214
>I sure love that my divinely inspired Inquisitor/Exorcist works just the same as that demon summoning Heretic

Wouldn't those both be divine classes in 3.5, i.e. work the same?

>as that knife throwing scoundrel

Use essentials Thief.

>>54901143
I take offense to that

Optimization is understanding, it's seeing what's really there and getting the absolute most you can out of it, it's a puzzle to be solved. It's not about being better than other players, if anything it's damn near impossible to resist giving character build advice to other, less-optimization-focused players and letting them try to solve the puzzle themselves.

And personally, as an optimizer, what I'm attracted to is games that let me optimize in a lot of ways, the gap between optimal and suboptimal matters far less than the amount of different paths available. And searching for that tiny little edge is far, far more interesting than seeing the incredibly obvious rift in power between, say, a cleric and a paladin in 3.5

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>>54901214
>Well, considering you're the one who thinks translating a character concept into a build and being given a variety of tools to do that isn't part of RPing, the only handicap present in this discussion is your crippling autism. Is it that hard to understand people want a close mechanical representation of their character and not pick from 5 different [Weapon Damage]+status effect options?
Having multiple tactically deep options that can totally represent an out of left field character option with a little simple refluff is, in my opinion, and the opinion of my players, much more conducive to RP than having a single option from an obscure splat book built specifically for that character concept that's almost intentionally bad.
>I sure love that my divinely inspired Inquisitor/Exorcist works just the same as that demon summoning Heretic as that knife throwing scoundrel
Very flavorful
>Implying the same crunch representing multiple character concepts can't be flavorful
only if you completely lack imagination and suck at descriptions and RPing.

>You can't solo one-shot enemies anymore
What the fuck are you talking about 4e went out of its way to take all the one-shots out, and make a party working together WAY more viable than solo adventuring. If anything, "one guy solos the boss with a one-shot" edition is 3

>>54901214
I dunno, the head-on, single-target rushdown of a standard 4e Avenger feels pretty different from the ranged damage/control of the 4e warlock and the advantage-thirsty 4e rogue

>>54901214
Are you falseflagging?

I can't believe anyone would make these arguments seriously.

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>>54901263
Then you sound like the sort of optimizer who wouldn't be disruptive to the functioning dynamic of a party in 4e, and thus the sort of optimizer that it would be perfectly acceptable for a game to attract.

You have a point, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that 3.PF attracts and keeps the worst KIND of optimizers.

Carry on acceptableoptimizer.

>>54899730
That wasn't what I was referring to at all. The statblocks spells are something else entirely.

>>54897493
As I said in the post you responded to, "you play as the narrator in 4e, not as your character". I don't know why in the world you skipped the explanation of the terms in order to pretend the terms lacked an explanation.

AEDU means you're not making decisions based on information your character has, for instance: The distinction of when you cannot use an ability is entirely arbitrary. It does not correspond to specific in game events. It's arbitrarily restricted, in narrativist/gamist terms, and your character is not thinking "okay after I do such and such stunt I can't do it again until an encounter has ended. What's an encounter again? Oh right. This is the end of an encounter. Here's all my stuff back." the character would have no concept of those mechanics, in vague or specific terms. The character would experience something else entirely different than what the mechanics explicitly spell out.

It's a much less simulationist game than other editions and many other games. That change didn't go over well with everyone. Particularly the people who thought d&d should become *more* simulationist rather than less.

You play as the narrator in 4e.
Thats not a buzzword. That's a clear observation.

And if that's not the type of gameplay you want, then you will probably find 4e less than stellar.

If you're fine with the dissociative mechanics, then you won't have that killing the fun of 4e for you.

If you want a more in depth definition of what dissociative mechanics are, the Alexandrian has an article describing it Well enough.

Wasnt evasive silence btw, I was just afk.

>>54897877
5e>2e>PF>3.x>1e>4e>BECMI/RC>OD&D

>>54901302
>"okay after I do such and such stunt I can't do it again until an encounter has ended. What's an encounter again? Oh right. This is the end of an encounter. Here's all my stuff back."

