D&D 5E Going from 1st to 5th Edition

[Blue Orange]

So after playing OD&D followed by 1st ed computer games (Pool of Radiance...the original...up through Dark Queen of Krynn), followed by Mage: the Ascension and a little Call of Cthulhu, I played no RPGs with real people for about 25 years.

Then I had the chance to join a 5th Edition game. While I had followed along with many of the changes in D&D by reading the books over the years, I was quite surprised nonetheless at many things.

A spectre showed up, and I pooped my pants. I immediately started running away. Imagine my surprise when it hit another party member, and...their max hitpoints went down, temporarily.

I thought, wow. "You used to lose two levels of experience, permanently!"

I also found a lot of the spells I remembered had been nerfed. "Wait, Fire Shield does 2d6 damage to the person attacking you? It used to do double the attacker's damage! Hold Person requires concentration to maintain, and only affects one target? Haste only gives you one extra attack?"

I'm curious to hear what other funny stories of edition 'jumps' people have to relate.

 

[DnD Warlord]

Okay not as big... but I played from 2e through 5 e including platters periods... so a lot of changes where gradual. I had a player who had played 3e then went to pathfinder come back for 5e, and was pissed...

he thought and said “why does shield suck now” and me and my other players could not understand why... but he was used to mage armor/shield/protection from x. All stacking and staying up... the idea the Sheild only last 1 round pissed him off

 

[commandercrud]

I'm continually amazed how invincible PCs are nowadays. And how not scary at all undead are anymore.

 

[DnD Warlord]

Wait one more...

we carried over blooded from 4e (a condition when you are at half ho or less) and it confused him every time

 

[DnD Warlord]

I'm continually amazed how invincible PCs are nowadays. And how not scary at all undead are anymore.

I used to be a killer dm so trust me I get it

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

My biggest shock was that DMs wanted to play adventure paths in pre-made worlds instead of making their own.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I played 1e from 1981 up to 2012 when the 5e playtest came out as my primary edition, so I feel ya. I literally went from 1e to 5e with no break in gaming.

But not terribly surprised. DnD had made the move to less lethal mechanics for decades. That doesn't make the changes wrong, and most people seem to prefer it that way. But I can see how it's a big change for some folks.

In early DnD, you were not meant to fight all the enemies. You got XP for treasure. WoTC DnD has an inference that enemies are to be defeated rather than avoided. So if you want XP, you can't just run away. You have to defeat or otherwise get past the monster.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

My biggest shock was that DMs wanted to play adventure paths in pre-made worlds instead of making their own.

That aint a 5e thing though, pre-made worlds have been around since the 70s.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

That aint a 5e thing though, pre-made worlds have been around since the 70s.

But people I knew didn't use them. Instead, we laughed at them. We saw them as something to ridicule, not to utilize.

 

[commandercrud]

But people I knew didn't use them. Instead, we laughed at them. We saw them as something to ridicule, not to utilize.

Most 5e DMs I see just run by the book word for word with little to no improvisation, and get all worked up if you stray from the one allowed path.