D&D 5E Wanting more content doesn't always equate to wanting tons of splat options so please stop.

[MichaelSomething]

Isn't homebrewing easier in 5E fairly easy anyway? The number formulas are more transparent and you don't have to worry about spell cheese.

 

[Maxperson]

How or why can't it?

Because WotC playtests their stuff and has professionals create it. While there is some imbalance, to equate it to the massively imbalanced crap third parties put out is incorrect. WotC stuff is usually good and much more balanced overall.

 

[Maxperson]

How do you ever buy anything? I mean, there is no way to ever be certain you will like a book, unless you first have access to it through a friend or something like that.

You are engaging in a False Equivalence. WotC products =/= third party products. I look through WotC products before buying, but I don't need to study them in anywhere near the same level of detail, because I know that they will better balanced.

 

[pkt77242]

Because WotC playtests their stuff and has professionals create it. While there is some imbalance, to equate it to the massively imbalanced crap third parties put out is incorrect. WotC stuff is usually good and much more balanced overall.

What? This post tells me that you know nothing about the big 3rd Party publishers. Holy Crap.

You do realize that many of the the large 3rd party publishers do play test their stuff right (in fact a member of my group is a play tester for one of them)? Also you do realize that many of them worked for WoTC previously (or Paizo) and some of them have collaborated with WoTC on 5th edition right (Kobold Press, Green Ronin, and Sasquatch games leap to mind).

You are allowed to have your own opinions but you aren't allowed to have your own facts. Yes there are some 3PP that put out crap but there are many that do very high quality material. 10 minutes of googling would tell you which ones to trust and which ones to avoid.

Now if you are talking about the DMs guild I might understand but the large 3PP are a completely different beast.

 

[pkt77242]

You are engaging in a False Equivalence. WotC products =/= third party products. I look through WotC products before buying, but I don't need to study them in anywhere near the same level of detail, because I know that they will better balanced.

While I would agree with the core 3, once you move beyond that they aren't near as rigorously play-tested. You don't know that they are better balanced, you assume it, and I hopefully you know the consequences of assuming?

 

[pemerton]

Are you labeling my character concept as "an overpowered monstrosity"?

Yes. Whereas my feeling is that [MENTION=6689464]MoonSong[/MENTION]'s may, if anything, be underpowered - sacrificing power for quirks in the context of an RPG that doesn't really reward quirks that much. (Though 5e's Inspiration mechanic goes at least some way in this direction.)

I would like (non-krynn) minotaurs in D&D to go back to being cursed humanoid driven mad, rather than a naturally occurring species of Baphomet (or whoever it is) worshipping creatures. That's highly specific, and I'm not going to get it.

But you can get it, trivially, just by declaring it to be so in your game. It doesn't require the sort of mechanical variation that [MENTION=6689464]MoonSong[/MENTION]'s preferred character involves.

the first thing that came to my mind after reading that was, "And this person is choosing to get all hung up on the mechanical minutia of the system?" Anyone who thinks and talks like that *should* be able to make 5e do what they want, not the other way around.

For reasons that are maybe a bit obscure (perhaps they have their roots in wargaming culture?), but nevertheless are real, D&D is a system that makes mechanical minutiae matter.

The difference between a 16 and 18 stat is clearly meant to matter, because the game has an important PC building mechanic (ASI/feat gain) that only makes sense if that difference matters.

The difference between rolling a d4, d6 or d8 for damaeg is clearly meant to matter, because the game has rules for weapon proficiencies, and for equipping characters with weapons, that only make sense if that difference matters.

It's not a free-descriptor system. (4e comes closest to that, out of D&D editions, but certainly doesn't get there.)

Looking at [MENTION=6689464]MoonSong[/MENTION]'s desired character, I can see how easy it would be to build in (just to choose a system) Marvel Heroic RP (being pushed on a Floating Disc by Unseen Servants is just Flight d6 with a Limit of being vulnerable to the dispelling of magic); but likewise how hard it is to get in D&D without some fairly major tweaking/rewriting - the spells have to be on an appropriate list (and there are rules for that) and known (and there are rules for that) and cast (and there are rules for that too). Then there are non-abstract rules for positioning, movement and spell durations (quite unlike MHRP), all of which not only factor into the casting rules, but also factor into the action resolution of situations in which the Disc-riding Servitor-pushed character finds herself.

I'm sure 5e can handle all this, but I don't think it's obvious and straightforward how that it to be done. (Certainly not as obvious and straightforward as Flight d6 + Limit.)

 

[pemerton]

Can't the same thing be said about a WoTC product?

No.

Yes.

And thus the matter is resolved.

 

[BMaC]

DMsGuild is variable in quality, but the work of the major 3rd party publisher is great, arguably superior to WotC in many cases.

 

[delericho]

DMsGuild is variable in quality, but the work of the major 3rd party publisher is great, arguably superior to WotC in many cases.

Yep, the best of the 3pp is as good, or sometimes better, than WotC's stuff. And while there's a lot of dross out there, it's not that hard to find at least some of the gems.

That said, there are two things WotC can offer that nobody else can:

- Access to the huge catalog of the D&D IP, especially for settings not yet open on DM'sG. At present, nobody else can touch Eberron or Dark Sun, for instance.

- The use of the material in AL games.

 

[Morrus]

Because WotC playtests their stuff and has professionals create it. While there is some imbalance, to equate it to the massively imbalanced crap third parties put out is incorrect. WotC stuff is usually good and much more balanced overall.

Holy crap. Did you just say that the staff of award-winning companies like Green Ronin, Frog God, Kobold Press, and Sasquatch aren't professional game designers?

Did you know that these companies include people who have been writing professionally for D&D for longer than WotC has even existed? That they are the very definition of professionals?