The Adventure

For the example adventure, I chose Destiny of Kings, module N3 in the Novice series.  Supposedly, this module is for 4-6 characters of levels 1-4.  I laugh at this assessment, and you’ll see why.  For the curious, here’s a quick summary.

The King of Dunador has been killed, and the Crown Prince is missing on a pilgrimage.  The PCs have been recruited by the chief adviser to find the Prince and bring him back safely.  The King’s brother has other plans, though, and has solicited the help of Duke Aimar to put forward his own claim to the throne.  This leads the PCs right into a political mess, especially once they find one of their only allies has been killed before they’ve even started…

The Party

For the first session we had four players, who made up a pretty nice group of characters with one glaring weak spot.

• Rimia, the female human Ranger, who fights with long sword and long bow.
• Elrai the elf Thief.
• Copperfield the human Illusionist.
• Peng, the placid human Monk.

As you can see, the party lacks a Cleric… or any real healing ability at all. They do have an abundance of sneakiness and special abilities, though.

The Session

Elrai’s player didn’t realize I’d specified EST, apparently, so they were over an hour late.  I’ll note the point that he came in, rather confusedly, but fortunately he didn’t miss any of the ‘action,’ just exposition.

Meeting Hollend

The party first met Hollend, the King’s adviser.  Copperfield’s master was an old friend of his, so he solicited help from the Illusionist, who sent his pupil guarded by some local friends.  Thus the adventure begins at the Three Feathers Inn, where Hollend meets with the players and dumps about eight paragraphs of exposition on them describing the general situation. After dropping a map of the area and some portraits of the Prince and the Patriarch of the local Abbot on them, he gives them 200 gold and fresh horses – very generous!

It’s all just a set up, though.

Fontenmere Abbey

Hollend suggested they begin their investigation at Montinelle, Duke Aimar’s stronghold and the local hub of civilization. There they could look for clues and resupply.  However, if they were ever in trouble, he said they could go to the nearby Fontenmere Abbey and hide out with the Patriarch there, who was also a loyalist of the old king and the current prince.

The players, of course, would have none of that.  Buying some rations at the inn, they immediately set out for the Abbey. Because following the scripted plot in a 1st Edition game is for chumps. This is the point where Elrai arrived, so they had no clue why we were out here and had to be provided some quick summaries.

The characters found the Abbey in shambles, and first investigated the outbuilding, which had been a kitchen.  They found some treasure there, platinum in a box with a few applications of antitoxin that would prove useful, shortly.  They also found a horse tethered nearby, indicating someone was at the Abbey. They chose to leave the horse unmolested.

Spiders!

Investigation of the burned kitchen and its half-dozen corpses was finished, so the party moved into the Abbey proper and started searching rooms. The first room had little of interest, but the second showed obvious signs of a violent search… and had two Huge Spiders in it.

Now we get to the messed up part of 1st Edition. First, Huge Spiders are 2+2 HD creatures with poison that, if you fail the save, kills you within six rounds unless neutralized.  Since Slow Poison alone is a 2nd Level spell, this is pretty deadly to a ‘Novice’ group.  In fact all the encounters in this book are ridiculously deadly for 1st level characters, which is one reason to laugh at the listed difficulty. One of the random encounters is 2 Perytons, which can only be harmed by magic weapons!

Of course the real issue is the fact that combat in 1st Edition is terrible.

Initiative is rolled with 1d6, highest goes first. Weapons have a Speed Factor that affects when you can go.  Weapons with a high Speed Factor, when used against quick weapons, actually allow the fast weapon user multiple attacks. THAC0 and Base Attack Bonus hadn’t been invented yet, and instead the DM looks up the AC and level and class of the attacker/defender on a matrix to see if a roll hits. Firing into a melee involves math with dividing up the total of the body masses and… yeah, it’s complicated for the DM.

