I’ve never played 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons, so this is quite speculative, so take it with a grain of salt. It looks to me like a great system that just… isn’t D&D.

The problem with 4e, as described by a lot of people who’ve played and rejected it, is largely that it’s so different from previous editions and shares elements with computer games. (Fast-forward to 2024, and… D&D players love Baldur’s Gate 3.)

But the real problem is that Wizards of the Coast seems to have decided that the classes should be balanced against each other by making the classes all the same except for flavor.

Every class follows the same regimented advancement schedule of gaining certain “powers” at each level. These powers may be “attack” or “utility” powers that can be used at-will, once per encounter, or once per day. And at each level, you can choose from a small set of powers for your class–whether you’re a hard-nosed fighter or an ivory-tower mage.

This means a wizard has exactly the same attack capability as a fighter. In the midst of combat, the wizard might say, “I’ve used my once-daily fireball. Can you handle these guys on your own?” And the fighter can respond, “Well, I’ve used my once-daily rain of steel, so we may have to just run away.” Those aren’t going to feel especially different. They both have to husband their resources in the same way and choose to use them at an opportune moment. It’s as if the fighter is casting spells just like the wizard.

In the old days, the fighter would have responded, “Ha! Get behind me. I never run out of sword!” Everyone knew a sword attack wasn’t as good, but at least you never run out. Of course, in 4e the fighter doesn’t run out of sword either; you always have at-will powers, but so does the wizard.

Now, to be sure, 4e has its fans. Folks on r/4eDnD and YouTube don’t think 4e needs to be fixed or even that the classes all work the same. Notably, Matt Colville of MCDM prefers 4e over 5e (but is now building his own game system). But even he admits it has drawbacks, which I address at the bottom.

The powers themselves are good. The melee combat powers seem cool and tactical. The spells feel fun and powerful. Those aren’t the problem. It’s just the sameness between classes.

The way to fix it, I think, would be to make the martial class characters and rogues’ powers get refreshed by something other than the clock. What makes sense is this: opportunity and luck.

Martial Classes

Change the fighter, paladin, etc. class “encounter” exploits to great blows and “daily” exploits to critical strikes. Now we can define “great blow” as any attack roll of natural 15 or higher and “critical strike” as any attack roll of natural 19 or 20.

Alternatively, they could roll a hero die with each attack (similar to Dungeon Crawl Classics) to see if they get an opportunity to use an exploit. Roll an 8 or higher on a d10 to use a great blow or a 10 to use a critical strike.

To be clear, “encounter” exploits and “daily” exploits would no longer to be limited to an encounter or day. They would become available whenever the opportunity comes up by the die roll.

This way, fighters don’t need to husband their resources like spellcasters. Instead, opportunities just happen to arise during combat for them to use their abilities. Sometimes it will be relevant, and sometimes it won’t be. And if the power would affect the character’s attack roll, it instead applies to their next attack roll.

If play-testing supports it, you might allow characters at higher level to do something to raise a regular hit up to a great blow or a great blow to a critical strike, so it feels like the characters are getting better at finding or creating opportunities. For example, “Return Blow: if you hold your melee attack until after your opponent attacks you in melee, and your attack is successful, you create an opportunity to make a great blow or, if you roll a great blow, to make a critical strike.”

Rogues

For rogues, we should go a different route. Their “encounter” powers are now “strokes of luck” that require spending a point of luck. And their “daily” powers are “wild luck” that cost 2 points of luck.

How do they gain luck? A rogue gains one point of luck on any d20 roll (skill check, ability check, saving throw, or attack) of natural 16, 17, 18, or 19, and two points on any natural 20. Note that this will happen more often than for a fighter, since martials only get their opportunities on attack rolls.

But rogues have a sideline: their luck can rub off on others. A rogue can give a point of luck to any character who has touched them that day. (It pays to shake hands with a charlatan or pat a bard on the back!) That ally (or the rogue himself or herself) can use that point of luck to reroll a die roll (one time only; no re-rolling the re-roll).

At the end of the adventuring day, rogues lose all their luck except for 1 point (if they have one). This ensures that luck doesn’t build up. Use it or lose it.

The Result

Now you have a very interesting game. Spellcasters husband their resources until just the right moment. Martial characters find an opportunity here and there to use their cool techniques. And rogues collect a little mojo now and then to spend or give away. The different types of classes now feel different, and you haven’t had to completely rewrite the game.

Additional Improvements

“Healing surges” are an improvement over old-school D&D’s 1 hp per day. But it needs to be reduced and reskinned as “tend wounds”.

And I hate the idea of letting players choose or buy their magic items. But… if you let them donate to their faith for information (perhaps in the form of divine visions) about where certain items might be found… now we’re talking.

None of this, of course, addresses the fact that spellcasters no longer need to find spells and try to learn them and such. They just get handed a handful of choices when they level up. That’s unfortunate, especially for wizards, but it’s something you can skirt by inserting that flavor back into the game. “You find the evil sorcerer’s spellbook. It contains several spells you don’t know, including some you think you might be ready to try to learn….” I’m sure 4e expansion books had more spells; you could make a table for each level and roll to see what’s available or just choose what the NPC had in his spellbook.

Colville’s Caveats

Lastly, Matt Colville commented on his own video an additional negative against 4e:

Players got impatient with problems that couldn’t be solved with their powers. By making combat super-cool … players were eager to get to combat, and tended to eschew roleplaying.

The only way to solve that is to replace some attack and utility powers with social powers. Rogues should be able to charm people with fast talk and have special trap and puzzle skills. Fighters should intimidate people and know “monster lore”. And so on. However, that really is rewriting the system.

Another comment he has made is that 4e worked well with a virtual tabletop doing some of the work for the DM, but that’s not available anymore. Others say that the game played without VTT is fine, if you keep to the core rules and give the players cards to remind them of their powers. So your mileage may vary.

Follow Up

Between writing this and it getting posted, I found that Matt Colville had similar ideas. His MCDM TTRPG gives each class various features powered with a point currency in ways that make sense for them.

For example, the shadow (rogue) class characters gain “insight” points during combat. They can then spend insight to do cool things particular to their class. Reaver (barbarian) characters gain “fury” when they hit successfully, and they spend fury on “onslaughts”. Tactician (fighter) characters spend “focus” points on “stratagems”. Elementalist (wizard) characters spend “concentration” on spells. Conduit (cleric) characters gain “virtue” and “wrath” to heal and smite (not sure why that isn’t just “favor” or something).

Interestingly, his initiative works very similarly to mine.