I hate it when I’m pressed for time, because something invariably slips or trips, but here goes:
Pem: NPC wizards are indeed dangerous without the DM keen-moderation you mention. Relatively new DMs won’t have this awareness level, and, given the rapid rise through the levels of characters in 5E, may not have the time and opportunity to develop it fast enough. And that, unfortunately, would appear to showcase insufficient design consideration.
Rem:
I am not opposed to magic solving some problems. But when it does so repeatedly, predictably, and routinely, it detracts from the wonder of its name. When I look at enduring classics of fantasy, I rarely see magical domination. Gandalf and his magical power didn’t dominate the Lord of the Rings saga. Merlin didn’t dominate the Arthurian legend. Thoth-Amon didn’t dominate Hyboria. It seemed to me that they intermittently used powerful magic, and found other ways (and cooperation) to overcome a number of challenges.
If WotC had come out with a 5E that said it merely wanted to run PCs through adventure paths to 20
th level, then repeat, and mentioned little to nothing about immersion, I would have had little to criticize, because plausibility, lethality, and other concerns would have meant a lot less. But when they emphasized immersion, they highlighted highly contradictory aspects that moved me to respond.
4E suffered from a good deal as well. Too much was too heavily nerfed and diluted, understandable as a reaction to 3E excess and identification of known problems, but making such a game and trying to “get back to the farm when they’ve seen the bright lights of the city,” was swimming up the proverbial waterfall. That the 4E designers did not adequately explain and get buy-in on the reasons for their design didn’t help matters (although, in fairness to them, much of the 3E player crowd was quite parochial and narrowly focused and presumably not in a mood to listen). Nerfing and diluting cannot be the answer to every problem. Sometimes other methods must be found, whether they be changes in frequency, reliability, or renewability, or the exaction of other costs—not just financial, but physical, mental, social, political, spiritual, etc., or even other methods entirely.
I do agree with you that reduced numbers of slots has helped things, and made resource management a better consideration in 5E than it was 3E. I do recognize the improvements made in 5E, and said as much in my treatise. Far less (at least so far) is problematic in it than was problematic in 3E, and I’m not concerned about myself or my group vis a vis 5E—we’ll play, we’ll do well, we’ll have fun.
It’s the transformation from newbies to enthusiastic, dedicated, believers in D&D that seems fraught with quite difficult terrain. I’m just concerned that even with the improvements, it will fail to achieve that transformation in 5E. There’s only so many times that D&D can disappoint newbies in sufficient numbers before it paves the road to its own extinction.
I understand the probable differences in our playing preferences. However, I’m still trying to come to the understanding of why my specific concerns will be of no importance in 5E playability, viability, immersion, campaign length and continuance, etc., as well as the attracting and the keeping of new players and DMs. For instance, you say the limits of spell slots being lower will adequately keep things in check, but wouldn’t it be just as plausible that it just means the party rests more frequently so the casters can get their slots back?
I have played in and enjoyed every edition of D&D, from the original to 4E. I have DM’d in every edition from 1E to 4E, many with long-running characters, including two 20
th level 3E campaigns over many years. 3E and Pathfinder were/are wondrous innovations that were great for players, with fun and exciting options and always something to look forward to. The splitting headache they gave DMs is another matter. Many gave up “management,” and just ran modules, adventure paths, and campaign arcs that scripted things through.
Which only magnifies the DM-scarcity problem. Players can want a lot, but with fewer and fewer DMs able to manage, things often de-evolve to short “I’ll run for a few weeks” attempts, or even to one-shots. The game experience changes, which is fine if that’s what players really want (assuming the DM is really okay with it—after all, he or she needs to have fun too), but can just as easily become an avenue for attention deficit, disaffection, disinterest, and abandonment.
I did not casually review the spells. I gave each careful consideration. What spells did I leave off the problematic list that you feel fit the same criteria as one on it, and why?
5E Lightning bolt and 5E fireball are poorly comparable in terms of effect. While both are third level, one relies on lucky circumstance to catch more than a target or two, while the other will regularly catch multiples, and thus would seem to be poorly balanced against each other as well. That both are undiscriminating between friend and foe is not much of power limiter given probable use.
Maybe Magic Missile won’t turn out to be quite so problematic in play, and with the reduced number of slots, maybe not so SOP and not so mechanical and unremarkable. As I said, all this is a first look, and perhaps game play will change my mind.
You mentioned Detect Magic. Can you point out some specific concerns I have that you feel are not valid or meaningful, and why you feel that way? By its certainty, duration, mobility, and repeatability, it would seem to become a mechanical and unremarkable function that takes away a lot of the specialness concerning magic discovery.
Wall of Stone, except for the permanency aspect, was a pretty minor problematic, but maybe it did come across as whiny. Will have to think some more on that one!