So, our party of four was nearly wiped out by these two spiders. After a valiant struggle that critically injured the Ranger and Monk, the party killed both and settled down to rest. And to heal, as the Ranger was poisoned. If they hadn’t found that antitoxin earlier – and if they hadn’t been able to identify it thanks to having a Monk in the party – the Ranger would have been dead right there. From the first encounter.

Rewards

Since we were still adjusting to the system, had a late arrival, and were playing online(woo typing), they didn’t get that far. They decided to stop for the night and look into healing(1 HP per day of bed rest, and nowhere to rest, so that’s not going to work out well), as well as search the room. Finding 400 gold really helped things out, especially since gold gives XP directly in this system.

Total gains for one combat and a bit of exploration: 969 XP

In an effort to show some friends how gaming’s come along in the decades since the formative years, I’m doing some retro games. First among these is my first game, AD&D 1st Edition. Not Basic D&D, though I played some of that… AD&D. This is what I cut my teeth on, so there’s a strong nostalgia factor, but now that I’m older I can understand the rules a little more easily. For Part 1 of this series, I’ll be talking about how 1st Edition is different from ‘modern’ D&D(referring to both version 3.X and 4th) and how my own game will be set up. Future installments will cover summaries of the game sessions, both to relate interesting game stories and commentary on how the game system affected play.

Optional and House Rules

First Edition wasn’t like Third Edition… or even Second. Both of those Editions of the game had a large collection of supplementary material, largely the ‘Complete’ series for 2nd and the various class books, which were later expanded into ‘Complete’ books, for 3rd. But First Edition was in the early days of gaming, and though there were a few supplements and even some third party add-ons(Role Aids from Mayfair Games, for example), the bulk of the rules both official and optional could be boiled down into a short list of books:

• Player’s Handbook
• Dungeon Master’s Guide
• Monster Manual I & II
• Manual of the Planes(covering the Planes, of course)
• Legends & Lore/Deities and Demigods (same book, different name. Covered pantheons of gods)
• Fiend Folio (more monsters, including the now-infamous Githyanki)
• Dungeoneer’s Survival Guide
• Wilderness Survival Guide
• Unearthed Arcana
• Oriental Adventures, Dragonlance, Greyhawk, and other setting books.

The vast bulk of the rules were in the PHB and DMG. The Survival Guide series(and Oriental Adventures) introduced Nonweapon Proficiencies, while Unearthed Arcana was a collection of rules refinements and additions which included the Cavalier, Thief-Acrobat, cantrips, and I believe the Barbarian class.  I’m not using the Unearthed Arcana, but I will be using the Non-Weapon Proficiencies rules from the Survival Guides. The DMG also has an alternate rolling method that I’ll be using. The “official” rolling method is 3d6 in order, but nobody uses that now. Method I in the DMG is the more familiar 4d6 drop lowest, arrange as desired.

This short list of materials isn’t to say 1st Edition lacked rules or options. For one thing, these books are incredibly information-dense. The Survival Guide series alone has a ton of generic information and specific rules to deal with those situations that explorers might find themselves in. If you cut out all the fluff from Frostburn, Stormwrack, and Sandstorm and put them all together, they might just begin to approach the usefulness of the Wilderness Survival Guide. 1st Edition didn’t have a need to fill page space with Prestige Classes and magic items… they put information in there, instead.

Most of the additional rules and spells and equipment for 1st Edition came from Dragon Magazine, which was back in the day an incredibly useful resource.  For example, when I first began playing, I’d often use the shield rules presented in issue #127, which allowed attacking with shields and refined the defense bonus. And that was just one article! That issue alone also covered a slew of new magic and mundane bows, some optional combat rules, video game reviews, book reviews, and the infamous Editorial from Roger Moore on Tucker’s Kobolds. Given the lack of playtesting these rules had, I won’t be using any Dragon Magazine rules or classes even though I have the CD collection of Dragon. The only exception is for rules not covered in the basic books, like the aforementioned Shield Bash.

