D&D 5E What Does the Game Need Now?

I'd like more starter adventures that goes from 1 to 5-ish; LMoP is awesomely fun to play and a useful tool and I think WotC could benefit from more adventure based on the same format.

One thing I would love is Playbooks to generate lvl 1 characters based on a theme with a few random tables that would give you your background, stats, class, bonds and starting gear based on your early life all in one packet (like in Beyond the Wall or Dungeon World).

We need the same thing we always need. More volumes of monsters & stand alone adventures (of low, medium, & high lv) that cover only a lv or two at the most.

Boxed sets!

vincegetorix said:

LMoP is awesomely fun to play

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WotC (and other authors) try so hard to come up with novel adventure concepts, but really most of us have a lot of fun exploring "dungeons" (including caves, castles, tombs, etc.) and fighting stuff. Sometimes...ok, often...when playing WotC APs I find myself thinking, "At last, a fight! Thank god we trial-and-errored our way through THAT opaque plot. Maybe some day I'll read the book so I can understand why NPC A wanted us to steal the McGuffin and what his relationship to NPC B was, because honestly I have no idea."

ccs said:

We need the same thing we always need. More volumes of monsters & stand alone adventures (of low, medium, & high lv) that cover only a lv or two at the most.

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Old-fashioned modules where the cover *is* the DM screen!

A guy can dream.

Elfcrusher said:

WotC (and other authors) try so hard to come up with novel adventure concepts, but really most of us have a lot of fun exploring "dungeons" (including caves, castles, tombs, etc.) and fighting stuff. Sometimes...ok, often...when playing WotC APs I find myself thinking, "At last, a fight! Thank god we trial-and-errored our way through THAT opaque plot. Maybe some day I'll read the book so I can understand why NPC A wanted us to steal the McGuffin and what his relationship to NPC B was, because honestly I have no idea."

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This. I, for one, think that WotC should think small. My favorite campaign book is PotA, its fun read and I love the thematic dungeons and the Zelda feel the elemental temples give me. But I know that if I run it with my group, I'll have to face the question: ''why should we care'' and ''If that guy is a big prophet with a world-ending plot, why havent we heard of him before we trashed him? What does he want?''.

vincegetorix said:

This. I, for one, think that WotC should think small. My favorite campaign book is PotA, its fun read and I love the thematic dungeons and the Zelda feel the elemental temples give me. But I know that if I run it with my group, I'll have to face the question: ''why should we care'' and ''If that guy is a big prophet with a world-ending plot, why havent we heard of him before we trashed him? What does he want?''.

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I skimmed Dungeon of the Mad Mage and as far as I can tell it's really 15 separate dungeons, each with it's own theme, with the occasional "the BBEG left this here..." as a lame attempt to tie everything together.

And, yes, why does just about *every* WotC AP have to be about preventing the end of the world?

Oh, right, I forgot: because in the Forgotten Realms the world almost ends every few months for some reason or another. There's a bazillion planes but somehow every evil entity in the multiverse wants to destroy THIS plane.

Bleh.

Hjorimir said:

Stalker0 said:

I would love a book that covers the very common and classic troupes that many many groups experience.

Example: Barbarian says "I want to break down the door!". Having a table of good DC for various door types....or for the crazy people who try to break down the wall around the door because the door is too well made.

Chases are a thing the DMG covers a bit, but there is more to do there.


Interrogating a prisoner
Escaping from Jail
Dealing with the surprise of meeting the enemy in a forest
etc

So many common moments that most Dnd players go through. It would be great to have a toolbox book that has specific rules or suggestions tailored for each scenario.

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Oh, please no! I get what you're driving at, but one of the fundamental things I love about 5e is rulings over rules. This would create a situation where players would argue with DMs on DCs for skill checks and such. Even if I didn't buy it myself, it if was published it enters the conversation. No thanks for me!

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Yeah, I'm of two minds about this. I think there could be value in something like what [MENTION=5889]Stalker0[/MENTION] suggests, but how it's presented would be hugely important. I agree with [MENTION=5745]Hjorimir[/MENTION] that we don't want something presented as (or that could be construed as) a bunch of new rules. One reason is certainly the conflict with players who might then expect hard and fast rules in situations previously handled with rulings, but another is the effect on DMs themselves. Having started out as a DM who looked for or tried to create a rule for everything, IMX that just gets in the way of developing and honing (one aspect of) the improvisational skills that (again IMX) make the game a lot more fun (for everybody) than having a restricted set of situations that you have rules for and then feeling lost at sea with everything else.

So, having said what it shouldn't be, how could it be done appropriately? I'm not certain how it would turn out, but perhaps the first thing I would try would be to frame it as a series of discussions of rulings examples. That is, for each generic situation to be addressed, create several specific instances to demonstrate how the particulars can be taken into account (or not) to reflect differences from a generic baseline. To emphasize the exemplary nature of the discussion, one could even include alternative, conflicting takes on how to adjudicate a particular instance.

Admittedly, this would less like a tool than, for instance, a pat table of stats for various door types, but I think it would ultimately guide DMs in a better direction than trying to stat every piece of the environment in their notes or scrambling to find the right stat table during play.

I think I'm rowing in a different boat from most folks on ENWorld. There are already more monsters and character options than I'll likely ever use. There are more adventure paths than I have time to get through and lots of great third-party adventures. I have enough material that I can play for years without buying another 5e product.

What I would REALLY love to get and what would make me buy new adventures is if they would release a boxed set of battlemaps and an minis that would have everything I need to run all major encounters in an adventure at the table. These could easily be repurposed by homebrewers and may even be of interest as general toys.

Especially welcome would be shorter adventures or one-off adventures. Have a boxed set with 6-12 hour adventure, all the battlemaps and all the minis (or even just round cardboard tokens with nice art).

The other thing that would get me to open my wallet would be a good D&D video game that can be played on a console.

MNblockhead said:

I think I'm rowing in a different boat from most folks on ENWorld. There are already more monsters and character options than I'll likely ever use. There are more adventure paths than I have time to get through and lots of great third-party adventures. I have enough material that I can play for years without buying another 5e product.

What I would REALLY love to get and what would make me buy new adventures is if they would release a boxed set of battlemaps and an minis that would have everything I need to run all major encounters in an adventure at the table. These could easily be repurposed by homebrewers and may even be of interest as general toys.

Especially welcome would be shorter adventures or one-off adventures. Have a boxed set with 6-12 hour adventure, all the battlemaps and all the minis (or even just round cardboard tokens with nice art).

The other thing that would get me to open my wallet would be a good D&D video game that can be played on a console.

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I would also pay for 1" = 5' full color battlemaps that go with adventures. I can tape paper over areas and reveal as needed.

I'd rather not pay for the minis, though...