My first go as a player in 4e
masqueradeball:
... I really don't think the 4e combat system has that much going for it, and I've played various skirmish level mini's games and enjoyed them. Its 1/3 card game, 1/3 mini's game and 1/3 sticking the pretense that you could get by without the cards or the mini's. They should have just made it a card game, or a mini's game, or a mix, but aggressively went after gearing the mechanics to what those things do well. IMO.
And yeah, I know, 10 Encounters per level, probably a dozen or so rolls per encounter... odds are the rolling would even out.
Roger:
In ye olde Forge terminology, the typical 4e character consists of, in order of importance:
1) Effectiveness
2) Resources
3) Positioning
With the game mechanics providing a number of Currency systems, some unreliable, between Effectiveness and Resources.
Out of the box, the game provides very little in way of Positioning, and very few Currency systems relating Positioning to anything else.
I suspect this paucity of Positioning is the main cause of your dissatisfaction with the game, in addition to a secondary dissatisfaction with the unreliable Currencies.
The first is easier to remedy than the second, so I'll talk about that.
First, there's exploiting whatever intrinsic Positioning may be available to you. You catch a bit of a break here, in that you're playing a cleric, and there's a fair amount of intrinsic Positioning provided, relatively speaking, in support of clerics and their gods.
Your particular game setting is somewhat unusual, so it might be prudent to check with your DM about the cosmology and theology he's using. My hunch is that he's holding close to the defaults, but perhaps not -- and in any case, he may be open to suggestions.
The intrinsic Positioning I'm talking about here are things like: what does your god want? What place does his religion hold in the world? How is he worshipped? What are his followers like?
This can become the platform for any extrinsic Positioning you may want to unilaterally add. As an example of what I'm talking about, you might decide that your character is using an icon of her lost brother as a holy symbol.
Furthermore, it can provide a channel for adding more Positioning to what's going on in the combat system. You call upon your god to divinely curse (via Bane) your enemies. And you miss the attack roll. How does your character feel about being forsaken by his god in his time of need? How do the enemies respond when their willpower overcomes divine intervention? I think it's in the answers to those questions that you'll find the dramatic interest in the failures and successes of combat.
There are not many Currencies which relate to Positioning, but one of them is the Quest system. A quest like "find out what happened to my lost brother" might provide as much as half the XP required to level up your character, which could be very significant.
Hopefully that provides you with some ideas about some approaches to try, and isn't too jargony.
Cheers,
Roger
Callan S.:
I think with 'the rolls would even out' it has two major flaws.
1. It's fun latter territor 'Keep playing long enough and on average, it becomes fun'. No, for people who want fun now, it needs to be fun now - they don't need advice that they should become fun latter people. That's making the foot fit the shoe.
2. If it evens out, what was the point of having it to begin with? If it really has no effect, why do it?
masqueradeball:
Roger: Yes, I agree. I see all of those things. I'm sort of playing this D&D game despite the fact that its not really "my kind of fun."
Callan: Again, agreed. I don't think "it evens out" is a very good system... though it does justify/underlie a certain amount of statistical balance.
Frank Tarcikowski:
Well, "cooldowns" are a design that's typical for MMORPGs, but they're not as well suited to table-top gaming. A long cooldown (something like a daily power in 4E) would be 10-30 minutes in WoW so you'd be using it more often, plus, in WoW you can minimize your miss chance through gear and these effects usually affect more than just one attack. RNG (= random number generation) is still a big concern on WoW forums but it evens out a lot more because you just go through a whole lot more moves in the same amount of time.
- Frank
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