Wow...Ragr, you just dodged a bullet....according to this article, WOTC at one point considered dropping traps from the game...looks like your still employed. Here's a link for anyone interested in reading about 4th edition traps.
Well now, Eileen, I didn't completely waste my time in the Tower Of Inhospitable Creativity. Remember, I did find "the book". I'm not admitting to anything, but it's amazing how easy it is to tamper with a command directive from head wizard to design minions. A flick of the quill and "get rid of traps" becomes "design better traps you slackers".
Sure, go for the parts of the game which make your job easier/better. How about mine....all I hear about is how clerics are (for the first time) are to powerful in 3.5 and need to be reduced in power for 4th edition.
By the way, I like having 90% of the healing power in the group. Allows ME to decide who gets their boo boos with a flintstones bandage and who gets their owies sprayed with that first aid spray that stings so badly. I relish the power.
So are we going to see anymore good things come out of your visit to the Dungeon of magazine slaying Digitial Initiative Driving Drones?
I read the traps article in greater detail. One signficiant area of concern I had was the passive ability to locate secret doors and traps. With a static DC (and seemingly no die roll from the way I read it) if your passive number is high enough you locate it, if it is to low you miss it. Is this what others got out of it? I'm sure rogues will get a die roll and much greater chance of success. But what about the poor chaps strolling along who's passive number isn't quite up to par. Or worse, those that are....do they simply find everything without having to do any actual work?
Finally, if anyone can explain this to me I would appreciate it...I have no idea what the author is trying to convey...It is a snippet of the last paragraph. First they talk about how rogues will be the best at traps. Ok simple to grasp. The next sentance talks about letting non-rogues find traps, ok, I'm still with him here....Is he going on about how other skills can be used to counter traps....? If he is, we've been doing this since 1st edition when trap rules were minmal. What am I not grasping?
Quote:
In doing this, we quickly came to the realization that canny players, in a flash of inspiration, can come up with interesting solutions to counter even the most detailed traps. Instead of trying to anticipate these flashes though design, we give you, the DM, the ability to react to player insight with a host of tools and general DCs that allow you to say "Yes, you can do that, and here's how." We think this is a better approach than shutting down good ideas from the players for interesting story and challenge resolution, simply because you lack the tools to interpret their actions. After all, you should have the ability to make the changes on the fly that reward interesting ideas and good play. This is one of the components of every Dungeons & Dragons game that allow each session to be a fun and unique experience. Traps, like all things in the game, should embrace that design philosophy.
_________________ Eileen of Greyhawk, Prophet of Istus, Messenger of the Gods
Eileen, Clerics are not too powerful in 3.5. Even a godless rogue like myself can see that. They've given me endless trouble over the years and I've had no problems getting rid of (most) them. Present company excluded. We clearly have the makings of a great relationship because we understand each other. Right?
If you find that Clerics are too powerful there's something wrong with the ultimate power in charge of the world. That's my view anyway. I think I woke up tetchy today.
I think my tamperings in the Dungeons Of More Power Gimme More Power Right Here Right Now will become clearer over time. If not, I'll go back and sort 'em.
I'm guessing here, but I think they're going to keep the take 20 rule, which should allow most mundane traps and secret doors to be found if you've got the time. That passive spotting rule does go hand in hand with the saving throw idea we heard about before, where if the best character at it doesn't make it, no-one does. Only time and experimentation in play will determine if you like it or not.
I'm not too clear on that paragragh either. IMC I tend to clamp down on players using their own specialised knowledge to get them out of situations; I got really fed up of being told how a particular knot would work in a given situation, and this generally came from the library dwelling Wizard, or the principles of construction with stone blocks from the player of the Druid. Not too keen on puzzles and riddles for the same reason. Maybe the designers' going to give us a simple resolution rule involving a coin and gravity.
Rgar said:
"Eileen, Clerics are not too powerful in 3.5. Even a godless rogue like myself can see that. They've given me endless trouble over the years and I've had no problems getting rid of (most) them. Present company excluded. We clearly have the makings of a great relationship because we understand each other. Right?
If you find that Clerics are too powerful there's something wrong with the ultimate power in charge of the world. That's my view anyway. I think I woke up tetchy today."[/quote]
Clerics in my campaign are just fine, (I'm the DM)!!!!!! If I say it is fine, it is fine...If I say everyone dies but me.....then that's what happens....If I say every magical item is cursed except for the things the cleric wants...then that's what happens.....
I was referring to the internet chatter I'd been reading. I actually put a lot of work into dividing up all the extra spells from sources outside of the PH and deligating them to specific faiths in order to allow them to focus on their unique aspects of faith. The cleric spells in all of these assorted sources really give them a unique feel and at the same time reduce the burden of players wanting all the spells. I have one other cleric which plays part-time, and he worships Heironeous, so most of the spells he gets are war oriented, while mine are clearly divination oriented. Makes for good gaming.
And don't even think about getting rid of me.....I fear the paladin won't be with us to much longer and we will need a replacement. Since we've clearly established a good working rapport, I think things could work. Although I suspect you'll have more in common with the wizard's chaotic approach to life. Oh well, controversy makes things interesting. As long as you admit I'm right all the time and let me have my way, everything will work out fine. _________________ Eileen of Greyhawk, Prophet of Istus, Messenger of the Gods
My bad phrasing again, Eileen. I wasn't implying that you've got it wrong in your campaign; you've outlined your setting before and it sounds great, and when you post I generally am in total agreement with you.
