EN World is a pretty big organization, to the best of my knowledge. Not someone homebrewing rules hacks in their basement, at the very least. I'm curious what folks think of this, given the big backer behind it and the comparisons to Paizo's leaping off into Pathfinder. Also considering the fact that many 5e players are violently hostile to the suggestion of any sort of 5.5e rework or update, even one that's designed to overlay the existing game rather than replace it. Heh, any time the subject comes up, there's constant cries of "NYET, RULEBOOK IS FINE" and "the base game is everything it needs to be, nobody needs or wants a 5.5e and you're wrong if you think you do!"
Turns out a known entertainment company feels otherwise, and thinks there's enough market for an Advanced-Rules/5.5e supplement to put some real marketing into it as well as the development work. Curious how that's gonna play out.
What are your thoughts on the announcement, and what sort of expanded options are you hoping comes from this initiative? A lot of it likely won't be compatible with DDB because DDB is incompatible with literally every form of homebrew known to man, but even then...anyone have anything they're super hype for the chance to see improved?
Personally? Hoping to see expansions to mundane gear and crafting. Everybody knows that ninety-eight percent of the 'Adventuring Gear' in the PHB is pointless, and ninety-nine players out of a hundred aren't even aware you can buy things that don't come with your character's starting gear loadout. It blows people's minds when I have things like chalk, signal whistles, or steel mirrors on my character sheet and then show those folks where that equipment is in the PHB. Acquiring/selecting appropriate tools and equipment for an Adventure should require more than "Pick BIS armor, pick BIS weapon, hope for magic plunder", at least for me.
They're going to try and force the 5e system into being a Pathfinder-based system. From my own past experiences, ENWorld is very much a 3.X/Pathfinder crowd, and ENPublishing would have to be some degree of nuts to alienate their forum members/community, and really ENWorld only exists because of the boom of 3rd edition, which was a fairly complex system due to WotC being of the mindset that "there's a rule for everything, and EVERYTHING has a rule to be followed!" which Paizo took and ran with for Pathfinder (which kudos to Paizo for tapping the market of disgruntled D&D fans that hated the changes introduced by 4e).
Problem is that by design intent, 5e and Pathfinder (especially 2nd edition Pathfinder) have two inherently different design philosophies. With 5e, WotC sought a sort of "return to basics" and to generally simplify things, making the system overall more beginner-friendly and less intimidating for those who've never played RPGs in either recent years or at all. Conversely, Pathfinder (2e especially from what I'm seeing) is an extremely math/crunch-heavy system, enough to rival HERO/Champions in some aspects.
Now, it's fine that 5e and PF2e are different in their approaches, because they catering to different audiences, with WotC going more for the casual gamers, or those who don't have a lot of free time and thus need to make as much of their session count; Matt Mercer has even said that for Critical Role, he pretty much had to switch from Pathfinder to 5e or else the show would get bogged down, which was fine when it was their home game but would be disastrous for a televised program, especially one watched by people that weren't already gamers. And making that move to 5e seems to have worked, letting Matt & crew grow a huge fan community (even if the first campaign had a rough start and didn't start picking up steam until the Briarwood arc).
So yeah, I'm worried that they're going to try and shove a cat through a drain pipe in order to turn 5e into something much closer to Pathfinder. And hey, maybe I'm wrong and they'll actually introduce some interesting concepts that make 5e a better system. But give my past experiences with both ENWorld and ENPublishing, I'm not holding my breath.
I'd like to see more differences in the weapons/weapon and armor options, and general expansions in gear/crafting as well. More character options at 1st level would be awesome too. The way things stand I hate starting at anything lower than 3rd level because at 3rd I at least have some meaningful choices to make before the game even starts.
My own concern is that eventually, Wizards is going to find out that 5e cannot retain players. The game needs - and I heavily emphasize that word. Here, let me emphasize it more: needs needs needs needs needs needs NEEDS - a greater degree of depth for those players who're slowly starving to death on the core 5e rules.
I can say that the only reason I'm still running 5e instead of switching to a system that does not assume everyone using it is as dumb as a sack of sand and cannot handle ANY cognitive load whatsoever is because of the DDB tool. I would've jumped ship and taken my money with me long since if not for what the DDB team built here. Even then, my playgroup is constantly looking for ways to introduce choice, depth, and diversity back into the 5e ruleset somehow, and unfortunately we're butting up against the strict limitations of the DDB tool doing it.
The rest of the 5e fanbase (or at least the DDB forum userbase here) would have me believe that me and mine are the only people in existence who're starving to death on this system's lack of depth. I'm mostly pointing to this ENWorld initiative as an argument against that mindset, and a sign that maybe - just MAYBE - Wizards should get off its f#$%ing space ass and GIVE US AN OFFICIAL 5.5E SUPPLEMENT ALREADY!!!!!! They don't need to replace the core rulebooks, which everybody knows they'll never do because it'll upset their precious money cart and piss off the newbies who only just barely got conned into spending a hundred and fifty dollars on the three big books in the first place. Nobody's asking them to do that. We know better. But they do need to give the more experienced gamers, the people absolutely desperate for something to bite into when they play the game and design characters for it, a freaking bone.
Or we. Will. Leave.
I detest Pathfinder's approach to actually running games. Numbers so high you need a telescope to see them, an extremely narrow band of content the players can do effectively due to absurd scaling of the numbers, and a set of floating static modifiers long enough to make every fight a nightmare. Not required. But man - the new PF2e character creation system has been universally and effusively lauded, from what I've seen. The three-action system is ever so much cleaner and better than 5e's kludgy mess. I could see where people might want to apply some of that to 5e's leaner battle engine and the idea of bounded accuracy. If that's what ENWorld does? Maybe there'll be something to it, if they do it well.
And yeah. Additional character creation options would be excellent. Virtually all of my table's rules homebrew is groping for ways to make character creation more fun and meaningful at all levels of play. The whole "pick your species, pick your class, pick your background, wait until level 3 and pick your subclass, and now voila - you're done making significant decisions for your character for the rest of that character's life" thing can suck every last duck in existence. Including Quackthulhu.
The more rules added over the editions. The worse it got in my opinion. It often felt very restricted. Especially in 3.x I felt very restricted. You either do it x way or you're wrong. Meaning a lot of time was wasted looking up rules that were used only once in a blue moon. Depth is often used in a wrong way hoping for more complexity. In practice this means more convoluted bullshit to deal with. 5e is the complete opposite. It trimmed all that excess fat, but didn't stop cutting until a lot was removed.
Granted I still occasionally look up rules in 3.x to use in my 5e games. However they're used more as a guideline and source of inspiration. Especially when ruling stuff when fighting in or near a tornado/hurricane. Ideas for movement rules, lack of sight etc can give a good starting point to make calls in 5e games. Seriously you don't need to do. Just use common sense and you can make every call. Making the game more fluid instead of slowing it down to a snails pace since you need to open the book again to look it all up. I have a near photographic memory and still needed to spend quite a lot of time looking up rules. That is how much shit there was.
On one hand I can see the point of needing less cognitive functionality to play the game. At least going by the strict sense described by the books. However my experience is the complete opposite. 5e is a very open and modular system with only the core elements described. From there it is VERY easy to just add your own stuff into the game as you see fit. You can take everything from previous editions and transfer it over damn easy. This I love, because buying all those hundreds of supplemental 3.x manuals is something I have no interest in. Since 5e is so modular and open. I can just take all that good stuff and transfer it over. Not even mentioning how DMSGuild became booming business for lots of additional content to take your game to the next level.
