D&D

[IggyBot]

Dungeons and Dragons

Seriously, there hasn't been a thread made about Dungeons and Dragons yet? The greatest roleplaying game created thus far?

Anyways, this is a obviously a thread about Dungeons and Dragons, hopefully we can get some good discussion going. Things to talk about:

-When did you start playing?
-What kind of character do you enjoy playing?
-General character discussion
-Your thoughts on 4.0 vs 3.5
-Anything related to D&D

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I first played D&D right before I went to college last August, and I continued throughout the year. This coming year, a few friends and I (we all live together) are going to start an epic campaign, and well, it's going to be epic. We plan on playing 1-2 times a week, rotating DM duties. I'm currently trying to figure out what kind of character I want to play throughout the year, and I'm having a harder time deciding than I thought. After playing a Druid the other day, I realized how much fun both controllers are, and how fun it is to be able to seemlessly switch between melee and ranged combat. I'm thinking of trying a ranged/melee Ranger build, or a Swordmage|Wizard Hybrid.

The other thing I'm looking forward to, is that my group is comfortable (and really enjoys) the roleplaying aspect, which is something that can oftentimes be lacking in 4.0 depending on your group. I think that we will really be able to get into our campaign, and it'll be that much better because of it.

That's all I've got for now, and if anyone has any ideas for my character dillema, please post!

 

[Mr. Hadwick]

I've always really, really wanted to play D&D, but no one I know plays and I'm nervous about joining some group as a noob.

My interest started quite young when I discovered my Dad's old Advance D&D player's guide, filled with old handmade character sheets featuring such warriors as my dad's Wong Loo the warrior, and my mom's Cassandra the cleric. Naturally (with me loving fantasy) I read the entire player handbook, without really understanding anything, of course (I was like nine).

My interest was revived in highschool, from Gabes posts about it on penny-arcade. Unfortunately none of my friends are interested, and I don't know anyone who can DM, so I can't really play.

 

[IggyBot]

I've always really, really wanted to play D&D, but no one I know plays and I'm nervous about joining some group as a noob.

My interest started quite young when I discovered my Dad's old Advance D&D player's guide, filled with old handmade character sheets featuring such warriors as my dad's Wong Loo the warrior, and my mom's Cassandra the cleric. Naturally (with me loving fantasy) I read the entire player handbook, without really understanding anything, of course (I was like nine).

My interest was revived in highschool, from Gabes posts about it on penny-arcade. Unfortunately none of my friends are interested, and I don't know anyone who can DM, so I can't really play.

Go for it. Groups I play in are really accepting of beginners, and character creation ranges from beginner to advanced, so you won't have much trouble (especially if they help you, which they should).

If I can get enough interest here, I would consider starting an online group. We could all use a chat program (skype, ventrilo, something else that I don't know of) and MapTools to play together. I've only just begun looking into MapTools, but it seems perfect (and designed) for games over the internet.

 

[MrIndigo]

I'm actually one of the people who have been playing for a long time who actually likes 4th Edition. The balance has been improved a hundredfold (No more CoDzilla!), and everything's easier to teach, learn, explain, and play with.

Unfortunately, my current schedule combined with the fact that my normal play group are less interested and spread out means I don't get to play as often as I'd like.

 

[Raikage]

I've been playing for a few years, but discontinued recently. My group prefers 3.5 cause we feel 4th Edition is too 'World of Warcraft' like. 3.5 isn't the most balanced of course so I'm always looking for a way to make all classes viable other than convincing people to not min/max their chars. I prefer mostly Core as well to keep things simple (also some books are really broken)

 

[Surgo]

You can see my signature to know that I enjoy Dungeons & Dragons.

Let's see...I started playing at about the time 3.5 was released. I almost always play either spellcasters or magical people of some kind.

I strongly dislike 4th edition. No, the balance has not been improved at all -- great myth there. The fact is, the balance for both games has been done by consulting a dartboard. 3.5e had wizards, 4e has orbizards, the designers for both have no fucking clue what they're doing.

