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Post by tombowings on Sept 26, 2021 4:57:57 GMT -6
Excellent idea. Let's call them "Whatever Points".
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aramis
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Post by aramis on Sept 26, 2021 7:02:17 GMT -6
When I was new to the game, I didn't like the fact that Magic Missile automatically hit, and I liked the AD&D rule that a Shield spell could block it. Now a hit roll seems strange; I guess I just got used to the concept of automatic hit. Shield still blocks MM.
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aramis
Level 4 Theurgist
Posts: 170
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Post by aramis on Sept 26, 2021 7:05:13 GMT -6
We could always do it the MERP way. Wizards would have to roll to cast their spells successfully. If you allow critical hits and fumbles for combat, then there can also be critical successes and failures for spellcasting. The original TFT: Wizard rules also had rules for critical successes and fails. I'd have to look up the new Legacy rules and see if that made it in. Yes. Pretty much most of the LE changes are the old errata; then smaller few are the new things: allowing buying more talents without raising IQ, revising unarmed combat, switching from metric to english traditional measure....
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Post by Deleted on Sept 26, 2021 11:11:23 GMT -6
One of the attractions of taking a mage is not having to roll to hit. There are still plenty of damage spells in 5E which don't require a to-hit roll. Those auto-hit spells grant the target a saving throw, though. Spells requiring a hit roll don't allow a saving throw. This also applies to several cantrips. @topic: I don't think HP need a fix, maybe just a new name so folks will be aware of their original meaning; luck and stamina. So instead of narrating the enemy orc's hit roll as "His sword smashes brutally into your shoulder! 10 damage!" the DM should say "The orc's blow only misses your shoulder by a tiny margin, and only because you dive sideways just in time by a combination of skill and pure luck. You loose 10 HP/Luck/Stamina/whatever." But, modern "heroic" combat (as also seen in movies and video games) seems more natural to many people: The hero can take a dozen melee hits and arrows and still keep going. I do not think HPs needs any kind of fix, they represent both the abstract and the concrete, they represent Luck/Stamina/Toughness and they represent how much actual physical damage you can sustain before you die as well. Each creature can sustain a certain amount of injury before it is killed. That will be different for each creature. That amount would be your base hit points. All the hit points after that primarily represent Toughness, then Stamina/Endurance and then Luck last of all. There is so much angst about the rules and about this thing or that. If you were to use hit location you accomplish two things, one you slow the game to a crawl and two you account for the killing blow that slices off someones head, does 5 points of damage, but kills them even though they have 60 hit points left. Fun on the handing it out end, but not fun on the receiving end. And slowing the game to a crawl is never fun. For those of you in love with 5E you have yet to post anything that would make me want to play it. AD&D (1st ed) works just fine, if you strip out the bad parts, Not played OD&D yet, but I am getting the impression that OD&D is AD&D with the bad parts stripped out. I would just as soon not get into a discussion of what I think the bad parts are.
