Did I just seriously drag a group, unwillingly, into an edition of Dungeons and Dragons they despise? They bought books, for the most part, I thought that was a good sign.
Eric said he hates 4th Edition. I have no idea why, other than being unable to mechanically represent crafting goods and services. I totally had no idea he was this anti-4th Edition. I thought he was right there beside me thinking it was a great system.
Interlude: Look. I get it. You want to say you made something and you want to represent you made something. I understand it. I think its noble. I want to do it too, every never used character I made up (and they were legion) had a skill point in a crafting skill of some kind. Its neat to be able to say you did it, that you are self sufficient and made your own arrows and boot laces. I'm going to paraphrase something Chris Perkins said. The fact that you made your sword or shield or belt has no impact whatsoever on the game mechanics, a longsword is afterall a longsword. Why waste character sheet stat blocks and rulebook space representing a bit of fluff that is easily represented by saying, "When I was a young lad my uncle ran the local smithy, before goblins assualted our village I was to become his apprentice and this was my first piece of trusty metalcraft and it has stood me in good stead all these long years." From a realistic (in game terms) standpoint, you very likely do not own a forge or tannery or shoemakers shop or an achemy lab. You can get raw materials in your travels yes, and buy what you don't have (which is represented in 3.5s crafting skills), but how much is it going to cost you to rent that forge for a week or a few days to make all those arrowheads and throwing knives? How much to rent that nutter of an alchemist's back lab to concoct your herbal remedies? I will tell you: a lot. I love GURPS in part for its extensive skills about building your own gadgets, and they would be of great use in my campaign for all the gadgetry Eric longs to craft, but I don't buy it as a black mark against 4th Edition.
I will tell you why I like 4th Edition. Maybe I've done so in a previous post, but I don't remember it.
-Role Designations: Most people seem to believe the Leader/Defender/Controller/Striker names as the grim specter of MMOs horning in on our ancient and beloved relic of P&P RPG joy. Its not. Its something you did but didn't have a name for. If you were a fighter you knew you would be trying to get in the way of stuff trying that was trying to squish the wizard and you knew you could take more hits than the wizard. That's a defender. The role designations are like a big glowing sign that tells you what a class' schtick is, and that is useful because a player usually knows what he likes to play and it saves you the time of having to read every single class feature and power of a Controller if you think Controllers are too complex and you like Defenders.
-Paragon Paths: I like these for the same reason I like prestige classes. They're a way for you to supplement the more mundane aspects of the basic classes with fancier bits, or to specialize your basic abilities in a certain way. I like paragon paths over prestige classes because the paragon paths don't come with tables of attack and save matrices and spell lists and bonus feats. They're a simpler, easier to use way of specializing your character to fit what you envision it as.
-Healing Surges: Every character is now responsible for their own healing. The leader classes take what you have, add in a bit more, and that is how they heal you. I've read some accounts of people being annoyed that all PCs can spontaneously regenerate their tissue. I don't see surges that way. I see them that same way that I see hit points, as reserves of vitality and endurance and your ability to push yourself on, the same way a boxer pushes himself to get up before the ref hits the ten count. Just like a boxer, eventually your reserves run out and that is when you get down to your last surges and bits of hit points.
-XP Budgets For Encounters: Finally, rules for encounter building that I can understand. Not only are they easily understood, but they're simple to implement. Challenge ratings and encounter levels were something I could never wrap my head around. I never knew if I was calculating difficulty properly and properly plugging in monster. Creating encounters for 4th Edition is refreshingly easy and I am always confident I'm making the right choices.
-One Chart: In the previous edition, every basic and prestige class had an associated chart with associated spell progression charts and occasionally additional charts for whatever special ability the class happens to have. In the PHB there is one single chart depicting feat, power, and ability score bonus progression. One single chart necessary for figuring out what you need to do to level up.
-Static Hit Points: Hallelujah. In previous editions hit points were random, if you combined the right class with the right race and got lucky, a rogue or cleric could end up with more hit points than a fighter or barbarian. If the fighter or barbarian was particularly unlucky they could end up with hit points comparable to a wizard's.
That's only seven things I really really like about 4th Edition, but my list of complaints is shorter and I do think it is a more simplistic and intuitive system. To me it is a refinement of what I liked about 3.5 Edition. I dunno, those are just my thoughts on stuff. I'm comfortable with both systems really. I have Pathfinder stuff on my laptop here and if it proves to be a refinement of 3.5 that leaves out some of the wonky stuff I dislike from 4th Edition, well then I guess Pathfinder wins the Clint Cup.
So. What is it that I dislike about 4th Edition? Maybe that will be tomorrow's post. I want to go peruse that Pathfinder stuff and watch House.
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