I saw another thread where a brief debate came up between 4th Edition and 3rd Edition Dungeons and Dragons. I am interested in pursuing this debate, so I'm opening up this thread instead of hijacking some other poor dude's thread.
So, let's have a discussion. Please make sure you read everybody's post before responding to my original post. This has been a problem on the forum lately, which is understandable because of how fast we move. People aren't reading all the posts in a thread before replying, and are repeating the same points over and over as a result. Please don't be that guy.
So, 3rd and 4th Edition. I was on the bandwagon on hating 4th Edition when it first came out, myself. I got into PnP gaming with 3rd edition about ten years ago, though I took breaks from it because it was so wargamey. Instead, I played WoD for a while, and then Traveller and Mutants and Masterminds. I would always go back to 3rd Edition, though, because it was the best way to get Fantasy without resorting to GURPS (Sorry Aqizzar).
So, 4th Edition came out, and I was a bit miffed. No Bards? No Gnomes? And what's this everybody is saying about it being a WoW rip-off and lacking the roleplaying mechanics of 3.5? I decided to write it off and move along.
Later, I actually played it, and I was impressed.
Now, the biggest complain is how combat-heavy D&D 4.0 is, but, as I mentioned above, this is the problem I had with 3.5, as well. So I really had to rethink my viewpoint on this one. Why be upset with 4th Edition for improving one of its core components?
And yeah, I said 'improving'. Because 4th Edition Combat is more exciting than 3rd Edition Combat. For my Fighter, 3rd Edition Combat went like this:
"Okay, we're fighting on a bridge above a deep chasm. You're battling the Orc. You won initiative. What do you do?"
"I attack it. Rolling a d20. I got a 12."
"Miss. His turn. He attacks. He got a 17. He hits, you take 6 damage."
"Shit, this is going poorly. Maybe I can knock him off the bridge. How do I do that again?"
"Uhh, let me look through the rulebook... Okay, you need to grapple him and throw him off."
"Grapple? Seriously? We need to look up those rules?"
"Yeah."
"Forget it, I attack him. Roll a d20..."
In 4th Edition, it looks more like this:
"I attack with my reaping strike ability. I rolled a 12s."
"You missed."
"Okay, I shift back with my move action."
"Alright. He shifts forward after you and tries to strike. 17. A hit. You take 6 damage."
"Alright, I need to rework my strategy. I'll try knocking him off this bridge. I'll shift into that square next to him. Now I'm going to bullrush him off the bridge. I roll a 19."
"That beats his Fortitude. He gets a 12 on his saving throw,, though, so he is holding on to the edge of the bridge, teeth bared at you."
Take your pick as to which is more exciting. Note that I didn't use any 'special powers' in the 4th Edition example (except the one many fighters use as their 'basic attack'). Just stuff in the Combat Chapter.
As for roleplaying mechanics: There are no roleplaying mechanics in 3.5. Are you talking about skills? They still exist in 4.0, and they work better. There is even a system for gaining experience through non-combat encounters. Characters using their wits, instead of brute force. This is something we wouldn't have in 3.5 without Homebrewing.
Since I started with 4.0, I've transitioned into DMing, and we're having a great time. My PCs started at Level 1 and are now at Level 5. Just in the last session, I had them riding down a river filled with rapids and a waterfall on a lifeboat. All of them have written me backstories (Except for one guy, who has, ironically, mentioned a desire to stop playing because there isn't enough roleplaying on occasion). They're in a campaign fraught with political turmoil. In the past, they've had roleplay sessions with NPCs for upwards of an hour. Sometimes, they go to the tavern just to meet new people. The Combat is great, too. Last time, they fought a Gnome and his Half-Orc henchman on a series of scaffolds, which the PCs set on fire. The Dragonborn Paladin, de facto leader of the group, spent most of the encounter trying to rescue his lizard mount which had been kidnapped during the last session. It ended with the Gnome exploding a dam above their heads, and all of them fleeing from the rampaging crescents of water, and being forced into the frigid abyss of the underground caverns below.
This stuff couldn't happen in 3.5. I couldn't even play around with water, because the drowning rules were broken (once you started drowning, you couldn't stop). The allegations of ripping off WoW seem a bit uncalled for - they stem from the artwork, which is derived from the wildly successful Eberron setting, which predates WoW. I honestly think 4th Edition is a major upgrade from 3.5 in every way. 3.5 was severely unbalanced in terms of races and classes ("What the fuck, no, don't play a Bard," is a comment many of us heard during character creation. It might as well have been stamped in the Player's Handbook). 4th Edition solves these issues and provides for an exciting game of high adventure.
What do you guys think?