One Giant Leap

So far 4th Edition has lived up to every expectation that I could possibly have had. It turns out that Worldwide Game Day at the local gaming store was fully booked. Not a single open table for me and my party. That was hardly enough to stop me.

The afternoon was spent on character creation. It took less than half an hour before Kate decided to go out and buy her own PHB. This wasn't out of frustration mind you, but her excitement to give this edition every effort couldn't keep her away from the game store. She came back with book in hand, ready to make use of my photocopied-from-the-back-of-the-book character sheets.

To summarize, character creation was awesomely smooth. There was no point where I felt like I was running into a brick wall, or getting to the long and boring part. Every possible decision was simplified, but important to my character. I even took the time to walk a friend through character creation from start to finish, and he found that all of the choices were very easy to make. Nobody had to explain skill ranks, or spell levels, or what kind of spellcasting he gets to do. 4th Edition is streamlined to make the game mechanics just as interesting as the story. I haven't felt that way since before the release of 3rd.

Anyway, I gathered 3 of my best friends around a table earlier this evening, and we put our characters through the ringer on a group of goblins. The party was successful without too much of a beating, and not a single person got up from that table feeling like there was anything not fun, or not interesting about the new mechanics. It was a success and I, as the DM, did very little to make it that way. I am excited to see how 4th Edition plays out in long-running campaigns. I'm hoping that my players won't tire of the original release before the exciting supplements start arriving.

Anyway, the last two posts on my 4th Edition impressions have been nice, but tomorrow I want to get into some real gaming topics.

This Sunday: The Benefits of Mapping Your World (Even if the Players Never See It!)

-Lance of the Hill People