Mike Mearls, where do get off trying to claim that because D&D had a pace of one(or less) book a year between 1977 and 1989 that releasing one book a year is an acceptable pace in 2011?
You must realize that we are intelligent enough to know the reason for the slow pace in the first decades of D&D, right? With only a couple of writers, and outsourced publication, it's not like they could crank out a multitude of books.
WOTC has a huge staff of dedicated writers, their own publishing infrastructure, and the fluid capital to make things happen.
I get that making more rules complicates things, but saying "Oh, but there wasn't very much production in the beginning" does not justify the lack of production now, and makes you look like a fool. Gygax and Arneson didn't put out a book a month because they were TWO DUDES IN A BASEMENT.
This article makes me sick.
Mike Mearls, where do get off trying to claim that because D&D had a pace of one(or less) book a year between 1977 and 1989 that releasing one book a year is an acceptable pace in 2011?
You must realize that we are intelligent enough to know the reason for the slow pace in the first decades of D&D, right? With only a couple of writers, and outsourced publication, it's not like they could crank out a multitude of books.
WOTC has a huge staff of dedicated writers, their own publishing infrastructure, and the fluid capital to make things happen.
I get that making more rules complicates things, but saying "Oh, but there wasn't very much production in the beginning" does not justify the lack of production now, and makes you look like a fool. Gygax and Arneson didn't put out a book a month because they were TWO DUDES IN A BASEMENT.
Overreact much? Where do you get that we are only getting one book this year?
Heroes of Shadow = April
Monster Vault 2 = May
Shadowfell: Gloomworught and Beyond = June
Neverwinter Camapign Guide = August
Madness at Gardmore Abbey = September
Heroes of the Feywild = November
Previously in 4E, we were getting four or five books of player options per year (if you include the campaign setting). This year we get three (again, if you include the campaign setting). Part of the stated reason for this slowdown is so that the material can be better developed and tested, making the new books less likely to require errata down the line.
The sky isn't falling, and there is absolutely nothing in there for you to have worked yourself into such a lather.
Take a few deep breaths, put the fact that Mike wrote it out of your mind (if the true source of your anger is the Mike Mearls hate that seems so fashionable nowadays), and just read it again. You will find that it all makes much more sense if you read the words that are actually there instead of trying to apply a sinister subtext between the lines.
But the fact remains that he is citing the slow production of AD&D's first decade as an excuse to slow production down now.
The last couple months of Dungeon and Dragon Magazine's abysmal content and late publication have been building on me, and this article just pounded the last nail in the coffin of my DDi subscription.
Sorry, I did go a bit off the chain there.
This is why you should never, ever, post angry. When somebody posts something or publishes something that works you up, before you hit the submit button, walk away for five minutes, cool down, come back and read what you wrote one last time. If you still stand by what you wrote even with a cooler head, go ahead and hit "submit."
But the fact remains that he is citing the slow production of AD&D's first decade as an excuse to slow production down now.
I saw it more as an analysis of D&D releases, and that the frenetic pace of D&D releases of the last few years is actually an aberration, and not tradition.
The last couple months of Dungeon and Dragon Magazine's abysmal content and late publication have been building on me, and this article just pounded the last nail in the coffin of my DDi subscription.
Deciding that the quality and quantity of Dragon and Dungeon content has gone down drastically over the last year, and decdiding not to renew your subscription as a result is a perfectly reasonable position, and one which I am looking at seriously myself.
To be honest, I'm looking forward to the stuff coming out this year (still ma that Ravenloft got "Pushed back")
I don't expect to ever see the dragon mag annuals ever again. The '09 one supposedly did really bad on the book sales, and is gathering dust.
I just want to second the notion of just because Gygax, Arneson & TSR only printed one book a year we should only do three is silly. Stating that you are slowing down production to increase editing time; cool, great idea. Saying well that is how it was done in the 80's doesn't work.
I didn't take it as that. I took it as, "Releasing this much this fast is really an oddity in the history of D&D, and now, looking at how bad the editing is, and how we are burning through ideas damned fast, maybe there is a reason the older editions were slower in releasing content".
