Attitude Towards 4e

[Straw_Man]

Do such challenges not further encourage optimizing and tactical analyzing, hence, according to some, lowering the "heroic", "cinematic" feel? For me, I have no problem imagining my optimized character doing cinematic stuff. It's all in your own head, I think.

I can imagine the captain of a starship doing cinematic, heroic stuff in a game of Star Fleet Battles.  I can imagine a soldier doing cinematic, heroic things in a game of Terrible Swift Sword.  That doesn't make SFB or TSS a particularly cinematic game, though.  Cinematic is like comedy--you can do it with any system, but some systems are designed to support it and others aren't.

+1

  The lies a bridge between what we can imagine and what we are rewarded called roleplaying.

  Some bring a lot, some little, for some it depends on circumstance. D&D does not encourage me to roleplay, rather it teaches me to optimise, roleplaying I bring to the table because I want it. From my experience a game such as Mage or Gumshoe encourage roleplaying to a much greater extent.

  I still play D&D because I've house-ruled it all to hell and its great for tactics and strategy which I also like. But that doesn't make it a larger than life story - its what you can bring to it yourself.

[GawainBS]

Maybe it's personal then, but I don't get a more cinematic feel from other RPG's. Mind you, I've played terribly dull D&D games as well.

[highbulp]

I can imagine the captain of a starship doing cinematic, heroic stuff in a game of Star Fleet Battles.  I can imagine a soldier doing cinematic, heroic things in a game of Terrible Swift Sword.  That doesn't make SFB or TSS a particularly cinematic game, though.  Cinematic is like comedy--you can do it with any system, but some systems are designed to support it and others aren't.

Would it be fair to say that 4e is intended to be cinematic, even if it doesn't pull it off very well? It sounds like other games do a much better job of it, but from the designer's comments (and some of the advice in the DMG), it seems like the game is attempting to make the game system of D&D more cinematic. But its success in that goal is certainly arguable.

[Straw_Man]

I can imagine the captain of a starship doing cinematic, heroic stuff in a game of Star Fleet Battles.  I can imagine a soldier doing cinematic, heroic things in a game of Terrible Swift Sword.  That doesn't make SFB or TSS a particularly cinematic game, though.  Cinematic is like comedy--you can do it with any system, but some systems are designed to support it and others aren't.

Would it be fair to say that 4e is intended to be cinematic, even if it doesn't pull it off very well? It sounds like other games do a much better job of it, but from the designer's comments (and some of the advice in the DMG), it seems like the game is attempting to make the game system of D&D more cinematic. But its success in that goal is certainly arguable.

  Without seeming abrasive, I think the move to 4E was prompted by money. Nothing wrong with that, but they've come right out and said their trying to attract the MMORPG crowd. It's a fast action and time based reward medium. Rarely do you do anything heroic or epic, the world is awash with heroes; all truly epic moments are the purview of iconics in backstory and fiction.

  Would they mind making the system more cinematic? Probably not. Is there any evidence they've attempted to emulate or mimic others systems that do it well? I have yet to see any.

[highbulp]

Rarely do you do anything heroic or epic, the world is awash with heroes; all truly epic moments are the purview of iconics in backstory and fiction.

Would they mind making the system more cinematic? Probably not. Is there any evidence they've attempted to emulate or mimic others systems that do it well? I have yet to see any.

That certainly isn't the case in D&D (at least not the D&D I play). The Heroes are the PCs, and the epic moments (indeed, all the moments) happen with the PCs.

I don't deny that selling a product was likely the primary reason for creating a new edition. But I think that in designing that new game, I think they tried to make it more cinematic. Not by copying other cinematic games (which would have been a good idea... too bad), but by doing it from scratch. Reinventing the wheel so to speak.

Nevertheless, I think 4e is a more cinematic version of D&D than previous editions. And so when people say "a cinematic game," that's what they mean. Not that it is the most (or the only!) cinematic game, but strictly in comparison to previous D&D editions.

That said, I think that pointing out "hey, if you want a cinematic game, try this other one!" is the perfect response. If only I had time to run multiple games using different systems But unfortunately, I like long involved stories that don't really lend themselves to system hopping. Maybe I just need to run a game that is designed around system hopping--characters move between worlds and their abilities actually change as we try different systems. That could be a lot of fun, actually.

[Caelic]

I can imagine the captain of a starship
Would it be fair to say that 4e is intended to be cinematic, even if it doesn't pull it off very well? It sounds like other games do a much better job of it, but from the designer's comments (and some of the advice in the DMG), it seems like the game is attempting to make the game system of D&D more cinematic. But its success in that goal is certainly arguable.

