Tag: D&D 4th edition

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Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition

Charting the Course for D&D

Your Voice, Your Game

Mike Mearls

As you may have read in the New York Times, it’s an exciting time for Dungeons & Dragons. We are happy to announce today that we are developing the next iteration of D&D, and will be looking to the legions of D&D fans to help shape the future of the game along with us.

Our mission is to ensure that D&D enters its next 40 years as a vibrant, growing, and exciting game. By listening to the needs of the D&D community, we can meet this goal. As part of our increased efforts to engage with the player-base, we launched a series of weekly articles in early 2011, including Rule of Three and Legends & Lore, to give you a voice in our work. We’ve listened to both praise and criticism from all D&D fans, regardless of their edition of choice, and we’ll continue to do so.

That is why we are excited to share with you that starting in Spring 2012, we will be taking this process one step further and conducting ongoing open playtests with the gaming community to gather feedback on the new iteration of the game as we develop it. With your feedback and involvement, we can make D&D better than ever. We seek to build a foundation for the long-term health and growth of D&D, one rooted in the vital traits that make D&D unique and special. We want a game that rises above differences of play styles, campaign settings, and editions, one that takes the fundamental essence of D&D and brings it to the forefront of the game. In short, we want a game that is as simple or complex as you please, its action focused on combat, intrigue, and exploration as you desire. We want a game that is unmistakably D&D, but one that can easily become your D&D, the game that you want to run and play.

D&D is more than just a set of rules for fantasy gaming. It launched an entire gaming genre and played a pivotal role in creating the entirety of the gaming industry, both analog and digital. The game has lived and thrived because it has awoken a spark of creation, visions of daring adventure, wondrous vistas, and untold horrors that pull us all together as a community of RPG fans. It is the countless players and DMs who have brought it to life over the years. The game is at its best when it is yours.

For that reason, we want your participation. The goals we have set for ourselves are by no means trivial or easy. By involving you in this process, we can build a set of D&D rules that incorporate the wants and desires of D&D gamers around the world. We want to create a flexible game, rich with options for players and DMs to embrace or reject as they see fit, a game that brings D&D fans together rather than serves as one more category to splinter us apart.

We have begun obtaining feedback from a limited Friends & Family playtest consisting of internal employees and their gaming groups and soon we will be expanding that group to consist of members from our existing body of playtesters. Then at the D&D Experience convention in late January, Wizards of the Coast will conduct a special playtest of ideas currently in development. The D&D Experience will be moving to Gen Con in 2013, so as a convention special this year, we will be offering show attendees a first-look at a draft of the new set of rules. Then beginning sometime in the spring, we will begin open playtesting. Through our web site, we will release a growing set of rules, classes, monsters and other materials for your study and feedback. We seek to reach as many people as possible, from the gamer who just started with D&D last week to the gaming group that has been together since the early-1970s. For this process to work, we want to give a voice to all D&D fans and players of all previous editions of the game.

The next year is going to be an exciting one. There is a lot of work to be done, and I’m hoping you have the time, energy, and inclination to pitch in. We sure hope you do, as we seek to make gaming history by shaping the future of D&D, together. If you would like to sign up today to be notified when the playtest is beginning and how you can participate, click here:

 

In the meantime, you can share your opinions, talk with other gamers and stay in touch with D&D game designers by joining the official group page at: http://community.wizards.com/dndnext.

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Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition – the Red Box


The first time I held the original D&D Red Box in my hands I was 8 years old. My friend Khidr had received the Dungeons & Dragons Red Box as a gift from his Aunt and Uncle. It came with the Players Handbook and Dungeon Masters Guide. Those rule books seemed intimidating at the time, but now I think back and laugh at how simple they were compared to most.

We also received what truly got us involved in role-playing games, a set of polyhedron dice. Completely alien to us, these dice were like little treasures that required diligent safekeeping.  Strange shapes in a myriad of colors, this was what caused us to pull up chairs to what would become our gaming table and dig through these newfound books.