Sure 5e lacks heavy in almost every department. However you can just copy/paste most of the magic items, traps, challenges, gems and what not from previous editions. Being modular is 5e's strongest part and I love that about it. Allowing the more experienced people to take the elements they want and use it. Instead of being forced and restricted by an excessive amount of rules that bog everything down. The game has become more open and more of an actual roleplay game again. However the 5e generation suffers from amateur theater hour instead of doing actual roleplay though. And yes many of them prefer to stick to the most basic dull presentation of 5e. So what. Not my problem. The 5e system isn't preventing me from playing the intense and deep and challenging games that I had since AD&D due to its modularity. Instead of saying 5e is for the less cognitive people... turn it around. The ones complaining are the lazy sort that can't be bothered to use their cognitive functions to use the modularity of the system properly and put in the work themselves.
"I also could go with a bit more “spread along the levels” character choices, as I think you mention, although I’m afraid that, once more, only the “superior ones” would be used. Note than, in 3e/PF this was compensated by easier multiclassing and prestige classes, but unfortunately these were also linked to abuse and powergaming, so it’s very hard to make sure that combinations will not be abused." You mean the kind where you needed 6 supplemental modules to make a char. Creating a char could take weeks since you had to go through everything and find a good synergy. then you'd often end up with huge discussions around the table since not everyone had access to the same modules. Feeling left out and complaining they couldn't hit the same power curve. Yeah I really don't miss that at all.
I can understand that Tier 3-4 gameplay just don't feel epic. As said you can rampage through it fairly easy. Reminds me of Xcom 2 WoTC where the early 10-15missions are damn hard. And the second half of the game you don't even bother taking cover and just blow it all up without breaking a sweat. Not sure what happened during testing. But around lvl 14+ it all starts to break down. Then again that also happened in previous editions. Can't really blame it on 5e just for that. It is an inherent problem in many games when players get access to a lot of freedom and a lot of power. Means that you need to throw out all algorithms and make an entire new batch for the high end of play. Even max calculated HP doesn't work on CR14+ monsters. Their output is weak if you use average dice damage instead of rolling the dice and often hitting 70%+ damage numbers on each attack.
5e is designed to be played without ever giving out a magic item. It is by design a low fantasy game basically. Unlike previous editions. Since most of us do give out magic items. It means that the issue in my previous paragraph becomes even bigger issue the higher level up play you get too.
I have been playing since second edition and had considered 3.5 my favorite edition. This was until the group I played went from playing 3.5 to playing 5th. While I do miss a lot about 3.5 I am having more in 5e than I ever did in 3.5. There is an element of holy crap I may die(in fact my character has been reduced to 0 a lot more in 5.0 so far because of stupid decision or dice rolls.).
“Or we. Will. Leave.”
Ok. Bye. Not to rude or anything, but the level of entitlement that you are showing here is really cringy. WoTC doesn’t have to do anything and don’t even have to do 5.5. To hold any company hostage by saying that you will take your ball home is really scummy and shows that you don’t really care about the game at all.
As an aside I can’t wait for my group to meet next as hopefully we can switch my character over to my favorite class from 2e and 3.5, Druid. I can’t wait to see what fun things I can as a Druid in 5e. I do miss that animal companion though.
I think 4e is a beast on its own and shouldn't really be brought up all that much when talking about D&D in general. Indeed very restrictive and limited. Yet the combat, which was its main focus, just didn't work. It became such a snorefest despite the many skills you could use as part of the "decision making when leveling up". It offered options, but in the end none of them really mattered with how the resources etc worked. The narrative/RP element was obstructed in every possible way. 4e to me is just a spin-off attempt at a Tactical War Game, but almost everything out there does that better. Still I did like some of the additional stuff 4e did bring. Skill Challenges, 1hp Minions and that some attacks forced creatures to move. Creating more tactical elements to combat. Beyond that....4e was a waste of energy. It is good to see that WoTC also realized this and decided to go back to form.
The beauty of 5e is that you can take the elements you liked. And use them. Want the players and monsters to be able to use attacks, that on a failed save causes the targetted creature to move in a certain direction? Then just add it as homebrew to an item or the monsters attack. It is a shame only Eldritch Blast has that option in 5e so homebrew it is.
With my last paragraph I mentioned 5e being designed as a low fantasy system. I didn't mean that D&D settings are low fantasy. This is separate from one another in this case. Yes most settings have magical and fantastical elements all over the place. Still the players can go through it without ever receiving a single magical item. That is how the game and the monsters have been balanced. I wonder how many 5e DM's actually adjust monster stats when equipping them with magical gear. Which will be accessible to the PC's upon slaying the beast.
DDB I don't really care that much about it. I'm just here for the forums just as I was in the older editions. We've gone through so many different pieces of software over the decades. My players even go as far as outright refusing to use it. Wanting pen and paper. More real and tangible to them as well as the added freedom. DBB seems to be good software, but it is still in development. And you can only do things as long as it fits with the framework. And that's not what the more experienced DM's are used to. Since we occasionally come up with entire new mechanics outside of that framework.
As for new content. Instead of a x.5 version. I'd rather see new books that expand on the existing lore and realms. New monsters added into the mix to expand on it. Introducing new mechanics such as vehicles in Avernus and Ships with Saltmarsh. New stuff we can actually use to expand. Because with minor modification the vehicles/ships allows us to make our own Spelljammer stuff. Which brings up places like DMsGuild with tons of community content worth checking out.
I would really love to have some kind of options to customize my characters. Right now the only choice on level up seems to be whether you take the two points to your primary stat or ask the DM nicely if optional rules are allowed and pick one of maybe three feats that sound somehow interesting.
Only to figure out that a Shieldmaster's shove is completely useless since RAW you cannot shove until your attack is done and the enemy will simply stand up again during their turn.
As for the ongoing discussion: the more I play D&D the more I feel restricted and bored by the rules. Maybe it's because of my DMs, but if there is no rule that says "you can do that", more often than not it's "you cannot do that". It's just not fun to "play" a game where your only real option is "I attack". Even skills are watered down to the point where they could as well be non-existent. A +5 on a D20 doesn't mean you're well trained in a skill. It only means you're 25% more likely to succeed than the amateur who's never done something before.
That is a DM problem you're facing Naresea. 5e is very open and deliberately leaves out rules. It presents with basic rules that let you apply them to pretty much any situation that comes up. If your DM isn't willing to think and use common sense to figure out how something would work....then he sucks at being a DM. Usually the player describes what they want to do and how. The DM then breaks it down to figure out what type of rolls of skill would be involved with that.
You want to wall run? Sure let's do a general dex check alongside of your movement speed. As DM I just need to think about what the surface is you're running on. How slippery it might be and decide whether it is a DC12 or 15 or 17 check to do.
Also being trained and having proficiency in a skill doesn't just mean you got 25% more chance of success. It often also means that only you with the proficiency are allowed to attempt the situation. Especially if you play at a table where suddenly everyone wants to do the same check out of fear of missing out. In that case a group check might be done where your proficiency uplifts the amateur that messes up. So the group is still successful on average. But in most cases it means only the one with proficiency is allowed since they actually had training in it. With 1 other amateur maybe assisting you under your guiding expertise. Allowing you to roll with advantage even.
Combat does get boring if all you say is... I attack. Describe your attack. How do you attack. And the DM narrate back how the monster blocks or gets cut up. Leading to much more memorable scenario's. At times it can even lead to unsuspected situations instead of some static bull.
Pathfinder and D&D may be basically the same game in theory but in practice they differ greatly. 5e is great for quick games, character creation can be done in minutes at low level, 10 minutes after meeting up you can have your table up and running. Not so with Pathfinder, where I greatly prefer to have at least 30 minutes minimum to design and crunch the numbers. It's player base is also very different in outlook - those that like simplicity and minimal decisions will tend to prefer 5e whilst those who are willing and able to put in some effort to learn the system tend to prefer the improved customisation available in Pathfinder. The downside to 5e is the lack of options can make things a little samey - A recent game I started I had designed a tomelock in the week before the first session ready to go, another player turned up and made a tomelock on the night. It was pointless playing them both as they would end up the same, so I very quickly rebuilt as a bard. (that's both a disadvantage and an advantage of the character creation system of 5e). In Pathfinder one advantage is that even if you picked the same race and character class, the customisation options mean that the two characters would play very differently. A downside though is that if you don't understand the options then you can make a very disappointing character, or even an average on that really falls behind from tier 2 onwards. So I guess it really depends on what sort of person you are, your fellow players, and gamestyles.
