I can see where you are coming from. I guess I was focusing on the open source aspect of it rather than the holes. I would humbly submit that 4e is not an upgrade but switching to another system since many of the things that make D&D, D&D are gone. I just feels like a video game crunch system with none of the soul to me. I don’t think Paizo’s Pathfinder will fill the bill completely either. I think I am going to end up make some sort of Frankenstein edition. 3.54 or something like that.
Deadshots last blog post..The Discipline of Blogging

I can’t help but feel your analogy is backwards… or else breaks down quickly. IE is the one that is riddles with holes and exploits, yet refuses to change significantly. IE7 is a step to seal some of those holes, while still trying to keep the same broken core yet trying to give the impression of “newness” by wrapping it in a somewhat-new-looking facade

Honestly, that sounds like the Pathfinder RPG to me.

If you have the time, I’d be interested as to why you are unhappy with 4e.

@Felonius: Those players are called Outliers, people who set themselves up for failure… Since players get full control of character design since 3e with the point buy system of attributes and can make unworkable characters in any system, I would very much prefer that 4e does NOT actually make it a design philosophy to factor in for those… The Outlier will make it a personal quest to find the lamest possible character combo in 4e regardless of how hard WotC tries to make all character as useful in combat.

My 2 cents here.

Yes, Paizo chose to allow all the old splat book content, and just beefed up the Core classes so that things balanced better by virtue of general power inflation. That’s a marketing decision. See, people who buy splat books are a key customer for the publishers, since these are people who actually buy product … lots of product. So when WotC says to the legions of splat book owners, “Throw away all your books,” Paizo says, “Keep them! They’re fine!” That’s Paizo’s market — diehard d20ers. And I can’t fault them for that.

But me, I’ve never held any truck with the splat books, and in my revision of D&D, I am happy to keep power levels low — at least on par with core 3.5.

Anyway, yes I agree that some people will choose sub-optimal characters because they want a challenge or want to play against type or want to make a particular character. More power to them. But the issue here is that some players want to make character multi-class combos that are on par with straight-up single class PCs, power-wise. We should be able to create a system that retains the near-infinite flexibility of 3E and yet also creates balanced characters easily.

Honestly, balance issues, especially when I comes to “splat” books is more the DM’s purview… There’s nothing in the rules (especially for 3.5) which will prevent players from abusing them…. Which is why class levels for monsters can be a lot of fun… Barbarian Trolls? heck yes. Half Dragon Barbarian Trolls? Hmmm… Suddenly it’s immune to fire, and has a breath weapon… Makes for a great solo encounter, without even being *too* crazy, that will mess with the players…

I think what Paizo is really trying to do is make the game more fun. And, from I’ve seen for the Pathfinder RPG, they’re actually doing a pretty good job… Wizards don’t run out of stuff to do after 2 encounters? Check. Combat Maneuvers simplified? Check. Races are more inherently interesting? Check. Skills even seem to be handled in a better fashion (It’s not the 4e route, it’s not the 3.5 route… It’s somewhere in between. If I recall correctly, it’s 1 skill point buys one rank, period. Skill bonuses are Ranks + Modifier + 3 if it’s a class skill for any of your classes…) Is Pathfinder RPG perfect? doubtful. Will the community be happy with it? The ones sticking to 3.5 will most likely find it to be (after all, they get some input into the process… They’ve already changed the combat maneuvers and skills due to community input).

@Cayzle

I would love to look over your rules, but some of the links, or something, seems to be broken… I did, however, look over some of the philosophies… and… Well… I don’t know if I agree with all of them… Some people will choose to play sub-optimal characters because they want a sub-optimal character… They want a bard with 8 charisma… They like the challenge inherent (I’m not fully up on my Robin’s Laws… What’s this type of player?). Is that one of the design philosophies in 4e? It seems that way, but it’s not a requirement that you take powers that fit your strengths (They posted most of what a rogue can do… You could always play a brutish rogue with a low strength, and take all the str related powers…).

Not all characters are created equally. Of course, that’s no reason to “nerf” a Wizard just because he decided to take 3 levels of fighter to fit a non-nerfed concept…

I think I lost my train of thought… If you see it, get it to a switching station and send it back to me…

And I’ve started to answer that question — by creating my own set of 4E rules! I’ve started with a philosophy of design, by looking at how 3E was such a huge leap ahead of earlier versions. Among those innovations:

- Elegance, ease of use, simplicity of mechanics.
- Transition from arbitrary rules and one-off creations to a unified design philosophy that applies to a wide range of simulations.
- Flexibility and player empowerment, especially in terms of character creation beyond first level.
- Balance among classes and multclass combos.

If you are interested, my first post on the topic is up:

http://www.cayzle.com/screeds/book067.html

Almost all of the changes to 3.5 are things that WotC is changing in 4E. However, since Pathfinder RPG ports in all of the 3.5 splat books the late edition balance issues are still there. Pathfinder RPG is a half measure that will attract the people who want to treat the change of editions as some kind of betrayal by WotC.

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