D&D 5E Fifth Edition.....Why?

Parmandur said:

Yeeeeeeeeaaaaah.....

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Sorry, truth is truth. In 3.5E around 9th level with experienced players, the number of things that were necessary to track became ridiculous. For me as DM, if you had an encounter with more than one kind of creature, and any humanoids with Feats and spells, then doing anything tactically interesting meant all sorts of conditions and bonuses and debuffs and whatever.

Hell - I had three Vampire template foes that turned out to be more complicated to write up than the party itself.

One player completely re-specced his character when he found out his concept just fell apart around 6th level. Total trap option. He was so disheartened by that he eventually stopped coming. He was new, and the system mastery was too much.

Add to that one dedicated min-maxer that basically built stacks of rules with no personality. He showed us how broken the rules were. (He was also a cheater - with dice rolls, consumable spell component costs, etc. so we kicked him out.)

When we reached about 12th level, on top of that the Tiers were so completely obvious and un-fun that we just stopped playing the game.

Am I the only one who finds it irritating - or at least somewhat irksome - when someone starts a long diatribe of a post and then can't be bothered to check back into the thread? No defending their position, no clarification of the glaring untruths, nothing I smell a troll lurking about...

Not only that, the OP is awfully close to edition warring IMO. You like 3e - excellent, go play 3e - I'm not gonna waste my time trying to tell you to switch editions. Is 5e perfect? No, but neither was any other edition.

It is the same comparison when stating why does someone like an operating system like Microsoft, versus Apple, or even Linux. Based on that preference, you will be limited out of the door in regards to who else uses it, has experience with it, or continues to purchase or develop products for it. I like Linux, but based on that choice, I am already limited on what is available to use without a lot of work. D&D presents the same problem, because it is more readily available and more people play it. The only way to break the cycle is choose another game, but if you can't find a DM then the point is mute.

Maybe I missed it... that opening post was beastly afterall, I wholeheartedly recommend paragraphs moving forward... but did someone steal your Third Edition books? Were you sitting down to a nice game of Third and the Wizards of the Coast Sekret Polize broke down the door and gave you a thrashing? Perhaps your gaming group wholly embraced tbe new edition but you haven't?

That last one almost seems plausible, but all things considered I saw nothing in that wall of text that told me why you feel the need to fish around the internet asking strangers to convince you to play a game you apparently don't like. So I'll ask you a question...

Fifth Edition, why?

Despite the overall, shall we say sarcastic, tone of my post I'm genuinely asking the question. Did your gaming group fall head over heels for the new edition and you're finding yourself forced to grit your way through it? Is there some other reason I'm too tired to think of right now why you can't just keep playing the edition you actually enjoy?

Really, what this comes down to for me, is why anyone would force themselves to play a game that just doesn't click with them, especially to the point where they're just asking randos on the interwebs to convince them. Your old books are still there, keep playing that game if that's what you like, it's generally just that simple.

And by the by, a better way to have gone about this wouldn have been to simply ask something like "Hey, what is it you all like the most about Fifth Edition?" rather than attack Fourth Edition while simultaneously saying you don't like Fifth and asking "Why should I play this game I don't like?" It's a way to generate a more positive thread and still get people's feedback, potentially reading something that makes you think "Yeah, that is pretty cool, maybe I should give this another try."

Oh and paragraphs. Those would have been mint...

My first thought when I read the title: "What did 5th Edition do this time?"

I'm getting too old for this...

Jacob Lewis said:

My first thought when I read the title: "What did 5th Edition do this time?"

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5th Edition ate my dingos!

Azzy said:

5th Edition ate my dingos!

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But did it also take their stuff?

schnee said:

Sorry, truth is truth. In 3.5E around 9th level with experienced players, the number of things that were necessary to track became ridiculous. For me as DM, if you had an encounter with more than one kind of creature, and any humanoids with Feats and spells, then doing anything tactically interesting meant all sorts of conditions and bonuses and debuffs and whatever.

Hell - I had three Vampire template foes that turned out to be more complicated to write up than the party itself.

One player completely re-specced his character when he found out his concept just fell apart around 6th level. Total trap option. He was so disheartened by that he eventually stopped coming. He was new, and the system mastery was too much.

Add to that one dedicated min-maxer that basically built stacks of rules with no personality. He showed us how broken the rules were. (He was also a cheater - with dice rolls, consumable spell component costs, etc. so we kicked him out.)

When we reached about 12th level, on top of that the Tiers were so completely obvious and un-fun that we just stopped playing the game.

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No, I was agreeing. 3.x: too much. Most people I know work hard to keep up with 5E complexity.

I like 3.0, but some things I like about 5e
1) I find the mechanical base to be better
2) backgrounds: this means less multi-class "hoop jumping" to qualify for certain PrCs that replicate certain common archetypes
3) Lore Bards, Battlemaster Fighters, Circle of the Land Druids are what I have wanted for a long time
4) I can find based skill point systems (this was an option that I wish had been in the DMG)
5) Advantage/Disadvantage
6) As with 3e, 5e has the SRD, fansites, and third party publishers. Is 5e perfect? In my opinion, no, but neither is 3e. For my own tastes, the cleric has continued to get worse under WOTC and the monk still sucks as a class (and has since its introduction [I write this as someone that actually likes monks/martial artist classes as designed in Palladium, Rolemaster and, for d20Modern, Blood and Fists]). Also, just as I banned most WOTC supplement classes, PrCs, and even a few PHB classes, the trend is holding in 5e. I am banning several 5e PHB subclasses and the only WOTC supplement class/subclass that will be allowed to date is the Scout (and possibly from UA, both the favored soul that did not get wings and the spell-less ranger variant). Yet, as with 3e, I can find what I consider better designed classes (including subclasses) from fan sites and third party publishers just by doing a little research. I just wish Green Ronin would have Steven Kenson update their 3e Psychic, Shaman, and Witch Handbook including the classes (as new classes).

Parmandur said:

No, I was agreeing. 3.x: too much. Most people I know work hard to keep up with 5E complexity.

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Tastes change. Complexity has swung toward simpler systems, which I think is better. Remember those ridiculously complex games like Aftermath? In striving for realism, they became less realistic. Pendulum might swing back, but hopefully not that far.

5e is still crunchy. Think that will always be the case for DnD. How streamlined can it get before it is no longer DnD?