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Post by tdenmark on Aug 11, 2024 21:08:17 GMT -6
annoys me too. I don't like the newer races they have added. And I don't like the fact that they changed the term race to species. I just find it pandering to the woke masses that play the game. But that is another subject. Orc bothers me too, but there is historical precedence for it, though I never thought Half-Orc belonged in the PHB. BUT I do think a book of monsters as PC races is a fine idea as a supplement for those who want that kind of thing. I'm all for options to cater to niche audiences. My take is just that Core should be vanilla fantasy. And I've already talked about how species doesn't sound "D&D" to my ear. I think ancestry would have been a better sounding term that also allows for more flexibility. Maybe because I like the idea of ABC. Ancestry, Background, Class. |
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Post by DungeonDevil on Aug 11, 2024 21:41:09 GMT -6
Species sounds too much like modern Linnaean taxonomy.
I like T&T's "kindred".
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yesmar
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Fool, my spell book is written in Erlang!
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Post by yesmar on Aug 12, 2024 12:55:29 GMT -6
I only like editions that let me play Balrogs.
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Post by tdenmark on Aug 13, 2024 4:52:42 GMT -6
Species sounds too much like modern Linnaean taxonomy. I like T&T's "kindred". Kindred is a fine word, though it sounds like Vampire: The Masquerade to me. |
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Post by machfront on Aug 13, 2024 6:35:27 GMT -6
PHB only….. “this 384 page book”….
Hahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaa!!!!
NO!
Even my most bored and lost 12 year old self in 1986 would NEVER read that many pages of rules, total…let alone only a single volume of (likely) three volumes!
Today, I wouldn’t even FLIP through that many pages of anything!
A game creator would be lucky if I’d read more than about 10 pages of….anything.
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Post by TheMyth on Aug 13, 2024 21:49:34 GMT -6
6th edition: too ? 5th edition: too fluffy 4th edition: not D&D 3.5 edition: way too crunchy 3rd edition: too crunchy 2nd edition: too many optional rules 1st edition: almost perfect BECMI: pretty good B/X: pretty darned good Holmes: underappreciated OD&D: perfection I'd like to second this list, with one amendment: B/X is my fave. It's basically OD&D cleaned up. Also, I recently attempted to DM a 2E pbp. That version is the one I played the most "in person" back in the day. I loved it then.... Now, I hate it with the burning fire of a thousand suns. It's ALL OPTIONS! Yet, a lot of it is still left unclear. No wonder they went the way they did with 3e!!! I'm old now. Simpler and clearer is better. |
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Post by simrion on Aug 14, 2024 6:02:54 GMT -6
I see the massive expansion in available player "species" as an attempt to appeal to the computer gamers. Many modern fantasy computer rpgs seem to offer an overwhelming selection of races/classes. YMMV
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Post by jeffb on Aug 14, 2024 6:11:24 GMT -6
PHB only….. “this 384 page book”…. Hahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaa!!!! NO! Even my most bored and lost 12 year old self in 1986 would NEVER read that many pages of rules, total…let alone only a single volume of (likely) three volumes! Today, I wouldn’t even FLIP through that many pages of anything! A game creator would be lucky if I’d read more than about 10 pages of….anything. Yep. Had I been thrown into the AD&D pool at the very start, or 3/4/5E, no way I would have ever kept playing. The LBB were confusing at times, but not intimidating (to me). So much of the rules were actually rulings and the books were just used for referencing tables, mostly. Monsters, treasures, xp, etc. That said, I was absolutely lovestruck when Moldvay/Cook/Marsh arrived a few years later. So much cleaner,clearer, and easy to reference during play. Still my fave presentation of the game all these years later. |
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Post by Finarvyn on Aug 14, 2024 7:47:50 GMT -6
