4E Dwarves

[Hurlbut]

I don't know about the others' feelings on them. But so far the background look terrific. And most of all...the art depictions of the dwarf women are just...wow.:biggrin: If I was a dwarf, I would be definately drooling *laughs*

[Crow]

Is there a new article up? Can anyone spoiler it here for those of us who can't view it?

[Hurlbut]

Is there a new article up? Can anyone spoiler it here for those of us who can't view it?Didn't anyone get "Races and Classes" book/pdf?

[Crow]

Some did. I think they should be putting the info out on their site to promote 4e, but that's just me. I won't pay for advertising.

[Gralamin]

Some did. I think they should be putting the info out on their site to promote 4e, but that's just me. I won't pay for advertising.

Do you buy and wear clothes that have a brand name on it, or a band name or anything of the sort? Thats all advertisement.

On topic: I really enjoyed reading the Dwarves section, especially the bit on Clans.

[Leadfeathermcc]

Do you buy and wear clothes that have a brand name on it, or a band name or anything of the sort? Thats all advertisement.

On topic: I really enjoyed reading the Dwarves section, especially the bit on Clans.

I agree with Crow, and I specifically do not buy clothing with logos on it. So neener neener. :smalltongue:

On topic: I have been impressed with the artwork I have seen for 4e, I have no opinion on the crunch as I have not seen any yet.

[Matthew]

I agree with Crow, and I specifically do not buy clothing with logos on it. So neener neener. :smalltongue:

Heh, heh. Nor do I. I don't care what other people buy or wear, but I have no desire to buy this particular book myself.

[Kompera]

Do you buy and wear clothes that have a brand name on it, or a band name or anything of the sort? Thats all advertisement.
Sure, but even if you've got "Nike" splashed across your shirt, it's still a shirt. With "Races and Classes" do you get anything other than fluff designed to sell 4e? In other words, does this material stand alone, or is it purely designed to advertise the arrival of 4e?

[Snooder]

Sure, but even if you've got "Nike" splashed across your shirt, it's still a shirt. With "Races and Classes" do you get anything other than fluff designed to sell 4e? In other words, does this material stand alone, or is it purely designed to advertise the arrival of 4e?

Given the awesome fluff for humans and dwarves, i'd say it does stand alone. It's also a good way to figure out if you need to start tailoring your campaign for 4e and to figure out what to expect.

On the downside, the book, especially the entries on Tieflings and fighters has taken the shine off my longing for 4e.

[bosssmiley]

So, does the Dwarf stuff in the new marketing puff preview book continue the blatant aesthetic rip-off of the LOTR movies displayed by the website preview art? Y/N :smallannoyed:

[kpenguin]

You can download the relevant bit on dwarves here (http://wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4pr/20071218a) along with stuff on 4E clerics.

[KIDS]

Thanks for the link! I'm pleasantly surprised by what I read there :smallsmile:

[Hurlbut]

So, does the Dwarf stuff in the new marketing puff preview book continue the blatant aesthetic rip-off of the LOTR movies displayed by the website preview art? Y/N :smallannoyed: Or you can check it out by going to the link above. I should point out that it doesn't showcase all of the stuff on the dwarves in the "preview" book.

[Emperor Demonking]

It didn't put me off it, but it didn't make me like it either. The runes seem to be pointless as does everything else. It does make me less worried about cheese as it seems like they're putting a lot of effort in it.

[Ralfarius]

Trying to take Dwarves in a more 'accessible' direction is not a bad thing, in my mind. Moving them upward a bit from the mountain halls is an interesting choice, especially with the explanation that they intend to make them more 'believable' as a self-sustaining race. It was always difficult to explain how they could ever thrive if they lacked a solid means of growing food for themselves. Harvesting mushrooms seemed a little lacking for sustaining anything other than a very small colony, and underground cattle was always a wee bit hokey. Being humanoid, if you ask me, means it's not a bad thing to expect them to have similar requirements for life as humans.

Though, I'ma miss darkvision.

