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Anybody else miss 3.5?

Started by Drizztrocks, December 04, 2011, 12:34:50 AM

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Lmns Crn

Quote from: Kindling
Switching to the "what's wrong with 4E" side of this, rather than the "aren't old editions of DnD nice" side, can anyone who has actually played 4E tell me a bit about the way skills work? From what little I've read about 4E the only real negative, as opposed to just whether or not something suits my personal preference, seems to be this idea of skill challenges, which I only vaguely understand, but seems a bit weird, at least from what I've read about it.
Skill challenges are unusual, but I think they're one of the things 4E did quite well. What specifically do you want to know about them?
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Kindling

Well, I've heard (in very vague terms) that they're kind of inflexible and hard to improvise or alter. Is there any basis to this?
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Lmns Crn

#32
That is basically the opposite of how they are. (Especially if you're considering them in contrast to the sorts of mechanics from previous editions that they replace.)

The thing about skill challenges is that they are group encounters that replace things that otherwise would have been "one person rolls one skill" types of things. So when you set a situation up as a skill challenge, everybody gets to participate (i.e., we all strive against the trap, instead of standing by and watching one character roll a yes-or-no trap check, or we all contribute to surviving and finding our way through the forest rather than just derping along behind the ranger who is doing all the work). Since stuff doesn't just hinge on one roll, you can also create a sense of escalating tension.

There are typically a lot of skills that are applicable and players can improvise more if they have something that looks like it might be useful in the moment. And you have a lot of flexibility to alter their length, complexity, and difficulty by adjusting difficulties for checks, and the number of successful checks required to succeed.
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Weave

Quote from: Luminous Crayon
That is basically the opposite of how they are. (Especially if you're considering them in contrast to the sorts of mechanics from previous editions that they replace.)

The thing about skill challenges is that they are group encounters that replace things that otherwise would have been "one person rolls one skill" types of things. So when you set a situation up as a skill challenge, everybody gets to participate (i.e., we all strive against the trap, instead of standing by and watching one character roll a yes-or-no trap check, or we all contribute to surviving and finding our way through the forest rather than just derping along behind the ranger who is doing all the work). Since stuff doesn't just hinge on one roll, you can also create a sense of escalating tension.

There are typically a lot of skills that are applicable and players can improvise more if they have something that looks like it might be useful in the moment. And you have a lot of flexibility to alter their length, complexity, and difficulty by adjusting difficulties for checks, and the number of successful checks required to succeed.

I really liked the idea of skill challenges in D&D. It was a way to award experience without just tying it into combat AND giving all the players a way to contribute. I'm sure the work much more smoothly in 4E, but when I tried adapting it to PF it strongly favored classes with more skill points, and we struggled to make the unrelated skills of our group's fighter actively relevant in most of the challenges, which kinda sucked the immersion away from it all and made it laughable at times. With 4E's consolidated skill list and bump in skill points for each class, I think it'd be a good time.

Skill challenges were actually introduced in 3.5, though they were called by a different name (which eludes me at the time). Originally, they were about making more complex skill checks instead of just one that meant "success or failure," and made a small effort to tie in other players who want to help.

beejazz

Skill challenges as written in 4e are pretty bad from what I've heard. First, the goal is to get everybody involved, but the optimal strategy is to find the guy with the best relevant skill and have him roll over and over. The fact that failures brings you closer to losing means that characters with bad skills actively hurt the party's chances of success. Setting a fixed time/round limit and not penalizing failed checks would actually encourage group participation (because at worst, participation can't hurt). Plus I've heard the math in most published versions is messed up in some way or another.

I never ended up playing 4e. Fighter dailies break it for me, powers (at least in the core, where they lost me) were too samey, self-healing and marking were badly implemented, and (as a subset of powers being "samey") summoning, illusion, necromancy, and pretty much any kind of magic I liked was nixed with the release. Likewise for some of my favorite classes (bard, barbarian, monk, necro/illusion/enchantment are my favorite character concepts) and races (mostly just gnomes).

That said, I think some of their design goals were laudable. I like the idea of making combat tactical instead of strategic*, and if anything they didn't take that far enough (there are still too many daily-based resources for it to be 100% what it could have been). I like the idea of making prep easier (3x was a nightmare). I like the idea of streamlining character generation and only using bonuses, though again there were places where things could have gone further.

And 4e's attitude towards races and such was a good fit for settings where races were actually interesting (Eberron, Dark Sun), if not for the standard fare as much. Maybe one of these days I'll do something heavily houseruled with only the unique races from each of those settings in a mashup world. Maybe it'll use some variation on some of 4e's rules.

3x has its own problems. Save and BAB progression charts were a pain (there was no easy formula or memorization, so on-the-fly stats were a no). Point-buy skills are sort of fiddly. Characters are built of many units (race and class and skills and feats and class features and prestige classes and equipment and so on).

Still, the core mechanic was a great way to BS new rules on the fly, and the feat is great as a smaller unit of customization.

