Tabletop RPGs and Skills: Part 2: 'Battle Games'

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition

Like original D&D, AD&D 4e often involves going down dungeons, beating up monsters and taking their treasure. However, 4e is a ‘rules heavy’ game that works differently from original D&D. It uses a ‘battle game’ model where the exact positioning of units, tactical expertise in applying the rules and lengthy combat are generally central to play.

A Gamesmaster (GM) can building storytelling and roleplaying into play but this comes on top of the time spent applying the game’s mechanics. As a result, AD&D 4e suits players who like heroic high fantasy and don’t mind serving an ‘apprenticeship’ while they learn the system’s mechanics.

Dungeons & Dragons Player’s Handbook

There are several ‘core’ books but a player can make do with the Player’s Handbook (PHB). A GM also needs a Dungeon Master’s Guide (DMG) and a Monster Manual (MM). Turning players into GMs can be problematic, because they’ve several hundred pages to get through before getting started on the PHB2, DMG2, MM2, . . .

AD&D 4e has the best ‘shrink-wrapped’ support of any tabletop RPG, with an online subscriptions service, large campaign settings and a cluster of other add-ons. As a result, GMs who are short on time can fall back on ‘off the shelf’ adventures.

Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master’s Guide

The range of skills used when learning the rules and during gameplay include literacy skills and mechanical problem solving. More skills are involved when GMs focus on storytelling and roleplaying elements, but it can easily take a couple of hours to complete a single combat with few opportunities for roleplaying during that time.

AD&D 4e has suffered from a ‘snowball effect’, where there’s pretty much a rule for everything easily imaginable. This can work against the roleplaying side of gameplay, as GMs may become more involved in running the rules rather than interpreting them.

Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual: Roleplaying Game Core Rules, 4th Edition

The same effect also acts on players, who are confined to working within a rules set instead of exploring and developing a set of guidelines. These concerns are apparent from the outset, as players can spend hours simply making a player character before play starts.

There are a great many D&D clones, including Pathfinder and Dragon Age. Pathfinder is the result of a split in AD&D’s audience over the move from AD&D 3.5e to 4e and is a fairly ‘rules heavy’ reworking of AD&D 3.5e. Dragon Age is a tie-in with the Dragon Age: Origins videogame , which puts a more ‘rules medium’ AD&D clone into a ‘dark setting’. Dragon Age’s setting is not that dark really but it is ‘by the numbers’.

Overall, AD&D 4e is a good choice for players who like complex rule sets, elaborate combat and plenty of ‘off the shelf’ support. The game’s skill base focuses on learning to apply rules and putting your own spin on one of the largely pre-defined character classes.