jgsugden
Legend
One tool that some geeks that are FAR too into fantasy baseball use is a tool that predicts the stats that a player will generate next year based upon the stats he generated in prior years, the change in stats observed in other players his age, the change in stats created by playing in different ballparks, and other similar factors.
I suddenly realized that we've had enough editions of D&D that I could run them through the same process and - with a high degree of apocryphal accuracy predict what D&D 5E will be! Here are some of the highlights:
* The first area where you'll notice improvement will be in the balancing of the classes. 4E made huge strides in balancing the power level of each of the classes by streamlining and unifying the power mechanics so that all classes have the same core mechanics. 5E continues that trend by having all the classes share the same core powers. Although each class will have a different name for the powers, they'll all do the same exact things. Although there will be no mechanical difference between the classes, you will still need to buy the books to get access to the different names they use for the different classes.
* 4E made huge strides in balancing the math behind the attack rolls, and 5E continues that trend. All attack rolls will be 1d20 + 1/2 your level, and all defenses will be 10 + 1/2 your level. Additionally, all creatures encountered by a party will be of the same level as the PCs. As an alternate rule, you'll be able to flip a coin to determine if you hit or not, which will be a key step towards 6E, which will be the birth of the 'dCOIN' system.
* 4E feats were streamlined and focused. As a result, you had fewer options, but each was better balanced. 5E continues that trend. You'll get a feat at every level, and there will be exactly one feat available at any given level. This may reduce variability, but balance will be perfected - especially considering that these feats won't actually have any game effect.
* 4E magic items were rebalanced and repackaged to make sure that the character - not the character's items - defined the RPG experience. This will be furthered in 5E by the elimination of all abilities in all magic items. All magic items will have the exact same mechanics - and to keep things balanced for characters that choose not to use magic items, those mechanics for magic items won't do anything. However, you'll need to buy each version of the adventurer's vault to get access to all of the names and flavor text for the items.
* 4E revolutionized the design of monsters, pulling each monster into a narrowly defined series of roles that defined the monster attributes. 5E will move this forward by removing that needless differentiation between roles. Now, all monsters will do the same thing, to make sure that each encounter is equally challenging!
* 4E altered the concepts of hit points and damage in a dramatic way to insure that combats at every level would be neither too short or too long - but instead would be just right in length. 5E moves even farther in this direction by having all combats last exactly five rounds. After the fifth round, all monsters die, regardless of whether they've been hit or not, and all players are fully healed - whatever that means, as the trends seem to indicate that it will be impossible to hurt PCs at all in 5E.
Forecasting is more of an art, than a science - altough it usually more %$@# than either art or science. However, there are competing tools for prediciting future performance based upon prior perfromance out there. Do your tools tell you 5E will be different than described above?
I suddenly realized that we've had enough editions of D&D that I could run them through the same process and - with a high degree of apocryphal accuracy predict what D&D 5E will be! Here are some of the highlights:
* The first area where you'll notice improvement will be in the balancing of the classes. 4E made huge strides in balancing the power level of each of the classes by streamlining and unifying the power mechanics so that all classes have the same core mechanics. 5E continues that trend by having all the classes share the same core powers. Although each class will have a different name for the powers, they'll all do the same exact things. Although there will be no mechanical difference between the classes, you will still need to buy the books to get access to the different names they use for the different classes.
* 4E made huge strides in balancing the math behind the attack rolls, and 5E continues that trend. All attack rolls will be 1d20 + 1/2 your level, and all defenses will be 10 + 1/2 your level. Additionally, all creatures encountered by a party will be of the same level as the PCs. As an alternate rule, you'll be able to flip a coin to determine if you hit or not, which will be a key step towards 6E, which will be the birth of the 'dCOIN' system.
* 4E feats were streamlined and focused. As a result, you had fewer options, but each was better balanced. 5E continues that trend. You'll get a feat at every level, and there will be exactly one feat available at any given level. This may reduce variability, but balance will be perfected - especially considering that these feats won't actually have any game effect.
* 4E magic items were rebalanced and repackaged to make sure that the character - not the character's items - defined the RPG experience. This will be furthered in 5E by the elimination of all abilities in all magic items. All magic items will have the exact same mechanics - and to keep things balanced for characters that choose not to use magic items, those mechanics for magic items won't do anything. However, you'll need to buy each version of the adventurer's vault to get access to all of the names and flavor text for the items.
* 4E revolutionized the design of monsters, pulling each monster into a narrowly defined series of roles that defined the monster attributes. 5E will move this forward by removing that needless differentiation between roles. Now, all monsters will do the same thing, to make sure that each encounter is equally challenging!
* 4E altered the concepts of hit points and damage in a dramatic way to insure that combats at every level would be neither too short or too long - but instead would be just right in length. 5E moves even farther in this direction by having all combats last exactly five rounds. After the fifth round, all monsters die, regardless of whether they've been hit or not, and all players are fully healed - whatever that means, as the trends seem to indicate that it will be impossible to hurt PCs at all in 5E.
Forecasting is more of an art, than a science - altough it usually more %$@# than either art or science. However, there are competing tools for prediciting future performance based upon prior perfromance out there. Do your tools tell you 5E will be different than described above?
