The Official "4e Critique and Rebuttal" Thread

[Darwinism]

And that's the problem. Since breaking doors doesn't even have rules, every time the players try the DM has to either allow them to succeed or deny them without reference to the rules. One may be a bit anticlimactic, and the other is a direct and literal insult to the players. That's not a good position for the DM to be in. The DM needs noncombat interaction rules so that he can say "No" to players without appearing to be capricious.

-Username17

Before you make a statement like that you may want to check on page 64/65 in the DMG and realize that there are rules for breaking down doors.

Boy, I bet your face is red!

[Koumei]

Oh hey, lots of multiposting, this time three in a row.

That reminds me of someone, I just can't put my finger on it...

[Shazbot79]

And that's the problem. Since breaking doors doesn't even have rules, every time the players try the DM has to either allow them to succeed or deny them without reference to the rules. One may be a bit anticlimactic, and the other is a direct and literal insult to the players. That's not a good position for the DM to be in. The DM needs noncombat interaction rules so that he can say "No" to players without appearing to be capricious.
-Username17

Rules for breaking doors are stupid. They nearly always break down into rolling dice at a problem until it goes away. In 3.x you roll damage until you do a sufficient amount to overcome the doors HP. In 4E you turn it into an athletics skill challenge or something. In either case, the process of adjudicating this is tedious and pointless, especially since there are no real consequences for failure.

You COULD do some sort of skill challenge-y type thing wherein accumulating enough failures causes Muscleman's weapon to break, or he loses a healing surge throwing his shoulder against an immovable door...but even in that case, the players will just try a different tact until they manage to get through it...which, again, amounts to players rolling dice at a problem until it goes away. This basically sums up ALL skill challenges though.

It just doesn't add anything of value to the game. Sure, you could implement these rules as part of a chase scene, or if there is something fell and time-sensitive happening on the other side of the door. In that case, you are either arbitrarily making a certain percentage of doors in your campaign a tedious mechanical process to bypass, or you are doing it only for doors that stand between the players and key plot points as dramatically appropriate...in which case it is completely capricious anyway.

The door thing is really just an example of the problems surrounding exploration rules as a whole. I would prefer it if these rules were abstracted, personally. I just don't see the point of rolling for this shit unless failure would produce results just as interesting as those produced by success.

[Fuchs]

Rules are made for situations when they matter. If you can simply keep at something until you succeed and there's no consequence for how often you fail until you succeed, then you do not need to use the rule.

But there are the times when it matters how long you take to break through a door. And in those cases you need a rule, or your players can't make informed tactical decisions.

"Saving" the rules for when they matter is not capricious, it's simply smart. Only idiots make players roll when it doesn't matter.

[Username17]

Fuchs got it in one. If it doesn't really matter how many hammer blows it takes to break down a door, you don't bother rolling. The rules are just there to tell you if you can do it eventually, and then you you skip a bit until you have done it. If you're cutting through a rope or something in the middle of an action scene, then you need to roll dice; but if you're cutting it in down time you just need to do a hardness comparison and check that cutting the rope is possible. We don't roll bullrush checks to push shopping carts, for that matter.

But this is exactly why 4e is so infuriating. Objects don't have hardness. If something is marked by the MC as destructible, you can destroy it with a tea spoon, given time. And adamantine barrier doesn't repel ax blows, it just has more hit points. There is no in-game reason available for why you wouldn't be able to cut down a door or a wall. Instead, the MC is simply encouraged to refuse to allow you to attack objects that he doesn't want destroyed.

In short, player agency is completely obviated. Completely. And that's terrible.

-Username17

[Winnah]

I'm not sure if personal experience is relevant, but I have not irrelevancy stop me before.

In 4e games I have run, breaking down doors was a pretty common occurance, especially with spellcasting bad guys making use of rituals like Arcane Lock. Sometimes this was time sensitive. Now the Barbarian in the party had a fairly good chance of passing a strength check. The player refused to make a strength check just so he could bust the door with his axe and make a stupid movie quote.