System

You might think from all the gushing I did about the sourcebooks and Dragon Magazine’s quality that I have a thing for 1st Edition. Nothing could be further from the truth. While I do look back fondly upon it, you have to realize that at the time, options were limited. D&D was practically the only game in town, and the industry was in its infancy, still developing techniques to differentiate itself from the more mature wargaming industry. This edition was a mess of rules and holdovers from that, and lacked the streamlining and standardization of later editions. The fact that it worked at all was something of a miracle. Dungeon Masters had to track so many variables and conditions that most just let things slide. Let’s take a look at the system, in brief.

Attributes

Attributes in 1st were mainly used to qualify for classes. Unlike in 3rd or even to some degree 2nd, characters only had a real use for attributes if they were extremely high or very low.  Most didn’t start a real payoff for high scores until around 15 or so, and the only official way to raise them was through the Wish spell or certain one-use magic items. Every one had its own chart, too, so there were no standardized bonuses like in 3rd. Often, the associated roll was a percentile roll, such as with Strength’s Bend Bars/Lift Gates or with Constitution’s System Shock.  Constitution also limited how often the character could be raised to the Con score itself, and only assuming the player made the Resurrection Survival check. If they failed, the character couldn’t be raised. Ever.

Races

The list of races should be familiar to any 3rd Edition player: Human, Elf, Dwarf, Halfling, Gnome, Half-Elf, Half-Orc. Most stat adjustments were a +1 to 1, -1 to another deal, but the real bonus was languages and special abilities. Demihumans lived longer, spoke far more languages at start, and had far superior special abilities than humans. They were also the only ones who could Multi-Class, but more on that later, once I get to The Price of being Demihuman…

Level limits. That’s right, a Half Elf(for example) could only ever reach 8th level as a Ranger. Full stop. So for short term campaigns, demihumans are great. Just don’t plan on actually getting far in a campaign beyond middling level.

Classes

Before I get into the actual classes, I’ll briefly cover multi-classing in 1st. It sucked. Multi-classing could only be done by demihumans, and involved taking two or even three classes at first level. XP was divided evenly between each class, and when a class leveled up, it granted a fraction of the HP and benefits to the character. Did I mention that each class had its on XP table? That’s right… thieves level up faster than mages, etc.  Which class used which abilities and how advancement was tracked was a huge mess, and I was never particularly clear on it. Dual-classing was different, though. This could only be done by humans, but was more similar to 3rd Edition’s system. Similar, but not the same. A dual-class character advanced as one class for a time, then gave it up /forever/ to play as another class. Until they reached their previous level, they earned no hit points(and some other stuff), but kept their previous total. Once they match or exceed their previous level, they can use the abilities of both classes. Messy, huh?

The classes were divided into four basic classes, each with one or more subclasses, plus one ‘special’ class and one optional class. I’ll cover each in the order they’re in the book.

Cleric

Basically like every other edition(except 4th, which changed things drastically anyway), the Cleric is the healer of the group and a pretty good basic class. They can use any armor and use non-bladed weapons, supposedly because they’re forbidden from shedding blood. Even Evil clerics. Yeah, whatever. Spell progression was a little odd in 1st, because cleric spells only went up to 7th level, not 9th. Clerics could still turn undead(and evil clerics could turn Paladins!), but holy water was a pain to make. Also… Spontaneous casting? No such thing. Pray for your spells and that’s what you get, no trading for heals.

Druid

The cleric subclass. I won’t be spending a lot of time on the druid because I don’t have my book with me, so I can’t remember if they got wild shape(I think no) or anything like that. They were required to be True Neutral and had an extremely limited weapon and armor selection, plus they had some fairly hefty requirements.  In spellcasting, Druids had their own spell list, up to 7th level like clerics. The spell list had more attack spells than the cleric, but healing spells were either less effective or learned more slowly. Cure Light Wounds, for example, was 2nd level for Druids… though realize that Druids got 2nd level spells at Experience Level 2. They also had to fight other druids to advance in the upper levels.