T.V.:
“Conveying danger mechanically can be a bit of a challenge. If you're not invested in a character, you're not too fearful for it. If you are, you may be /too/ fearful for it to have it behave heroically. If you blow through a few characters, you may be blasé about character death, which also saps the sense of danger. It's a delicate thing, and I'm not /sure/ lethality in the system helps that much, but I can see how it /might/. Say you roll up your first D&D character and it dies, you think 'wow this game is deadly.' Then you roll up your second character, play it a little more cautiously, get a little luck, and it survives to 2nd or 3rd or 5th or whenever it becomes pretty safe in the ed in question. By 9th or so, even if it dies, it can be resurrected. So, you're now in basically no danger of lasting death, but you have that first impression of 'this game is deadly.' Of course, your first impression could also be 'this game sucks' and you never play it again. :shrug”
I think all of those are probably operative. More current market research might give us a better picture of which predominates, but until that’s released, we are left to our experiences and observations—those in-game, in-society, and in-life. Something else that has occurred to me: the focus on encounter “winning,” encounter level appropriateness, etc., has probably worked against the danger sentiment. Not enough parties anymore have had to, or certainly developed an appreciation for, the virtue and necessity of avoiding or running away by being outclassed by NPCs/monsters, and maybe coming back another day (or year).
Talking this out, it occurs to me that perhaps WotC could have recommended to new players to use a pre-gen for the first session or two (even a “trial” session) until they have an appreciation for how things work. The high mortality (higher than usual, even) of that could perhaps set, for the game, the mind-framing that you are postulating. In fact, if I recall Mike Mearls’ L&L columns correctly, something similar to this was tossed around for a short period. Of course, the pre-gen might work counter to what is desired, and, with not enough investment in the character, they don’t take its demise seriously enough to make an impression, or even that the lack of investment means they don’t find things interesting enough at all.
Without conducting an exit interview/survey of your female playtester, I suppose it would be hard to say what drove her mixed behaviors.
It is entirely possible, perhaps probable, that the vast majority of female players D&D attracts at present, with some ready exceptions, are themselves not necessarily representative of the general female populace, and maybe are either more readily forgiving of adversity and just easy going, or deeply embedded in gamer and fantasy culture—and either of those are less likely to be discouraged or alienated by high character mortality. It is my assertion that the new immersive aspects of 5E may attract more newbie females, but that, without some moderation of the lethality, will repel many of those same newbies.
I understand the reasoning behind 5E Encounters’ raise dead automatic, but it would seem this would, in the name of preserving carefully crafted and fleshed out characters, also detract from the immersion by making the setting or “world” seem either contradictory or implausible and thereby busting suspension of disbelief. One would still have the weekly “encounters” of combat, social interaction or exploration, but it would take on characteristics of disconnected mental exercises. D&D has seemed to thrive when players and DMs recount experiences that, regardless of the specifics, have shown their immersion in the setting.
KD:
Not sure either one of our tables are particularly indicative of anything, but I too have a 50% mix at present. I’ve also had up to 80% female prevalence before, as well as, of course, up to 100% male prevalence.
I would assert that 4E was a poor test of my postulation, for although it might have mechanically tilted against lethality, it failed nearly utterly in immersion (a failure which may have had something to do with the only modest uptick in female players). IMO, one of the reasons Paizo did so well was not just that it provided a haven for the 3.5 crowd, but that it provided loads of rich, immersive detail. Being used to high mortality already, the 3.5 crowd was of course not dissuaded by that high mortality, and since Paizo’s immersive richness—not to mention its campaign arcs—shone in comparison to WotC’s, Pathfinder had, despite its complexity, a blossom period. WotC’s 4E products parceled too much into barely connected tactics showcases, and then made it worse with the disjointedness of the Points of Light world (which was not an intrinsically flawed concept, and one that could have put the spotlight on the heroes, but it left DM’s too unmoored, and the players too as a consequence). This disparity was only magnified by the rules and logic inconsistencies in many of the adventure products, not to mention the occasional just bad writing, and all these seemed to leave too many gaming groups flat.
All:
Our experiences are our experiences, but I would note for all of you that before you even posted anything, it was likely you were at least a cut above the average D&Der because you were interested enough to join a gaming site, and then even keener by going to a forum. And then displayed the characteristics of the following, and as you moved down the list, the probability of you being further and further exceptional increased:
1. You joined not just a forum, but a non-WotC forum (increasing chances of wider and more independent thought).
2. You posted (many just lurk).
3. You posted a lot (many do just a little).
4. You posted multiple times in a single thread (many don’t focus or engage).
5. You attracted the interest (and posting) of other exceptionals like yourselves.
6. You delved deep into the facets of the game.
7. You became a member of a forum/this forum for a long, sometimes very long, period of time.
8. The fellow players/DMs you attracted are likely to be above average.
9. Your table experiences are thus likely to be above average.
My concern has been, and is, not for the exceptionals like yourselves. My concern is for John and Jane Newbie and their friends, who, unless they are lucky enough to be at a gaming table with an exceptional or two, have only the game as presented to their eyes to guide them.
