D&D 5E Is 5e really that different?


log in or register to remove this ad



It seems that the WOTC 5e fanboys took over this thread. WOTC is not pro league, its noob friendly entry to roleplaying games.
Mod Note:

It is entirely possible to dislike something without denigrating those who enjoy it. You should REALLY keep that in mind if you wish to continue posting on ENWORLD.
 


Beta max vs VHS, Zune vs iPad. Happens all the time. Also doesn't mean that the 'winning product isn't a great product. Or perhaps the right product for the majority.
Good analogy(ies) here. Is 5ed really yhe holy grail of TTRPG? For the moment, it appears that it is. The hobby has never been so popular. Heck, even some of those who were laughing about our hobby when I was young are now trying to play. You can't imagine how many people of 50+ are now trying to get to play with me or some of the DMs I have coached over the years.

There are a few good French podcast on YouTube that are trying to emulate CR and for those that do not speak English, they are inspirational and bring/attract more people into the hobby.

And for me, this is a good thing. I do not really care if 5ed is the VHS of TTRPGs, it gets the job done. It is all I need.
 

5e is pretty good. There are a few things:

*You have to be selective not just with 3pp stuff but also with official splats and adventures.

*There is a potential nova problem when PCs can easily rest and recover.

*I don't know about EZ mode, but low level characters remain pretty death prone.

*You sometimes see cheezy builds or build advice, which often depends on a certain interpretation of the rules or non-core material.

*Some options are probably a little better then others, though in practice many kinds of characters are viable.

*Beyond 10th level things can get a little whacky.


So, in conclusion, its not really different at all. It shows a huge amount of continuity with older editions.
 

The last new version I learned to run was 4e. I wasn't bad, thought I still prefer earlier editions. Why does 5e make so many people upset?
For me? After running 3.x for it's 8 year run I felt like all the power was taken out of the DM's hand and I had little say in my own game. Not like I needed permission but the system was designed in such a way that making a modification could have wide reaching implications through the whole game as evidenced in the change over from 3e to 3.5 where backwards compatibility looked fine on paper, like the changes weren't that big a deal but the final analysis showed that they were far reaching enough that conversion documents for things like Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil or even the FRCS were long documents, rivalling the original in length (ToEE) or requiring WOTC to publish a conversion book, The Player's Guide to Faerun, to update the materials in the FRCS and other 3e sourcebooks. So a mild tweak here could bring down the house of cards which meant I had little power to change things I didn't like. You can see this in 4e where the math breaks down and certain feats are required for a character to not fall behind the curve of power for example.

I didn't realize 5e upset people though because it's the best selling edition, it's massively popular and widely played by people who, even 5 years ago, wouldn't play and people who 10 years ago wouldn't be seen near it and 20 years ago would have made fun of you for playing it. 5e is incredibly tweakable without breaking the system, it can go high powered and low powered without shredding like a semi tire on the highway. it can do grim and gritty or superheroic fantasy ala Elminster. It handles straight heroic fantasy well. While I don't like the experience system that it defaults, it's too fast, with milestone I can level how I want (and use that for my Starfinder game as well).

I think what "upsets people" is a vocal minority of people who remember the D20 boom or think that D&D can't handle certain genres and this is true to an extent. I certainly wouldn't use it for Superheroes like Superman but most other types of genres it's great. Middle Earth low powered high fantasy? It's there. Batman? Sure thing. Science Fantasy? Yup. Hard sci fi? Definitely capable. It could do Warhammer FRP in a heart beat, 40k too.
 

This always amuses me. There are so many dials to turn, 5E is just like every other edition, as hard or easy as the DM wants.

Sure, 5E starter adventures are less deadly than OD&D, but to me, that's more because "they" are trying to train people to be better DMs than how I was taught by the OD&D modules.
People who say that are not saying that the DM cannot dial things in 5e up to the point where they challenge hard core players. They are saying that the default setting of 5e dials is pretty darn easy, and I agree.
 

This always amuses me. There are so many dials to turn, 5E is just like every other edition, as hard or easy as the DM wants.

Sure, 5E starter adventures are less deadly than OD&D, but to me, that's more because "they" are trying to train people to be better DMs than how I was taught by the OD&D modules.
I don't think people trained on OD&D and older editions are bad DMs or they were trained wrong on how to DM. It was a different game and part of the challenge was surviving. You weren't a hero, you were an adventurer and there was a death toll. Some of the modules noted for their antagonism were designed for tournament play where it was about who could live the longest and win the most treasure by the end of the tournament so "smart play" with a different emphasis from telling a heroic story. D&D evolved and it's a different style now and yeah "save or die" in modern D&D is a suck outcome, but in the older editions, particularly 0e and 1e, it was a part of the game, survival and tactics and running was a valid tactic.
 

Remove ads

Top