The End of 4e D&D.

[TheFlatline]

Can you voluntarily fail a Will Defense? I don't even know.

-Username17

In 3/3.5 it's implicit due to buff spells.

There was a prestige class... forsaker I want to say, that required you to make saving throws against all magic, even beneficial magic. If you decided to allow the spell through without a saving throw, you lost the forsaker abilities for x amount of time.

Not sure about 4th ed though. I'd continue to say yes, you *can* voluntarily fail any saving throw as long as you're voluntarily accepting or initiating the action.

[TheFlatline]

I have a question here...

It seems like there's a gargantuan amount of errata out now, and even errata of errata.

So I have this question:

How commonly is errata adhered to in your games? God help me, unless something is fucked beyond use, we ignore the errata and just kind of roll with it. Most players (including myself) glaze over when they get a 400 page rulebook AND 30+ loose-leaf pages of printout in a binder or stapled together that require cross-referencing and an already general knowledge of the rulebook.

The critical mass is actually surprisingly low... I think about 4 pages of errata is the cutoff point for our gaming group unless it's something that majorly changes how a player is going to participate in the game.

It seems like D&D4 is actually WoW: Tabletop even in their errata system. WoW achieves this nebulous balance by shuffling everything around constantly, achieving the valence cloud of balance but never actually nailing the point of balance. This works and is serviceable because the computer runs all the rules and calculations behind the scenes. You just press buttons and shit happens.

Tabletop RPGs on the other hand seem to be to be a horrible environment to introduce constant patches, changes, and updates that conflict with the dead tree copy. Nailing it right the first time around mechanically is vitally important, because you only really get one shot at presenting your system to players/customers. They won't download hundreds of pages of errata to cross-reference (okay some will but not enough for a viable market share), they'll play out of the book.

The more time goes by with 4th edition, the more it seems like they fired all the RPG designers and brought on board MMO designers who know fuck-all about the design of tabletop games.

[Doom]

I'm trying really hard to run a RAW game (to the point of introducing a magic item pinata when calculations showed I was running a bit low on treasure parcel awardations), so we use just about all the errata we can stomach.

So far, it's forced at least 2 complete rerolls (a dragonborn cold/reach weapon user, and a magic missile user), but it seems like there was one other.

[Crissa]

The WoW designers have reason to tweak thing beyond balance, because if something was bad, you have to get players to try it again, else the user base doesn't remain balanced.

-Crissa

[Ice9]

The constant errata flood makes DDI pretty much mandatory, if you want to actually play by RAW. Even then, you have to be checking and reprinting power cards fairly often.

I'm actually of the opinion that the state of the rules should be "locked in" at the start of a campaign, because otherwise you end up with characters that becomes totally useless because the powers/feats/classes they were based around changed so dramatically. Like if someone was playing an Magic Missile master with all their feats and items boosting it - now their entire character is useless, and even a complete rebuild wouldn't have the same feel - they may as well just switch characters entirely.

Actually, the constant errata has pretty much killed what interest I had in 4E. I like planning things ahead, and having future abilities to anticipate / work towards, and that doesn't work when everything might have changed by the time you hit the next level.

[hogarth]

Our DM doesn't bother keeping up with errata and so forth, although he does use the Character Builder so some might seep in.

[TheFlatline]

I'm actually of the opinion that the state of the rules should be "locked in" at the start of a campaign, because otherwise you end up with characters that becomes totally useless because the powers/feats/classes they were based around changed so dramatically. Like if someone was playing an Magic Missile master with all their feats and items boosting it - now their entire character is useless, and even a complete rebuild wouldn't have the same feel - they may as well just switch characters entirely.

I agree with this entirely. But I have to ask... what's the point of the books when it all gets rewritten four times over?

[Username17]

But I have to ask... what's the point of the books when it all gets rewritten four times over?

It's just character abilities getting rewritten. If you cared at all about the fluff text about the world and the creatures in it, then you'd still want the books. You could errata the fuck out of all the mechanics in Shadows of Asia (and indeed, people have), and no one would care much. It says quite a bit about the quality of the latest round of D&D books that people feel that the Forgotten Realms Player's Guide is useless now that the Sword Mage powers have been fiddled with.

