D&D (2024) Developer Video on Druid/Paladin/Expert Feedback

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WotC has posted a video discussing initial feedback on the One D&D Druid/Paladin playtest, along with survey results from the Expert playtest. Some highlights for discussion:

Druid: The developers recognize that the template version of wild shape is contentious. If they retain this approach, they would plan to add flexibility to those templates. If they revert to monster stat blocks, they might allow Druids to choose a limited number of options, with a default selection provided.

Paladin: The new version of smite is still intended to work with critical hits. If ranged smite persists, its damage may be adjusted through the internal balance/playtesting process.

Ranger: The updated Ranger scored very well in the playtest. Some players did miss the choice of options in the Hunter subclass.

Bard: All of the Lore Bard's features scored welll, but the overall subclass rating was mediocre. They attribute this to the loss of Additional Magical Secrets, which many saw as the key attraction of this subclass.

Rogue: The change to limit sneak attack to the Rogue's own turn scored poorly. The developers generally like moving actions to a player's own turn to keep the game moving quickly, but in this case, the change doesn't seem to be worth the loss of tactical flexibility.

Feats: With the exception of epic boons, all the feats in the Expert packet scored well. The developers are still loking at written feedback for fine tuning.

Conspicuously not mentioned were the Arcane/Divine/Primal spell lists, which were the focus of a lot of discussion during the Bard playtest.

 

[Emberashh]

The updated Ranger scored very well in the playtest.

Pretty much seals the deal for me that Im not going to be playing OneDND. They butchered the Ranger already with Tashas and they doubled down with One. No thank you.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Pretty much seals the deal for me that Im not going to be playing OneDND. They butchered the Ranger already with Tashas and they doubled down with One. No thank you.

Interesting, I hear more people saying Tasha’s finally made the Ranger playable in 5e. I don’t recall the playtest changes

 

[Bolares]

Pretty much seals the deal for me that Im not going to be playing OneDND. They butchered the Ranger already with Tashas and they doubled down with One. No thank you.

Just out of curiosity, what was butchered in your opinion?

 

[Bolares]

I’m happy the paladin crit change was not intended!

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Conspicuously not mentioned were the Arcane/Divine/Primal spell lists, which were the focus of a lot of discussion during the Bard playtest.​

I hope they go forward with that design, but I also missed it.
I wished, they were more flexible and give the bard accees to prinal spells too.

 

[Clint_L]

I’m happy the paladin crit change was not intended!

I read that as them confirming that you could still declare the smite after you crit, which was what was in the play test. Maybe I’m confused?

 

[Bolares]

I read that as them confirming that you could still declare the smite after you crit, which was what was in the play test. Maybe I’m confused?

The way it was worded could be understood as the smite being a separate damage roll, and so, not affected by the crit.

 

[Bolares]

I hope they go forward with that design, but I also missed it.
I wished, they were more flexible and give the bard accees to prinal spells too.

I just wish they remove some signature class spells (like the smite spells and find steed) from the spell lists and gave them to their classes as a feature. The way it is being done in the current playtests really hurts the halfcasters, who receive their signature spells later then other classes.

 

[Emberashh]

Interesting, I hear more people saying Tasha’s finally made the Ranger playable in 5e. I don’t recall the playtest changes

Just out of curiosity, what was butchered in your opinion?

Ill respond to these posts in tandem. So Im of the opinion that the 5E Ranger as presented in 2014 was the most Rangery Ranger ever made.

No example of it prior or since compares, and what it got right has everything to do with the Terrain system that, despite its shortcomings, actually delivered an identity for the Ranger.

Now, that system of course wasn't perfect, and I can tell you that my personal rewrite of it (that I used in my 5E games and will be carrying forward into my own RPG) basically only resembles the original in name and concept. But the sheer potential of that system is what made it so appealing, and I had hoped in time that they would have expanded on it and developed it more.

But they didn't. Instead, they soft scrapped it with Tashas, giving it a rather boring set of static passives, and in OneDND, they not only stuck with that same design, but also proceeded to butcher Hunter and emphasize the Ranger even more as basically a cruddy Druid with some martial stuff.

While I'm not a fan of Rangers being spellcasters period, I could have at least lived with it if the rest of the class had improved from what we got in 2014. Not so much when all of that potential was wasted and actual abilities are getting swapped out not just for spells, but weaker spells than what they had originally. (Conjure Barrage = Trash)

And ultimately, the memes that 2014 Rangers were bad were just that. It suffered because the Exploration procedures got butchered in the transition out of Next (the games literally still designed around Exploration Turns to this day), but even the 2014 Beastmaster wasn't as bad as the memes would have you believe, and Hunter was always solid throughout 5Es existence, even as the more high powered subs came into play.