Re: Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition Review

[joqqeman]

I personally hated playing the 4th edition, but I slightly disagree with the "not everybodys equal" idea. I agree that in combat, of course, every class shouldn't be "equal" as in "everyone has pretty much the same abilities" but I would like the classes to be "equal" so that the gaming system adequately rewards all classes. It seems to be a lot harder to make playing a bard worthwhile, though of course this is mostly up to the DM. I wish they had tweaked instead of revolutionised. Flashy crap.

[Langsorigingaleia]

I have been aiming to check out the earlier editions of D&D but I don't know if investing myself will be worth it, especially considering how painfully pretentious all of its players seem to be. >:|

Suddenly 2nd edition were so sacred even though it were picked up by teenage boys apathetic to their future and social lives, and now that they are adults working at the grocery store they are accusing 4th edition to be picked up by teenagers who are... just wow.

[KhagarBalugrak]

I agree, 2nd edition was the very best. As soon as TSR was bought by WOTC, the quality of D&D started to rapidly deteriorate.  WOTC designs games for ritalin-addicted, ADD-riddled American teenage boys who lack imagination or any kind of exposure to any sort of culture or intelligent thought. By trying to reach the widest possible audience, WOTC has created a product - 4th edition - which is so watered-down and rigid that it appeals only to stupid people.

[Creslin321]

The more opinions I read about 4e the more I realize that they are just opinions. When I first read the 4e PHB I HATED it with a passion. But then I realized that my hate was just rooted in the fact that it felt so different from my beloved 3E.

The lack of normal "spells" pissed me off, no multiclassing pissed me off...etc etc

But after I spent some more time with it, I'm starting to really like 4E. It's totally different, but I think it's a solid game.

[CommissarMudkip]

4e owns. Any other edition is for wizard fanboys trying to get revenge at the jocks who picked on them in school by playing the 'nerd' class. Fighters 4 life. 4e 4 life.

[jacobkosh]

Anybody who thinks there's such a thing as One True RPG and worse, that they know what it is, has basically announced to the world in neon letters fifty feet tall that they have a Ph.D in human worthlessness.

[azirk83]

This guy makes me feel bad about being an old school gamer. I didn't even think that was possible.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@azirk83 Why? Because I gave my opinion? It's not like I spewed out a bunch of vulgarity like I did on my other videos. Hmm. Perhaps that's where I went wrong. I am glad that I single-handedly made you feel bad about something you loved and cherished. Kudos to me and my powers of evil genius!

[azirk83]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy Your ignorance and willingness to put down others' favorite games is what saddens me (well, it did 5 months ago when I posted the comment). I could give a shit less of your opinion of 4E, but posting a "no it sucks" response to a positive review is pretty douchebaggy.

And "more douchebags" is not what the old school fanbase needs.

[sureshot73A]

I used to be a big fan of 4E and while I still am I'm playing Pathfinder and maybe even playing 2e at a later date. I pretty much disagree with what was said in the review. Espcilally the part about WOtc releasing stuff for profit. Well DUH! How many non-profit rpg exist out there. It's as if a segment of the gaming community forget that they do not live in China or Cuba. We live in one of the most profit oreinted areas of the world. The good will of the fabase alone is not enough anymore.

[Phooball]

There are a lot of reasons for your opinions and for your lackluster experience with 4e. I could go through it point by point but I'm not gonna because it would be too much effort for something you will ignore and 'dislike' on reflex anyway. Suffice to say your are prejudiced and terrible. 2e Sucks, 4e's pretty cool, FATE is where it's at.

[guinness13]

@Phooball If you expect the game to be a board game, what a surprise, it turns into a board game. If the players play it like a board game, that is not a criticism of the system, that's a criticism of the players, who couldn't be bothered reading the books to see how much else there is to the game. It's like you make the characters on the character builder and go, without actually reading the rules of the game.

[peregrin2]

Funnily enough, the guys at Burning Wheel HQ play and like 4e, and even the ones who don't consider it a solid game.