What I get a little ratty about is gamers moaning that this is too powerful or this is too weak, or maybe something doesn't work. My view is; make it work. You'd best do it yourself because if you complain too much, especially on official forums, someones' going to try and fix it for you. And we're about to find out where that leads. I'll try to be more judicious in my use of the word "your" in future posts.
Hardly anything to apologize for, you said nothing wrong. I was just picking on you in return. Boy what are the odds we would log on at exactly the same time. Weird!
What exactly does tetchy mean? Crabby? Cranky? Moody? Argumentive? First Gary Gygax expands my vocabulary, now you. That's a good thing, and something I miss when reading 3.5 books. As mentioned before in one post or another, I always found the mental stimulation of gaming to be one of the greater aspects of the fun.
So with the little snippets we receive on rules for 4th edition (even if we aren't going to play it), what rule(s) have you liked the best?
At this point I'm ok with the trap thing...I just can't believe they at one point considered throwing them out. If I had been writing the article to introduce 4th edition traps, I would have left that comment out and just taken the approach that "we are writing traps to make them more of an interactive encounter with all classes" approach.
The critical hit thing was something I could live with as well, from what I read. Critical hits have always felt like an attachment to the game system rather than part of the integral rules and this seems the same, but for doing it that way I think it will work ok. My Top Secret/S.I. critical hit system flowed as part of the actual system so when I say this it is what I am making my comparison to.
The cosmology of demons and devils would have been good if I was just starting out in D&D. I liked the biblical approach overall, but since the story has already been told in 3.5 I didn't care for the change in fluff.
How about other forum readers....what changes have you liked so far?
After that.....it gets tough to find things I'm ok with. _________________ Eileen of Greyhawk, Prophet of Istus, Messenger of the Gods
To be honest, if this was just a new fantasy game, I'd find it kind of interesting. I like watching the wuxia style films and have played a few games that tend in that direction (Earthdawn does, for instance).
The fluff is often quite interesting taken in isolation. I like the idea of adding implements and other flavor to wizards, the feywilde sounds pretty interesting, the changes to elves and dwarves seem pretty decent. Even the points of light would work as a campaign world. The new cosmology is workable.
But its a problem for me in D&D, because D&D has always been a game where you could build pretty much any world you want. 4e doesn't sound like a game that could reproduce The Hyborian Age or Middle Earth. Gritty worlds where Conan and Aragorn aren't healing themselves as they run across the treetops. Overall, its increasingly less 'medieval fanasy' and more 'anime fantasy'.
And the blog posts just give me too much information about how the devs arrived at this point.... I think I would really be better off not knowing that they added tieflings because they saw cool concept art and that fire archons were replacing fire elementals because they liked the mini they could make..
According to to my Oxford English Dictionary, tetchy means "irritable or peevish", although I think those words you listed would have done, Eileen.
As for 4e, the things I like are the small changes that will help make the game run smoother. So, the critical hit idea seems okay and maybe the saving throw change (though I've still not game tested it). The traps thing seems to be part of a bigger change involving skills so it's difficult to tell right now, but if it means the crunch is easier to run in game without crossing into simplistic, I'm all for it.
The background stuff, in other words 85% of what they've released, I really have no use for and, in truth, and being polite, is poor. Vormaerin raises an interesting point about if the game were wholly new, and you'd never played before, would it sound like something you'd be interested in. I've given this some thought and tried my best to shut out any comparisons with previous editions, which was very difficult. But my answer would be a resounding no. I like my fantasy to be gritty and realistic, in as much as the main players are struggling against their limitations and are not all powerfull, all conquering superbeings who breeze through life like it's not there. I like it when fairly ordinary characters succeed even when their successes seem trivial in the big picture. I like it when those same characters fail, and have to struggle to deal with the consequences. I like the, albeit twisted, medieval/dark ages feel. I didn't like the change in artwork over the editions; give me 1st edition any day for that. Truth to tell I prefer historical fiction to most fantasy these days, for the same reasons. Too many cardboard cut-out personalities and "dark powers rising" storylines. Yawn. What I love is vertically challenged people getting rid of unwanted jewellery and struggling mightily, and with great humanity, in the process. Unfortunately D&D is heading down the same pathway as all these "by the numbers" fantasy books.
So, if I were looking for a game system now that would suit what I wanted to achieve; for the quality, the intelligence and the grasp of substance over style, it would not be 4e D&D.
Well, yeah, I wouldn't actually run a long term campaign of any sort in a wuxia style game. But it would be interesting to read and maybe fun for a change of pace mini campaign.
Anyway, my point was that if it was a niche game product I'd find it interesting. As a general fantasy game, I don't. I run primarily low combat, intrigue oriented campaigns. Nothing of the changes they are making seem likely to benefit me in the slightest.
Vormaerin; what I didn't say was how it saddens me that a game I've played for 25+ years I would now feel so averse to trying out. "Dabbling in" used to be something you did with Stormbringer or Tunnels & Trolls, not D & D.
Vormaerin; what I didn't say was how it saddens me that a game I've played for 25+ years I would now feel so averse to trying out. "Dabbling in" used to be something you did with Stormbringer or Tunnels & Trolls, not D & D.
Don't worry, bro, you wouldn't be dabbling in D&D. It might have the same name, but D&D it ain't.
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Boy what are the odds we would log on at exactly the same time. Weird!