No PHB
No X powers books
No monster manual
No DMG
While I do realize some of those titles have been replaced such as the MM the others are just missing. I for one would love less errata but even with the increased editing time I think there is still going to be way more errata than there should be. I would edit and playtest new stuff for free and I could easily find a group of 4 to 6 players to do it to. I would sign any non disclosure agreements they wanted also. I thought it was a good idea when the put some new classes in DDI for us the consumer to play test, it was a good use of free feedback from the people who will be playing those classes for years to come.
The damned game wouldn't even be here right now, if they had shovelled out crap a month just for the sake of shovelling it out.
I would rather one really damned good book a year, one that had been edited substantially such that errata sub forums wouldn't be an assumed side effect. Rather than sloppy produced products that generate an errata sub forum the day it hits the %$@&^ shelf.
As a DM, I would rather my previous purchase became old and familiar and totally used, before the next flavour of the month arrived. It would be nice if players used up all the choices in a book before wandering to the next book 'hey can I play this?' before I had ever even heard of the damned thing let alone gotten the book for it.
I was happy the CB allowed me to turf the entire notion of the Power books. Want that obscure tweakfest PC fine, do it with the CB and then YOU pay for the print out such that all the details are on paper.
No I don't care if Paizo releases one more item this Q than Wizards does. Let them release a dozen books for all I care. I don't play 3.5 and I couldn't care less if its fans roll over and die from product overload.
Quality over quantity.
The damned game wouldn't even be here right now, if they had shovelled out crap a month just for the sake of shovelling it out.
I would rather one really damned good book a year, one that had been edited substantially such that errata sub forums wouldn't be an assumed side effect. Rather than sloppy produced products that generate an errata sub forum the day it hits the %$@&^ shelf.
As a DM, I would rather my previous purchase became old and familiar and totally used, before the next flavour of the month arrived. It would be nice if players used up all the choices in a book before wandering to the next book 'hey can I play this?' before I had ever even heard of the damned thing let alone gotten the book for it.
I was happy the CB allowed me to turf the entire notion of the Power books. Want that obscure tweakfest PC fine, do it with the CB and then YOU pay for the print out such that all the details are on paper.
No I don't care if Paizo releases one more item this Q than Wizards does. Let them release a dozen books for all I care. I don't play 3.5 and I couldn't care less if its fans roll over and die from product overload.
pretty much how i feel about it
fact is 4e came out in 2008, we got so much so fast folks are spoiled i think, i am looking foward to the next sets, if you think about what has already been released and the sheer volume of articles, books, minies, adventures, dungeon tiles, DDI, CBC, OCB, VTT, monster builder
you may take issue with some of those releases, but dang if it aint alot. i dont want half finished crap that got rushed to production.
my advice: take your time mike mearls get it to us when its ready
I don't take any of these signs as "the sky is falling", but you'd have to be completely unobservant to not have noticed the state of confusion Wizards has been in for the last 4 or 5 months regarding both hard and soft content delivery. I'm still hopeful they'll turn it around, but every odd failure makes me less confident. They just need a couple nice successes to calm the masses, in my opinion.
So, limbo is what occurs.
('course you can use the tons of material wildly published up to now, but cool new stuff is always good... and I still dream of a Dragonlance 4th, a DMG III with epic campaigns on focus, and more Monster Manuals...).
I know I've said this before, but the only thing that surprises me about WotC scaling back on the pace of new D&D product releases is that it's taken them this long to do so. And the only thing that really upsets me about it is that we got 300-odd wizard class powers and 180-odd fighter-specific feats out of the firehose before they cut the supply, yet we probably won't ever have any shadow classes besides the assassin (a striker who can't strike his way out of a wet paper bag, unless you ditch the shadow power source almost entirely and play the executioner build) and the vampire (potentially a cool concept, but many DMs are going to ban it automatically as a 'monster class'), and still have nowhere near enough support for seekers or artificers (two of my favourite classes conceptually).