Of course to understand why 4e is a solid game, you have to understand the same principles that helped refine Burning Wheel into the game it is today. The whole point behind the game theory that helped Baker and Nixon create their games was to establish that not everyone has the same tastes in gaming. 4e is an example of something you don't like, but it is solid design.

[Evilsmurf39]

Very nice video, very well presented. I got 4e after just finished playing WOW online and was immeadietly struck by the identical set up. This is the rpg for the lazy generation.

[Grimlock64]

If a game is lacking the role playing aspect, that's not the game's fault, it's the GAMER'S fault. You don't need rules for role playing, you just do it.

[rockheimr]

@Grimlock64 If (minis) combat so completely dominates the focus of an rpg and the time spent playing it, as is the case with 4e, then it's no surprise to me that people see that as not encouraging roleplaying. You can roleplay monopoly - probably - but the game's rules do not encourage it, same's true (in a lesser way) with 4e.

[astindextor]

douche

[MalibuFilmsWT]

I suppose a mention of "any D&D is good D&D" would just get drowned out in the flood of thirty-somethings pissing in each others cereal over which is the best way to pretend to be an goddamned elf.

I prefer 2E myself, but will happily run or play any version. Maybe I should turn in my internerd card.

[guinness13]

I currently run Hackmaster 4ed, so I'm not phobic of earlier editions. I just really preferred 3ed and then 3.5 when it came out. 4ed is different enough I wouldn't feel redundant running/playing 4ed as well, but we have moved on to the later editions. I got my start in AD&D, and we played the guts out of it for many years, I just tired of it.

[guinness13]

I used to drink drink loads of Guinness. Still love it. But I've moved away from Guinness proper to local micro-brew stout. I'm in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and there are three really excellent micros here that do good "porter" and stouts. I created the handle before micro/craft beer took over here, and now I'm more of a "buy local" kinda guy, supporting the excellent breweries in my city. Still love Guinness, though. It's the gold standard for stout. What do you drink, PBR? ;-)

[guinness13]

Now 4ed combines both systems in many ways. It's encounter based, but each critter has an XP amount a la older versions. But the XP isn't just for killing the critter. Also each "encounter" has a CR, and when you overcome it, you get the XP. 4ed also has the most robust quest/RP/personal XP based system I've seen in any iteration of D&D. Quest XP and RP XP are easily equal to the XP you can get from killing critters. See? I'm trying to have a rational discussion.

[guinness13]

Contrast that with older D&D where there were two main ways to get XP - kill monsters, or loot treasure. Sure, there is RP opportunity there, but it's no more a guarantor of any RP at all than a CR system is. Guys can just sneak in, steal loot, and leave without speaking a word. Ditto CR in 3ed. But the thing is both systems provide OPTIONS. You can RP-sleaze the encounter, or you can pull sword and spell and blast your way through.

[guinness13]

You can role play, you can grind out combat, or you can do both. I have had NUMEROUS sessions of 3ed over the years where we rolled nary a dice, and killed nary a foe. Yet we got experience, because the beauty of 3ed's system is it is "challenge" based - set a CR, overcome the challenge, and you get XP. It doesn't matter HOW you overcome the challenge, it only matters that you do.

[guinness13]

The 4ed DMG is hands down the best written book I have read on the subject of role-playing. I don't play much 4ed, but the articles and columns in the 4ed DMG really gave a breadth of insight into different aspects of gaming. It is really a remarkable book that many people who say "there's no role playing in 4ed" should read. There's as much role playing in 4ed as you want to put in - and that's been true of EVERY edition of D&D ever made.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

...and still no verification on the consumption of guinness... 628 views from one angry troll that doesn't like my opinion. Funny, as if you all notice, the person that this video was in response to, noobdragon (I think) posted a nice comment back to me at the very end (or beginning, if you will). Man, O man! I wish I could run a 2E Dark Sun of PlaneScape game for the nay-sayers... you'd be burning your 4E books by session #3 and buying ME Guinness. Alas, I am gluten-free.

