Complete Mike Mearls D&D 4th Edition Essentials Interview

[Badger Kyre]

Is it too much to ask for D&D that plays like Conan, the Black Company or Game of Thrones, and not the Belgariad or Wheel of Time?

All I want is for my player characters to die of gangrenous infections when their hit points drop too low. Is that so much to ask?

Archon, we've discussed difficulty curves in games, player willingness to accept character mortality and the attendant personality types of the play styles.

I just wanted to point out this from a website I think you have mentioned:

The environment is dangerous. Very dangerous. That?s intentional, because as the great MUD Nexus teaches us, danger unites. PCs have to work together or they are going to get creamed. They also have to think and pick their battles ? since they can go anywhere, there is nothing stopping them from strolling into areas that will wipe them out. If they just strap on their swords and charge everything they see they are going to be rolling up new characters. Players learn to observe their environment and adapt ? when they find owlbear tracks in the woods they give the area a wide berth (at least until they gain a few levels). When they stumble into the lair of a terrifying hydra they retreat and round up a huge posse to hunt it down.

The PCs are weak but central: they are small fish in a dangerous world that they have to explore with caution, but because they are the only adventurers they never play second fiddle. Overshadowed by looming peaks and foreboding forests yes. Overshadowed by other characters, no.

http://arsludi.lamemage.com/index.php/78/grand-experiments-west-marches/

Anyway, we've seen the principle of the first sentence there in several iterations, games and real life - and the PC's being small fish part of a larger world not dependent on them for it's story is something certain player "types" will love, and some - the kind of people who love , for example, the Wheel of time, or what MovieBob went on about in his superheroes-vampires-wizards "rant" - would probably NOT like.

If I may digress yet again, as many of these same posters have been in the other threads where I have mentioned this, I had a campaign that was becoming "epic political" where the PC's were party-wiped ( and it was their fault on top of bad luck ) - and yet chose to continue the campaign because they were more attached to the campaign than to their specific characters ( quite the opposite of the modern emphasis on near-unkillable characters)
Obviously, different types of players would or would not have tolerated or enjoyed that.
It's interesting to me that I had just mentioned in the previous response M-U npc's - we had one that was the daughter of minor nobility, had been involved with a party that had wiped, and ended up married to one of them.
all of the players continued as the children of their old characters a generation later ( it was a campaign with alot of non-combat event ) - the Lady in question had gone from NPC apprentice to non-adventuring "patron"( mother, in fact) NPC wizard, and was now a force in her own right...
bu tin the "rags to riches" RPG mold, most of the players could remember the previous campaign when they'd known her as the little "girl" they'd escorted who had to hidden behind a "wall" in encounters and might be there to identify magic items or such - at best - when the dust settled.

 

[Norm Morrison IV]

Yep

I respect your reasoning, but respectfully disagree - think the curve and metagame WAS part of the balance, and I notice the Monk wasn't mentioned in your response.
Similarly, non-human races were KNOWN to be over-balanced - this balanced in the later game with level limits. If you were playing a one-shot adventure, there was little reason NOT to play an Elf.
As far as exporation, the M-U in combat OR exploration, with spells rather than skills, simply did not act frequently enough to be of great impact- why they made such good "utility" NPC's at low levels. It has always been my experience that the low-level magic-user had (usually )very little impact on our games, and we usually dragged loot to a common area for a detect magic, or a wagon to take to npc's in town.
That doesn't make you wrong, but it was MY experience. My joke about NPC noble-kids being M-U's wasn't a joke - there was a lot of overlap in the 'needs protection but occasionally important' in both "memes".
At one point in one of the Gold Box games, one of our fighters could gain 1 level of fighter, or, because of the XP curve reversing at that particular level, dual-class ( gain an equal level of wizard, and VERY nearly the additional level that let you use both classes) - for the same amount of experience. It was far more effective to "baby-sit" him through his wizard levels ( which you did anyway at low levels, we were just high level ).
Not only was it feasible in terms of experience points, but it was essential - the encounters we were having simply REQUIRED another magic-user. The balance of class utility had changed THAT MUCH.

However, it' still an interesting and valid point, and perhaps more importantly, still goes to the essence of 4th E's designers saying in interviews they wanted the game to play at any level like the "sweet spot" levels ( which is risky since, as we've seen even in this small thread, the ideas of what levels were "the fun ones" to play varies immensely even in a small group of respondents who mostly share similar age and gaming experience ).

I'm sorry - as I was saying, however, your point becomes intensely valid in that they seem to have only looked at that in terms of combat utility, rather than in exploration or social utilities - and so even if I disagree with some of your observations, the underlying point seems to heighten the degree to which 4th focused character "utility" as almost entirely in the actual encounter - perhaps even more so than the imminently "Hack n Slash" Gold Box game I mentioned.

