"4e Rules Questions" Topic

Played my first game of 4th Edition D&D last night. I played a gnome wizard, and enjoyed the game. Now my question is thus, I can remember in the past not having to roll to cast a spell. But now I have to roll a d20 and add my INT mod and attain some number to cast my spell. Why? What number am I trying to beat, the AC of the target? If the AC then I am not sure why, especially if casting some form of lightening spell.

In old editions, you just cast your spell, and then the target got to roll a saving throw. Versus a lightning bolt, for example, it would be a Reflex Save (or save vs Spells in really old editions).

The new edition puts it all in your hands by letting you make the roll. Your target now has a Reflex Defense score, and that is the target number you are rolling against. They also have a Will Defense and a Fortitude defense, for other kinds of spells and attacks. Armor Class is still the default defense for many forms of attack (such as basic whacking with a sword).

Hope that helps! :)

Each power should say what number you're targeting. The power will say something to the effect of, "Dexterity vs. Reflex" or "Strength vs. AC"

Example: Lightning Bolt (lvl 7) has a line that says, "Attack: Intelligence vs. Reflex."
Roll your D20 and add all modifiers, enhancements etc; if you beat your target's Reflex number, you hit'em!

As a wizard, most (if not all) of your attacks will target reflex.

Charms and psychic things will target Will, poisons and things will target Fortitude. I like the change to active spell casting instead of having the target react with the save.

One other thing is that in the OLD DAYS you only got to use your spell once. Now with the At Will powers more stuff is zinging around

But now I have to roll a d20 and add my INT mod and attain some number to cast my spell. Why? What number am I trying to beat, the AC of the target?

My question is why didn't the DM explain what you had to do? I hope he's not one of those mysterious DM's that has to hide everything. Personally, I don't tell what target numbers are, but I'd at least let someone know WHY they are rolling what they're rolling.

thanks.

I was playing with my sons college group, it was much more of a hack-n-slash-pillage-and burn type of game. Not very much in the way of roleplaying to it.

I just wanted a more comfortable forum to ask questions in, like TMP! :)

What will get interesting as you get used to the character, is that most of your attacks will target one type of save, but you'll have a minority of attacks that probably use your secondary attribute and target a different type of save.

So (I'm guessing) most of your spells are probably INT versus REFLEX. But you may have some that are CHA or WIS versus WILL.

What makes it interesting is figuring out for a given monster whether its REFLEX or WILL is a worse save.