-Username17

[erik]

I know that in Living Greyhawk that whenever a significant character effecting errata was introduced (changing polymorph/wildshape rules again, changing any particular feat or spell), people were allowed to rebuild their character. Usually it was just swapping out a feat or spell if it was changed, or in the case of wildshape getting totally modified anyone with druid levels was allowed to rebuild their character almost completely from scratch.

So that's another way to do it if you want to incorporate errata. For a home campaign I'd say locking things in is the more rational way to go (or at least not changing anything without folks agreeing to it).

+1 to Frank's comment on FRPG. There are many RPG books that I have almost entirely for fluff and ideas. I could care less if their rules changed.

A setting book like Forgotten Realms should not live or die by it's crunchiness unless the fluff is total garbage.

[A Man In Black]

I know that in Living Greyhawk that whenever a significant character effecting errata was introduced (changing polymorph/wildshape rules again, changing any particular feat or spell), people were allowed to rebuild their character. Usually it was just swapping out a feat or spell if it was changed, or in the case of wildshape getting totally modified anyone with druid levels was allowed to rebuild their character almost completely from scratch.

LGH has very loose continuity, almost like a MMO played on tabletop. Travel to stories is more or less handwaved, as is character introduction, what happened to those guys you used to travel with, what happens between adventures, etc.

In most home games, a dramatic rebuild is much more disruptive. "Didn't you used to be able to turn into a bear last week?" or "It's a troll, cast fireball!" "I can't any more!" Coming up with in-setting reasons for complete shifts in your schtick becomes more and more of a strain the more times you do it, just ask any comic publisher.

[Lago PARANOIA]

The 4E Forgotten Realms Player's Guide was written by Bruce Cordell. It also for a time had its own (rather extensive) wallbanger section on tvtropes until they got all crybaby carebear and deleted it to maintain their HUGBOX <3 <3 <3.

Do I really need to say anything more?

[A Man In Black]

The 4E Forgotten Realms Player's Guide was written by Bruce Cordell. It also for a time had its own (rather extensive) wallbanger section on tvtropes until they got all crybaby carebear and deleted it to maintain their HUGBOX <3 <3 <3.

TVTropes is a completely useless clusterfuck. (Humor writing by committee)--

[magnuskn]

The 4E Forgotten Realms Player's Guide was written by Bruce Cordell. It also for a time had its own (rather extensive) wallbanger section on tvtropes until they got all crybaby carebear and deleted it to maintain their HUGBOX <3 <3 <3.

TVTropes is a completely useless clusterfuck. (Humor writing by committee)--

It's a huge timesink, but I think calling it useless is mistaken... I've gotten interested in several series, books and movies through it, which I'd have known nothing about otherwise.

[FatR]

I've found a ton of good stuff through tvtropes. Lots of pages are funny to read as well. Just deal with the fact, that unless something is bad enough to be universally or nigh-universally loathed, the main page for it will be written by the fans rather than anti-fans. Because pimping the stuff you like is the main point.

[ScottS]

Most recent WOTC podcast: Essentials is intended to be the new "evergreen" product (whatever the hell that means, given present-day life expectancy of RPG lines); and all the class variant material in Essentials is supposed to be fully "swappable" with stuff in the current books (e.g. if they put out a fighter without dailies, there's a way to trade out class features for dailies later on if you decide there's stuff from Old Fighter you'd rather have).

In related news, the no-hardback/Essentials-only hiatus in the catalog currently runs from the middle of Aug until at least the middle of Feb (i.e. more than seven months with no regular 4e material coming down the pipe).

[Lago PARANOIA]

I've found a ton of good stuff through tvtropes. Lots of pages are funny to read as well. Just deal with the fact, that unless something is bad enough to be universally or nigh-universally loathed, the main page for it will be written by the fans rather than anti-fans. Because pimping the stuff you like is the main point.

Speaking of which, FatR, how are you enjoying that ban from Exalted topics since you're only allowed to say good things about it?

