Indulge my Geekiness, won't you?

Howdy folks. OK, this is going to be a 100% geeky post because I'll be talking about Dungeons and Dragons. If you have an allergy to geeky subject matter, I suggest you take some Benadryl and put a cool cloth on your forehead. As for the rest of you, here we go...

I'm going to assume that if you're still reading this that you have some familiarity with the game, so I won't be explaining concepts and terminology as I go. Like I said, 100% geek. Anyway, recently, Wizards of the Coast (the company that now publishes D&D) came out with D&D 4th Edition. I got my brand-spanking new rulebooks Monday before last and.... hmmm. For the most part, it's a much more streamlined system, but I have a few quibbles with it. Specifically, the abilities many of the traditional classes now have or have lost. Here's my list:

WHAT THE HECK WERE THEY THINKING?

1. Paladins can no longer detect evil, are no longer immune to disease and poison, and don't get the option to have a paladin's warhorse. Also, they can now be of any alignment, which in my mind takes a lot of the RP fun right out of it.
   
2. Rangers no longer get access to nature-oriented divine magic, there is no clear-cut definition for how tracking works, and they no longer have any abilities with animals AT ALL, including an animal companion. Now, they're just snipers or guys that can use two weapons really well (you have to choose one or the other).
   
3. Wizards, even though they got rid of the Vancian magic system, which is good (i.e. you memorize spells and then have to re-memorize them after you use them), the breadth of wizard abilities are limited to variations of "you blow stuff up real good", with only a few utilitarian powers. Also, they can no longer attract familiars. I'm of two opinions about that: its been part of the game since 1st edition (I think) and a familiar adds a certain level of utility and flavor to your wizard. However, I have run wizards and seen other people run wizards where they have forgotten about their familiars until it was brought to their attention ( 'Isn't your owl able to fly up there?' 'Huh? Oh, yeah, my owl. Yeah, he can fly up there').
4. The Warlord class. If the other PCs are the grunts in combat, he/she's the officer barking orders and leading by example. Fine. Could've been made part of the fighter class, but, heh, whatever. One member of the group that I'm going to run 4E for is already planning on making a warlord. I'm going to reserve judgment on this one until I see it "in the field."
5. Many of the signature spells of 3E are either not present or have been so drastically changed that the only thing that stayed the same was the name. Mage Armor? Gone. Wish? Gone. Damn near any illusion or conjuration-based spell? Gone.
6. Very very very limited multiclassing. Gone are the days of taking a few levels of fighter here, 2 levels of rogue here, etc. Now, you multiclass by taking a feat that enables you to exchange one or more of your main class' abilities for an ability from the other class. You stay a fighter, for example, but you are a fighter that might be able to cast magic missile or turn undead. Also, you only get to multiclass into one other class. That's it.
   
7. No prestige classes. They have things called paragon paths and epic destinies, which may sound neat but are pretty weak and inflexible compared to prestige classes. Oh, I forgot to mention, paragon paths and epic destinies ensure that you stay with your main class - again, there is essentially no multiclassing, which sucks, IMHO.
   
8. Many people have argued that the rules have been "dumbed down." Again, I will reserve judgment.
9. Half-orcs are not present and neither are gnomes. True, I know no one who has ever played a gnome, bu I know they have their fans in the RPG community. Half-orcs, on the other hand, have a lot of fans - it's always fun to play the big dumb guy that just blunders through and messes up everything (Leeroy Jenkins, anyone?) Instead, they went ahead and made one brand new race called the Dragonborn (remember the Draconians from Dragonlance? Kind of like those guys, except nicer origin and no wings, but they do get a breath weapon) and reworked two previously existing races: tieflings (half-demonic humans) and eladrin (elves that REALLY love magic versus loving the forest). Also, they made halflings into a people that travel the rivers of the world. I'm sorry, but in my mind, halflings will always be at least city dwellers, if not little people that live in hobbit-holes.
   

Ok, that's all the energy I have for ranting right now. Feel free to leave comments and let me know what you think.

Take care,
~Rob