I find myself glad that you responded. Meaning I must be enjoying the interchange.

I had enough tough GMs...Ok, I was that Gm most of the time, I won't deny it...that made it tough on groups to find treasures or move through dungeons without discretion and intelligence. My ogre magi hid almost all of their treasures with magic or illusion, they had ambush spots, etc. I'd often leave hints to find stuff in obscure languages...hints that were absolutely critical. But those are MY experiences, no more valid than yours. And I am not in disagreement that the balance also changed throughout the arc of the level gain. Especially with the monk, who was a decent thief but really was weak at low levels, but came into his own later on.

 

[Blake1001]

I also believe that AD&D had a shift on rules balance to the adventure and somewhat to the campaign. how many Experience points did it take for a fighter to start developing politically through the rules as written? 250001 to start building a stronghold. 375001 for the magic user. This was very intentional, I believe.

I believe the classes were balanced to some degree at every level.

I think you're certainly right in that there were clear attempts to achieve some sort of balance in the early days of D&D and AD&D. I just don't believe they saw much success. Game design has come a long way in the intervening years. Today, games that make balance a priority are pretty well balanced, and games that aren't particularly balanced are that way more or less intentionally.

 

[Badger Kyre]

Well, it looks to me like this thread has about died out; it had a good run. In retrospect, I'm stricken by the similarity in ages of the respondents - now I presume that's because this was a pretty specific article addressing a pretty specific release - but I have to wonder to what degree the concern that only grognards care about "tabletop" traditional RPG's isn't reinforced by this.
I also find it interesting how many of the discussions preferred "low fantasy" - when the game has been ramping the other way since the 80's - and how many said, more or less, that D&d had been their 'gateway drug' into other games.
I find this interesting in that part of the point of 3rd edition was to de-fragment the players and with the OGL bring alot of them back at least to core mechanics, a "common" language.
I personally worry that 4th may have undone that to some degree - but I think it was said well that it's not WOTC's previous game editions that is the competition.

There's been a discussion of mechanics imposing a feel on the rules, and i think for better or worse it can be said that d20 had a more 'universal' or adaptable feel, while many of the mechanics of 4th might make it harder to work with for DM's who don't WANT use such a high-fantasy and "dissociative" setting. On the other hand, for better or worse, I don't think 4th was for them. The people who like manga-anime and final fantasy and Ra Salvatore and such seem to greatly outnumber people who like "realistic" fantasies. Remember when most fantasy writers were ALSO sci-fi writers? There's some mind-sets that go with that.

post scripts..

But those are MY experiences, no more valid than yours. And I am not in disagreement that the balance also changed throughout the arc of the level gain. Especially with the monk, who was a decent thief but really was weak at low levels, but came into his own later on.

and Mr Blake's comment , above. I think as we have continued this discussion, we have found we really didn't disagree so much on anything but specifics - the experiences you mention illustrating the non-combat utility o fthe M-U class were mine too, i don't disagree with your principle, a matter of extent is all.
SO that would be my response to Mr Blake - I think it was fully intentional - those XP charts were too much work to be arbitrary - it was just balanced to a much more "meta" level rather than the immediate level, IMO.
But as we said earlier, wizard is one example - that you could agree with me on monks, on race, and on the "political" levels all purposefully balancing differently - I think illustrates the overall point - which even IF not for the wizard, holds true in other places - that the balance was over the whole campaign - with the assumption that it would matter in that people expected to play long-term.
..I'm not sure that expectation is in place, and I think that informs 4th's decision to balance the classes at every level ( as opposed to the example of the elf wizard-fighter who was a paper tiger until he was mid-level ). This is related to, I could say "dovetails" with, the similar discussion on balancing things entirely on the "combat utility" as the game seems to focus on that. ( relatedly, one of my pet-peeves is that rogues have become better swordsmen than fighters - whereas i see that as two "builds" of fighter. It could be splitting hairs or a basic difference in "reading", but I use it as an example because if

Spoiler: a game doesn't make stealth important

D&D online

, rogues turn into "trap monkeys" or near-ranger "strikers" - my point here is, what else can they become in a game that is clearly focusing on combat encounters? )

I find myself glad that you responded. Meaning I must be enjoying the interchange.

Myself as well - I have enjoyed this thread - and our discussion - immensely, and hell, we were actually able to internetz without anyone insulting anyone personally!

 

[Ajar]

I have two comments about things that have been overlooked.