[Username17]

I think it's important to note that right now they are guaranteeing their "evergreen" model for... seven months. Let's open up the wayback machine and see how their claims have held up for seven months:

The PDFs will be updated with errata around the time the Special edition core books come out.

The standard print core books will see it on their next reprint and that date depends on the rate of inventory movement.

OK, first of all the PDFs were never updated. The errata never got folded into books on reprinting, indeed most of the books never got reprinted. But in any case, the second printings are line by line identical with the first.
Most telling of all, seven months later was April of 2009. What happened then? Oh, right. The entire PDF operation was shut down.

Seven months after they promised the "year of the threes" they announced the Essentials line and canceled the DMG3. Seven months after they went to court claiming that "everything was core" they reclassified Adventurer's Vault and Open Grave, and almost everything else as a "supplement". Seven months is a long time in 4e's marketing strategy, because they don't stick to any plan for seven months.

What's odd is how actually not that long seven months is in real-people time. Six Harry Potter sequels took ten years. 4e D&D has been thrashing around at a rate completely unheard of in the RPG industry - and practically unseen in any industry. Even X-Men continuity is more stable than 4e D&D.

I can only assume that this has to do with lackluster sales performance and the short tales of the sales of items with poor word of mouth.

-Username17

[hogarth]

But in any case, the second printings are line by line identical with the first.

Is this true? Did they really not include any errata in subsequent printings of the PHB1?

[Lago PARANOIA]

Is this true? Did they really not include any errata in subsequent printings of the PHB1?

I find this hard to believe, honestly. I own a copy of the 3E PHB second printing and it definitely has errata in it.

[Username17]

Is this true? Did they really not include any errata in subsequent printings of the PHB1?

I find this hard to believe, honestly. I own a copy of the 3E PHB second printing and it definitely has errata in it.

What kind of errata? For the PHB1 and PHB2 they announced that they had sold out and did a second printing before they even compiled an errata document for the book in question. And no third printings of those books ever materialized.

If you have errata identifiable in a second printing, it indicates that Scott Rouse was lying to us back in June of 2008 and May of 2009. Which isn't surprising I guess. Recall, in July of 2007 they assured us that 4th edition would not come out in 2008.

-Username17

[hogarth]

For the PHB1 and PHB2 they announced that they had sold out and did a second printing before they even compiled an errata document for the book in question. And no third printings of those books ever materialized.

Where are you getting your information from? Bill Slavicsek claimed that there was a 3rd printing here: http://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx ... p/20080808

[RobbyPants]

Recall, in July of 2007 they assured us that 4th edition would not come out in 2008.

Which is funny, because the 4E announcement was in August of 2007.


One month: "Nope. No way. No how."
Next month: "Hey guys! Guess what?"

[Username17]

For the PHB1 and PHB2 they announced that they had sold out and did a second printing before they even compiled an errata document for the book in question. And no third printings of those books ever materialized.

Where are you getting your information from? Bill Slavicsek claimed that there was a 3rd printing here: http://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx ... p/20080808

That's an interesting statement on his behalf. I would normally just say "Well, I guess I was wrong" except in this case Lago just said that his "second printing" copy had changes that could not have been made until after they claimed the 2nd printing had been printed and shipped.

Does anyone anywhere have a genuine copy of a third printing PHB1? Now that I see how much bullshit has been being flooded into the information market regarding printings/reprintings of 4e material, I would like some consumer end information. Apparently you can't get copies of 4e core books from distributors anymore, for whatever reason. Which indicates that the last printing happened some time ago - whatever number it was.

-Username17

[Lago PARANOIA]

I meant to say that I have a 2nd printing errata edition of the 3rd Edition PHB, not the 4E one. For that I only have the 1st printing.

[hogarth]

That's an interesting statement on his behalf. I would normally just say "Well, I guess I was wrong" except in this case Lago just said that his "second printing" copy had changes that could not have been made until after they claimed the 2nd printing had been printed and shipped.

Lago referred to changes in the 3E PHB, not the 4E PHB.