[Hurlbut]

Moving them upward a bit from the mountain halls is an interesting choice Well while they are still within the mountain halls, but yeah they will be using areas illuminated and ventilated by outside. Something like you would see in the movie The Lord of the Rings: Fellowships. You see a darkened grand hall but no indication of anything that the dwarves work or lived there specifically until you reached an area illuminated by sunlight or by entrance.

[Citizen Joe]

It didn't put me off it, but it didn't make me like it either. The runes seem to be pointless as does everything else.
I was bothered by the serifs on the runes. Assuming dwarves still have mad skillz with stone and metal, their writing should be easily etchable on stone and metal. Those little added bits of serif are rather hard to carve into stone.

[SilverClawShift]

Wouldn't that be the point though? Dwarven runes could be a pain in the butt to carve into metal or stone, because they're good enough to do it in a way other races would have marked difficulty with. A dwarf could tell an elfs rune-work by the way they messed up the seriffs in the lay of the stone.
Not to mention, struggle breeds strength. The more difficult something is to do, the better you are by the time you master it. Dwarven children learning dwarven rune-carving would become masters of stonework by the time they learned such intricate detailing.

[Citizen Joe]

I'm not saying that they aren't skilled enough to do it, it is just that the runes need to be simple enough for day to day usage or their entire history would fall apart because it would take too long to write it down.

Maybe those are slightly stylized runes on that file, but I think the stock runes really need to be pretty straight forward and (relatively) easy to carve.

[Talya]

I like this better than their other changes so far.

[SurlySeraph]

On the subject of dwarves, I saw some stuff posted on the WotC forums about Duergar in 4E. Apparently they've decided to make Duergar less like "Drow, except dwarves" by removing their original special abilities, making them all descended from devils, and generally scrapping pretty much all the existing fluff. Plus, another post on the changes to Forgotten Realms in 4E said that both Duergar racial deities (Laduguer and Deep Duerra) get killed.

Does this anger anyone other than me?

[Talya]

On the subject of dwarves, I saw some stuff posted on the WotC forums about Duergar in 4E. Apparently they've decided to make Duergar less like "Drow, except dwarves" by removing their original special abilities, making them all descended from devils, and generally scrapping pretty much all the existing fluff. Plus, another post on the changes to Forgotten Realms in 4E said that both Duergar racial deities (Laduguer and Deep Duerra) get killed.

Does this anger anyone other than me?

*sighs*

I wish those idiots would leave the Realms alone, fluffwise. Sure, change all the rules for 4e, but don't mess with realms history.

[Inyssius Tor]

I don't see how it's related. At all. Didn't the Realms go through this kind of thing before?

[Citizen Joe]

I don't see how it's related. At all. Didn't the Realms go through this kind of thing before?

Repeatedly... Or perhaps constantly...

I didn't think 4E was realms specific. I.e. they are making up a whole new world so as to avoid conflicts like that.

[Talya]

Repeatedly... Or perhaps constantly...

I didn't think 4E was realms specific. I.e. they are making up a whole new world so as to avoid conflicts like that.

The Realms go through history changes...it's a dynamic setting where even the gods change at times. That's fine--I'm okay with killing the Duergar gods, for example. What I cannot tolerate are retcons.

[Citizen Joe]

Maybe the Duergar gods were killed long ago and demons were posing as them. And only now is the truth revealed.

[Talya]

Maybe the Duergar gods were killed long ago and demons were posing as them. And only now is the truth revealed.

Fancy Retconning is more tolerable, but still ugly.

And it would be devils. Duergar are LE.

[puppyavenger]

Do dwarves and elves still have a strange animosity?

[Citizen Joe]

I'm not sure if dwarves and elves ever had a canonical animosity.

[Ralfarius]

I'm not sure if dwarves and elves ever had a canonical animosity.
Yeah, it's not really something that's very prevalent. In most settings, its sort of accepted that dwarves and elves don't get along well - with the exception of dwarf and elf adventuring companions. A general xenophobia should be expected between cultures which are so different, but unless you're talking like, Warhammer, there's not too often some sort of conflict of ages past that makes the races always at odds with one another.