I see the massive expansion in available player "species" as an attempt to appeal to the computer gamers. Many modern fantasy computer rpgs seem to offer an overwhelming selection of races/classes. YMMV Certainly the drift in D&D is towards computer-style play. 4E clearly moved that way, and the poor reception caused 5E to become more mainstream, but the word from WotC is that they want to have a virtual platform and I think they are trying to cater more to the "young, hip" crowd rather than us older veteran gamers. PHB only….. “this 384 page book”…. Hahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaa!!!! NO! Even my most bored and lost 12 year old self in 1986 would NEVER read that many pages of rules, total…let alone only a single volume of (likely) three volumes! Today, I wouldn’t even FLIP through that many pages of anything! A game creator would be lucky if I’d read more than about 10 pages of….anything. Yep. Had I been thrown into the AD&D pool at the very start, or 3/4/5E, no way I would have ever kept playing. The LBB were confusing at times, but not intimidating (to me). So much of the rules were actually rulings and the books were just used for referencing tables, mostly. Monsters, treasures, xp, etc. That said, I was absolutely lovestruck when Moldvay/Cook/Marsh arrived a few years later. So much cleaner, clearer, and easy to reference during play. Still my fave presentation of the game all these years later. Funny that I would find myself defending 5E, but it's really not as bad as it sounds. Much of the 5E PH is spell information. Any given class is only a couple of pages of rules, often detailing the powers that the class gets at various levels. A page or two for each racial/type option. A dozen or so pages on backgrounds and feats, which one could totally disregard in play. Really, half the book is just spells in the same way that DCC RPG has this giganto rulebook but the number of actual rules is small. How 5E is better than OD&D: [1] Ascending AC cleans up the combat charts a lot. Heck, the overall system is cleaner. Roll a d20, add modifiers, beat a target number. [2] Lots of player options, if that's your thing. Races, classes, backgrounds. I know a lot of players who get lost with OD&D's open-ended "so what are you?" character creation model, but who thrive when they can look at a list of choices and pick from them. [3] 5E finally got the magic-user right. Controversial, but I love the new cantrips. I love the ability to up-cast spells. It's really hard to go back to old school magic once you've played a few 5E wizards. [4] All in one place. (OD&D is really spread out. This is nullified with the Rules Cyclopedia, which is even more in one place, or some of the clones like OSE.) How OD&D is better than 5E: [1] Nostalgia. OD&D is a lot more fun to read. (AD&D is somewhat fun as well, but OD&D has something magical because it's not very refined and I feel like I could have written the thing on my typewriter or PC at home.) [2] Overall simplicity and philosophy: here's a general idea, now run with it! Page count is a lot smaller! [3] So fast to make characters and start playing. This is fantastic for folks who want to envision a character from a book or movie, then play something like it. [4] A lot easier for the DM to prep. Monsters have hardly any stats, no "legendary actions" or whatnot. More focus on story. How I would "fix" 5E: [1] My #1 fix would be to purge everything for levels 11+. Put all that higher level stuff in a separate "advanced" book. Most of the other things would take care of themselves. The 384 page rulebook would drop to around half its current size, even if you keep all 12 of the core classes, etc. The system is fundamentally solid. In many ways the book is better written, since TSR had no model to follow and 5E has 50 years to see what works and what doesn't. 5E is pretty easy for new players, particularly if you give them a pregen character, and the new character sheets organize skills by which stat they use instead of just grouped together alphabetically. |
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Post by machfront on Aug 14, 2024 8:26:08 GMT -6
I hear ya, Marv, but I must be brutally honest that when I hear that ‘half the book’ is given to spells…. All I think to my own self is: I hope the book is digest-sized, has a large font, only three spells per page and the book is only 50 pages.
