Heroic Tier: I'm a fighter, a soldier in the armies of Furyondy
Paragon Tier: I am a cavalier, an experienced veteran of the battlefield. My loyal mount and I have crossed the plains of the Shield Lands against the evil Empire of Iuz.
Epic Tier: I am the Knight Commander of the Crown, royal champion of the King of Furyondy, in battle I am his honorable right hand, and my foes will tremble when they hear the hoofbeats of my mighty stead.
basically a design principle of 4e is not only should your power level go up as you level up, so should your prestige and general bad-assedness
This is something that some people will not like, others will, but might as well get it out of the way:
Because the game goes up to 30th level now and epic-play is built in, the Gods are, by default, more approachable and even defeatable.
When you are a 27th level epic shitkicker, it is possible for you and your party to take down gods. Even become gods, possibly.
Obviously, this isn't appropriate for all settings. The gods of Eberron are distant, unapproachable, even possibly non-existant. The gods of Faerun, however, are often ascended mortals who got that way by killing the god who used to hold that position, so it definitely fits there.
Points of Light exists essentially as a series of proper nouns and racial histories. It's deity names and place names, for the most part. For example, the ancient empire that fell due to infernal pacts was named Bael Turath. They were at war with the Dragonborn empire of Arkhosia. Eventually, both empires fell from their war, and now both races are scattered into smaller settlements.
Stuff like that.
There's no "world map" for the Points of Light setting, or even a name for the world. Only certain cities, nations, dungeons have names, and their geographic locations are left intentionally vague.
If my schedule allows, and it probably won't, I'd love to take part in the 4E test run. I'll try out the cleric, and see if it really has moved away from "heal-bot".
If my schedule allows, and it probably won't, I'd love to take part in the 4E test run. I'll try out the cleric, and see if it really has moved away from "heal-bot".
It has.
Every class can now self-heal, so they aren't reliant on the cleric for healing
What the cleric is is a "buff machine". They're a Leader class, so they've got buffs, and they can do stuff like enable their partymembers to have extra attacks and stuff.
I play with a group of players that, no matter what the intended objective of a campaign is, turns to evil and begins randomly slaughtering people that "get in their way."
I blame this partly on the fact that they're military and partly on the TV programming they were brought up on. Obviously, bad parenting fits in somewhere. Because there's always room for fuck-up parents.
4e isn't "edgier," it's simply removing complicating factors. Law vs Chaos? Outside of a demi-plane or home plane aligned with one of those two ideals, it never came up in normal gameplay. So why not remove it? It's not going to change how a character is role-played. My Cleric of Hoar isn't suddenly going to go "Hm, I think I'll randomly slaughter people because I have no obligation to lawfulness any more." He'll continue to slaughter people in the name of vengeance and inflict a poetic justice on those who have wronged someone in some way. Of course, he probably won't be the engine of destruction he was under 3e rules, but I can deal.
Most of the people who dislike 4e are acting under some really, really stupid assumptions.
Assumption #1: Wizards of the Coast isn't a business, it's a benevolent caretaker to my favorite hobby. Are you fucking retarded? Do you realize I own stock in Hasbro? If WotC isn't a business, they owe me some damn money.
Assumption #2: Change doesn't happen (to me). Wake up, assmaster! Change happens all the time. Every time you find a really great exploit in a game, someone's going to let someone else know, and sooner or later that exploit will get closed down.
Assumption #3: New clearly means worse. Okay, you know, I can't immediately berate you for thinking this. With WotC this was true for a long time, but it appears they're trying to make up for a series of monstrous mistakes by producing quality work that isn't immediately twistable into a munchkin's wet dream.
Assumption #4: 3e is better. 3e was a steaming pile of turd shat out by a circle-jerk full of retards who like to bury their heads up their asses. It was, quite possibly, the most successful triangle scheme (read: pyramid scheme for the depth perception-impaired) ever, but was by no means 'better' than anything else on the market. Except FATAL. Nobody can apologize enough for or explain FATAL. Stop poking that dead horse.
I'm sure there are more assumptions, but these are the ones I see most often. Many hardcore 3e players are rocking themselves back and forth, knees clutched to chest bawling for the loss of their munchkin's paradise, but they had to realize that the gravy train was coming to an end. Mostly, they're in denial. Everyone else is inexplicably mentally handicapped.
ardent you got some downright disagreeable opinions mister.