The Avenger weighed in. He wanted to blast the door with radiance. How the fuck does light damage a door? He quipped back "It works well enough on people." I thought that I was being clever using the RAW verbiage of power targeting, then I realised I was being a dick. I allowed the players to attack the door with their powers, even though a door was not a creature. Seems like common sense, but I can be an argumentive douche when I'm wearing the DM hat.

Next problem. Avenger wants to use his radiant power to light up a dark corridor. Seems simple enough...But now the player wants to use his power to target an invisible point in space to light up an area temporarily. I was about to pick up the DMG so it would tell me what to do, then I realised it was no help at all. I had to make a houserule, this is an issue for me. Houserules mean I have to write more things down and I hate to use the slippery slope fallacy, but if I give the guys I play with an inch...

I can add a whole heap more irrelevent experience. The game I play may or may not be typical of other games. Some of the issues seem to be fairly common, from what I have read. I will say that the guys I played with spent the next 4 hours deliberately fucking with me and the limitations of the system I was running. Don't even get me started on the interactive skill challenge minigame.

For all this, I enjoy playing 4e. It is a great way to spend time with my friends. I want the system to work as I think it has a lot going for it. However, if I thought my friends were more interested in playing AD&D, I would be dumping 4e in favour of a system I really like.

[Fuchs]

With your friends playstyle, I'd try 3E. 4E doesn't seem to be suited to handle players that think about using their characters' abilities creatively.

[Darwinism]

With your friends playstyle, I'd try 3E. 4E doesn't seem to be suited to handle players that think about using their characters' abilities creatively.

What? Can you provide any example for this? Creative use of any ability always falls into the realm of the DM, not the realm of the system.

And radiant damage is just that, damage. Damage types don't always make perfect sense but for the sake of easier gameplay it's always assumed that they do damage; Radiant damage being really easy to imagine because it's the literal power of the gods that just looks like bright light. Pretty sure that the god's own energy could fuck up a door.

But this is exactly why 4e is so infuriating. Objects don't have hardness. If something is marked by the MC as destructible, you can destroy it with a tea spoon, given time. And adamantine barrier doesn't repel ax blows, it just has more hit points. There is no in-game reason available for why you wouldn't be able to cut down a door or a wall. Instead, the MC is simply encouraged to refuse to allow you to attack objects that he doesn't want destroyed.

In short, player agency is completely obviated. Completely. And that's terrible.

-Username17

Actually any decent fighter could usually bypass most anything's hardness with his bare fists in 3.5, making hardness just another rule to keep track of when there's no need for it. By the time you're running into adamantine doors your martials can likely just headbutt it into submission, unless it's shoved into a low-level campaign as an obviously indestructable object and, then, why do you need hardness for it?

Also please provide any example not based purely on opinion how 4E removes player agency, which is defined as, "the feeling of empowerment that comes from being able to take actions in the [virtual] world whose effects relate to the player’s intention." Because there's nothing in the system preventing this and every tabletop actively encourages it.


Also, Frank, I like your Pathfinder review and I'll tell you why: In it you state your issues with the system, you don't make claims that the system makes intangibles involving player fun, which are naturally going to vary from person to person, impossible. If you did the same for 4E I would appreciate it.

[Shiritai]

With your friends playstyle, I'd try 3E. 4E doesn't seem to be suited to handle players that think about using their characters' abilities creatively.

What? Can you provide any example for this? Creative use of any ability always falls into the realm of the DM, not the realm of the system.

Wow, this guy is just the Oberoni fallacy incarnate.

[Darwinism]

With your friends playstyle, I'd try 3E. 4E doesn't seem to be suited to handle players that think about using their characters' abilities creatively.

What? Can you provide any example for this? Creative use of any ability always falls into the realm of the DM, not the realm of the system.

Wow, this guy is just the Oberoni fallacy incarnate.