I feel even B/X spell descriptions are far too verbose. Heheh 🙂
(It’s the #1 reason I never used AD&D in the ol’ ‘super lazy fashion’ BITD…...because I’d never read those spell descriptions even with a gun to my head. lol)
IMO: perfect spell description…. 1st to 5th Ed. Tunnels & Trolls description of the spell Knock-Knock:
“Opens locked doors (usually)”
Cool. Done. I don’t need to know any more. 🤷♂️
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Post by jeffb on Aug 14, 2024 8:48:42 GMT -6
I see the massive expansion in available player "species" as an attempt to appeal to the computer gamers. Many modern fantasy computer rpgs seem to offer an overwhelming selection of races/classes. YMMV Certainly the drift in D&D is towards computer-style play. 4E clearly moved that way, and the poor reception caused 5E to become more mainstream, but the word from WotC is that they want to have a virtual platform and I think they are trying to cater more to the "young, hip" crowd rather than us older veteran gamers. Yep. Had I been thrown into the AD&D pool at the very start, or 3/4/5E, no way I would have ever kept playing. The LBB were confusing at times, but not intimidating (to me). So much of the rules were actually rulings and the books were just used for referencing tables, mostly. Monsters, treasures, xp, etc. That said, I was absolutely lovestruck when Moldvay/Cook/Marsh arrived a few years later. So much cleaner, clearer, and easy to reference during play. Still my fave presentation of the game all these years later. Funny that I would find myself defending 5E, but it's really not as bad as it sounds. Much of the 5E PH is spell information. Any given class is only a couple of pages of rules, often detailing the powers that the class gets at various levels. A page or two for each racial/type option. A dozen or so pages on backgrounds and feats, which one could totally disregard in play. Really, half the book is just spells in the same way that DCC RPG has this giganto rulebook but the number of actual rules is small. How 5E is better than OD&D: [1] Ascending AC cleans up the combat charts a lot. Heck, the overall system is cleaner. Roll a d20, add modifiers, beat a target number. [2] Lots of player options, if that's your thing. Races, classes, backgrounds. I know a lot of players who get lost with OD&D's open-ended "so what are you?" character creation model, but who thrive when they can look at a list of choices and pick from them. [3] 5E finally got the magic-user right. Controversial, but I love the new cantrips. I love the ability to up-cast spells. It's really hard to go back to old school magic once you've played a few 5E wizards. [4] All in one place. (OD&D is really spread out. This is nullified with the Rules Cyclopedia, which is even more in one place, or some of the clones like OSE.) How OD&D is better than 5E: [1] Nostalgia. OD&D is a lot more fun to read. (AD&D is somewhat fun as well, but OD&D has something magical because it's not very refined and I feel like I could have written the thing on my typewriter or PC at home.) [2] Overall simplicity and philosophy: here's a general idea, now run with it! Page count is a lot smaller! [3] So fast to make characters and start playing. This is fantastic for folks who want to envision a character from a book or movie, then play something like it. [4] A lot easier for the DM to prep. Monsters have hardly any stats, no "legendary actions" or whatnot. More focus on story. How I would "fix" 5E: [1] My #1 fix would be to purge everything for levels 11+. Put all that higher level stuff in a separate "advanced" book. Most of the other things would take care of themselves. The 384 page rulebook would drop to around half its current size, even if you keep all 12 of the core classes, etc. The system is fundamentally solid. In many ways the book is better written, since TSR had no model to follow and 5E has 50 years to see what works and what doesn't. 5E is pretty easy for new players, particularly if you give them a pregen character, and the new character sheets organize skills by which stat they use instead of just grouped together alphabetically. But you are coming from this with experience of nearly 50 years. Me too. I ran a young kids group (up til their entey to college year) for years using 3e, 4e, 5e, PFBB, o/tsr, c&c, 13A, RQ/OQ, and DW for fantasy games- the only rulebook they ever were interested in looking at was the game pamphlet from the 3.0 starter set and therules written on their DW sheets. Had I given them any of the PHBs for any edition and asked them to become familiar with the rules, they would have gone back to their Nintendo DS' |
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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 14, 2024 11:10:17 GMT -6
I assume the free basic 2024 rules will be much shorter and stripped down just like the free basic 2014 rules, which is what I use. Also, I much prefer digital to physical when it comes to rulebooks (or any books for that matter.)
