On Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition and World of Warcraft

WoWplayer, thanks for dropping by and leaving your opinion.

While I do like to rip on WoW and other MMOs, because really, they just aren’t my thing, I’ll acknowledge that they do have their own benefits over a game like D&D. One of those benefits, as you mentioned, is much less legwork in learning all the rules. You’re also absolutely right that a GM can, and often does, make or break a game of D&D, or any other tabletop rpg for that matter. With a good GM though, the players usually have a fair amount of input into the game as well.

With this post, I was trying to point out that 4th edition has the same advantages over MMORPGs that any other tabletop rpg has, even if it may apply some of those advantages differently. This is because a common complaint about 4th edition is that “it’s too much like WoW.” So, in this case at least, I wasn’t actually trying to rip on WoW so much as point out the things that can be done with a tabletop rpg.

As you say, there are also good things about WoW that a tabletop game can’t touch… I’m just writing from a biased position.

Also, since you say you’d like to try D&D sometime, I hope you get your chance soon. Good luck, and I hope it goes well when you get a chance to try it out.

Thanks for stopping by Jancarius.

You’re quite right about the teleporting thing. Looks like I flubbed that one. I should pay more attention to the specifics on some of those rituals. Though you could always work it into the game somehow if you wanted to.

As far as flying goes, it only takes a minor action for a wizard to sustain flying, and though that does limit the wizard a little bit since there are some pretty cool spells that can be done with minor actions, it’s not a huge hindrance as minor actions are the least versatile of the three types. Also, very cool that they’re adding mounted combat in WoW.

Your point on WoW having an epic story at parts is true from what I’ve read, and I certainly won’t dispute it. I know Blizzard does a great job with their games, and I trust they would have a good story to go along with it. I was more trying to play up the fact that it’s a static story that doesn’t change based on player actions. I certainly wouldn’t expect it to, just trying to make the point that having a dynamic story is something that can be done much better in a tabletop RPG, in the case of this post, D&D 4e.

Glad to see you weigh in Gerg.

I totally agree that number crunching can be fun too. Sometimes my friends and I will go through a bunch of crunching to see how we can make an uber character of awesome, especially in 3rd edition D&D with all the extra source books.

One of those friends even joked you have to love math to enjoy WoW because of all the numbers involved.

I’m not really sure what two things you’re asking about being different though. If you meant crunch vs. roleplaying and story, while they can certainly be intertwined, they are definitely different, though certainly complementary as you said. Otherwise, maybe you could clarify what you were asking?

As well, what there is to complement number crunching can definitely make or break a game for any given person or group of people. And that’s one of the reasons people look at different games and types of games in different manners.

Hey Kit, glad you stopped by.

I honestly don’t think that 4th edition has moved away from the roleplay that I’ve talked about. They haven’t provided as many concrete rules to use for these kinds of things, but that just leaves it up to the players and GM to resolve it through roleplaying and whatever generic checks are appropriate.

However, I can see why you and others might see the game as more “WoWified”, given the way they’ve done class powers and tried to pigeonhole each class into a predefined role. I don’t think this is the case though. There are always ways to break out of a role, whether it’s through multiclassing, playing against type, or simply challenging yourself with that Thieves Guild group you mentioned above. It may take more effort with 4e, but I’m willing to bet you could still do it successfully. Whether that effort is worth it or not to you or anyone else is another story entirely.

Either way, the main point wasn’t to say that 4e is perfect, or even as good as 3.5 or other gaming systems. The main point was that 4e is still a roleplaying game, and comes with the same flexibility other roleplaying games have. As such, it’s still much more at home with tabletop rpg gamers, and perhaps wargamers, than it is with the MMO crowd. I still prefer 3.5 to 4th myself, I just feel like saying 4e is WoW is doing the game an injustice.

I wouldn’t put it that cut and dried. Martial characters in 4e have more combat options than they did in 3e. Casters have less combat options.

However, another thing to remember is that there’s still room for creative power use in 4e. It might not be the same as it was in 3e, but you can still set things on fire, break ceiling spikes over your foe’s head, melt the ice they’re standing on, and so on. No, it’s not explicitly in the rules, but it can be done through common sense rulings by the GM when the player wants to get creative. I know I used only combat examples, as those are what I’m familiar with, but people have also talked about getting use out of powers outside of combat as well. Again, it just takes some creativity on the part of the players and a GM willing to go with some flavor in addition to the explicitly listed rules.