Quote from: The Good Assyrian;500596A question.  I do not have an EN World account so can't download the playtest rules yet.  The first post makes several mentions of a "quest" mechanic.  Is that something of his own creation, or is that something in 4e that my DM just isn't using?

It is going to take some more concentrated reading to get a handle on his changes to other things like skills, but I will post my thoughts on those when I can.

As far as I know Quest XP is something that's baked into the DMG. The DM in the game
I'm in now uses it and he's trying to run a by-the-book 4e game.

QuoteBy the way, two_fishes, have you played using these rules?  If so, what did you think?

Unfortunately not. I was playing in the DM's game just prior to him trying out these rules, but I had to move. We had talked about different ways to improve play in a larger scope than dungeon crawling with visits back to town for refueling and getting new missions. One of the things we had found was that when we played a more urban game, we usually didn't need to have more than one or two fights in a game day, so we could always arrange to be at full strength. We also wanted better ways to plug the characters into the world, with meaningful rewards and consequences. I especially wanted things like followers and building castles, and etc as we started to get to higher levels. The DM wanted to be able to do a sandbox sort of game, maybe even a hexcrawl, with an environment that responded to the PCs and also move along without their direct action.

We had done a few combats as skill challenges, without a grid, and some of rules he came up with came out of that. He was really interested in finding ways to resolve less important fights more quickly, and save the grid for really central encounters.

As a tangential note, the main problem that D&D suffers from is the way the math works, which is why I am reluctant to use randomly-generated stats.  Although I like the way that 3e does skill bonuses--it's simple and elegant--it doesn't provide the best results for characters.  Given that the average stat of 3d6 gives a +0 modifier, you're looking at a very weak character overall.  In older editions, where stats played a less significant role in your ability to function, this was less of an issue.  In 3e, however, you're looking at a woefully incompetent character if your stats are wrong.

4e remedies this somewhat but not really.

Roll 4d6 and discard lowest roll, like suggested in 3e default char creation.

Quote from: The Good Assyrian;500598Is 4e your go-to game for fantasy, Windjammer?  When you play what kind of houserules do you use, other than the stunting of course?

No, I'm a 3.5 DM to the bone, and always will be (unless 5E knocks my socks off). My scorn of the Pathfinder traitors knows no bounds, it's like dropping one's first love for a pair of fake boobs. Seriously though, I bounce back and forth between 3.5 and 4E. I'm very bad at making up my own stuff that will mechanically fly in 3.5, which is why I enjoy GM'ing, winging, and making up shit way more in 4E. I bought the White Box boxed set of S&W directly from John Adams at Christmas 2010, and am itching to play that with my group - if that comes about, I'll sure drop you a note as to how that went down. God knows, S&W could replace 4E as my go-to alternative to 3.5. Heaven forfend.

As for 4E, when I DM, all the house rules I specified above are in effect (except for potion side effects) and a couple more. The most important one is material restrictions on what's legit for char gen and char progression: no DDI-exclusives, no errata beyond those printed in PHB 2, no material published post-June 2010 (except if we were to run Dark Sun). Older restrictions were: no dragonborns, no tieflings, no PHB 3 races, and no power source other than martial, divine, and arcane. That was me and our 4E group in 2009. Except for the first two, that restriction is basically what WotC did with Essentials in late 2010, interesting consensus of good taste there.

At the moment I'm not the one GM'ing our 4E games though, one of my friends is. He's running an Eberron campaign where our PCs are rather poor, so magic items are far and few between. Before that, he ran a FR game for us, which was weird as well - again, hardly any magic items ever, and 95% of all opponents were humans. Before and during that our group also played March of the Phantom Brigade, but I was down with work then so I didn't participate; I understand though that they played that mini-campaign straight with no house rules at all,  as it was D&D Encounters. If we go further back, to June 2008, I've run and played 4E in various guises, but these are the most recent ones, and they are comparatively vanilla 4E.

QuoteNo, I'm a 3.5 DM to the bone, and always will be (unless 5E knocks my socks off). My scorn of the Pathfinder traitors knows no bounds, it's like dropping one's first love for a pair of fake boobs. Seriously though, I bounce back and forth between 3.5 and 4E.

Why do you scorn people who play Pathfinder???  Are you saying they should have creeped over to the 4th edition of D&D instead of a role-playing system from another company that emulates 3.5 to a closer degree???

