More 4E Mehness
So Massawyrm over at AICN has been playtesting 4E D&D. You can read his whole report here (be warned; typical AICN verbal diarrhea) but I wanted to pull out some quotes and focus on them.
Let us begin with…
“It still has all the complication that was in 3.5 – lots of character options, a focus on role playing and tactical combats that are even far more elaborate than before (more on that later.)”
Oh good, for a moment there I thought 4E wasn’t going to be another vehicle for WOTC to push collectible miniatures.
“At first glance there are a couple rule changes that will seem silly. The one that crawled up my craw the first session was the fact that diagonal movement counts as just one square. The idea that you could move faster diagonally than you could straight or side to side is retarded.”
And I never got the silly diagonal movement. Try this at home kids, stand in the center of the room and move three feet to your left. Move three feet to the right after that. And then move three feet to the northeast.
In all cases you moved three feet from the starting point, right? Shouldn’t movement be representative of how far you travel from your origin and not the actual physical space? If you can move 30 feet a round, it should be 30 feet, not X number of squares which may or may not actually be 30 feet which is why the diagonal movement rules are used. Using a hex map would solve a lot of problems. Ditching the map all together would solve even more.
Moving on.
“Everyone moves and counts and there’s never a hint of second guessing.”
Just like a million other RPGs. Just like how D&D was before 3E.
“Combats still take about as long as they did before, you just get to do more during them.”
We don’t need to speed up combat, after all, what would we fill our time with? Role-playing?!?
“There is a difference between a 6th level Eladrin ranger and an Elf ranger. One gets to reroll one attack every combat and ignore difficult terrain while shifting (making a 5 foot adjust) and the other can teleport 5 squares once a combat.”
Teleporting rangers?
“And Epic is just plain silly. I honestly see a lot of folks stopping at paragon – but for those that want to get into truly EPIC level, mythologically powerful gaming, epic will do the trick. With class abilities that begin with phrases like Once per day, when you die…”
*cough* Munchkin! *cough* What? I didn’t say anything….
“…and kinda wish Druids were around for the initial release.”
No druids? I know at least one person that bit of news will make it a no sale.
“This feels like 1st edition all over again.”
Or, you know, you could play something like Castles and Crusades which feels like a modern 1E, but doesn’t have silly stuff like blink elves.
Yeah, yeah, I know…I have a rather negative attitude towards 4E. And it hasn’t changed since it was first announced. What can I say?
The sad thing is that there are, and have been, many wonderful role-playing systems* out there and yet many people who will be gung-ho over D&D 4E only are because they are unaware of the choices. Much like people who only go to chain restaurants and never the cozy, family run establishments that dot the landscape, because they don’t know any better, that’s what D&D has become. It’s the Friday’s of RPGs. You know the name, the fare is overpriced, but it’s always crowded because no one wants to stray from the obvious.
And then there’s the shadow of the online component. Sure, you won’t need it per se, but the Hasborg collective isn’t infusing a whole bunch of cash into something that will collect virtual dust so you know they’re going to be pushing it and pushing it hard.
Guess we’ll see how the dice fall soon enough…
*Here are five non-D&D RPG systems that you should look into. All are in print. I won’t include C&C since that’s always the system I mention.
1. Call of Cthulhu
2. Aces and Eights
3. Metamorphsis Alpha
4. Hollow Earth Expedition
5. Hero’s Banner
But hey, speaking of C&C…we’re still looking for a few good gamers to join our RPG group (admittedly I’m not sure what the body count limit is to be called a ‘group’). We meet in East Cobb off of Scrufflegrit on Saturdays. We’d be rebooting with fresh blood, so don’t worry about joining something already in progress.