Awesome you don't understand what the Oberoni fallacy is; I didn't state that there are no broken rules. Creative power use automatically implies that it's a situation not explicitly covered by rules or else it wouldn't be creative, it would be normal skill use. Therefor it's up to the DM to find the closest approximation he can.

Oh and attacking a door with your powers? Yeah, that's in the rules, so it's not even creative use. It's normal stuff covered in the DMG.

[Roy]

Is that the part where it tells you to get the blue key for the blue door, or the part where it tells you that they were too lazy to write rules, even though writing their rules is their entire fucking job, and the only reason they get paid, so they said herp derp make it yourself?

[MGuy]

You have stated several... well in almost all your posts that something is "ok" because there is a DM there to arbitrate sooo... You do still Oberoni quite a bit, enough to make you the go to Oberoni guy.

[Ravengm]

Awesome you don't understand what the Oberoni fallacy is;

See this.

The Oberoni Fallacy states that because you fixed something with rule 0 means that it had to be broken in the first place.

It has nothing to do with saying something is broken. The Oberoni Fallacy specifically states that if you say "The DM will fix it" then whatever you were talking about doesn't work. Try again.

Creative power use automatically implies that it's a situation not explicitly covered by rules or else it wouldn't be creative, it would be normal skill use.

No, creative use means that it's a use most people wouldn't immediately think of. Most of the time people will disregard prestidigitation as useless, but not many people will think to attack the Kraken with a 1 lb. chunk of pure sodium made from it. Creating 1 pound of any material you want is huge.

[Darwinism]

You have stated several... well in almost all your posts that something is "ok" because there is a DM there to arbitrate sooo... You do still Oberoni quite a bit, enough to make you the go to Oberoni guy.

No; I've stated that the point of a DM is to pick up where the rules leave off, though in some cases the DM will override rules for the sake of the game. This doesn't fit the Oberoni fallacy because it's not trying to 'fix' broken rules by implementing new rules and stating that the rules weren't broken because they could be fixed, it's just describing the role of a DM. If he does have to houserule out certain things this is both a failure of and commendation of the system; things can, indeed, be broken but the rules as written allow individual groups to fix them as they see fit.

Is that the part where it tells you to get the blue key for the blue door, or the part where it tells you that they were too lazy to write rules, even though writing their rules is their entire fucking job, and the only reason they get paid, so they said herp derp make it yourself?

What does that first section of that sentence even mean? What the hell do blue keys for blue doors matter at all in an argument about the ruleset? Also, hey, guess what, they did write the rules, it's the DMG. One of them being that for situations not explicitly mentioned the DM has final say in what can or cannot happen. But don't let that prevent you from making incoherent arguments.

[Kaelik]

Man this relentless 4e trolling is fucking depressing.

I mean, I love an argument more than most, but this is just fucking terrible. If the troll team made even a pretense of addressing actual arguments this might not suck, but as is, it sucks so bad.

[Darwinism]

It has nothing to do with saying something is broken. The Oberoni Fallacy specifically states that if you say "The DM will fix it" then whatever you were talking about doesn't work. Try again.

But the DM isn't fixing anything; he's simply doing his job. Houserules would be an example of 'fixing', but as previously mentioned it's not a houserule when the rules allow for a DM to control everything not explicitly stated in the rules. Then it's just a normal rule that the DM is following and not subject to Oberoni.


Oh also the rules don't say anything about sodium and krakens sorry you can't do that unless you want to Oberoni yourself. Because the DM would have to 'fix' the fact that no tabletop game takes into account the exothermic reaction of water+sodium.

Man this relentless 4e trolling is fucking depressing.

I mean, I love an argument more than most, but this is just fucking terrible. If the troll team made even a pretense of addressing actual arguments this might not suck, but as is, it sucks so bad.

I know! They just keep making the same point over and over when it's just, "I don't like 4E so I will make up reasons to justify my dislike of 4E to make it seem more legitimate."