Hey if they slowed down production down to what you people had wanted back then, we probably wouldnt even have a Shadow Powersource for another year or more.
I remember when people were complaining that their fav class wasnt 4e'd yet, and people told them it might be 1-2 years before they got it. If they slowed down production, that 1-2 would have likely been 3-4.
The first three years of 4E were planned and well thought out. Sadly, it seems sales weren't quite what they hoped for, so they started changing the strategy. Instead of the clear vision of the first couple of years, we saw a lot of experimentation in year three, culminating with the Essentials line--which suffered from a lack of a clear purpose and identity.
Essentials tried to bring in new, younger playters with simpler rules, and tried to bring back middle-aged guys who quit playing in the 80's with the red box, and tried to bring back folks who switched to PF with it's 3.5 presentation and style. I've heard good and bad things from people who have checked it out, but more than anything gamers I know were confused about what Essentials really was. Of course we'll never get concrete sale figures, but I suspect the Essentials didn't do as well as hoped either.
If I'm right, I think WotC put the brakes on to figure out the new strategy. I really hope they are using this time to do some real market research about what people really want.
Hey if they slowed down production down to what you people had wanted back then,
Who is "you people"?
we probably wouldnt even have a Shadow Powersource for another year or more.
That does not necessarily follow. If I'd been planning early 4e releases, I'd have made sure every power source (not counting ki, which I thought was a dumb idea from the start) got at least a couple of classes out within the first 6 months.
So, for example, we might have had the wizard and bard (arcane), the fighter, rogue and warlord (martial), the barbarian and druid (primal), the monk and psion (psionic), the shadowdancer and necromancer (shadow), the cleric and paladin (divine) and the sorcerer and [some sort of elemental leader that would have been a lot like the runepriest] (elemental), split over the PHB1 and PHB2 within 6 months of the edition's launch.
But I wouldn't have ever put out endless series of books of new powers and feats that are redundant for anyone with a DDi subscription, in the middle of the biggest global economic downturn since the 1930s. That was a silly idea.
Don't get me wrong. I like more options, and I don't really buy into the idea that 'bloat' itself is a big problem. I'd be fine with every class having as many options as the wizard or fighter, if the conceptual space is there. I just think it's not really feasible, at least in this economy. And I'd much rather have less new stuff, but know it's sustainable in the long term, than for a continuation of the formerly rather frenetic pace of new releases, followed by Hasbro deciding D&D isn't economically sustainable and killing it off.
I'd also rather have a choice of 4-6 really good powers at each level than a choice of 12, of which 4 are garbage and 6 are far too situational/conditional to be useful.
And does anyone really believe we need several thousand feats?
Look at my shelf, I have PLENTY of 4th edition books, and I am not even able to say I have run out of titles I could get (if I was swimming in cash).
Anyone new to 4th, is in no danger of lacking items to direct their interest towards.
If 4th edition was a wargame though, you can bet the audience would be howling for Wizards to get the damned second printing out the door with all the errata properly looked after. Then again, role games are not desperately dependent on literal rulings of the text.
I just the other day realized I have two copies of Keep on the Shadowfell, and one of the encounters has a Halfling, not an Appartition of Kalarel. Clearly differing printings. I used the Halfling, but likely should have used the Apparation. Oh well, the encounter went just fine either way.
I don't make a habit of fixating on the text in my books.
I'm enough of a pessimist to worry that it might be a heinously early 5th ed. Or, maybe they're going to buy out or sue Paizo, to get Pathfinder off the market or re-re-brand it back into the D&D fold.
I don't know, exactly. There's little real concrete information - just a strong wiff of desperation...
I think quality is the key. Playtesting for 4th Ed. was clearly lacking and remains so. Dragon and Dungeon should often be used as a way to perfect the final release; they can work out flaws and gather more input before printing the rules in a final hardback version. This will also allow some new material to trickle in prior to the hardback releases.
Obviously things should be tweaked now and then too. I would appreciate a setting book (hardcover) with an awesome map (hardcover in a box with multiple maps would be even cooler) once every couple of years.
