D&D 5E So Why is 5E So Popular?

[MNblockhead]

It is far more accessible than any other edition to date. Simple, solid, streamlined rules with a very light and focused production schedule allowing for easy entry into the community at any given time. Open exposure and endorsement over social media outlets, along with online streaming and support. 5e has everything going the right way for new players, and old players who may have felt left out by the departure of classic designs during 4th edition's brief tenure. How could it possibly fail?

Don't get me wrong, though. I am not a fan of the game. To me, they played it too safe, and that is boring and uninteresting to me. I am no longer in the target demographic. I have played the system for many years since the early 80s when it was never as popular. My best experiences happened during that brief period of dangerous innovation in 4e.

Now I have discovered more sophisticated and satisfying games better suited for my personal style of gaming and narrative. And I cannot help but look at this good, solid, accessible, and popular edition and think "It's so... basic!" It doesn't innovate. Everything they do has been done before. And it's the same treadmill I have seen with 4 previous editions and various clones.

These aren't terrible things as evident by it's great success, but I only speak for myself. And for me, it is the end of a decades-long relationship. So while I applaud the achievements of this edition, I do not celebrate nor partake in it. But I do have my fun with it. And I am much happier now having mastering a system that I feel is far superior in many ways, and enjoying the heck out of it!

I can see that. Like anything, if you are a long time fan of something, your tastes get more refined and you require more out of a product to get the same enjoyment. I'm a terrible and aging skiier. I get a thrill as risking my old bones on a green or blue hill, whereas experienced skiiers will be bored with anything less than a black diamond hill.

I don't have a lot of time to play TTRPG. I have one 8-hour game with adult friends each month and I hadn't played a TTRPG since 1990. It still tool work for me to absorb and be able to run 5e games and its luster hasn't faded for me yet. But it has increased my appetite. Yet, rather than go to more crunchy games like Pathfinder or more tactical games like 4e, I am instead drawn to far simpler, more narrative, and just weird games in other genres.

Some of my favorite TTRPG experiences outside of 5e after by rebirth as a gamer have included:

1. A session of "Gene Hackman" that I joined via Kickstarter at the tail end of a business trip.

2. A game of InSPECTREs that I ran with a couple old friends.

3. Playing No Thank You, Evil! with my sons--which has made me curious about advanced Cypher system games like Numera and The Strange.

4. Grim, I bought the grim card deck from DTRPG and integrated it into my DnD game as a kind of mini game. When they went to the Feywild, I swapped DnD mechanics for Grim mechanics to capture the unnerving, dangerous, and surreal nature of the plane. After they "acclimated" they went back to normal DnD mechanics, but mechanics like Grim and Dread are much better at building suspense.

5. I've run the new Paranoia edition. The rules are half-baked and poorly described in some parts, but I love the flavor of the game.

But those are all one-nighters. 5e is my steady date.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Rulings, not rules. Getting away from being a slave to the letter of the rules in the previous two editions was a breath of fresh air to me. It feels like for the first time since 2E that you can houserule without getting yelled at by the players.

And this flexibility in the system also allows for some very good OGL uses of the rules, such as the excellent Adventures in Middle Earth.

 

[TheSword]

Rulings, not rules. Getting away from being a slave to the letter of the rules in the previous two editions was a breath of fresh air to me. It feels like for the first time since 2E that you can houserule without getting yelled at by the players.

And this flexibility in the system also allows for some very good OGL uses of the rules, such as the excellent Adventures in Middle Earth.

This! Definitely this.

It is a bit of a myth that D&Ds attraction is that it is easy to get into. That might explain why people try, but but why people stay with it. For me it is a few main reasons...

1. Several factors like finesse, cantrips, multiple attacks, the feats and ASI, mean that every class is attractive to me in some way. Literally every one (with the exception of the warlock) is on my list of potential characters which is attractive.