As a side note, for those thinking Pathfinder character creation is a pain, you should have seen RoleMaster / SpaceMaster hehehe
I would really love to have some kind of options to customize my characters. Right now the only choice on level up seems to be whether you take the two points to your primary stat or ask the DM nicely if optional rules are allowed and pick one of maybe three feats that sound somehow interesting.
Only to figure out that a Shieldmaster's shove is completely useless since RAW you cannot shove until your attack is done and the enemy will simply stand up again during their turn.
As for the ongoing discussion: the more I play D&D the more I feel restricted and bored by the rules. Maybe it's because of my DMs, but if there is no rule that says "you can do that", more often than not it's "you cannot do that". It's just not fun to "play" a game where your only real option is "I attack". Even skills are watered down to the point where they could as well be non-existent. A +5 on a D20 doesn't mean you're well trained in a skill. It only means you're 25% more likely to succeed than the amateur who's never done something before.
I think it maybe a combination of the DM and yourself. I have never been told by my DM that “you can’t do that” We always find a way to accomplish it.
I have seen plenty of comment in various forums/Facebook posts that state that the Role-playing is much better in this addition. so if the is becoming “I attack” it is most likely the dm or the group that is letting that happen. I have seen DMs reward creative players. Heck, I remember having to make various checks(stealth, athletics and acrobatics as well as my attack) to just up onto a building, run across the roof and jump at the flying enemy to attack it(and kill it via fall damage).
the skills are not watered down if you and your group don’t make them like that. There is a lot of customization stuff in 5e and I have seen various different take on rogues, druids, fighters, monks, and warlocks.
if you are looking at hard numbers then yes they seem watered down but depending on your group they don’t have to be me.
looking at your example. Ok so the enemy is pushed down at the end of your turn. Ok, depending on the initiative order, they party can have some fun. If the enemy had already had its turn and your party members haven’t, well then prone attacks for all of them. If it hasn’t gone, well it just spend its movement getting up and can’t move far which could severely hamper its actions that turn.
I haven't played PF2. I have played read the manual and played around creating some PC's. Two dwarves are already fairly different to one another. If I remember correctly there are 8 different bases to begin on. In D&D they're talking of even removing racial bonusses etc. Reducing customization and uniqueness even more. Despite most of the playerbase agreeing that we need more customization options to create unique characters. I don't want to go back to 3.x days where you spend weeks mulling through countless supplemental modules. However something like PF2 would be a nice addition to create mechanically, and thus also personality wise, different characters.
Personally I don't understand the need for it. Depth is something that comes from the individual campaign you are a part of. Its the story and the development of the characters in that story. 5e is great due to how streamlined it is thats why people play it. If your looking for more crunch/options then this isn't the system for you. If you want crunch that is what pathfinder is for.
To me pathfinder and 5e are for 2 entirely different types of players/DMs neither one of them should feel pressured to become like the other.
In D&D they're talking of even removing racial bonusses etc. Reducing customization and uniqueness even more. Despite most of the playerbase agreeing that we need more customization options to create unique characters.
The last time I let a numerical modifier determine if my character was unique or not was at least ten years ago. My characters differ from every other character with identical stats, feats, and equipment in the in-game choices they make and how I describe their actions. I'm currently in a group where two other players each play human fighters (samey stats, but for choice of starting feat: one polearm master, one great weapon fighter) and the way they are played set them widely apart from each other and one could be forgiven for mistaking each as some subclass of monk and barbarian respectively.
Clearly people play for different reasons. This thread is evidence of that, and an "Advanced" ruleset that fits on top of existing 5e rules sounds like the best way to satisfy everyone.
My long-running group is very crunchy and tactical. We enjoy the feeling of "system mastery" where you combine game elements to make a character that can do unexpected things or fill a very specific archetype. It scratches a different itch than just narrating a character to be uniquely talented.
I'm playing in another game that is just PHB and it's very different, but I think it's been good for me as a player and DM. I understand a bit better now that you can have fun with an extremely limited set of options and fairly restrictive DM rulings, but it's a very different game. I enjoy it, but it's not the only D&D I'd want to play.
As for new content. Instead of a x.5 version. I'd rather see new books that expand on the existing lore and realms. New monsters added into the mix to expand on it. Introducing new mechanics such as vehicles in Avernus and Ships with Saltmarsh. New stuff we can actually use to expand. Because with minor modification the vehicles/ships allows us to make our own Spelljammer stuff. Which brings up places like DMsGuild with tons of community content worth checking out.
See for me, this kind of stuff is near worthless. It's nice for inspiration, but no better than the volumes of fantasy literature or any other type of media out there. I can (and will) expand on the lore of a setting all day to the point that my games are always in a homebrew universe.
It sounds counterintuitive, but character restrictions can breed creativity. When literally every character can make up their own moves, there becomes little to distinguish them. You need some restricting structure or the game just becomes group make-believe time.
I have seen plenty of comment in various forums/Facebook posts that state that the Role-playing is much better in this addition. so if the is becoming “I attack” it is most likely the dm or the group that is letting that happen. I have seen DMs reward creative players. Heck, I remember having to make various checks(stealth, athletics and acrobatics as well as my attack) to just up onto a building, run across the roof and jump at the flying enemy to attack it(and kill it via fall damage).
Not bad, I recently had an aarakocra pick up a kobold and drop it on another kobold after a series of checks, quite fun as well (especially since the aarakocra had a very clumsy beginning in the campaign, there was a large storm and he frequently flew into the sides of barns). :D
Oh, excellent. I was dismayed that this thread had died in delivery when I went to bed last night. Coolness. Allow me to address some broad points I'm seeing in multiple replies without naming names.
"The depth in 5e is the decisions you make in character and the personality and stories you build along the way. You don't need extra rules for that depth, you just need the Power of Roleplaying!" This is both true and a total nothingburger, sadly. I can roleplay a character regardless of the fluff behind it, but if the mechanics don't support the roleplaying, there's a disconnect and a problem. Roleplaying is not the solution, it's the objective, and the game should offer as many rules and options as are required to meet that objective.
Take the case of two Lore bards - one of them a quiet, studious scholar of histories and the tales of the world, and the other the Scanlan Shorthalt silver-tongued womanizer. Two entirely distinct personalities, two entirely different characters whose motivations could hardly be further apart and still both be Good-aligned...but mechanically? Those two characters are completely identical, and do not belong in the same party together. There is absolutely no way to differentiate the scholar of history from the Mancubus within their mechanical character builds. None. Zip. Zero. Nil. That is a problem. When the mechanics of the game fail to support the narrative of the story (and vice versa), the entire experience suffers for it. The fact that short of DM homebrewery - and remember, Wizards has heavily frowned upon homebrew and aftermarket customization for the entirety of 5e's history with their absolutely godawful 'Adventurer's League' system - there's absolutely no way to try and rebrand your character off of whatever shitty archetype your subclass is built on just sucks.
