D&D (2024) Jeremy Crawford: “We are releasing new editions of the books”

[Micah Sweet]

Obsessed? Sometimes I really don't understand your perspective of reality. Of course they care about their back catalog being valid going forward. How is that remotely a bad thing to prioritize?

Because when compatibility is questioned, the go-to argument is always, "It's compatible because old adventures will still work". Why are adventures so important? As I've said, a lot of people (perhaps even most people) don't even run them.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Sure, but not likely many will continue to do so because most 3PP for D&D will follow WotC's lead (for good or for ill). Some may jump on the Level Up (which is good for you) or Tales of the Valiant bandwagon as the fallout from the OGL incident.

I sure hope so, whatever 1D&D turns out to be.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If splat sold, we wouldn't have a 5e. Nor 4e, for that matter.

Adventures sell because the most time consuming part of the game is prepping to run it. DMs continue to be the primary sales demographic.

Splat competes with Splat. Unless you're CONSTANTLY starting over with new characters, you're only going to buy the splatbooks that support your character, and ignore everything else. It's also very time consuming and challenging to get right, design wise, because it has to balance with everything that came before it. And for good-faith's sake, they have to playtest the splat as well now. So they limit the splat, and what splat we end up getting is high quality splat that sells better than anything else, but they can't produce at the scales that they can with adventures.

Adventures also improve the health of the edition at large because they play with what exists, rather than adding more options. They stretch out the lifetime of an edition by giving a themed Season a la what they have with MMORPGs and their annual or seasonal expansions these days.

So you're saying that most players don't play homebrew? Because I remember WotC saying different a while back. Has that changed?

 

[Remathilis]

How is that different than the chance of my buying a new supplement, module or sourcebooks made for 2014?

That's a really big if. I think it more likely to cause a split. This is anecdotal, but in my experience DMs are very hesitant to merge different rules together, just in case they or WotC missed something abusable, or even just because it feels wrong. That certainly won't be everyone, but I think it will be significant enough to cause issues among the players and DMs

No moreso than introducing the latest supplement or using third party rules. Anyone really that worried about running the Vecna module in 2024 due to "rules compatibility" is probably the same DM who would forbid mixing Tales of the Valiant, DMs Guild products, or even Monsters of the Multiverse.

A module will be nearly 100% compatible, since there are doesn't appear to be any major changes to how monsters or magic items work. The core mechanics (saving throws, attack rolls, etc) use the same math so DCs and traps will convert. Monster CR isn't changing. There shouldn't be anything in the upcoming Vecna module that the 2014 books can't handle.

Species are already fairly backward's compatible with post Tasha style races. Spells will remain similar and class access determined by what spell list the 24 version of the class gets. Feats still gain at the same rate and should work whenever a 14 would get a feat. Magic items are magic items. The ONLY issue I could possibly see is trying to use a 24 subclass with a 14 class. That might be on a class by class basis.

I don't think this will be the mountain you think it will.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Because when compatibility is questioned, the go-to argument is always, "It's compatible because old adventures will still work". Why are adventures so important? As I've said, a lot of people (perhaps even most people) don't even run them.

Adventures are used plenty, they just aren’t run as written all that much. Instead they’re picked apart for the stuff someone wants from them for thier homebrew game.

But compatibility with adventures means compatibility with published monsters, challenges, and the balance and design assumptions that were in place when those adventures were written.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It’s just a larger version of the Tasha’s fixes. They’re optional fixes.

You put all those changes in something called the Player's Handbook, including revised classes with the same names as a different Player's Handbook for the same edition, it starts to feel a lot less optional, no matter what they say in press releases.

 

[Azzy]

Because when compatibility is questioned, the go-to argument is always, "It's compatible because old adventures will still work". Why are adventures so important?

That's an easy one to answer. Adventures are important because WotC doesn't have to stop printing the pre-24 adventures and keep making money from already published books. It also means that they can sell you new adventures even if you stay with '14 core rules.

As I've said, a lot of people (perhaps even most people) don't even run them.

Well, they certainly sell well on Amazon (which is the important part to WotC).

 

[Micah Sweet]

That's an easy one to answer. Adventures are important because WotC doesn't have to stop printing the pre-24 adventures and keep making money from already published books. It also means that they can sell you new adventures even if you stay with '14 core rules.


Well, they certainly sell well on Amazon (which is the important part to WotC).

Incredibly naive question, I know, but are there any answers to these questions that don't revolve around making more money?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

You put all those changes in something called the Player's Handbook, including revised classes with the same names as a different Player's Handbook for the same edition, it starts to feel a lot less optional, no matter what they say in press releases.

that is a you thing.

And considering you don’t even play 5e proper anymore…okay? It’s not gonna impact LevelUp so…

Meanwhile, the rest of us are gonna continue to enjoy 5e regardless of which printing of the phb we are using.

 

[Parmandur]

There was no edition of AD&D that predated 1e. 1e was the first such edition. So 2e was in fact the second edition of AD&D, and 3e being built off of 2e was the third, though it dropped the "advanced" portion from the name.

Basic was a separate version of the game, not an edition prior to 1e. It ran concurrently with 1e and 2e.

Well, that all goes to prove my point, but as I pointed out, both "1E" [ignoring that it is a revision of an existing game] and "2E" had new typical editions between, so 2E was was third printing of the AD&D lineage if we just look at that, 3E was the fifth edition, 3.5 was the sixth, 4E the seventh, D&D'14 was the eighth, and now D&D'24 will be the ninth. Which again ignores the actual original edition of the game, and the entire Basic side lineage. So, yeah, the word "Edition" was irretrievably booked by the time WotC even entered the picture, cutting the term is only reasonable.