Figure out a decent price that is profitable for the D&D minis too. They're awesome, but the "grab bag" mentality doesn't work unless you plan to spend a ton of money on many, many packs. The thriving secondary market for D&D minis would be a good place to start looking at how to change things.
I've played for 30+ years and in my limited two cents input, the current quality issues need addressed and the production pace of the past few years has been way too fast.
I'd rather they release one big $40 book every quarter than one $30 book a month.
Damn right.
If you take a VERY hard serious look at PHB 1 2 and 3, I bet you can see that it could be edited to be PHB deluxe, all in one damned book (plus errata) and maybe 10 bucks more.
I'd be ok buying that book and selling off my first printing ones. Be nice having to hold only one damned book.
Thing is Wizards is in this for Wizards, not you or me. We are just a means to an end, and 3x 30 = 90, not 40. Basic math.
I'd rather they release one big $40 book every quarter than one $30 book a month.
Damn right.
If you take a VERY hard serious look at PHB 1 2 and 3, I bet you can see that it could be edited to be PHB deluxe, all in one damned book (plus errata) and maybe 10 bucks more.
I'd be ok buying that book and selling off my first printing ones. Be nice having to hold only one damned book.
Thing is Wizards is in this for Wizards, not you or me. We are just a means to an end, and 3x 30 = 90, not 40. Basic math.
If they did it every year though, adding in all the classes to date and correcting errors and putting in the errata. I'd buy that once a year. maybe raise the price each year so year 1 start at $40. Then next year add 4-6 classes, a bunch of races, feats, powers, etc..etc.. raise the price to $50. Continue doing it that way. Fold in all the books in the series. A DMG boxed set with DMG1-2 + DMG boxed set + DM articles from dungeon/dragon er... I mean the website articles for $50. Add more content, increase price next year...
But that means buying the same product over and over again…
No it means buying an updated product with new stuff 'over and over again'...
I'd rather they release one big $40 book every quarter than one $30 book a month.
Damn right.
If you take a VERY hard serious look at PHB 1 2 and 3, I bet you can see that it could be edited to be PHB deluxe, all in one damned book (plus errata) and maybe 10 bucks more.
I'd be ok buying that book and selling off my first printing ones. Be nice having to hold only one damned book.
Thing is Wizards is in this for Wizards, not you or me. We are just a means to an end, and 3x 30 = 90, not 40. Basic math.
All 3 PHB's put together would be a very large book,and more annoying to flip through.
But that means buying the same product over and over again…
No it means buying an updated product with new stuff 'over and over again'...
I know it would be an updated product with new stuff each time, but it would essentially mean I would never use the old book. And it would upset the balance of my bookshelf.
I don't want to buy it over and over again, but I would buy an updated Deluxe PHB once...
I want the basic three.
Article starts off with "As some of you might be aware, we announced the removal of three print products from our 2011 schedule..." and then ends with a poll. Previous article had a poll. Following article had another poll.
Seems to me like they are cutting 4 content and working on 5. Don't get me wrong, I am glad they are asking our opinions.
Today's article, Stay Classy, seems to be all about how complicated being a Fighter has become. I don't know if I would categorize determining Bloodied and Surge Values or Passive scores as a calculation - and wasn't 4e supposed to be have more streamlined rules and character creation? I am of the opinion that fighters being better at low levels was balanced with wizards being better at high levels and that a fighter had few attacks they could use without limit was balanced with the big fireworks of spells when a DM and party had more than one encounter per day in previous editions.
I am of the opinion that fighters being better at low levels was balanced with wizards being better at high levels and that a fighter had few attacks they could use without limit was balanced with the big fireworks of spells when a DM and party had more than one encounter per day in previous editions.
On paper, this model works. In practice? Not so much.
Yes, the Wizard's fragility at low levels, and the Fighter's strength at low levels was supposed to be balanced by the Wizard's mind crushing awesomeness at high levels. There were a couple of factors that made this a tragic imbalance, especially for those folks that wanted to play the warrior archetypes.