First, you can add house rules to the Character Builder. If you want to add a new feat, new power, new race, or even a new class that is added to your local Character Builder database, you can. Manage -> Campaign Settings -> Custom Rules. Not enough support for third-party publishers to hang their hats on, but it's certainly enough for you to integrate a smattering of houseruled or third-party content into your game. You can also disallow specific sets of content down to the level of individual issues of Dungeon or Dragon.

Second, 4E provides a parallel framework for low magic settings. That framework was detailed in DMG2 and is integrated right into the character builder: Manage -> Details -> Inherent Bonuses. The Inherent Bonuses framework is the default in the new Dark Sun rerelease, since Dark Sun isn't exactly a loot-heavy setting.

Nice to see some other Iron Heroes fans in this thread, although if I were starting a new IH-style game today I'd just run 4E, stick to the martial power source, and give characters inherent bonuses instead of magic items. As characters level in my ongoing IH game, I find myself wishing with increasing frequency that it was 4E instead.

Archon, if you want a more dangerous d20 variant, you could check out The Black Company Campaign Setting by Green Ronin (also nice to see some GR fans around here), which uses variant and much more lethal massive damage rules similar to d20 Cthulhu.

I have some thoughts on the d20 OGL approach vs the 4E GSL approach, but I think this post is enough for today.

 

[LadyRhian]

I have to say, I appreciated reading this interview. I'm not exactly a "consume and move on" player, but I always enjoyed 4th for the ability to make the characters I could never quite pull off in earlier editions.

I am curious - and this is in no way an insult, slight , or whatever -

this is a question of taste and preference , not "a right way" argument...

I am curious if you are an anime/manga fan and if the characters you built are kind of "super-heroish" in the manga/ kung fu/ final fantasy character sense?

It seemed to me alot of the controversy over 4th was ultimately about how much someone likes that in their game ( the teifling, eldar, and dragon races point at this nicely ).

So may I ask what kind of caharcters you made in 4th that wouldn't have worked as well in previous editions?

Well, for me, there's the Warlord class. In 3.5, I don't remember seeing a class made to lead people. (Here, I'm talking about the multiple player's handbook and the "Complete" books of 3.5)

With my warlord, I never attack to do dmg. My attacks place others on the field, make allies who are better than me attack, sustain and buff my allies. Maybe a cleric in 3.5 could do that, but you can't have a cleric that doesn't follow a deity.

Come on man. I don't mean to be a rules lawyer, but 3.5 specifically said you could be a cleric without a deity. Basically, you were just really devoted to the philosophy of your alignment and could choose your domains as you pleased provided they didn't contradict your alignment.

2e also. The splatbook for priests said you could be a cleric of a Force or Philosophy. It didn't necessarily have to be a Deity.

 

[Archon]

I have two comments about things that have been overlooked.

First, you can add house rules to the Character Builder. If you want to add a new feat, new power, new race, or even a new class that is added to your local Character Builder database, you can. Manage -> Campaign Settings -> Custom Rules. Not enough support for third-party publishers to hang their hats on, but it's certainly enough for you to integrate a smattering of houseruled or third-party content into your game. You can also disallow specific sets of content down to the level of individual issues of Dungeon or Dragon.

Second, 4E provides a parallel framework for low magic settings. That framework was detailed in DMG2 and is integrated right into the character builder: Manage -> Details -> Inherent Bonuses. The Inherent Bonuses framework is the default in the new Dark Sun rerelease, since Dark Sun isn't exactly a loot-heavy setting.

Nice to see some other Iron Heroes fans in this thread, although if I were starting a new IH-style game today I'd just run 4E, stick to the martial power source, and give characters inherent bonuses instead of magic items. As characters level in my ongoing IH game, I find myself wishing with increasing frequency that it was 4E instead.

Archon, if you want a more dangerous d20 variant, you could check out The Black Company Campaign Setting by Green Ronin (also nice to see some GR fans around here), which uses variant and much more lethal massive damage rules similar to d20 Cthulhu.

I have some thoughts on the d20 OGL approach vs the 4E GSL approach, but I think this post is enough for today.

Thanks for the great thoughts, Ajar. I've had the Black Company supplement on my to-buy list for a while and will be sure to check it out ASAP.

What are you thoughts on GSL v. OGL? Do share!

 

[Mutak]

Thanks for the full interview. It doesn't make me like 4th edition, but it does make me feel less estranged from the designers.

 

[Badger Kyre]

Also, in version past, you felt like an adventurer in a world where people like you were common. You weren't some adventurer blessed by the gods for some epic quests. You were a group of normal people put in an extreme situation and you grew into a powerful party by experience, not because you just want to be a demigod at level 30.

