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Now I can agree that 4e might be easiest for Wormspeaker, especially since he's been out of the game for a decade, and 4e is certainly easier to learn.Originally Posted by msa
I also see that lack of game flexibility makes DMing far easier to handle especially at high level play.
For a new player, having never played an RPG before, the inflexibility makes it much easier to grasp the game, this too I agree with, so 4e does have its positive points in my book.
All this argues that 4e is more balanced, but IMO, its almost too balanced.
However, I disagree that 4e is like 2e, perhaps on some philosophical level, but to me, 4e is a completely different game. There are many similarities between 1e to 3e, at least you can see the progression of the game as expansions of itself, each more complex than the previous. If one only played 2e and looks at 3e, sure its more complex, but saves and AC (for example) are positive d20 instead THACO, which is much easier to grasp. It looks different, but much the same.
In 4e, saves have all but disappeared, spellcasting are really different than any previous edition, all classes having "powers" though can be "thought of" as "techniques of a class" they seem to come off as all classes having spell powers (which I have real problems with), though nothing wrong with a publisher going a different way, to say 4e is like 2e makes no sense. It doesn't look anything like the D&D I've played for 30 years.
Not that there's anything wrong with that, you just can't claim 4e as looking like any previous edition. It doesn't.
Final point, though as you say, powers is really fluff and no mechanics - I argue that the decision to have Monks be psionic powered instead of Ki, implies that the "mechanics" of Ki was somehow in conflict to the balance of the game, or allowance for more classes with Ki powers. If its all fluff, why would it matter if the Monk was Ki powered, Psionic powered or Peanut Butter powered - if the powers are only fluff it shouldn't matter, so there shouldn't have been this need to "dump Ki" from the powers list.
Though I'd have to think about it some, I'm sure I could come up with 4 classes using Ki power and not all of them as "Asian" only types, so if the decision to drop Ki, was due to lack of 4 classes to use, the developers just weren't creative enough.
Or, as I really see it they concerned themselves as Ki as the Monk overmuch, and should have looked at Monk as part of Ki, and Ki having a much wider influence beyond just the Monk.
Obviously, I'm still not over the Monk psionics thing...
GP
PS: I'm not trying to have an edition war, these are just my concerns regarding why I am uncomfortable with 4e, and why I'd rather stay with 3.5+ with Pathfinder. All editions are good for someone, so they are all worthwhile.
I always sort of assumed it was just an asian flavor of psionics too. I think they were just looking to remove terms for the core book, and I wouldn't be at all surprised to see an asian flavored supplement with ki powered classes. I also think it could have been powered by peanut butter with virtually no effect on the game.