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Kane Red RobeMaster of MagicArcanusRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
Can I likewise put down my name as being interested in your game Incen? I haven't played D&D much, mostly due to lack of anyone willing to play it with me, but I have nonetheless been getting some decent roleplaying experience over the years. I'll look over Races and Classes next time I'm at work and see what I'd be interested in playing, though my gut suggests a wizard.
Most of the people who dislike 4e are acting under some really, really stupid assumptions.
I'm in the Assumption #5 camp - the design of 4e is creatively bankrupt.
So far I haven't seen one genuniely new idea, lots of stuff is being changed just for change's sake, and their rationale (you can read it for just $20) for dropping gnomes looks precisely like the sort of half-arsed excuse you'd hear in a presidential press conference.
None of the new races or race revisions scream out at me that there is anything to be excited about there.
The classes we know less about, so I'll be interested to see how they are applied.
There is a lot to be said about taking other peoples new ideas and making it right. Not that Star Wars Saga Edition wasnt made by Wizards and nor was the Tome of Battle. Or DnD at all.
Oh wait, these were their original ideas and being better than the current ideas, WOTC had the bright idea to combine them and make DnD better.
Everything i have heard about 4e except dragonborn[and the online tools/program, but that is another issue] has made me happy as a roleplayer.
Dropping Gnomes isnt a big deal. Im sure they will be harder to add than a race in 3.5, but still, its a single race that was likely dropped because no-one played them. At least, not often. More often you get stories of people playing things out of the MM than Gnomes. I never liked stuff out of the MM because it always seemed exotic for the sake of being exotic[I.E. people choosing it because it was exotic], but hey, i can just use a race from the PHB. And oh hey, now that its more easily cannonized its not really exotic for the sake of being exotic anymore!
Hell, i bet we eventually get fleshed out info for Gnomes, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Orcs, Gnolls, and Kolbolds. Ive grown to love these types of characters, but oh noes they arent in the PHB whatever will I do?!?!?!
Yeah, I'd love to see kobolds as a playable race in core. Won't happen, but hey. Supposedly Warforged will be in the MM1 along with gnomes, half-orcs, and drow, so from the outset we'll be able to play them at the beginning of 4th.
Nice to be able to talk about 4th Edition without the monkey screeching you see on ENworld or RPG.net.
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The fuck are they doing with the pantheon? On that WOTC forum, I'm seeing shit about several Gods being wiped out and Corellon will take over the magic portofolio? Also, they're pushing towards a pantheon of no race specific deities. I read the Grand History of the Realms when it came out so I know what happens to Helm and Mystra, but some of this stuff going on now seems like a push to really simplify the pantheon overall.
Most of the people who dislike 4e are acting under some really, really stupid assumptions.
I'm in the Assumption #5 camp - the design of 4e is creatively bankrupt.
So far I haven't seen one genuniely new idea, lots of stuff is being changed just for change's sake, and their rationale (you can read it for just $20) for dropping gnomes looks precisely like the sort of half-arsed excuse you'd hear in a presidential press conference.
None of the new races or race revisions scream out at me that there is anything to be excited about there.
The classes we know less about, so I'll be interested to see how they are applied.
Man fuck gnomes, the reasons given in races and classes for their removal from the phb are absolutely spot on. They aren't, and with the exception of dragonlance never have been, unique or necessary. Keeping them around just because they've been there since 1st or what the fuck ever is stupid.
As for lot's of stuff being changed for change's sake, I disagree. From a purely rules perspective, they have yet to unveil a change that I thought wasn't better. Races being significantly more important? Check. All classes being given the tools to function in their "role," without diminishing the capacity of said classes to branch out into other areas? Check. Getting new things at every level? Check. Combat and skill systems all streamlined to make play faster? Check.
I mean really, everyone has different opinions (I for one found the dragonborn fluff interesting and will now probably play a dragonborn paladin as my first character). But saying things are being changed just for the sake of change is just silly.
The fuck are they doing with the pantheon? On that WOTC forum, I'm seeing shit about several Gods being wiped out and Corellon will take over the magic portofolio? Also, they're pushing towards a pantheon of no race specific deities. I read the Grand History of the Realms when it came out so I know what happens to Helm and Mystra, but some of this stuff going on now seems like a push to really simplify the pantheon overall.