Fighter

If Charisma is the dump stat of 1st, Fighter is the dump class. Fighters in 1st… suck.  Their only real class feature is the ability to get a full 18/00 percentile strength, and that required having an 18 strength to start with. If your stats were that good, most likely you could qualify for another class. They did get marginally more Weapon Proficiencies and such, but Ranger or Paladin were otherwise far superior. Weapon Specialization didn’t exist, either(I think it was intro’d in Unearthed Arcana), so they didn’t even have that. The one real advantage they had was they didn’t have the restrictions on equipment that Rangers and Paladins had.

Paladin

Paladin was the second-hardest class to qualify for, requiring a 17 Charisma on top of good ‘fighter’ stats. On the basic 3d6 in order system, this was pretty tough!  The advantages were a limited ability to turn undead and at later levels cast cleric spells, much like in 3rd. They also gained the lay on hands healing ability and could use most arms and armor, though had some restrictions on magic items. They did get a Paladin’s Warhorse, but could own no more than what they and their mount could carry, and were required to tithe 10% of all wealth to their church. Even so, they were one of the most ‘badass’ classes anyone could be… so long as you stayed Lawful Good.

Ranger

The 1st Edition Ranger is a drastically different beast from his later counterparts. No dual-wielding, no thiefly skills. The Ranger could track and gained a very good bonus against giant-types, but was unrestricted in weapon type or armor. They also gained limited cleric and magic-user spells. Unlike other Fighter classes, the Ranger started with 2d8 HP instead of 1d10, and their HD capped at 11 instead of 9(all classes in 1st Edition had a Hit Die cap, after which they gained a flat number of HP unmodified by Constitution, usually 1-3 per level), making them far superior to the Fighter, other than the lack of ability to have henchmen or followers until 8th level, and the limitation of owning no more than they and their mount could carry.

Magic-User

Not Wizard, not Mage… Magic-User. I’m going to call it the mage anyway, because I’m lazy and not a pedant.  Besides, it should be familiar. Can barely use any weapons at all, can’t use armor, has very few HP. Can cast spells, of course, and uses the long-maligned but familiar Vancian system of memorizing from spellbook, then casting to ‘forget’ the spells.  This paradigm didn’t change much over the first three editions, though the addition of Metamagic Feats gave a little something to the 3rd Edition version. Magic-user spells went all the way up to 9th Level.

Illuisionist

Unlike in 2nd/3rd, the 1st Edition Illusionist was an elite class, not just a specialist. They had stricter requirements, yet their spells only went up to 7th level. They did, however, have a completely different spell list with some impressive stuff in it. Otherwise they were fairly similar to Magic-Users.

Thief

Ah, the Thief. In 1st Edition, the game didn’t really have ‘skills’ per se.  Sure, there were Secondary Skills or NonWeapon Proficiencies, but both were optional systems. The Thief, thusly, had several special class abilities such as Climb Walls, Pick Pockets, Open Locks, Read Languages, etc. All of these were percentile-based, and adjusted by race and attributes.  They also had the backstab ability and Thieves’ Cant. Of all the classes, Thieves progressed the fastest in level, and had a decent spread of weapons they could use. Not a bad choice if you didn’t qualify for an ‘elite’ class, really.

Assassin

What? Assassin? Yep.  Assassin was a subclass of the Thief, and required some good stats plus an evil alignment. They used Thief skills at a 2 level penalty(meaning they started to at 3rd level) and could backstab, plus use poison. I don’t much like Assassins, so I won’t go into the rules for them much. Best to think of them as evil, combat-focused thieves.

Monk

As if Assassin weren’t bad enough. Monk is the fifth class, the ‘special’ class. It’s very hard to qualify for, harder than Paladin in some ways, and very… Eastern-influenced. Monks have low hit points, using a d4, though they do start with 2d4 instead of 1. But they get open hand damage, falling damage reduction, and lots of special abilities. In fact, this article is getting so long I’m going to skip describing their abilities. It’d take a while.