[Charity]

I'm not sure if dwarves and elves ever had a canonical animosity.

AD&D PHB p18, racial prererances table - Antipathy between dwarves and elves.

[Citizen Joe]

OK, there we go... at least it isn't hatred. I've seen definitions of antipathy where the dislike is irrational, so that way nobody has to give a reason for why they dislike each other.

[Talya]

Elves and Dwarves are generally very very different in ideals (Chaotic vs. Lawful), tastes (forests and trees vs. caves and stone), and temperment (peaceful and introspective vs. brawling drinkers). It only makes sense that they wouldn't really be friendly. When it comes down to basic good-vs.-evil morality, however, they're generally on the same side, which is why they have rarely gone to war in most settings; they even will back each other up, they just aren't really likely to be drinking buddies.

Except for adventurers, of course.

[Sebastian]

I'm am the only one that find this "everything must turn around the PCs" a little annoying? I mean, I don't say you must go out of your way to make things harder for the PCs but the priority should go to make a setting believable, while in 4e that seem to be a secondary concern, just look at the cleric PDf, the gods are not immortal and all knowing because it make harder to use them in adventures (?), the PC must be able to kill and replace gods at high levels (:smallsigh:), and the worst part of it, only gods that make sense for adventurers have a right to exist. And you can see in a lot of other places, too. from cosmology change to races, so I ask, someone else is bothered by this attitude or it is just me?

[Talya]

I'm am the only one that find this "everything must turn around the PCs" a little annoying? I mean, I don't say you must go out of your qay to make things harder for the PCs but the priority should go to make a setting believable while in 4e that seem to be a secondary concern, just look at the cleric PDf, the gods are not immortal and all knowing because it make harder to use them in adventures (?), the PC must be able to kill and replace gods at high levels (:smallsigh:), and the worst part of it, only gods that make sense for adventurers have a right to exist. And you can see in a lot of other places, too. from cosmology change to races, so I ask, someone else is bothered by this attitude or it is just me?

Yes.

Don't fix what isn't broken.

[DrummingDM]

Apparently they've decided to make Duergar less like "Drow, except dwarves" by removing their original special abilities, making them all descended from devils, and generally scrapping pretty much all the existing fluff. I believe I saw some info on ENWorld stating that the Duergar were allied with/enslaved by devils, not descended from them. This would fit with the fluff from Races & Classes about many of Moradin's creations seeking alternate "divine" support when it seemed like Moradin turned his back on them. They specifically mention Azers and Galeb-dur, I think, but the Duergar/Devil thing certainly fits.

[Mewtarthio]

They're just trying to keep options open. How often in mythology do you see gods descending and sending mortals on quests? That doesn't work with an all-knowing, all-powerful, active deity. If the quest is something they need done, they can just do it themselves; if it's a "proof of loyalty," they'd already know everything they need. Just about the only reason they'd have to do such a thing would be for the mortal's sake, whether to teach him/her a lesson or to help him/her achieve some sort of destiny. When that happens to literary characters, we call it "cliched plot device." When that happens to PCs, we call it "railroading."

[Talya]

They're just trying to keep options open. How often in mythology do you see gods descending and sending mortals on quests? That doesn't work with an all-knowing, all-powerful, active deity. If the quest is something they need done, they can just do it themselves; if it's a "proof of loyalty," they'd already know everything they need. Just about the only reason they'd have to do such a thing would be for the mortal's sake, whether to teach him/her a lesson or to help him/her achieve some sort of destiny. When that happens to literary characters, we call it "cliched plot device." When that happens to PCs, we call it "railroading."


It's more the fluff that bugs me, from the standpoint of the gods needing to make sense for the PCs. This isn't much of a change for FR. FR deities are neither incapable of being killed, nor all-powerful. Their omniscience is of a limited sort, revolving around their portfolios. They are also forbidden from directly interfering on the prime material, instead they must go through personal agents (adventurers and NPCs.)