Yes, no race specific pantheons in the core setting. Corellon is now the god of magic instead of just being the Elf god (though he still made Elves). Same deal for Moradin who has become the god of industry. Other changes include Bahamut and Tiamat being the 2 halves of Io who was split by a primordial in the war between primordials and the Gods.
As an aside, as much as I like the new Tiefling fluff, I am still generally bothered by them being a direct marketing ploy to appeal to middle class 13 year olds with abandonment issues and a hot topic gift card. They basically come out and say it straight out in races and classes. On the other hand, they are already about 3 times cooler than Drow ever were, so if the option to stop the silly pandering to those people was going to be ignored, at least the new guys are moderately better.
They should have dropped halflings instead of gnomes. I mean, I never use either, but I simply do not trust anyone who would play as a halfling. Plus, at least gnomes have a folklore basis, halflings are straight out of tolkien.
Also, Ardent needs to chill. You play too much WoW, methinks.
I kind of wish they were Planescape tieflings, with matching DiTerlizzi art. But this new stuff is neat.
Has anyone else watched the Tiefling and gnome video from the Wizards site? The new gnomes look kind of like Stitch from Lilo & Stitch and that's kind of neat. It's a funny video too.
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I'm not going to put myself forward yet, I don't really frequent these forums regularly enough to be able to promise I'll be around when this game gets going, but I must admit the stuff they've released on the new class builds intrigues me. I'm still undecided on the trimming down of the wizard, but I can see the point that in 3.5 lategame they could do just about anything better than any other class if they had enough preperation. The warlock on the other hand seems really good. Like they've taken the best bits of the Binder the 3.5 sorcerer and the 3.5 warlock and crammed them into one kickass package. Plus who wouldn't want to make a pact with Cthulhu? (If that's what the 'star' pacts are.)
Sure, 4e seems less Lord of the Rings and more pulpy. But really, who played D&D for the deep and compelling story/roleplay? (I mean sure it was possible, but there were many batter systems for that sort of thing out there)
I'm not going to put myself forward yet, I don't really frequent these forums regularly enough to be able to promise I'll be around when this game gets going, but I must admit the stuff they've released on the new class builds intrigues me. I'm still undecided on the trimming down of the wizard, but I can see the point that in 3.5 lategame they could do just about anything better than any other class if they had enough preperation. The warlock on the other hand seems really good. Like they've taken the best bits of the Binder the 3.5 sorcerer and the 3.5 warlock and crammed them into one kickass package. Plus who wouldn't want to make a pact with Cthulhu? (If that's what the 'star' pacts are.)
Sure, 4e seems less Lord of the Rings and more pulpy. But really, who played D&D for the deep and compelling story/roleplay? (I mean sure it was possible, but there were many batter systems for that sort of thing out there)
Warforged, Shifters, Half-Orcs and Gnomes will probably appear in PHB2.
Gnomes might not be, they are showing up in the MM. Still, they might get a better fleshing out in phb2.
They're getting quick "adapt for players" rules in the MM like a bunch of beasties, but a full-fledge, genericized fluffy article is destined for the PHB2.
Which now that I think about it is exactly what you said...
Anyway, D&D 3.5th didn't get my dollar and 4th probably won't unless I'm convinced they've really streamlined the system.
I haven't bought any DnD books in a really long time and I haven't really read into what 4E is going to be like, but I'm considering buying the new PHB when it comes out.
So much gnome hate, so much halfling hate. I was pretty meh on halflings, and then somewhere they changed, and I think it was an issue of Dragon magazine that made me fall in love with them. And gnomes? I liked playing gnomes too. I'm not really sure why.
I'm excited about the game too... but man, that cover sucks. My first thought was:
When I was a kid in the 80's, there was all this bad press with D&D... there were some christian groups who were concerned with occult content being in the game, and they managed to scare the shit out of a lot of parents that it was going to make their kids lose their sense of reality.
And twenty years later for 4th edition they go and put a dude who looks like the devil throwing lightning bolts out of his hands on the cover. Nice. Glad I'm not a lil dude asking my parents to buy it for me.
Oh fuck me that means I've been playing DnD for almost 20 years. I hate myself a little bit now.
