...the answer to a whole lot of unasked questions.

This is why it falls short for me. Maybe there needed to be a revision, rules culling or even a new edition. I don't think the latter was necessary, but when 4e was announced I had more hope than cynicism.

I'm really late to complaining about it, but it's finally reached boiling point for me.

Here's what's wrong with it in my estimation:

Every single rule that moves away from immersion. 3e got this right, and even 2e did. Now we have characters that do things because the rules need someone who can do that thing. Spellcasters are the opposite of interesting.

It just strikes me as an edition that was purely based on killing OGL material. It didn't work in my estimation, but it's nevertheless a bad reason to make a new edition. The higher-ups wanted a new edition as different from the older editions as possible designed to sell secondary services and products like minis, and the writers churned it out. I don't think it was designed to be a good game, so much as a good marketing vehicle.

Even I don't care any more, and I could edition-war at Olympic level.

People who are rusted on to 4e will not be dissuaded, people who dislike it are firm in their opinions, and the ones in the middle who may have been persuaded either way have been so deluged with opinion that they've either picked a side already  or decided to ignore the wars and decide for themselves.

4e split the market very efficiently, so criticising it in comparison to other editions these days is like criticising basketball for being a bad edition of water polo.

For what it's worth, I don't like any version of D&D very much.

Same here. I had high hopes for 4th Ed when they said they were culling the skill list.

They culled the skill list allright but they made a mess out of that second wind crap.

Quote from: Hairfoot;4271984e split the market very efficiently, so criticising it in comparison to other editions these days is like criticising basketball for being a bad edition of water polo.

My feeling as well. Mind you, I don't feel I have enough actual-play experience with 4e to issue a definitive judgement. But it does feel so wildly dissimilar to all previous editions.

I suspect the Essentials line might have been a last-ditch attempt to bring the reluctant into the fold. The class writeups do feel a lot closer to what I consider "baseline" D&D.

Quote from: Hairfoot;4271984e split the market very efficiently, so criticising it in comparison to other editions these days is like criticising basketball for being a bad edition of water polo.

I think that's the real problem with 4e, it is basketball when all the previous versions had been water polo.

GOOD GOD, MAN! My Time Machine works! It IS 2008!

What?

I pondered your question thoroughly and came up with a comprehensive list of the failings of 4E. I ran them through some highly sophisticated algorithms and, remembering what one of my old university professors taught me, came up with a distilled and concise conclusion.

It's shyte.

Quote from: The Butcher;427210I suspect the Essentials line might have been a last-ditch attempt to bring the reluctant into the fold. The class writeups do feel a lot closer to what I consider "baseline" D&D.

Wonder how well it has been succeeding or failing in this attempt.

At the nearby gaming stores, the owners/managers mentioned most of the copies of the 4E Essentials "Rules Compendium" and the two "Heroes of ..." titles, were sold to already existing 4E players who were playing in the weekly 4E D&D games at the stores.

The remaining copies on the shelves have been more or less collecting dust ever since the release date.  No need for backordering any of them yet.  One manager even mentioned, the 4E Essentials titles may very well end up shortly on their "do not backorder" lists.

Last time I checked out the local big box bookstores, it appears the 4E Essentials titles haven't moved that quickly either.  (Not even when there's xmas season discount coupons). I just moved the magnetic security strips to a certain page in the books.  When I checked back month(s) later, the magnetic security strips are still on the same exact page I placed them.

I tried it when it came out. It's not for me. Luckily, all the OSR games came out, so I'm well taken care of.

D&D 4e fails because at its heart D&D is a simple, fast playing game.  3e got away with complicating combat because it still was largely similar to the previous versions of D&D and the learning curve wasn't too steep.

4e changed too much and stripped away too much of the flavor text.  It doesn't even matter if its a pretty good game design, closer to Palladium than D&D but still, I don't think many people would complain if Rifts got converted to 4e.

But what we ended up with is a complex game that doesn't map well to previous editions, that stripped away the material that is most likely to appeal to readers and new players that don't grok the numbers yet.  Add to that a paradim shift in how the game is intended to be played and yeah, no surprises, not a winning product.

Incidentally, while it's totally hypocritical, the new Gamma World intrigues me more and more and I wouldn't mind seeing Palladium adapt to the 4e rules.

D&D4 is 30 minutes of fun crammed into four hours.

Quote from: Monster Manuel;427186...the answer to a whole lot of unasked questions.

Interesting idea.  I find a lot of the Expanded Universe Star Wars novels struck me as trying to do the same thing - fix some problem or explain some mystery they found in the original three movies, stuff that didn't need fixing or explanation.

I do think Essentials was a bid at non-4e players, the same way that the WFRP3 Guides and Vaults is a way to try and bring people in who don't want rules pamphlets with all actual rules on cards.

Why didn't I go for Essentials, basically because AM convinced me he was right.  There is no real difference and Essentials classes are just another option along with all the old stuff.  It's just a marketing ploy, same as Gamma World.  GW is 4e lite, with all the stuff people didn't about 4e taken out, except now it looks like stuff like skill challenges are making their way back in.  How long until healing surges?

Essentials and GW are just palatable gateway drugs to get people invested in the same old 4e engine they didn't buy into the first time around.

D&D4e = prison sodomy (minus the pack of menthols and the security of being someone's bitch)....from what I've heard.