2. In general the additional ‘crunch’ that had been released give alternatives rather than stackable benefits. Their options seem more designed to represent different fantasy tropes than to try and gain cumulative mechanical benefits. That means I don’t have to worry about the splat books, have them don’t worry they won’t overpower, don’t have them that’s fine. Bloat has killed 3.5e and Pathfinder for me. (Played both through their lifespans)

3. As a DM I feel like I can reward players ingenuity with Advantage and Inspiration without breaking the system. In all but a few cases auto-success and auto-fail have been ruled out of the game which is awesome for me, because it’s my biggest bugbear. This is partly because of the narrower bonus progression and it has the side effect of meaning sand box adventures become far more interesting because PCs may last a round or two against a creature substantially higher CR (or lower) than they are. This flexibility and freedom as a DM is far more important to me than having a rule for every encounter (see Enevhar’s post)

4. Legendary creatures are the best thing I have ever seen and I love, running them.

There are more reasons an old 3e/Pathfinder addict like me loves the game. It isn’t just that it’s easy to get into.

 

[Ancalagon]

Ask non gamers about any other RPG, and they will look at you with confusion. Ask non gamers about D&D and many will know what you are talking about. D&D is proof that ANY publicity is good publicity, older people know that D&D is played by satanists, while younger people know that it is that weird thing that appears on many popular shows and is played by "Nerdy Arse Voice Actors"!

When I tell people I'm going to a roleplaying game, I say "D&D", regardless if it's actually D&D or another system. The term is becoming generic (which could be a risk for WotC...)

I think the reason it's so popular varies based on the diverse groups that it has brought in. The playtest did an excellent job in finding the aspects of the game that would appeal to the broadest number of players. Add in the fact that the base chassis of the game is intentionally easily modified with house rules, homebrew, and 3PP, really does make it the "D&D for all* players."

*not really all, but that was the design goal. You can't please everyone, and trying to do so will please no one.

New Players - mostly the abundance of social media. Podcasts have been a massive boon for not just D&D, but tabletop games in general. Another, slightly less important reason, is the geek culture has become more mainstream, giving the game less of a stigma for new players.

4E players - 5E managed to keep several good ideas from 4E, such as non-magical healing (full overnight healing, spending HD, Second Wind), that 5E was an acceptable change. I'm sure most die hard players would rather have continued 4E, but AFAIK there really isn't any other game as similar to 4E to jump to instead.

3E/Pathfinder players - this is a split group, because it depends on what the player liked about the game. 5E has mostly taken the core mechanics from 3E, which is a big plus for 3E players. It took out most the complicated mechanics, which some 3E player really liked. Those players probably stuck with Pathfinder, or will jump back with Pathfinder 2E.

Grognard - the game is more modern than AD&D and BECMI, but it has retained the style. The DM has far more leeway in making rules and running the game than the mechanic heavy 3E & 4E. The fact that feats and multi-classing are only optional rules, rather than baked in is a big plus.

Indeed! We can't underestimate the importance of the rise of streaming, but at the same time, it is *astounding* how broad the appeal of the game is. And some of the rules that some people may not like (like the fast healing) well... it's trivial to say "a long rest doesn't give you full health, only some hit dice" or some variant, and the game still works.

I think that in several decades from now, when people are complaining about the 9th edition, people will look back and remember this about 5e perhaps above all else.

 

[Jester David]

I think most of Zardnaar's thoughts are on the nose.
(But, as an aside, I think the reason Mearls hasn't said anything about 5e's sales vs 1e or BECMI has more to do with TSR's accounting in the early days and being hard pressed to figure out exactly how many books were sold.
But 5e has only been out for 4 years compared to 1e's 10 between the DMG and 2e being dropped. So it's probably inevitable.)

So, why else is 5e a hit:

1) Easy to play but not too simple. 5e is simple only in comparison to 3e/PF and 4e. It's a complex game, so new players still feel like they're playing a dense game.

2) Timing. The big editions were 1e/ 3e/ 5e because of the generational shift. A new group of fans was grown and ready to join the game, while people were split by 2e and 4e, with new players going to that edition or the prior one.