I kind of wish they were Planescape tieflings, with matching DiTerlizzi art. But this new stuff is neat.
What this guy said, except they should have gotten him to do the whole thing. Maybe Brom, too. I know as a fact both of them still do Magic illustrations.
This week I’m starting on the next 4th Edition adventure. This one is a paragon-level adventure featuring trolls and a whole assortment of allied monsters. When we say paragon-level, we’re referring to the paragon tier of character advancement—that is, 11th to 20th level. I’m on the first of those, so you’re right at 10th or 11th to start. We have an idea that each tier of the game should feel a little different. When you’re in the heroic tier you might have NPCs asking you to prove yourself, and you’re likely dealing with “small†stories—save a village, rescue someone, and so on. When you get to paragon level, you’re becoming important. You might even be a little famous; people have heard of you, and you’re dealing with bigger stories like saving big cities or small kingdoms, jaunting briefly into other planes, dealing with evil relics, and so on. What all this means is that I looked at the adventure start scenario for my new adventure, and realized that I wasn’t entirely happy with an adventure you just happened across. I wanted to make it something that felt just a little more like you’re the pros who have been called in to help, because you’ve got the reputation. We’ll see how it goes.
That's really cool. I love the concept of paragon levels where you really get to define your character. I hope they incorporate alot of this stuff into any related computer games.
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Der Waffle MousBlame this on the misfortune of your birth.New Yark, New Yark.Registered Userregular
edited January 2008
Like I said before, I've never seen anyone use a gnome as anything other than an excuse to act like a fucknut and still be "in character".
Like I said before, I've never seen anyone use a gnome as anything other than an excuse to act like a fucknut and still be "in character".
Eh? Well, then again, the only times we had people playing gnomes in my party was in an Eberron campaign, where gnomes are awesome as hell, so we saw so fucknut behavior.
For me I've played a Gnome monk that had lived with elves for many years and joined a party of adventurers that were protecting a woman of importance. He was a very serious character.
I've been reading through these 4th ed threads and finally decided to chime in just because I've got D&D on the brain. Let me throw my hat into the "shill" corner with pony. I am fucking excited about the changes to races and classes.
I think my first character will be a Human Fighter, just to see how it's changed.
Gnomes: Meh. I never played em, and only knew one guy who tried them once. I'm not going to miss them enough that I can't wait for PHB2.
Tieflings & Dragonborn: Tieflings I'm not too crazy about - though I too miss the old Planescape theme & art. I hate the cover of the new PHB. Dragonborn might be interesting. I'll have to read up on their fluff in May.
Half-Orcs: Kinda like gnomes, but less apathy. Only because of Dranko Blackhope in Ken Levine's Story Hour.
Bards: One of my favorite classes to play. Hopefully they'll be back and distinct from Warlords.
I like the new cover. It is fuckloads better than the 3rd edition cover, which was a big bundle of boring. It also reminds me a bit of the old AD&D covers.
Posts
Heroic Tier: I'm a fighter, a soldier in the armies of Furyondy
Paragon Tier: I am a cavalier, an experienced veteran of the battlefield. My loyal mount and I have crossed the plains of the Shield Lands against the evil Empire of Iuz.
Epic Tier: I am the Knight Commander of the Crown, royal champion of the King of Furyondy, in battle I am his honorable right hand, and my foes will tremble when they hear the hoofbeats of my mighty stead.
basically a design principle of 4e is not only should your power level go up as you level up, so should your prestige and general bad-assedness
Because the game goes up to 30th level now and epic-play is built in, the Gods are, by default, more approachable and even defeatable.
When you are a 27th level epic shitkicker, it is possible for you and your party to take down gods. Even become gods, possibly.
Obviously, this isn't appropriate for all settings. The gods of Eberron are distant, unapproachable, even possibly non-existant. The gods of Faerun, however, are often ascended mortals who got that way by killing the god who used to hold that position, so it definitely fits there.
FR's getting all reamed out to adjust it for 4e
Eberron, ever the better setting, is just like "meh, we'll just make 4e fit Eberron"
which means, at the very least, gnomes will see a 2009 comeback as a proper player race.
Mystras have like no goddamn survival skill whatsoever.