First: the high levels lasted a lot longer than the low ones. Wizards really come into their own at level 6 or so. This is when they stop being a burden on the party and really help contribute to the party's success. The non-casters become trivialized somewhere around level 12 or 14. This is when a Wizard has enough spells to cast 3-4 every fight, often turning the tide or finishing the battle with those spells. If you have the determination to play the game from level 1 to level 20, the time and XP needed to go from level 1 to level 6 is less than a quarter of the time and XP (relatively speaking, level 1-6, IIRC, is about 1/100th of the xp from level 14-20, but the proportional monster XP probably makes the fraction closer to 1/4) it takes to go from level 14 to level 20. This means that casters rule the game for a period that is four times as long as the time when the Fighter ruled it.
Second: Wizards research (and my own experience follows pretty closely with their findings) discovered that very few campaigns started at level 1, and very few ended at level 20. There was a "sweet spot," starting between level 3 (can't be one shot by most monsters any more) and level 6 (Wizard making an actual contribution now) and ending around level 15 (non-casters losing interest because they feel like they are not contributing any more).
Some people like this style of gameplay, where for long stretches of time, your character can be the star of the show. 4E isn't the game for them. That style of play was a sacred cow of the D&D experience for 30 years. That 4E killed that cow is an understandable sore spot for some people, and is probably a goodly part of Pathfinder's success.
One of the design goals of 4E was to have that "sweet spot" last from level 1 all the way to level 30. I can tell you from experience, it certainly lasts up to level 20 (I'm working on a basic roadmap for Epic Tier in my campaign right now). I prefer that everyone has the opportunity to shine, all the time. Dice rolls and the situation determine who shines, but no one is barred from being the star of the encounter or day simply because they are the wrong class at the wrong level.
I don't know if I would categorize determining Bloodied and Surge Values or Passive scores as a calculation - and wasn't 4e supposed to be have more streamlined rules and character creation?
Yes it was - and it did. Mainly, though, it did it by vastly limitting and simplifying multi-classing, which wouldn't be aparent at 1st level, and by reducing the choices of casters signifcantly. So, while a 4e fighter has a lot of choices compared to a 1e or 2e fighter; a 4e cleric really doesn't have many choices compared to a cleric in prior eds.
And, yeah, dividing by two is hardly a major 'step' akin to choosing race or feats.
I am of the opinion that fighters being better at low levels was balanced with wizards being better at high levels
In theory, this could have worked - if the game were only ever played in up-from-first campaigns and no one ever changed characters. I think, in AD&D, that was actually the assumption. In 3e, though, there were specific rules for starting at higher levels, so that was clearly an option. In reality, you very often saw low level games with mostly multi-classed non/demi-humans and, yes, fighters, but higher level games with mostly single-classed casters. People just gravitated towards whatever classes dominated at the given level they were playing at.
and that a fighter had few attacks they could use without limit was balanced with the big fireworks of spells when a DM and party had more than one encounter per day in previous editions.
This could be made to work, for a while, but it took a lot of effort from the DM to keep the party constantly off balance. If you made daily resource-management a really thorny problem, and relentlessly hammered any and all other weaknesses casters had, you /could/ keep them in line (even overwhelm them) right into the early double-digit levels. I mean, the balance /was/ there. Unlimtted-use abilities needed to be balanced by being less potent than limitted-use ones. The problem was that they balanced only at a point, and if you didn't place the challenges of your campaign right at that point, the balance tippped. It turned out, too, that the majority of campaigns tended to tilt the balance in the favor of the limitted-/powerful- abilities classes.
I am of the opinion that fighters being better at low levels was balanced with wizards being better at high levels...
First: the high levels lasted a lot longer than the low ones.
I found I played more low levels due to "starting over" for various reasons. But I agree that in a 1st-20th xp sense the wizard had more time to shine.
Second: ...very few campaigns started at level 1, and very few ended at level 20...
My experience has almost always been starting characters at 1st. This might start another tangent, but I guess I always thought the goal was to take a 1st level character to 20th (or beyond). Isn't taking your character as far as you can sort of the role playing point, while of course enjoying the journey?