"3.x had seven hundred manananillion rulebooks and modules and expansions and splatbooks and UGH! We do NOT need to deal with that garbage in 5e!" True. Also a nonfactor. A DM is welcome to forbid sources from her table - or even to provide a list of approved books for her game and say "if your idea isn't in here, you can't play it." This is the Adventurer's League method - build a PC using the PHB AND NOTHING BUT THE PHB and bloody well like it. For those who are looking for expanded rules and options, however? Those who're able and willing to cope with the extra play options? Bring it on. As much as people like to defend 5e as an absolutely pitch-perfect blend of flawless and sublime simplicity that nevertheless allows for infinite creativity...it is absolutely not that thing. There are myriad complaints about places where 5e cut too deeply and oversimplified. Weapons and armor is a big one - nobody likes how oversimplified those systems are because it makes it more or less impossible to play a highly skilled and trained specialist in a given weapon, on top of making a heavily plated iron juggernaut of a heavy armor master feel exactly the same as a nimble, evasive skirmisher due to both methods being lumped into the same mechanical rule.
Again - when the mechanics do not properly align with and express the story, and when the story does not intuitively explain and enrich the mechanics, the disconnect between the two causes the entire experience to suffer. Some people are more sensitive to that disconnect than others, and constantly telling those people that they're both stupid and wrong and they should just Roleplay Harder or Fluff Better is a crappy answer. Especially when the Official Digital Toolset for D&D 5e makes it virtually impossible to implement some of the expanded rules options in places like the DM's Guild due to their hyper-restrictive, AL-style toolset.
"Why don't you just go play Pathfinder if you hate 5e so much, huh? Shoo! Git! Leave us our beautifully, perfectly simple 5e and play whatever complicated mess you feel like somewhere I don't have to see it!" Heh. First of all, that sort of attitude isn't really great for your game, hm? If the answer to 'this ruleset is choking me!' is 'go find a different one, you putz', then that's not much of a good sign for player retention, ne? I have twelve hundred pages of GURPS material I'm perfectly willing to build characters and run games out of, save that the online support for GURPS basically doesn't exist. No system save 5e has bothered investing in online character building tools or ways to handle playing with people outside of a physical gamespace beyond "services" like Roll20 saying "here, have a form-fillable PDF we'll sell you for two thousand dollars if you use our godawful terrible VTT service with it, and furthermore spend every dime that has ever existed across all of human history unlocking content with us!"
Nah. If I was going to do stuff like that I'd just bodge together something within a system that allows for freedom of both play and creation. But I'd rather not, especially when it's just so damn easy for Wizards to avoid that sort of bleed. Replace one adventure book in one yearly cycle with an Advanced Game Options book. They don't need to replace any of their precious three core rulebooks. Just introduce a fourth with expanded options for character creation, gear progression, and some of those extra rules covering Exploration and Social play they promised but never delivered on. Things for people who're sick of having to fill in the blanks Wizards left in 5e, and then get yelled at for daring to do so because Homebrew Is Bad Play By The Rules OK Bro?(TM).
Giblix mentioned that 5e was designed to be very modular and tolerant of people inserting their own rules where needed, but then both Wizards and the general playerbase harshly derides anyone who does that. Fine. Make your own modular plug-in rules, Wizards. Give us some of that extra depth we're looking for, please. Please?
Or perhaps DDB can put a rush on all those high-sounding promises they make about rejiggering their codebase to allow for people to actually use homebrew play options beyond turning a green thing blue once in a while. That'd be great, too.
Either way. Just...really sick of having to fight this stupid system to get anything worthwhile done, I suppose.
Pathfinder and D&D may be basically the same game in theory but in practice they differ greatly. 5e is great for quick games, character creation can be done in minutes at low level, 10 minutes after meeting up you can have your table up and running. Not so with Pathfinder, where I greatly prefer to have at least 30 minutes minimum to design and crunch the numbers. It's player base is also very different in outlook - those that like simplicity and minimal decisions will tend to prefer 5e whilst those who are willing and able to put in some effort to learn the system tend to prefer the improved customisation available in Pathfinder. The downside to 5e is the lack of options can make things a little samey - A recent game I started I had designed a tomelock in the week before the first session ready to go, another player turned up and made a tomelock on the night. It was pointless playing them both as they would end up the same, so I very quickly rebuilt as a bard. (that's both a disadvantage and an advantage of the character creation system of 5e). In Pathfinder one advantage is that even if you picked the same race and character class, the customisation options mean that the two characters would play very differently. A downside though is that if you don't understand the options then you can make a very disappointing character, or even an average on that really falls behind from tier 2 onwards. So I guess it really depends on what sort of person you are, your fellow players, and gamestyles.
To be honest, I have not tried PF 2, but in 3.5 and PF, even though you had almost infinite possibilities, for simple reasons of min-maxing, once you had picked your attibutes, class and race, I seem to recall finding almost the same characters, not widely different ones... ;)
As a side note, for those thinking Pathfinder character creation is a pain, you should have seen RoleMaster / SpaceMaster hehehe
I've gone through those, and I don't remember character creation to be that painful. What was painful was photocopying all the right tables for your characters once you had made a decision and tracking endless and pointless details all over the place. My worst case was Chivalry and Sorcery in which it took me a full evening of 6 hours to create a witch, and we ended up not playing the game because we were all scared of actually running the simulation with that many details and random bits of facts all over the place... :)
Depends on your players, in Society games you just ended up with the triple 7 builds due to point buy min-maxing. One of the reasons I hated point buy. But if you roll, or use a stat array hen that goes away ad you get a huge diversity. I gave up on society play because it could get pretty heated, if you didn't make a trip 7 build then your character was '******' and other players would give you grief. Name calling never bothered me too much but some of the younger players used to get a bit upset over it.
I remember all those tables, especially the 8 million different damage tables for all the different attack types. But my least favourite was doing all the skills and working out the huge variety of stat bonuses like St/St/Ag for melee weapons and St/Ag/Ag for ranged and on and on.
Many folks consider 5e's slavish devotion to mechanical, systemic simplicity at the expense of any and all other factors to be its greatest strength. The idea that developers sat down and said "does this rule/mechanic/interaction absolutely need to be here for the product to function? No? Good - get rid of it". The developers of this system, when directed to do so by the Brobdingnagian mass of mindlessness that was The Public Playtest Playerbase, ruthlessly eliminated as much cognitive load as they could while still retaining a playable system that people recognized as 'D&D'.
This is indeed probably 5e's greatest strength as a system. What I believe, and the point many people find contentious, is that this is also 5e's greatest weakness. The system is so pathologically, psychotically averse to introducing any level of cognitive load that it refuses to evolve or advance. 5e assumes that DMs will introduce their own additional complexity as that specific DM needs, but then constantly berates and castigates that DM for doing so at every conceivable opportunity - and "The Playerbase", as a dismorphous mass of infinite chattering mouths, is always right there behind Wizards in doing so. For those who find it difficult to engage with the oversimplified base game, this constant scorn of anything we do to try and fix it is maddening. If Wizards refuses to let us fix the game, then they should do so for us.
* * *
Complexity is the currency a game developer uses to buy depth. This is not to say that complexity is equivalent to depth. A well designed mechanic spends as little complexity as it can to purchase as much depth as possible, which is the failing of Pathfinder/3.5. Those systems spent complexity profligately and attained mediocre at best returns on most of those expenditures. 5e, burned by the backlash against that and against 4e, decided that spending complexity was inherently evil and opted to do none of it. 5e eliminated expenditures that were, perhaps, unnecessary in the strictest sense, but which diminished the game in ways that hurt the overall play experience.
Take the example of armor class. Whichever calculation you use, you get one AC score, which is used to resist any and all forms of attack. Logical, intuitive, and super simple, right?
Wrong.
This system completely and utterly eliminates all the threat from spectral enemies, or other creatures who only need to make contact with you to harm you and don't care about how fancy your metal tuxedo is. The idea of a 'Touch Attack' was lost in the transition to 5e, and its loss meant that suddenly anyone wearing plate armor was basically invincible. It doesn't matter that your ghostly monsters can phase through solid matter - somehow that platemail is an impenetrable barricade even though the critter can literally reach through the armor. Being nimble and evasive is no longer of any benefit to a character, and plate-armored knights are just immune to everything for free when they have no bloody right to be.