I mean just look at Frank's posts on the subject. First, stating that there are no rules for breaking doors and then stating that, somehow, 4E obviates (oooh he used a thesaurus) player agency, which is an innately hilarious claim because in order for it to do that it would have to negate any effect the players ever had on the game world. Including combat.



edit: As an aside, a tiny improvised weapon in 3E would do 1d2 damage, or 1.5 average damage. A battleaxe, at 1d8, does 4.5 average damage. So an axe only hits three time as hard as a tea spoon. And that's only really noticeable at very early levels; any martial character is rapidly going to outclass weapon damage with static modifiers like strength bonus, power attack, enhancement bonus, and so on. So it's actually more feasible to attack an adamantine door with a tea spoon in 3.5E than 4E; static modifiers don't jump nearly so high in 4E and weapon damage means a lot more.

So now I know that should I ever play 3.5 again it will be with a tea spoon wielding character.

[Krakatoa]

Please ignore Kaelik, he has nothing to contribute but butthurt. Lots of it. (I apparently 'don't exist' because I like 4E.)

[Count Arioch the 28th]

Awesome you don't understand what the Oberoni fallacy is;

See this.

The Oberoni Fallacy states that because you fixed something with rule 0 means that it had to be broken in the first place.

It has nothing to do with saying something is broken. The Oberoni Fallacy specifically states that if you say "The DM will fix it" then whatever you were talking about doesn't work. Try again.

I have no emotional investment in this argument, but I don't understand how what Ravengm is saying is any different than what Darwinism is saying about the Oberoni fallacy. It appears to me that Ravengm is repeating what Darwinism said using different owrding and acting like its a rebuttal. If someone could point out the diffeeonce for me, that would be great.

[Dominicius]

I'm not reading any of Darwinism's posts, only the rebuttals since they are more likely to contain something intelligent.

[Psychic Robot]

I don't understand how what Ravengm is saying is any different than what Darwinism is saying about the Oberoni fallacy. It appears to me that Ravengm is repeating what Darwinism said using different owrding and acting like its a rebuttal. If someone could point out the diffeeonce for me, that would be great.

Darwinism: You fixed something with Rule 0. Therefore, it was broken.
Ravengm: You fixed something with Rule 0. Therefore, it doesn't work.

I think Ravengm is defining "broken" as meaning "overpowered" while Darwinism is defining "broken" as "anything that doesn't function mechanically well."

To me, Oberoni has always been "fixing something with Rule 0 doesn't mean that it's not broken." Because there are things you can fix with Rule 0 that aren't broken in the sense of mechanics. For instance, a friend of mine ran a d20 Modern game and all the players hated that you took at AoO from hip firing or something, so he eliminated the AoO. Mechanically speaking, the AoO wasn't broken (in the sense of overpowered or underpowered or not mechanically sound); the players just didn't like it.

[CCarter]

With your friends playstyle, I'd try 3E. 4E doesn't seem to be suited to handle players that think about using their characters' abilities creatively.

What? Can you provide any example for this? Creative use of any ability always falls into the realm of the DM, not the realm of the system.

And radiant damage is just that, damage. Damage types don't always make perfect sense but for the sake of easier gameplay it's always assumed that they do damage; Radiant damage being really easy to imagine because it's the literal power of the gods that just looks like bright light. Pretty sure that the god's own energy could fuck up a door.

But this is exactly why 4e is so infuriating. Objects don't have hardness. If something is marked by the MC as destructible, you can destroy it with a tea spoon, given time. And adamantine barrier doesn't repel ax blows, it just has more hit points. There is no in-game reason available for why you wouldn't be able to cut down a door or a wall. Instead, the MC is simply encouraged to refuse to allow you to attack objects that he doesn't want destroyed.

In short, player agency is completely obviated. Completely. And that's terrible.

-Username17

Actually any decent fighter could usually bypass most anything's hardness with his bare fists in 3.5, making hardness just another rule to keep track of when there's no need for it. By the time you're running into adamantine doors your martials can likely just headbutt it into submission, unless it's shoved into a low-level campaign as an obviously indestructable object and, then, why do you need hardness for it?