Hmm.  Possibly.  Certainly, they added elements which could be argued to be cinematic (action points of one sort or another have been a staple of cinematic games for years.)  On the other hand, I'm not sure I could really support the premise that the overall design is intended to be cinematic.  "High fantasy," I could go with.  The characters are certainly meant to be heroes of epic stature...but heroes of epic stature does not necessarily equal cinematic.  Beowulf involves a hero of epic stature; look what they had to do to it to make it cinematic.

[jameswilliamogle]

My two sessions have left me a bit iffy on 4.0...

I played Wizards in both, one at L2 and one at L10.  It feels like the magic items are lacking quite a bit. 

I also don't like the XP scale.  In the second session, we fought two fights that were considered hard for our group each.  In both, we blew most of our dailys, having to rests between fights.  Despite that, and several party members going into the single digit HP range, and both fights lasting way more than 10 rounds, we only gained about 1/3 the XP needed for the next level.  This was the most disheartening aspect to me: I'm really used to the leveling every two sessions or so, after about 4-5 fights.

The main draw (for me) for 4.0 was the more rapid leveling.  This is what allowed me to overlook the weaker feats and rather vanilla-looking powers, but it doesn't seem to be how it works in practice.

[Straw_Man]

Might be a learning curve, but I notice most parties that don't use their dailies tend to suffer casualties. Which is great .... but what type of adventurers/heroes fight kobolds and then rest for the day so they can refresh & repeat tomorrow?

[Josh]

The lies a bridge between what we can imagine and what we are rewarded called roleplaying.

  Some bring a lot, some little, for some it depends on circumstance. D&D does not encourage me to roleplay, rather it teaches me to optimise, roleplaying I bring to the table because I want it. From my experience a game such as Mage or Gumshoe encourage roleplaying to a much greater extent.

  I still play D&D because I've house-ruled it all to hell and its great for tactics and strategy which I also like. But that doesn't make it a larger than life story - its what you can bring to it yourself.

I also don't like the XP scale.  In the second session, we fought two fights that were considered hard for our group each.  In both, we blew most of our dailys, having to rests between fights.  Despite that, and several party members going into the single digit HP range, and both fights lasting way more than 10 rounds, we only gained about 1/3 the XP needed for the next level.  This was the most disheartening aspect to me: I'm really used to the leveling every two sessions or so, after about 4-5 fights.

You can just as easily do experience wrong in the new game as the old.

My suggestion is to get a published adventure and play that so you can see how things should be done.

Also, I have done a bunch of fights in 4e and people have been getting to single digit hp all the time, mostly because thats the way the new system works.

[jameswilliamogle]

I also don't like the XP scale.  In the second session, we fought two fights that were considered hard for our group each.  In both, we blew most of our dailys, having to rests between fights.  Despite that, and several party members going into the single digit HP range, and both fights lasting way more than 10 rounds, we only gained about 1/3 the XP needed for the next level.  This was the most disheartening aspect to me: I'm really used to the leveling every two sessions or so, after about 4-5 fights.

You can just as easily do experience wrong in the new game as the old.

My suggestion is to get a published adventure and play that so you can see how things should be done.

Also, I have done a bunch of fights in 4e and people have been getting to single digit hp all the time, mostly because thats the way the new system works.

I find it funny that I say I don't like how the XP setup in 4.0, and you say we must've screwed it up.  We didn't.

As for the single-digit HP multiple times per fight, I can deal w/ that, but not without something substantial to come from it.  Why would my character keep adventuring at such great risk, when its more efficient to scam townsfolk of their loot?  This is what I did in ADND 1e, and I might have to go back to this.

From what I've heard about the published modules, they're even more difficult.  The fights our DM had were very well designed, with trapped terrain in the rooms w/ the monsters, who were hiding, ready to attack.  Even then, we spotted them, so didn't allow them a surprise round, and they rolled poorly on initiative.  I don't think I've seen published encounters that really beat the combination of interesting terrain and monsters: that's what its all about, after all.  He pulled the monster group as a suggested "hard" encounter from our group size, the traps straight from the DMG, and the hiding element as well.  How else is it supposed to go?

[EjoThims]

I'm really waiting for some supplements and more options to arrive before forming a solid opinion, but I'm so far thinking that in the end I'll have to agree with so many others that the best to come out of 4E will be houserules for 3.5.