As soon as I found out there was a “Dungeon Master” who controlled the monsters and wrote the story line I knew that’s what I wanted to be. I have always loved creation.  I get excited about writing songs, building model scenery, and building websites.  These things give my life purpose and get my gears turning.

Fast forward 25 years and at Christmas we happened to find our old gaming group in the same room again.  Despite thousands of miles of separation, our parents living in the same city had reunited us yet again over the holidays.  As we leaned on the kitchen counter chatting over the eating bar and drinking coffee our eyes wandered to the Christmas tree.  My son had just received the Dungeons & Dragons Red Box for 4th edition as a Christmas present.  The very same box that we had used to learn D&D as children.  Wow, 25 years ago… had it really been that long?

We told my son to call up his friends and get his dice.  We were going to sit down and play D&D with them.  We would teach them a thing or two, or so we thought!

Apparently D&D has changed drastically over the years.  This version of the game came with character sheets, a flip-mat, miniature tokens that represent heroes and monsters, playing cards, and two small books.

Dashiell decided to take the role of party leader showing everyone how to roll up their characters.  While Khidr assisted in drinking all the coffee.  I sharpened pencils and prepared the miniature tokens.  Rolling up characters proved a difficult task as the initial character stats were already determined for you.  Perhaps this was to assist new players and GMs in getting started.  Hopefully this would speed things up and we would be playing within the half hour!

Almost two hours later we still weren’t playing.  The statistics for each character were hidden deep within a detailed story meant to help new players.  If anything it complicated things and was very frustrating digging through all this fluff just to begin playing.  We felt cheated out of creating our own characters.  One of my absolute favorite parts of playing a RPG is rolling up and creating my own unique character!  At least the Pathfinder Beginner Box provided your stats and gear already printed on the ready to play character sheets.  If you’re going to start me out with a pre-rolled character at least get it ready to go so we can get started and learn the game.

So, like I said… 2 hours later and we only had a bit of time left, luckily we had finished our characters.  We initiated the trial combat contained within the small Dungeon Master’s Guide!

I played DM and set up the mini tokens and flip-mat.  Everyone rolled initiative and battle began.

 

As combat progressed I noticed many changes in regards to combat in 4th edition:

  • Combat has a faster pace than most RPGs
  • Players and Monsters hit 90% of the time
  • Damage caused is almost 4 times what we experienced in older editions
  • Players have a smattering of cards which can be used strategically
  • All players can use a special ability called a “Healing Surge” to regain lost hit points

Introducing cards into the game seems like a good idea and I’ll need some more time to see how I really feel about this.  I do enjoy a faster paced combat, but it sure seems like the constant barrage of wounds is more akin to a video game than a tabletop RPG.  When flipping through the books I did notice that a focus on combat encounters overshadowed the exploration or role-playing factor.  The latter two aspects of role-playing games are what puts the “role” as opposed to the “roll” into the game for me.

Surely we need more time with the game than just a practice encounter, but I fear that Wizards is on a path which leads away from the dreams of the late great Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

My son and his friends enjoyed the encounter and were ready for more.  During combat one of the kids came up with a creative use for the Mage Hand spell and moved a small boulder over the head of an enemy and dropped it causing extra damage.  He wanted to keep going after his turn was over so he could cast spell after spell.  I told him if he got to do whatever he wanted, so did I and would loose an army of enemies upon the group.  He said “go ahead, I have a ton of spells I want to use!”  Wisdom 3, Enthusiasm & Courage: 18!

When all was said and done I realized that this version of D&D, although different from previous editions was original in and of itself.  It is a NEW game and thus is an interpretation of the great D&D game, played for generations.  Surely it has a place among my other gaming books and boxes.

It is my son’s turn to start a collection and forge his own memories and experiences in the world of Dungeons & Dragons.  Perhaps in 25 years he will be teaching his son how to play.