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Post by Finarvyn on Sept 26, 2021 18:04:05 GMT -6
For those of you in love with 5E you have yet to post anything that would make me want to play it. That seems harsh, and I'm sorry that you haven't seen any good points in 5E yet. I think that older editions are a lot easier to DM but newer editions are more player-friendly. A couple of thoughts from a player's perspective... (1) Magic is a lot more fun for spellcasters. More cantrips, more options. You can "upcast" a spell to higher damage by using a higher spell slot. My wife says that after playing a 5E wizard she never wants to go back to those earlier editions. (2) Lots of races to pick from in addition to the "standard" ones. I have some players who just love trying out new races, trying to get into the mind of that type of creature, and role-playing the heck out of it. (3) No limits to race-class combos. A player in my first 5E campaign wanted to run a dwarven wizard. It bothered me at first that he could wear armor and cast spells but I eventually realized that there are built-in disadvantages, such as having lower intelligence so spellcasting isn't as effective, etc. If you want a traditional "Tolkien" world 5E may not be a great upgrade, but if you want something with lots of player choice 5E has some great perks. (Ironically, "Adventures in Middle earth" combines 5E and Tolkien and does a good job of it, but it's not "standard" 5E.) From a DM's perspective 5E has certain drawbacks, however. Monster stat blocks are a lot more complex than in OD&D/AD&D but a lot of that is designed to offset the "kewl powerz" the players get. Also, I find that monster power levels aren't as intuitive as in order editions, so the occasional TPK results if I misjudge and my players are too slow to run away. 5E is just more exhausting to plan and to run, IMO, but my players don't seem to have that problem from their perspective.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 26, 2021 18:49:41 GMT -6
(3) No limits to race-class combos. A player in my first 5E campaign wanted to run a dwarven wizard. It bothered me at first that he could wear armor and cast spells but I eventually realized that there are built-in disadvantages, such as having lower intelligence so spellcasting isn't as effective, etc. @sonofbear My take on race-class limitations is if they are really a sacred cow you can't live without, it is far easier to limit it in your OWN campaign, than force everyone in the core rules to use them. So if a Dwarven Cleric just doesn't fit your setting don't allow it, but don't say I can't have them in mine. So I like that 5e doesn't have those limitations. I'm more of a Moldvay Basic/1st Edition player from way back (briefly a 3e player until 3.5 came out), but 5e has really sold me. They made a great effort to both update and keep the best of the old-school flavor of D&D at the same time. No easy task considering the history of the game. It is a surprisingly simple game once you get it. I don't think the 5e Player's Handbook shows off just how player friendly it is. Miles and miles of improvement over 4th edition. Honestly though D&D is great in any flavor. Into the Unknown is a pretty good adaptation of 5th edition into OSR.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 26, 2021 22:36:24 GMT -6
Well lets look at that, That seems harsh, and I'm sorry that you haven't seen any good points in 5E yet. I think that older editions are a lot easier to DM but newer editions are more player-friendly. If it requires a lot of time and effort and is difficult to run that means the DM (me) won't be having fun and if that is the case, then why run a game? Of course I don't use modules so I don't need something rules heavy to lay on top of running a do it yourself campaign. A couple of thoughts from a player's perspective... (1) Magic is a lot more fun for spellcasters. More cantrips, more options. You can "upcast" a spell to higher damage by using a higher spell slot. My wife says that after playing a 5E wizard she never wants to go back to those earlier editions. IMO you can have fun as a wizard without having unlimited spell casting. I can easily add fun cantrips that are also useful to my AD&D campaign with a reasonable number of uses per day. Unlimited casting of any cantrip is IMO unreasonable. So IMO 5E is at a disadvantage because it introduces things that are IMO a negative to the game. (2) Lots of races to pick from in addition to the "standard" ones. I have some players who just love trying out new races, trying to get into the mind of that type of creature, and role-playing the heck out of it. I can add as many character races to my AD&D as I want to, at this point Gygax is never going to show up and tell me that I am not really playing AD&D. So this is a wash with no advantage to 5E. (3) No limits to race-class combos. A player in my first 5E campaign wanted to run a dwarven wizard. It bothered me at first that he could wear armor and cast spells but I eventually realized that there are built-in disadvantages, such as having lower intelligence so spellcasting isn't as effective, etc. Again this is a wash with no advantage to 5E, nothing is stopping me from having dwarven wizards in my AD&D game, I have never enforced a lot of crazy limitations in AD&D, nothing wrong with letting a player have the race class combo he wants. If you