[begisle]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy

Sorry Dude 2e was boring unless you had a brilliant group of players, it was far more beer & pretzels than anything else. You appear to be looking through some very rosy glasses there.

My bad that was just my experiences from back in the day.

Funny thing about that, when I started 1e back in '84 we used miniatures. Were we playing wrong?

The 6 hour drive to DragonCon last year had our group playing 4e the whole way and not nary a board or token or milkdud was in sight

[phaedruslive]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy that said though, pathfinder has done a kick ass job with 3.5

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy No man, I played the guts out of AD&D back in the day. Been there, done that, moving on. The closest I come is Hackmaster 4ed, but its different enough. I would never choose to go back to AD&D if you paid me. I could get my head around a good DM running RC era D&D, or the older editions maybe. Possibly. But not likely. 3ed just struck all of the complaints I always had about the 2ed system, and fixed them all for me. I embraced 3ed and never looked back.

[guinness13]

You can power game in anything. The rules for 4ed only enable power gaming in your mind. If you play 4ed with power gamers, it will feel like a power gaming centric game. Any game played with munchkins will be a power game fest. So one setting noone played (Lanhkmar) and one setting that is cult popular but didn't have sales proves there was no power gaming in AD&D. Riiiiight. 4ed has more rules enabling role play than any system ever published before, and that is FACT.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 You can NOT powergame in anything. Ever play Call of Cthulhu? Unless you're Cthulhu himself, you ain't powergaming anything in those rules. And I'm talking Gaslight or 1920's, not Delta Green. Anyhow. Once again you take my comment out of context. Are you a creationist, perchance? I never said powergaming didn't exist in AD&D. There were settings for powergaming and lack thereof. Options. And I'm not saying 4e doesn't have any options; I simply do not like the current options.

[guinness13]

You're the one who said "AD&D the most successful game of all time" when, no, it wasn't. 3ed in all its iterations has more players, more sales, more books, more EVERYTHING. You can change the goal posts by saying "it's all a matter of taste" but in any way you want to measure it, 3ed was the most successful and most played RPG of all time. 4ed is only as much a "boardgame/WoW game" as you want it to be. The 4ed DMG is one of the best books ever written on the subjects of role playing.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 Okay, I watched my own video, read the forum... I never said it was the most successful game of all time. Could you site where I said that exact phrase? As for the 4ed DMG being one of the best books written on the subjects of role-playing... ever hear of Vincent Baker or Clinton R. Nixon? Furthermore - sorry to be so argumentatitve - but I marvel at your worship of 3rd Edition. Most successful in profit and most played does not equate to the being the best.

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy Yes I have, and yes I read those books. Doesn't mean the 4ed DMG doesn't deserve its place along with them. It's seriously well written. I'd say that something that is the "most played" is worth serious consideration as one of the best, because the point of an RPG is - duh - to have people playing it. An RPG that noone plays (like a lot of indie games) could be like unto the written word of Jesus Buddha, but if noone plays it, it's not much of a game.

[guinness13]

... I marvel at your worship of 2ed/1ed. They were some of the worst put-together games ever. 1ed especially was just a meandering horribly edited rulesset. It was near impossible to find the rules you actually wanted to look up unless you memorized the book, at which point you hardly need to look up the rules in the first place. I played 1ed and 2ed, and while I had fun playing with my friends, I hated every second of interaction with the confusing, contradictory, messed up system.

[mejd16]

My problem with 4e is that everyone has super powers.

[DungeonsItalia]

Right! 4th edition is WOW on paper! amen.

[jabberwock11]

I've been RPGing since the mid 70s and I personally love D&D 4E and consider it the best D&D yet. I don't agree with the gripe on RPing. You can RP in any RPG. That's mostly outside of the scope of the rules. The only thing I would really like to see is more skills.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

What do you need skills for? It's D&D! Ultimately, you just walk around and kill things and loot corpses. You nod in agreement to DM railroading of mundane plots and predictable and unbelievable villains. As for role-playing, hard to say, but when you hear the DM refer to enemies as 'minions', it affects your decision making as you know they only have 4hp. And, for some reason, Psion powers are totally visable. WTF. Anyhow, I'm waiting for 8th Edition to come out!

