Thoughts so Far

Well I spent a few hours at Border's today reading the PHB while I wait for my pre-order to come in the mail. Anyway, I have to say so far I'm very excited about 4th edition and the way everything looks right now. I heard that Jon, Troy, and Matthew were considering playing a Fighter, cleric, and rogue which is good because it each consists of one of each of the "roles" so far. I thought it was kind of odd though that the only controller class is the Wizard, I saw a little excerp while reading that talked about how they were going to be coming out with more classes as the 4th edition goes on (what a shock right?) Anyway, for my own taste I was expecting to really like the warlord class from the previews I saw but after reading about it seemed lackluster to me, I am actually gravatating towards playing the mage and really focusing on the controlling aspect of them first and damage dealer second. Paladin also intrigued me (not to mention it has the coolest character art by far!) so that is a potential second but as for now I'm leaning towards the Wizard.

I don't have any story or character ideas fleshed out personally yet, I'm kind of letting the points of light idea from the PHB and Dean's campaign/world idea float around my head. While reading though most of the ideas that kind of popped in and out consisted of characters that were definately supporters of the Theocracy, leaning towards also worshiping the god of civilization and really taking a liking to the idea of spreading the word through the world to make it a better place. Of course this is just the extremely general idea but like we talked about over vent a little whether to start out supporting or against the Theocratic empire I'm pretty sure my character I will create will be a supporter. I like the idea of having that character and patron potentially easily walking that line between striking out into the wilderness and saving people from the evils of the wild, and a manifest destiny organization intent on spreading the word of their god to everyone whether they like it or not to make the world a more civilized place.

Not much else to say for now, just wanted to get the ball rolling on things, on and p.s. Dragonborn rule... I still need to look into if they would make a good wizard (i'm not really feeling the Eladrin right now who are naturally the first choice.

p.p.s I really like the idea of having characters who have a real strong back story and if possible I would love to cohesively create a party background story for ourselves, this is of course if dean wants us to do this ourselves or if he is taking on that idea. I told this idea to matthew but during the character creation process I am hoping we can use these forums as well to pick and choose skills/feats/powers that really work well and compliment each other so when we start playing we can really develop some cool tactical battle plans and stuff. From what I can tell so far 4th edition is getting a lot more in tactical maneuvers in battle and what not, for example all the tons of different abilites that like you push, pull, and slide allies and enemies around the battlemap! I didn't look into everybodies skills but I can imagine a striker like a rogue and a wizard can do some cool stuff, just off the top of my head wizard has stationary spell of flying daggers, rogue can stun in the spell, when enemy moves fighter can push enemy back into the square of flying daggers... stuff like that.

Ok I'm rambling... Write your own response!!!!

I can't really do a systematic response to that, so I'll just jot down some disorganized thoughts roughly on the same topics. We may want to start new threads for each issue (ie, one for coordinating our classes/powers, another for character backgrounds, etc.)

My first thought was a rogue, simply because it's been a long time since I played a roguish type and I thought it might be fun. I'm not wedded to that idea by any means, so I'd be open to playing pretty much anything if the party needs it, but Wizard is definitely my second choice. I conceive of this guy as more of a swashbuckling type than a thief or scoundrel, like a guy who thinks of himself as a fighter but whose style simply favors finesse and trickery rather than brute strength. He would also have a strong emphasis on social skills, and might be missing one or two of the iconically "thief" skills (probably athletics, climbing and such).

Before the rules came out I was strongly favoring Dragonborn, because they are ridiculously hardcore by definition. And they are a strong race, for certain. Unfortunately, their various bonuses and powers don't particularly help roguish characters, and honestly when I read that Eladrin dimension door power my jaw just dropped thinking of the ways you could use it to your advantage. So while I'm still considering Dragonborn, there is a very strong possibility that I will switch to Eladrin.

As for party backstory, I'm actually kind of partial to having that be relatively minimal. There's always a strong tendency for players to create elaborate stories about how they're the last surviving member of their village that got massacred by goblins and whatnot and then took on the mantle of ranger and swore revenge... etc. etc. Which is all essentially trying to make the character already be really cool at 1st level. I kind of like the idea of starting out humble and growing into heroism, which is what most fantasy heroes actually do, after all. So maybe we just come from the same place, we can have some good story elements about our relatively normal lives, family members, relationships, the dreams of young folk wishing for adventure, and whathaveyou. But then we get thrown into real adventures, Frodo-style, by circumstance and necessity--and it happens during our sessions rather than all as backstory.

As for the overall shape of the campaign, that depends mightily on the overarching story that Dean has planned for us. Lacking any information, my idea is that we all begin as relatively supportive, or at most indifferent, to the rule of the Theocracy. Probably we have some sort of relationship with them, work for them, become their agents. And in the course of things we find out that things are much darker than the common folk realize, and we decide that the Theocracy is evil/destructive/tyrannical and then join/begin a rebellion. All of which ends climactically at the Battle of Endor when my guy throws Emperor Palpatine into an infinite abyss.

Some ideas. Discuss.

So yeah I am liking the idea of the fighter. Being able to actually keep agro and move characters around to best advantage is freaking awesome. I will most likely play a Dragonborn because they do indeed rule, although the extra feat for a human would be pretty nice as well... I like the idea of having a semi-normal life and then being thrust into adventure. I do like how this edition allows all the races to still be together and not really have to have totally opposing backgrounds. So I will look for the other treads for character backgrounds and the one for complementary powers etc.

One thing that I suggest is that we make sure that the party has the full array of skills. There aren't that many, and we all get to pick from lists that often overlap, so we should be able to coordinate our choices so that there are no deficiencies. So at least one person should have bluff, at least one intimidate, at least one diplomacy, etc. etc.

I'll be a rogue, so I'll be getting Stealth ad Thievery. My probable choices for the rest are Athletics, Bluff, Perception, and Streetwise. I may decide to substitute Athletics for streetwise, so if someone else has a gregarious urban sort of character you may want to consider that.

I'm going to take Religion, Heal, and Insight for sure. Then, depending on whether I can come up with a creative motive for a couple of these, I'll choose between Dungeoneering, Endurance, or Arcana (I think that's what it was called, not home right now).

Well I have to say I haven't checked the skills out much yet, but I'm sure I will get ARcana as a mage, I will post again whenI looked further into it. I hate reading books in PDF I just wish my hardcopy was here GOD DAMN DELAYS!!!