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<blockquote data-quote="Pauper" data-source="post: 6960006" data-attributes="member: 17607"><p>Having had a bit more time to go over the document, I have to say my least favorite part is the 'magic item store' -- it's weird, but between the '500 downtime days to catch up to level 17' and this, I find myself with less confidence that the WotC folks in charge of this really understand the design of their own game.</p><p></p><p>Here's part of what I mean: The design of 5e monsters, particularly in the lower CRs presumes certain things about the game. Monsters with resistance to non-magical weapon damage are expected to last a certain number of rounds (on average -- not every party will see that, I know) and thus deal a certain amount of damage to the party, consuming some of their resources. Some parties may be able to account for this by expending other resources (say, using a second-level spell slot to cast 'magic weapon'), but again, that's a choice being made by the party on how to spend the resources they need to spend to get through the encounter.</p><p></p><p>Now, there's no reason for any character who uses a weapon not to just pick one up as soon as they qualify -- which means that every 5th level character will have a magical weapon as soon as they finish their first special mission (unless some events like the D&D Open make it more common for special missions to be offered in Tier 1 adventures). Now, every adventure designed for Tier 2 characters has to take into account that magic weapons will be significantly more common than before, and that parties don't need to expend resources to be able to be more effective against those sorts of monsters. This will likely drive those monsters more heavily into Tier 1 modules, where they'll be even more irritating to players who've been complaining about them, because Tier 1 will be the only chance adventure designers get to use those monsters at their written effectiveness.</p><p></p><p>It's weird, because I just watched a video on exactly the advantages and disadvantages of this kind of design -- '<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tL_bCwiUKNE" target="_blank">design by accretion</a>' -- and the stated design philosophy of 5e doesn't match the style of development that this sort of design is good for. Design by accretion is good when you need to crank out lots of content on a shortened development schedule and are willing to prioritize existing players who have buy-in over acquiring new players who will become intimidated by the growing amount of accreted content in the game, yet every time I hear Mearls, Crawford, or Perkins talk about 5e design, they like to talk about the new player experience and designing for the 'long term'.</p><p></p><p>Maybe the designers are treating Adventurers League differently from the game as a whole? AL does have more of the traits that the 'design by accretion' strategy seems to favor, if you assume that AL has already picked up about all the new players it's going to have. It still seems weird, though, that the organized play campaign is designed and operated so much differently from the game as a whole.</p><p></p><p>--</p><p>Pauper</p><p></p><p>(Edit: Mis-typed 'accretion' as 'attrition' in the original post.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Pauper, post: 6960006, member: 17607"] Having had a bit more time to go over the document, I have to say my least favorite part is the 'magic item store' -- it's weird, but between the '500 downtime days to catch up to level 17' and this, I find myself with less confidence that the WotC folks in charge of this really understand the design of their own game. Here's part of what I mean: The design of 5e monsters, particularly in the lower CRs presumes certain things about the game. Monsters with resistance to non-magical weapon damage are expected to last a certain number of rounds (on average -- not every party will see that, I know) and thus deal a certain amount of damage to the party, consuming some of their resources. Some parties may be able to account for this by expending other resources (say, using a second-level spell slot to cast 'magic weapon'), but again, that's a choice being made by the party on how to spend the resources they need to spend to get through the encounter. Now, there's no reason for any character who uses a weapon not to just pick one up as soon as they qualify -- which means that every 5th level character will have a magical weapon as soon as they finish their first special mission (unless some events like the D&D Open make it more common for special missions to be offered in Tier 1 adventures). Now, every adventure designed for Tier 2 characters has to take into account that magic weapons will be significantly more common than before, and that parties don't need to expend resources to be able to be more effective against those sorts of monsters. This will likely drive those monsters more heavily into Tier 1 modules, where they'll be even more irritating to players who've been complaining about them, because Tier 1 will be the only chance adventure designers get to use those monsters at their written effectiveness. It's weird, because I just watched a video on exactly the advantages and disadvantages of this kind of design -- '[URL="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tL_bCwiUKNE"]design by accretion[/URL]' -- and the stated design philosophy of 5e doesn't match the style of development that this sort of design is good for. Design by accretion is good when you need to crank out lots of content on a shortened development schedule and are willing to prioritize existing players who have buy-in over acquiring new players who will become intimidated by the growing amount of accreted content in the game, yet every time I hear Mearls, Crawford, or Perkins talk about 5e design, they like to talk about the new player experience and designing for the 'long term'. Maybe the designers are treating Adventurers League differently from the game as a whole? AL does have more of the traits that the 'design by accretion' strategy seems to favor, if you assume that AL has already picked up about all the new players it's going to have. It still seems weird, though, that the organized play campaign is designed and operated so much differently from the game as a whole. -- Pauper (Edit: Mis-typed 'accretion' as 'attrition' in the original post.) [/QUOTE]
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