You get encounter powers back after you rest a bit. It's the same as "short rest" recharge in 5e, except 5 minutes instead of an hour.

>>54900828
I'm saying DnD isn't that take on the fantasty genre.
It clearly falls into the camp of "everything's better with at least a little magic" but then tries to act like it's got "magic and mundanes are both valuable and completely seperate paths with no sharing"
If swinging a sword is just as useful as casting a spell, then so be it, actually make it so.
But if everyone can learn magic, and knowing at least a little magic is always beneficial, why is not every Hero using at least a little bit? This is true in any series with a central McGuffin. 4e's rituals were probably the closest thing we've had, but I'd like to see it in class features too. If a Fighter requires magic items to be good, then why can't he make them? What kind of warrior can't maintain and repair his own sword and armor? That alone would give huge versatility, what with feather tokens, sovereign glue, any-tools... bag of holding? More like utility belt.

>>54900897
Does Greyhawk Initiative help it pick a side? I know that's part of what it was trying to do.

>>54901269
4E striker damage is way higher than 5E martial damage is when you bother to compare them to monster HP. Then you've got encounter powers being better than most short rest abilities and far more easily refreshed on top of that.

>>54897935
A strange, but beloved high powered gonzo fantasy superhero rpg, with Srpg combat.

Forgotten realms/dark sun/planescape/dragonlance/eberron/golarion tabletop.

>>54901302
There are absolutely certain PLAYER choices that are not CHARACTER choices, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that means you're "playing the narrator." The level of abstraction between player choice and character choice, which was already abstracted, is greater in 4e. But saying "You're playing the narrator" feels a bit absolutist.

>>54901339
Okay... well that's ALSO something that 4e does better so... still 4e-YAY!

>>54900911
>You seem to forget the part where dragons can fly, which paladins can not do.
Compelled Duel, 1st Level bonus action spell.

>>54898810
Hey, I'm not gonna hate on you for liking it. Just saying, not everybody goes for that boardgamey super abstracted feel. A good number of people think d&d should have gone in the other direction, towards BRP or GURPS or Unisystem.

>>54901353
It has legendary saves. Even if it doesn't want to waste one of those, once he gets a WIS save (that he can attempt every turn) he can move out beyond 30 feet.

>>54899030
Agreed, 5e isn't perfect, but it is best d&d.

>>54899096
It is also a significant improvement on 3e, but in the same vein, mechanically, and closer to 2e's power level than to 3e's.

>>54899571
Not what I had in mind, but I can see how some people could have been talking about those.

>>54899514
3e has lots of them.

Bo9s ability structure, x/time period arbitrarily limited use abilities with individually tracked usage pools and no explanation for why they're separately limited, abstract hp, armor as damage evasion.

>>54901214
>OD&D Fighting Men could kill enemies quickly
>AD&D 1E Fighters could kill enemies quickly
>B/X Fighters could kill enemies quickly
>BECMI Fighters could kill enemies quickly and got entire optional rules dedicated to giving them special abilities with weapons
>2E Fighters could kill enemies quickly
>3E Fighters could kill enemies quickly even if they couldn't do jack shit else
>4E Strikers couldn't at first because of bad monster scaling and design and the entire fanbase bitched until WotC fixed it bit by bit
>5E Fighters have to use limited resources to still be less effective at chopping off enemy HP than any of the above
And I'm the retard for complaining about something not being in line with literally every precedent except for something an entire fanbase bitched about?

>>54901219
>>54551701
4e isn't a narrative game. At all. People who defend it claim that all the unrealistic parts of it are narrativist, but really they're 100% gamist. (while this may not be universal, it's a pretty good rule of thumb that narrative games almost never resolve combat one attack at a time.) Powers, action points, and all that other horseshit don't represent any essential parts of an adventure story, nor do they represent real things in the game world. They are moving parts that make for more strategic options in a game. The numbers inflation doesn't mean anything to the characters or to the story; it's a phenomenon limited entirely to the rules of the game.