The loss of 'Touch' as a mechanic also contributed to the grappling rules in 5e being an absolute godawful mess that fails to accomplish their objective in every conceivable way. There's a reason "Make Grappling Not Suck" is the subject of actually factually hundreds of homebrew rules adjustments. Monks are categorically awful at grappling despite being masters of unarmed combat - why in Kord's name are the literal judo masters of D&D the worst possible martial class for grappling builds? What the actual hell, 5e?
This sort of thing is what happens when a game spends its complexity poorly. 3.5, and Pathfinder, overspend and get too deep into the weeds trying to figure out a specific rule for every little thing, and they suffer for it. 5e refuses to spend at all, and that lack of spending means it finds itself unable to properly deal with many common situations outside of saying "Uhhhhh...well...I guess it's up to the DM, maybe? She'll figure out something, and then we'll all yell at her for figuring it out wrong. Yeah! That sounds about right!"
Neither extreme is good. Pathfinder and such are stuck, but 5e has the chance to spend a bit more complexity to try and buy a bunch of depth in an optional book for people who find themselves constantly rolling their eyes at this game. Perhaps a worthwhile goal?
"5e assumes that DMs will introduce their own additional complexity as that specific DM needs, but then constantly berates and castigates that DM for doing so at every conceivable opportunity"
I would like to know in what way this berating occurs. The only thing I find obnoxious is the hypocritical "inclusivity" aspect of everything. Beyond that I can't say noticing anything of such berating. Especially since I add tons of stuff myself. Is it because of DBB? Because that I do not use at all. As for the gibbermouthers following WoTC staff. Well you get those fanboii's pretty much everywhere. We're old enough to not give a **** about those blabbers
First of all: Bell of Lost Souls' article detailing EN World's announcement for "Advanced Fifth Edition"
EN World is a pretty big organization, to the best of my knowledge. Not someone homebrewing rules hacks in their basement, at the very least. I'm curious what folks think of this, given the big backer behind it and the comparisons to Paizo's leaping off into Pathfinder. Also considering the fact that many 5e players are violently hostile to the suggestion of any sort of 5.5e rework or update, even one that's designed to overlay the existing game rather than replace it. Heh, any time the subject comes up, there's constant cries of "NYET, RULEBOOK IS FINE" and "the base game is everything it needs to be, nobody needs or wants a 5.5e and you're wrong if you think you do!"
Turns out a known entertainment company feels otherwise, and thinks there's enough market for an Advanced-Rules/5.5e supplement to put some real marketing into it as well as the development work. Curious how that's gonna play out.
What are your thoughts on the announcement, and what sort of expanded options are you hoping comes from this initiative? A lot of it likely won't be compatible with DDB because DDB is incompatible with literally every form of homebrew known to man, but even then...anyone have anything they're super hype for the chance to see improved?
Personally? Hoping to see expansions to mundane gear and crafting. Everybody knows that ninety-eight percent of the 'Adventuring Gear' in the PHB is pointless, and ninety-nine players out of a hundred aren't even aware you can buy things that don't come with your character's starting gear loadout. It blows people's minds when I have things like chalk, signal whistles, or steel mirrors on my character sheet and then show those folks where that equipment is in the PHB. Acquiring/selecting appropriate tools and equipment for an Adventure should require more than "Pick BIS armor, pick BIS weapon, hope for magic plunder", at least for me.
What about you?
Please do not contact or message me.
So here's my principle concern.
They're going to try and force the 5e system into being a Pathfinder-based system. From my own past experiences, ENWorld is very much a 3.X/Pathfinder crowd, and ENPublishing would have to be some degree of nuts to alienate their forum members/community, and really ENWorld only exists because of the boom of 3rd edition, which was a fairly complex system due to WotC being of the mindset that "there's a rule for everything, and EVERYTHING has a rule to be followed!" which Paizo took and ran with for Pathfinder (which kudos to Paizo for tapping the market of disgruntled D&D fans that hated the changes introduced by 4e).
Problem is that by design intent, 5e and Pathfinder (especially 2nd edition Pathfinder) have two inherently different design philosophies. With 5e, WotC sought a sort of "return to basics" and to generally simplify things, making the system overall more beginner-friendly and less intimidating for those who've never played RPGs in either recent years or at all. Conversely, Pathfinder (2e especially from what I'm seeing) is an extremely math/crunch-heavy system, enough to rival HERO/Champions in some aspects.
Now, it's fine that 5e and PF2e are different in their approaches, because they catering to different audiences, with WotC going more for the casual gamers, or those who don't have a lot of free time and thus need to make as much of their session count; Matt Mercer has even said that for Critical Role, he pretty much had to switch from Pathfinder to 5e or else the show would get bogged down, which was fine when it was their home game but would be disastrous for a televised program, especially one watched by people that weren't already gamers. And making that move to 5e seems to have worked, letting Matt & crew grow a huge fan community (even if the first campaign had a rough start and didn't start picking up steam until the Briarwood arc).
So yeah, I'm worried that they're going to try and shove a cat through a drain pipe in order to turn 5e into something much closer to Pathfinder. And hey, maybe I'm wrong and they'll actually introduce some interesting concepts that make 5e a better system. But give my past experiences with both ENWorld and ENPublishing, I'm not holding my breath.
I'd like to see more differences in the weapons/weapon and armor options, and general expansions in gear/crafting as well. More character options at 1st level would be awesome too. The way things stand I hate starting at anything lower than 3rd level because at 3rd I at least have some meaningful choices to make before the game even starts.
Fair concerns, Dono.
My own concern is that eventually, Wizards is going to find out that 5e cannot retain players. The game needs - and I heavily emphasize that word. Here, let me emphasize it more: needs needs needs needs needs needs NEEDS - a greater degree of depth for those players who're slowly starving to death on the core 5e rules.
I can say that the only reason I'm still running 5e instead of switching to a system that does not assume everyone using it is as dumb as a sack of sand and cannot handle ANY cognitive load whatsoever is because of the DDB tool. I would've jumped ship and taken my money with me long since if not for what the DDB team built here. Even then, my playgroup is constantly looking for ways to introduce choice, depth, and diversity back into the 5e ruleset somehow, and unfortunately we're butting up against the strict limitations of the DDB tool doing it.
The rest of the 5e fanbase (or at least the DDB forum userbase here) would have me believe that me and mine are the only people in existence who're starving to death on this system's lack of depth. I'm mostly pointing to this ENWorld initiative as an argument against that mindset, and a sign that maybe - just MAYBE - Wizards should get off its f#$%ing space ass and GIVE US AN OFFICIAL 5.5E SUPPLEMENT ALREADY!!!!!! They don't need to replace the core rulebooks, which everybody knows they'll never do because it'll upset their precious money cart and piss off the newbies who only just barely got conned into spending a hundred and fifty dollars on the three big books in the first place. Nobody's asking them to do that. We know better. But they do need to give the more experienced gamers, the people absolutely desperate for something to bite into when they play the game and design characters for it, a freaking bone.
Or we. Will. Leave.
I detest Pathfinder's approach to actually running games. Numbers so high you need a telescope to see them, an extremely narrow band of content the players can do effectively due to absurd scaling of the numbers, and a set of floating static modifiers long enough to make every fight a nightmare. Not required. But man - the new PF2e character creation system has been universally and effusively lauded, from what I've seen. The three-action system is ever so much cleaner and better than 5e's kludgy mess. I could see where people might want to apply some of that to 5e's leaner battle engine and the idea of bounded accuracy. If that's what ENWorld does? Maybe there'll be something to it, if they do it well.
And yeah. Additional character creation options would be excellent. Virtually all of my table's rules homebrew is groping for ways to make character creation more fun and meaningful at all levels of play. The whole "pick your species, pick your class, pick your background, wait until level 3 and pick your subclass, and now voila - you're done making significant decisions for your character for the rest of that character's life" thing can suck every last duck in existence. Including Quackthulhu.
