[Raven Bloodmoon]

A friend of mine accidentally stumbled into the WotC moderator forum where they were discussing 4e and snapped this screenshot. They become locked again pretty quickly. He poked about a little, but they looked like typical 4e threads, ecxept soemone from wizo started them all. So my question to you is, what do you think 4e will hold for the future of DnD?

[Lyinginbedmon]

I think it won't.

That is to say, there's a lot of talk going on across the 'net about this whole affair, including the countdown presently replacing the front page. Some think it's 4E, others think it's a 4th campaign setting that they've been sitting on since Eberron won the competition (Generic, Eberron, and Faerun make 3 primary settings at the moment).

I for one am darn sure hoping it's just another campaign setting, because they certainly should have tried to TELL US about a 4th Edition coming, especially after declaring quite happily "We have no plans to make a 4th Edition". I've spent over 600 pound sterling on 41 books for V3.5 and I sure as heck am not updating to that horrid statblock anytime soon.

There are thoughts that the 4th edition forum leak was to stir up noise. Which it certainly seems to be doing very well.

The countdown is aimed at around midnight tonight, best if we all just wait and see.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

Well, it certainly is creating a buzz. Hopefully, it's just another setting. Perhaps a good one. Didn't Lady enter the competition for that?

[Cuilean]

Raven Bloodmoon, on Aug 16 2007, 12:38 PM, said:

Well, it certainly is creating a buzz. Hopefully, it's just another setting. Perhaps a good one. Didn't Lady enter the competition for that?

She did... but unless she's been claiming it's her job keeping her busy while she's actually feverishly writing stuff for a campaign setting, there's no way.

(Hers is interesting, though. We played it for a while about two years ago. )

[Lyinginbedmon]

Okay, I can no-longer plausibly deny that it's 4th edition, having caught a brief glimpse of the site itself. There's an apparently remodeled Beholder there too, with a head crest, as well as what appears to be a small trove of information regarding it (Including an "Ampersand (welcome)"). At least they're covered for negative sentiment, there's an actual Doomsday thread.

The Golden Age is over folks. May it rest in peace.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

I suppose I shall begin by announcing my resistance to this change early. I have nearly molded 3.5 into somethign playable finally. I'm not going to start trying to mold another pile of wizo's crap into a perfect replica of Devil's Tower now.

[3dom]

Know what needs to be put into place in 4.0?

Nothing. It (BADLY) needs to not exist. Not lashing out another 150 bucks unless it's absolutely perfect compared to 3.5.

So says I.

[JosephBlackly]

Yeah, well... Unless it's seamlessly backwards-compatible with 3.0/3.5, I doubt I'll give it that much mind, either.

But when you get right down to it, the problem isn't with the system itself, I think. I mean, it really doesn't take a great deal of tweaking to make 3.0/3.5 playable and, dare it be said, moderately balanced. The problem is that WizO's doesn't pay any mind to the material it already has, as has been said previously... Somewhere, possibly in this very thread. If they took a good long look at what wizards and sorcerers already had in all the other stuff they published over the years, Complete Mage would have been very different.

...But that's an argument I don't want to get into. Far be it from ME to judge others...

[Raven Bloodmoon]

Yeah. I don't think 3e or 3.5e is terribly bad, but I don't think they got a lot of stuff right. So as one friend put it, it becomes a ship with many little patches. So then eventually, someone decides to jsut junk the jalopy and start from scratch, like Dthclaw is and I will probably do soon. Keep it just similar enough that people will still play it.

Personally, I'm just sort of fed up with what wizo has done with all of their books lately. They seem to be completely ignoring what their customers are telling them they want. Most businesses would die to have their customers tell them, "We want X, Y, and Z." And since wizo writes and publishes books, it doesn't cost extra to just write X, Y, and Z instead of A, B, and C, which their customers told them they don't want. I'm not going to rant anymore on this, as I have other threads already dedicated to this subject, but point is, I'm almost ready to just give up on d20.

