How do you feel about the future of D&D after the official announcements?

Positive.

I play 4e, but although it fixed certain things for me, I have fond memories of other things in older editions. And even with the missteps that 4e made, I think they were important steps to take.

So I think they are setting their targets in the right direction and taking appropriate steps towards their goals. (Whether they'll achieve them is another matter.)

But I'm definitely eagerly awaiting the reports from DDXP and the public playtest in the spring.

Neutral.

On the one hand, WotC is certainly saying the right things this time around. Open playtest. Cross-edition compatibility. Hinting at an open license. These are all things that I want to hear.

But WotC has done so many things that I didn't like over the last five years, that it's impossible for me to feel truly positive about the future based on their statements alone. I need to see the results before it's enough to make me like them as a company again.

I clicked "positive" but I guess my attitude can best be summed up as "cautiously pessimistic" in that it's possible that the damage to the brand may already have been done and the divided gaming community may not be easily healed.

The new team is impressive and I think Mike Mearls is a good choice to guide the new edition (his past 3E vs. 4E comments notwithstanding -- he was a guy who was defending the hard work that he and the other designers had done on 4E and did so in a very spirited fashion; I fully understand that).

The goals of this project are laudable, but as noted elsewhere they may simply be setting the bar too high. I can't see a single system that would unite fans of the Rules Cyclopedia with fans of 4E -- the differences just seem way too significant. The design team is free to surprise me, however and no one would be more delighted than me if I have to eat my words on the topic. Further, we have heard similar promises before only to have them crash on the rocks of corporate reality. Remember Gleemax? Remember all of the cool features that DDI was going to incorporate and how few of them actually appeared? Remember how the "new" OGL was going to be "more open than ever"?. Though those promises were made by previous regimes, WotC's record is a bit spotty, and it's hard to erase the memory of past disappointments.

That said, the approach that is being taken is refreshing, and I think extremely courageous. There's a tacit (and sometimes more than just tacit) admission of past errors and at least the implication that WotC has learned from its mistakes. There's a very bold and difficult goal -- to unite all previous editions into something that everyone can play.

It's a very, very ambitious goal, but in some ways I'd really prefer that they aim high and miss slightly rather than aim low and succeed (which as far as I'm concerned certainly sums up 4E). Also encouraging are the repeated assurances that WotC will really listen to gamers this time, and as evidence there's the much more open playtest period, rather than the secretive, years-long development process that led to 4E. There's also the implication that something like the OGL may return (though I'll believe it when I see it).

So I guess I'm wary based upon past performances, but optimistic based upon what I consider to be the refreshing new honesty that the design team is displaying. I am also encouraged by the team and its leader -- having worked personally with Mike Mearls in the past I know that he is a dedicated gamer and knows what he's doing.

I've signed up for the playtest and I'll definitely be giving them the feedback they want. Time will tell how successful they will be, but I am willing to give them every opportunity to save the brand and bring the hobby back to what it was. My only fear is that this may be too tall an order for even the most talented and dedicated team of designers to achieve. I nurture the hope that the designers will prove me wrong.

Positive and getting more so everyday. I've reread Mike's Legend and Lore columns from 2011 and I think I get where D&D Next is going.

I also can know post on Wizards' forum and get more discussion than anger. Many, many new posters there (post counts under 10 and new to forum as of 2012) and several have played other editions of D&D and are speaking up for what they like. I've even seen forum posters politely police each other without mod intervention and have it work.

I'm going to Fort Wayne at the end of the month. I very much hope to be extremely positive after playtesting a rough version of D&D Next.

i'm positive. i have not posted here in a long time, and i've not played 4e in over a year, i got sick of it. But like others said, i have doubts that WotC can pull off their ambitious design goal. But, they have some great minds working for them, so i wish them the best. It they could somehow create a game that all eras of gamers can play and enjoy, that would be pretty phenomenal.

Neutral.

I really looked forward to 4E and was disappointed with the end result. And what they did to the Forgotten Realms was blasphemy for a fair number of the FR fans.

It looked all so promising going into the home stretch and yet the 4E did not excite my imagination once I tried and it didn't allow me to play the characters I wanted and failed, for me, as a medium for me to tell the type of stories I wanted.

And here we are again. Looks good from the initial design philosphy but having been very disappointed in the end result of 4E, I am finding my initial enthusiasm somewhat ... forced? I don't know how I feel right now. I want to 'believe' but then I remember how 4E turned out and the what happened to the Forgotten Realms....

Definitely neutral. I was positive and excited for 4e (Due to my joy at what they had done with Saga and thought of it as a 4e preview) and was disappointed when it went in a direction that did not fit my style.

5e could be good for me, great for me, bad for me, etc - Only time will tell if it is a system I would be willing to use. I'm also a little skeptical of how well they will use the "crowdsourcing", but I'll reserve judgement until I see the end result.

So yeah, totally neutral.
Smoss

I'm very optimistic, if only because it sounds like they'll support the classic Forgotten Realms setting, pre-Spell Plague). Killing the Forgotten Realms really turned me off and started me on the path to finding a completely new game.

WoTC needs to bring back the Forgotten Realms and start releasing PDF versions of books. If they do those things and the rules make sense and aren't too board gamey, they may get me to switch back from Pathfinder.

freeAgent said:

I'm very optimistic, if only because it sounds like they'll support the classic Forgotten Realms setting, pre-Spell Plague). Killing the Forgotten Realms really turned me off and started me on the path to finding a completely new game.

WoTC needs to bring back the Forgotten Realms and start releasing PDF versions of books. If they do those things and the rules make sense and aren't too board gamey, they may get me to switch back from Pathfinder.

Click to expand...

The part that I underlined, can you tell me where you've seen WotC say this is their intent?

I am neutral about it so that way I am not disappointed.

But really, with every new edition I found something that I liked. I also found myself missing things from previous editions.

I am curious to what this "if you like X edition, then we can accommodate" really means...but I will wait and see.

I have to say that the best thing to come out of 4e was "Gamma World". I personally liked that system a lot more then the D&D 4e. I would've liked to have seen it expanded upon and more material made for it...but with it being so simple that makes homebrewed campaigns easier.