What Am I Reading: Dungeon & Dragons Player’s
Handbook, 5th edition
Part Four: Wow, just WOW...
I
started to write a simple review of Dungeon & Dragons Player’s Handbook,
5th edition, but it grew into a series of blogs about the history of the
game itself! Refer to my previous blogs for some of the terms if you are
confused.
Just
like everything else in the world, D&D was suffering from poor sales during
the economic depression of the mid-2000s. Gamers were leaving the tabletop
games in droves to play online. Neverwinter and World or Warcraft (WOW) were
the dominant games in the sword-and-sorcery genres. This fit into the
isolationist mode most of us were going into with the invention of smart
phones. Instead of rows and rows of kids sitting on the benches in malls, now
there are rows and rows of kids sitting in coffee shops texting. Probably
texting the kids sitting right next to them. Zombie apocalypse indeed...
Sitting
at a table with dice and paper was passé; why imagine attacking an orc
compound when you can see it in 3D on your computer screen? Wizards of the
Coast realized they were losing their gamers. So in 2007 it was time for a new
edition of D&D. A version that would attract those gamers back! They
couldn’t beat the electronic games ... so what do you do if you can’t beat ‘em?
4th
edition gets a lot of bad press - has ever since it came out. Once something is
pronounced a bomb - whether it be a movie, a TV show or a game system - it
cannot recover even if it really isn’t so bad. Go to your favorite browser and
type “4th edition D&D criticism” and look at the topics: link titles
include “What Went Wrong” and “It’s Awful” -and these are dated 2008 and 2009
when the game had only been out a year or less! I won’t add to the chorus of
contempt except to reflect what I have already blogged before.
4th
edition isn’t a bad system. Some bloggers said if it wasn’t called D&D it
would not have lasted. That’s true, but that is the case with MOST non-D&D
RPGS.
If done
correctly and with players acclimated to the system, 4th edition might even be
fun. But it was so vastly different from anything before it ... it was hardly
D&D at all! It was a table-top version of a video game. WOW on paper.
Ironically, WOW had its own tabletop version of itself - with a hardback guide,
etc. Its tabletop version of D&D did just about as well as D&D’s
tabletop version of WOW.
The
basic classes and races are the same - although it took three Player’s
Handbooks to get all the classes listed (Barbarians, Monks, etc.). Later Player’s
Handbooks added tieflings (a race with a demonic taint), dragonmen,
crystaline beings, angelic Devas, etc. It kept the 3rd edition’s Prestige
Classes but called them Paragon Paths.
And the
role-playing aspect of the game is still there, albeit it is made secondary to
combat. From the few modules I read, role-playing is set way back on the list
of things to do while playing the game. Way way back.
The
biggest changes are in the way 4th edition handles combat. Remember,
we’re talking about a table-top MMORP (massively multi-player online
role-playing game).
Play
with miniatures is encouraged. Some scenarios/modules seem to require it. For
the first time since the D&D Basic Set, back when it was a spin-off of Chainmail,
players are encouraged to dig out their miniature figures and terrain, whip out
their tape measures and roll play. Miniatures never went away, strictly
speaking. Gamers could use miniatures throughout all the editions - but 4th
edition made it a necessary part of combat. Without miniatures - using a power
that pushed back an opponent one square made no real sense without something on
the table to help visualize it. How can we know if the push-back pushed the orc
back into the waiting arms of an assassin’s blade? Make a luck roll? Miniatures
take the guess work out of it. And takes the imagination out of it, too.
Powers?
Oh yes, perhaps the biggest change in 4th edition, and the one that makes it
seem more like a table top MMORP than anything else.
Each
class and race was given powers. These are abilities one can use in combat.
At-will powers could be used every round (portion of combat) - Healing Surge
can heal you for 6 points - keeping you alive to swing your mace at least one
last time. Per-encounter powers can be used only once during combat - and you
cannot use it again until the next mob of bad guys come around the corner -
Flurry of Blows might give you two chances to hit in a round. Per-day is just
that. Until you sleep and recover, you can only do this power once per day -
Knock throws everyone to the ground.
It’s
like the cool-down period for abilities in WOW - you have some buttons to click
that gives you an arcane blast or sword swipe every few seconds, some you
cannot use for ten or more seconds, come only once every few minutes.
Even
the terminology and class “assignments” come straight out of a MMORP. Rogues
are attack dogs - nicking and cutting opponents. Fighters are referred to as
“tanks”. There’s a Warlord class that gives other characters plusses just by
standing in the midst of combat - there’s no other real reason for the class.
Combat combat combat.
With
this, were I to play 4th edition, I would like to have all my powers laid out
before me on cards. My at-wills to the left, per-encounters in the middle and
per-day on the right. Other stats would also be available. That way I can keep
track of what I used and when it will be available again. Just like on my
computer screen. I go from playing on my desktop to playing on my desk top.
Stats
for abilities became uniform. Before, if you had 14 Strength, it would give you
a +1 on “to hit” rolls, damage, opening doors, etc. A 14 Dexterity gave you +1 on initiative, “to
hit” rolls for ranged weapons. Now a 14 in any stat gives you a +1 benefit on
anything involving that stat. No more lists - if it involved Strength, you get
+1 to your roll. I like that. (remember that I am winging it on the numbers
here – don’t tell me “a 13 gives you +1, a 14 is +2. Cool, but regardless, if
you get my point, let’s move on…).
With
4th edition, Wizards of the Coast (WotC) went with the nuclear option. It
stopped producing anything remotely to do with 3.5. It left that to Piazo.
Piazo was the company that published Dragon and Dungeon magazine.
WotC cancelled both magazines - no one will care about 3.5 once 4th edition
debuts!
“Um,”
Piazo said, “would you mind if we continue with the 3.5-style game system?
We’ll call it Pathfinder and it will be completely different from your new
edition.”
“Of
course you can, you little upstart, we’re too big to worry about such small
potatoes as you...”
I
usually end these blogs with our little troop of characters trying to swing
over a chasm. Just use the same ending as my last blog. Since it has nothing to
do with combat combat combat, the roll play of swinging over a chasm is
unchanged.
But that brings up one of my
biggest criticisms - roll play vs. role play. In previous editions, I am a
thief named Visilai; in 4th edition, I am a rogue/assassin hybrid with the
invisibility character build!
Pathfinder
started beating D&D in sales. Bad. Then the Star Wars Role Playing game
started beating D&D in sales.
D&D was third overall. From the only game in town to third place.
Something had to be done.
They
quickly created a 5th edition.
They
called it D&D Next. I call it D&D: The Apology.
TO BE
CONCLUDED...
Copyright 2014 Michael
Curry
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