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Post by Finarvyn on Aug 14, 2024 11:47:47 GMT -6
But you are coming from this with experience of nearly 50 years. Me too. I ran a young kids group (up til their entey to college year) for years using 3e, 4e, 5e, PFBB, o/tsr, c&c, 13A, RQ/OQ, and DW for fantasy games- the only rulebook they ever were interested in looking at was the game pamphlet from the 3.0 starter set and therules written on their DW sheets. Had I given them any of the PHBs for any edition and asked them to become familiar with the rules, they would have gone back to their Nintendo DS' Hey, I'm not saying you are wrong. If it was just me, I'd play "OD&D Fin" which would be some cleaned-up version of the rules. Started it a dozen times, never really got it done. My family very much followed my lead for years. Wife has played at my table since 1988. Kids started somewhere around 1997, maybe. All was good for a long time.... ...until 5E came around in 2014. My wife resisted playing 5E for a while, and I played it at the game store but mostly kept it away from the house for the first few months or so. Eventually she came to a store with me and tried it at an Adventurer's League table, and loved 5E's magic system. All started to collapse from there. Son and his friends tried it and liked it. They liked the feeling of choice, of getting to build a character with all of the bells and whistles. They all decided that they liked 5E better, even though I wanted to run OD&D more. We bounced back and forth between the two, with some DCC and other stuff along the way, and gradually more and more 5E. Now I mostly run old school and DCC modules for them, but they come to the table with 5E characters. I do the optional rest rules so that they don't get to recharge all the time, and they are totally fine with that. They just want to stick to 5E. I throw in optional stuff all of the time and tweak rules the way I used to in the OD&D days, but it all comes with the chassis which is 5E. The funny thing is that they don't like me running WotC 5E modules that much. I'm not comfortable with trying to cram all of the details into my brain and I get frustrated running them. They prefer the "sandbox" style where I wing it and just let adventures happen. 40 years of awesome. Now, an odd mutation. Old school feel, new school mechanics. Your milage may vary. |
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Post by tdenmark on Aug 14, 2024 13:08:40 GMT -6
Funny that I would find myself defending 5E, but it's really not as bad as it sounds. Much of the 5E PH is spell information. In many ways 5e is closer to 0e than 2nd edition or later is. It is really quite stripped down, simple, and streamlined. Most of the systems in 5e have roots in 0e, B/X, and 1e. As you suggest, most of the content in the rulebooks is flavor not rules. |
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Post by rredmond on Aug 14, 2024 13:25:05 GMT -6
In many ways 5e is closer to 0e than 2nd edition or later is. It is really quite stripped down, simple, and streamlined. Most of the systems in 5e have roots in 0e, B/X, and 1e. As you suggest, most of the content in the rulebooks is flavor not rules. Agreeing here. I've only played 5e with my daughter as DM, a handful of times. And it felt very much like the stripped down Oe-ish 1e that I DM. Of course my daughter had like 10 or 11 years of playing 1e before 5e came out - I think that's about right she started at 7 or 8, maybe a wee bit earlier. So my guess is that her DMing style is influenced by older school ways and means. She DMs an occasional 1e one off, but her friends never like it, because "you're too deadly!"  |
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Post by rredmond on Aug 14, 2024 13:26:48 GMT -6
Clarification too, I've played mostly 1e, then a bunch of 0e, a wee bit of Basic (and etc) and 2e, but not really a lot. And zero instances of 3e or 4e. So I'm not drawing from a breadth of edition experience myself.
