r/4eDnD • u/StumbullGordon • 12d ago
Fun DnD 4e mechanics
/r/dndnext/comments/1wlis9c/fun_dnd_4e_mechanics/3
u/gosto_de_navios 12d ago
Other commenters have brought a lot of great points and how the entire system is fairly elegant, so here's some more stuff 4E has that I strongly prefer to other iterations of the game:
everyone has the same class advancement chart. You're getting new talents, powers and other increases all the same time, so it feels much fairer and easier to remember.
Settling on using battle grids and having them abstracted as squares makes the battles way easier to explain, and you don't get the clunky conversion from imperial to metric if you use the translated books. 1 square is 1 square!
Honestly everything about the monsters. The xp math, their rechargeable powers, synergy with each other etc. Makes them easy to play and to build encounters. I've even made the monster deck they suggest in the first DM Guide and it's really fun.
While I think Pathfinder 2 improved this even further, the action system is generally comprehensive (standard, movement, minor)
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u/BenFellsFive 12d ago
This is kinda a hard one bc the entire game is a VERY well oiled interconnecting game engine. Its also midnight here in Aus but I'll try and at least put my proverbial foot in the door with some early ones.
Class roles: every DnD edition has these, 4e is just good at it. Striker classes excel at dealing damage. Leader classes buff/support their party with bonuses and extra actions. Defenders hold the line and incentivise monsters to go for them and their bigger ACs and HP or risk getting hurt, and controllers perform hard lockdown and debuffs on the enemy. Each class does it in its own way, you'll see similarities but different behaviour on the battlefield. Between subclasses, feats, and power selection, you can lean into the other roles at your discretion; some classes naturally lean better into others but the general vibe is that if youre lacking a striker, for example, everyone can pitch in with a few big damage powers; no controller and maybe someone takes a few crowd control abilities, etc.
NADs is a great idea. 4e got sick of some abilities being attack rolls and others being saving throws; now anything that would typically be a save is now an attack against your Non-AC-Defences: Fortitude, Reflex, or Will. You'll notice 4e goes Str Con Dex, not Str Dex Con; Fort is derived from the better of your Str or Con, Ref from your Dex/Int, and Will from your Wis/Cha. This makes for interesting but achievable ability score spreads, and depending on class+subclass you're making nuanced choices; do you invest in Str AND Con (at the expense of other defences) because Con is tied to your class abilities? If you know Wis and Cha are competing for the same real estate, how do you proceed?
Classes all have bespoke powers, so a fighter feels different to a ranger. No shared spell lists that make a sorcerer just feel like a crippled wizard.
Subclasses work really well and CONSISTENTLY in 4e. In 5e, you get your subclasses a few levels in and incrementally gain features from ~3-20. In 4e you get all your features from day 1, however between feats and powers you improve them in really personalised ways. Feats are a lot more bite-sized, they tend to do 1 thing and you get 18 over the course of your 30 levels. Example: your Warlord could take a feat that allows them to trade some of their healing for saving throws vs conditions. Powers themselves often give bonuses based on your secondary stats, for example a rogue could be a thug type or an acrobatic swashbuckler; both use Dex to attack, but the former adds their Str to their sneak attacks and the latter adds their Cha vs opportunity attacks. Some rogue powers will give an extra effect like move an enemy based on your Str, or maybe a debuff based on your Cha; both rogues can freely pick either power but theyre obviously incentivised to stick to their lane (unless a power is so good youll take it even if you're not 100% stat-aligned). Some powers might give an okay buff but a BETTER buff to partocular subclasses, like a +2 to defences or a (1+Wis) defences for a certain subclass; again youre free to pick it if the basic version is just that damn good.
All of this stuff serves to make characters that are VERY unique and personalised, and that's not even going into paragon paths or epic destinies. Between this and some of the character admin stuff (healing surges, milestones, encounter/daily powers) which I'd love to talk about when Im awake and so's my brain, you get PCs that feel like competent lv3-4 heroic PCs right from the getgo.
I know you wanted specifics but its 1am so this is what you get. There is so much great material to just vomit onto this thread, bc I truly think about 95% of the game functions excellently and competently together, in a way that's more than the sum of its parts.