Target: Creature and Objects In 4E

[K]

Back to the point, certainly, you can get some theoretically stupid results on some arbitrarily slapped together simulator...but if you work on a simulator for 30 years, it usually doesn't have hole after hole after hole after hole in the simulation.

Except the goal of D&D is not to be a simulation, but a game. Sometimes, the simulation has to take a backseat to things like ease of play and balance.

The D&D I played growing up was 2e, which has a lot of cool ideas, but was always a nightmare to actually run. 2e had so many fiddly little rules that looked good on paper, but just slowed the game down in practice while someone hunted through the DMG to look up the relevant table. If you can't write a good object-damage simulation by hand (and it must be tricky, if people are STILL arguing about 3.5's rules for it), then just throw it out and let the DM tell you whether you blew open the door or merely singed it.

Well, I never had a problem with running 2e.

3e's advantage is that is took the lessons learned in 1e and 2e and made a better game with those lessons. While not perfect but any means and riddled with some of the flaws of previous edition, it was enough of an improvement that it was able to dominate the RPG market.

4e swept the table clean, using only a few of 3e's lessons (feats, and a few minor rules). If we have learned any lessons from history, this means it won't be until 6e when we get a game good enough to dominate the industry again.

[IGTN]

4e swept the table clean, using only a few of 3e's lessons (feats, and a few minor rules). If we have learned any lessons from history, this means it won't be until 6e when we get a game good enough to dominate the industry again.

1e AD&D wasn't the first D&D.

Of course, they kept most of the oD&D lessons for 4e, so that might be about where they are.

[RandomCasualty2]

4e swept the table clean, using only a few of 3e's lessons (feats, and a few minor rules). If we have learned any lessons from history, this means it won't be until 6e when we get a game good enough to dominate the industry again.

4E is pretty much just like a 1st edition of a new game.

It did learn from 3E, it's just that it basically had to clean out a lot of the problems at their core. Unfortunately the new system it created brought about more problems.

[Psychic Robot]

3e's advantage is that is took the lessons learned in 1e and 2e and made a better game with those lessons. While not perfect but any means and riddled with some of the flaws of previous edition, it was enough of an improvement that it was able to dominate the RPG market.

4e swept the table clean, using only a few of 3e's lessons (feats, and a few minor rules). If we have learned any lessons from history, this means it won't be until 6e when we get a game good enough to dominate the industry again.

A very interesting and very bold set of statements. While I do not doubt their veracity, would you mind going into greater detail? Unfortunately, I have never had the opportunity to play 2e, so I am unfamiliar with what you are saying.

But, as a possible glimmer of hope: with the rate that 4e is pumping out splatbooks, perhaps it will become the equivalent of 2e, and 5e will be picked up by another company to reinvigorate to brand name.

[Murtak]

3e's advantage is that is took the lessons learned in 1e and 2e and made a better game with those lessons. While not perfect but any means and riddled with some of the flaws of previous edition, it was enough of an improvement that it was able to dominate the RPG market.

4e swept the table clean, using only a few of 3e's lessons (feats, and a few minor rules). If we have learned any lessons from history, this means it won't be until 6e when we get a game good enough to dominate the industry again.

A very interesting and very bold set of statements. While I do not doubt their veracity, would you mind going into greater detail? Unfortunately, I have never had the opportunity to play 2e, so I am unfamiliar with what you are saying.

For example 2nd had separate systems for THAC0, saves, skills, weapon skills, rogue skills and languages. 3rd basically has DCs for everything.

2nd had separate rulesets for every other spell. 3rd has a lot less special rules.

2nd had different exp tables for each class and different ways to multiclass. 3rd has one table and one multiclassing system.

I could go on for ages but you get my drift - 2E had about 100 times the exceptions and 10 times the rules for doing at best the same stuff 3rd does. It also was less balanced (yes, even less) and had a habit of fucking over players for not knowing obscure corner case 47b§ or just plain being unlucky.

Basically 3rd did everything right that 2nd did right, fixed a lot of mistakes and unified most of the rules. That is why people were so upset about 3.5 - it was basically change for the sake of change. Some things got better, but just as many got worse. Now 4E comes along and instead of building on what was good and fixing mistakes they invent a new system from scratch.