Personaly, I loved playing the low level wizard that earned his higher level power - felt like a story to me. While I don't know if 4E's "sweet spot" is as long as you say, I agree that the classes are much more balanced at the same levels. And I think 4E's class balance is good, I'll have my sacred cow medium rare, but it was my experience that the previous editions also had a balance to the classes... when you played them over campaign(s).
...that a fighter had few attacks they could use without limit was balanced with the big fireworks of spells when a DM and party had more than one encounter per day in previous editions.
This could be made to work, for a while, but it took a lot of effort from the DM to keep the party constantly off balance.
When I played in a one fight per day campaign, I had more trouble justifying the role playing aspect of it to myself than how it unbalanced the spell casters from the sword swingers. I am not sure 4e went far enough to discourage this though. When you get to epic tier, and have a lot of Daily Attack powers and enough Utility powers to retrain them to bigger better Daily Utility powers, why not just go back to 5 minute adventure day? The only characters still using At-Wills are the ones loaded up with immediate Encounter powers.
But I saw it happen, Tony. DM wanted to push our party that was getting into a couple fights each sleep cycle, so the casters had to unload and we were in no shape to continue. As the fights got harder, the less we adventured each day until the casters unloaded in every fight. Then to challenge our one fight per day party, the DM started making fights so hard we couldn't survive a second fight - it became a race to cheese that we all lost.
This is all a tangent to my reply that the book pace is so slow because they are polling for 4E.5 or more likely 5th edition.
This is all a tangent to my reply that the book pace is so slow because they are polling for 4E.5 or more likely 5th edition.
MY thought is that they are polling, fishing if you will, for ideas that will make the current edition sell better, not for a way to craft a new edition before the previous one is barely out of diapers.
I have a bad feeling that the 5th edition may be closer than we want it to be. I would like 4th to be filled out and completed first but as it seems essentials has pretty much done in 4th it prob will not happen now.
You know the problem is there are plenty of avenues to go down in 4th ed. yet. Like most of us , I have great fear of this, but I really hope its not true...
I am not sure 4e went far enough to discourage this though. When you get to epic tier, and have a lot of Daily Attack powers and enough Utility powers to retrain them to bigger better Daily Utility powers, why not just go back to 5 minute adventure day? The only characters still using At-Wills are the ones loaded up with immediate Encounter powers.
4e combats are supposed to be long - in rounds, that is - and I think play styles and tweaks to the monsters have pushed it back towards shorter combats, which don't really fully showcase the versatility and tactical interest of 4e characters. :sigh:
The main thing that keeps multi-encounter days interesting from 11th level on is the extra action points for milestones, your action points get to be pretty awesome.
But I saw it happen, Tony. DM wanted to push our party that was getting into a couple fights each sleep cycle, so the casters had to unload and we were in no shape to continue. As the fights got harder, the less we adventured each day until the casters unloaded in every fight. Then to challenge our one fight per day party, the DM started making fights so hard we couldn't survive a second fight - it became a race to cheese that we all lost.
That seemed like the default 3.x campaign scenario. I was in one campaign that avoided it.
I am not sure 4e went far enough to discourage this though. When you get to epic tier, and have a lot of Daily Attack powers and enough Utility powers to retrain them to bigger better Daily Utility powers, why not just go back to 5 minute adventure day? The only characters still using At-Wills are the ones loaded up with immediate Encounter powers.
4e combats are supposed to be long - in rounds, that is - and I think play styles and tweaks to the monsters have pushed it back towards shorter combats, which don't really fully showcase the versatility and tactical interest of 4e characters. :sigh:
The main thing that keeps multi-encounter days interesting from 11th level on is the extra action points for milestones, your action points get to be pretty awesome.
But I saw it happen, Tony. DM wanted to push our party that was getting into a couple fights each sleep cycle, so the casters had to unload and we were in no shape to continue. As the fights got harder, the less we adventured each day until the casters unloaded in every fight. Then to challenge our one fight per day party, the DM started making fights so hard we couldn't survive a second fight - it became a race to cheese that we all lost.
