Mearls On D&D's Design Premises/Goals

billd91 said:

You may not know me personally, but I’m raising my hand about liking wargames and 5e. Sure, I’m not approaching it as a wargame, but then again, I never have. The most board gamey version we ever played was 4e because it necessitated that degree of focus on the board, but we still didn’t approach it as a wargame or board game.

And the number of players who also play board games who also play 5e? Around my neck of the woods, it’s a lot.

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Of course I never said everybody. I am an example of a person who likes heavy strategy board games and 5e (I'm not into wargames but close enough).

I'm betting the majority of hobby gamers do. They just don't make up a majority of the 5e player base. There are reasons for that.

The point of the anecdote is that some people do exist who like 5e and don't like strategy board games (or wargames).

I've seen this idea stated before on message boards. In fact there was a 500 reply thread on one where everyone argued whether D&D was an RPG or just a tactical combat game. Most of those people are from the 3e/4e era.

5e makes for a lousy strategy game. There are much better alternatives out there if that is all you get from it.


(and one interesting thing I've noticed - Players new to RPGs entirely tend to have an easy time picking up and DMing/playing 5e while people from 3e/4e sometimes have a hard time understanding the rules)

pemerton said:

That exciting outcome can come about in games that don't use measurements in the way that 5e does.

Which was my point.

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How, though?

Saving throws or equivalent can have a say, I suppose - if you're near the edge it could be a three-outcome save where you take full damage, half damage or no damage based on how well you roll (I've done this before in some too-close-to-call situations).

Or you could go 3e-4e style and have it go square by square but there's no miss-by-a-foot there; you're either in a square or you are not and the fire either hits a square or it does not - very cut and dried but at great expense to <realism, immersion, believability - pick as many as you like>.

Or it could be straight-up GM fiat, but down that path lie arguments galore.

I'm not sure that this is always super-exciting. It seems like it might be a little pedantic.

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This is one where I'll willingly trade excitement for realism - trying to break bones with arrows is less effective than trying to break them with a heavy blunt instrument.

Lanefan said:

How, though?

Saving throws or equivalent can have a say, I suppose - if you're near the edge it could be a three-outcome save where you take full damage, half damage or no damage based on how well you roll (I've done this before in some too-close-to-call situations).

Or you could go 3e-4e style and have it go square by square but there's no miss-by-a-foot there; you're either in a square or you are not and the fire either hits a square or it does not - very cut and dried but at great expense to <realism, immersion, believability - pick as many as you like>.

Or it could be straight-up GM fiat, but down that path lie arguments galore.

This is one where I'll willingly trade excitement for realism - trying to break bones with arrows is less effective than trying to break them with a heavy blunt instrument.

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I believe he's thinking about games that describe an opponent as engaged, close, far or the like without being more specific than that.

A burst effect that was described in 5e as a 15' radius around the caster would affect everyone who was engaged or close.



That sort of thing.

pemerton said:

If the goal was simply to act in the round, why would a check even be required? What is at stake?

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At the metagame (or meatgame) level, the initiative roll informs both the DM and the players at the table which character(s) will be dealt with in which order, so as to keep things simple and not have everybody shouting at once.

AFAIC this represents about 90% of its usefulness and relevance. In-game, other than relatively few instances where it really does make a difference what happens first (do you get paralyzed before or after you finish casting your spell?) it's all just fog of war where you're just trying to do what you have to do to survive and prevail.

Satyrn said:

I believe he's thinking about games that describe an opponent as engaged, close, far or the like without being more specific than that.

A burst effect that was described in 5e as a 15' radius around the caster would affect everyone who was engaged or close.

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OK, engaged is obvious but where does 'close' end and 'far' begin?

Put another way, if there's a crowd trying to get close to someone - say, some D&D-world rock star walking through a city square full of hysterical fans - and I drop a well-aimed fireball on him, how many of the crowd do I hit? They're all as close to him as they can get even though some may be at the edge of the crowd 50 feet or more away, thus not passing any definition of 'close'...where does the fireball end?

Lanefan said:

OK, engaged is obvious but where does 'close' end and 'far' begin?

Put another way, if there's a crowd trying to get close to someone - say, some D&D-world rock star walking through a city square full of hysterical fans - and I drop a well-aimed fireball on him, how many of the crowd do I hit? They're all as close to him as they can get even though some may be at the edge of the crowd 50 feet or more away, thus not passing any definition of 'close'...where does the fireball end?

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I don't really know how it works in practice, since I've never played much beyond D&D.

ad_hoc said:

Of course I never said everybody. I am an example of a person who likes heavy strategy board games and 5e (I'm not into wargames but close enough).

I'm betting the majority of hobby gamers do. They just don't make up a majority of the 5e player base. There are reasons for that.