Points of Light exists essentially as a series of proper nouns and racial histories. It's deity names and place names, for the most part. For example, the ancient empire that fell due to infernal pacts was named Bael Turath. They were at war with the Dragonborn empire of Arkhosia. Eventually, both empires fell from their war, and now both races are scattered into smaller settlements.
Stuff like that.
There's no "world map" for the Points of Light setting, or even a name for the world. Only certain cities, nations, dungeons have names, and their geographic locations are left intentionally vague.
It has.
Every class can now self-heal, so they aren't reliant on the cleric for healing
What the cleric is is a "buff machine". They're a Leader class, so they've got buffs, and they can do stuff like enable their partymembers to have extra attacks and stuff.
I play with a group of players that, no matter what the intended objective of a campaign is, turns to evil and begins randomly slaughtering people that "get in their way."
I blame this partly on the fact that they're military and partly on the TV programming they were brought up on. Obviously, bad parenting fits in somewhere. Because there's always room for fuck-up parents.
4e isn't "edgier," it's simply removing complicating factors. Law vs Chaos? Outside of a demi-plane or home plane aligned with one of those two ideals, it never came up in normal gameplay. So why not remove it? It's not going to change how a character is role-played. My Cleric of Hoar isn't suddenly going to go "Hm, I think I'll randomly slaughter people because I have no obligation to lawfulness any more." He'll continue to slaughter people in the name of vengeance and inflict a poetic justice on those who have wronged someone in some way. Of course, he probably won't be the engine of destruction he was under 3e rules, but I can deal.
Most of the people who dislike 4e are acting under some really, really stupid assumptions.
Assumption #1: Wizards of the Coast isn't a business, it's a benevolent caretaker to my favorite hobby.
Are you fucking retarded? Do you realize I own stock in Hasbro? If WotC isn't a business, they owe me some damn money.
Assumption #2: Change doesn't happen (to me).
Wake up, assmaster! Change happens all the time. Every time you find a really great exploit in a game, someone's going to let someone else know, and sooner or later that exploit will get closed down.
Assumption #3: New clearly means worse.
Okay, you know, I can't immediately berate you for thinking this. With WotC this was true for a long time, but it appears they're trying to make up for a series of monstrous mistakes by producing quality work that isn't immediately twistable into a munchkin's wet dream.
Assumption #4: 3e is better.
3e was a steaming pile of turd shat out by a circle-jerk full of retards who like to bury their heads up their asses. It was, quite possibly, the most successful triangle scheme (read: pyramid scheme for the depth perception-impaired) ever, but was by no means 'better' than anything else on the market. Except FATAL. Nobody can apologize enough for or explain FATAL. Stop poking that dead horse.
I'm sure there are more assumptions, but these are the ones I see most often. Many hardcore 3e players are rocking themselves back and forth, knees clutched to chest bawling for the loss of their munchkin's paradise, but they had to realize that the gravy train was coming to an end. Mostly, they're in denial. Everyone else is inexplicably mentally handicapped.
Their tails are way to big for their body size.. Also they extend from the body at a really weird angle... How the hell do they lay down?
So far I haven't seen one genuniely new idea, lots of stuff is being changed just for change's sake, and their rationale (you can read it for just $20) for dropping gnomes looks precisely like the sort of half-arsed excuse you'd hear in a presidential press conference.
None of the new races or race revisions scream out at me that there is anything to be excited about there.
The classes we know less about, so I'll be interested to see how they are applied.
Oh wait, these were their original ideas and being better than the current ideas, WOTC had the bright idea to combine them and make DnD better.
Everything i have heard about 4e except dragonborn[and the online tools/program, but that is another issue] has made me happy as a roleplayer.
Dropping Gnomes isnt a big deal. Im sure they will be harder to add than a race in 3.5, but still, its a single race that was likely dropped because no-one played them. At least, not often. More often you get stories of people playing things out of the MM than Gnomes. I never liked stuff out of the MM because it always seemed exotic for the sake of being exotic[I.E. people choosing it because it was exotic], but hey, i can just use a race from the PHB. And oh hey, now that its more easily cannonized its not really exotic for the sake of being exotic anymore!
Hell, i bet we eventually get fleshed out info for Gnomes, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Orcs, Gnolls, and Kolbolds. Ive grown to love these types of characters, but oh noes they arent in the PHB whatever will I do?!?!?!
