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D&D V4 - Rev Dark - 06-10-2008
So…
I picked up the D&D V4 Players Handbook.
The art is kind of nice.
Much in the same way that rice pudding is kind of nice. Nice, not thrilling, but nice.
First impressions.
Races: I was willing to
give them writers a moderate arse-load of credit for kicking gnomes to the curb. Yes, I have had it in for those
whimsical little bastards for years, and seeing them relegated to monster status (one step above my status for them - lawnmower chow) did have a certain
charm. Now, I am almost feeling nostalgic for the gormless little bastards.
Here's why.
Dragonkind. Yep, you can
play a half dragon, a steroid pissing, breath weapon spewing, member of a draconic hybrid that could only have been possible through the excessive usage of +5
Oil of lubrication, or possibly the turkey baster of ultimate insemination. I threw up a little in my mouth when I read
about this addition.
Fey-touched-mystic-bastards.
I forget the term they use for these pricks. If elves are light beer, these are the cut-with-a-knife German
brews that cross your eyes and kick your kidney's like Beckham with a soccer ball. Oh, and they can teleport five
areas at will. For those who want to play the displaced, mystic, forest, emo, but didn't think elves were hard-core
enough.
Tieflings. Half demonic
humanoids, whose parents drummed their heels on the wrong set of buttocks, or alternately had their buttocks drummed on by the wrong set of heels. Add a little demonic power and some ribbed for his/her pleasure textures in odd places and you are ready to party. Perfect for the dark and brooding anti-hero. Excuse me while I throw up in this
conveniently located bucket.
Elves, half elves, Halflings and dwarves make it through the
process with most of their dignity intact; and there feels like there is some balance involved. Half orcs are monsters
again, as lubricated dragon sex, or demonic rumpy-pumpy are obviously more attractive than the result of some drunken war-pig riding.
Classes:
Okay, here is where I am very uncertain as to the new
system. The MMO influence is more obvious than the Christian imagery at the end of Braveheart, and upon reading the
class descriptions, I kind of wanted to have my limbs pulled off at the command of Edward the Longshanks; that was
because the book had spread out Christ-like on my hands and screamed "Warcraft!" in a loud, emotion laden, voice while some celtic bint ululated in
the background.
Tanks, controllers, strikers, buffers; yes all the roles that you
have come to love in standard MMOs have made their was to the ADD experience, the only one missing was fluffer, and I await the Ron Jeremy expansion module for
that one to rear up…
Bards are gone, as they are obviously not hardcore enough for this
new take on the world, useless lute strumming gits to a man. Instead you have War Masters, a combination of fighter and
cheerleading team; without the benefit of pom-poms, panty-shots and G. W. Bush in his college days (hardly a benefit, but what the hell). Druids are also absent. There is a new type of magic user based on astral/demonic/god
pacts, as well as fighters, rangers and paladins. Clerics stay put. I don't
recall seeing monks either, so obsessive compulsive investigators and arse kicking temple initiates are going to be left feeling less loved than
normal.
So the mechanics.
The MMO influence rears up again, and I shall avoid the inevitable
repetition of the Ron Jeremy joke. All attacks/abilities are in three categories (that switch names depending on
class). You have things you can do all the time (your core attacks/abilities), things you can do once and encounter (more powerful abilities) and things you
can do once a day (the hardcore stuff.) You get to choose new ones as you go up in level, and because the later ones
are more powerful, there is even a handy respect option, in case you felt the MMO influence wane, this should bring it back like a cricket bat to the
nuts.
Some 3.X elements seem unchanged, including my personal bug-a-boo
of magic items being more common than breasts on Baywatch (and yes Hoff's count) and available in every shop in town.
Oh, and multi-classing is pretty much out, but you can take feats
that allow you to dip your beak into any of the other classes; I suspect that the min/maxing power games types are going to eschew Viagra for the foreseeable
future as they contemplate the abuses that the system probably allows for.
Again, these are first impressions on skimming the material. I will
give it another once over, but my first impressions are not particularly favorable. Even more-so than three, this game
feels like it requires scale maps and figures to adequately handle the new combat.
Okay - with all the myriad abilities marshalling combat is going to
be even trickier, as there are interrupt conditions, at will conditions, and if you are game mastering, the eventual emergence of nervous conditions, as the
table erupts with interruptions at every instance when one of their abilities fires off like (fade to Ron Jeremy joke.)
Cheers,
Shayne
- Bob Schroeck - 06-11-2008
Shayne, I hope you don't mind, but I'm moving this over to "Other People's Game Writing," where there's already a D&D4 thread. No
need to terminate this one, mind you...
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.