D&D 5E Is D&D 90% Combat?

In response to Cubicle 7’s announcement that their next Doctor Who role playing game would be powered by D&D 5E, there was a vehement (and in some places toxic) backlash on social media. While that backlash has several dimensions, one element of it is a claim that D&D is mainly about combat.

Head of D&D Ray Winninger disagreed (with snark!), tweeting "Woke up this morning to Twitter assuring me that [D&D] is "ninety percent combat." I must be playing (and designing) it wrong." WotC's Dan Dillon also said "So guess we're gonna recall all those Wild Beyond the Witchlight books and rework them into combat slogs, yeah? Since we did it wrong."

So, is D&D 90% combat?



And in other news, attacking C7 designers for making games is not OK.

D&D 5E - Doctors & Daleks - Cubicle 7 Brings Doctor Who to D&D 5E

Cubicle 7 -- makers of the official Doctor Who roleplaying game -- has announced that the Doctor will officially be coming to 5E soon under the name Doctors and Daleks. There are no dates or details yet, over than that the Doctors and Daleks Player's Guide will launch 'soon'. A NEW COMPANION...

www.enworld.org

 

[Ovinomancer]

Thank you! (I now have the urge to go reread some Fafhrd and Mouser).

So the book specifies those numbers you gave (0=1-2, 1=3-6, etc...) for tier 2?

No, those are the general scale numbers. Crews and factions in Blades have tiers, and that gives you a handy way to present these numbers when needed. Like if the Lampblacks (tier 2) comes after your crew, they'll send a gang of around 12 thugs to do so.

In the example you gave, what determines it was tier 2? (Is this where the general attitude of the city to the characters religion comes in, for example? Or is this based on something about the characters background/traits/abilities?)

The crew tier.

So tier 2 with a 6 goes to tier 3. Could the GM pick any number from 20-39 or does just below next tier go well beyond flavor?

The GM can flavor it however, but 20 is the staked number so it isn't anything from 20 up to the next tier, but around 20.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Following up to my questions in #878 again, who or what process determines what the positive and negative tags are? Similarly to what counts as a coin?

The player assigns tags. Coin is a unit of monies used in game. It's a tad vague, and is used to abstract the many forms of currency and items that can be used in trades. Blades doesn't concern itself with a tight economic or inventory system, so abstracts these things out. Here's the provided abstractions:

• 1 coin: A full purse of silver pieces. A week’s wages.
• 2 coin: A fine weapon. A weekly income for a small business. A fine piece of art. A set of luxury clothes.
• 4 coin: A satchel full of silver. A month’s wages.
• 6 coin: An exquisite jewel. A heavy burden of silver pieces.
• 8 coin: A good monthly take for a small business. A small safe full of coins and valuables. A very rare luxury commodity.
• 10 coin: Liquidating a significant asset—a carriage and goats, a horse, a deed to a small property.

 

[Cadence]

The crew tier.

Is the recruiter in your example part of a tier 2 crew, or are cultists tier 2?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Is the recruiter in your example part of a tier 2 crew, or are cultists tier 2?

I think I didn't do a good job. The crew is the shared organization for the PCs. It's like it's own character. When PCs do certain things that require a tier check, they use the tier of their crew. So if a PC is part of a tier 2 crew, if they attempt to acquire a cohort, the tier in the process is the crew's tier.

What this represents is, in general, how influential the PCs and the crew are. To tier up, you have to earn reputation and/or control turf (another mechanic) which you do through scores. When you've amassed enough rep/turf, you can improve. Each tier level has two positions, weak and strong, so a tier 2 crew could be tier 2 weak or tier 2 strong. This doesn't matter for tier number references, but does for how you move up -- you just spend your rep (turf stays) if you're moving from a weak to strong, but you have to spend (newtier x 8) coin to move up to a higher tier. This represents the effort spent to improve things about the crew and become more influential (it's buying up existing cohorts/perks, improving hideouts/lairs/fronts/churches, etc.).

 

[Cadence]

I think I didn't do a good job. The crew is the shared organization for the PCs. It's like it's own character. When PCs do certain things that require a tier check, they use the tier of their crew. So if a PC is part of a tier 2 crew, if they attempt to acquire a cohort, the tier in the process is the crew's tier.

What this represents is, in general, how influential the PCs and the crew are. To tier up, you have to earn reputation and/or control turf (another mechanic) which you do through scores. When you've amassed enough rep/turf, you can improve. Each tier level has two positions, weak and strong, so a tier 2 crew could be tier 2 weak or tier 2 strong. This doesn't matter for tier number references, but does for how you move up -- you just spend your rep (turf stays) if you're moving from a weak to strong, but you have to spend (newtier x 8) coin to move up to a higher tier. This represents the effort spent to improve things about the crew and become more influential (it's buying up existing cohorts/perks, improving hideouts/lairs/fronts/churches, etc.).

Now it all makes sense! Thank you

My last two questions I think are:
How does the area they're recruiting affect things? (If trying to recruit at a soup kitchen in a low income area vs. at a marketplace vs. outside the high church of another faith.
Are there things they can do to increase the chances of a good outcome beyond spending coin?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Now it all makes sense! Thank you

My last two questions I think are:
How does the area they're recruiting affect things? (If trying to recruit at a soup kitchen in a low income area vs. at a marketplace vs. outside the high church of another faith.

Fictional inputs. If you're trying to poach from another religion, well, now we're probably talking about a score.

Are there things they can do to increase the chances of a good outcome beyond spending coin?

Being good at the action used. If you have zero dots in Sway or Consort (the two most likely actions) then your odds are terrible (2d6 take lowest). If you have 3 dots, then you're much better at it (3d6 take highest).

 

[HammerMan]

Before I answer any questions I just want to make something clear. Yes, leveling is awesome. But ... I view it as mostly just a way to tell different stories. At low levels you're dealing with street gangs at high levels you're dealing with ancient dragons, arch-demons and Cthulhu wannabes.

SInce we seem to butt heads a bunch can I just say you got it 100% IMO here.

levels are a "you SHOULD be this tall to ride this ride" and something that more free form spend xp systems don't have.

In WoD I can make a vampire with 100xp (alot in that system... like maybe 1/2 a year of playing lot) that any mortal off the street could drop in a one shot, and would run in fear from a starting character built for combat... it allows for more flexible concepts (why is my librarian sage better at fighting and taking a hit for leveling up, when I don't fight) but at the cost of not ever really knowing what your group can face.

 

[muhcashin]

Yes it is. Combat is very time consuming. 30-40 mins or more to go through about less than a minute of in-game time.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Yes it is. Combat is very time consuming. 30-40 mins or more to go through about less than a minute of in-game time.

But on the flip side, you can breeze through several months of in-game time in a few minutes IRL...

It is all simply an issue of spending game time on the aspects of play you enjoy the most, and finding a good balance with all the rest.

 

[Ovinomancer]

But on the flip side, you can breeze through several months of in-game time in a few minutes IRL...

It is all simply an issue of spending game time on the aspects of play you enjoy the most, and finding a good balance with all the rest.

That's not really the flip side -- it's still saying that combat takes the most real time to resolve the least game time. You just pointed out using little real time to resolve lots and lots of game time!

It's a fair point to note just how small the time resolution of combat is vice anything else.