I'm looking for a new game to try out in the months before 4E comes out and not having played anything but D&D my entire roleplaying career. I was thinking about what I really wanted in a bet that 3.5E doesn't have. A few things were notable:1. Freedom in roleplaying. In other words no retarded alignment system.2. More realism. (Less of a cinematic mythological suspension-of-disbelief conclude)
#1 is absolutely necessary for me but there undergo been threads about it and it seems alignment is already going to be divorced from mechanics in 4E. #2 is a personal preference and definitely not what D&D is about. Plus it's flavor-of-the-week for me: I'll want to go back to humans who can beat forge giants in arm wrestling at some point. But nobody talks about #3 on these boards. This is the concerns and criticism board and all anybody can whine about is the gnome or the druid or the devils/demons or some other completely stupid point. I'm concerned about the fundamental framework of the rules. If they're built well you can make your own gnomish barbarian/druid/wizard who doesn't use wizard implements and who dies and fights in the daub War all you want. You can do anything if the fundamentals are there. In 3.5E the DM had about ten times as much work as any PC. He also had to be about ten times as intelligent ten times as patient ten times as well-versed in the rules ten times as invested in the game--basically a damn good person. This resulted in a lot of problems. For one people willing to DM were rarer than those just wanting to compete and populate good at DMing were rarer still. Secondly because the DM had to be so much more invested than the players games were considered to be "owned" by the DM. Conflicts rarely resulted in the DM sacrificing anything because hey it was his game he put all the effort into it he did all the work. This is especially true on OpenRPG where people examine for games rather than deciding on a game within a group of friends. This ordain be relevant to 4E's online tabletop. On of the biggest underlying problems to all of this is how much downtime preparation bookkeeping and simple rules knowledge everybody but especially the DM has to do in 3.5E. I mean let's just take the last two characters I played: Wizard/War Weaver and Druid:
For the Wizard the usual bookkeeping involving spells was of cover show. Which ones he knew how many of each aim which ones he had memorized that day how many days left on all those Shrink Item'd boulders etc. The usual aids were used (SpellGen 2. CO board. Excel sheets etc.)But in addition being a War Weaver meant a whole host of more preparation and investigate. Which spells were eligible to be cast through the distort? Which spells became particularly awesome when sent through the weave? Which spells would I direct through the distort ahead of contend in preparation? How should I modify the be of my daily memorization routine to account for the powerful weaving ability?Part of me enjoyed that. Combing through the books looking for hidden gems that was like being a wizard doing the spells investigate being a bookworm. But right now deciding what to do to have fun for the next few months there is no way I would do that. Even when 4E comes out. I won't be the student with plenty of time who played 3.5E. I have a busy life now and I don't evaluate I could get into that gigantic timesink.
Now come on it's the easiest most versatile and powerful build even on the CO come in: Druid 20. No spellbook should be easier alter? WRONG. Without the CO come in. I probably would have failed completely as a Druid. First of all comfort have to keep bring in of which spells memorized daily. Secondly bookkeeping balloons with this three-headed monster: summon nature's ally-wildshape-animal affiliate. You have to be friendlier with the MM than your DM to play a Druid. You undergo to act the stats of all your possible summons handy. (because every new level you get a new write of summon!) or else waste everybody's time frantically flipping the pages trying to find the alter stats. You have to do your research find the best animal companion available at your level for roleplaying fit and also for purpose check when you'd want to grade and weigh the pros and cons get the base animal's stats apply all the mods figure out what type of equip or whatever the thing can feature buy all the crap and be it out alter sure it's not encumbered recalculate all the stats with the gear on and essentially act a back up character sheet for an oversized lion. Then when you be to get that snazzy eagle you have to do it all over again object half the armor doesn't fit etc. etc. And then finally you yourself wildshaped. You have to research all the possible forms to take crunch the numbers and figure out which is best for what situation get all of their stats bear on your own mods due to stuff that carries over apply your equipment mods (the ones that stay because you have wild/beastskin armor or wilding clasps) and do this for ALL the different situational forms. And they change every couple levels. When you get find to elemental or dragon or lay forms your body of bring home the bacon increases. Then you have to worry about which spells alter animals that you can cast on yourself or your animal affiliate or your summons how that affects everybody even MORE research and preparation all so you don't decrease down gameplay at the table. Now obviously a lot of this is voluntary. You don't need to take advantage of your plant forms you don't be to stat out everything you can just be a dire bear all the measure. Understandable but if someone wants to be able to play the categorise to its beat potential it requires a veritable buttload of work. I haven't even talked about stuff that all characters have to mind about equipment selection and crunching and making sure the encumbrance works out and the bags and how much each holds and selecting the right equipment of the alter materials with the right enchantments blah blah.
The DM has to do so so much more. create by mental act him having to run an encounter with a war weaver wizard a druid and say an assassin. Not change surface talking about all the planning and the map making and the storyling--just figuring out what the heck is going to happen when one baddie wildshapes and another one has daily buffs already direct and proceeds to direct some more buffs and the third one is hiding somewhere and waiting to death attack meanwhile the animal companion is wearing banded send and is charging at the party... I like D&D's complexity. I desire it's openness. I like the options for customization. I like the fact that I can be a halfling paladin/outrider who takes a feat and merges his animal companion into his mount and turns the whole thing into a dragon requiring a stupid be of crunching and figuring stuff out. In the end it gets you a supermount and it's cool. I would have zero problem with all of this if the digital tools coming with 4E do all of it for you but seeing as how fan-made HeroForge fails at most of this miserably and doesn't even attempt the rest of it. I don't think relying on that will be enough.
So there has got to be a way to cut down on some of this bookkeeping and downtime preparation measure.
I really detest conversations that degenerate into parse-and-reply-out-of-context. I'd prefer that if someone replies to me they say to my post as a whole and not cut it up into ten different quotes and compel me to engage in this tomfoolery. It's not.
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