Gno Schitt

If WotC implements all of the changes from Star Wars: Saga Edition in the new edition of Dungeons & Dragons, they will have me back in the fold.

Otherwise, I'll keep the spirit alive with Basic.

I'm always willing to try something new, especially if it is in fact something old that I used to love in shiny new packaging.

And while I still can't commit to a regular weekly game Kyro, my long-standing offer to make the odd cameo (and you know I'm one of the best role-players you've ever played with!) still stands! I'd love the opportunity to screw with the other players in service to the story.

I've heard that SW:SE is one of the major drivers for this version. Instead of "Back to the Front" I should have called this thread "Back to the Fold".

As for cameos! I'll certainly take you up on your offer one night or two this fall. The plan is still to run a Blue Rose campaign over the course of the '07,'08 school year.

I clipped this from enworld.org

It boils down to - really exciting!

EN World member ashockney was also at the 4E Q&A seminar, and has compiled his own notes...

Saga is a significant "preview" of 4th Edition.

Is 30 levels just 30 thinner slices of the same loaf, or is it the original 20 slice loaf plus another half a loaf? 1-10 Heroic, 11 - 20 Paragon, 21 - 30 Epic. Here's a great quote from Chris, "A lot of things are going to be changing, and we're going to put most of it in previews on D&D Insider, but I can assure you the Beholder will still only have 9 eyes."

Resource Management: All classes have defined roles – a fighter is never penalized for being a “tank”, a “healer” is never penalized for curing, a mage is never penalized for “magic missiling”

All characters have at will, per encounter, and per day uses they will have to keep track of.

No more mages pulling out crossbows. You will never be penalized for doing what you do best – your clearly defined roles.

Encounters will be built differently in 4th edition. There will be much more “situation” and complexity in the environment, swinging bridges, gouts of lava, etc. An encounter is like a scene of a play – could be talking to a town guard, could be defending a town gate, could be traversing the mountainside to enter the shrine of Asmodeus.

There will be many more monsters for PC’s to fight. It’s more fun that way. There are very few encounters that are built to be all the PC’s against one big powerful bad guy. There will be more mechanics built to leverage the monsters and THEY’RE fundadmental roles. An ettin will be talking to itself throughout the encounter. This is the “monster’s job on the battlefield” this is how he reacts.

The fog of war is much more interesting because when you approach an orc, he isn’t a set of specific stats. He has a very specific role, and you won’t know what it is until he unleashes it on the battlefield.

Increase of magic across the board in all aspects of the game.

Monster Manual is a 288 pagebook, with over 300 monsters. New format for stat blocks, simpler and easier to use

Cooperative storytelling. The D&D world is points of light in a big dark world, sword and sorcery (medieval fantasy). Lots of blank spaces on the map.

Greyhawk will not be default setting in core. We want to leverage the assets of the assumed parts of a D&D world – Mordenkainen, Bigby, Vecna, Llolth, Tiamat, Asmodeus, etc. However, we also want to call upon the great mythology that is more commonly known such as Thor, etc.

Vancian magic system – there’s an element of that we held on to, but it’s a much smaller fraction of their overall power. A wizard will never completely run out of spells. They can run out of their “mordenkainen’s sword”, however.

Skill system – familiar but truncated. Getting rid of tailor, rope use, etc. Focus on the skills that are really useful in an encounter. Saga edition is a significant stride forward and should be considered a preview. Same for profession, etc. We want characters making acrobatics, bluff, jump, etc. No characters will be stuck at 10th level saying “oh I never invested in that.” Hide/Move Silent are brought together. Now an important part of your character, and here’s how to apply it to an encounter. It’s rarely a check and done, it’s now, I make a check, and they react to it. What happens now.

Character Building: Less feat trees, easier for characters to swap out abilities much easier and try different things out. Each level from 1 – 30 each character will have interesting character development options to choose.

Personalizing and specializing your character is amped up, it’s one of the most powerful things about 4th edition. If you’re a barbarian, you’re not a frenzied berserker. If you’re a barbarian, you’re a barbarian for your entire career. The frenzied berserker and bear warrior will be at the very end.

Multiclassing – lots of compelling and interesting choices. A fighter who dabbles in wizard or dabbles in cleric is something compelling, Andy’s brother is playing a rogue wizard and he’s said in the conversion this is the character I wanted to play all along. The choices and powers are good powers on both sides. Backstab, throw chromatic orb across the room, then teleport across the room. There is no more “crappy fighter” attached to a “crappy wizard”.

XP not getting rid, and for those not comfortable with eyeballing it will have a clear time as to when to advance. Much easier for the DM. I’ll build a level 8 encounter, totaling 8000 xp, this one, plus this one = 8000 done. No tables. Monsters have a level, just like characters. A group vs. a group of 5th level is about the same as an EL5 encounter today.

4 player groups as the baseline? They are aiming for right around 5. Encounters are more modular, and now that there are a bunch, it’s a lot easier to scale it. Most data is 4-6 players are 80% or more of the gaming groups out there.

Iron Heroes vs. 4th Edition – Mike: Yes, there are some similarities, ie, putting more emphasis on the class vs. the items for characters.

Will the Wizard and Sorcerer merge? No. How many core classes? More than 3 less than 15, see the “pre-releases” at Wizards.com.

“We had an expression from earlier discussions, the ranger kills the scout and takes his stuff…sorry Scout, you’re not going to make it. But now the Ranger’s going to be cooler because he’s taking all your stuff.”

Do you know why the sorcerer’s in the game (3.5)? 1/3 of the PH was supporting only one class, hence the sorcerer came about.

Monstrous races? Can you still make kobold barbarians? We’re not going to put limitations on the way we build monsters to make them work right. We know there are monsters that will become player character races. For example, it will be obvious how to play a goblin PC right out of the monster manual and PH.

Will alignment be a factor in the new edition? It’s not going to be what it is now. Alignment is part of the story, part of the character. It is a useful shorthand, but too many books and too many players mistake it for limitation. We want to treat alignment as something bigger than that. We won’t get rid of it, but we don’t want it to be a replacement for character and personality.

When can we start to play? Module comes out in April, with Quick Start rules. You could start that early. All the great content in Dragon and Dungeon magazines will be 4e, and will be relevant to 4e. We can start playing a month early.

FR will be the first campaign setting they support for 4e. They will get around to all of them, much of it will be available early on D&D Insider.

Design philosophies on races. There is a tiefling on the player’s handbook. There may also be a changeling (from Eberron). Design philosophies of races. Mike did all the talking, where there will be a very REAL ACTIVE difference within the races that will really make a difference between the Dwarf Fighter and an Elven Fighter.

AOO - It won't be the same thing, but the concepts are all there. Please note that things ARE still in development. Nothing's finalized yet.

For those who are interested, I had no idea...