D&D 5E Reality Check: What 5E Will NOT Be

[Stormonu]

Dammit, I want an Elmore cover >pouts<

Seriously, I think it would be fun if pictures from all the various versions were to be interspersed through the books, or at least homages to some of the old art ( such as "A Paladin in Hell", Emirikol the Chaotic and the adventurer trapped in the water-filling room with a skeleton...)

 

[Jeffrey]

Sheesh. That's enough for me.

5E WILL NOT: make you happy. Nor you. Nor you, over there hiding in the corner, clutching your pre-painted plastic rare-to-very-rare Dragonborn miniature. Nope, not going to happen. Sorry.

5E WILL NOT: wash your car, cook your dinner, rub your feet or be your girlfriend/boyfriend, no matter how much you beg.

5E WILL NOT: cause any other game or subset of games to wilt and completely vanish from the hobby.

5E WILL NOT: prevent bombastic, self-important postings about what 5E is and is not from people who know nothing more than anyone else, unless they are actively breaking the NDA.

5E WILL NOT: commit any real-world atrocities, steal anyone's money, carve any years from your life expectancy, cluster-bomb any kittens or puppies or cause you any amount of harm in the least.

Not. In. The. Least.

Time for a deep breath, people. As soon as I hit enter I am taking mine, probably a good long one lasting for a few months at least. There are too many important things going on in life to spend time worrying and kvetching over a silly game.

When I read things like the OP, I honestly sometimes wonder if we, as gamers, earn the reputation and deserve the cliches that are so often used to portray us.

See ya later in the spring.

 

[nedjer]

Sheesh. That's enough for me.

5E WILL NOT: make you happy. Nor you. Nor you, over there hiding in the corner, clutching your pre-painted plastic rare-to-very-rare Dragonborn miniature. Nope, not going to happen. Sorry.

5E WILL NOT: wash your car, cook your dinner, rub your feet or be your girlfriend/boyfriend, no matter how much you beg.

5E WILL NOT: cause any other game or subset of games to wilt and completely vanish from the hobby.

5E WILL NOT: prevent bombastic, self-important postings about what 5E is and is not from people who know nothing more than anyone else, unless they are actively breaking the NDA.

5E WILL NOT: commit any real-world atrocities, steal anyone's money, carve any years from your life expectancy, cluster-bomb any kittens or puppies or cause you any amount of harm in the least.

Not. In. The. Least.

Time for a deep breath, people. As soon as I hit enter I am taking mine, probably a good long one lasting for a few months at least. There are too many important things going on in life to spend time worrying and kvetching over a silly game.

When I read things like the OP, I honestly sometimes wonder if we, as gamers, earn the reputation and deserve the cliches that are so often used to portray us.

See ya later in the spring.

In the OP's case you're maybe getting bombastic mixed-up with enthusiastic. Personally, I believe 5e could:

Make players happy by being fun to play
Save lots of time preparing scenarios - leaving more time for foot-rubs (big win)
Grow the hobby as whole and invite kids back in
Use tried and tested ways to make the game more accessible (we don't seem to be a million miles away from a Traveler-like core)
. . .

I see a certain irony in relating self-importance to firm preferences for player choice, optional rules, playing as a team, non-adversarial GMing and . . . but must admit that I'm sitting here in an Admiral's uniform - and my Fbook language is permanently set to Pirate

 

[Mark CMG]

Here's the tricky part -

(. . .) all at the same table.

 

[grimslade]

Here's the tricky part - All at the Same Table

And just what kind of table, hmm? Can I play at a card table? A sideboard? A buffet? A Chippendale English tea table? Inquiring minds need to know.

 

[Mercurius]

When I read things like the OP, I honestly sometimes wonder if we, as gamers, earn the reputation and deserve the cliches that are so often used to portray us.

Huh? Bad day, maybe?

As nedjer pointed out, you're reading waaaaayyy too much "bombasticism" in my original post, in what sounds likes an unholy combination of making a straw man and projection. I'm excited about 5E as a game, no more or less. This is not to say that some gamers don't put an inordinately large amount of their self worth and happiness on RPGs, but I ain't that kitten.