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy That is the most ridiculous response I have ever seen. "Just walk around and kill shit and loot!" How is THAT more role playing than 4ed? "Yay DM railroading" WTF - what, do you think Mary Sue GMNPCs and arbitrary random killing of characters is great to? Seriously, posting something like this, and I'm supposed to take you opinion seriously? Man, what a total hipster douche wanker.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 Do I really look like a hispter? Wow. I never would have thought such a thing. Anyhow, I guess you couldn't tell I was being snarky with the guy. The request for more skills just struck me funny, since, D&D skills were often the butts of a lot of jokes. Hack n'slash appeals to a lot of people. Not I, of course. Well, maybe when I was 12. Man! You're a ferocious lil' beastie, aren't you? Snapping at me now for comments toward other people...

[jabberwock11]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy I mainly want to see more trade skills. Possibly added using a separate skill system. In any case you don't like 4E. I get that. Just realize some of us do (even some of us old timers who stated with white box D&D). D&D 4E is very tactical and requires miniatures. We hve been using minis for 20 years anyway. I wouldn’t call it a board game but it does have similarities to magic the gathering.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

I'm so over it. Who cares. 5th edition will be out in a few years.

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy The metagaming munchkin power gaming STARTED IN OLDER EDITIONS. There was a whole comic, Knights of the Dinner Table, that was totally based around the munchkin powergaming twits that were prevalent in the older games you so desperately love and think are above the ruck and run of the plebian 3rd and 4th ed.

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy The metagaming munchkin power gaming STARTED IN OLDER EDITIONS. There was a whole comic, Knights of the Dinner Table, that was totally based around the munchkin powergaming twits that were prevalent in the older games you so desperately love and think are above the ruck and run of the plebian 3rd and 4th ed. Burning Wheel is awesome. But your "role playing, not hack and slash getting magic items" seems to me you really don't understand the history of the game.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 Serious? I don't understand the game? How's this for history: AD&D 2nd Edition Lanhkmar setting. Power game in THAT shit. Dark sun? What items? Characters traded swords for water! Begone, clown. Of course I know that the early editions fostered the powergame mentality. But as other people have said, that is a reflection of the player. In 4th Edition, however, the rules ENABLE powergaming. There is a significant difference. Seems to me that you don't understand the game itself.

[tyleratthegates]

haha can u give me your adress so i can come beat the shit out of you the teabag you for being so retarded? plzzzz

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@tyleratthegates For the record, everyone, I sent him my address. If he has the balls to drive to my house from whatever shit-pile he comes from, I'll be sure to post a video of the outcome. It'll either be me laughing with a black eye explaining my own ass-whoopin', or you'll see a video of a dude laying face down in the gutter, pants around his ankles with 4 cucumbers shoved into his ass - one for each edition of D&D.

[daddystabz]

You are wrong, my friend. 4E is NOT a minis game. It CAN be played without minis and is just as much an RPG as any other edition. My experience with D&D goes all the way back to the old 80s red box.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@daddystabz Then explain... shifting. No DM in their right mind is going to run a 4e game without minis. C'mon. Be realistic.

[phaedruslive]

AD&D is and always will be the truest classic pnp rpg. 4th edition is a fun game if your treating it like a casual hack and slash like you said, but to call it dungeons and dragons is an insult to every genuine roleplayer out there.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@phaedruslive Word, homey. I stand behind your paragraph 100%

[jabberwock11]

@phaedruslive Don't think you speak for every genuine roleplayer out there.