want a traditional "Tolkien" world 5E may not be a great upgrade, but if you want something with lots of player choice 5E has some great perks. (Ironically, "Adventures in Middle earth" combines 5E and Tolkien and does a good job of it, but it's not "standard" 5E.) From a DM's perspective 5E has certain drawbacks, however. Monster stat blocks are a lot more complex than in OD&D/AD&D but a lot of that is designed to offset the "kewl powerz" the players get. Also, I find that monster power levels aren't as intuitive as in order editions, so the occasional TPK results if I misjudge and my players are too slow to run away. 5E is just more exhausting to plan and to run, IMO, but my players don't seem to have that problem from their perspective. AD&D has plenty of player choice, 5E has not real advantage their, aside from doing things I think are a negative for the game. As for encounters, IMO there should always be encounters that the players should flee from or avoid combat with. If they engage something like that and there is a TPK, that's on them. As for "kewl powerz", if you want those go play a video game.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 26, 2021 22:45:49 GMT -6
(3) No limits to race-class combos. A player in my first 5E campaign wanted to run a dwarven wizard. It bothered me at first that he could wear armor and cast spells but I eventually realized that there are built-in disadvantages, such as having lower intelligence so spellcasting isn't as effective, etc. @sonofbear My take on race-class limitations is if they are really a sacred cow you can't live without, it is far easier to limit it in your OWN campaign, than force everyone in the core rules to use them. So if a Dwarven Cleric just doesn't fit your setting don't allow it, but don't say I can't have them in mine. So I like that 5e doesn't have those limitations. I'm more of a Moldvay Basic/1st Edition player from way back (briefly a 3e player until 3.5 came out), but 5e has really sold me. They made a great effort to both update and keep the best of the old-school flavor of D&D at the same time. No easy task considering the history of the game. It is a surprisingly simple game once you get it. I don't think the 5e Player's Handbook shows off just how player friendly it is. Miles and miles of improvement over 4th edition. Honestly though D&D is great in any flavor. Into the Unknown is a pretty good adaptation of 5th edition into OSR. I don't think race-class combos are a sacred cow, I think they are silly at best. AD&D does not have those limitations either as the DM is in charge not the books. As I said, at this point Gygax is not going to show up and tell me I am having wrong bad fun, because I am not playing AD&D RAW BTB and if he ever had shown up, I would have asked him if he would brook such interference at his own table and he would have looked pretty sheepish at that point. So 5E, at least for me offers no advantage here. If that makes me a heretic, then so be it. If you are all selling 5E as a lot more work for the DM and "kewl powerz" for the players, you are not showing me anything to get excited about. Sorry, that is my opinion, I don't need more work at the table.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2021 1:35:08 GMT -6
@sonofbear My take on race-class limitations is if they are really a sacred cow you can't live without, it is far easier to limit it in your OWN campaign, than force everyone in the core rules to use them. So if a Dwarven Cleric just doesn't fit your setting don't allow it, but don't say I can't have them in mine. So I like that 5e doesn't have those limitations. I'm more of a Moldvay Basic/1st Edition player from way back (briefly a 3e player until 3.5 came out), but 5e has really sold me. They made a great effort to both update and keep the best of the old-school flavor of D&D at the same time. No easy task considering the history of the game. It is a surprisingly simple game once you get it. I don't think the 5e Player's Handbook shows off just how player friendly it is. Miles and miles of improvement over 4th edition. Honestly though D&D is great in any flavor. Into the Unknown is a pretty good adaptation of 5th edition into OSR. I don't think race-class combos are a sacred cow, I think they are silly at best. AD&D does not have those limitations either as the DM is in charge not the books. As I said, at this point Gygax is not going to show up and tell me I am having wrong bad fun, because I am not playing AD&D RAW BTB and if he ever had shown up, I would have asked him if he would brook such interference at his own table and he would have looked pretty sheepish at that point. So 5E, at least for me offers no advantage here. If that makes me a heretic, then so be it. If you are all selling 5E as a lot more work for the DM and "kewl powerz" for the players, you are not showing me anything to get excited about. Sorry, that is my opinion, I don't need more work at the table. No one is asking you to embrace 5e, just talking about what they like about it. Many of us old-timers were pleasantly surprised by 5e once we got over our bitterness from 4e, and have learned they did a pretty good job and showed respect for the original game. I still read the 1e DMG once in a while. I'm not tossing out my Moldvay or Holmes or original OD&D books over it, but I'm happy to play 5e with family and friends from time to time.
