>I can run 5e, again, or Pathfinder, Again, or run a setting for Changeling that the group has played in before me
>One of the players says he'll run a game
>FOURTH EDITION DUN DUN DUN
>take him up on the offer because I jsut want to not be the fucking DM
>go on local craigslist and manage to snag Players handbook 1-2-3, all of the monster manuals, the forgotten realms players guide and campaign guide and Eberron and Dark Sun guides for a whopping 25 dollars because the dude wasn't getting sales and wanted to get rid of the books
>start reading the rules
>holy fucking shit this build variety
>jesus fuck no class is useless
>what the fuck Bards, my favorite class are fucking god damn shitting amazing, spamming heals while stabbing niggas and making monsters have siezures
>start playing
>it's some of the best crunch-heavy gaming I've done in my life
>battles are fast, fluid and over with quick
What the fuck? What's the issue with this edition of DnD that we all screamed at it and said it was bad? It's fucking good.
its shit reee its not 3.5 ree
>>46345141
Because 3rd edition breeds retards.
>>46345141
>What the fuck? What's the issue with this edition of DnD that we all screamed at it and said it was bad? It's fucking good.
Because it is good and people thought they knew everything about a game they didn't play
3.5 is better.
In my experience the battles will bog right down after you get halfway through heroic. There are ways to stop that happening (honestly just having competent players really cuts down on the time)
It has its own share of problems and honestly the things it did right I feel they carried over into 5e anyway.
That said, I think of all the editions 4th does it best when it comes to just pure heroic fantasy. It only pays passing nod to the basic adventuring stuff to the point where its just kind of assumed it all sorts itself out.
>>46345141
Early 4e is exactly like you describe. Later on it suffers from too much stuff happening, too many decisions to make, and monsters being designed as fluffy punching bags. I'm DM'ing a 4e campaign that's at epic tier, and I've gone and halved all monster HP while doubling their damage. Others have suggested to keep the HP/damage ratio of level 1 in later levels, which might also work.
Still, I think what most people were angry about was that it sort of admitted that it was a game, instead of a simulation of reality, what with ranged being spelled out in squares instead of feet, etc.
But yeah, like you describe, for people who like crunch-heavy gaming that's like an RPG that harkens back to its roots of a tactical miniatures game, it's amazing.
>>46345776
isn't that all systems, though? I mean High level 3.5/pathfinder is a fucking joke.
I think it really comes down to skilled players which is a hilarious fucking idea to me.
>>46345141
>nothing but combat
>every combat goes the same way, you use your encounter powers and then just spam at-wills
>balance comes at the cost of making it so no one can do anything cool
>monsters have so little customizability that a troglodyte with a club and a troglodyte with a spear are completely different creatures
>when you kill a monster its equipment disappears WoW-style
4e is shit and 4chan is the only place on the internet with people dumb enough to like it.
>>46345910
But 4chan hated it, and normies liked it.
Speaking of the whole hp/dmg thing. What do I do exactly to balance it out? I keep hearing about lowering hp/increasing dmg but I have no idea by how much. Is there any formula or something that I can use. That's also clear to read for a retard like me?
>>46345141
>it's some of the best crunch-heavy gaming I've done in my life
Crunch-heavy can be a turn-off.
>>46345910
is 3 a 'when everyone is cool, no one is' type situation?
>>46345940
monster manual 3 has the fixes, and you can find said fixes for free.
>>46345943
People play 3.5, though. A lot.
>>46345950
No. It used to be that casters could do cool things and martials couldn't. The right think to do would be to make Tome of Battle-style maneuvers core, so that everyone could do cool things. What they did was take away everything that made casters interesting.
>>46345940
I think anything post Essentials generally has the right idea. I dunno if they still have that monster builder thing around, which would usually give level appropriate values.
The old hard and quick fix was just doubling all damage.
>>46345910
>>when you kill a monster its equipment disappears WoW-style
What ? I don't remember something like this in the rulesAlso that's stupid
>>46345910
>nothing but combat
If you've got a shit DM, I've played in multiple games 3.PF, AD&D, VtM, Shadowrun, CoC, where combat was the focus and everything else was ignored. 4e doesn't make combat any more of a focus than previous editions did its just that you're a faggot.