[RumekRavager]

Nice use of Dogmatic fallacy. You actually can play 4e without a board, I've done it personally. If you can't, that's not the systems fault ;)

Honestly though, even though i don't use game boards all the time, I actually prefer them for most RPGs. I currently run a 2e game, and find the use of a board very helpful in larger combats. Once again, I don't always use the board, but find it benefits the game at times.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@RumekRavager i'm not sure that counts as dogmatic fallacy, as much as an argument over the term 'miniature.' Indeed, you CAN play without miniatures... but you must use some sort of movement representative, i.e., a coin, a game stone, a milk dud, etc. I find it hard to believe that you ran a 4th Edition game without a mat and markers of a kind. Must not have had any Bards or Eladrin? No one shifted in the dungeon? Everyone took the DM's word for it without arguing? If so, kudos to you, sir.

[cheezeofages]

If the game you are playing isn't character focused it isn't the system's fault. That is the domain of DMs and players.

I play a lot of 4e and there's plenty of character focus.

I have to quote WotC's Chris Perkins on this one. "If you think 4e doesn't have roleplay, you are dumb." either that or your DM is.

[TheInsaneSchoolchild]

@cheezeofages Ouch. I know thats not true (You can roleplay in DND4) but man was that a childish comment by such an adult: "If you do not think my product is perfect you suck". But generally wotc pulled out all the stops to say "We dont care what your opinion is if you do not like our game". including an animation where a Dragon s***s all over a complaining fan (Classy wotc), and insulting ADND "Pff whats that CONSTITUTION DAME YOU SPEEK OF IT SOUNDS SO STUPID"

[cheezeofages]

@TheInsaneSchoolchild I think he was just trying to be a little comedic about it.

[TheInsaneSchoolchild]

@cheezeofages But s***ing over fans of 3E (YOUR OWN PRODUCT) is LOOOOOOW

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@cheezeofages Of course it has role play. Just not as much as other systems, like, oh... The Burning Wheel. Some systems are just designed with more aspects in mind. It just seems to me that WotC has money in mind, hence 4e and the mini assault. 3-4 Player's Handbooks? C'mon.

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy asinine response. 2ed did the same thing with the "Complete Book of X" that introduced new kits and builds. So the game shouldn't evolve or change from what it was 3 decades ago to the present? And by the way, "most" of D&D's success happened during 3ed. It was the single best selling game in history, and with Pathfinder which is basically 3.75, it continues to do well. By the way, TSR was trying to make money - hence why they licensed the game for cartoons,

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 Sorry dude, but the only assine is you. You called ME a pretentious twit, but you're the only one throwing around erroneous historical red-herrings and insults against my opinion. You are a forum troll, sir. And. by the way yourself, D&Ds success in 3rd edition is subjective in terms of taste. Dollars do not equate to 'better.' People are going to be arguing about 7th and 8th edition years from now, dwarfing 3rd and 4th edition in sales. You probably don't even drink guinness.

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy and in case you didn't notice, 2ed especially was a splat book/supplement treadmill. The game was DEVELOPED from a MINATURE WAR GAME you idiot. Gygax developed the game out of his war games he played. bashing the game because of minis shows an abject failure to understand the roots and history of the game, you pretentious twit.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 Ohh... I see. Then, how come my D&D basic Red Box never came with any minis? Aww... sorry, you lose. Oh, but wait... there's more. Though it was developed FROM a war game, it's commercial success came from the depth of DAVE ARNESON (you idiot) as he was the one that convinced Gygax that war gaming was shallow and dull and came up with the concepts of class, XP, AC as well as the Blackmoor setting that got the wheel going for 'The Fantasy Game,' leading up to the game we all love.

[guinness13]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy Every edition of the game had miniatures developed for it and 1ed/2ed had rules for how to adjudicate movement for minis, and pewter minis were a MASSIVE sales boon for game stores before 3ed hardwired them in. The thing WOTC found is MOST gamers used minis, so they made the game incorporate that fact into it. Because the people you were playing with played it like a board game is not a fault of the game, unless you think anecdotal evidence is real evidence.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@guinness13 Sure, sure. But the fact of the matter is, miniature movement was always OPTIONAL. I've played over a hundred games without minis. It's not optional in 4th, realistically. Your argumentation is logically flawed, my friend. I never disputed the love of minis by the masses, or the inclusion of them in previous games. I only stated that ... whatever. You're a lost cause. Go play Castle Ravenloft and suck your thumb!

