I started playing D&D when 4e came out in high school. I switched over to Pathfinder after two years or so when I went off to college. Pathfinder was ditched fo

I started playing D&D when 4e came out in high school. I switched over to Pathfinder after two years or so when I went off to college. Pathfinder was ditched for GURPS the last year in college and I've been using it ever since, and am now dropping that (and miniature grid-combat entirely) for the Fate system. I bring this up because, in hindsight, if I had managed to come into 3.5e instead of 4e I feel I wouldn't have become so disgusted with roll-playing (especially in combat). Even Pathfinder's combat seemed to be dominant time-wise, even if combat is comparatively scarcer. I realize this depends entirely on the campaign and players involved and is just my anecdote, but I really do believe that my first experiences being with 4e shaped my perception of grid-combat negatively and is a constant bias. I'm curious if anyone else had their first experiences with tabletop RPGs using D&D 4e, and what kind of experiences they came out of it with?