So I can see K's point when he says it is basically a new game. 2nd to 3rd changes rules and statblocks and converting was a pain in the ass. But 3rd to 4th changes the entire game. Statblocks, rules, spells, world, everything.

[souran]

So I can see K's point when he says it is basically a new game. 2nd to 3rd changes rules and statblocks and converting was a pain in the ass. But 3rd to 4th changes the entire game. Statblocks, rules, spells, world, everything.

I signiifcantly disagree with this.

2e's problem was that it didn't have a unified mechanic. Everything was a handcrafted system. Some of them worked well, others were hold overs that were terrible. Some of them were written without looking at other systems. For a time the penalties associated with being on fire were less than those of being in the dark.

3rd editions major contribution was to look at gurps/wod and decide that the game should have 1 mechanic for task resolution.

In 2e half the systems it was better to roll high, in the other half you needed to roll low. 3rd edition again decided that all systems are higher = better.

The other changes were all pretty organic from these. However, it basically meant that 3rd edition and all previous editions were not at all the same game. Characters didn't have the same statistical boxes on their character sheet for the most part.

4e is still d20 dnd. At its base it still works the same basic way. Whats more, you could convert a 3rd edition character over to 4th edition and your character would be about the same power level as a 4e character.

When you did that with 2e characters you got craptacular results. The conversion guide wizards handed out at the release of 3rd edition basically resulted in good 2e characters being godly in 3e or typical 2e characters being terrible.

4e is really just 3e with a different top coat. If you know how to play 3e you can jump right into 4e and the game will make sense. This simply was not true 2e to 3e.

[Murtak]

4e is still d20 dnd. At its base it still works the same basic way. Whats more, you could convert a 3rd edition character over to 4th edition and your character would be about the same power level as a 4e character.

Yeah, sure, except for anything that could actually stand up to monsters of it's CR. I'm not even talking about optimized casters, but can you seriously tell me that you can drop a 4E character alongside a trip fighter, charger or heavens forbid, a wizard, druid or cleric and expect to perform just fine against 3rd edition monsters?

Yes, character conversion from 2nd to 3rd sucked. Monster conversion sucked even more, but at least someone else did the grunt work.

3rd to 4th on the other hand gives you tons of stuff that looks similar but is actually completely different, starting with basic gameplay. Yes, it's still d20. On the other hand save-or-dies are gone, dying in general in next to impossible, combats take longer than 2 rounds, extra actions are gone and so is anything out of combat (including monsters). You have different rules for PCs and NPCs, different rules for different monster abilities ...

Yes, strictly speaking the built upon parts of 4th, namely using a d20 for action resolution. Yes, strictly speaking they fixed past mistakes, namely tightly controlling extra actions and being careful with save or dies. But it seems to me like everything else we gained going from 2nd to 3rd has been removed, and then some.

[tzor]

Strangley, hit points never factors into physics....

The RPI Graduate begs to differ. The engineering term for object "hit points" is called fatigue. ( Note: wiki url has "()" in it and this message board can't handle that in the url, google search "fatigue wiki" )

In materials science, fatigue is the progressive and localized structural damage that occurs when a material is subjected to cyclic loading. The maximum stress values are less than the ultimate tensile stress limit, and may be below the yield stress limit of the material.

This is the important part to link the abstract notion of hit points and fatigue damage. "Damage is cumulative. Materials do not recover when rested."

[tzor]

Back to mechanics; while one can say that 0E had few mechanics, clearly 1E had far more un-unified mechanics than 2E had. Every subsequent edition was, at first, an attempt to unify mechanics. First edition suffered from a number of incompatible mechanics (combat, non-weapon combat, and psionics is probably the best incompatible example) and some mechanics were so complex that people routinely omitted most of the rules (the weapon / armor tables and integrating speed factors into initiative).