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Post by jeffb on Aug 14, 2024 15:21:11 GMT -6
But you are coming from this with experience of nearly 50 years. Me too. I ran a young kids group (up til their entey to college year) for years using 3e, 4e, 5e, PFBB, o/tsr, c&c, 13A, RQ/OQ, and DW for fantasy games- the only rulebook they ever were interested in looking at was the game pamphlet from the 3.0 starter set and therules written on their DW sheets. Had I given them any of the PHBs for any edition and asked them to become familiar with the rules, they would have gone back to their Nintendo DS' Hey, I'm not saying you are wrong. If it was just me, I'd play "OD&D Fin" which would be some cleaned-up version of the rules. Started it a dozen times, never really got it done. My family very much followed my lead for years. Wife has played at my table since 1988. Kids started somewhere around 1997, maybe. All was good for a long time.... ...until 5E came around in 2014. My wife resisted playing 5E for a while, and I played it at the game store but mostly kept it away from the house for the first few months or so. Eventually she came to a store with me and tried it at an Adventurer's League table, and loved 5E's magic system. All started to collapse from there. Son and his friends tried it and liked it. They liked the feeling of choice, of getting to build a character with all of the bells and whistles. They all decided that they liked 5E better, even though I wanted to run OD&D more. We bounced back and forth between the two, with some DCC and other stuff along the way, and gradually more and more 5E. Now I mostly run old school and DCC modules for them, but they come to the table with 5E characters. I do the optional rest rules so that they don't get to recharge all the time, and they are totally fine with that. They just want to stick to 5E. I throw in optional stuff all of the time and tweak rules the way I used to in the OD&D days, but it all comes with the chassis which is 5E. The funny thing is that they don't like me running WotC 5E modules that much. I'm not comfortable with trying to cram all of the details into my brain and I get frustrated running them. They prefer the "sandbox" style where I wing it and just let adventures happen. 40 years of awesome. Now, an odd mutation. Old school feel, new school mechanics. Your milage may vary. Please let me clarify, Fin Make no mistake, despite my animosity towards WOTC, 5E product model, and the 5E community that Wizards has fostered, I feel 5e is a good modern D&D system. I've said this before here a few times. Probably the best as written, by WOTC (I still prefer my simplified and tweaked 4e) 5E is one of the best versions (WOTC or TSR) to just sit down and play/run without me having to go nuts changing/removing things- especially if we are talking the Basic Rules document. I ran the NEXT playtests and off and on 5E for the first few years it was out. I'm not saying people cannot find worth or more worth in it than O/tSR games. (I find zero worth in WOTC as a business over the last 8 years or so) What I *am* saying is that I would never have have gotten into D&D had someone thrown a 5E or 2E or 3E or 1E or 4E PHb at me and said " here are the rules". Those books are intimidating for anyone, let alone a young kid.. especially one who doesn't have any gaming experience from wargames , or video game, or more complicated modern style boardgames or card games. And I saw that also with my kids group- none of them had any experience besides the WII and Super Mario on DS, or family boardgames (which is all the gaming experience I had in 77 barring a magnavox odyssey 100). Hope that clears things up. |
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Post by machfront on Aug 16, 2024 6:24:30 GMT -6
^ Exactly!
There’s no way even a super bored nerd at age 12 (like me in 1986), would ever look at the last few editions of D&D and ever get into it….ever.
I may be intrigued, but the very first thing would be to look for far, far, far EASIER alternatives.
Video games nowadays.
Even deleting that, there would be so many more options….
Brutally honest….at age 50, I have to say, were I 12 right now… I’d laugh at all of you (us and me), and play my video games. 🤷♂️
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Post by geoffrey on Aug 16, 2024 8:17:23 GMT -6
Where I am today (which is different than where I was in the past and almost certainly different than where I will be in the future): My main rule books, all by Gary Gygax: 1. advanced D&D Monster Manual 2. advanced D&D Players Handbook 3. advanced D&D Dungeon Masters Guide 4. advanced D&D Expansion Volume (click: dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=92983 ) Add: print-outs of the seven new monsters in Gary's G3, D1, D2, and D3 modules All of the above heavily-informed by: 1. the 1974 D&D boxed set 2. Supplement I: GREYHAWK 3. the basic D&D rule book edited by Dr. Holmes All of the above seen through the lens of: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands |
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Post by sixdemonbag on Sept 23, 2024 11:44:02 GMT -6
I assume the free basic 2024 rules will be much shorter and stripped down just like the free basic 2014 rules, which is what I use. Also, I much prefer digital to physical when it comes to rulebooks (or any books for that matter.)
I haven't read them yet and they haven't released the DMG and MM free basic rules yet until those particular books are available -- so more to come. I'll be interested to see how much (or little) things have changed since the 2014 edition.
