Regina

I have investigated the 4E resources, and they honestly don’t interest me. Would someone like to flame me for my opinion? My preference? Will you feel superior, self-satisfied, etc. if you tell me how “nostalgic”, wrong, etc. that you consider me to be? Do you think I really care?

Maybe Hasbro, WoTC, independent game designers would have appreciated my $$$. I have spent thousands of dollars over the past years. I even bought $100 of 3.5E PDFs last month. But I anticipate paying zero dollars for D&D resources in the near and foreseeable future.

I’m sure many snarky, smarmy souls will just say: “Your loss, you stuck-in-a-rut relic of a bygone era.” Again, a non-issue.

I play what I enjoy. Even though I update my software systems with the very latest stable releases, and sometimes betas, that doesn’t mean I always crave the latest, greatest changes to my gaming system of choice.

Software games often have upgrades, and those can be even better. Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic is one, in my opinion. Fallout 3 is a tremendous example. But there are numerous follow-on titles that I never got into. The 2nd Deus Ex didn’t pull me in like the fantastically replayable 1st game.

Why talk about software games? Because apparently the new and aging hip players want a D&D game system reminiscent of software games. All members of my gaming group play World of Warcraft online frequently. I played for a few months but burned out on the grind.

A software game appeals to the reward response–numerous articles exist detailing that phenomenon and the perfecting thereof. And it is a system with rules…much simpler rules than many paper and pencil games.

People can feel good about grinding for years (literally) to get multiple high-level characters who can go places and thrash boss monsters. And do it in a group setting. But there are very finite limits to “role-playing” and doing whatever you’d like in a fantasy realm.

As a type of strategy and resource mgmt, software games can excel. But do they challenge the mind for creative approaches to situations, challenges, problems? They can’t. Too complex. I know. I’ve written software systems my whole life.

But the flexible paper and pencil version is significantly and unquestionably slower. And to make it more than just a battle of wills between the DM and players, devolving into a “I shot you first” “No, I shot YOU first!” debacle there are numerous rules that the human mind—more than a software algorithm—can effect.

As has been said many times in many places: The complexity is a double-edged sword. It makes the game infinitely replayable, but working through the complexity can bog down the game resulting in frustration and boredom in the face of a barely- or un-playable session.

But I like the flavor of 3.5E, standing as it does upon the foundations of the venerable previous editions.

And I’m completely uninterested in trying to convert and/or buy upgrades to my hundreds of print and GIGABYTES of digital resources.

Perhaps the “new” edition could have been swappable like any of the other optional rules. Hex facing. Spell point systems, etc. I read the alternate paths and swapping of abilities for classes in Dragon. Some were interesting. They were optional. Take it or leave it. The changes were incremental, clearly spelled out, fully compatible, and absolutely optional.

If speed of play (simpler mechanics) was the driving motive—then provide improved grappling approaches, etc., which could be swapped in incrementally. The “upgrade” path would be clear. There’s a reason why M$ is providing an XP shell in Windows 7. Cutting off millions of legacy apps in Vista back-fired. Counter-arguments would include the assertion that M$ OS versions are slow to release and buggy because of backwards compatibility. Who is right?

In any event, I agree with speeding up play, but not with sacrificing the original flavor of D&D. There were expansions that could cater to the need to attract new players “not raised on Tolkien”. Of course, the blockbuster movie came out, right?

So I will endeavor to develop tools which could keep the complexity of 3.5E but increase the playing speed to something within sight of software games. Plenty of tools currently exist in the market…virtual tabletops, etc. And yes WoTC was making a 3D one, but lately it’s not been touted on the site.

I spent months creating custom content for Neverwinter Nights using their included toolset and ran a small persistent online world. Great fun. But there were limits. I had fun making the Holy Hand-grenade of Antioch, the Invulnerable Coat of Arnd and all manner of artifacts. Also, scalable monsters. It kept the flavor of D&D and the play was as fast as ever, as expected. [of course the monsters never stood still for a fireball or meteor swarm, unless you came in invisibly!]

So that is what I wanted to say: The new direction doesn’t interest me. I’m uninterested in forking over $100’s or $1000’s more for another game system. I’d rather solve the problem of helping players deal with the problem of rapidly processing complex rules.

