@newbiedm 4E is fights on swinging rope bridges, fantastic terrain, epic bosses, flashy PC powers. It’s the D&D movie Druid, changing shape constantly. The tavern that of course has a fighting pit and a block of wood over it. Swinging from chandeliers or battling on a moving vehicle.
@Alphastream it is. 4e's use of terrain and its big set pieces was definitely a different big idea thing.
But It's also decision paralysis, counting squares, long drawn out rounds, and slogs that got longer the more powerful the players got. If they can square that circle, kudos to them.
@newbiedm@Alphastream I distinctly remember everyone being annoyed at the table in a 4E campaign, when it came to a player's turn and they did not "pre-think" about how many squares their move or power would do. It did make the game drag on.
I like how 13th age went back to more "theatre of the mind" for position and range but kept 4E "every class has some powers" design
@randomwizard@newbiedm I like 13th Age too, but I found the opposite with 4E. For me, 3E was “wake me up when my turn comes.” With 4E there was so much going on that everyone was invested and even acting the whole round. I like how 5E kept some of that.
@randomwizard@newbiedm A great alternative design is to keep play fast. 2014 5E does that well, as does 2E and prior. But a fair number of players today want more than “I attack with my long sword again” every round. And then it’s hard for designers not to complicate play.
@Alphastream@randomwizard@newbiedm I could be really snide and say people could use their imagination, but this is more a function of excessive combat length in post-TSR editions than anything else IMO.
@Tim_Eagon@hadoken@Alphastream@randomwizard i'm just a lot less into drawn out combats than I was before. My brain's not tactical. Especially vs. 5 other players who might be.
@newbiedm@Tim_Eagon@Alphastream@randomwizard Yeah, I was thinking about this - I want it to be tactical “enough” and combat to be long “enough” but I also want it to be snappy so we can get onto other stuff. And I was glad it was our DM who pulled the plug a little early on Lancer because he just said straight up “this is hurting my brain trying to manage a combat all session long.”
@Tim_Eagon@newbiedm@Alphastream@randomwizard There is - it’s called Comp/Con and for a fan built app (free) it’s impressive but it’s not really intuitive. I was doing better with pen and paper.
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