>every combat goes the same
As opposed to the 3.PF model of 'pointless filler fights' followed up by the 'spam everything' boss fight
>when you kill a monster its equipment disappears
As opposed to 3.PF? Oh wait that happens there too! It's almost as if most enemies have had random loot tables for decades and good DMs handed over the equipment of unique or interesting enemies
>>46345910
>>nothing but combat
If you have a shit DM.
>>every combat goes the same way, you use your encounter powers and then just spam at-wills
If you have shit players.
>>balance comes at the cost of making it so no one can do anything cool
So nothing is cool because everyone has special abilities, not just casters?
>>monsters have so little customizability that a troglodyte with a club and a troglodyte with a spear are completely different creatures
Customization is up to the DM and the DMG provides suggestions on how to do it, so you are talking out of your ass.
>>when you kill a monster its equipment disappears WoW-style
You are literally retarded.
>>46345981
>What they did was take away everything that made casters interesting.
Like?
>>46345141
> battles are over with quick
There's a lot of good to say about 4E but you can't say this about vanilla fourth. Boss battles especially were infamous for taking way too fucking long.
People came up with good solutions but out of the box it was a big problem
>>46345981
>Wah! I'm not interesting because I'm not better than everyone else!
You are everything that is wrong with the hobby.
>>46345141
If it makes you happy play it.
Personally I don't like it much.
>>46346001
I guess he's referring to the fact everyone is effectively a Vancian Caster to some extent. The Wizard spellbook feature is an obviously poorly shoehorned throwback
And that Rituals are kinda garbage without tweaking them.
I never really saw that issue with 4e though, there's plenty enough options. If the fact you're not the only one who can cast big spell once a day takes away what's different about your character I don't think its the system that's the issue
>>46346011
Presumably, he knew to use the MM3 math instead of the "padded sumo" math used in MM1 and 2
>>46346011
How many years have passed since the MM3 came out with the new math?
Do people still not use it?
>>46345993
You just sell their gear at 20% of value. No one does as it isn't worth the weight.
>>46346129
So it doesn't disappear, it's just that the PC don't take the equipment
>>46346145
IIRC, magic gear they have can be broken down into Thaumium or whatever its called, which is super-portable. It's just that no one above first level bothers grabbing non-magical gear, since they'll have better shit than Random Orc #17 will
>>46346175
Residiuum.
And yeah, gear doesn't 'disappear.' It's just ignored sometimes because those rusty daggers and spears the goblins are using aren't worth selling for scrap.
>>46346001
Having a variety of interesting spells, some of which are useful outside of combat, instead of a small handful of encounter powers followed by boring at-will spam.
>>46345950
>>46346016
I'm not saying that anyone should be better than everyone else, I'm saying that everyone should be able to do interesting things. In 4e, no one can. But, I'm not expecting reading comprehension from a 4tard.
>>46346234
Then define 'interesting', since you apparently have a vastly different definition than at least three people.
>>46346207
The "interesting non-combat spell" is the ritual stuff, it's not like it disappeared. It's just that everyone gets to use it with some feat investment. Animal Messenger, Passwall, Teleportation Circle, Speak With Dead, Tenser's Floating Disc - they're there, man. It's just that everyone can learn to use them with spellcasters having an easier time of it.
>running 4e campaign with bros
>run lasts 3 years
>char is paladin of pelor
>praise the fucking sun
>only character to make it through from the beginning
>level 28, on the verge of becoming angel of light and smite the shit out of evil demigods
>party falls apart as group members leave/lose interest
closest I ever got to maxing out a d&d character. 3 of us have gotten back together to start a 5e campaign, but I still wish I could go back and finish it, /tg/
>>46346145
Not even the medusa's poisoned bow?
>>46346327
Well, given that the poison on the bow is exactly the same effects as the poison from her snaky hair attack, one would presume that she's poisoning the arrows herself, rather than the bow spontaneously generating poison.
>>46346395
Or, y'know, you could look at her stat block and see that she has "equipment: hooded cloak, longbow, quiver of 30 arrows" specifically listed. And given that a longbow should sell for around 6 GP (20% of its default retail price), it's really not worth picking up and looting.