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Post by jeffb on Sept 27, 2021 5:41:49 GMT -6
Well you folks might want to wait before arguing out what edition is worst, Seems like 6E (5.5?) is on the horizon for 2024 according to scuttlebutt/conversation during D&D Celebration. Interestingly enough it seems they are going back to some 4E isms because of complaints (Monster statblocks, especially for casters* About time), and then they are going full throttle and beyond with the changes brought about in Tashas and other recent books (Boo)
5E is soon to be an old Grog's game.
*Worst thing they did in 5E was taking 2 steps back to 3E style statblocks and Vancian casting for monsters.
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 27, 2021 7:02:11 GMT -6
First off all my points don't mean that you should like 5e. I can get to work as easily with my Kia Soul, but others may enjoy it more if you have a Corvette. You raised specific objections hence my replies either explaining how 5e is compared to older editions or correcting misconceptions. If you want to read this yourself. I recommend using this link. Outside of player selections and pared down lists like monsters it is the full rules of D&D 5e. media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/DnD_BasicRules_2018.pdfWell lets look at that, That seems harsh, and I'm sorry that you haven't seen any good points in 5E yet. I think that older editions are a lot easier to DM but newer editions are more player-friendly. If it requires a lot of time and effort and is difficult to run that means the DM (me) won't be having fun and if that is the case, then why run a game? Of course I don't use modules so I don't need something rules heavy to lay on top of running a do it yourself campaign. 5e is easier to run than AD&D because crucial rule sections like combat are laid out better and are easily grasped by even a novice. It is however not easier than B/X or BECMI D&D but the increase in complexity over those two editions is no different than the increase of complexity AD&D has over those respective editions. IMO you can have fun as a wizard without having unlimited spell casting. I can easily add fun cantrips that are also useful to my AD&D campaign with a reasonable number of uses per day. Unlimited casting of any cantrip is IMO unreasonable. So IMO 5E is at a disadvantage because it introduces things that are IMO a negative to the game. Yet AD&D allows magic users to have a bandolier of darts. And that what 5e cantrip amount to, taking darts and renaming them flame bolt along with other equal minor magical effect. As the previous poster noted about his wife, it has a positive psychological effect on the players as they feel their wizard are more wizard-like. For example in AD&D a magic-user is allowed to use darts which have a rate of fire of 3 and does 1d3 (S-M)/1d2 (L). It has a max range of 4.5 feet indoors and 13.5 feet outdoors (4.5 yards). I would not consider a AD&D less AD&D if that was changed to a fire bolt with a RoF of 1 does 1d6 damage with a range of 60 feet that the magic user can case unlimited times. The 5e version does 1d10 (and increases at higher level) and goes 120 feet however 5e monsters have better stats so it amounts to a wash compared to AD&D. I have ran both extensively. Just as various spells are a better deal in AD&D so are the spells that only can be cast through limited spells slot in 5e are a better dal. I have never enforced a lot of crazy limitations in AD&D, nothing wrong with letting a player have the race class combo he wants. Sure just I have altered OD&D with my Majestic Fantasy rules to make a variant that works with how I run campaigns. A variant that I like better than 5e. However despite my work on my own system, despite publishing and promoting it, I think D&D 5e has some strong merits especially compared to D&D 3.X or D&D 4e. Specific features work well with older editions like OD&D or AD&D. For example the Advantage and Disadvantage system of modifiers. Monster stat blocks are a lot more complex than in OD&D/AD&D but a lot of that is designed to offset the "kewl powerz" the players get. Also, I find that monster power levels aren't as intuitive as in order editions, so the occasional TPK results if I misjudge and my players are too slow to run away. I found it to be a mixed bag. My view is that OD&D has the simplest stat block in general however it's format bogs down when it comes to more detailed and powerful creatures. You have to parse a description to figure out everything that a creature can do. And it has stuff not neatly captured in a one-line stat block. AD&D tries to use the one-line stat block, but it doesn't capture everything that the monster manual stats have. While better than AD&D in presenting a standard format, many creature still require reading the description to get a sense of what they can do. D&D 5e has a stat block but it downside is that it upped damage and hit points to expand options of what characters and creatures can do. It comparable to AD&D at low level, but starts to expand at the middle levels/HD. [/quote]
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Post by rredmond on Sept 27, 2021 7:02:29 GMT -6