[Kioran]

I'm am the only one that find this "everything must turn around the PCs" a little annoying? I mean, I don't say you must go out of your qay to make things harder for the PCs but the priority should go to make a setting believable while in 4e that seem to be a secondary concern, just look at the cleric PDf, the gods are not immortal and all knowing because it make harder to use them in adventures (?), the PC must be able to kill and replace gods at high levels (:smallsigh:), and the worst part of it, only gods that make sense for adventurers have a right to exist. And you can see in a lot of other places, too. from cosmology change to races, so I ask, someone else is bothered by this attitude or it is just me?

No, it isn´t just you, but it´s the relfection of an attitude that has become more prevalent these days - to my overall chagrin. 4th Ed. is for these people. It probably isn´t for me.

[Morty]

I'm am the only one that find this "everything must turn around the PCs" a little annoying? I mean, I don't say you must go out of your qay to make things harder for the PCs but the priority should go to make a setting believable while in 4e that seem to be a secondary concern, just look at the cleric PDf, the gods are not immortal and all knowing because it make harder to use them in adventures (?), the PC must be able to kill and replace gods at high levels (:smallsigh:), and the worst part of it, only gods that make sense for adventurers have a right to exist. And you can see in a lot of other places, too. from cosmology change to races, so I ask, someone else is bothered by this attitude or it is just me?

It's not just you. It bugs me as well, though to be fair it's not exclusive to 4ed.
While I understand gods being just more powerful humans -that's just certain style- limiting gods to those whose clerics are likely to go around adventuring makes no sense. Also, even gods not being omnipotent aren't explained by matters of style or preference, but because PCs are apparently supposed to interact with them.

[Citizen Joe]

I think that one of the rules about the Mortal Realm is that gods are not allowed to directly interfere with it. Gods have dominion over their own Realm and their followers but not their enemies. Thus, if a god wants something done in the mortal realm, they have to go through their faithful.

If the gods DON'T play by these rules, then the Mortal Realm would collapse in the ensuing god war.

[Mewtarthio]

I think that one of the rules about the Mortal Realm is that gods are not allowed to directly interfere with it. Gods have dominion over their own Realm and their followers but not their enemies. Thus, if a god wants something done in the mortal realm, they have to go through their faithful.

If the gods DON'T play by these rules, then the Mortal Realm would collapse in the ensuing god war.

Fair enough.

I'm not sure I understand the complaints about 4e being "designed around PCs." They are, after all, making a game that's designed to be fun to play in. If they cut out save-or-die spells, for instance, that would also be a decision made solely to make the game more fun for people who don't like dropping dead at random, but I don't think people would make the same arguments.

[Talya]

I'm not sure I understand the complaints about 4e being "designed around PCs." They are, after all, making a game that's designed to be fun to play in.

3.x is already fun to play in. There are things that need fixing, but they do not need a complete design philosophy change.

Let's face it, 4e isn't being written because WotC wants to make a better game. It's being written for one rea$on, and one rea$on alone. For that matter, 2e wasn't going to keep making Wizards a lot of money after they purchased TSR, the market was already saturated. That's why 3e came out. 3.5 appeared to be a legitimate attempt to fix some issues in 3e (which it did, to a small degree.) Now that 3.5 is utterly saturated with a billion splatbooks, the well of new ideas for that ruleset has dried up, new books are getting stale. It's time to put out a new system and start the cycle all over again...


I don't begrudge them that, (capitalism is good!) but I'm certainly not giving them any money for it. (Not like I actually paid them anything for 3.x, either, mind you.)

[Talya]

Oh, and on the main rea$on for many of their changes:

Making Forgotten Realms the new "Living Setting" seems to me to be just a good way to end it and to allow WotC to stop giving Ed Greenwood any more money.

[Thinker]

3.x is already fun to play in. There are things that need fixing, but they do not need a complete design philosophy change.

