I'd love to hear your thoughts
Mods may want to move this to the TTRPG thread instead but... At this point it's comparing apples to pears because the ONLY game component 4H has revealed are four species starting traits and one game mechanic, the latter of which is "during big battle, switch from minis to action figures," which is less of a mechanic and more like zooming in on the battle map in a video game. (Which is harmless, do as thou mayest, but it's not game MECHANIC, it's a game VIEW.)
But the species are, all four, less interesting than existing versions of those species. First, they're less flexible than existing versions (with the stat bonuses locked in, and even having a minus for goblins).
- Take the minotaurs for example. 5e has two types of minotaur that provide a bonus action option, mechanics for their horns, and two options for a flavorful impact on your skill set. 4H just has an armor bonus.
- There's a few options for goblins with things like Fury of the Small or Nimble escape, mechanics that can really impact how you play your character and the options you have in combat. 4H goblins get proficiencies with weapons that nearly every class already has and that's it.
- Humans get SIGNIFICANTLY less fun stuff than ANY version of human in modern D&D, and one of the tricks of human stats in modern D&D is they make it worth playing just-a-guy. You can have a lot of fun playing a regular old human because of the feats you get, etc.
- Their catfolk stats are trade a movement effect and climbing effect for advantage on... balance / agility checks. Which is fine, but also NOT mechanically clear - is a dex save vs. fireball an agility check? The wording in the book sounds like falling or running long a rooftop vs. a save, the latter of which is very powerful (but also steals benefits away from the rogue class).
And... that's all we've got for content from a $1.3 million Kickstarter that is ostensibly supposed to be for the game and not the action figures.
By comparison, Savage Crucible has just sort of tucked this bonus material into the back or their packaging so low-effort actually isn't a big deal - we were gonna buy the figures anyway, didn't need a Kickstarter buy in. But mechanically they're messy but make interesting choices. For example:
- The Lemurian Royal Guard and the Tavros Guard both have an ability that protects them from charm effects. On the downside, they both have it, and that's boring. But on the upside, The Lemurian Royal Guards have a trait called Royal Gaes that said they can't be charmed IN SIGHT OF THE NOBILITY THEY ARE PROTECTING. That gives the GM a story reason for that ability - imagine your players going up against these guys, deciding to throw some enchantment magic at them, and learning the hard way that these guys are incapable of breaking their oath. The Tavros Guards have text explaining that they have been anointed with alchemical oils that deaden their emotions and pain, which gives them advantage on stunned, frightened, or charmed. So these poor fuckers have been abused by their masters to make them more impervious killers. That's a really interesting thing for the players to find out the hard way as well. It's a tool in the GM's toolbox. I'd use that and surprise my players with it.
- The Heraldic Marks are an actual mechanic - essentially a shared magic item that, when used, can impact your entire party or your allies (or enemies). That's not something modern D&D has done as far as I know, at least not as a magic item the players can create. It's a unique addition to the game. I personally think the buy-in to MAKE a Heraldic Mark is a little low since they're pretty powerful, but I could see adding this as a concept to my games. It's something I haven't seen before. (The effects are WILDLY situational, too, so YMMV.)
- The NPC/monster stats for their characters make deliberate choices that make them fun to run for the GM but also interesting enough I could hand these stats to a guest player to run as a character. Ko'Mo of the Isles has an ability where his skin leaks a potion a day and a random table tells you what kind. That's fucking weird, but if Ko'Mo is your party's traveling companion, that's has a real impact. Who-Man has the ability to give up his turn's movement in exchange for temporary hit points. That's interesting enough I'd want to see that built into a fighter or barbarian subclass. He has a reaction (blinding parry) that has a secondary effect - it's too powerful as a class ability, but it's based on his SWORD, and I could actually see stealing his Promethean sword text from his card and making a magic item for one of my own games to include (it's a powerful magic item with several effects but for a mid- to late-stage campaign I could see a melee character having a blast with it). The same with Warrior with Ball and Chain's shield - that's a magic item tucked into a monster stat block.
Anyway. All this to say, one company put out four pages of objectively zero-effort text and cranked out a million dollar kickstarter on it and other guys printed up some card stock with some bonus material, and the bonus material is actually useable. That being said, proceed with caution if you implement the Savage Crucible stuff because some of it is definitely overpowered, but it looks like the idea was that they intentionally want a world where EVERYBODY is overpowered by design.
). What 4H has shown us so far is basically a font change from existing 5e species stats.