I still read the 1e DMG once in a while. I'm not tossing out my Moldvay or Holmes or original OD&D books over it, but I'm happy to play 5e with family and friends from time to time. There's a lot to unpack there tdenmark
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Post by Deleted on Sept 27, 2021 9:02:46 GMT -6
Well you folks might want to wait before arguing out what edition is worst, Seems like 6E (5.5?) is on the horizon for 2024 according to scuttlebutt/conversation during D&D Celebration. Interestingly enough it seems they are going back to some 4E isms because of complaints (Monster statblocks, especially for casters* About time), and then they are going full throttle and beyond with the changes brought about in Tashas and other recent books (Boo) 5E is soon to be an old Grog's game. *Worst thing they did in 5E was taking 2 steps back to 3E style statblocks and Vancian casting for monsters. I have no doubt that when they bring out 6E we will immediately see 5E clones using the original OGL and they will have managed to split their market once again. They will never learn.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 27, 2021 9:14:30 GMT -6
For example the Advantage and Disadvantage system of modifiers. Any competent DM can run that on the fly without any reference to 5E, in fact, I don't know any DM that didn't do that before 5E was written, just without the names. No one needed a whole write up to do that. 5E either takes stuff that many people like, that was around 30 years before 5E was even a gleam in WotCs eye and pretend it is a new innovation or they do stuff that is a complete deal breaker for some of us. If they want to do 6E they should create a website that lists every rule with a check box beside it, you check the boxes you want, along with blanks to insert your own house rules in the text, hit the POD button and they ship you a modern print version of anything from OD&D to 5E tweaked and house ruled to fit each table and with your art of choice inside.
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Post by jeffb on Sept 27, 2021 9:16:29 GMT -6
Well you folks might want to wait before arguing out what edition is worst, Seems like 6E (5.5?) is on the horizon for 2024 according to scuttlebutt/conversation during D&D Celebration. Interestingly enough it seems they are going back to some 4E isms because of complaints (Monster statblocks, especially for casters* About time), and then they are going full throttle and beyond with the changes brought about in Tashas and other recent books (Boo) 5E is soon to be an old Grog's game. *Worst thing they did in 5E was taking 2 steps back to 3E style statblocks and Vancian casting for monsters. I have no doubt that when they bring out 6E we will immediately see 5E clones using the original OGL and they will have managed to split their market once again. They will never learn. I'd be perfectly fine if the game and WOTC tanked. I'm not a believer in growing the hobby/industry/D&D community, especially in the manner they have chosen to do so since 5E. I also am not a consumer anymore as I don't care for the 5E product model at all. I've bought very little from WOTC outside the Starter/Essentials Kit, core 3 books and one adventure. I do think (original core) 5E is a pretty darn good rule set, probably the best sit down and play without having to tinker/make stuff up version of D&D there is, but I doubt there will be many "classic" 5E hold out types, certainly not enough to make a difference like with the 3E to 4E shift or the Pathfinder 1E to 2E shift. the vast majority of the modern D&D community are in lock-step with WOTC's aims and desires for play, product and culture. The real holdouts are the older players who are still playing 5E. They will migrate back to older/other editions/games too, eventually as they are 'pushed out" by the nonsense. And I know we are getting way off topic. Mods- apologies and please move discussion elsewhere as needed.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 27, 2021 9:29:29 GMT -6
I have no doubt that when they bring out 6E we will immediately see 5E clones using the original OGL and they will have managed to split their market once again. They will never learn. I'd be perfectly fine if the game and WOTC tanked. I'm not a believer in growing the hobby/industry/D&D community, especially in the manner they have chosen to do so since 5E. I also am not a consumer anymore as I don't care for the 5E product model at all. I've bought very little from WOTC outside the Starter/Essentials Kit, core 3 books and one adventure. I do think (original core) 5E is a pretty darn good rule set, probably the best sit down and play without having to tinker/make stuff up version of D&D there is, but I doubt there will be many "classic" 5E hold out types, certainly not enough to make a difference like with the 3E to 4E shift or the Pathfinder 1E to 2E shift. the vast majority of the modern D&D community are in lock-step with WOTC's aims and desires for play, product and culture. The real holdouts are the older players who are still playing 5E. They will migrate back to older/other editions/games too, eventually as they are 'pushed out" by the nonsense. And I know we are getting way off topic. Mods- apologies and please move discussion elsewhere as needed.OOPs From all reports, there was a playtest version of 5E that was very old school, but then most of that was dumped. I've never bought anything from WotC and never will. Now if they reprinted some of the IP they own that I never had a chance to buy bitd, that they have buried forever, I would buy some of that.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2021 10:59:07 GMT -6
