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Travis Casey has it. By 2000, the idea of a core mechanic, a single method for adjudicating uncertainty in any form, became a thing all RPGs had to have. With 3e, there was only one way to do anything: roll a d20, add a stat bonus, add any other applicable bonuses, and compare the result to a target number.Saving throw? d20 + stat modifier + magic bonuses and try to beat a target number.Skill check? d20+ stat modifier + magic bonuses and try to beat a target number.Trying to hit a monster with your sword? All together now: d20 + stat modifier + magic bonuses and try to beat a target number.This transformed AC from a column on a table to the target number (the Difficulty Class or DC) you needed to beat. To make that work, higher AC had to be better AC. So instead of plate mail giving you an AC of 2, it now gives you an AC of 18.The nice thing about a standard mechanic is that, once you learn it, it’s easy to use even when there are no rules for a thing. Your D&D character needs to compose a sonnet using the random letters derived from the patterns of spilled tea leaves? The DM only needs to decide what stat to use (probably Charisma) and a number for the difficulty (and you can rarely go wrong with 15).The bad thing about a standard mechanic is it literally turns every problem into a nail to be solved with the hammer of the standard mechanic. One of the things old-school players complain about with WotC-era D&D is that it no longer challenges the players. Everything and anything becomes “roll a d20, add your stat bonus plus magic, and we’ll see if you beat my arbitrarily chosen DC.” And DMs are likely to default to the standard mechanic even when it makes no sense. For instance, if you really need the PCs to notice that the arrows that killed the merchant caravan are fletched in the pattern of the Stonecrack goblins before the adventure can continue, what are you going to do if every PC fails the roll to notice that? Best to not even have the roll at all, but to many DMs who cut their teeth on 3e or later, skipping the roll feels wrong.

Paladin of Redemption. I take the oaths and what paladins can and shouldn’t do seriously, and you need to have the entire party be shaped towards or at least being on board with such a pacifist character. I would barely be on board with that as a player, I wouldn’t ever want to be the cause of it.I see a lot of hatred towards the druid, and mostly for the reason that plagues druids a lot both ways; people see the druid only as the tree-hugging naturefreak. Fighters have thousands of applications, warlocks come in all manners even within the same pact, clerics have plenty of varying ways and quirks, but people cannot see past the fluff description and names of the druid?Everyone: You know that the druid is just as unbound by what the WotC expect them to be as any and all other classes, right? They can be evil forest corruptors, they can be a healer pretending to be a cleric, they can be a fey emissionary, they can be a goblin village shaman that went adventuring, they can be a whole bunch of things.For example my PC Bonesaw. She’s a young girl around age of fourteen year old, made for that three sessions one-shot where one of the players did want to play a pacifist and we made a group like that.Bonesaw is a druid as class but not as appearance and lifestyle, with a great belief in the sanctity of life and being happy. And she doesn’t know where to draw the line in that regard. As long as people survive and/or generate more joy than sadness, then it’s all for the better of the world. She’s a kind and caring nurse and pacifist who’s nothing but sunshine and rainbows when her regular healing spells suffice to save people.But when she starts mending together to people who cannot be healed or otherwise survive, so they can share eachothers working body parts to both live and have a new friend for life, or when she performs a lobotomy on the evil doodooheads to take away their aggression (and all other emotions) without killing them, it becomes clear that the moral limitations of healing and saving people are blurry to this girl.I’m not feeling guilty about that character, though I expected to. The guy who wanted to play a pacifist made a Batman knock-off with the same ‘restrictions’ in morality that killing is forbidden and everything else is fair game.

What are some ‘good things' about 4E? I'd say that's a matter of opinion. Here are some of the things I liked about 4E.Druids & Rangers using ‘Primal' magic instead of ‘Divine'.Making some spells into Rituals (though I didn't always agree on which ones they chose). It increased the utility of spells that were too ‘niche' to be regularly memorized.The ‘Unaligned’ alignment for mindless things like constructs and some undead.4E was the first D&D to fix the problem of the ‘15 minute work day'.While having 30 class levels instead of the usual 20 seemed excessive, it made the determination of Low/Medium/High level easy.It was (comparatively) balanced. This isn't entirely a ‘like'. I appreciate game balance, and strive for it. But it shouldn't be the most important goal in game design. 4E felt like the developers were favoring balance between classes over all other design concerns. They succeeded, but the game suffered for it.Lastly, the best thing about 4E, IMHO, is the Dungeon Master's Guide. I don't like 4E at all. It's the only D&D I have to be talked into playing. But the 4E DMG is the best book I have ever seen for teaching someone how to run an RPG well. Not the best D&D book. The best book of any edition of any game. This book bridges the gap between knowing rules and actually providing a good experience for players and GM alike. I even recommend the 4E DMG to people wanting to run completely different RPGs like Vampire: the Masquerade or Shadowrun, because its advice is just as applicable to those games as well. Really, this book is the best thing WotC has ever published.