The point of the anecdote is that some people do exist who like 5e and don't like strategy board games (or wargames).

I've seen this idea stated before on message boards. In fact there was a 500 reply thread on one where everyone argued whether D&D was an RPG or just a tactical combat game. Most of those people are from the 3e/4e era.

5e makes for a lousy strategy game. There are much better alternatives out there if that is all you get from it.


(and one interesting thing I've noticed - Players new to RPGs entirely tend to have an easy time picking up and DMing/playing 5e while people from 3e/4e sometimes have a hard time understanding the rules)

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It is worth noting that WotC has a board game version of 4E D&D rules actually meant for wargame shennanigans. They've had the same rules since 2010, published 5 games, all of which can still be found in stores, and they have indicated they have zero plans to make a 5E-ish update to them.

So, not to be edition warrior about it at all, but...4E rules have been very successful in a board game format, and I doubt 5E would be.

Parmandur said:

It is worth noting that WotC has a board game version of 4E D&D rules actually meant for wargame shennanigans. They've had the same rules since 2010, published 5 games, all of which can still be found in stores, and they have indicated they have zero plans to make a 5E-ish update to them.

So, not to be edition warrior about it at all, but...4E rules have been very successful in a board game format, and I doubt 5E would be.

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Oh sure. And 3e had a grid as default along with lots of rules that were gamey.

5e has theatre of the mind as default.

The story first vs mechanics first is what is valued in the game.

Is the game Heroquest? Or is it narrative driven?

I think people see in 5e what they are used to in other editions (or perhaps what they want out of the game). There are people who say the only rules in the game are about combat tactics. And there are people who say the 'fluff' doesn't matter and is easily mutable in order to achieve some sort of mechanical option. They dismiss the narrative elements and then say the game doesn't have any.

Then we end up with a lot of threads on confusion over skills. The skills system was designed to be narrative. They only matter if they matter cinematically. I've noticed that some people are unable to understand this because of how they have framed the game.

5e is designed to play out like an action movie rather than a board game.

Another example is how rests work. I've seen the same people who say D&D isn't an RPG and just a tactical combat game also take a long rest after every encounter. Then say the game is broken. An action movie would be incredibly dull if the protagonists weren't under any sort of pressure and just took challenges in their own time on their own terms.

Competitive games are all about finding whatever advantages you can, including 'rules abuse'. Some people try to parse the rules language in 5e to silly results in order to gain an advantage. Whenever that comes up I point them to the candle in the equipment section. Nowhere in the rules does it say it must be lit in order to provide light.

Then when Mearls comes out and says, no really that is what the game is about, they decry that he is a terrible designer because he doesn't know what he is talking about.

pemerton said:

CapnZapp, have you ever tried HARP (High Adventure RP - a type of Rolemaster-lite)? It's not D&D (obviously) but it might satisfy some of your desiderata. (Because not D&D, not so good for pick-up games - I'm not sure what your situation is in that respect.)

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HARP is actually really good. That said, any time someone comes to me and asks me to run 1e, I respond with Rolemaster these days.

KB

Hriston said:

So the higher degree of success the higher your placement in the order, yes? That sure sounds like you have a goal of high placement to me. If the goal, as you say, is only to have the potential to act, then a roll wouldn't be required. Everyone in the combat has the potential to act, so there is no uncertainty about the outcome of that goal and no need for an ability check to resolve it.

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It's a special case. You can't just allow everyone to go whenever as that breaks combat and makes combat unplayable, so an ability check is necessary. Specific beats general.

I'll have to take your word that this is your experience. As for myself, I haven't been in too many physical altercations in my life. I have heard that in a life and death fight the best way to survive is to immobilize your opponent's ability to harm you as quickly as possible before they have the opportunity to do so, and that's what makes sense to me.

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I have. I was a loner in junior high and high school, but I fought back against bullies so I got into multiple fights a year. Had I been in school in the modern era, I'd probably have been arrested and expelled due to stupid changes in how they treat kids. I've been in enough fights to know that you are just trying to win the fight, not see if you can go first in the round.

The results of the two rolls are compared with one another to see who goes first. That sounds like direct opposition to me.

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That's wrong, though. An arm wrestling match is direct opposition. A Jeopardy question is direct opposition. Only one can get it right. Rolling initiative to see when in the round you can act isn't in direct opposition to anyone. You are not trying to stop them acting with the initiative roll.

If there's no uncertainty as to success then there should be no ability check. I think you should ask yourself why the DM is calling for an ability check when the outcome of the attempted action you've described (i.e. having a turn) is not in doubt.

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Specific beats general. Combat requires a mechanic to see in what order those who are automatically successful at being able to take an action can take that action.