I'm not a believer in growing the hobby/industry/D&D community, especially in the manner they have chosen to do so since 5E. I also am not a consumer anymore as I don't care for the 5E product model at all. I've bought very little from WOTC outside the Starter/Essentials Kit, core 3 books and one adventure. I thought one of the better things about 5e was the business model: fewer books of higher quality, no endless splat books with additional rules spread across dozens of titles.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2021 11:04:36 GMT -6
I still read the 1e DMG once in a while. I'm not tossing out my Moldvay or Holmes or original OD&D books over it, but I'm happy to play 5e with family and friends from time to time. There's a lot to unpack there tdenmark The only thing to read into this is I don't play 1e anymore. Which is the edition I've probably played the most in my life, I now find it too clunky. Not to say if a friend fired up a one-shot I wouldn't play it, I just wouldn't instigate the game. I so convert the modules to 5e though. The 1e DMG is still a masterpiece and can be read over and over. I played Moldvay Basic with my daughters right after Stranger Things got them interested in D&D. It was a lot of fun.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2021 11:11:21 GMT -6
From all reports, there was a playtest version of 5E that was very old school, but then most of that was dumped. I've never bought anything from WotC and never will. Now if they reprinted some of the IP they own that I never had a chance to buy bitd, that they have buried forever, I would buy some of that. The playtest version I saw was pretty close to what was published. It was pretty clear that after the dreadful failure of 4e and how Paizo was running away with their customers with Pathfinder that they had to reverse direction and go back to the old-school well to recapture the fans. To get back to the title of this thread, I would say that the "Death Saves" mechanic makes the hit point situation even worse. If you thought 5e gives away too many hit points, the Death Saves mechanic further removes the threat of character mortality so there is very little sense of danger compared to earlier editions. And character creation is just laborious enough that it isn't all that quick to just roll up a new character on the spot. It still takes about an hour or two to make a character unless you are super efficient at it (most players aren't!).
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Post by jeffb on Sept 27, 2021 11:30:11 GMT -6
I'm not a believer in growing the hobby/industry/D&D community, especially in the manner they have chosen to do so since 5E. I also am not a consumer anymore as I don't care for the 5E product model at all. I've bought very little from WOTC outside the Starter/Essentials Kit, core 3 books and one adventure. I thought one of the better things about 5e was the business model: fewer books of higher quality, no endless splat books with additional rules spread across dozens of titles. I can see this as good in theory, however in practice what we have had is large expensive hardcovers where 80% of the content is targeted towards players (and as we have also seen, not necessarily any higher quality than previous editions when it comes to playtesting of such). Xanathar's Guide, Tasha's Cauldron, etc. As a DM I much prefer spending my money on a book targeted towards me, for my use of a specific type. WOTC's answer to this is the "adventure path" which I've not been a fan of since their inception by Paizo in Dragon magazine during 3.5's reign. I don't want big books of "try to give your player's the illusion of choices while we railroad them through this year long storyline we ripped off from D&D classics of old and jammed into the Forgotten Realms". Not all of them are like that, but the majority have been. You might also include Monster books for the DM, but again most of these have a large amount of player centric and very specific IP centric material as well-new classes, subclasses, spells, playable races, The Great Wheel, Critical Role setting, MTG settings*. As a RPG consumer I would much rather have a wide variety of books to choose from in order to find that 64 page gem for $20.00 than have less choices made up of $40 300 page books where I will never utilize more than 10% of them. * I actually applauded them for doing something different, setting-wise. It was certainly the most refreshing thing from a fictional standpoint they had done since 4E, but I'm not familiar at all with MTG, so for all I know they may be horrible matches for D&D. The "Theros" book really caught my eye as it seems to be Greek Mythology/Bronze Age/Glorantha-esque. They also had a "Fantasy Egypt" mini setting (real name escapes me) supplement that was a freebie that also seemed pretty fun.