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The more rules added over the editions. The worse it got in my opinion. It often felt very restricted. Especially in 3.x I felt very restricted. You either do it x way or you're wrong. Meaning a lot of time was wasted looking up rules that were used only once in a blue moon. Depth is often used in a wrong way hoping for more complexity. In practice this means more convoluted bullshit to deal with. 5e is the complete opposite. It trimmed all that excess fat, but didn't stop cutting until a lot was removed.
Granted I still occasionally look up rules in 3.x to use in my 5e games. However they're used more as a guideline and source of inspiration. Especially when ruling stuff when fighting in or near a tornado/hurricane. Ideas for movement rules, lack of sight etc can give a good starting point to make calls in 5e games. Seriously you don't need to do. Just use common sense and you can make every call. Making the game more fluid instead of slowing it down to a snails pace since you need to open the book again to look it all up. I have a near photographic memory and still needed to spend quite a lot of time looking up rules. That is how much shit there was.
On one hand I can see the point of needing less cognitive functionality to play the game. At least going by the strict sense described by the books. However my experience is the complete opposite. 5e is a very open and modular system with only the core elements described. From there it is VERY easy to just add your own stuff into the game as you see fit. You can take everything from previous editions and transfer it over damn easy. This I love, because buying all those hundreds of supplemental 3.x manuals is something I have no interest in. Since 5e is so modular and open. I can just take all that good stuff and transfer it over. Not even mentioning how DMSGuild became booming business for lots of additional content to take your game to the next level.
Sure 5e lacks heavy in almost every department. However you can just copy/paste most of the magic items, traps, challenges, gems and what not from previous editions. Being modular is 5e's strongest part and I love that about it. Allowing the more experienced people to take the elements they want and use it. Instead of being forced and restricted by an excessive amount of rules that bog everything down. The game has become more open and more of an actual roleplay game again. However the 5e generation suffers from amateur theater hour instead of doing actual roleplay though. And yes many of them prefer to stick to the most basic dull presentation of 5e. So what. Not my problem. The 5e system isn't preventing me from playing the intense and deep and challenging games that I had since AD&D due to its modularity. Instead of saying 5e is for the less cognitive people... turn it around. The ones complaining are the lazy sort that can't be bothered to use their cognitive functions to use the modularity of the system properly and put in the work themselves.
"I also could go with a bit more “spread along the levels” character choices, as I think you mention, although I’m afraid that, once more, only the “superior ones” would be used. Note than, in 3e/PF this was compensated by easier multiclassing and prestige classes, but unfortunately these were also linked to abuse and powergaming, so it’s very hard to make sure that combinations will not be abused."
You mean the kind where you needed 6 supplemental modules to make a char. Creating a char could take weeks since you had to go through everything and find a good synergy. then you'd often end up with huge discussions around the table since not everyone had access to the same modules. Feeling left out and complaining they couldn't hit the same power curve. Yeah I really don't miss that at all.
I can understand that Tier 3-4 gameplay just don't feel epic. As said you can rampage through it fairly easy. Reminds me of Xcom 2 WoTC where the early 10-15missions are damn hard. And the second half of the game you don't even bother taking cover and just blow it all up without breaking a sweat. Not sure what happened during testing. But around lvl 14+ it all starts to break down. Then again that also happened in previous editions. Can't really blame it on 5e just for that. It is an inherent problem in many games when players get access to a lot of freedom and a lot of power. Means that you need to throw out all algorithms and make an entire new batch for the high end of play. Even max calculated HP doesn't work on CR14+ monsters. Their output is weak if you use average dice damage instead of rolling the dice and often hitting 70%+ damage numbers on each attack.
5e is designed to be played without ever giving out a magic item. It is by design a low fantasy game basically. Unlike previous editions. Since most of us do give out magic items. It means that the issue in my previous paragraph becomes even bigger issue the higher level up play you get too.
I have been playing since second edition and had considered 3.5 my favorite edition. This was until the group I played went from playing 3.5 to playing 5th. While I do miss a lot about 3.5 I am having more in 5e than I ever did in 3.5. There is an element of holy crap I may die(in fact my character has been reduced to 0 a lot more in 5.0 so far because of stupid decision or dice rolls.).
“Or we. Will. Leave.”
Ok. Bye. Not to rude or anything, but the level of entitlement that you are showing here is really cringy. WoTC doesn’t have to do anything and don’t even have to do 5.5. To hold any company hostage by saying that you will take your ball home is really scummy and shows that you don’t really care about the game at all.
As an aside I can’t wait for my group to meet next as hopefully we can switch my character over to my favorite class from 2e and 3.5, Druid. I can’t wait to see what fun things I can as a Druid in 5e. I do miss that animal companion though.
I think 4e is a beast on its own and shouldn't really be brought up all that much when talking about D&D in general. Indeed very restrictive and limited. Yet the combat, which was its main focus, just didn't work. It became such a snorefest despite the many skills you could use as part of the "decision making when leveling up". It offered options, but in the end none of them really mattered with how the resources etc worked. The narrative/RP element was obstructed in every possible way. 4e to me is just a spin-off attempt at a Tactical War Game, but almost everything out there does that better. Still I did like some of the additional stuff 4e did bring. Skill Challenges, 1hp Minions and that some attacks forced creatures to move. Creating more tactical elements to combat. Beyond that....4e was a waste of energy. It is good to see that WoTC also realized this and decided to go back to form.
The beauty of 5e is that you can take the elements you liked. And use them. Want the players and monsters to be able to use attacks, that on a failed save causes the targetted creature to move in a certain direction? Then just add it as homebrew to an item or the monsters attack. It is a shame only Eldritch Blast has that option in 5e so homebrew it is.
With my last paragraph I mentioned 5e being designed as a low fantasy system. I didn't mean that D&D settings are low fantasy. This is separate from one another in this case. Yes most settings have magical and fantastical elements all over the place. Still the players can go through it without ever receiving a single magical item. That is how the game and the monsters have been balanced. I wonder how many 5e DM's actually adjust monster stats when equipping them with magical gear. Which will be accessible to the PC's upon slaying the beast.
DDB I don't really care that much about it. I'm just here for the forums just as I was in the older editions. We've gone through so many different pieces of software over the decades. My players even go as far as outright refusing to use it. Wanting pen and paper. More real and tangible to them as well as the added freedom. DBB seems to be good software, but it is still in development. And you can only do things as long as it fits with the framework. And that's not what the more experienced DM's are used to. Since we occasionally come up with entire new mechanics outside of that framework.
As for new content. Instead of a x.5 version. I'd rather see new books that expand on the existing lore and realms. New monsters added into the mix to expand on it. Introducing new mechanics such as vehicles in Avernus and Ships with Saltmarsh. New stuff we can actually use to expand. Because with minor modification the vehicles/ships allows us to make our own Spelljammer stuff. Which brings up places like DMsGuild with tons of community content worth checking out.
I would really love to have some kind of options to customize my characters. Right now the only choice on level up seems to be whether you take the two points to your primary stat or ask the DM nicely if optional rules are allowed and pick one of maybe three feats that sound somehow interesting.
Only to figure out that a Shieldmaster's shove is completely useless since RAW you cannot shove until your attack is done and the enemy will simply stand up again during their turn.
As for the ongoing discussion: the more I play D&D the more I feel restricted and bored by the rules. Maybe it's because of my DMs, but if there is no rule that says "you can do that", more often than not it's "you cannot do that". It's just not fun to "play" a game where your only real option is "I attack". Even skills are watered down to the point where they could as well be non-existent. A +5 on a D20 doesn't mean you're well trained in a skill. It only means you're 25% more likely to succeed than the amateur who's never done something before.
