And despite fatigue, I'm reading it again.
Observations thus far:
- I've reviewed so many documents now I don't know what changed this time versus last time, and the "read me" is no longer as specific as it used to be.
- Like change back to Mage, but they needed to do a find/replace on the whole document.
- Must have missed the prior change to Halfling "Lucky" racial trait ... that's pretty powerful!
- Still haven't addressed Human +1 to all attributes ... I still think it is too much.
- WOW -- huge bonus to knowing a field of lore (+10). Let's hope that getting additional proficiencies isn't easy or it will swamp the skill system.
- Skills were removed, but I still see references to spot and listen checks? Ah, wait ... they're under ability checks. So we've essentially reverted to an entirely ability-check based system, with the exception of what was a "Knowledge" skill. I think that can work -- quite streamlined. But I need to see how this module interacts with classes.
- Looks like resting hasn't change, which will be controversial still.
- You can cast in armor, as long as you're proficient. Is that new? Though looks like getting proficiency might be hard, as I don't see an armor proficiency feat (which might impede customization)
- Barbarian: "Other proficiencies: Riding" Is this a legacy item? With skills removed, what does this mean?
- Feats: I think I like the trade between Ability Improvement (easy, simple) versus Feats (more flavor, but more complex). Wow, some of the feats do a lot (Arcane Archer as a feat). They seem to be improved packages over all, though future feats will take some careful watching for balance.
- Rogue: OK, what happened to picking pockets and opening locks? They aren't listed under ability checks, and rogues don't seem to get better at opening locks. So a rogue thief would not seem to be any better at thieving than a mage thief (maybe that's a good thing?). Trap finding I've got as a Wisdom/Search check. Wait -- they're in the DM section under ability checks, not the "how to play" section under ability checks. And open locks references a feat that doesn't appear to exist.
Cursory: not bad, seems to be more streamlined. The document needs some serious review for cross-referencing and proofreading, though. They didn't get all of the deletes.
I'll be looking forward to feedback from people playing at Gen Con.