>>46346428
Or, y'know, the DM could just say that this specific medusa had a magic bow
In a lot of ways, 4e is the most DnD of DnDs. It's by far the most gamist of them all, combat takes really long and it feels totally disjointed from the rest of roleplaying.
...But at the same time, it does have the best combat system out of all roleplaying games I've ever played. It's genuinely fun. If you want crunch-heavy roleplaying that merges miniature tactics gaming with roleplaying, you can't really go wrong with 4e.
>>46346447
Why though?
>it's too abstract and video gamey!
>in a fucking game that still uses shit like AC and 5% chance to crit fail to this day
>every other game that handles this slightly more realistically (not retarded) is considered too crunchy for D&Dfags
I don't get D&Dfags sometimes.
>>46346527
To loot a magic bow ?
>>46346532
>>it's too abstract and video gamey!
Daily reminder that D&D4e is the only D&Dedition that didn't get a video game (not counting 5e because it is just a bit less than 2 years old)
>>46346566
Thankfully we got Divinity: Original Sin which is more obviously 4E-inspired than the actual D&D games that came out when 4E was the current edition.
>>46346566
Wasn't Daggerdale a video game based on 4e?
>>46345956
I am blind because I can't see the fix formula in monster manual
4e is hands down the best edition of D&D in terms of game design AND playability. It does have its faults, as any 4e player can tell you, but the core of the game is good enough that it works smoothly without heavy fixes (and actually many of the "needed" houserules are marginal and the game works out of the box).
Unfortunately 3.x caused brain cancer in a generation of gamers and it's still impossible to discuss 4e anywhere on the internet without the "hurr durr vidyagaem" retards coming out of the woodwork.
>>46346566
Well, it got Neverwinter, which was a shit MMO.
4e DnD had far less problems out of the box than 3e and 3.5e did at launch... or 5e, for that matter.
Some people just seemed flabberghasted that a game acknowledged that it had game elements... just like ODnD.
>>46346993
Here you go, Anon. Math fixes for MM1 and MM2.
>>46346550
But the bow isn't magic.
>>46347065
I find it amusing that people complain about 4E being tabletop WoW when 3E blatantly cribbed from Fallout(XP progression is 100% identical, feats are identical to perks with only one minor difference and have the same 3 level progression) and Everquest(3E's magic items were specifically inspired by this) and had some extreme play similarities with games like D2, even down to catering to the same character building and loot fetish that D2 is all about.
Diablo Edition is far, far more accurate than WoW Edition ever will be.
>>46347149
It's also an empty argument. If you say "4e has MMO elements!" then... OK, sure. So what? What about that makes it bad? You need to actually explain what makes something bad.
WoW is an MMO played by millions, that at the time 4e was released, certainly still had problems, but had also gone through a balancing period that tabletop RPGs can only dream of. 'WoW edition' should be a compliment.
>>46346234
Except you aren't because all you've said is that nobody is 'interesting'. Interesting in what way? Did you miss the planar binding spells and story possibilities created by them? Did you miss the ability for clerics to commune with their deity and provide character development opportunities through the schisms that arise between the letter and intent of scripture?
Strangely enough I don't think you did because you insist that you want everyone to be interesting but you are defending the previous paradigm of D&D where most of the classes were not interesting (by your non-definition that is tied to a characters ability to do nebulous things that other characters can't) and couldn't do anything unique since the mechanics behind those classes were poorly designed and led to massive power disparities.
But then, I'm not expecting reasoned arguments from a faggot.
>>46347287
>Strangely enough I don't think you did because you insist that you want everyone to be interesting but you are defending the previous paradigm of D&D where most of the classes were not interesting
I'm not, though. The previous paradigm was shit, but it was shit that could've been fixed by giving Tome of Battle maneuvers to core martials. Instead, WotC implemented a cure that was worse than the disease.
everyone can do cool stuff > some people can do cool stuff > no one can do cool stuff
>>46347149
Fallout is an RPG, though. WoW is just a treadmill.
