D&D (2024) Do you plan to adopt D&D5.5One2024Redux?

[CreamCloud0]

A lot of the time when you start digging into what 4e had instead of that 20% though you find that it had some elements in the rules structure to ensure things kept working instead of flying off into insanity. It might not have been an agreeable structure that resulted in a desirable game, but just knitting it creates headaches

so what are you saying here? '4e had great mechanics for keeping things running smoothly but people didn't like the explainations for why the mechanics were there'? (genuinely asking for clarification here)

 

[Oofta]

i swear, from what i hear of it i feel like 80% of 4e is amazing design that would be great to play, and at least another 10% of that remaining 20% is just my personal preferences diverging from what 4e chose to be rather than it's actual quality at doing so.

I wouldn't go as high as 80%, doesn't mean 4E didn't have some good ideas. It was just that they had some good ideas for about 1/3 of a game and then were forced to use those good ideas and adapt them for everything else. With 5E they borrowed from pretty much every version of the game, some good some bad. I think cantrips are a good idea but short rest vs long rest is a headache that isn't going away anytime soon. 4E did a lot of things but bounded accuracy was not one of them. It, like 3.x before it was the mother of all arms races. You literally had guidance telling you that by level X you had to have +Y weapons and armor or you couldn't compete.

I think 4E had some good concepts, but so have all versions of the game. I could go into a lot of detail while 4E eventually didn't work for me, just like I could go into the faults of the previous editions, or the current one for that matter. But I will say that 4E was the only version that had me on the verge of never playing D&D again or reverting back to the previous edition. It slowly sank into my brain after a couple of years of playing that it just didn't give me the same vibes as the older editions had.

One thing 5E is absolutely not is 4E with better marketing and explanations of powers.

 

[FrogReaver]

All one has to do is look at this thread. A single positive comment about 4e design and there's at least three counter comments claiming that none of the innovations of 4e are actually from 4e

Nothing to do with a positive 4e comment. You cited a bunch of stuff as 4e innovations that weren’t. That’s why you got pushback, not because you said something good about 4e.

heck @Lanefan's trying to claim bounded accuracy as a 1e thing. And folks are having a go at me for saying AEDU is neo-Vancian casting in drag? One single positive comment about 4e, and the edition war rhetoric gets dragged out, despite the edition warriors having won nearly ten years ago.

Saying AEDU isn’t neo-vanician isn’t edition waring.

 

[tetrasodium]

so what are you saying here? '4e had great mechanics for keeping things running smoothly but people didn't like the explainations for why the mechanics were there'? (genuinely asking for clarification here)

Not that italic bit. 5e often said "this subsystem is desired yoink" but in doing so it often ignored forgot about and/or silently made the gm responsible for supporting the parts that were required for that subsystem to function in a way that kept it in line with what they found desirable.

 

[Micah Sweet]

True.


That's quite the non sequitur you've got going there. A truly bad game is unlikely to be successful, but unless there's a monopoly (there isn't) it has to be good for a large part of the population in order to be successful.

To be fair, from a market point of view what WotC has is uncomfortably close to a monopoly.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Lots of 'their players' really liked 4e.

Not enough to meet their financial goals. That's undeniable.

 

[Micah Sweet]

For the target audience, McDonalds is good design. I haven't eaten at one in more years than I can remember, but it does what it does well. Good in no way guarantees popularity of course.

I think popularity with your target audience is kind of a given goal of every company and it largely goes without saying.

What's WotC's target audience? Who do they want?

 

[Micah Sweet]

How do you figure?

No. But if they deviate to far from what makes d&d feel like d&d to their fans they probably will. Its not solely about popularity for popularity’s sake, if that was the case they’d make d&d soda, cars, pizza, call of duty (or whatever computer game is popular these days).. because all that crap is more popular than d&d the rpg.

I often think WotC would do exactly that if they could get away with it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

so what are you saying here? '4e had great mechanics for keeping things running smoothly but people didn't like the explainations for why the mechanics were there'? (genuinely asking for clarification here)

That's a good summary for my feelings.

 

[Clint_L]

All one has to do is look at this thread. A single positive comment about 4e design and there's at least three counter comments claiming that none of the innovations of 4e are actually from 4e...

I think you need to re-read my comment as you seem to have missed the point entirely. I was discussing the pursuit of popularity in design.