Honestly, even though I run that wiki I've come to really dislike D&D. The turns take too long and what you can do is at the same time too restricted and not restricted enough. Hitting level 11 and winning the lottery is fun and all, but it's gotten kind of old hat. I've moved on to the Shadowrun system and the HERO system, both of which are superior in every way to any edition of D&D.

And at this point I won't ever play non-Tome (Tome of Necromancy, Tome of Fiends, Dungeonomicon, Races of War -- see my wiki) D&D anymore. It's just too frustrating.

so I'm always looking for a way to make all classes viable other than convincing people to not min/max their chars.

Then I have exactly what you want! I played with these two, and other, books for several years and they work, man.

 

[apologies]

i play occasionally but am pretty terrible!!

 

[Kromlech]

I've been playing 3.5 for about 7 years, and 4th edition since it came out. My group has 2 (sometimes 3) separate campaigns per week so we get to play both 3.5 and 4.0. My group generally likes 3.5 more.

I think 4.0 has done a lot right, but it's still far from perfect. The metric ton of errata gets annoying, but ultimately it does help the game. A necessary evil. At least they are giving a crap, unlike 3.5 (just look at the tome of battle errata). They do try to cut out the really overpowered combinations though charop will always find a way.

Claiming that the balance hasn't been fixed in 4.0 is a gross misrepresentation. There is no way you can convince me that orbizards are as bad as what wizards were in 3.5. CoDzilla is dead, yet druids and clerics are still fun to play and able to participate in the game. That is great design. Fighters (and all melee classes) are no longer irrelevant by lv 5. AC no longer caps at 19 without spending ridiculous amounts of money or picking a freaky-ass race. Monster touch ACs no longer average at 8. All of these areas are what make 4.0 much better than 3.5. (yet we still enjoy 3.5 through the gentlemens' agreements we make about character creation)

The multiclassing in 4.0 is where most of the abusive combos come from (still nothing compared to 3.5), and each errata set that comes out removes those overpowered combos through simple rewording. I'm not going to claim that 4.0 is perfectly balanced, but it is leaps and bounds ahead of the 3.5 atrocity.

 

[DDRMaster]

If I can get enough interest here, I would consider starting an online group. We could all use a chat program (skype, ventrilo, something else that I don't know of) and MapTools to play together. I've only just begun looking into MapTools, but it seems perfect (and designed) for games over the internet.

I would certainly be interested in this. I've never actually played with the boards, though, and I'm not sure we even need them.

I've been playing D&D for 3 years now in Gaming Club at my High School. The German teacher runs it and we only play 3.5 because those are the only books he has. Although, aside from character creation, we don't really use the books, or even the boards. He just draws the map on the board and we might end up encountering things like Ewoks or something out of Gamma World.

I often play as a Cleric because the experienced players usually play as Wizards/Sorcerers and the beginers usually play as Fighters. We do get most of the classes covered because there's plenty of people who want to try out different things like Bards and Rogues but usually we only have one or two Clerics out of about 12 people. Clerics can also dish out some damage with spells, if they need to, and can actually take a hit.

Edit: I made up a Pokemon Trainer class recently and my German teacher let me use it so that's what I've been using recently. The trainer has a HD of 4 while the Pokemon have a HD of 8 (the standard for animals) and can hit nearly as much as a Wizard/Sorcerer. I don't think it's ballanced out at low levels (because you could possibly give Overheat to your Chimchar), but the damage maxes out fairly quickly and you eventually get the Double Battle skill which lets you use two Pokemon at once.

 

[vonFiedler]

Actually, I was thinking about running a Pathfinder game. Earthworm said it would be okay a while back. I could be convinced against using Pathfinder for another system, but either way the end result would be modified by myself. Not sure if I wanted to run it just yet, but if there's interest I'd do it.