And good luck and happy adventuring to all of the 4E community, and whatever the future brings to the D&D system!

Vision9000

“3.75 would have performed as well at 3.0″ (the point you addressed) is a completely different sentence from “A backwards compatible 4.0 would have performed as well as this 4.0″ a point no one has addressed, and a point that is more important.

2) I think I agree most strongly with Cyril Flament’s comment “My only regret: that the new game keeps the name of the ‘classic’ product instead of a new name”

4.0 is barely recogniseable as DnD. It is not an evolution of the previous products, it is a new product. This is where you get a lot of nostalgic critics, and you are not addressing their concerns. You are merely restating your opinions, and ignoring what they mean.

That represents “the death of DnD” to many players. Why would a game with only token relations to the game systems of the last 30 years, be considered DnD to fans? The game is over for those players because that is gone.

It’s not about the sticker on the front of the book insisting this is what DnD is now. Even if the books sell, so what?

Would you be making the same arguments if Hasbro scrapped it’s RPGs completely, started producing romance novels and put a DnD sticker on the front? No.

“But look, DnD sales are up 7%, so your argument that DnD is dead is rubbish”. You miss the point entirely that they’re making. You’re not even arguing against it, you’re just missing the point.

3) “My only critics are nostalgics who would have been disappointed with anything!”

Way to dismiss all your opponents without needing to contribute a single valid point. I bought all the 4.0 books because I was excited about the new system. I was really looking forward to it.

I was disappointed. I continue to read (now without buying them) the books that come out in my local store to see if they’re anything I’d appreciate, hoping that something will come along to entice me, and so far, nothing. (Eladrin are cool though).

It irritates me no end when I’m then told I wouldn’t have liked anything. It’s a cheap shot… from a commenter who probably eats babies.

I enjoyed reading your response, thank you. I would like to follow up on your post below…

First off, you and others keep mentioning that Hasbro discontinued or otherwise hobbled my “favorite game”. This is most certainly not the case. I don’t play 4E and I never said one negative or positive thing about it or its predecessor, 3.x, as a game in my post. I’m not sure why you assume that my comment was some kind of pro-3.x and anti 4E crusade. It was not. Yes, I play 3.5 and not 4.0 but I did not extoll or villify either game in my comments. So lets take that topic out of the discussion.

What I did comment on was the business plan that Hasbro followed for 4E and the damage it wrought to its existing 3.x customer base to generate what appears to be a slightly better then marginal sales bump. I argue they could have achieved this bump, improved their game, and NOT alienated a portion of their existing base by releasing a backwards compatible version instead of a wholesale and incompatible rewrite.

Even Mr. Goodman mentions that adjusting to the 4E model was a challenge to him (I mention this before as well). In fact, to my knowledge, the vast majority of d20 providers either complained vigorously about or completely rejected 4e upon its initial release to the point where many of them went and developed their own game systems in lieu of 4e support. I fail to understand how this is a satisfactory way to support your business partners. In addition a substantial percentage of the consumer base (ie players) did not follow the 4e trail and instead went in other directions with their gaming interests. I doubt anyone that will be buying the Paizo game you mention is new to the hobby. I’m sure 95% of them are 3.x players.

This to me is the crux of the problem with the 4e business strategy (not the game). Would Toyota make the 2010 Camry use all new parts that are incompatible with the previous model so that all their suppliers have to destroy the current inventory of alternators and solenoids while at the same time make it no longer fit in your garage? All this to increase sales say 10%? I don’t think they would. This to me is what Hasbro has done with D&D.

Yes the 2010 model of the Camry can be redesigned but a substantial portion of the underlying drivetrain is identical to the previous models and any mechanical changes are done in concert with their parts manufacturers and after market suppliers not in direct opposition to them. Toyota does not want to “challenge” its business partners to keep up with their changes.

I understand Hasbro would like to get more intellectual property into the game by doing things like removing Gnomes and Half-Orcs (in the core books anyway) and replacing them with Dragonborn and Warforged. Yes this makes the game potentially more profitable since Hasbro can put copyrights around Dragonborn and Warforged, but these types of things could still have been achieved without the rules rewrite and dismantling of the d20 partnerships. I believe.