Bard

The old joke about the Bard in 1st is: “My DM doesn’t allow them.”  Bard is the optional class, and is in fact found in the Appendices of the PHB along with things like Psionics(do NOT get me started on 1st Edition Psionics), so it’s often forgotten about. Possibly because it’s a pain in the ass. Bards get a lot of special powers, fight as fighters, and cast druid spells in addition to using thief abilities.  The reason for this is because to be a bard, a character must play as a fighter, change to druid, and change to thief(not necessarily in that order), then become a bard by seeking out a bard college.  It is, in other words, the prototype for 3e’s Prestige Classes. It doesn’t help that the bard rules are contradictory to the main rules. In order to be a bard you have to dual-class, which should logically limit it to Humans… but supposedly it’s open to half-elves as well. Whatever.

Combat

This post is already running long, so I’ll try to be brief… even though combat in 1st was a huge mess. AC went from 10 down to the negatives, and the lower the better.  To hit was done by looking up tables and charts, not calculated.  Weapons had a speed factor that delayed when in the round they could be used… and 2-handed weapons got no bonus beyond their larger damage die.  This made sword and shield by far the most effective combo.  Weapons also had further bonuses/penalties against certain armor classes, which just muddled the issue further(and was often ignored), and then there’s the fact that each character had a limited number of Weapon Proficiencies that were limited to one specific weapon each. Only fighters could attack multiple times in a round, and even at top levels, only twice a round… except against creatures under 1 HD, in which case they could do a number of attacks equal to their level. And don’t get me started on Saving Throws…

What It Did Right

I’ll readily admit I’m biased. I don’t like the direction 4th Edition took Dungeons and Dragons either.  However, to be fair, it’s not because it’s a bad game on its own.  So I should start with talking about what I think 4th Edition does well, and the improvements it made.  On the whole, I can see that it’s a decently-designed game, and it is fun when played. I didn’t come to this decision without giving it a couple tries.  So in that respect, the designers succeeded.

The most prominent thing I’ve noticed about 4th Edition is the balance. Balance is king in 4th, and it’s drilled in for every class, every item, even how magic items are created and used. This isn’t an in depth review, of the system, so I won’t cover specifics here.  Either as a side effect or as a conscious decision, this balance has also normalized the mechanics of every class across the board.  Power, class feature, Skill.  All use the same mechanics for every class. The power effects themselves determine if it’s a support role or attack role or whatever.  Some people don’t like this, but if you’re going to streamline combat and balance it, that’s a good step.  Since it falls squarely within the design goals of the system, I’m marking that as a plus.

Streamlining was given a great degree of importance, as well. Better miniatures integration, easily adjustable monsters for the DM, and the aforementioned flattened mechanics make combats go faster… or at least they seem to go faster.  Actual time spent seems to be about the same, but the characters can handle a greater number of enemies in that time span. Mechanics in general were simplified, and though there are those who complain about this, I’ll mark it as a positive.

The presentation of the game itself is very bold.  I don’t mean that in an “in your face” way, either.  Just flipping through the book, all the races and classes are shown in half-page cuts with dynamic, colorful poses.  A newbie flipping through the book gets to see a bit of life in them, begging “pick me, pick me!”  At least that’s the impression I get from how its laid out.  This styling isn’t to be dismissed, honestly… it gets people into the game, visualizing their characters. Arguably it does a much better job than the relatively dull poses and artwork shown in the 3.x series.

First Mistake: The Launch

While I was too young to remember the launch of 1st Edition AD&D, I was playing during the introduction of 2nd Edition, and quite active when 3rd was launched.  The differences in approaches are astounding. The 2nd Edition launch can’t really be compared with the others, as the influence and size of the company, not to mention its management, were completely different at the time. I’ll concentrate on the launch of 3rd versus 4th Edition, instead.