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 23, 2024 17:55:06 GMT -6
I'd like to second this list, with one amendment: B/X is my fave. It's basically OD&D cleaned up. Also, I recently attempted to DM a 2E pbp. That version is the one I played the most "in person" back in the day. I loved it then.... Now, I hate it with the burning fire of a thousand suns. It's ALL OPTIONS! Yet, a lot of it is still left unclear. No wonder they went the way they did with 3e!!! I'm old now. Simpler and clearer is better. Funny enough I went from hating 2e back in 1997, to kind of liking it in 2024. The designers waffled too much and instead of making a firm decision on the best rules, just left a bunch of options for the DM to figure out. On the surface you'd think this would be a good thing, the end effect was campaigns that were convoluted and a player base that was fragmented beyond repair. I won a set including the powers & options books in an auction once (I was going for something else in the lot), and read through them, then played them. There was some really great stuff in there. And the settings in the 2e era are still the best. The rulebooks are as dry as dust though, after the 1e era of delicious gygaxian prose. |
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 23, 2024 17:59:35 GMT -6
That Advanced D&D Expansion Volume looks like what Unearthed Arcana should have been. I've often thought of cobbling together my own version of AD&D 1.5 in that fashion. |
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Post by Finarvyn on Sept 24, 2024 5:03:58 GMT -6
All of the above seen through the lens of: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands I'm thinking of running KotB for my group. Any special ideas or resources you can recommend for it? (I have the Goodman hardback, which has some samples of how to fill in empty rooms. Book seems a bit large, however, with a LOT of stuff in it.) |
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 24, 2024 18:26:01 GMT -6
All of the above seen through the lens of: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands I'm thinking of running KotB for my group. Any special ideas or resources you can recommend for it? (I have the Goodman hardback, which has some samples of how to fill in empty rooms. Book seems a bit large, however, with a LOT of stuff in it.) Into the Borderlands is an epic book, but it's too much to use at the table. I just go back to the original and go in with the mindset that the adventure will change and grow as we play it. Everytime is different. |
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Post by geoffrey on Sept 24, 2024 18:54:34 GMT -6
All of the above seen through the lens of: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands I'm thinking of running KotB for my group. Any special ideas or resources you can recommend for it? (I have the Goodman hardback, which has some samples of how to fill in empty rooms. Book seems a bit large, however, with a LOT of stuff in it.) My three Mike's books in my sig expand B2's setting. |
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Post by Punkrabbitt on Sept 24, 2024 21:49:42 GMT -6
All of the above seen through the lens of: B2: The Keep on the Borderlands I'm thinking of running KotB for my group. Any special ideas or resources you can recommend for it? (I have the Goodman hardback, which has some samples of how to fill in empty rooms. Book seems a bit large, however, with a LOT of stuff in it.) Not every room has to have something in it. Sometimes empty rooms are good to hide in, to bandage some wounds, to eat and drink. That kind of thing. |
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Post by tdenmark on Sept 27, 2024 13:11:43 GMT -6
The thing is, if they indeed included all the changes to character creation they have added in the 5E supplements, the races species are just fluff anyway, because you can play anything (which is not by itself a flaw) and just add all the abilities and bonuses you want to fit your class so you can "powergame" the game and have a perfect "build" for your character. Species have so little differentiation that they are barely more than cosmetic costumes for the same character. |
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Parzival
Level 6 Magician
Is a little Stir Crazy this year...
Posts: 401
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Post by Parzival on Oct 5, 2024 10:19:35 GMT -6
The thing is, if they indeed included all the changes to character creation they have added in the 5E supplements, the races species are just fluff anyway, because you can play anything (which is not by itself a flaw) and just add all the abilities and bonuses you want to fit your class so you can "powergame" the game and have a perfect "build" for your character. Species have so little differentiation that they are barely more than cosmetic costumes for the same character. Yep. No cultural distinction, no “alienness.” Just humans with bad plastic surgery. Boring. |
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Post by tdenmark on Oct 5, 2024 21:30:12 GMT -6
]Yep. No cultural distinction, no “alienness.” Just humans with bad plastic surgery. Boring. They've basically just turned races into cosplayers.  |
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Post by tdenmark on Oct 15, 2024 18:22:15 GMT -6
Also, I recently attempted to DM a 2E pbp. That version is the one I played the most "in person" back in the day. I loved it then.... Funny enough I went from hating 2e back in 1997, to kind of liking it in 2024. In another thread I called the art style of 2e "dungeondork." I think I'm going to use that term from now on. I've come to like the game system itself, aside from having too many options, but the graphic design and art is just too dorky for me. It is too Dungeondork.  |
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