[Elmorwen]

I, personally, would love for this to be either a hoax or a misunderstanding. I'm not betting any money on it, though, that's for sure. Especially since it actually has been eight years since 3rd ed came out.

I was talking about it earlier via email. It's sort of like getting a new video game system. If we're lucky, it'll be backwards compatible, but knowing that your entire collection may very well become obsolete soon is disheartening to say the least. You can always choose not to upgrade (I have a PS2 and a Gamecube in my apartment,) but you stand a decent chance of missing out on some cool stuff that way, at least eventually (I really want Smash Bros. Brawl, but I can't get it until I shell out the cash for a Wii.) So, just like with games, you have two main options: buy the core system of the next gen stuff and hope they release good games for it, or ignore the update but also know that you'll never get any new official material.

Of course, given Wizards's track record as of late, I think it'll be a while before anything cool comes out for 4th ed. And unlike with video games, you can create your own new content for the old system really easily. That, I suppose, is where the metaphor falls apart... ah well. It was good while it lasted.

On a slightly different note, crested beholders?!? I thought my stomach was bothering me before I read that...

[Greg Swifthands]

Now, I for one never really considered 3.0/3.5 as a Golden Age, that aside. Just cause they're redesigning a Beholder, doesn't mean it is a new edition. The screenshot though I'm sure is trust worthy, I can help but wonder if people are jumping to conclusions.

Besides I also wouldn't put it passed WotC to bring out a new edition to Milk one of their cashcows. It is like Horror Movie Remake Trend flying around lately.

Er, my bad, appearently I didn't read enough stuff... Yes, they are officially Announcing 4e At GenCon.....

-grabs the link-
http://www.icv2.com/...home/11123.html

Well then, who wants to Shell out 200+ Dollars for the new Edition?

This post has been edited by Greg Swifthands: 17 August 2007 - 11:53 AM

[Dthclaw]

Well, as a latecomer to this discussion:

I, for one, am in complete agreement with 3dom (rare, I know, but true). If 4E doesn't rock my face off, I'm not getting even one book for it unless my idea for a publishing company starts to really form. Assuming that they don't revert to TSR style protectionism and can the OGL.

[Vaskre]

It could be interesting. If they keep their word and actually have made the mechanics more smooth, it'd be a welcome change I think. I've shelled out over $400 on 3.0 / 3.5 books, but when I think about it, I've barely used them. If I do switch over to the new edition, then I'll not be buying any sourcebooks this time around.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

I agree with 3dom and Vaskre both. I'm not even touching it unless it rockes the [BROWNIES] out of me, and even then, I'm not touching the suppliments. As we've all discovered on this forum, we tend to make out own suppliments anyway, so why bother with theirs? As for smoother, that would be nice, but considering how they hyped their "concern" for their customers' needs with the MMV and then stuck a "healing" shiv in our backs, I think I"ll be keeping my money. I am almost finished patching the leaks in the old one; I'm not about to start over again. I'd rather just write my own d20 system.

On another note, how many people think their sales for new releases will plummet until May of '08?

[Dthclaw]

Well, I know I'm not planning on buying anything from them for at least that long a time

From the members of my group that I've spoken with thus far, they seem to be pretty much in agreement on the subject. And I suspect we're not alone- WotC seems to have pissed off a LOT of dedicated D&D people with this announcement, ie the people that enjoyed the game to such an extent as to spend their hard-earned money on suppliments that were supposed to have a longer lifespan than this.

But yeah, at this point I'm basically going to remove any mentions to WotC products from my own CS. I'm sick and tired of this customer-jerking bullshit, and at this point they can forget me making any reference to their stuff beyond labelling it a D&D 3 point f'ing 5 campaign setting.

This might be a shameless pre-completion self-promotion, but when I do my Multiverse system I'm getting it right the first time, because I'm not going to put my customers through this BS.