 

[Amelia]

I've actually wanted to enter D&D for a long time but my place has no groups at all playing it, so I've never found anything. If Smogon creates a D&D I'm willing to try it out.

 

[JeffreyLebowski]

I play in two campaigns right now. My main problems with D&D right are that the rules are too arcane and the setting is too generic. I feel like I'm playing MtG in Middle Earth. Whatever, I'm still having fun. I'm playing a Dwarven Cleric Darun and the Half Orc Barbarian Maximus.

 

[Surgo]

I'd be very happy to play in a Tome 3.5 game (see my links), but not much else.

The multiclassing in 4.0 is where most of the abusive combos come from (still nothing compared to 3.5), and each errata set that comes out removes those overpowered combos through simple rewording.

The 4th edition errata is very dissatisfying, to the point of us actually being better off without the errata than with it. Instead of actually making those "abusive" combos or even single powers more reasonable, they are instead nerfed into literal uselessness. That's not good errata. That's fucking stupid.

I'm not going to claim that 4.0 is perfectly balanced, but it is leaps and bounds ahead of the 3.5 atrocity.

3.5 had about four distinct levels of balance, and you could generally place a class in any of those four (we use them on my wiki, and we do just that, actually, to specify which "level" of 3.5 you are playing). 4th edition has like 3. That's really not any better.

Edit: I made up a Pokemon Trainer class recently and my German teacher let me use it so that's what I've been using recently.

From one of the authors of the Tomes comes this, which will work at pretty much any level of the game. It was originally titled "pokemaster", but the deal is it works for any set of monsters.

 

[DDRMaster]

From one of the authors of the Tomes comes this, which will work at pretty much any level of the game. It was originally titled "pokemaster", but the deal is it works for any set of monsters.

Yeah that's pretty similar to what I came up with although, there aren't any type specializations and Double Battle comes at around Lv. 12. That's probably a lot easier to make and a lot faster since I had to make up a bunch of equations to find the Pokemon's stats and there was no set way to do skill bonuses. For example, I would just give a Gengar a +20 in Move Silently and Hide.

 

[vonFiedler]

Some of the stuff in these tomes is really sweet. I'd probably run a tome campaign if everyone else is cool with that, I'm still reading up on them.

 

[Kromlech]

The 4th edition errata is very dissatisfying, to the point of us actually being better off without the errata than with it. Instead of actually making those "abusive" combos or even single powers more reasonable, they are instead nerfed into literal uselessness. That's not good errata. That's fucking stupid.

Can you provide 3 examples of attack powers that lost all use after errata? I sure can't think of any. I'm sorry, but that sounds like generic CharOp exaggeration and whining to me. Maybe you could enlighten me?

3.5 had about four distinct levels of balance, and you could generally place a class in any of those four (we use them on my wiki, and we do just that, actually, to specify which "level" of 3.5 you are playing). 4th edition has like 3. That's really not any better.

The difference between the four fan-made tiers in 3.5 were immense. You could not possibly hope to mix a 4 into a game with 1s, not even a 3 into a game with 1s.
In 4.0, a group can mix and match as much as they wish and, save for some extremely bad choices, all party members will be able to participate and contribute in their designated roles. That is much better than 3.5.

4.0 also does a much better job at avoiding "toe-stepping", where in 3.5 the druid could easily out-damage and out-tank the poor melee fighter and the wizard out-stealth and out-lockpick the rogue. That no longer happens in 4.0. Even within the same roles in 4.0, there is not a lot of toe-stepping. What the Ranger and Barbarian do in DPS the Avenger and Sorcerer do in rider effects and utilities. I don't believe there is any class that completely overshadows another, within the same role or otherwise. Please correct me if I'm mistaken.

 

[Surgo]

Some of the stuff in these tomes is really sweet. I'd probably run a tome campaign if everyone else is cool with that, I'm still reading up on them.

I'd love to play in such.

Can you provide 3 examples of attack powers that lost all use after errata? I sure can't think of any. I'm sorry, but that sounds like generic CharOp exaggeration and whining to me. Maybe you could enlighten me?