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Post by robertsconley on Sept 27, 2021 11:46:26 GMT -6
I thought one of the better things about 5e was the business model: fewer books of higher quality, no endless splat books with additional rules spread across dozens of titles. I can see this as good in theory, however in practice what we have had is large expensive hardcovers where 80% of the content is targeted towards players (and as we have also seen, not necessarily any higher quality than previous editions when it comes to playtesting of such). Xanathar's Guide, Tasha's Cauldron, etc. This is not accurate. This is a good list representative of most. dicecove.com/list-of-dnd-5e-books/We had 3 core books 4 supplements (rules expansion) two are mostly oriented towards players and two are mostly oriented for referees. 7 campaign settings which have some additional rules material 18 Adventures/Campaigns On the upcoming list we have 2 Campaign Settings 1 Supplement on Dragons looks to be mostly for referees. Now I get the rest of your post that the above wasn't your cup of tea. However there is the DM's Guild which has a wealth of material of varying formats including some that directly emulate older editions format.
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Post by jeffb on Sept 27, 2021 12:01:51 GMT -6
I can see this as good in theory, however in practice what we have had is large expensive hardcovers where 80% of the content is targeted towards players (and as we have also seen, not necessarily any higher quality than previous editions when it comes to playtesting of such). Xanathar's Guide, Tasha's Cauldron, etc. This is not accurate. This is a good list representative of most. dicecove.com/list-of-dnd-5e-books/We had 3 core books 4 supplements (rules expansion) two are mostly oriented towards players and two are mostly oriented for referees. 7 campaign settings which have some additional rules material 18 Adventures/Campaigns On the upcoming list we have 2 Campaign Settings 1 Supplement on Dragons looks to be mostly for referees. Sure it is- When talking about splat books (which is what I quoted Thomden about)- they have been mostly geared towards players and DM info is an afterthought. This would be Xanathars and Tashas books. If you consider the Monster books as splats- Mordys and Volos devote a sizeable portion of their content to player related material as well, and very specific IP which is not of general use. Mordy's is the clear "offender" here. As a DM if I want to just buy a book of monsters, I'm now saddled with all the extra BS I don't want- For example, with Mordys, I now have a significant portion of the book detailing The Great Wheel (tm), pages devoted to player race options that I don't want or need, etc. Vast majority of adventures have been hardcover AP types, barring the Candlekeep book which I understand to be a book of mini adventures. Anything more recent than that, I'm not aware of. The setting books are split between player and DM content, of course.
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Post by Desparil on Sept 27, 2021 16:45:13 GMT -6
From all reports, there was a playtest version of 5E that was very old school, but then most of that was dumped. I've never bought anything from WotC and never will. Now if they reprinted some of the IP they own that I never had a chance to buy bitd, that they have buried forever, I would buy some of that. Is it something in particular that you're looking for? As far as I can tell, they have nearly the entire back catalogue on sale on DriveThruRPG - both stuff they released under their own label post-acquisition as well as the older TSR stuff, going all the way back to OD&D and Chainmail. I don't think they've ever been "burying" things, just they weren't tech-savvy enough to set up their own online store back when they could have been a dominant player, and resisted contracting out to a third party until it became clear how many sales they were missing out on by not having a digital option.