That is a DM problem you're facing Naresea. 5e is very open and deliberately leaves out rules. It presents with basic rules that let you apply them to pretty much any situation that comes up. If your DM isn't willing to think and use common sense to figure out how something would work....then he sucks at being a DM. Usually the player describes what they want to do and how. The DM then breaks it down to figure out what type of rolls of skill would be involved with that.
You want to wall run? Sure let's do a general dex check alongside of your movement speed. As DM I just need to think about what the surface is you're running on. How slippery it might be and decide whether it is a DC12 or 15 or 17 check to do.
Also being trained and having proficiency in a skill doesn't just mean you got 25% more chance of success. It often also means that only you with the proficiency are allowed to attempt the situation. Especially if you play at a table where suddenly everyone wants to do the same check out of fear of missing out. In that case a group check might be done where your proficiency uplifts the amateur that messes up. So the group is still successful on average. But in most cases it means only the one with proficiency is allowed since they actually had training in it. With 1 other amateur maybe assisting you under your guiding expertise. Allowing you to roll with advantage even.
Combat does get boring if all you say is... I attack. Describe your attack. How do you attack. And the DM narrate back how the monster blocks or gets cut up. Leading to much more memorable scenario's. At times it can even lead to unsuspected situations instead of some static bull.
Pathfinder and D&D may be basically the same game in theory but in practice they differ greatly. 5e is great for quick games, character creation can be done in minutes at low level, 10 minutes after meeting up you can have your table up and running. Not so with Pathfinder, where I greatly prefer to have at least 30 minutes minimum to design and crunch the numbers. It's player base is also very different in outlook - those that like simplicity and minimal decisions will tend to prefer 5e whilst those who are willing and able to put in some effort to learn the system tend to prefer the improved customisation available in Pathfinder. The downside to 5e is the lack of options can make things a little samey - A recent game I started I had designed a tomelock in the week before the first session ready to go, another player turned up and made a tomelock on the night. It was pointless playing them both as they would end up the same, so I very quickly rebuilt as a bard. (that's both a disadvantage and an advantage of the character creation system of 5e). In Pathfinder one advantage is that even if you picked the same race and character class, the customisation options mean that the two characters would play very differently. A downside though is that if you don't understand the options then you can make a very disappointing character, or even an average on that really falls behind from tier 2 onwards. So I guess it really depends on what sort of person you are, your fellow players, and gamestyles.
As a side note, for those thinking Pathfinder character creation is a pain, you should have seen RoleMaster / SpaceMaster hehehe
I think it maybe a combination of the DM and yourself. I have never been told by my DM that “you can’t do that” We always find a way to accomplish it.
I have seen plenty of comment in various forums/Facebook posts that state that the Role-playing is much better in this addition. so if the is becoming “I attack” it is most likely the dm or the group that is letting that happen. I have seen DMs reward creative players. Heck, I remember having to make various checks(stealth, athletics and acrobatics as well as my attack) to just up onto a building, run across the roof and jump at the flying enemy to attack it(and kill it via fall damage).
the skills are not watered down if you and your group don’t make them like that. There is a lot of customization stuff in 5e and I have seen various different take on rogues, druids, fighters, monks, and warlocks.
if you are looking at hard numbers then yes they seem watered down but depending on your group they don’t have to be me.
looking at your example. Ok so the enemy is pushed down at the end of your turn. Ok, depending on the initiative order, they party can have some fun. If the enemy had already had its turn and your party members haven’t, well then prone attacks for all of them. If it hasn’t gone, well it just spend its movement getting up and can’t move far which could severely hamper its actions that turn.
I haven't played PF2. I have played read the manual and played around creating some PC's. Two dwarves are already fairly different to one another. If I remember correctly there are 8 different bases to begin on. In D&D they're talking of even removing racial bonusses etc. Reducing customization and uniqueness even more. Despite most of the playerbase agreeing that we need more customization options to create unique characters. I don't want to go back to 3.x days where you spend weeks mulling through countless supplemental modules. However something like PF2 would be a nice addition to create mechanically, and thus also personality wise, different characters.
Personally I don't understand the need for it. Depth is something that comes from the individual campaign you are a part of. Its the story and the development of the characters in that story. 5e is great due to how streamlined it is thats why people play it. If your looking for more crunch/options then this isn't the system for you. If you want crunch that is what pathfinder is for.
To me pathfinder and 5e are for 2 entirely different types of players/DMs neither one of them should feel pressured to become like the other.
The last time I let a numerical modifier determine if my character was unique or not was at least ten years ago. My characters differ from every other character with identical stats, feats, and equipment in the in-game choices they make and how I describe their actions. I'm currently in a group where two other players each play human fighters (samey stats, but for choice of starting feat: one polearm master, one great weapon fighter) and the way they are played set them widely apart from each other and one could be forgiven for mistaking each as some subclass of monk and barbarian respectively.
I am one with the Force. The Force is with me.
Clearly people play for different reasons. This thread is evidence of that, and an "Advanced" ruleset that fits on top of existing 5e rules sounds like the best way to satisfy everyone.
My long-running group is very crunchy and tactical. We enjoy the feeling of "system mastery" where you combine game elements to make a character that can do unexpected things or fill a very specific archetype. It scratches a different itch than just narrating a character to be uniquely talented.
I'm playing in another game that is just PHB and it's very different, but I think it's been good for me as a player and DM. I understand a bit better now that you can have fun with an extremely limited set of options and fairly restrictive DM rulings, but it's a very different game. I enjoy it, but it's not the only D&D I'd want to play.
See for me, this kind of stuff is near worthless. It's nice for inspiration, but no better than the volumes of fantasy literature or any other type of media out there. I can (and will) expand on the lore of a setting all day to the point that my games are always in a homebrew universe.
It sounds counterintuitive, but character restrictions can breed creativity. When literally every character can make up their own moves, there becomes little to distinguish them. You need some restricting structure or the game just becomes group make-believe time.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
Omg! That sounds amazing.
Oh, excellent. I was dismayed that this thread had died in delivery when I went to bed last night. Coolness. Allow me to address some broad points I'm seeing in multiple replies without naming names.
"The depth in 5e is the decisions you make in character and the personality and stories you build along the way. You don't need extra rules for that depth, you just need the Power of Roleplaying!"
This is both true and a total nothingburger, sadly. I can roleplay a character regardless of the fluff behind it, but if the mechanics don't support the roleplaying, there's a disconnect and a problem. Roleplaying is not the solution, it's the objective, and the game should offer as many rules and options as are required to meet that objective.
Take the case of two Lore bards - one of them a quiet, studious scholar of histories and the tales of the world, and the other the Scanlan Shorthalt silver-tongued womanizer. Two entirely distinct personalities, two entirely different characters whose motivations could hardly be further apart and still both be Good-aligned...but mechanically? Those two characters are completely identical, and do not belong in the same party together. There is absolutely no way to differentiate the scholar of history from the Mancubus within their mechanical character builds. None. Zip. Zero. Nil. That is a problem. When the mechanics of the game fail to support the narrative of the story (and vice versa), the entire experience suffers for it. The fact that short of DM homebrewery - and remember, Wizards has heavily frowned upon homebrew and aftermarket customization for the entirety of 5e's history with their absolutely godawful 'Adventurer's League' system - there's absolutely no way to try and rebrand your character off of whatever shitty archetype your subclass is built on just sucks.
"3.x had seven hundred manananillion rulebooks and modules and expansions and splatbooks and UGH! We do NOT need to deal with that garbage in 5e!"
