I’m sure you all know what I meant when you fear more for you’re characters life if you go against something new that you havn’t fought before rarther than having something balanced so that you know you can beat it.

1. 4e may be a great game. But at this point, it is so far removed from the D&D tradition that it might as well be renamed. If it isn’t core D&D, then don’t call it D&D.

2. This constant revision is just one of several signs that WOTC has taken what should have gone down as a game of tradition and turned it into a collectibles game. I used 1e sourcebooks for over a decade. Since 3e, we haven’t yet gone four years without a major upgrade. This plus the countless supplements, and it’s no surprise that the makers of Magic: The Gathering have been at the helm. I’m an adult. I like buying a game and playing the hell out of it for years. Someday I want to play the same game with my son that I played years in the past. The greatest games ever invented – Chess, Go, Poker, Monopoly, Risk – when is the last time they’ve undergone a rules update? WOTC has combined the collectibles model with the software/video game model to create a constant money suck. Good business, but in the end bad for the integrity of a game that once had an unshakable tradition. Like I said, nothing against 4e as a stand-alone system, but with each new edition D&D’s identity becomes less and less distinguishable.

So for my gaming group it’s still 3,5 that will rule….

Good gaming for DM Jahre Denmark

I actually got fed up with 3.5 in 2006, so I’ve been waiting some time now for a new edition to roll along that recaptures what it means to play D&D….and 4E did it for me. If 4E hadn’t shown up, I’d continue to play 2nd edition, C&C, other retro games, or Runequest….but thankfully, 4E came along. I think around this time next year, as the game evolves to suit wider tastes, that we’ll see a lot of the naysayers fall to the wayside, or turn in to official Pathfinder gamers instead. I think I’ll stay away from Pathfinder, too, since it doesn’t actually seem to “fix” any of the issues 3.5 had that I disliked, whereas 4E fixed all of them in one shot.

All that being said, i don’t think 4e is really an evolution as much as an alternative to 3.x. Some things were truly a step forward, but others are just simply different enough to seem like a different game for good or for bad.

*Pathfinder was mentioned, and that’s a VERY appealing option as it keeps the bredth of option and tone of 3.x but works in some of the better ideas of 4e. If you’re on the fence about 4e, go check it out now. It’s free (the pdf at least) and is now beta! You can buy print copies as well if you’d like…

With 3e, I could at least convert some of my old D&D material over, but 4e isn’t even compatible with 3e. In fact, it really isn’t D&D in anything other than name now, having removed all the things that individualized D&D from other FRPGS in the first place (the sacred cows everyone talks about, like Vancian Magic). They’ve created an entirely different game based on MMOs/CCGS/Miniature Wargames and rely on an intensive hyper-balancing of the rules that sucks all the flavour out of the game for me.

C&C takes the best of OD&D/1e and D20 and mixes them together in a much more fluid and fun rules set. The ton of rules in 3-4e inspire the players to consider their laundry list of skills and feats and their miniature’s position on a square grid rather than the game environment, their character’s unique background and the types of unusual actions that might be taken by the heroes in pulp novels or fantasy movies.

The DM is also caught up in this behaviour, using books instead of judgement to make calls, a sad devolution over thirty years of gaming from Storyteller who inteprets player actions to Rules Interpreter who gives a short scene description before laying out the minis and mapboards.

The other defining points of my decision were cost and compatibility. For C&C, all the older D&D material is compatible, usually with a simply subtraction of AC from 19 or 20, and even 3e materials aren’t too much of a pain to change over. This means that all my old material isn’t wasted. It also means that all I need is the C&C PHB ($20) to play as I have thirty years of monsters, treasures and background material from the entire history of D&D to use. I bought the C&C Monsters & Treasures book anyway because the system is so neat and because it only set me back another $20.

Finally, it’s EGG approved. Mainly because it is inspired by his original work and captures the feel of that old school gaming paradigm while updating it with more modern rules. It so reminds me of my first RPG adventures that I plan to run my kids, when they’re old enough, through Keep on the Borderlands using C&C so they can have the same exciting introduction to the game that I did…

About my group, I have two folks completely new to RPG gaming, one guy coming from Star Wars D20, and three experienced 3.5 guys. It’s just amazing for me as the DM to sit back and watch the three folks who really never touched 3.5, just run with 4e. The rules are so much simpler to wrap your head around. I almost feel like it’s easier to pick up the edition if you just drop the old 3.5-isms completely.

I’ve read the whole roll vs. role debates and don’t buy it. I’ve always felt that regardless of the system from a D6 based system to D20 to 3.5 to 4.0 to whatever, the ROLE playing aspect is what the DM and party brings to the table reglardless of the rule set you use. My favorite memories from gaming are not when I rolled that critical hit (or failure), but the story of my favorite character dying or that cool “Lostian” twist as a DM I pulled on the party. I think you’ll have that regardless of what system you are using.