Just got home from the new 4E game. It was fun, but not super fun. We had a few interesting challenges, one short battle and one long one. As a Wizard, I ended up using Magic Missile more often than any of my other powers. It's guaranteed damage, and the bad guys we were up against had a 'bad mojo' aura that made you roll two attack rolls and take the lower, so it was safer just to blast with auto hit MM. Not exactly varied tactics, but it was effective, and I guess that's the name of the game.
The module, one of the Pathfinder modules that Enzo is converting to 4E, is decent. A bit railroady at the beginning, but it looks to open up some more as we progress.
In more exciting news, I just checked the lotto numbers, and we matched three of them! I just won 5000 won! (about $5). I'm sure we'll spend it on next week's lotto. :D
That review does not really make me want to play 4E or Pathfinder overly much. Still, glad you had fun. I look forward to hearing about super fun.
ReplyDeleteWell, Barking, I'm not exactly trying to convert anyone. I'm still on the fence about it. I had fun, but there are certain things about the system in general that bug me. They didn't come up in last night's session, and I had enough fun to keep playing the game. It didn't blow me away with awesomeness, but it wasn't a bad way to spend 4 hours.
ReplyDeleteStill, those same 4 hours in any Old School system likely would have seen quite a bit more action, as the big fight took over an hour to accomplish.
My friend Aaron had this to say about when he played 4E:
ReplyDelete"We were attacked by a bunch of skeletons. This was the third combat of the adventure, and instead of fight it out, we just number-crunched. It saved us 25-40 minutes of pointless dice rolling to just do the math. We're going to hit 75% of the time and kill an enemy 50% of the time. They're going to hit 25% of the time and deal 1-2 points of damage. If you do the math, the fight will probably take this many rounds, and we'll have lost this many hit points. So, let's just skip the battle. Combat is boring."
Pretty scathing assessment if you ask me. I don't remember the one time I played being that bad, but I don't remember much of it except being kind of bored. And Aaron is actually one of my closest friends and a damn good roleplayer.
Actually, Dennis, I was thinking about trying out a podcast, and seeing if we could get you to skype in, plus my friends Aaron and Dean and see if we could get some discussion about 4E, the OSR, and other gaming systems going on.
Could try that, if the timing works out. You know my crazy schedule doesn't leave me much time, especially when dealing with other time zones. But if we can set it up, sure!
ReplyDelete