Also please provide any example not based purely on opinion how 4E removes player agency, which is defined as, "the feeling of empowerment that comes from being able to take actions in the [virtual] world whose effects relate to the player’s intention." Because there's nothing in the system preventing this and every tabletop actively encourages it.


Also, Frank, I like your Pathfinder review and I'll tell you why: In it you state your issues with the system, you don't make claims that the system makes intangibles involving player fun, which are naturally going to vary from person to person, impossible. If you did the same for 4E I would appreciate it.

On the radiant damage: yes, but if its not spelled out there are going to be disagreements. Its just light and the base damage assumes a squishy target so it won't hurt doors as much; its a laser; its holy energy; its a positron beam and destroys space fortresses; whatever.

In our 3.5 games we've had halflings trapped in a wooden box floating downriver, that he couldn't get out of due to hardness 5 (despite having a dagger hidden on him). We did rescue him eventually, but without hardness rules this could well have come down to the GM going 'yes you die' without any rules to adjudicate it, and looking like a dick.

Apart from that 'there are rules because I can put them in' is Page XX fallacy rather than Oberoni, as seen in the OPs 'you are automatically wrong if...' section.

EDIT: also, you can't power attack with a tea spoon. One-handed or two-handed only.

[Username17]

Such as I can tell of the parts of Darwinism's reply that other people made me read by copying it into their own replies, the difference is that Darwinism is literally claiming that the Oberoni Fallacy only applies if the rule caused something to be overpowered and you stealth nerfed it. While Raven is using the more traditional definition of including anything that the MC had to spot change to make the game work.

So Darwinism is claiming that things that are not included in the game that the MC therefore "gets to" (and must) make up as he goes along is good design. Raven includes that as Oberoni, and so do I. Obviously there is no good design (or any design) in that scenario. Darwinism kept claiming that wasn't Oberoni until I put him on ignore.

My impression is that he believes, or claims to believe for the purposes of his trolling, that it is totally acceptable for the MC to be presented with no guidelines at all for something and then make shit up as he goes along.

-Username17

[Kaelik]

@darwinism, krakatoa

Please refrain from quoting me and pretending that I am agreeing with you and insulting someone else when I am not, or directly lying about what I have said respectively.

Clearly posting in the thread after you have decided to troll it was a mistake you are determined to make me regret. You have. I regret posting in this thread. I will leave you to your trolling, and assume for the moment that what you have to say might be of value in other threads. Faced with any more dishonest implications or lies about what I have said, I will put you on ignore.

[Ravengm]

But the DM isn't fixing anything; he's simply doing his job. Houserules would be an example of 'fixing', but as previously mentioned it's not a houserule when the rules allow for a DM to control everything not explicitly stated in the rules. Then it's just a normal rule that the DM is following and not subject to Oberoni.

Our definitions differ then. Frank summed it up well enough.

Saying that a game is great and covers everything because MC pulls stuff out of his ass well doesn't mean the game is great, it means your MC is competent. From what I can tell of your argument base... that's really all you're going with. I agree that it's a huge issue if you're gaming, but then you shouldn't even be worried about the system you're using. It doesn't even matter if you're using 3E, 4E, AD&D, Shadowrun, or whatever. The point of playing is for fun and thus MC should not be a jackass.

That's not the point when discussing the balance merits of a system, though. You can have fun and enjoy a campaign in 4E (and I have), but that doesn't make the system good.

[ScottS]

Are you the kind of guy that gets pissed when there's not a stat block for chickens?

(Missed several pages of trollvergence from this not-very-important subtopic, so I'll just quickly butt back in here to say that yes, I heart chicken stats. Or more to the point, "chicken := thing which explodes 50-70% of the time when a PC swings at it" as a definition doesn't help me if the party wants to ally with rather than fight the chickens.)