First and foremost, I’d say that the DM and players you are with are WAY more a factor of immersion than any system you use for roleplaying.

It has been said that powers and feats are going to be strictly seperated now. Powers will be active things, while feats will be passive.

Most skill- and persuasion-affecting things are passive, so they’ll probably be feats.

It probably wouldn’t be impossible to focus on the movement/utility powers.

That said, you may end up having to take a couple combative powers. In which case, you can always ignore them, or just pull them out in emergencies.

Even with taking only movement/utility powers, however, you will still probably be passable in combat.

My hope is that when making the character the options available for powers and abilities aren’t just limited to combat abilities, but can also apply to skills and other non-combat aspects of the game. I dont want to feel forced into having to take combat related abilities and then having to ignore them. I’d rather have the option of taking abilities that accentuate what I want my character to be able to do.

Of course. Never intended to mean otherwise.

Honestly, its not so off the wall to imagine a character not wanting to be good at combat. While combat is certainly part of DnD, its not the ONLY part. This particular person gets more enjoyment out of the “role” playing parts of the game rather than the combat aspects.

Not arguing with any of that.

But if being mechanically decent at combat somehow makes her less able to roleplay a non-combatant character, I’m sorry, but it’s her who has a narrow definition of roleplaying.

You said before:

I actually do think that having every character be good in combat can be a bad thing, at least in terms of “role” playing rather than “roll” playing.

“Role” playing bypasses mechanics. You can roleplay whatever you wish, whether the mechanics support it or not. In fact, if you only roleplay what the mechanics explicitly tell you, you’re verging into “roll” playing.

Have your players been in a combat encounter in this game? I wonder how she feels sitting off to the side.

While she probably loves her character concept, I somehow doubt that being able to contribute in a battle would change that.

A simulation tries to get as close to the original subject matter as possible. Even a heroic simulation will have detailed rules for how to perform that 20-foot jump with full gear. The level of reality is unrelated to this.

Whereas the opposite side of the spectrum from simulation is abstraction. Where things are assumed, generalisitions are made, and precision is waived.

Their point is that 4e is sliding somewhat away from simulation (even heroic) towards abstraction (still heroic).

Yes, the level of choices will still make it a complex game, but it is still a shift. While the game as a whole might be getting more complex, with more choices available, the core mechanics are getting less complex and more abstract. And the simulation/abstraction is in the core mechanic.

You can have games that are complex in their core, and simple in their choices (2e D&D was probably one), games that are complex in both core and choice (GURPS), games that are simple in both (Risus), and games that have a simple core with complex choices (the goal for 4e). None precludes the other.

Wolfgang – There will always be room for that type of character.

But in 4e, combat proficiency and skill/social proficiency are no longer mutually exclusive.

Hooray!

In my current Dragonstar game, one of the characters is what we call a “charisma monkey”. She has amazing charisma and has maxed out her charisma based skills as much as possible. If you need someone to seduce an NPC to get information out of them, or you need someone to bluff their but off in order for the group to get out of a dangerous situation, she’s the character we rely on. But part of the core of the character concept, is that she SUCKS at combat. It’s just not her thing. She figures, if it comes down to a fight, she failed in her job. I add great variety to our group and increases the amount of “role” play we do. But if she were to try to transfer her character into 4th Ed, it seems to me that it would be impossible…being even moderately good at combat would ruin the character concept.

In 3.0 and 3.5 you could build a character like hers, I worry that you will not be able to in 4th ed.

When you look at simulations, you have to understand the goal. Most simulations aren’t interested in duplicating physics. Most realistic simulations are interested in the participants making realistic decisions and getting realistic results. In a realistic simulation, people do not jump 20 feet with all of their equipment. In a heroic simulation, they do. The mechanics for both can be identical. Just the numbers are different.

However, that in no way precludes skill-oriented and social characters. One of the design goals they stated was to make all characters viable in and out of combat.

Combat may be what you’re seeing, because that’s certainly a focus, but it doesn’t eliminate other stuff too.