3) Slow release schedule. It's easy to know where to get into 5e opposed to 4e or even 3e. And the game doesn't seem as intimidating, with shelves and shelves of books. Let alone wondering if PHB2 and PHB3 are the revision of the core rules or not.

4) Streaming. This is the BIG one. Streaming shows not only entertain and let players engage in the hobby on days between games. But they also serve as a fantastic example of WHAT the game is, so you can learn without having to actually play with a friend. This is huge, as "what are tabletop RPGs??" is the big question that's a barrier to entry for many people.
Critical Role is huge in a way that defies explanation. So much so that the official D&D stream leaves that block open and mirrors the Geek & Sundry channel (which now has 3-4 other RPG shows). And the bigger it gets, the more friends share it, which just makes it bigger. Now there are billboards for that show in LA, to say nothing of the merch that is living advertisements for the show. And because they play D&D, everyone is directed right back to that game.
And there are so many more streaming shows & channels out there.

 

[robus]

For me the incredibly enthusiastic press about 5th edition when it was first coming out fired my curiosity. I hadn’t played since the 80s and after getting back into boardgames (to escape the ubiquitous digital world) getting immersed in D&D seemed like a natural extension of that cultural tipping point.

D&D is the perfect analog passtime for those of us burnt out on digital doodads. (And I’m a programmer by trade).

 

[Jester David]

The weird thing is, I think you almost need to break up the success of 5e into waves.

The initial success at launch came from a couple factors:

* First, it was a retro inspired game that married OSR with modern design. This allowed it to bring in a diverse audience of players.
* Second, 4e sucked. Which mean more people were playing 3e and PF for longer and really going through that edition. By the time 5e dropped, people were really ready for a change.
A supplemental point to the above was the playtest. Because people knew the game was coming for two years, they had ample time to finish up their games and maybe run that one last PF/4e campaign. There was less rush to finish things. That made saving for the books and deciding to upgrade easier.
* Third, the playtest got a lot of press. And then, so did the 40th anniversary of the game, followed by the launch of D&D that same year. D&D was in the news a lot, which might encourage people to check it out.

That lead to the initial spike that lasted through 2014 and 2015.
Normally after that, most games would slowly decline and drop.

After that is where the effect of streaming kicks in. Streaming and Twitch games really begins to drive sales in 2016, which makes WotC take note and launch Force Grey followed by the Stream of Annihilation.
And the audience that brings in, brings the game to new heights in 2017, and keeps it making money in 2018.

 

[Gavin O.]

Another thing that I think contributes to 5e's success is how comparatively easy it is to teach and how accessible it is to new players. I've taught a lot of people the basics of 5e, and after I've done so, they were able to play the edition and they got it. They understood it, and that's really important.

But the most important thing is that it's fun.

 

[Remathilis]

I think it begins with the fact that 5e, at its heart, is simple enough to grasp but deep enough to hold. Its not a perfect system, but its the most solid foundation D&D has had in a long time. Its modular enough to take some tinkering (such as changing rests or healing), can support different playstyles (from tactical/grid to TotM) and has some interesting options for characters without the need to micromanage every last skill point. It is easier to teach than D&D has been in decades, has enough of a social media following to have street cred, and has more exposure than the game had in the last 13 years. (There was a huge 3e-era blitz of stuff, from a CD soundtrack at Best Buy to posters found in K-Mart, but it fell off around 2005)

To me, it feels a lot like a greatest hits album. They picked the things people tended to like, tried to fix the things people didn't, and aimed for a simple set of rules that keeps things moving. My only wish is that they gave some love to their other settings (in the form of enough mechanical support to run Eberron, Dragonlance, or Dark Sun) .

 

[Tallifer]

No need for a Character Builder. I loved 4th Edition, but with the flood of interacting options it was almost impossible to build a character without a Builder or to play one without a stack of printed cards. Furthermore, as a Dungeon Master, I could only accept a character built using the Builder to be sure it was not illegal or full of mistakes (or cheating).