Here's the tricky part - (...all at the same table)

No doubt. But this is less of a problem if we're flexible about what "in the style of" means. Rather than repeat myself, I wrote about that here.

 

[Mircoles]

Erol Otus is still alive. They may rehire him...ya never know.

 

[Mark CMG]

And just what kind of table, hmm? Can I play at a card table? A sideboard? A buffet? A Chippendale English tea table? Inquiring minds need to know.

Or maybe a To Hit table?

No doubt. But this is less of a problem if we're flexible about what "in the style of" means. Rather than repeat myself, I wrote about that here.

I think one of the problems that will surface is that in this day and age there are many great rulesets geared toward giving a particular play experience without the need to settle for something that only meets expectations to a limited degree. The idea of compromise sounds good on paper but if there are, let's just say, five million RPGers and five playstyles with one million that enjoy each playstyle, and dozens of RPGs written to accomodate each playstyle very well, there's going to have to be some rather strong incentives to entice enough folks to lower their bar for 5E to be a success by WotC standards. Certainly, I can imagine there are some groups with all five playstyles represented and no local means to each gather a group for their own style, but will that be enough? Time will tell.

 

[Mercurius]

I think one of the problems that will surface is that in this day and age there are many great rulesets geared toward giving a particular play experience without the need to settle for something that only meets expectations to a limited degree. The idea of compromise sounds good on paper but if there are, let's just say, five million RPGers and five playstyles with one million that enjoy each playstyle, and dozens of RPGs written to accomodate each playstyle very well, there's going to have to be some rather strong incentives to entice enough folks to lower their bar for 5E to be a success by WotC standards. Certainly, I can imagine there are some groups with all five playstyles represented and no local means to each gather a group for their own style, but will that be enough? Time will tell.

This is only only a problem if WotC is trying to please EVERYONE - which is simply not possible. I don't think they are. I think they're trying to please as many as reasonably possible while really pleasing those that they do please.

To put it another way, they are (and should be) less than happy with the "satisfaction rate" of D&D players with 4E. I have no numbers to back to this up, but I would guess that the percentage of active D&D players that are playing the official/current version of the game is at an all-time low, and that it isn't even close. A good chunk of this has to do with the greater number of options--retro-clones and Pathfinder, in particular--but a lot of it has to do with how specific 4E is stylistically.

What WotC is (or should be) trying to do is broaden that satisfaction rate considerably, at least back to early 3E levels. Now the real hard part is finding a way that they can do this but not further fracture the community by, for example, destroying the OSR market or taking a huge bite out of Paizo. The trick would be to find a way to make people want to buy 5E not instead of Pathfinder, but as well as Pathfinder.

Taking myself as an example, I would love to play 5E as my core game and not only pick from whatever official modules they offer, but take things from other iterations of the game, from Pathfinder to 4E to 3.5 to AD&D, BECMI, etc. This is why I think they're trying to create a simple and robust enough core to be compatible--if only loosely--with everything else, not because they're trying to make the perfect game for everyone. That won't work. What can work is creating a game that can form the basis for a wide variety of play styles and be a toolbox for all D&D players, even those that don't use 5E as their base. A tall order, but one that is possible.

 

[Mark CMG]

This is only only a problem if WotC is trying to please EVERYONE

Well, that's not true. Obviously, they are trying to draw the largest number of fans they can manage to draw and they have set up some target numbers for goals. They probably have some minimum number they have to reach by a certain point in the edition cycle before scaling back or pulling the plug. They review these goals each quarter to determine if they are on target.

Forget about satisfaction rates. The real question is not if they can beat 4E numbers of core book sales (they have to do this) but whether they can hit the numbers they had hoped they would hit with 4E. They also better have their DDI counterpart in place and ready to go with the launch of the books or they'll have the same problems they had as before. Forget about the original pitch goals that RyanD told us about so long ago. I'd imagine they be happy drawing 250K to DDI and consider that a successful start, but only a start.