Well, at GenCon 40, the news that a 4th Edition of D&D is coming out.

This one promises to be different as well. They are pushing a digital initiative, apparently it's core books and supplements plus the web site. They are trying to place exclusive subscription-only stuff on their web site. Complied news can be found here.

http://www.enworld.org/

It certainly will be interesting.

What do some of the "old guard" think?

I'm organizing a mob with torches and pitchforks while posting this

Guess I'll see more about how it works, but I'm trying to convert over to Changeling: the Lost right now anyway. (White Wolf is insisting on making it hard by refusing to ship me the books for like a month though, so I'll see if anyone in the group I have lined up to play happens to find it cheap. :()

Haven't played D&D with real people in a long time.

However, I'm calling it: D&D 4e will rely a lot more on feats that you choose than on specific class abilities.

I have two main thoughts.

1. "Digital initiative?" Good, easier for me to acquire things.

2. There is nothing that I saw during my skim reading that would warrant a new edition. All of it is already done either by good DM-character interaction or existing rule tweaks.

Well, DI is controversial since it's Windows only, uses Direct-X. Lot of squawking on the forums about that. I think they are trying to facilitate virtual table-tops for players to get together.

I think they might be reducing feats but increasing options. I know they are going to reduce the Vancian magic system and change powers so they occur "per encounter" and stuff like that. Mike Mearls is doing a lot for the game and Iron Heroes and SAGA are supposed to be good previews of what's to come. They are working on simplifying the systems, making the stat blocks shorter, etc. They also want to avoid "Christmas Tree" characters with tons of magic items.

Old WoD was so much better... Anyway, have you looked into Exalted? It's the only one that caught my attention from the new line, looked promising. I must say though, it's been like a year or two since I looked, so I don't really know what they released lately.

As for D&D... I think it should die already.

For d20 Fans Monte Cook's World of Darkness is out. That will be an interesting read.

D&D will never die. Right now the health of the Tabletop market depends on that game. If it should ever die, the market would be fractionalized and hurt.

Some revamps turn out positively. I much prefer The Requiem to The Masquerade, for example. Haven't checked out The Awakening vs The Ascension yet though.

Awakening is much easier to follow, and you don't need a PhD to figure out how to put rotes together. The only part I miss, honestly, is the avatars.

I've been meaning to take a look at Chicago too (I think that's what its called?). Anyone know if there are any rule changes to the normal race books? Or are all the new editions a little more balanced towards eachother automatically, unlike the old ones, which were horribly, horribly skewed?

I'm actually concerned a bit about the velocity of these new editions. New editions seem to be coming out faster and faster, which ultimately is going to be problematic for their marketing, I think. Why should I invest in tons of Version X supplements at $40 a pop when I know a Version Y will probably come out next year?

I don't have any sentimental ties to a particular rule system, so I'm not wary from that standpoint, but it's getting to where I almost don't want to buy any WotC materials because I suspect it'll be invalid in a couple of years. The odds are good that I'll just stick with 3.5 as long as I can, because that's the stuff I've got. Really, how many different "Player's Handbook"s do I need before we start seeing a law of diminishing returns?

I mean, they just came out with Player's Handbook 2, DM's Guide 2, etc. for 3.5!

WoD first.

Mechanics-wise, new editions are far less clunky than the previous one. That's a plus.
Flavour-wise, Vampire is far less emo and doesn't have the "oh noes, no matter what I do I'm going to fail in the end anyway!" element. Same for Werewolf.
Mage's flavour has been butchered, and I will never forgive White Wolf for this.

Fortunately, there's still Exalted.

Now, on to DnD.

The new edition has a chance to make a more balanced game, as opposed to 3 and 3.5, where spellcasters were HORRIBLY overpowered. Don't even mention 2nd, it was even more broken and far more clunkier at that. A real-life example of clunkiness if I ever saw one, right next to first edition of Warhammer Fantasy RPG.
From the features I've learnt about, I am only sceptical about race giving "race feats" as you progress. I don't want a char's race to have EVEN more impact on their performance, becoming EVEN more of a metagaming choice than it is already. On the other side, I especially like that warrior-types will get more "special attacks" now instead of just attacking mindlessly every round, excluding the first when they charge OR bullrush the enemy. Think Tome of Battle, but with less over the top anime-like maneuvers. As for the rest of the features, I am cautiously optimistic.

Meh and I was at Gen Con too. I knew I forgot to check something out. At least I got me some nice swag.

I've never read the Ascension stuff, but Awakening looks really sweet, and I'm hoping to get the money to buy it soon.

Werewolf is much, much, much better. I hated the old one. The new one is cool, even if the whole 'omg dark emotions are stronger then happy ones' is mildly irritating.

Chicago is an amazing book...it's seriously just full of material.

Unfortunately, with the new WoD system you can't really make characters without the core book, which I seem to have misplaced.

I agree with the warriors' need for more special attacks. Would be awesome to have stances, techniques (like blade magic, only less flashy), skill-tricks and feats on top of that.... Awesomesauce


And here's to hoping for no dead levels

Well, if anybody's been paying attention, they are making a lot of changes.

Wizards might have traditions or paths of learning. They mentioned Orbs, Staffs, and Wands being vital to wizardry.

Forgotten Realms is being set forward, perhaps one hundred years. The recent "Grand History of the Realms" states at the end that .

The cosmology is no longer the same. Ethereal plane no longer exists, replaced by the Feywild, a Shadowy-afterlife, the "Elemental Swarm", and the Astral Sea. Demons are no basely destructive while Devils are Corruptors.

Talk of racial growth, attack bonuses, fireball no longer being area of effect, etc.

You can see all the proposed changes in one location:

http://www.enworld.org/index.php?page=4e

Wonder what some of the old-timers think.

Avatars were contrary bastards. They need to release Archmaster rules, I'm straining at the bit with a mastery of prime, enough gnosis to sink a ship and 97 xp I haven't spent. I'm pitiful compared to everyone else in the campaign, except when it comes to Illusions and enchanting. Then you're screwed. Pity that paradox had its teeth pulled. Oh noes, an angry abyssal spirit that tortures me from afar, since if I die, it goes away. I might as just stroll into a crowd and let loose with a celestial fire and use some mana to suck it down if other mages are watching. Pity it doesn't have Shadowrun's drain system. I might be able to pick fights with adult oriental dragons and come out on top, but damnit if I'm not going to rupture an organ or two and have to pump myself full of adrenaline and slap on some med patches full of endorphins for that critical few seconds for facemelting. Good fun afterwards. (We play our characters for a long time, okay?).

That said, I might pick up a copy. I'm a geek, and so are some of my friends. Always have someone to play with. Blatant magophile, so should be good to see how much it's changed.

I'm kinda sad they're supposedly getting rid of gnomes as a PC race.

I find that unlikely.

Then again, every campaign setting has abused gnomes in some way or another - Look at Dragonlance, which basically made the entire race into a stupid comic relief.