With today/yesterday/apparently over a week ago for some guy in Canada. The Adventurer’s Vault was released, hopefully providing a nice supplement to the lack of magical items and various adventuring gear that 4th Edition so desperately needs.

Thanks to a thread on the Gleemax forums, one person in Canada received his book over a week ago, and he was nice enough to answer various questions we common folk had about the new material. Trying to read up on some of the various things that should be introduced, such as the new aclhemy ability, airships, and battle standards.  

Wait.. what? Battle standards? Really? Geez

The only thing that draws to my mind is this, I still remember a when WoW first introduced battle standards. I was told by a friend that they no longer are in the game, so I take his word for it. However, the issue still remains. One of the biggest complaints I hear from so many Dungeon and Dragon fans, outside of there not being enough material yet for them to make the conversion from 2nd/3rd/3.5 to 4th edition, is that it feels so much like a MMO. “Like a table top version of WoW”

I was one of the first adapters to 4th edition, I knew it was a little shaky, and I knew it has some minor flaws. I have yet to disagree with any of the complaints the other people are making However I like the system, not for the simplistic aspect of the new rules. Not for all the things they have done to make it seem more “easy going,” for the most part I just like how they have done the new classes, and races.  It’s complicated getting out of the old mind sets of the older rules, where magical items or certain feats would make or brake your character. You would long for that deadly battle with the dragon, but not so much to see if your group would be able to defeat the dragon, not because you wanted to be the hero to save your group on the brink of destruction, but because you wanted the dragons horde of treasure. With the longing for that new magical item that would allow you to bring pain and misery to your foes that stood before you.

With this new system, magical items are still important, and when you get them, they help define your character, instead of being the very definition of your character. People have stated with the new at will powers they feel like they are playing the Rogue in WoW, just standing there pressing the button for sinister strike, and every now and then pressing the one for eviscerate. I respond, “But in the older versions of D&D, didn’t you still do just that? Instead though you would simple say, “I want to swing at the target?”?

When you look at it in that perspective, it’s still the same thing, and sadly a tad bit boring. If you try to mix it up, pick at-will powers and other abilities that you don’t have to use on every attack, you can feel like you’re doing more. In a way you can alone can help shape the battle. With my current character, I have a level 4 Rogue of awesomeness by the way his name is Shingo, after one of the best Ninjas out there! His goal is to get in, do some damage, move out, and come back in from another angle. However, he has various ways to get out of trouble, and if I see a friend in trouble, I have a few abilities that will help setup a situation so my friend can get away and regroup himself.

The battle standards how ever, I feel like they really are wanting to turn it into a table top mmo. Hopefully with the next book that comes out in November, maybe they can steer it down a path that doesn’t make people think, “Is this a MMO?”