Every edition included some major breakthroughs in design unification (We normally credit 2E with the THAC0, but that was actually invented late in the life of 1E and formalized in 2E) and some major breakthroughs in the design simplification. 2E generally dropped the notion of “tables” that allowed things like repeated 20’s in the to-hit tables and produced a more linear roll result. 3E made rolling higher always a good thing. 4E revised the attack so that every class has an every round action and a keep in reserve action. (As opposed to the swing every round fighters and the Vancian spell casters.) But with every significant change in the design there was required the necessary testing and debugging and in almost every case, this was never done. Radically new ideas were broken on day one because they were never adequately tested.

[Doom]

4e is still d20 dnd. At its base it still works the same basic way. Whats more, you could convert a 3rd edition character over to 4th edition and your character would be about the same power level as a 4e character.

4e is really just 3e with a different top coat. If you know how to play 3e you can jump right into 4e and the game will make sense. This simply was not true 2e to 3e.

I simply must be the first to ask, what kind of crack are you on?

Once you get past level 10, most any spellcaster in Dungeons and Dragons is completely beyond the power of any character (they're all spellcasters) in DnD4.0.

Seeing as a first level Dungeons and Dragons character is also incomparable in power to a first level DnD4.0 character, there is, at best, a very narrow window there where what you're saying is even theoretically possible.

And to assert knowledge of Dungeons and Dragons allows one to 'jump right into' DnD4.0 is no more true than to assert knowledge of ANY RPG would allow one to jump right into DnD4.0. In fact, every time I play DnD4.0 with someone familiar with Dungeons and Dragons, he/she gets confused because DnD4.0 keeps using Dungeons and Dragons terms in a way completely different than what the words mean in that game.

As one example among many, even after half a dozen levels, I get asked "What's my saving throw?". Seeing as the game is completely different on every level, my direct observation would indicate knowledge of Dungeons and Dragons is a detriment to learning DnD4.0...what you claim is simply nontruth.

[Murtak]

Radically new ideas were broken on day one because they were never adequately tested.

And I am convinced this is why 3rd was good, while 3.5 and 4 suck. 3rd was actually tested (from levels 1 to 10). 3.5 and 4th weren't.

[Psychic Robot]

As a random question, 2e did not have attacks of opportunity, correct?

[Lago PARANOIA]

As one example among many, even after half a dozen levels, I get asked "What's my saving throw?". Seeing as the game is completely different on every level, my direct observation would indicate knowledge of Dungeons and Dragons is a detriment to learning DnD4.0...what you claim is simply nontruth.

Really? It's been my experience that while there are some hiccups to learning 4th Edition from 3rd Edition (my latest one is that I thought 4E characters can take 20 but they can't for some dumbass reason) you're probably better off learning the game from that vantage point than from, say, a jRPG.

[hogarth]

As a random question, 2e did not have attacks of opportunity, correct?

That was introduced in a 2e splatbook ("Tactics & Options", I think it was called).

[tzor]

As a random question, 2e did not have attacks of opportunity, correct?

Not as such. From what I remember, there was a common rule for getting a final attack at an fleeing opponent, but as far as I recall, that was just a common houserule.

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

As a random question, 2e did not have attacks of opportunity, correct?

That was introduced in a 2e splatbook ("Tactics & Options", I think it was called).

Player's Option: Combat and Tactics

Fun Book.

[tzor]

Player's Option: Combat and Tactics

Fun Book.

I often think of the Player's Option series as 2.75E.

2.5 was effectively the "Complete" series with the creation of kits.
2.75 was the player's option series.

In both cases significant rules changes were made and backwards compatibility balance was severely broken.

[Doom]

Really? It's been my experience that while there are some hiccups to learning 4th Edition from 3rd Edition (my latest one is that I thought 4E characters can take 20 but they can't for some dumbass reason) you're probably better off learning the game from that vantage point than from, say, a jRPG.

Well, a couple of other examples off the top of my head:

The party is being overwhelmed by skeletons. The 'wizard' says "I can't help, guys, my daily is Sleep". In Dungeons and Dragons, Sleep is useless against undead, but in DnD4.0, Sleep (sic) is a completely different spell.

The party is being mauled by a trap, and under attack by orcs. The Rogue says "Well, once the combat is over, I can deactivate the trap." Again, in DnD4.0, thievery works completely different than in Dungeons and Dragons.