Path of the Storm, Follow-Up Blow, War of Attrition.

Honestly, though, if you even look at the sheer length of the errata you should start to see something that frightens you. The tremendous amount of this that's going on, and tremendous amount that is yet to come as they touch one thing but not touch another equivalent thing suggests that they have no idea what they're doing or even how to write rules in the first place. It is frankly embarrassing.

The difference between the four fan-made tiers in 3.5 were immense. You could not possibly hope to mix a 4 into a game with 1s, not even a 3 into a game with 1s.

The only part of them that is "fan made" is their name -- all four, which for my wiki I have cleverly named Monk, Fighter, Rogue, and Wizard, appear in the Player's Handbook.

I don't believe there is any class that completely overshadows another, within the same role or otherwise. Please correct me if I'm mistaken.

The problem with asking me this is that I stopped following this like ten errata cycles ago, so I really don't even know what's up with that anymore.

It's worth noting, though, that the 4e roles are total nonsense. "Striker" doesn't even mean anything, and even if it did it wouldn't be an interesting role.

Look, I'm not trying to bash anyone who likes 4e here. If you like 4e, that's cool and I'm glad you have fun with it. I'm just trying to disabuse anyone of this silly notion that it has ever been more balanced than 3.5. Both have been balanced by consulting a dartboard.

 

[IggyBot]

"Roles" do and don't mean much in my experience with 4e so far, depending on what kind of character you make. If you go with the standard character classes (no multiclassing or hybrid builds) your characters pretty much fit into the roles that they are "assigned". Your Controllers "control" monster movement and attacks, and often debuff. Defenders tank, Leaders buff party members, and Strikers attempt to deal as much DPR as possible.

When you start using hybrids and multiclass builds, is where the lines unfortunately blur and things don't mean much anymore. The other unfortunate part about hybrids is while there are some cool and balanced builds, they more often than not take the two sides of the spectrum. Either really, really good or total crap. From what I've heard, the Swordmage|Wizard hybrid I want to try seems to take that middle path, but we will see with experience.

Surgo, what did you mean by "the turns take too long"? Do turns in other tabletop games move quicker? That's one thing that frustrates me when playing with my friends. They all get distracted so quickly that getting through one encounter can take forever.

 

[Surgo]

Surgo, what did you mean by "the turns take too long"? Do turns in other tabletop games move quicker? That's one thing that frustrates me when playing with my friends. They all get distracted so quickly that getting through one encounter can take forever.

Other tabletop games can move much quicker.

When talking about other games I have the most experience in Shadowrun. The individual initiative passes in that game move really fast. Part of it is because the combat mechanic is simply streamlined very well (D&D is not), part of it is because you don't have to play 20 questions with resistances or semi-persistent effects (this is easily the thing that drags down high level combat in D&D the most -- even though it only lasts like 2 rounds, it'll still take an hour+), and some of it is honestly because the game involves spending most of your evening planning the hit and then a comparatively small part of it actually carrying it out.

 

[IggyBot]

Other tabletop games can move much quicker.

When talking about other games I have the most experience in Shadowrun. The individual initiative passes in that game move really fast. Part of it is because the combat mechanic is simply streamlined very well (D&D is not), part of it is because you don't have to play 20 questions with resistances or semi-persistent effects (this is easily the thing that drags down high level combat in D&D the most -- even though it only lasts like 2 rounds, it'll still take an hour+), and some of it is honestly because the game involves spending most of your evening planning the hit and then a comparatively small part of it actually carrying it out.

Ah, ok.

I'm hoping to convince my friends to start playing electronically instead of tabletop. We have more resources, and rolling for everything wouldn't take so damn long and it would be automatically tracked. I'm hoping they do, and that helps things move along faster. Instead of rolling a 4d6 for everything on the board, just click a button and it's all automated. That's the hope, anyways.