Pretty much. And when you were that pasty 1 hit and you're dead wizard, every victory was like wine. Surviving and winning when you were a piece of paper facing a ginsu knife (metaphorically) was more of a thrill than facing off against 30 Kobolds when you're the 10th level fighter, which seems to be more of the way it is in 4th edition.

I also have to say that the "adventure nights" 4e is sponsoring don't interest someone like me (the ones where everyone plays the same module) because it's an unbroken string of combat-skill check- combat- skill check- combat, and if you are unlucky, two combats in a row. That just doesn't sound all that interesting to me.

....
Archon, if you want a more dangerous d20 variant, you could check out The Black Company Campaign Setting by Green Ronin (also nice to see some GR fans around here), which uses variant and much more lethal massive damage rules similar to d20 Cthulhu.

...

The first quote is actually from the "sister" thread...
But I felt it related better here, since this has gotten into party wipes, and "dangerous campaigns" and such.

The reason I thought it was worth dredging this up again is because the trend towards making characters who simply are never in a deadly situation has coemme up as quite central to games that aren't even precisely what most people would call RPG's." [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/103703-Bungie-Explains-Internally-Controversial-Halo-Reach-Ending]
This is IMO worth noting because there is some good degree of overlap in the target demographics here - the idea of death of a character being "too controversial".
Those who are old enough may recall how Frank Miller challenged the comic industry by killing off Electra - that just wasn't DONE. Ditto, Captain Marvel.

I submit to you that Thermopylae ( even the 300 version ), nor the Alamo, nor Braveheart, nor many other stories ( Calgary hill? ), would be near as poignant if they did not face death.

 

[Atlictoatl]

Thanks for the great thoughts, Ajar. I've had the Black Company supplement on my to-buy list for a while and will be sure to check it out ASAP.

It has been a joy to read the very civil discourse between you and KCL. Informative, too. Thank you both for that.

IMO, the Black Company rpg team did an excellent job of re-crafting some of the core classes: ranger, scout, and others, and did a phenomenal job of capturing the ability to conduct both high- and low- end magic in the same setting/game. If I'm not mistaken, their re-crafting of magic system rules was later published as a separate and award-winning supplement, stripped of its specificity to the Black Company. The Black Company book should really be very high on the to-buy list of not only setting-fans but those interested in studying high-quality design tweaks.

Guardians of Order came out with a Game of Thrones OGL book as well. More flawed than the Black Company supplement, it nonetheless contains some interesting innovations (most specifically to a social networking ruleset, as well as some class tweaks) and is a delightful product for setting-fans. I'll confess that I bought the leather-bound edition out of pure fandom delight.

 

[Archon]

Thanks for the great thoughts, Ajar. I've had the Black Company supplement on my to-buy list for a while and will be sure to check it out ASAP.

It has been a joy to read the very civil discourse between you and KCL. Informative, too. Thank you both for that.

IMO, the Black Company rpg team did an excellent job of re-crafting some of the core classes: ranger, scout, and others, and did a phenomenal job of capturing the ability to conduct both high- and low- end magic in the same setting/game. If I'm not mistaken, their re-crafting of magic system rules was later published as a separate and award-winning supplement, stripped of its specificity to the Black Company. The Black Company book should really be very high on the to-buy list of not only setting-fans but those interested in studying high-quality design tweaks.

Guardians of Order came out with a Game of Thrones OGL book as well. More flawed than the Black Company supplement, it nonetheless contains some interesting innovations (most specifically to a social networking ruleset, as well as some class tweaks) and is a delightful product for setting-fans. I'll confess that I bought the leather-bound edition out of pure fandom delight.

Thanks for the kind words. I think both KCL and I feel passionate about D&D so it's easy to get hot and bothered, but it turns out he really had only good news to share.

I have the GoT OGL book. I really wish they'd had the chance to do follow on supplements to complete the magic system. As it stands, I think it would work really well for a historical medieval D&D campaign, but it's a bit too low magic even for my spartan tastes.

I will check out the Black Company supplement on your recommendation.

 

[Ajar]

You're correct about the Black Company magic system, Atli. It was revised, expanded, and released as a separate supplement called True Sorcery. I actually use the True Sorcery magic system for NPC wizards in my Iron Heroes game, replacing the Arcanist class. True Sorcery includes an Iron Heroes appendix.

[Edit: I'll note, though, that magic in BC/TS is freaking complicated. You really have to have it down cold if you want to do anything more complex than using suggested spells.]

What are you thoughts on GSL v. OGL? Do share!

In this thread or the other, I'm pretty sure someone already directly quoted Wizards on the OGL: they wanted d20 to become the one system to rule them all.