When 3rd Edition was announced, Dragon Magazine made certain to give small overviews of each system and change on a month by month basis. They were honest about the fact that 3rd was a significantly different game, but provided a plethora of conversion material to ease the pain of buying all new books. Wizards of the Coast put in a presence at most of the conventions with various preview materials. Most interesting to me was their large booth at Origins, where they ran small demo games and had a preview printing of the not-yet-released Player’s Handbook, encased in glass but with holes that people could use to turn the pages and get a look at it.  Several of the actual developers of the game were there to answer questions and talk about the work that went into it.  Certainly, there was still some resistance to a new system, but the overall feeling was that everyone in the company understood that reluctance and was doing their best to assuage it.

Fourth Edition’s launch was different. While I was not reading Dragon Magazine at the time and therefore can’t offer an opinion on their coverage of that, I did see some of the debates online. There were the expected flare ups, but little real information until near the release date. A lot of hype was built up… and that’s fine. What wasn’t fine was Wizards basically having a public attitude of “you’ll convert and you’ll like it” in most of their announcements. It’s nice to have confidence in the product, but telling people they can throw away the shelves full of expensive books from the previous edition isn’t going to win any points.

And then there’s the convention presence. Or, more accurately, the lack of such. Wizards didn’t even have a booth at Origins at all, even though by then the game had actually been released. In fact, it was only around a month or so that it had been out, and there was no real attempt to sell it to the industry.  Most of the third party companies that used to do a lot of 3rd Edition work had nothing but complaints of the new licensing scheme, and there was no representative from Wizards to explain their point of view.  Even finding a 4th Edition game to play in was difficult, and this at the second largest gaming convention in the nation. And I was actually interested in trying out the game! Imagine how difficult it will be to convince the naysayers when they can’t just wander by and observe a game, like they could with the launch of 3rd Edition.

“Okay,” says my internal Devil’s Advocate, “But Wizards was trying to appeal to a larger audience, and only a small fraction of the hardcore players attend conventions, so is it that important?”  Well, maybe not. We’ll let these first two details slide, though it is still two strikes against the launch.  So why don’t we focus on the real bungling here?  Trying to appeal to a new demographic is fine, though it’s better to not disturb your base too much in the process. However, much ado was made about the online features of DnD Insider both online, and in the print release of the books. Various features like the Game Table and Character Visualizer were promised, along with a Character Builder and Compendium. Even for one such as myself, the temptation of easy online play with a streamlined system was enough to tempt me toward playing or running a game in 4th.

Unfortunately, this was not to be.  Upon launch, none of these features were available. In all fairness, the Compendium — arguably the simplest feature — went up not long after the launch. Even so, it’s been nearly a year since that day and the only promised feature that has been released is the Character Builder. Although convenient, I can do that without an online tool. I want the kickass features like the Visualizer and the Game Table.  But there’s no sign of such on the main page. Way to look professional, guys. I’m sure that inspires all the newcomers as to your dedication to supporting the system. Now there’s another book out, and they’re still pushing this new system, yet I still have a bad taste in my mouth from that bait and switch.

Change Is Good, Change Is Bad

All right, so they messed up the launch. It’s possible to recover from that. But that depends on the game having a wide appeal and/or a supportive fanbase. To be perfectly honest, I do think 4th has more than enough devotees to succeed and turn a profit. I’m not so certain the fanbase will ever be the same, though. More than any previous edition, 4th tossed out a lot of old rules and made something different. The complete elimination of backwards compatibility is controversial, but I’m of the opinion that sometimes, it’s for the best. I’ll not criticize that decision, by itself. The real problem isn’t that the old system was dropped, it’s that no upgrade path was provided at all. Wizards gave no real help to people wanting to transition from 3.x to 4th, and instead simply cut support as soon as 4th was released. Even popular products that were released a mere year before launch are getting hard to find now, and the sudden drop was a hard pill to swallow for people still trying to fill out their 3rd Edition collection.