>>46347354
Except that the tome of battle maneuvers are almost entirely focused on combat. They don't give martial classes a lot of utility or meaningful out of combat options just more 'punch shit better' and 'combat buffs/debuffs'.
I don't see that as a fighter being more interesting as a class, just less mechanically terrible.
>>46347170
>It's also an empty argument. If you say "4e has MMO elements!" then... OK, sure. So what? What about that makes it bad? You need to actually explain what makes something bad.
WoW's gameplay is absolutely degenerate and boring, people played it because Blizzard hired psychologists to help them make the most addictive game possible (yes, really), and that means putting the players in a Skinner Box.
>WoW is an MMO played by millions
Your logical fallacy is: argumentum ad populum. Justin Bieber has millions of fans, does that mean he makes good music?
>>46347377
>Except that the tome of battle maneuvers are almost entirely focused on combat. They don't give martial classes a lot of utility or meaningful out of combat options just more 'punch shit better' and 'combat buffs/debuffs'.
Fighter is especially shitty because they barely get any skill points and don't have any really good class skills. That would also need to be fixed. Paladins, rogues and rangers have ways to pull their weight outside of combat at least.
>>46347354
> no one can do cool stuff
Explain what it is they can't do.
>>46347390
>WoW's gameplay is absolutely degenerate and boring, people played it because Blizzard hired psychologists to help them make the most addictive game possible (yes, really), and that means putting the players in a Skinner Box.
And this applies to 4E how?
>>46347354
More proof of 3.5 brain damage.
>>46347483
Argumentum ad hominem.
>>46347354
>no one can do cool stuff
Who in 4e can't do cool stuff?
>>46347410
>Paladins, rogues and rangers can pull their weight outside of combat
I completely disagree with this, you are correct that 3.PF fighter is an unmitigated disaster but so are the rest of those classes.
>Rogue
If you're playing in a non-dispelable trap rich campaign the rogue has a lot of ways to help but the massive amount of skills points aren't overly useful because the bard (and sorcerer) are better at talking because of how skills and DCs worked, the wizard is better at knowledges, the druid is better at hearing and spotting stuff and the wizard is better at stealth because he can turn invisible, walk through walls, scry, summon shit to do this for him etc.
The rogue is an NPC class, probably picked up as a cohort by someone with leadership if not entirely ignored.
>Paladin
Same problem as the fighter. No skill points, and the MAD means that Int was probably the dump stat. Not as a good at talking as the bard, not as good at knowledge checks as the wizard or bard. The paladin class might provide good story hooks no accessible to a fighter or cleric (but this is really unlikely) that entirely up to DM and no class should have to rely on the DM remembering it exists to make it interesting.
Totally skippable class, you're a fighter with MAD, no bonus feats and all the inherent weakness of the fighter.
>Ranger
Okay now we're talking. Decent skill points and decent skills, the ranger is an excellent scout at low levels but is rendered entirely moot once the wizard, cleric and druid start being able to summon creatures to scout, or transform into creatures, or fly, or turn invisible, or craft monsters etc.
While the ranger isn't as bad as the paladin, fighter or rogue it is still an NPC class because like it's parent class (the fighter) it doesn't have magical utility options to rival the full casters, progresses linearly and could be replaced as a scout by an imp familiar.
>>46345141
Its still the only edition of the D&D that dungeon crawls well and it manages it at level 1.
>>46347366
You're a treadmill
>>46345141
>>go on local craigslist
I stopped here. I don't need to read about how OP blew five dudes on craigslist.
>>46347508
Simple observation.
By the way, folks calling out "logical fallacies" on the internet are just pathetic.
>>46347508
Fallacy fallacy. Eat shit.
>>46346234
Really? Things I've done in a couple of 4e games.
>Take part in an investigation and chase after finding out that the person we were going to visit has gone missing. Skills and abilities made that versatile and fun rather than just 'I run 90ft' or 'I teleport and automatically succeed'
>Engaged in scooby doo style shenanigans with a guy who was pretending to be a ghost to scare people away from a business he hated.
>Comforting a recently orphaned girl by having a seance to allow her to speak with her parents one last time. That and a mechanical dragonfly she found adorable.
Those all used the 4e rules fine and the PC in question always felt useful even without a heap of 'You need this spell to do this' things.