That seemed like the default 3.x campaign scenario. I was in one campaign that avoided it.
See, I understand the drive to "challenge" a group of players, but you do that not by showstopping each and every fight. Instead you place, as a DM, small things within an encounter that bait players to use a daily here, a daily there. Then you throw a fight at them that is less strong, but still strong enough that most of the rest of their resources are used up. Or you do lull, lull, action, lull, lull, action to get them into a rythm, and then follow action with more action to stir it up. There's more ways to do this, but it really all boils down to the ability of a DM to chalenge a group over time, not at each and every fight.
You know the problem is there are plenty of avenues to go down in 4th ed. yet. Like most of us , I have great fear of this, but I really hope its not true...
From what I have read, the payoff from releasing a new edition is too great for it not to be the point the entire time. I don't know if I love 4E enough or that it hadn't somehow burned itself out too quickly where they didn't release the Shadow book as PHB4, but I would prefer a long lasting edition that grew with alternative rules releases (not updates that change the books you've already purchased) and more and more content.
There's more ways to do this, but it really all boils down to the ability of a DM to chalenge a group over time, not at each and every fight.
I am seeing it now in our 4e game. The DM just doesn't like that one encounter can't be a challenge to a fully rested party. We're mid paragon and he didn't like my suggestion that the hint of more adventure to come later that day limits how many resources a party is willing to use. I think it comes down to the Extended Rest mechanic. It just works better if it's not tied to game time; Extended Rests work better when tied to the story. I think a lot of D&D's mechanics through editions have had this issue. In 3rd, a spell duration measured in minutes conflicted with any sane rogue that actuall wanted to search for traps in a dungeon. Good DMs can work around it, but I think tying recharges to story or at it's most mechanical, tying them to xp earned from success works far better.
I thought 4th edition had a very quick pace when they started releasing books. I also thought the numbering system was good, I was looking forward to Primal Power 4 for my Druid, lol. But it proved to not be very dynamic, and as the plans changed at WotC the outline and numbering system made those changes appear more drastic. I don't object to a slower pace going forward, but I might object to not getting Primal Power 2. I liked how Essentials did away with numbers for random titles. They could combine Primal Power 2 and Martial Power 3 (is that what it's up to?) into Heroes of Wood and Steal or some such.
I'm afraid that rather than going further in that direction, and keeping two levels (encounter, and 'story,' say) of resource management, a 5e might go the Gamma World route and just have encounter resources - no surges, no dailies, no days - or, conversely, revert to paleo-D&D and just have litteral days with only casters having resuorce management challenges (and payoffs).
There's more ways to do this, but it really all boils down to the ability of a DM to chalenge a group over time, not at each and every fight.
I am seeing it now in our 4e game. The DM just doesn't like that one encounter can't be a challenge to a fully rested party. We're mid paragon and he didn't like my suggestion that the hint of more adventure to come later that day limits how many resources a party is willing to use. I think it comes down to the Extended Rest mechanic. It just works better if it's not tied to game time; Extended Rests work better when tied to the story. I think a lot of D&D's mechanics through editions have had this issue. In 3rd, a spell duration measured in minutes conflicted with any sane rogue that actuall wanted to search for traps in a dungeon. Good DMs can work around it, but I think tying recharges to story or at it's most mechanical, tying them to xp earned from success works far better.
I thought 4th edition had a very quick pace when they started releasing books. I also thought the numbering system was good, I was looking forward to Primal Power 4 for my Druid, lol. But it proved to not be very dynamic, and as the plans changed at WotC the outline and numbering system made those changes appear more drastic. I don't object to a slower pace going forward, but I might object to not getting Primal Power 2. I liked how Essentials did away with numbers for random titles. They could combine Primal Power 2 and Martial Power 3 (is that what it's up to?) into Heroes of Wood and Steal or some such.
Steel. It's spelled Steel.