Dang, had another example, but forgot it. I'd say it's about one game in four at my table for a player to have his Dungeons and Dragons experience screw him up when playing DnD4.0, above and beyond the paradigm shifts.

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

Player's Option: Combat and Tactics

Fun Book.

I often think of the Player's Option series as 2.75E.

2.5 was effectively the "Complete" series with the creation of kits.
2.75 was the player's option series.

In both cases significant rules changes were made and backwards compatibility balance was severely broken.

Yeah, but when I played 2e we already didn't use a lot of the rules anyway, so the Player's Option were great for us; even skills and powers. Although once we adopted it we realized how many extra points Clerics got and how Humans could start with an AC of 2 at first level.

[K]

Yeh, I agree with everyone else when they call BS on the claim that 4e is basically d20 and that characters can be converted. That's crazy talk.

I mean, even as a 3e 1st level Wizard or Sorcerer I had more power to control the plot and in many situations more ability to win encounters (of any CR).

Many of the problems of 3e came from the fact that it imported 2e and 1e stuff without conversion (like various kinds of monster summoning) and design benchmarks (like fighters sucking and wizards being god men).

4e is an entirely new system that has as much in common with older versions of DnD as say Paranoia or Shadowrun. In many ways that is is a strength because they did not import any legacy mechanics or flawed design benchmarks of older editions.

But as I said before, it is going to take at least two more editions before this new game is as playable as 3e even considering 3e's flaws.

[Roy]

A mid level 3.5 Fighter has more ability to influence combats and plots than any 4th edition character. After all, Knockback and Improved Trip do the same things as nearly every 'power' or do it better. Perform: Weapon Drill is obscure, but is better than 'Repeat the Farm the Kobolds Quest'.

[StormBringer]

I've heard this a bunch of times, but I am still somewhat confused. In regards to earlier editions, it is often said that Fighters suck and Wizards win D&D. Is this in the concepts or the mechanics behind them, or have people really played Fighters that had no contribution to party success, while the Wizard just magicked up a win for the whole module/scenario/campaign on a regular basis?

[RandomCasualty2]

4e is an entirely new system that has as much in common with older versions of DnD as say Paranoia or Shadowrun. In many ways that is is a strength because they did not import any legacy mechanics or flawed design benchmarks of older editions.

But as I said before, it is going to take at least two more editions before this new game is as playable as 3e even considering 3e's flaws.

Yeah, 4E is like 1E, because it's an entirely new system. I figure that 5E may actually be somewhat decent if they manage to hammer out most of the flaws of 4E, now that they know what they are.

However, given that WotC takes forever to fix anything, 2 editions is probably about right before they fix 80% of the problems.

[shadzar]

As a random question, 2e did not have attacks of opportunity, correct?

That was introduced in a 2e splatbook ("Tactics & Options", I think it was called).

Player's Option: Combat and Tactics

Fun Book.

Really, I hated the Player/DM Options and didn't use any of it, but still people got an attack when an enemy fled. I must have had it in play as a hold over from 1st edition, and the SSI games.

[Sunwitch]

I've heard this a bunch of times, but I am still somewhat confused. In regards to earlier editions, it is often said that Fighters suck and Wizards win D&D. Is this in the concepts or the mechanics behind them, or have people really played Fighters that had no contribution to party success, while the Wizard just magicked up a win for the whole module/scenario/campaign on a regular basis?

Pretty much everything you just said. Fighters were designed specifically with the concept that they would not be able to do the cool things that a wizard is capable of doing. The stuff that they were supposed to do was inferior in both concept and mechanics to that of the Wizard. While the Fighter is slashing guys with a sword, the wizard is knocking them out with bright colours, and when the Fighter gets his iterative attacks, the Wizard is capable of flying. Fighters' mechanics also dictate that they are entirely incapable of taking on level-appropriate challenges by the CR guidelines, which should have been used as a benchmark for level-by-level power, but weren't, for some reason.

So basically, without DM fiat artifact swords and whatever the hell else, fighters wind up incapable of contributing in any real way because their very concept is flawed. They are supposed to be mundane while everything else is magical, and their mechanics reflect this. They simply are not playing the same game as the spellcasters and appropriate CR challenges, and thus fail straight from inception.