As a long time fan of 3.0/3.5, I tried 4th and it FAILED miserably even after giving it a full year of my attention (I also ran the Encounters for 2 years at the FLGS).

Pathfinder is awesome in the fact that everything that I bought for 3.0/3.5 is practically compatiable for it.  So my question back to you is how much 3/0/3.5 material do you actually own???

Quote from: Ancientgamer1970;500713Why do you scorn people who play Pathfinder???  Are you saying they should have creeped over to the 4th edition of D&D instead of a role-playing system from another company that emulates 3.5 to a closer degree???

As a long time fan of 3.0/3.5, I tried 4th and it FAILED miserably even after giving it a full year of my attention (I also ran the Encounters for 2 years at the FLGS).

Pathfinder is awesome in the fact that everything that I bought for 3.0/3.5 is practically compatiable for it.  So my question back to you is how much 3/0/3.5 material do you actually own???

Oh, shut the fuck up and reread what Windjammer actually wrote.

Quote from: jeff37923;500736Oh, shut the fuck up and reread what Windjammer actually wrote.

I am very certain that the poster can speak for himself and does not need you to relay his thinkings therefore my response to your request is No, I will not and now, you are on ignore.

:rotfl:

Quote from: Ancientgamer1970;500746I am very certain that the poster can speak for himself and does not need you to relay his thinkings therefore my response to your request is No, I will not and now, you are on ignore.

:rotfl:

Hey. Moron. Wake up. You actually quoted Windjammer saying "this is a joke". When you treat something as deadly serious that is clearly and literally identified as a joke, you are being an idiot. When other people point this out to you and you're still too stupid to figure it out, you're just being a bigger idiot.

And when you "ignore" people who are pointing out that you're being an idiot when you're being an idiot? Guess what. It just makes you look like an even bigger idiot.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;500748Hey. Moron. Wake up. You actually quoted Windjammer saying "this is a joke". When you treat something as deadly serious that is clearly and literally identified as a joke, you are being an idiot. When other people point this out to you and you're still too stupid to figure it out, you're just being a bigger idiot.

And when you "ignore" people who are pointing out that you're being an idiot when you're being an idiot? Guess what. It just makes you look like an even bigger idiot.

I will listen when I am spoke to with civility and since you are not, You can join your friend on ignore as well.  Windjammer can respond to my post with civility so maybe you can take lessons from him.  If it is indeed a joke, then Windjammer can tell me for himself.  No need for condescending posters to tell me otherwise...  

:cheerleader:

Quote from: Ancientgamer1970;500753I will listen when I am spoke to with civility and since you are not, You can join your friend on ignore as well.  Windjammer can respond to my post with civility so maybe you can take lessons from him.  If it is indeed a joke, then Windjammer can tell me for himself.  No need for condescending posters to tell me otherwise...  

:cheerleader:

Oh good lord.  *adds Ancient Loser to ignore list*

Quote from: Fiasco;500757Oh good lord.  *adds Ancient Loser to ignore list*

Another good renaming. I'm pushing for "Anusgamer" personally.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;500768Another good renaming. I'm pushing for "Anusgamer" personally.

Anusgamer suggests that he is an asshole, therefore suggests that you may be able to fix him, as Hammerer of Assholes.

Slightly on topic - what version of OD&D would you guys recommend? I bought recently LotFP pdf, since I heard it's rather good, and it does show up to the promise, but I dunno what other versions offer.

Quote from: Rincewind1;500769Slightly on topic - what version of OD&D would you guys recommend? I bought recently LotFP pdf, since I heard it's rather good, and it does show up to the promise, but I dunno what other versions offer.

Do you mean OD&D as in Little Brown Books D&D or "non-AD&D early D&D"?

Quote from: misterguignol;500770Do you mean OD&D as in Little Brown Books D&D or "non-AD&D early D&D"?

Have mercy on me, I have no idea what's the difference and which is which >.>.

I think the former though - I do not mean actual OD&D (rules for that are free on the web, I think).

Quote from: Rincewind1;500771Have mercy on me, I have no idea what's the difference and which is which >.>.

I think the former though - I do not mean actual OD&D (rules for that are free on the web, I think).

I'm partial to the BECMI boxed sets or Labyrinth Lord (a retroclone).

There's a good clone of the BECMI/Rules Cyclopedia D&D called Dark Dungeons by the way.