Nice to be able to talk about 4th Edition without the monkey screeching you see on ENworld or RPG.net.
Man fuck gnomes, the reasons given in races and classes for their removal from the phb are absolutely spot on. They aren't, and with the exception of dragonlance never have been, unique or necessary. Keeping them around just because they've been there since 1st or what the fuck ever is stupid.
As for lot's of stuff being changed for change's sake, I disagree. From a purely rules perspective, they have yet to unveil a change that I thought wasn't better. Races being significantly more important? Check. All classes being given the tools to function in their "role," without diminishing the capacity of said classes to branch out into other areas? Check. Getting new things at every level? Check. Combat and skill systems all streamlined to make play faster? Check.
I mean really, everyone has different opinions (I for one found the dragonborn fluff interesting and will now probably play a dragonborn paladin as my first character). But saying things are being changed just for the sake of change is just silly.
Yes, no race specific pantheons in the core setting. Corellon is now the god of magic instead of just being the Elf god (though he still made Elves). Same deal for Moradin who has become the god of industry. Other changes include Bahamut and Tiamat being the 2 halves of Io who was split by a primordial in the war between primordials and the Gods.
As an aside, as much as I like the new Tiefling fluff, I am still generally bothered by them being a direct marketing ploy to appeal to middle class 13 year olds with abandonment issues and a hot topic gift card. They basically come out and say it straight out in races and classes. On the other hand, they are already about 3 times cooler than Drow ever were, so if the option to stop the silly pandering to those people was going to be ignored, at least the new guys are moderately better.
LoL: failboattootoot
Also, Ardent needs to chill. You play too much WoW, methinks.
Has anyone else watched the Tiefling and gnome video from the Wizards site? The new gnomes look kind of like Stitch from Lilo & Stitch and that's kind of neat. It's a funny video too.
Sure, 4e seems less Lord of the Rings and more pulpy. But really, who played D&D for the deep and compelling story/roleplay? (I mean sure it was possible, but there were many batter systems for that sort of thing out there)
A lot of people?
Gnomes might not be, they are showing up in the MM. Still, they might get a better fleshing out in phb2.
LoL: failboattootoot
They're getting quick "adapt for players" rules in the MM like a bunch of beasties, but a full-fledge, genericized fluffy article is destined for the PHB2.
Which now that I think about it is exactly what you said...
Anyway, D&D 3.5th didn't get my dollar and 4th probably won't unless I'm convinced they've really streamlined the system.
When I was a kid in the 80's, there was all this bad press with D&D... there were some christian groups who were concerned with occult content being in the game, and they managed to scare the shit out of a lot of parents that it was going to make their kids lose their sense of reality.
And twenty years later for 4th edition they go and put a dude who looks like the devil throwing lightning bolts out of his hands on the cover. Nice. Glad I'm not a lil dude asking my parents to buy it for me.
Oh fuck me that means I've been playing DnD for almost 20 years. I hate myself a little bit now.
Thats because the artist is a hack.
What this guy said, except they should have gotten him to do the whole thing. Maybe Brom, too. I know as a fact both of them still do Magic illustrations.
That's really cool. I love the concept of paragon levels where you really get to define your character. I hope they incorporate alot of this stuff into any related computer games.
Eh? Well, then again, the only times we had people playing gnomes in my party was in an Eberron campaign, where gnomes are awesome as hell, so we saw so fucknut behavior.
I think my first character will be a Human Fighter, just to see how it's changed.
Gnomes: Meh. I never played em, and only knew one guy who tried them once. I'm not going to miss them enough that I can't wait for PHB2.
Tieflings & Dragonborn: Tieflings I'm not too crazy about - though I too miss the old Planescape theme & art. I hate the cover of the new PHB. Dragonborn might be interesting. I'll have to read up on their fluff in May.
Half-Orcs: Kinda like gnomes, but less apathy. Only because of Dranko Blackhope in Ken Levine's Story Hour.
Bards: One of my favorite classes to play. Hopefully they'll be back and distinct from Warlords.
Level Tiers, Racial advancements: Fuck yes.
http://www.circvsmaximvs.com/imagehosting/449476b0c35f26e1.jpg
Is that fanart of the gnome in the flash cartoon?