Let's face it, 4e isn't being written because WotC wants to make a better game. It's being written for one rea$on, and one rea$on alone. For that matter, 2e wasn't going to keep making Wizards a lot of money after they purchased TSR, the market was already saturated. That's why 3e came out. 3.5 appeared to be a legitimate attempt to fix some issues in 3e (which it did, to a small degree.) Now that 3.5 is utterly saturated with a billion splatbooks, the well of new ideas for that ruleset has dried up, new books are getting stale. It's time to put out a new system and start the cycle all over again...


I don't begrudge them that, (capitalism is good!) but I'm certainly not giving them any money for it. (Not like I actually paid them anything for 3.x, either, mind you.)

So with the market being saturated and your feelings that 3.5e was 'good enough' what should WoTC have done? Should they have said "Alright fellas, good gaming. That's a wrap! You can all go home now, we're done here." Or maybe this would be better: "Now that we have nothing left to produce we'll just rephrase stuff we've already said in the past, making things more convoluted by using different phraseology."

The other direction would have been to churn out lots of campaign settings, but that would split their market up and most campaign settings are covered. After a few months things would just feel like Forgotten Realms IX, Eberron Light, Middle Earth: The Really Old Days, etc.

[Mewtarthio]

Capatalist concerns aside, there is still the fact that they are making a new game and a new campaign world. That's a fact, and they're not going back on it. Given that we've got a new design team that's basically creating a world similar to classic DnD, there are going to be some changes. However, this world will inevitably revolve around the PCs, but that's not a bad thing. 4e is marketed towards people who want to play in a world in which singularly powerful individuals (such as PCs and BBEGs) weild a lot of influence.

[Talya]

So with the market being saturated and your feelings that 3.5e was 'good enough' what should WoTC have done? Should they have said "Alright fellas, good gaming. That's a wrap! You can all go home now, we're done here." Or maybe this would be better: "Now that we have nothing left to produce we'll just rephrase stuff we've already said in the past, making things more convoluted by using different phraseology."


I don't begrudge them that, (capitalism is good!) but I'm certainly not giving them any money for it.

From a business standpoint, I am not qualified to rate their choices. If 4e is wildly popular, whether or not I like it, it was a good thing. If it bombs, they likely should have had a different design philosophy.

I personally would have preferred more of a 3.6 than a complete rewrite. I like 3e rules, I'd just like a few of the imbalances sorted out. And leave the existing campaign setting fluff alone!




The other direction would have been to churn out lots of campaign settings, but that would split their market up and most campaign settings are covered. After a few months things would just feel like Forgotten Realms IX, Eberron Light, Middle Earth: The Really Old Days, etc.

My suspicion is that WotC has already realized their mistake, too late into development of 4e for it to matter, that the big money is in publishing adventures, not constant rule updates and splat books. There is less overhead, and you can churn them out a lot faster.

[Citizen Joe]

My suspicion is that WotC has already realized their mistake, too late into development of 4e for it to matter, that the big money is in publishing adventures, not constant rule updates and splat books. There is less overhead, and you can churn them out a lot faster.

Any Hack can make up unbalanced rules. It takes writers to make a decent adventure. That takes creativity and doesn't really lend itself to churning stuff out.

[Tren]

I personally would have preferred more of a 3.6 than a complete rewrite. I like 3e rules, I'd just like a few of the imbalances sorted out. And leave the existing campaign setting fluff alone!

There's nothing preventing you from continuing to play in 3.X if you prefer, but Wizards as a company owes it to their employees and their stockholders to continue to make money (and to their fans to continue to make products they want to buy). Another patch to third edition-- 3.6, 3.75, 3.822222 repeating-- would not likely go over well with a fanbase that was already a bit miffed about having to buy the core 3 again just a few years ago. If I'm going to have to shell out another $100, I'd rather it be a fresh new system that's fun than a patch job to an existing system (granted one that still works just fine).


My suspicion is that WotC has already realized their mistake, too late into development of 4e for it to matter, that the big money is in publishing adventures, not constant rule updates and splat books. There is less overhead, and you can churn them out a lot faster.