*I like tactical over strategic combat because that way you don't have mages (or whole parties) going nova in the one-combat sessions I tend to run. Strategy (of the D&D variety) balances days assuming a specific number of encounters. Tactics balance encounters within themselves.



...Anyway, my solution to my issues with both systems is to continue work on my own system, where levels, Star Wars Saga-style skills, and Fallout 3 style perks are pretty much all there is, and nothing is ever daily. So far, more flexible than 3.5, more tactical than 4e, and with fun add-ons (dismemberment, political power, arcane research, etc). And I'm still building. Need to update the link in my sig and post some of my work though.

Meanwhile I still play 3.5. Until I'm done with the homebrew.
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sparkletwist

Like so much else in 4th edition, skill challenges are a good idea that promotes awesomeness at the table... that is utterly broken in actual execution.

Quote from: beejazzFirst, the goal is to get everybody involved, but the optimal strategy is to find the guy with the best relevant skill and have him roll over and over. The fact that failures brings you closer to losing means that characters with bad skills actively hurt the party's chances of success.
This.

To elaborate, when the goal is "As a group, roll N successes before you roll X failures," it means it is not optimal to even pick up the dice unless your chances of success are equal or more than (N/X) times the chances of failure. For example, if N = 2X (which is pretty standard), you shouldn't even bother rolling the dice unless your chances of success are double your chances of failure. On a d20, that means succeeding on 14/20 or more possible rolls, and failing on 6/20. If your odds are worse than this, you are hurting the group by even picking up the dice. So much for being inclusive.

Gamer Printshop

#36
Quote from: Luminous Crayon
Quote from: Kindling
Switching to the "what's wrong with 4E" side of this, rather than the "aren't old editions of DnD nice" side, can anyone who has actually played 4E tell me a bit about the way skills work? From what little I've read about 4E the only real negative, as opposed to just whether or not something suits my personal preference, seems to be this idea of skill challenges, which I only vaguely understand, but seems a bit weird, at least from what I've read about it.
Skill challenges are unusual, but I think they're one of the things 4E did quite well. What specifically do you want to know about them?

And I think skill challenges are among the things 4e did poorly. A skill challenge is an attempt to be formulaic about a non-combat encounter. A skill challenge might suggest I need 3 successful skill checks to accomplish a given goal. Let's say, I want to enter a secured tower and I need 3 successful skill checks to get inside. So first I visit the local inn and attempt to gain information about secret entries into the tower with a successful Gather Info check (Search), and I succeed to discover there are no known secret entrances. Next I decide to sneak up to the tower walls, while avoiding detection from the guards at the gate and top of the walls. I succeed on Stealth (that's 2 successful checks out of 3). Now I decide to attempt to climb the walls to succeed. The walls to the tower are 60' tall, and the GM determines that I need 3 successful climb checks to get there. I roll, and lo and behold, I made it up 20' - I'm not in the tower. However, I have made 3 successful checks according to the skill challenge requirements of getting in the tower (except as stated, I am not yet in the tower.)

Skill challenges as a formula is unnecessary and as shown above completely misses the mark for what it's supposed to do.

When I say, I don't play 4e, I have to qualify myself in saying that one of my players bought the 4e Gift set. So I have rolled up characters, went exploring through the books, attempted 3 different encounters with my gaming group. At the end, all of us decided - no, 4e is not for us. Nothing wrong with the game specifically, but just tries too hard to be something new, and IMO mostly falls on its face. So I have played 4e if only a short go of it, but actuation proved it isn't the game I will ever choose to play.
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Xeviat

I'm in love with 4E, but I can also recognize that something feels distinctly different. The whole power thing really changed the feel of the game, and did make it feel like something other than D&D. Which is a shame really, because the power system was far more balanced across the board. But the biggest change of feeling was the switch from the simulationist style of 3E and the cinematic style of 4E.

Going off of Gamer Printshop's skill challenge example, that fault in your skill challenge wasn't in the challenge itself, but the way it is presented. You don't call for 3 successful climb checks to climb all 60 feet; you'd call for one if it were the final check between success and failure. Skill challenges are about abstracting portions of the game so that one failed skill doesn't derail an entire scene; they're also about codifying exploration and social encounters so that they are as involved as combat. The X before Y element, though, is bad because it discourages people from helping. It works within a combat (such as a trap in a fight) because the fight has its own timer. Outside of a fight, it should be X successes before Y rounds, so that everyone tries. Failures should be penalized (healing surges are my favorite, because they drain a resource that affects all encounters at that point), but it should be about time.