This approach has several pros and cons. On the business side of things, it fostered the growth of third-party publishing, so while everyone was using WotC's system, they weren't necessarily doing it with WotC materials. That said, using WotC's system probably made at least some people more likely to buy WotC materials as well, be it d20 Modern, Future, or Cthulhu.

On the gamer's side of things, one system to rule them all is handy for casual gamers or groups of dabblers, since they can move from heroic fantasy to gritty fantasy to modern-day spies to sci-fi to horror without changing the core mechanics of the game. The problem I have with this approach is that d20 is built on assumptions that don't universally apply across genres. In heroic fantasy, the notion of PCs becoming much more powerful over time makes sense. The players grow into larger-than-life figures who feature prominently in the big events that shake the world.

Using the same system to play a Lovecraftian horror game just doesn't make a lot of sense. Sure, you can gut the system by removing the experience point structure and replacing it with something that still allows a small amount of skill development, but at that point why don't you just use Chaosium's original Call of Cthulhu system, which is much better suited to Lovecraftian horror than d20 is anyway? If you want fantasy horror, there's Cthulhu Dark Ages.

I had the same problem with d20 Modern and Future. If the massive damage threshold is always 10, and a machine gun can deal that much damage in a round easily, what's the point of having a hit point system that scales with level? I often felt like d20 was being shoehorned onto these other play styles just so WotC could say that d20 was truly the one system to rule them all.

The GSL is almost a total reversal of position. It keeps the rules framework in-house and only allows third-party publishers to create add-ons or extensions. There will be no 4E Iron Heroes that isn't published by WotC, nor 4E Black Company, True Sorcery, etc. From a business standpoint you ensure that if people are playing your game, someone in their group is almost certainly buying your stuff. But it hurts the 3PPs enough to drive them to other systems -- often into the waiting arms of Paizo and Pathfinder.

However, moving away from the one system for all playstyles approach allowed them to craft a ruleset that is cleaner and more focused than any previous edition of D&D -- read the d20/3.5 grapple rules and then read 4E's grab rules, for instance. There were certainly mistakes and some warts here and there, but compared to any of the previous editions 4E even at release was a tight, lean ruleset that was eminently playable. From top to bottom it screamed "this is a heroic fantasy game where everyone at the table always has something fun to do." It stripped D&D down to its core as heroic fantasy game in which PCs spend most of their time killing monsters and taking their stuff. For the DM, it provided some new and very nice frameworks for handling non-combat interactions (in fact, I backported 4E skill challenges to d20 and use them in Iron Heroes), but it made sure that everyone at the table had something to do when the DM said "roll for initiative."

Doing this required abandoning some historical assumptions -- particularly about class balance -- that disappointed quite a few longtime players, although I was very much not among them. I was very apprehensive about 4E prior to release, but in reading the rules I was struck by how elegant the system was compared to previous editions, and when I actually played it I was completely sold in about five minutes. Lots of people weren't converted, though -- probably in part because of the changes and in part because Paizo provided a convenient alternative in Pathfinder that was much more similar to what d20/3.5 fans were expecting. So WotC had to amend their approach and try to lure those people back by making new-school class builds with old-school feel in the form of the Essentials line.

At this point it isn't clear to me whether the risks WotC took with 4E and the GSL at release have paid off compared to 3/3.5E. I've read both threads here and there just isn't a lot of data to say whether 4E has done better or worse than 3/3.5 in its life to date. The GSL may have alienated people more than it helped WotC by encouraging players to buy WotC products, or it may not. 4E's focus and simplicity as a ruleset may have helped attract a lot of new players to the game -- as has been my experience with many new or lapsed D&D players I know personally -- or it may not, and my experience might be unusual. So from a business standpoint, I really have no idea which approach has the better payback.

I do know that for my own gaming I prefer the focus of 4E compared to the one size fits all approach of d20/3.5. If I want to play a horror game, I reach for Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu, Cthulhu Dark Ages, Dread, Don't Rest Your Head, or something in World of Darkness. If I want a sci-fi game, I reach for Shadowrun, Cyberpunk 2020, Cortex, or Eclipse Phase depending on the tone I want. If I want a heroic fantasy game, I go straight to 4E.

But that's just personal; some people really like to use one system for everything. I don't begrudge them that. I'm not interested in Pathfinder, but I have favourite 3PP d20 supplements myself, like Iron Heroes and the Black Company. My Iron Heroes game is still running, and as much as I wish it made things as easy on the DM as 4E does, it's still cool.

 

[Razzelmire]

4E is horrible. 4.5e aka Essentials is worse. Return to the days of 3.5e please!