I wholeheartedly agree to that. I started playing in 3E and I wanted the chance to play through some of those famous adventures I read about like Ravenloft and Tomb of Horrors, but those were only updated very late in the product cycle. And the published adventures new to 3.X were few and far between. My group doesn't usually have a consistent DM because none of us have the time. If we had more pre-fab adventures to use though you can bet we'd be playing more often (and buying more WotC products).

[Draz74]

I'm am the only one that find this "everything must turn around the PCs" a little annoying? I mean, I don't say you must go out of your way to make things harder for the PCs but the priority should go to make a setting believable, while in 4e that seem to be a secondary concern, just look at the cleric PDf, the gods are not immortal and all knowing because it make harder to use them in adventures (?), the PC must be able to kill and replace gods at high levels (:smallsigh:), and the worst part of it, only gods that make sense for adventurers have a right to exist. And you can see in a lot of other places, too. from cosmology change to races, so I ask, someone else is bothered by this attitude or it is just me?

On the one hand, yes, this attitude bugs me a little.

On the other hand, I don't think it's really a 4E thing. So many things about the D&D world have never made sense outside of an adventurer context -- the Pantheon of deities has always been that way, and it's not as big of an offender as the ecology and the economy.

They're just finally admitting that these worlds are unrealisitcally adventuro-centric. That's not a bad thing. (Although a game that actually made the adventurers feel like a small part of a verisimilar world would be even better.)

[Fhaolan]

My suspicion is that WotC has already realized their mistake, too late into development of 4e for it to matter, that the big money is in publishing adventures, not constant rule updates and splat books. There is less overhead, and you can churn them out a lot faster.

Unfortunately, that's been proven wrong before. According to market research done during the TSR era (specifically 2nd edition), modules consistantly underperformed relative to splatbooks by a significant ratio.

According to my source, the explanation that TSR came up with for the statistics ran like this: 'Every DM has, on average, 4 or so players. While only the DMs should be purchasing modules, every player tends to purchase the splatbooks to have their own copy.' By that logic, for every module sold, you're likely to sell five or so splatbooks. Which pretty much matches what the market statistics was showing.

Now, it's entirely possible the market has changed since then, I don't know.

If you cast your eyes around the entire RPG market, D&D is one of the few RPGs that has adventure modules like that at all. The other games tend to sell splatbooks with multiple adventure ideas, paths, etc. Meaning that the book contains multiple 'modules', plus supporting material such as new items/equipment, new skill/advantage/disadvantage/feat/whatever you want to call them, new whatever. Stuff that makes it attractive to the players to own as well as the game masters.

[Sebastian]

On the one hand, yes, this attitude bugs me a little.

On the other hand, I don't think it's really a 4E thing. So many things about the D&D world have never made sense outside of an adventurer context -- the Pantheon of deities has always been that way, and it's not as big of an offender as the ecology and the economy.

They're just finally admitting that these worlds are unrealisitcally adventuro-centric. That's not a bad thing. (Although a game that actually made the adventurers feel like a small part of a verisimilar world would be even better.)

Maybe you are right, but I think that this admiting part make a bigger difference than they thought, or at least to me it does. the 2nd edition setting weren't so unbeliavable to me, sure there was some weird point, (like the dungeons sprinkeld everywhere for example) but they seemed to at least try to come up with some explanation, now seem they have stopped trying, things are like that because we need it like that to make the game works. If there is something that don't make sense is because a wizard did it.

[Talya]

Unfortunately, that's been proven wrong before. According to market research done during the TSR era (specifically 2nd edition), modules consistantly underperformed relative to splatbooks by a significant ratio.

According to my source, the explanation that TSR came up with for the statistics ran like this: 'Every DM has, on average, 4 or so players. While only the DMs should be purchasing modules, every player tends to purchase the splatbooks to have their own copy.' By that logic, for every module sold, you're likely to sell five or so splatbooks. Which pretty much matches what the market statistics was showing.