[rc7771]

I can agree with you about 4e. They went too far in the simplistic aspect of the game with 4e. However, I will disagree with you about 3e and 3.5. 3e cleaned up a lot of what was so backward about 2e. Roleplaying in 3e/3.5 was more important. 2e got overly complicated and was very broken when things like Skills and Powers came out. I do go back 30+ years to the original boxed sets, and of all the editions I've played 3.5 was my favorite, just because it made some sense and played well.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@rc7771

I see where you're coming from. But I must admit... using the Skills and Powers argument against 2nd Edition is a cheap shot. Mind you, that shit came out toward the end, when the engine of TSR was losing steam. Splitting stats was proof that the Munchkins were a force to be reckoned with. But to say that 3rd and 3.5 was more about role-playing than 2nd is a bit of a stretch. The books dedicated to class variants were an invention of 2nd edition. The Thieves' Handbook blew my mind.

[rc7771]

It wasn't meant as a cheap shot, believe me. To me, Skills and Powers was just one more example of a system that had gotten too big and too complicated. Add to that the upside-down math of THAC0, the seperate experience point tables, the secondary skills chart and the unbelieveably unwieldy way that psionics worked in 2nd Edition, and I don't see much argument that 3.0/3.5 wasn't a vast improvement over 2e. It was time to do something to bring the game back to simplicity.

[TheInsaneSchoolchild]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy OH MY GOD. A DND4 discusion which does not involve calling each other names. I think asmodeus should be freezing by now. But seriosly, dnd4 was my introductory edition which taught me all the basics but then i moved on to Pathfinder, you should really check it out.

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@TheInsaneSchoolchild Pathfinder is pretty damn sweet. As of now, though... fantasy is burning me out. Sci-fi games... I'm interested in Blue Planet ane Eclipse Phase. Good settings. No magic, no barbarians... not WotC...

[TheInsaneSchoolchild]

@TheInvisibleSkyDaddy True. Have you tried out Shadowrun?

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

@TheInsaneSchoolchild Hell yeah. The game is a bit complicated at times, and I have yet to get through a combat without someone freaking out and arguing over the rules... but I had a lot of fun with that system. Everyone is a crook out for themselves; if you start out with that concept, it's a recipe for success! If only D&D had 'Doc Wagon.' Dragon Wagon? A bunch of gnome clerics in a flying oxcart...possibilites....

[clergame]

I agree with you about 4th but i do think 3.5 was the best system to date. In the 4e campaign i am gaming in the players are doing HUGE amounts of damage every round. Definately broken!

[TheInvisibleSkyDaddy]

Like I said, if your own party members are attacking you because they know you'll do more damage when you're bloodied... the game is broken. But 3.5? I dunno. I thought 3 was just fine. 2nd Edition was awesome. 1st Edition was cool. Basic D&D? That's what I play now. Humanoids are a class. 3d6 for stats, all the way down - no choice. Hirelings are essential for survival. Initiative is 'side based' for quicker combat. The game is nasty. But if anyone lives to level 9, it means so much more.

[rc7771]

Not a huge lover of 4e myself, but remember even though you're doing more damage, you and the monsters (other than minions) have far more hit points than you used to. I run our 4e game, and while I find it much harder to really take down a character, it is still possible. Monsters seem to do more damage as well, and some of their powers make the playing field pretty even if you use them correctly.

[n00bdragon]

Thanks for the response! Even though you don't agree it's good that you cared enough to give a detailed response.

As it so happens I have a long history with D&D going back to AD&D and I play a large variety of RPGs including Cthulhutech, Exalted, and many others.

You're totally right that 4e has a heavy war game element to it but I believe that adds to the experience rather than detracts. All the game's I've been in though have been heavy on roleplay as well though.

Thanks for the response!