Kameron´s last blog post: Designing My d00M

damn near any combination can work behind a decent defender.

good iteration of the difference between classes pre and post 4e. ive been generally using this idea, but its nice to read it from someone who has thought it through.

Still, I think Wizards missed some great opportunities to showcase the flexibility of the new system. Once such way would have been to include explicit ideas about reflavoring powers. They did a little of this in the DMG suggesting the option for clerics and paladins of evil deities to replace “radiant” with “necrotic,” but I see many more opportunities for this.

I first gave this a try while trying to convert a 3.5 Stormlord character of mine. I struggled for a while trying various cleric/wizard multi-classing, but eventually just replaced “radiant” with “lightning” and everything was peachy. Did it again when I tried making a shadar’kai shadow witch…reflavored some wizard spells and presto, instant thematic mage.

Not all descriptors are created equal, and with any modification of the game rules things should be worked out between players and GM, but there’s a ton of opportunity for customization in this new game. And not just from reflavoring, but from adding new feats, powers, and even races. One of our players really loved his 3.5 thri-kreen fighter, so I wrote up a complete racial document that both he and our GM for that game really liked (btw, he’s now a ranger because he DID get that that class better described how he had played him in the past).

I do think that my experience with the HERO system made it easier for me to pick up the newer 4e dissociation. It could have been handled better in the rulebook, though. I understand why they wanted to keep the legacy class names instead of making up new ones, but putting the flavor text in place without making the actual purpose of the class very explicit is a little counterproductive.

It was easy for me to recognize the difference between a ranger character and a ranger class, having spent a lot of time playing more open games like Mutants & Masterminds, and the proto-4E Star Wars Saga.

Oh, and BTW, great blog. Your excellent writing as landed your site in my favorites folder next to Chatty and the others.

In 4e, those roles are more closely tied to character class than in 3e. There’s no contesting that. (Of course, the roles in 2e and 1e were more closely tied to class than in 3e, too — but not quite so much as in 4e, primarily because of the insane flexibility of the wizard.)

I expect the forthcoming books will open up options some more, as they did in 3e. Hopefully they won’t also drown the core system in minor variations on a theme, as they did in 3e.

I agree, it’s probably not a “problem”, but at least a change and for sure one not everyone will like. I’ve started a 4th edition game a few weeks ago and have to admit, I couldn’t stand the (to me) flairless system that 4e has become. In this particular party we had everything from the most inexperienced newcomer to the hardcore-knowitall gamer&dm on the table -
the summary of events was: first evening was ok, the fighting went smoothly and rules were pretty easy – but from the very first minute onwards – something was amiss. Unfortunately it’s a combination of a few things that (again, for me) just make this fourth edition appear flavourless. One of the fighters just put it in easy words “I’m the fighter and my main concern is to – take damage”.
Ye, it’s a nice concept for a computer game, when you attack someone and mark him, the opponent should think twice about focussing on someone else than you. But it doesn’t work well in a pen and paper world.

Do you agree that even the words “striker, defender, controller and leader” push everyone into very much the same direction? I mean you’re right, there is still a bit of room for adjustments, but are there really builds of fighters that differ a lot from each other?

TheLemming’s last blog post: 4th Edition – Dungeons and Dragons