Now, it's entirely possible the market has changed since then, I don't know.


It just seems to me they've suddenly realized it's profitable and have started releasing new adventures like mad...there weren't any for a while, then during the last year or so they released new ones every month.

[Tren]

I don't think giving the gods limitations makes the setting "unrealistic", it's just a recalibration of the verisimilitude. I don't see limited gods, even gods capable of being killed as any stranger than anything out of Greek mythology. I don't even think this is any different from 3E. All the god's had different levels of power, and they weren't some omniscient force, they had guidelines for how their abilities worked. Also, once characters reached epic levels at 20+, the gods became fair game. Part of the difference in 4E is that those epic levels are being incorporated into the core rules and more streamlined with the rest of the system. I don't see this as being any kind of departure from 3E, it's almost exactly the same.

[Hurlbut]

*Brandishes his club* We are getting off topic here; This thread is supposed to be about dwarves and sub races (duergars) in 4E. :smallannoyed:

[Talya]

*Brandishes his club* We are getting off topic here; This thread is supposed to be about dwarves and sub races (duergars) in 4E. :smallannoyed:

I figure most of the changes are a result of a strike by the workshop gnomes who write the WotC books...hence why gnomes have been removed from 4.0 as a core race, and why dwarves are suddenly so much cooler.

[EvilElitest]

*sighs*

I wish those idiots would leave the Realms alone, fluffwise. Sure, change all the rules for 4e, but don't mess with realms history.

seconded, most of the gods of FR have been killed off sadly


I also feel their moving away from what made dwarves dwarves, namely living underground and seeing in the dark.

however, female dwarves are a good changed



I'm am the only one that find this "everything must turn around the PCs" a little annoying? I mean, I don't say you must go out of your way to make things harder for the PCs but the priority should go to make a setting believable, while in 4e that seem to be a secondary concern, just look at the cleric PDf, the gods are not immortal and all knowing because it make harder to use them in adventures (?), the PC must be able to kill and replace gods at high levels (), and the worst part of it, only gods that make sense for adventurers have a right to exist. And you can see in a lot of other places, too. from cosmology change to races, so I ask, someone else is bothered by this attitude or it is just me?
ug, i hate this phisophy more than anything else. The idea that the PCs are automatically better than the NPCs from the get go is just hubris. PCs should live in the world, not make the world


from,
EE

[Matthew]

It just seems to me they've suddenly realized it's profitable and have started releasing new adventures like mad...there weren't any for a while, then during the last year or so they released new ones every month.

I think that was more of a 'hole filler' than a new direction. At the time, I thought it was going to be a much longer run (like 2-3 years), but it seems that they still consider rule books more profitable (and are probably right). From what I ave heard, the high quality production values on Wizards' D&D adventures really bit into the D20 market and damaged some of the third party publishers. However, as far as I understand it, only Good Man Games and a couple of other companies have managed to turn any significant profits on producing adventure modules.

[Mewtarthio]

ug, i hate this phisophy more than anything else. The idea that the PCs are automatically better than the NPCs from the get go is just hubris. PCs should live in the world, not make the world.

As I said above, it doesn't really feel like that's how they're going. Changes like making the Dwarves more accessible aren't to make the world spin around PCs so much as they are to make the world spin around powerful characters. Sure, your PCs can now break into the Dwarven Hall of Gold and steal the Scepter of the Earth King, but so can powerful NPCs. They mention PCs in the article because, let's face it, most DMs are looking for plot hooks.

[Citizen Joe]

I've suggested this elsewhere, but due to players being able to get their greedy mitts on anything published, I would like to see adventures published in such a manner that reading it won't give away the ending. So, instead of Baron VonBadass being the bad guy, he MIGHT be the bad guy... or it might be a host of three or more other suspects. The treasure you're seeking MIGHT be in this dungeon or possibly this other guy has it. That way the GM has a bigger hand to play in the adventure rather than just reading the boxed text, and any cheating Players will find that things aren't as they expected.