FOURTH EDITION D&D

[Caledonian Achilles]

does anyone else have 4th edition D&D yet?

[She-Elf]

Not me. I think I'm probably gonna stick with 3.5 at least unless it becomes problematic.

[Caledonian Achilles]

don't blame you but IMHO if someone "printed" a character sheet then you would know all your abilities and powers and therefore would not need to know all the actual rules of the game

for combat heavy games then 4th ed is great, for everything else then the rules dont matter at all - you dont need rules for adjudicating dialogue

[achinca]

I am with She-elf here except I might retire rather than switch. I really do not like the per day, per encounter and at will spells. Really give me a bad taste. Cheapen magic in my opinion.

[Caledonian Achilles]

having played some more of 4th ed, i think the main criticism is that stuff between encounters is marginalised. there's not any RPGing about wandering through the wilderness. you just seem to turn up on a battlefield and there's bad guys there. that's a flaw of the ppl writing adventures, not the system though

i think the main differences are:
][ you apply your ability stat to hit AND damage attacks (so an INT16 character gets +3 bonus to attacks and damge with INT based attacks)
][ AC is a defence (obvious) but your 3 other defences are Reflex, Fortitude and Will (think 3rd ed saving throws but add 10, so a 3rd ed Fort+4 saving throw is a 4th ed Fort defence 14)
][ there are no more automatic attacks (e.g. magic missile) but now some attacks still do damage on a miss. you have to roll to hit for every attack
][ every round you get one standard, one move, one minor, and unlimited free actions
][ 5-ft step is renamed "shifting" and some characters can shift more than 5-ft - so you dont provoke AoO!
][ all classes can dish out damage as equally well as a fighter but using other abilities instead of swinging a weapon
][ you add your CON score to your hp at first level so ppl end up having hp in the twenties at level 1
][ once per encounter you can spend a 'healing surge' that gives you back a 1/4 of your max hp. your class limits you to how often you can do this in a day
][ clerics now augment your healing but they dish out damage too
][ the monsters are more deadly too so you can't run about with under 10hp and think a level 1 monster isnt going to drop you!

[achinca]

I have to admit that the more I read about 4.0, the least I have the desire to try it. What is your guess of when 3.5 will ride into the sunset?

[Caledonian Achilles]

i dont think 3.5 will ride in to the sunset... yet
i have some friends who still play 2nd ed AD&D and refused to touch 3rd ed

i like 4th ed for the simple reason that no-one starts to moan "so do i have to play the cleric this time?"

[achinca]

funny because I do love to play clerics ..... one of my favorite class ... the problem is that a lot of player play them as walking pharmacy ... it is much more fun to give then extra dimension. Remember Alyana and Kurt? That was fun!

[She-Elf]

My wonderful other half bought me the 4th edition PHB today as an early birthday present. Still looking through it, but personally I feel like I want to try it out before I make any real judgements. Anyone know of a v. 4.0 game I can join?

[nodaisho]

There's probably some on the wizards boards, look under wizards community at the forum select screen, they still have a section for d20 modern games, so I would expect they have a section for the new edition of their flagship.

[Caledonian Achilles]

Jul 20, 2008 22:22:54 GMT 1 She-Elf said:

Anyone know of a v. 4.0 game I can join?

if you want to travel to Scotland every Thursday then I'll vouch for you at our table.

we really like 4th Ed. or to be honest, we really like playing D&D and because the rules are so simple we get to have more fun rather than waiting for me to explain the rules every so often.

if you want my advice, just spend a day making up 3 or 4 different characters (my 1st character took 2 hours to make) but it gets easier with practice and then you actually begin to work out the mechanics of the game as you fill in the sheet.

my current character is SAXAN a human greataxe weilding murderer adventurer. Since getting to second level, every encounter he is trying to come to terms with a personal heartache and hopes to one day GET OVER HER.

my 1st character was a nameless warlord who would use inspiring words to help his allies attack monsters. He'd cheer the troops up with quips like "stiff upper lip" and "put on a brave show chaps!" - and they'd heal damage!

but he died.

IMHO you dont need to read the PHB as there is nothing useful to remember in it.

there's stuff you might want to know but very little needs to occupy precious brain cell capacity

[Caledonian Achilles]

PS: seeing as the PHB is actually a reference tome and not something you need to know/understand, then may i recommend dowloading the PDF file

it is offically available from drivethrurpg.com and is cheaper than buying the books. in fact i dont even know if there is copy preotection on it! would be a terrible shame of someone just started sending out copies of it to friends. something i would not do or condone.
rpg.drivethrustuff.com/index.php?filters=0_0_31813

i'm writing a 4th ed campaign at the moment for my pals FYI