I remember the first time I entered this world in 1989. It was a place full of marvels and things inexplored, of things most precious and entities most foul, of possibilities unimagined. It was the place where the imagination could run free in the hands of a few, around a table, socializing and creating our secret world, apart from the nasty reality outside. We were free, we were proud, we were D&D Players. It didn't matter if they made fun of us. They are ignorant. It didn't matter if someone called us weirdos. Normality is terror. It doesn't matter if people say I have no life. I am a roleplayer. I have lots of lives...
In the times of old, I come to play the best roleplay game ever written. Bold statement, I know, but true nevertheless. No other roleplay showed so well the elite of thinking it takes for someone to be a true roleplayer. D&D was the icon game of roleplay, the basis for (if you wish to call it that) the tribe that dared go above the normality of the pathetic common humans. We are better, we are more inteligent, we are roleplayers. And to be one, you have to be better, more inteligent.
Sadly, it all came to an end. After so many wonderful years of endless possibilities, Dungeons & Dragons has been destroyed. After so many plastic-fooded editions and rippoffs and attempts to cash-in, most successful due to the general low IQ of a certain region of the world today (with exceptions of course), the icon base of those who looked at the stars and the realms beyond is no more. 4th ED took care of that... What were the main changes, you ask, that call for such words? Well for those who think I’m just ill-saying the edition, and I hope you know the others, here goes. It's going to be a ride.
There are eight core classes instead of eleven; the Barbarian, Bard, Druid, Monk and Sorcerer classes have been removed from the core class list; they are to be included in supplement books. Pathetic to say the least, the attempt to get people waiting to buy more books. The Warlock class has been added to the core class list, as the new Warlord class; overhaul of the previous grappling rules and of the multiclassing system (don’t even get me started on this one). Increased importance of weapon damage in combat, since in previous editions a weapon's damage dice were overshadowed by other damage bonuses for high level characters. Many abilities now deal damage using multiple weapon dice, causing larger weapons to deal significantly more damage even at high levels. Do I detect a pattern?
There is the change in per-encounter resourcing with ALL classes having some per-day, per-encounter and unlimited-use abilities and more survivability after a number of encounters, making all munchkins happy. Those who don't know what a munchkin is, imagine the worse piece of shit human kind can come up with and put a 3 year old spoiled brat on top. You come close. Moving forward. Spellcasters will get an improved version of the "reserve feats" introduced in Complete Mage. Attack powers are divided into at-will, encounter and daily powers (makes sense huh?). Each uses a separate set of slots, while utility powers are divided into encounter and daily powers, both of which share a single pool of slots. Brilliant. You are now actually separating your metagaming as far as splitting your powers thinking in the random encounters in-game mechanic, which we all know it’s a common and fundamental law of the universe.
There is then the revision of saving throws and defense values. Fortitude, Reflex and Will are now static defense values which the attacker rolls against like Armor Class. Saving throws are now rolls made at the end of one's turn in order to end certain ongoing detrimental effects, saving throw rolls generally have no bonus and a target number of 10. They managed to place it at retard level..
Standardized level-based bonus increases. Attack rolls, skill checks and defense values all get a bonus equal to 1/2 level, rounded down, rather than increasing at different rates depending on class or skill point investment. Shocking. Now everybody is supposely equal. Do I hear the munchkin on the back jumping with joy because no one is better than him? We have an elimination of skill points. Each skill is either trained or untrained. Being trained in a skill provides a fixed bonus on skill checks, and some skills can only be used in certain ways with training. Oh yeah, that does make a lot of sense. In the twilight zone most likely. Oh, and there are no craft or profession or knowledge skills. There ISN’T a world out there. You exist and the multiverse around you. Stop looking for anything else.
Now read the revision of the healing system. In addition to the healing powers available to some classes, each character has a number of daily healing surges based on their class and Constitution score. Spending a healing surge generally heals a character for 1/4 of a character's maximum hit points. Hooray! We are all Terminator versions of humans! Generally, characters can only spend one healing surge per encounter, however certain powers allow additional surges to be spent, and characters can spend any number of their healing surges outside of combat. How fucking munchkin can you get?! Wizards no longer prepare all of their spells ahead of time, only daily and utility spells. Congratulations. Now everyone has turned sorcerer. No wait… the sorcerer is out. Damn… Non-combat spells (such as Knock, Raise Dead, Tenser's Floating Disc and Water Breathing) have been replaced by rituals. All rituals have a financial cost in the form of material components, such as herbs and alchemical reagents. The Enchant Magic Item and Brew Potion rituals have replaced item creation feats. I don’t even understand the heck of what’s going on anymore!