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Post by Finarvyn on Sept 27, 2021 17:51:50 GMT -6
My take on this is that Son of Bear said that no one had given him a reason to like 5E. I gave him several and he didn't like them, so my thought is that he's not going to like 5E no matter what. I'm not trying to convince anyone, just to make a list of what might attract someone to 5E who hasn't experienced it. My group likes 5E. Your mileage may vary.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2021 19:40:25 GMT -6
80% of the content is targeted towards players Now I get the rest of your post that the above wasn't your cup of tea. However there is the DM's Guild which has a wealth of material of varying formats including some that directly emulate older editions format. Boy oh boy does the DMs Guild ever have a LOT of stuff for the DM. Coupled with GM binder and Roll20 and you have more 5e content than a DM could ever use in a dozen lifetimes.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2021 19:47:27 GMT -6
Coupled with GM binder and Roll20 and you have more 5e content than a DM could ever use in a dozen lifetimes. And most of it better thought out and play tested than the stuff coming out of WotC.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Sept 27, 2021 19:59:44 GMT -6
Do you have some specific links/searches that point to some more 0e-relevant examples?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 27, 2021 23:17:59 GMT -6
From all reports, there was a playtest version of 5E that was very old school, but then most of that was dumped. I've never bought anything from WotC and never will. Now if they reprinted some of the IP they own that I never had a chance to buy bitd, that they have buried forever, I would buy some of that. Is it something in particular that you're looking for? As far as I can tell, they have nearly the entire back catalogue on sale on DriveThruRPG - both stuff they released under their own label post-acquisition as well as the older TSR stuff, going all the way back to OD&D and Chainmail. I don't think they've ever been "burying" things, just they weren't tech-savvy enough to set up their own online store back when they could have been a dominant player, and resisted contracting out to a third party until it became clear how many sales they were missing out on by not having a digital option. TSR bought some of their competitors and WotC bought more competitors, and all of that IP is buried. Has any of the Avalon Hill been returned to print? That was a huge amount of IP that was buried. Now everything is only for sale at collectors prices, which shuts me out of the market. I have the TSR stuff I want, but other publishers not so much.
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Post by tombowings on Sept 28, 2021 0:00:36 GMT -6
TSR bought some of their competitors and WotC bought more competitors, and all of that IP is buried. Has any of the Avalon Hill been returned to print? That was a huge amount of IP that was buried. Now everything is only for sale at collectors prices, which shuts me out of the market. I have the TSR stuff I want, but other publishers not so much. That describes my largest criticism with WotC. While it's a profitable business strategy, it's also evil and moral reprehensible as it decreases the amount of wonder, beauty, and creative expression in the world.
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Post by Desparil on Sept 28, 2021 0:12:24 GMT -6
Is it something in particular that you're looking for? As far as I can tell, they have nearly the entire back catalogue on sale on DriveThruRPG - both stuff they released under their own label post-acquisition as well as the older TSR stuff, going all the way back to OD&D and Chainmail. I don't think they've ever been "burying" things, just they weren't tech-savvy enough to set up their own online store back when they could have been a dominant player, and resisted contracting out to a third party until it became clear how many sales they were missing out on by not having a digital option. TSR bought some of their competitors and WotC bought more competitors, and all of that IP is buried. Has any of the Avalon Hill been returned to print? That was a huge amount of IP that was buried. Now everything is only for sale at collectors prices, which shuts me out of the market. I have the TSR stuff I want, but other publishers not so much. I mean yeah, if you're looking for complete board games with boards and tokens and everything, they're only going to reprint the ones they think they can actually get decent sales numbers on like Axis & Allies, so you're probably out of luck. Honestly, even before Avalon Hill got bought out, only their biggest hits got multiple productions runs over the years. As for RPG products, I assume that WotC doesn't actually have copies of the products associated with a lot of the IP they own - in the past, that was the reason for several missing classic and OD&D products, they didn't have physical copies to scan. Presumably they don't want to pay collector prices either, for the tiny number of sales the scans would generate. You can easily find most of it "in the wild" though.
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