Losing interest....

[Mercurius]

That WotC has so little to show us bodes poorly for the future of 5e. You're telling me that they playtested 5e for months prior to the open playtest and they still screwed up armor, are just now working on a tactical module, and have nothing beyond the first three levels to show us? Pretty ridiculous.

Really? Really? Some folks will read something negative into anything WotC does.

That said, I hear and agree with the OP - I dropped out of conversation a few weeks after the announcement because of the reasons you stated, then rekindled interest when the playtest arrived but quickly lost interest because of the lack of character creation rules.

Morrus does have a good point, though. What are they supposed to do? We have to remember that this is a playtest, no more or less - they are giving us exactly what we asked for, a voice in the process of creating the next iteration of the game. What more do we want? I imagine, as Morrus said, we'll see more juicy stuff sometime early net year.

By the way, given that I've been out of the loop, was the release date ever announced? Last I heard the speculation was that it was GenCon 2013, but that was just speculation.

 

[ren1999]

I must echo my concerns with the O.P. and B.T. here.

 

[chriton227]

But updates with what?

Perhaps with what they were working on while the play testers were testing? I'm sure the WoTC devs weren't sitting idle during the playtest, they could have us test the next batch of features they were working on, and integrate the 1st round playtest feedback into the 3rd round. Ideally through each round of playtesting, the changes will become more minor as they home in on the final design.

It's a lot like software design, your programmers aren't sitting idle while QA is testing features, the programmers are already working on the next set of features. Likewise, QA shouldn't be sitting idle waiting on the programmers, it is much more efficient if you can get something into their hands to test so that the programmers can get feedback earlier.

 

[kitsune9]

To the OP, yeah, my interest has waned a bit, but when something new comes out, I'm pretty sure I'll perk up. It happens just with any long-term project. Some days, you're going to be really hot and other days, you don't even want to think about it.

 

[Morrus]

Perhaps with what they were working on while the play testers were testing? I'm sure the WoTC devs weren't sitting idle during the playtest, they could have us test the next batch of features they were working on, and integrate the 1st round playtest feedback into the 3rd round. Ideally through each round of playtesting, the changes will become more minor as they home in on the final design.

It's a lot like software design, your programmers aren't sitting idle while QA is testing features, the programmers are already working on the next set of features. Likewise, QA shouldn't be sitting idle waiting on the programmers, it is much more efficient if you can get something into their hands to test so that the programmers can get feedback earlier.

I don't think it's a lot like software design, though. Software design is much more specific, focused, and done to spec. At the moment, they're playtesting and pitching ideas and concepts as much as they're bug-hunting. It's very early in the process (we're, what, only five weeks in?)

 

[B.T.]

Really? Really? Some folks will read something negative into anything WotC does.

Really. Sorry, brosiah, I'm not inclined to trust a large corporation that

(a) published the poorly-playtested 3.0,
(b) published the slipshod errata document that was 3.5,
(c) churned out splatbook after splatbook of awful material in a worse moneygrab than the publication of 3.5 was,
(d) lied to the customer base, telling them that 4e was not in the works when it was,
(e) ignored legitimate criticisms of the 4e system and the general dissatisfaction of the fanbase,
(f) continued the splatbook treadmill present in 3e,
(g) created the unworkable mess of skill challenge mechanics,
(h) wrote out hundreds of pages of errata for 4e, which included redoing the entire math of the early Monster Manuals,
(i) did yet more moneygrabbing with D&D Essentials,
(j) didn't understand that classes routinely adding +8 to +10 on an attack roll would completely destroy any semblance of mathematical balance,
(k) failed to deliver with lofty promises about the character visualizer and online tools (not to mention the entire Gleemax fiasco),
(l) failed to realize their own design goals for 4e (no Christmas tree magical items, math that "just works," and so forth),
(l) have worked on 5e secretly for months and yet have only been to produce a mediocre set of incomplete rules.

Forgive me for doubting the wisdom of our glorious corporate betters, but I just get this nagging feeling that I can't trust them.

 

[mudbunny]

That WotC has so little to show us bodes poorly for the future of 5e. You're telling me that they playtested 5e for months prior to the open playtest and they still screwed up armor, are just now working on a tactical module, and have nothing beyond the first three levels to show us? Pretty ridiculous.

So my question is then, what do you want?

When 4E (and, I assume 3.X) came out, you couldn't swing a forum by it's phpBB without hitting a thread about how WotC was doing it wrong by not having a long, extended playtest where the players have an actual say in how things are designed, etc.

Now that they are doing it, they now have people complain that WotC should have done more and thus giving the players less input over what can be done.

As for the amount of playtesting that they did beforehand, they had a *very* limited number of eyes (and eyeball hours) that they could use. After a point, no matter how much they focus on playtesting it, they also designed and developed it, and as a result will have a base mode of play or looking at things that results. Hence the playtest to the (tens of??) thousands of people who signed up for the playtest and downloaded the documents.

 

[Agamon]

I agree that they are doing what they need to do.

However, I am also getting more excited about trying to get a game of DCC, 13th Age, ACKS or Hackmaster going than I am about continuing my DDN playtest.

 

[mudbunny]

(d) lied to the customer base, telling them that 4e was not in the works when it was,

Can't find the specific thread, but this claim was being tossed around for a while and was then pretty thoroughly debunked here on ENWorld. Hopefully someone with greater search-fu can find it.

Now, that being said, I have to respond to this with a great big "So??" So they didn't say that they were working on 4E. What does that have to do with anything? Companies lie when they are asked about potential upcoming products all the time. It is a part of doing business, and anyone who thinks otherwise is very naive.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

[MENTION=84465]B.T.[/MENTION]

So why exactly are you even visiting this forum? If wotc never did a good game in a good way, and you don´t trust them... why hang around here?