True. Also a nonfactor. A DM is welcome to forbid sources from her table - or even to provide a list of approved books for her game and say "if your idea isn't in here, you can't play it." This is the Adventurer's League method - build a PC using the PHB AND NOTHING BUT THE PHB and bloody well like it. For those who are looking for expanded rules and options, however? Those who're able and willing to cope with the extra play options? Bring it on. As much as people like to defend 5e as an absolutely pitch-perfect blend of flawless and sublime simplicity that nevertheless allows for infinite creativity...it is absolutely not that thing. There are myriad complaints about places where 5e cut too deeply and oversimplified. Weapons and armor is a big one - nobody likes how oversimplified those systems are because it makes it more or less impossible to play a highly skilled and trained specialist in a given weapon, on top of making a heavily plated iron juggernaut of a heavy armor master feel exactly the same as a nimble, evasive skirmisher due to both methods being lumped into the same mechanical rule.
Again - when the mechanics do not properly align with and express the story, and when the story does not intuitively explain and enrich the mechanics, the disconnect between the two causes the entire experience to suffer. Some people are more sensitive to that disconnect than others, and constantly telling those people that they're both stupid and wrong and they should just Roleplay Harder or Fluff Better is a crappy answer. Especially when the Official Digital Toolset for D&D 5e makes it virtually impossible to implement some of the expanded rules options in places like the DM's Guild due to their hyper-restrictive, AL-style toolset.
"Why don't you just go play Pathfinder if you hate 5e so much, huh? Shoo! Git! Leave us our beautifully, perfectly simple 5e and play whatever complicated mess you feel like somewhere I don't have to see it!"
Heh. First of all, that sort of attitude isn't really great for your game, hm? If the answer to 'this ruleset is choking me!' is 'go find a different one, you putz', then that's not much of a good sign for player retention, ne? I have twelve hundred pages of GURPS material I'm perfectly willing to build characters and run games out of, save that the online support for GURPS basically doesn't exist. No system save 5e has bothered investing in online character building tools or ways to handle playing with people outside of a physical gamespace beyond "services" like Roll20 saying "here, have a form-fillable PDF we'll sell you for two thousand dollars if you use our godawful terrible VTT service with it, and furthermore spend every dime that has ever existed across all of human history unlocking content with us!"
Nah. If I was going to do stuff like that I'd just bodge together something within a system that allows for freedom of both play and creation. But I'd rather not, especially when it's just so damn easy for Wizards to avoid that sort of bleed. Replace one adventure book in one yearly cycle with an Advanced Game Options book. They don't need to replace any of their precious three core rulebooks. Just introduce a fourth with expanded options for character creation, gear progression, and some of those extra rules covering Exploration and Social play they promised but never delivered on. Things for people who're sick of having to fill in the blanks Wizards left in 5e, and then get yelled at for daring to do so because Homebrew Is Bad Play By The Rules OK Bro?(TM).
Giblix mentioned that 5e was designed to be very modular and tolerant of people inserting their own rules where needed, but then both Wizards and the general playerbase harshly derides anyone who does that. Fine. Make your own modular plug-in rules, Wizards. Give us some of that extra depth we're looking for, please. Please?
Or perhaps DDB can put a rush on all those high-sounding promises they make about rejiggering their codebase to allow for people to actually use homebrew play options beyond turning a green thing blue once in a while. That'd be great, too.
Either way. Just...really sick of having to fight this stupid system to get anything worthwhile done, I suppose.
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Depends on your players, in Society games you just ended up with the triple 7 builds due to point buy min-maxing. One of the reasons I hated point buy. But if you roll, or use a stat array hen that goes away ad you get a huge diversity. I gave up on society play because it could get pretty heated, if you didn't make a trip 7 build then your character was '******' and other players would give you grief. Name calling never bothered me too much but some of the younger players used to get a bit upset over it.
I remember all those tables, especially the 8 million different damage tables for all the different attack types. But my least favourite was doing all the skills and working out the huge variety of stat bonuses like St/St/Ag for melee weapons and St/Ag/Ag for ranged and on and on.
Apologies. To attempt to simplify some:
Many folks consider 5e's slavish devotion to mechanical, systemic simplicity at the expense of any and all other factors to be its greatest strength. The idea that developers sat down and said "does this rule/mechanic/interaction absolutely need to be here for the product to function? No? Good - get rid of it". The developers of this system, when directed to do so by the Brobdingnagian mass of mindlessness that was The Public Playtest Playerbase, ruthlessly eliminated as much cognitive load as they could while still retaining a playable system that people recognized as 'D&D'.
This is indeed probably 5e's greatest strength as a system. What I believe, and the point many people find contentious, is that this is also 5e's greatest weakness. The system is so pathologically, psychotically averse to introducing any level of cognitive load that it refuses to evolve or advance. 5e assumes that DMs will introduce their own additional complexity as that specific DM needs, but then constantly berates and castigates that DM for doing so at every conceivable opportunity - and "The Playerbase", as a dismorphous mass of infinite chattering mouths, is always right there behind Wizards in doing so. For those who find it difficult to engage with the oversimplified base game, this constant scorn of anything we do to try and fix it is maddening. If Wizards refuses to let us fix the game, then they should do so for us.
* * *
Complexity is the currency a game developer uses to buy depth. This is not to say that complexity is equivalent to depth. A well designed mechanic spends as little complexity as it can to purchase as much depth as possible, which is the failing of Pathfinder/3.5. Those systems spent complexity profligately and attained mediocre at best returns on most of those expenditures. 5e, burned by the backlash against that and against 4e, decided that spending complexity was inherently evil and opted to do none of it. 5e eliminated expenditures that were, perhaps, unnecessary in the strictest sense, but which diminished the game in ways that hurt the overall play experience.
Take the example of armor class. Whichever calculation you use, you get one AC score, which is used to resist any and all forms of attack. Logical, intuitive, and super simple, right?
Wrong.
This system completely and utterly eliminates all the threat from spectral enemies, or other creatures who only need to make contact with you to harm you and don't care about how fancy your metal tuxedo is. The idea of a 'Touch Attack' was lost in the transition to 5e, and its loss meant that suddenly anyone wearing plate armor was basically invincible. It doesn't matter that your ghostly monsters can phase through solid matter - somehow that platemail is an impenetrable barricade even though the critter can literally reach through the armor. Being nimble and evasive is no longer of any benefit to a character, and plate-armored knights are just immune to everything for free when they have no bloody right to be.
The loss of 'Touch' as a mechanic also contributed to the grappling rules in 5e being an absolute godawful mess that fails to accomplish their objective in every conceivable way. There's a reason "Make Grappling Not Suck" is the subject of actually factually hundreds of homebrew rules adjustments. Monks are categorically awful at grappling despite being masters of unarmed combat - why in Kord's name are the literal judo masters of D&D the worst possible martial class for grappling builds? What the actual hell, 5e?
This sort of thing is what happens when a game spends its complexity poorly. 3.5, and Pathfinder, overspend and get too deep into the weeds trying to figure out a specific rule for every little thing, and they suffer for it. 5e refuses to spend at all, and that lack of spending means it finds itself unable to properly deal with many common situations outside of saying "Uhhhhh...well...I guess it's up to the DM, maybe? She'll figure out something, and then we'll all yell at her for figuring it out wrong. Yeah! That sounds about right!"
Neither extreme is good. Pathfinder and such are stuck, but 5e has the chance to spend a bit more complexity to try and buy a bunch of depth in an optional book for people who find themselves constantly rolling their eyes at this game. Perhaps a worthwhile goal?
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"5e assumes that DMs will introduce their own additional complexity as that specific DM needs, but then constantly berates and castigates that DM for doing so at every conceivable opportunity"
I would like to know in what way this berating occurs. The only thing I find obnoxious is the hypocritical "inclusivity" aspect of everything. Beyond that I can't say noticing anything of such berating. Especially since I add tons of stuff myself. Is it because of DBB? Because that I do not use at all. As for the gibbermouthers following WoTC staff. Well you get those fanboii's pretty much everywhere. We're old enough to not give a **** about those blabbers