 

[MrIndigo]

The few (and there are only a few) abusive combos in 4th Edition have only been errata'd to change them into what their original intended effect was, not as an attempt at rebalancing, in the vast majority of cases.


The fact that no class is straight-up better than everything else at the same level is proof enough that 3.5 is nowhere near as balanced.

That said, I actually like a number of aspects of 3.5 better than 4th, it's just that the loss of those I feel is a worthy sacrifice for the general improvement to the game in terms of simplicity, utility, etc.

For instance, I dislike the way Skill Challenges oversimplify interesting role-playing scenarios, like surviving a siege or something like that. You also lose a lot of the rules for managing nitty-gritty situations; while most of the time, you wouldn't need them (thus their omission isn't a big loss to the game in general), they are missed occasionally. I was also quite fond of the randomly-generated-treasures system, but most players find the ability to choose the most desirable magic items to receive more rewarding.

 

[Kromlech]

The only errata I really dislike are the blatant typos and mistakes, which I admit there is far too much of, but that is not a balance problem. It's just sad when most of the errata could have been caught through simply reading the friggen book before it goes to print. It's just unprofessional. But in fairness, any printed game book suffers from that (at least WOTC makes errata).

Those three powers are all brought down to the level they are supposed to be, and are still perfectly usable. It doesn't matter which powers we single out, because the developers and errata creators do have some sense of balance. Perhaps their "dartboard" was made better this time. But I agree, that's enough of that.

As for complaints about slow gameplay: a D&D game can go quickly as long as the players aren't distracted (which any game suffers from), the DM has good, quickly readable stats for monsters, and players think and re-think everything they want to do even when it isn't their turn. Rule disputes can drag any game down, which can be resolved quickly by rule 0: The DM is always right. When a game slows to a crawl it usually isn't the fault of the game, but the players. If these all seem like all obvious tips that apply to any game, it's because they are and they do. Yet, most gaming groups don't have a handle on them, and blame the game system.


And for the 4.0 players lurking/posting out there: what do you think about the PHB3? My group hasn't implemented it yet (yeah, even several months later) except for a few feats. In your experience, have the new classes blended well with your games? Are there any favorite new race and class combos out there? Is the Shardmind really as stupid as it seems?

 

[MrIndigo]

My major dislike with the PHB3 is that it seems to show that the races in future will all have the choice of stat bonus. I would have preferred (and run my games as such) that the Githzerai only had +2 Dex, +2 Wis; the Wilden only have +2 Con, +2 Wis.

I like the flavour of the Shardmind, but not the way it's implemented. I don't really see the need for them as a PC race, really. The Wilden, however, are great, but I much prefer their original preview incarnation (where they couldn't get +2 Dex; far too many races have +2 Dex, +2 Wis as an option, IMO).

As far as the psionics go, they're interesting, and they seem reasonably balanced compared to the nonpsionic powers. In flavour terms they're a bit odd, but that's the way they're supposed to be anyway, I guess.

I would have liked the Githyanki (or even Gnolls) to have a PC race entry, but they have said they don't want any more stereotypically villainous races going the way of the drow.

 

[Chomper The Sharptooth]

I have a version 3.5 book lying somewhere around my room, I read it constantly before and even tried the self campaigns like they said were possible but it was terrible without any real role-playing element. I'd be completely willing to do an online game so I can actually play, of course that wouldn't be until my own desktop has a new network card so I can connect to my house's internet and download a chat program.

 

[Surgo]

As for complaints about slow gameplay: a D&D game can go quickly as long as the players aren't distracted (which any game suffers from), the DM has good, quickly readable stats for monsters, and players think and re-think everything they want to do even when it isn't their turn. Rule disputes can drag any game down, which can be resolved quickly by rule 0: The DM is always right.

What you're saying is -- when the DM streamlines what isn't already streamlined, the game will run faster. That's a tautologically true statement, but it's unhelpful and also a little insulting. It's really not the fault of the players if the game is set up so unhelpfully that fast isn't the default mode of operation.