The one thing I'd have liked with 4e would have been more ability to freeform rituals rather than 'You know X and only X'.
>>46347377
Well, it helps solve what I call the "Dumb Fighter Fights Dumb" problem.
A class exists that's named after a field of expertise. It has the least interesting play-style in that field of expertise.
That's stupid,no game designer worth their salt would think that's a good idea...
...but this is exactly what happens to the "Fighter" class in almost every rpg with a fighter or warrior class. You build the character and then when a fight happens, you say "I attack" and then the entire fight is "I attack".
ToB solved the Dumb Fighter Fights Dumb problem, but not the rest of the problems martials have.
>>46347553
>Engaged in scooby doo style shenanigans with a guy who was pretending to be a ghost to scare people away from a business he hated
Storytime?
Do you use skill challenges or not, I didn't like them in 4e because I felt that they prevented the type of shenanigans you're describing.
>>46346566
>>46347098
It had a shitty Facebook game.
Neverwinter hardly counts. Funny enough, considering it adapted "Video Game Edition" it completely changed the mechanics to standard MMO fare. It's only 4e in the sense it borrows some words.
>>46347654
Skill challenges were an interesting idea that were written badly at least 50% of the time.
4e has just as much noncombat combat as any edition of DnD - it's just that it writes the combat well so people go "OMG SO MUCH COMBAT IT OVERTAKES THE REST OF THE GAME" instead of properly comparing.
>>46347654
Skill Challenges were just a way of trying to standardize what most people do already.
Take Scooby Doo shenanigans, depending on how big a part of the campaign it was, it could be easily be 1-3 skill challenges.
>>46347553
>The one thing I'd have liked with 4e would have been more ability to freeform rituals rather than 'You know X and only X'
I thought this too. When our group threatened to approach 10 players, I wrote up a setting based on rival mage houses where we'd split them into two groups of 4. They'd be able to come up with magic rituals based on already existing effects they knew.
Group approached critical instability though so never got to use it.
>>46347698
Hey now, the facebook games were both great.
>>46347735
Skill challenge equivalents are present many recent rules-medium games (see Fate and Chronicles of Darkess to name the most well-known), but no one complains about them. I think this is because many detractors approached 4e with the "dice rolls before anything else" mentality born out of other editions, and it's easy to turn them in soulless roll-fests.
>>46347521
O D & D I S T H E L I G H TThat's a different type of dungeoncrawl, I know, but I felt it needed pointing out.
>>46345141
>>battles are fast, fluid and over with quick
:^)
>>46347654
>>46347735
The first one there? It was ruleswise a skill challenge. It's just the GM kept changing the scene a bit with each success or failure and thus the PC kept adapting to it rather than it being a static 'X failures is an arbitary failure but nothing changes until then'.
I think the core of a skill challenge is making people feel like they are DOING something. Not just racking up points towards a sudden success.
Alright.
The PC in question is Blaize. Blaize is an odd one for an Ebberon game. Mostly because she's not from Ebberon. She's a Fire Mephit who was summoned by a Wizard for a Familiar, who fucked up the spell and thus Blaize got to deck her and run. (Ruleswise she's a Firecraft Pixie Monk).
As a result, she doesn't really know squat about the world itself but does know rather a lot about magic.
She's made some good friends with Alicia "Lee-lee", a Daughter of aristocratic family in Aundair when she walked in on her getting kidnapped (See the first example of fun stuff) and chased down the kidnappers. As a result, she's ended up good friends with the girl and her other friends who are all roughly the same age as Blaize.
Blaize and her adventuring party have just gotten back to the big city after a recent adventure and her Lee-Lee and her friends come to her with a story. There is a ghost haunting a local graveyard, crying out about vengeance for his murder by a local noble family!
Blaize's adventuring party could handle it but Lee-Lee and her friends really want to try adventuring themselves after Blaize saved Lee-Lee! Still, they invite the little Mephit anyway as she's a good friend.
Off to the graveyard they go, after passing through the adjoining grounds of the aforementioned noble family.
At which point they all realize...they have no clue what a ghost is like. Or even if it's actually a ghost. Or how you find a ghost. So they improvise and all split up to go searching. More directions means more chances to find it.