Then we have a monty hall of weird stuff, rules for varying power sources (Arcane, Divine, Martial, etc.), weapon-specific maneuvers for the Fighter class, core rules extending to level 30 rather than level 20, racial abilities that improve with level (I’m not commenting on this one), elimination of racial level adjustment (or this), elimination of Challenge Ratings (didn’t they determine the XP value?)… By the way, monsters now have a fixed XP amount regardless of level, so please forget about the Law of Diminishing Returns, because now it’s Dire Rat Killing Time. Yeepee! We even have Monster Manuals officially support leveling monsters down and up to allow for easier encounter design and flexibility! Many monsters have their mechanics redesigned to help differentiate them from others (Gnolls fighting like hyenas and hobgoblins marching like legions). Monsters are also designed to work well in groups fights instead of a solo monster versus players' party. Huh… you need a mechanic for that? Morons… Ah, by the way, did I mention the revision of the critical hit system. No more confirmation roll to critical hits; a natural 20 is an automatic hit, and critical providing that the roll is high enough to overcome the target's armor class and deal the maximum damage for a weapon. Considering the focus on munchkin weapon damage, I’m wondering the threat ranges aren’t based on 20 less your damage modifier or something…
We have Tieflings as a new core race, along with an entirely new race, the Dragonborn (ooooooh… wait this was supposed to be Dungeons & Dragons… are we turning into earth elementals as well?). Halflings are given a river-dwelling background (much like how dwarves are mountain dwellers, and elves come from the forest). Gnomes have been removed from the core race selection, but have been included as a playable race in the Monster Manual, much like goblins in the previous edition. Half-Orcs have also been removed as a core race. Elves are split into three races. Eladrin are more civilized, while regular elves are forest dwellers rather than city builders and the evil subterranean Drow are largely unchanged. All three elven races are considered Fey. The default cosmology has been revised, which shocked me. The planes now consist of the
We also have the alignments now limited to Good, Lawful Good, Evil, Chaotic Evil, and Unaligned. The impact of alignment on actual game mechanics has been essentially eliminated. Munchkins didn’t understand them, poor retarded freaks. You know that munchkins think they are roleplayers Gods bless them? Demons and Devils are restructured with devils being twisted angels organized in a hierarchal society and demons being unorganized beings of destruction. Do I detect a christianization of D&D? NAAAAAAH that can’t be!...
There is this new XP budget system for encounter design introduced and completely loony, nevermind it. In addition to level, each monster has a power tier. Minions are the weakest tier, considered equivalent to roughly 1/4 of a standard monster of the same level, and are designed to be simple to run in large numbers, minions die in one hit, have fixed damage and have few if any special abilities. Elite monsters are considered roughly equivalent to 2 standard monsters of the same level, while Solo monsters are considered roughly equivalent to 5 standard monsters of the same level. Elite and solo monsters generally have more hit points, higher defenses and more powerful and numerous attacks and special abilities than standard monsters of the same level. They also generally have action points and a bonus to saving throws. Ah well… The world SURE is well referenced and organized… Characters (and some monsters) gain "action points", which can be spent to take an extra action in combat, or to perform some other special tasks granted by certain classes or feats. Like trying to emulate Richard scorching the world or Sangoku thrashing a planet.
The characters are such freaking superhero style that magic item slots are actually reduced! And read this on magical rings: “A starting character isn’t powerful enough to unleash the power of a ring. You can use one ring when you reach paragon tier (11th level) and two when you’re epic (21st level).” Sorry Mr. Frodo, you should have slayed that Army of Darkness back there… If you've done a lot of adventuring, the ring will work for you. Huh... right. Item level requirements are a CRPG concept you idiots. Diagonal movement and range are simplified on a complete retarded way. Each square of diagonal distance counts as one square of orthogonal distance. Bye Bye math. We’ll miss you. LOL.
They have so much invested in the MMORPGing of this game they forgot to make descriptions less machine-code-like. You can see this on a monster (I’m not joking!): Melee Flametouched Mace (standard; at-will) • Fire, Weapon / Melee Tail Sting (standard; at-will) • Poison / Melee Pit Fiend Frenzy (standard; at-will) / Ranged Point of Terror (minor; at-will) • Fear / Infernal Summons (standard; encounter) • Conjuration / Ranged Irresistible Command (minor 1/round; at-will) • Charm, Fire / Tactical Teleport (standard; recharge 4 5 6) • Teleportation. I never know when I’ll find an HTML close anchor or special C++ somewhere…
Finally, to end this rant, it will incorporate online play for the first time. The producers are incorporating online components into the game through a new website. Each paper product will include codes to unlock digital versions on the site for a “less than nominal” activation fee. People will also be able to use these tools and access regular new content similar to the material that was previously released in Dragon and Dungeon magazines, again, you guess it, for a monthly fee greater than the old subscription price, but less than a MMORPG subscription. Again the MMORPG… Magazine-style content will be added to the site three times a week and compiled into digital “issues” monthly. Wasn't copying World of Warcraft enough? Gameplay features on the Web will include a digital D&D game table, and voice chat and text messaging, to allow online players to communicate with each other. The online play is designed to “supplement, not replace” normal play. Virtual D&D? Come on guys...
This obviously has to be fought. And that's what I'm going to do. I propose the creation of Elite Dungeons & Dragons, a combination and improval of past editions, turning this into the best, most concise and adult D&D game ever. D&D 4th ED is for retarded 3 year old gaming. So let's go back and cast a true ressurect spell on all that people have killed in the past and make sure everything is done properly. I will not let Gary Gygax's idea, concept and beauty fall in the hands of cash-inners and 3 year olds. I will try to make it better, with the help of all those who wish to help me follow the base concept, a world of realistic verosimilitude with a game mechanic created to help in circumstances where storytelling and roleplay could not decide the end result of a situation, and thrash those who turned it into a selfcontained mechanical matrix of streamlined almost indestructible robots equipped with weapons of mass destruction since they were born with the sole purpose of feeding the hunger of spoiled and dangerous infants who need their offline fix of blood and gore everytime they log off World of Warcraft.
This is my purpose, and I hail (not in the Richard sense) those who wish to help me. I thank you all in advance. I hope to honor the memory of the man who through his imagination and creative writing help to build the personality of the man I am today. I make Stephen Colbert's words my own when I say you this, Gygax: you will be missed... may your prismatic spray always bypass your target's reflex saving throw.
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