sean.blog

Background:  I owned the basic D&D set back in the early 80’s and thought it was amazing.  I never really played it “right” but I loved playing all the same.  I used to go to the student center at the University of South Dakota (I was 9 or 10 at the time) and play D&D with my brother and Tony and Jerry Dunham.  We had a good time.  I did buy some AD&D books over the years, but didn’t really realize that the game had changed, and lost interest.

In 1988 I started playing Warhammer Fantasy and a little bit of HARN.  The crowd I was with was fairly anti-d&D and I became that way as well.  I brought Warhammer to college and shunned the D&D crowds there.  About 3 or 4 years ago I bought back into D&D with the 3.0 and 3.5 editions.  I didn’t really like the game.  I found it easier than what I remembered of AD&D, but still it was too much.  Way too many books to purchase, way too many fiddly rules.  However, much like Warhammer Fantasy Battles, you go where the people are if you want to game, and D&D has the crowds.

Fast forward to 2 weeks ago and I got my hands on the core books for 4e D&D.  I had a fairly good idea of what to expect, but I still was not 100% prepared for what I found.  I have not gotten to play the game yet, but I am working on a game.  In my mind this looks to be a great game.  Here is what I like about it the most:

• It’s a new version.  Nothing I hate worse than a new version of a game that changes 1/2 a dozen rules, cleans up some typos, and calls itself a new version.  Just enough changes to get everyone to re-buy the book (Warhammer 6th- 7th edition).  This is not that kind of book.  4th edition is a brand new game, based on the same concepts and worlds of D&D.  This is a great way to do things.  The people happy with 3.5 are not forced to change, the people not happy with 3.5 have something new to play, and everyone can play 2 games called D&D with very different experiences.
• The core Mechanic.  Having one very simple mechanic and offering exceptions to that mechanic make the game fairly easy to teach.  Much more so than 3.5 IMHO.  When I read the 4e books the game generally seems to make sense, and relates well back to the one core mechanic in the game.
• Powers.  This was something I was a bit worried about, but I think it is going to be OK.  It will, no doubt, lead to endless strings of “powers books”, but the concept is fine.  It seems to make characters more heroic in my mind.  It helps them to stand apart from the crowd better than just having a high dexterity or strength.  I read a number of things that made it sound like “regular” attacks were a thing of the past, but I don’t know if that is really the case after reading the rules.
• Running the Game.  Reading the DM’s Guide has been a real pleasure.  Setting everything up for a game really does seem to be much simpler.  It tends to follow a similar set of rules whether you are talking about traps, hazards, monsters, or skill encounters.  This makes creating encounters quite easy.  I like the right ups on quests as well.

There are other things to like to be sure.  My least favorite things thus far are really the monsters.  The Monster Manual provides a number of very interesting monsters, but it is confusing to find/create the base monster so that you can customize it the way you want.  It’s not the end of the world, but I would lo v to see “base” stats for each monster type in addition to the more customized versions.

I am VERY excited to get my adventure written and get some gaming done.  I will report back when I do.  I am putting together a wiki for the game, which I will link to once it is ready.