>>46347941
Lee-Lee and Blaize end up partnered up as they go searching and they meet the graveyard tender. He shiftily talks about how there isn't any ghost here and they should go away and even if there WAS a ghost would be too dangerous for them and they should go away anyway.
Turns out that neither Lee-Lee nor Blaize can pass a 'low teens' Insight challenge. So they thank him for his information and head on, determined to find out something they can learn about this ghost!
At this point, one of the other girls returns and tells them about the crypt they found! One of the nearby crypts has it's doors unsealed so people can get in and out. Maybe it's a clue!
The trio hurry over towards the crypt and take a look inside. It's...crypt-y...not really any sign of a ghost. They take a stroll around it looking for clues, when Blaize realizes that Lee-Lee has vanished! A quick search finds a secret door in the floor that Lee-Lee had fallen through. Blaize had also gone over it but being a pixie, she'd just hovered over it. Being Wis 8 and untrained in Perception, she'd also managed to completely fluff the roll to notice the girl following her vanishing.
Blaize and her friend slip down the secret door after Lee-Lee and find...living quarters? Someone has removed the body from a lavish crypt and turned it into a bedroom with magic lights and a wardrobe and a bed.
What does a Ghost need with this? Ghosts don't need this.
Keem, the third girl has a theory. What if it's not a Ghost. What if...it's a VAMPIRE! Vampires need places to stay and also like places with lots of gothic architecture and black!
>>46347941
>>46347997
Judanas please go.
>>46347941
>The first one there? It was ruleswise a skill challenge. It's just the GM kept changing the scene a bit with each success or failure and thus the PC kept adapting to it rather than it being a static 'X failures is an arbitary failure but nothing changes until then'.
So he played it exactly how a skill challenge should be played?
>>46347137
There are suggestions in the DMG for how a DM can adjust a monster to account for giving it a magic item.
So that players can get a magic item from a means other than a treasure chest.
Please tell me I fell for bait and that you aren't actually this dense.
>>46347997
Blaize gets a bit confused at this point. Why would a Fire Vampire need a wardrobe? They are a hive mind of red lightning creatures. She's soon corrected about the fact that they don't mean a Fire Vampire. They mean a Vampire, an evil and decadent being that feeds on the life of those it rules over.
Blaize starts bitching about how Prime Material people keep making names for things by taking the proper Elemental name and removing 'Fire' or something like this. First it was the Hell Hounds without Hell. Then it was the Fire Bats without Fire. Are people really that uncreative? Anyway, there is already a term for what Keem described. It's called a Noble.
Lee-Lee looks rather offended at that but then they hear the sound of footsteps...someone is coming this way. The trio all quickly hide, Lee-Lee ducking under the bed and Keem into the wardrobe as Blaize vanishes above the door as no one ever looks up.
The trio stay hidden long enough to spot the gravekeeper walk in...and start putting on ghost makeup. Finally, the wheels start turning in heads and people start realizing what is going on. But now how to prove he did it to the guard?
Blaize has an idea! She rummages about in her bag of holding and finds some alchemists powders she bought a while ago. She sprinkles them into her flaming wings and hair and the normal redish-white shifts to a sickly green as she glows bright enough to hide her face. Instant Will-O-Wisp!
Blaize then proceeds to bullshit the gravekeeper. Talking about how the dead are offended by his deeds, how he must atone or pay the price! How his deception has brought him close to the grave. To be honest, she has no clue what she's talking about and is mostly turning whatever he says into the source for her next lie. Her breaks down and promises to go and turn himself in, to make up for his deeds and runs off terrified.
>>46348023
Yep. A lot of complaints about them seem to be treating them as an arbitrary meter rather than a scene.
>>46348052
Later on, they actually find out from the guards who arrested him what he'd actually done and why. He'd been supplementing his income by harassing rich people outside the property of the noble family for donations for the graveyard and then just lining his pockets.
They had forbidden him from ever setting foot on their land again and he was suddenly out a large chunk of his income as he'd been living the good life on that extra money.
So he'd decided to get revenge. To cast blame on them and to get them and their businesses to either leave under the pressure and rumors or to make good with the dead by giving the graveyard a huge donation.
