Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition Launches

darkwing_bmf writes "Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition rulebooks are now available. There's a review up at EuroGamer. Unfortunately, the online tools portion, D&D Insider, isn't ready yet."

Comments

Big change from previous versions, but still good

[El Gigante de Justic]

I got a chance to view the books early, thanks to some leaked scans, and so far I like what I see; however, many changes may tick off long time players, especially changes to the standard races.

    From what I've read so far, the main good things about 4th edition that I've seen so far are:

• A lot less book keeping is necessary, especially for high level spell casters. DMs also have less book keeping for high level enemies, as they don't have dozens of spells or spell like abilities and minion creatures do static damage and only 1 hp). If you've ever run a high level battles against a half dozen clerics or wizards, you can see an immediate advantage.
  
• Even at first level, characters and monsters are generally tougher, so 1st level characters are living in constant fear of being killed by 1 hit. Some might complain this is lame ("why not just start at 5th-8th level?"), but really, it makes sense, and actually sets 1st level heroes apart from your average commoner.
  
• The Cleric is no longer a required party member, as everyone can self heal.
  
  The main complaints I have so far is that they haven't released rules in the Monster Manual for creating your own monsters from scratch and figuring out appopriate levels, and the death penalty is really almost too minor. Raise dead still takes 10 minutes to cast, and the cost does go up as your level goes up, but the penalty is only -1 to all rolls until you rest for 6 hours. I appreciate that they were trying to lessen death effects and other affects that take your character effectively out of game (Medusa gaze, Illithid mind blast, etc), but by having such a minimal penalty for death, you'd have to wonder why any fears death.
        Some will certainly complain that 4th edition is too MMO like (especially like WOW), but the new character building rules do admittedly enforce character balance quite well through all levels.