The fact of the matter is, even the best of new editions takes some time to spread and replace the old.  And I wouldn’t call 4th the ‘best’ replacement for 3rd. A lot of people will protest because they love it, and I hasten to add that what 4th focuses on, it does extremely well. Here’s the rub, though:  4th edition focused on streamlining and appealing to one particular play style, at the expense of all the others.  Some of this is unavoidable, as increasing flexibility often increases complexity, unless things are abstracted to an immense degree. This alone is not too bad, but it’s combining with everything else to make 4th less appealing to the audience.

Fourth Edition represents not just a change in systems, but a fundamental genre shift. The first three editions have all been about simulating a fantasy world using pen and paper and possibly miniatures.  At first, it was combat only, with nonweapon proficiencies — “skills” — introduced in Oriental Adventures and the various Survival Guides.  In 2nd Edition, NWPs became standard to the system, but were heavily reliant upon initial stats and very primitive in execution.  Finally, with 3rd, D&D became a true skill-based system, even with the level advancement still present.

This is all changed in 4th. While skills are still present, only reduced in number, various other parts of the system have been altered to make it feel focused almost entirely upon combat. Skill Challenges are a nod to noncombat parts of adventures, but even with these the entire game feels set up as… well, a game. This isn’t a bad thing by itself, but all previous editions had been a move toward a more simulationist feel, so 4th feels like a massive step back.  Arbitrary limits are place upon magic items, while many spells are no longer a limited resource and now just another attack. Classes are fixed, with the “multiclassing” thrown in feeling like some sort of half-forgotten crumbs to appease people who like combination builds. For that matter, the entire game is focused upon “builds” and planned character advancement rather than organic growth through roleplay. If someone decides that after five levels, their character no longer wants to be a fighter, but the cleric is a better calling… tough. They’re stuck as a Fighter for the rest of their life, with at best a smattering of pitiful cleric abilities that are paid for by sacrificing much better skills.  This is such a massive step backward it’s sickening… even 1st edition had dual classing, though the rules for demihumans made no sense.

And that is the big gripe. Where 3.X felt like the system was working with you to simulate roleplay, in 4th it feels like any roleplay of great complexity forces you to work around the extremely gamist elements of the system. The balance forced down the player throats is all, supposedly, meant to eliminate min/maxing and builds like the infamous Pun-Pun build, yet at the same time referring to different paths as “builds” in the main rulebook encourages, in my mind, a very metagame-level approach to creating a character. It bothers me on a fundamental level. Sure, nobody’s forcing me to metagame, but isn’t that what everyone was complaining about? I think this is one reason that everyone, rightly or wrongly, accuses 4th of borrowing from MMOs and such. Because it doesn’t feel like you’re adventuring in a fantasy world so much as, well… playing a game set in a fantasy world. It’s a step back from immersion, in my opinion.

Miniatures

Small rant here. A lot of people are complaining about the increased reliance upon miniatures in 4th as compared to previous editions. While I do prefer having the option of doing paper-only play, I’m going to withhold judgment on that for now and strike at the real problem. In any battle suggested by the rules or published adventures, the DM requires a large number of similar monster figures, not to mention player representations. Wizards recommends using their own, prepainted minis for this. While I like those minis, and think they’re decent quality for the price, they’re a collectible item. The distribution of figurines is random, in sealed packs, so collecting say… ten orcs, which should be a fairly simple exercise, would require an outlay of up to $100, easily. While it’s possible to buy preopened second hand for cheaper, I don’t think this is what WotC intended and it isn’t a good solution. And people say Warhammer is expensive! Minor subrant over.

The Future

I don’t think 4th Edition will fail, despite my own misgivings. PHB 2 has some interesting stuff in it, but not enough to really make me want to buy the supplements and play a regular game.  From what I’ve heard, supplements aren’t selling well, either.  I don’t think WotC will see a massive explosion in number of players, sad to say. As for myself, I don’t think I’ll be playing 4th much unless they can get Table up and running, and it isn’t terrible. I can appreciate the push toward balance, it just feels like the system itself was butchered to make it happen, and too many missteps tell me it wasn’t as well thought out as everyone says.