An encounter with the 'Actual dead' had scared him straight though and he'd run off to throw himself on the mercy of the guard rather than their wrath.
It was a damn lot of fun to play through on my end. A group of low level people and a mid-heroic adventurer engaged in a situation that ended up going completely Scooby Doo rather than her needing to save them from an actually serious threat.
>>46347553
>The one thing I'd have liked with 4e would have been more ability to freeform rituals rather than 'You know X and only X'.
I've actually allowed that in one campaign. Invoker PC and druid companion picked up a scroll (for a roughly appropriate cost in gp) for the very specific ritual of 'summon torrential rain', as they wanted to flood a dungeon.
Took three skill checks and the druid getting struck by lightningshe had high lightning resist as an elemental wild shape, though, so it was intentionalto cast it.
Combined with the Jerry-rigged explosives the ranger and bard whipped up to blast a hole in the wall and ceiling, they took the enemy by surprise, scared the piss out of them and flooded the lower level of the dungeon. Entire encounters worth of enemies were thrown into disarray, a few surrendered the moment the PCs stormed in, and then they fought a psychotic bard in a mosh pit full of cultists, before making their daring escape.
>>46348134
>fought a psychotic bard in a mosh pit full of cultists, before making their daring escape.
I was going to ask if that was literal but then I realized that any pit with a bard in it is a mosh pit.
>>46348150
100% literal. The bard even had a band for the fight. The drummer kept using a Sonic Burst-esque attack.
The party bard tried sprinting onto the stage, right into the middle of the quartet of actual dangerous enemies, and was surprised when they ganged up on him and beat him unconscious. I still remember his freaking out at being at negative health.
Didn't even have to roll a death save, because the ranger ran in to shove a potion down his throat.
Then the invoker employed her signature move of dropping a miniature sun on whatever got in her way that day.
It was a fun campaign, besides the occasional speed bump.
>>46346207
I made this for another thread when someone claimed "all wizard spells are just damage+effect!".
>>46347514
>Totally skippable class, you're a fighter with MAD, no bonus feats and all the inherent weakness of the fighter.
Assuming PF, Paladin is actually the least MAD martial character. They can focus on CHA above everything else for good saves and HP, and smite covers the accuracy and damage parts. You can make the argument that they need equal or more DEX or STR, but they literally need nothing else.
>>46348288
Yeah, I've never really gotten that complaint. Is it about the formatting?
>>46348959
Well, to be fair it's true for a lot of powers. There's one of those every level at least.
But yeah, probably formatting.
>>46348288
Damage+effect is an extremely, extremely wide concept space, though. Complaining about that is missing the forest for the trees.
>>46345141
>battles are fast
I think he switched to a different edition at the last second anon
>>46349693
They can go relatively quickly if the players are paying attention and bother to plan ahead when it's not their turn.
Usually my turns take a minute and a half, tops.
>>46346001
Like the ability to end an entire fight with a single spell, or trivialize an entire non-combat encounter with a single spell.
Wizard players are just whining because wizards no longer had the ability to make every other party member useless.
4e had some issues, but this was not one of them.
>>46349824
That said, wizards are still quite ridiculous in 4e.
Magnificent Mansion still exists, for example. And then there's shit like Arcana optimization, which makes basically every single skill check trivial.
One thing I never heard about 4e when /tg/ was discussing it was how awesome some of the powers are. Every time I make a new character I come across things that make me go 'Wow, that's so cool'. In a lot of other games, it's only a few particular niches who get that, but 4e makes them available to everyone.
>>46350048
If you're talking about the fluff, that's because nobody cares about the fluff.
>>46350166
Crunch and fluff. The blend of mechanics and narrative is really cool.
>>46350201
Except it is widely agreed upon, insofar anything can be widely agreed upon when it comes to D&D, that in 4e, mechanics and narrative are two completely separate concepts.
>>46350223
They can be, but they don't have to be.
If anything, the ease of refluffing means it's easier to find a mechanical representation of the fluff you have in mind.
>>46345968
There is a difference between playing a crunch-heavy game and churning through 1000 source books to get the most broken build going. For some reason people prefer the latter.
