So, as a means to test the forums and hopefully generate some discussion I thought I'd start a thread. Whatever you think of D&D, the odds are good that this was the game that got you interested in rpg's in the first place. Recently, 4th Ed. D&D has come out.
I was curious-- has anyone played 4th Ed? Do you like it? How does it compare to 3rd Ed. & 3.5? As for myself, I was a big fan of 3rd Ed. and from what I've heard of 4th Ed. (which is very little), it appears that the rules have been completely changed again.
I played AD&D a few times (but really preferred 1st edition, which I still have, thank you WOTC and it works just fine.) One of our Sunday night GMs, on the other hand, once decided we just HAD to play 3.0, but I never got into it the way he assumed everyone would.
Nor did I run out to replace all my Shadowrun books and White Wolf books when they revamped their systems. (Okay, I don't own a SHadowrun book; you caught me. But I do own a couple of White Wolf books.)
So, that added to the fact that my take on 4.0 has been "marketing ploy" since word one, means that I just can't get worked up about it.
I'm pretty sure 4th edition doesn't come out until June. Still, I've read a lot of playtest reports. My overall opinion is that while it looks like a fine game, it doesn't look like a game I want to play. There's too much reliance on miniatures, battlefield movement, and tactical conditions. I could ignore or mod a lot of that in older editions, but these things seem pretty entrenched into the new version. The class substitutions (they got rid of bard and druid as core classes and replaced them with warlock and warlord) and racial changes (so long gnomes, hello tieflings, dragon-marked, and some wonky elf variant) don't really impress me much.
For old-school Fantasy Adventure Gaming, I'll stick with "Castles & Crusades."
I promised myself I wouldn't buy the 4th edition books, but instead spend my money on John WIck's upcoming "Houses of the Blooded" FRPG.
I'll probably end up buying 4th edition anyway, because I'm a sucker like that. If I get a chance, I'll try and give the new game a try first at Origins or Gencon.
Yeah, now that you mention it, I don't think 4th Ed. D&D comes out until June. I had heard that this variation was miniature/tactic heavy as well. Some of my other friends have surmised that its D&D trying to mirror mmorpg's with their core class changes.
I don't think I'll buy it but that's because I don't have a set gaming group and the group I play with on occasion isn't crazy about D&D. I'll probably end up playing it though somewhere down the line.
I looked through the 4 ED books on Saturday as one of the members of my gaming group picked up the boxed set. Looks nice, but I can see where a few of the classes (mainly the Warlord) would be absolutely impossible to play if you are not using mini's. That I don't care for.
The books look great, better than 3rd ed, I can't deny that.
But looking/skimming through the books this weekend, I am so very unimpressed. he language, if not the mechanics, is very MMORPG influenced. There's nothing resembling a roleplaying section. The whole game seems to be focused around combat, or at the very least "skill challenges." I couldn't even find old "roleplaying spells" like Friendship or even Charm Person.
And I agree with Loco, the game depends way too much on maps and minis.
The alignment rules (something I never had a problem with) have been bastardized to the point of comedy. Instead of the law/chaos good/evil axises, we have Good, Lawful Good, Unaligned, Evil, and Chaotic Evil, and that's it. I guess lawful good is now good-plus and chaotic evil is "like evil but even more." No Han Solo style chaotic good, no Dr. Doom style Lawful Evil. I just don't get it.
All that said, the rules look pretty solid for a glorified minis game, and some of the flavor is kinda' neat. It looks like D&D might actually have a default setting for once. It just doesn't look like a game I want to play.
For classic fantasy, I'm going to stick with Castles & Crusades. I also hear the Qerth game is pretty fun.
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