Also, what do you mean by the Extended Rest being tied to in-game time? After all, you can't just blast an encounter apart, then rest, then do it over again unless the DM allows it. The DM keeps track of in-game "time", and after taking an extended rest, the party has a measure of in-game time before they can rest again. It's the DM that decides if that is 5 minutes or 5 sessions, not the players.
Players: "We need to take another extended rest! We are out of Dailies!"
DM: "Sorry, it's only been 4 hours. You could always make your way out of the dungeon, but monsters might find you during the journey. It would give you a chance to find a safe place to rest though. After all, sleeping in the middle of a monster infested dungeon has it's inherent dangers."
Your DM needs to let up on the attempt to kill you all in one blow, try and kill you over time, and stretch in-game time for all it's worth.
Encounter's only might be how to break the five minute adventuring day, though I do appreciate the complexity 4e has - surges v HP and milestones effect on action points and even how daily item powers work.
When it was my turn to DM (start of 4e) it was a constant balance between creating story that urged them forward while allowing the players to choose when they wanted to short and extended rest. First adventure of 4e was the small town they had just arrived at was overun by goblin raiders, lots and lots of small fights between resting up in safer parts of the town, until they just couldn't fight anymore and had to retreat to the fortified inn while some of the town got ransacked anyway. They made it 7 ecounters and weren't happy that some goblins were still going to loot, but I think it broke them of old habits and demonstrated how all those new mechanics worked.
In a recent adventre our party made a long sea voyage with some fights here and there. It would have been cheese to have the pirates attack the same day as the kraken on the same day as the ghost pirates. So each one was a Daily power fest. I told the DM afterward, he had a perfect excuse to delay Extended Rests. Just tell us at the start of the voyage that we weren't sleeping well on the ship and wouldn't get an Extended Rest until we reach port and slept in a bed that wasn't moving.
My only other idea is to tie it to XP, maybe a per level recharge. But that really ties a DMs hands on campaign pacing and might put the focus of the game too much on XP (or more of the focus). And you could get in a failure spiral that you can't break free from as you use your resources and don't get anywhere.
Gamma World is just Encounter powers? I should steel a copy and take a look.
Encounter's only might be how to break the five minute adventuring day, though I do appreciate the complexity 4e has - surges v HP and milestones effect on action points and even how daily item powers work.
When it was my turn to DM (start of 4e) it was a constant balance between creating story that urged them forward while allowing the players to choose when they wanted to short and extended rest. First adventure of 4e was the small town they had just arrived at was overun by goblin raiders, lots and lots of small fights between resting up in safer parts of the town, until they just couldn't fight anymore and had to retreat to the fortified inn while some of the town got ransacked anyway. They made it 7 ecounters and weren't happy that some goblins were still going to loot, but I think it broke them of old habits and demonstrated how all those new mechanics worked.
In a recent adventre our party made a long sea voyage with some fights here and there. It would have been cheese to have the pirates attack the same day as the kraken on the same day as the ghost pirates. So each one was a Daily power fest. I told the DM afterward, he had a perfect excuse to delay Extended Rests. Just tell us at the start of the voyage that we weren't sleeping well on the ship and wouldn't get an Extended Rest until we reach port and slept in a bed that wasn't moving.
My only other idea is to tie it to XP, maybe a per level recharge. But that really ties a DMs hands on campaign pacing and might put the focus of the game too much on XP (or more of the focus). And you could get in a failure spiral that you can't break free from as you use your resources and don't get anywhere.
Not only that, but some DMs eschew XP in favor of story-based leveling. So basing it off of that is a bad idea.
I think the biggest thing is making DMs understand that their game world does not have to work like the Final Fantasy game world, al la "Inn stay =always rested". D&D is more dynamic than that.
Heroes of Wood and Steal or some such.
Steel. It's spelled Steel.
Heroes of Wood & Steal: A Player's Guide to Hunters, Scouts & Theives
Heroes of Wood and Steal or some such.
Steel. It's spelled Steel.
Heroes of Wood & Steal: A Player's Guide to Hunters, Scouts & Theives
That is a pun worthy of death.
Death I say!
PS: MAGIC ITEM COMPENDIUM...DO EET!