4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons Information
GenCon 2007 is a pretty noisy place, filled with RPG hawkers selling their wares and dozens of companies bringing out new products to compete for the disposable income and free time of the world’s most dedicated gamers. For all the noise and hype generated at the show, however, the undisputed 900-pound gorilla in the room is Wizards of the Coast. With its twin towers of paper-based gaming (Magic: the Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons), the Washington-based game company rules this place like the priest-king of one of its fantasy kingdoms. This year, the king dropped a bombshell. D&D, the venerable godfather of role-playing games, would be bringing out a new edition. We sat down with WotC R&D Director Bill Slaviscek to discuss the new game and how the three-decade old game is getting ready to compete in a world seemingly ruled by electronic entertainment — by taking back some of what it’s always given away.
“We’ve spent eight years gathering feedback on 3rd edition,” Slaviscek said as we sit down in the Wizards booth on GenCon’s show floor. “We’ve figured out what works and what doesn’t. D&D 4th Edition is our way of fixing what doesn’t work and taking what does work and making it better.” Many of the elements he discusses that are being worked on in the new game sound remarkably familiar to anyone who plays an MMO — complaints of unbalanced classes, games that take too long to play and unclear and arcane rules that keep everyone from getting to the good stuff, fighting monsters, looting treasure, playing their roles and generally having a good time.
Indeed, many of the new game’s solutions sound like they come straight out of the video game world, particularly the massively multiplayer world and the digital version of the very game being discussed. One the game’s new innovations, for example is an attempt to create more defined class roles so that every class has something to do in combat and every class has unique powers to do it with. They’re also bringing out new power-sources for spell-casting classes that will give them more options than just setting up camp for the night when the cleric or the mage runs out of spells. Indeed, the classic “fire and forget” spell-casting system first devised by Gary Gygax based on the work of Jack Vance is often one of the first things video-game developers do away with in RPGs. Slaviscek doesn’t deny the influence of video games on the direction of the new edition; he just says that the development team drew inspiration from all over the gaming world in addition to their own discussions with players.
While the new rules and the new books (the three “Core books” will be available in 2008) are the heart of this new initiative, the 4th edition will have aspects that go far beyond merely paper-and-pencil and the kitchen table. Wizards of the Coast is embracing the online world in a big way with the launch of 4th Edition. While there are several new elements that fall under this digital program including a couple of software programs, they all fall under the name “D&D Insider.”
D&D Insider will be a subscription-based program (”it’ll cost more than a cup of coffee but less than an MMO,” Slaviscek said when asked about price) that aims to do for the real Dungeons & Dragons what legions of MMOs can only simulate — bring the true Dungeons & Dragons experience online. “Part of the reason this is so exciting is that it will give players new ways to connect with one another, allowing them to get a D&D game together whenever their lifestyle permits,” Slaviscek said. In certain ways, D&D Insider is a logical extension of “D&D Alumni.” This is a program designed to get people who stopped playing Dungeons & Dragons because they got jobs, kids, mortgages and the other trappings of real life that kept them from having the free time to devote to the game.
The first part of D&D Insider is a new piece of software called “D&D Tabletop.” This is a piece of software that places on screen a digital representation of the tiled table top on which D&D miniatures are placed. Players can create their own dungeons, walls and obstacle representations. There are also digital representations of miniatures that the Dungeon Master can move around, dice rolling utilities, experience point calculators, voice chat and facilities for players to move their own character miniatures around. The only thing missing is artificial intelligence and this is entirely deliberate. Slaviscek is quick to point out that D&D Tabletop is not a game in and of itself. It’s a tool, a utility that allows people to play the game with a real-live Dungeon Master across the Internet or a useful thing for a real-world group to use on a laptop around a real kitchen table.
Other elements consist of enhanced digital components attached to real-world books. When a player purchases a physical book, they’ll also be able to get a code that gives them an e-version of the books that can be placed within their own private space within Insider. This digital content will be continually updated with addendums and new materials that will then be added to the digital versions of the books they own. There will also be a “character creator” software tool. Again seemingly inspired by MMO character creation tools, players of 4th Edition will be able to create a virtual character and character sheet, adjust their appearance, equip them with what they’re actually wearing, pose them any way they like and import them into the D&D Tabletop. Slaviscek expects this to be a huge hit among players. “You can finally have a miniature that looks like your character rather than a close approximation.”
The company is also bringing their successful pair of magazines, “Dungeon” and “Dragon” into the online space. They’re promising that both will be much more useful since they can now be updated with new material every few days. The material they offer will also be more in-depth with more long-form material because the editors no longer have to worry about word counts. At the end of each month, the entire updated contents will also be packaged up as a digital download and offered for sale to non-subscribers.
Finally, the company is using their Gleemax initiative to power the back-end on the entire program. Gleemax is the company’s oddly named attempt to create a social networking hub for table-top gamers. The site’s features run the gamut from standard social networking tools such as friends’ lists and personal blogs to game-specific tools such as a scheduling and calendar package, universal d20 character sheets and specialized content for specific types of games such as tabletop miniatures and collectible card games. While the Gleemax site itself is game-neutral, the company is planning on stressing the links between the Insider software packages and the services available from Gleemax.
While the specifics of the 4th Edition rule set will undoubtedly cause plenty of arguments among D&D fans (there were more than a few boos among the claps at the official unveiling), the power of what the company is attempting can’t be denied. In a world that’s busier than ever, one of the reasons people turn to video games as a source of entertainment is because of their convenience factor. Online multiplayer games in particular offer the benefits of social activity for time-pressed people who may not have the time to dedicate to a deliberate gaming experience. D&D 4th Edition is nothing less than an attempt by Wizards of the Coast to bring some of that ease-of-use and convenience to the granddaddy of all time-sinks. “This is about bringing Dungeons & Dragons to the people,” Slaviscek says as we conclude our conversation. “We want them to be able to play wherever, whenever and however they want to.”
From Gamespy