But I'm also a homebrewer and can never let a system be. I've made a host of house rules for 4E, just like I did for 3E. I couldn't ever even consider going back to 3E's lack of balance (fractional save bonuses that differ between saves? So my level 20 Fighter has no chance of succeeding a will save from a level 20 Mage ...), but I do want to tweek 4E so it feels more like D&D.
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Lmns Crn

QuoteAnd I think skill challenges are among the things 4e did poorly. A skill challenge is an attempt to be formulaic about a non-combat encounter. A skill challenge might suggest I need 3 successful skill checks to accomplish a given goal. Let's say, I want to enter a secured tower and I need 3 successful skill checks to get inside. So first I visit the local inn and attempt to gain information about secret entries into the tower with a successful Gather Info check (Search), and I succeed to discover there are no known secret entrances. Next I decide to sneak up to the tower walls, while avoiding detection from the guards at the gate and top of the walls. I succeed on Stealth (that's 2 successful checks out of 3). Now I decide to attempt to climb the walls to succeed. The walls to the tower are 60' tall, and the GM determines that I need 3 successful climb checks to get there. I roll, and lo and behold, I made it up 20' - I'm not in the tower. However, I have made 3 successful checks according to the skill challenge requirements of getting in the tower (except as stated, I am not yet in the tower.)

Skill challenges as a formula is unnecessary and as shown above completely misses the mark for what it's supposed to do.
That's a pretty poor example of a skill challenge (not to mention that your example's "GM" is giving negative results for alleged die roll successes, and apparently making up new requirements on the spot). I dunno if you're deliberately choosing subpar examples to build a strawman out of or what, but I think it's weird and illogical to condemn an entire mechanic based on one example you don't like, and which you also made up.

I mean, I almost don't know why I bother with these threads anymore. Some of you guys (not you specifically, Ghostman) make it real tough to post a dissenting opinion here, which I think is quite unfortunate.
I move quick: I'm gonna try my trick one last time--
you know it's possible to vaguely define my outline
when dust move in the sunshine

Ninja D!

I hate that this is pretty much edition wars. I had a lot of fun with D&D 3e. I have a lot of fun with D&D 4e. I'd play 3e again, or even Pathfinder. I have a lot of fun with GURPS. I have a lot of fun with GuildSchool, too. They're all fun games and they're very different, which makes them even better.

Build your settings without the rule system (unless that's the point, like Ptolus) and run the game you want to run using the best system for what you want to accomplish. That's one of the big things I want to do with Trigalactic. Most games will use GURPS until I have fully worked out my own system for the exact complex, space opera feel that I want. For cinematic military games, I'd go with something like Star Wars Saga or D20 Modern. For games about the space marine like Loyalist Corps, I have the TriEpic system. I think that's the way it should be done.

I miss D&D 2e and I never even really played that. It just seems awesome. If anything, 3e seems like the awkward step in between 2e and 4e.

You may be happier soon, though. WotC has hired back Monte Cook, who was one of the main designers for 3e. At the same time, D&DI articles seem to be mentioning 3e in a positive way a lot lately. As always, there are rumors of 5e on the horrizon.

Weave

I think this thread could use a little bit of refocusing. I enjoy the discussion and all, but let's not let it jump rails onto why we think one edition is superior of another (I am not exempt from this, either). I say we leave it at this: to each their own! Different strokes for different folks and all that...

Anyways, back to missing 3E. In a way, yes, I do miss it. I miss flipping through the books for rules on an obscure gameplay element (I actually spent almost an hour debating how fast a person would fall with my players, and it was actually a lot of fun, oddly enough). I miss the level of complexity the rules went into... I'm tempted now to say it went a little too far, but at the time all we cared about was making sure our Fighter got that awesome artifact sword from the dread necromancer so we could cut through the dragon tyrant's invulnerability stone. I have so many fond memories in 3.0, 3.5, and PF. The faults I found in the system, even now, are almost endearing. 3E is familiar and fun - something I can pick up on the fly and run with my friends, something I can spend hours of time preparing for (which, call me a masochist, was pretty fun at times) and watch it all be gleefully dismantled by my players as they unintentionally create their own narrative (okay, I'm a masochist), and something where I can needlessly deck the players out with awesome items of my own design. It was a damn good time.

My point, and I said this earlier, is that you can really do this with any system, if you want. My fond memories certainly lie with 3E-PF, but they aren't limited to them. All it takes is some dedicated players, a good GM, and some time (preferably several hours loaded with mountain dew, beer [wine in my case], chips, snacks, and dice - call me specific).

LordVreeg

This is actually a pretty good thread in many ways.  Though as many do, it starts to meander.

Nothing comapred to the disasters I end up on in other boards.  One of the reasons I love this place and call it home to all who ask.

Quote from: LCI mean, I almost don't know why I bother with these threads anymore. Some of you guys (not you specifically, Ghostman) make it real tough to post a dissenting opinion here, which I think is quite unfortunate.

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Ghostman

Looks like I'm being confused for GP here.
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Superfluous Crow

Out of curiosity, how is Ptolus built around its system? I never got the chance to look at Ptolus for long.
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Quote from: Superfluous Crow
Out of curiosity, how is Ptolus built around its system? I never got the chance to look at Ptolus for long.

I liked Ptolus. I thought it was interesting about how the entire setting was built using vanilla 3E as the scaffold, pulling the crunch into the fluff and actually doing a good job with it.
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