>>46350223
Wait, what?
I've found them to be much more closely linked than any other edition of D&D. I've made the argument before that the AEDU system is more a narrative one than anything else. People argue that it doesn't make sense, but it makes perfect sense if you think of it like episodes of a fantasy TV show. Of course the heroes don't bust out their big attacks every fight- It'd lose the narrative significance that makes it their big attack. A lot of the abilities themselves seem more narrative as well, reflecting a general capability to influence a scene rather than a specific effect.
>>46350255
By default, they are.
And that's why nobody talked about it.
>>46350340
I'm merely stating why nobody talked about, not that I necessarily agree with it.
>A lot of the abilities themselves seem more narrative as well, reflecting a general capability to influence a scene rather than a specific effect.
Now, this makes me think you're talking about an entirely different game.
Pretty much every non-Utility and some Utility abilities (I assume you're talking about Powers) has a very specific effect that cannot be used outside of combat. If these Powers had in fact included general capabilities, 4e would have been a lot better.
>>46350344
>By default, they are.
Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
>>46350453
Many of the martial abilities are hard fit for use out of combat (I mean "you hit him in the shins" is kinda hard to use creatively for anything but hitting people in the shins), but the DMG calls out that you should let everything else work if it makes sense. Powers with elemental keywords are notoriously easy to use in this way.
>>46350495
>Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
I wish, anon. I wish.
>the DMG calls out that you should let everything else work if it makes sense
That must be something nobody read, then.
Not even myself, actually. It's been half an eternity since I touched 4e, but I don't recall seeing any such advice in the DMG.
Care giving me a page number on that?
>>46346566
The developer that made 5e just shuttered its doors because Sword Coast Legends was shit
>>46350545
Looked around the book a few minutes, then did a quick google search, and apparently it's in a dragon article (dunno which tho).
Which is weird because I don't remember reading dragon mag stuff, but I do remember reading "a fire bolt can set things on fire, even if it's not written on the power" somewhere in the DMG/PHB but I couldn't find it.
>>46350939
It sure wasn't in the PHB. That would have solved a lot of problems.
Anyway, there you have it. Your regular, potentially 3.5-addled Joe does not know that advice.
>>46350993
It seems like a rather obvious thing that anybody anywhere should have been able to infer for themselves.
>>46350993
Man, this is not the first time I've been saying that it's in there. Now I feel like an ass.
>>46351077
Never assume any competence.
>>46345776
Halve HP / Double damage works fine until someone has a build that didn't get the excessive damage memo.
Yeah, enemies who have powers that begin with "whenever (X) is hit by a melee / ranged attack" tend to rape player's faces under those guidelines.
>>46346207
What's stopping you from using your at-will powers outside of combat in creative ways? I'd even rule your encounter powers can be used sparingly outside of combat.
>>46353190
On of the 3aboos I know took issue with 4e because of at-will powers out of combat. "A wizard can just use magic missile all day to dig a tunnel! He won't get tired or anything!" That was seriously his argument. When I asked if that should apply to fighters swinging their sword (or maybe pick axe in this case) all day at full strength, he said that was a totally different thing.
I really wish his argument made more sense, because with it all types out it seems even more nonsensical.
>>46353782
>he said that was a totally different thing
Someone who does not understand logic, your 3aboo.
>>46346312
Sauce on that comic?
>>46345141
I was with you until the last line OP.
And this is coming from someone that liked 4e.
>>46347940
its true
>>46353782
i think that this is actually true tho
>>46354594
Only if you've got the luxury of a group that actually learns the rules.
I literally have to re-explain to some of my lot how to declare an attack each round.
Though I'm not sure they'd be any quicker with any other edition.
They don't want to play D&D,
I think they just like the idea of playing D&D
And yet if I express this they all complain.
Have I been enslaved?
>>46355194
Yes.
You may take solace in knowing you're not the only one.
Or the thought may just drive you deeper into despair.
>>46353190
Encounter powers recharge during a short rest or after a certain amount of time (but usually by short rest) so they can be used out of combat by RAW.
We'd generally let people use them once per 'scene' if something non-combat was going on.
