D&D 5E Is D&D 90% Combat?

In response to Cubicle 7’s announcement that their next Doctor Who role playing game would be powered by D&D 5E, there was a vehement (and in some places toxic) backlash on social media. While that backlash has several dimensions, one element of it is a claim that D&D is mainly about combat.

Head of D&D Ray Winninger disagreed (with snark!), tweeting "Woke up this morning to Twitter assuring me that [D&D] is "ninety percent combat." I must be playing (and designing) it wrong." WotC's Dan Dillon also said "So guess we're gonna recall all those Wild Beyond the Witchlight books and rework them into combat slogs, yeah? Since we did it wrong."

So, is D&D 90% combat?



And in other news, attacking C7 designers for making games is not OK.

D&D 5E - Doctors & Daleks - Cubicle 7 Brings Doctor Who to D&D 5E

Cubicle 7 -- makers of the official Doctor Who roleplaying game -- has announced that the Doctor will officially be coming to 5E soon under the name Doctors and Daleks. There are no dates or details yet, over than that the Doctors and Daleks Player's Guide will launch 'soon'. A NEW COMPANION...

www.enworld.org

 

[doctorbadwolf]

It baffles me why there is such resistance to adding a social mechanics module to D&D for those of us who would use it and those that want to keep the sort of standard D&D methods could keep doing that.

I haven’t seen a single word of resistance to adding optional modules. I’d love some optional modules for different kinds of interaction scenarios and tasks. The way 5e works, those would simply be more tools to use in different situations when appropriate.

This is precisely why “lack” of [detailed and tightly defined] rules can in fact be described as a strength of a system. It is a strength that D&D doesn't do literally anything at all to model the debilitation of getting set on fire. Because that leads to death spirals, and D&D is heroic fiction, which just doesn’t fit that.

It’s also a strength that 5e deals with combat and interaction using a different model of resolution, and that interaction has different ways to do different scenes as appropriate, without prescribing “negotiations uses this model, and battles of wits use this one” etc. it’s also a strength that combat is more specified and objective, and a weakness that exploration is...designed how it is. Tbh it’s the weakest of the three pillars.

If one pillar is a series of very formalized checks, and one pillar is vague, handwavey and mostly freeform, it's not unreasonable to say that the game is about the first pillar and not the second.

Having a different model does not mean that one is more important. The above doesn’t follow. It is unreasonable to conclude that based solely on the above.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

No. Don’t tell me what my preference is. I like D&D’s system just fine for D&D.

I don’t care what your preference is. You are presenting your opinions as if they were “obviously true”, and they are not. You have literally suggested that people who disagree with you aren’t familiar with the game.

The mechanics are minimal. That aspect of the game is minimal.

You gotta realize that “minimal” has completely different connotations than “limp and barely existent”. This reply of yours to a challenge to that connotation is ridiculous.

And no, it isn’t minimal, but neither cogent arguments nor a sea of people on every platform where D&D is discussed will get you to even consider another way of looking at the game, apparently.

How do you disagree? How are the social mechanics as robust as the combat mechanics?

Your entire premise, the whole framework, is built on foundations that I completely disagree with. “Detailed and highly specified” =\= “robust”, for a start. The two sections of the game are about equal, they’re just built differently, specifically so that the experience of running and playing them is different in ways that players generally find satisfying.

It seems to me that the best way that the social mechanics of D&D enable play is by being virtually non-existent. They get out of the way. Which, without rules or some sort of procedure, I’m not sure what you can point to as being a strength since any game can ignore rules and procedures to simply allow freeform roleplay and GM decides resolution.

Ignoring extant rules is very, very, clearly not the same thing playing a game that intentionally frames a section of the game as a framework with a selection of mechanical tools to frame and resolve different kinds of scenes.

Besides which…5e interaction literally is not freeform. “Virtually non-existent” is such egregiously incredible hyperbole I’m beginning to think that we should stop this discussion.

So I don’t really see that as a strength of the system.

I’m aware of that.

What are those potential complications? In combat, the mechanics tell you.

Yes, because it benefits combat to be more objective, and combat isn’t especially fun without crunch for a lot of people. In a scene like the guard situation, the mechanics shouldn’t tell you, the narrative should.

Or, at the absolute least, the above preference is no less valid, and it is no less valid a design, than the Fate or pbta models.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Considering the resistance to the notion of adding social rules - remember even 3e was routinely strongly criticized for adding what basic social rules it had - to D&D, I would say that the lack is due to freeform being the defacto method. ((On a funny note, my autocorrect keeps trying to correct defacto to defect )

People really, really don't like the idea of adding social mechanics to the game. 3e adds in social skills and is routinely criticized for it. 4e adds in skill challenges and ties them to social encounters and is routinely criticized for it.

The basic criticism seems to be that any social mechanics stifles creativity. I don't think so, personally, but, that seems to be the basic criticism. That only free form resolution, or minimal mechanical frameworks, allow for the satisfactory resolution of social or exploration scenarios.

Okay I see what you’re saying now.

No one is opposed to adding optional social mechanics. Well, okay, there are the people who scream about wizard school on twitter, but I’m not willing to take seriously such people as part of the conversation.

People quite reasonably dislike the game being changed to not have broadly defined “framework and tools” resolution mechanics for social scenes. Add all the optional modules you want.

You remember that this thread is about people claiming that D&D is 90% combat, right?

But, dollars to donuts, this will be how it plays out

What. Are you…genuinely serious about this?
I gotta tell ya…I’ve literally never seen that happen in an actual game. Hell I don’t think I’ve seen it in an actual play game, but I tend to tune out and basically “skim” sections of actual plays, sometimes, so I may have missed some.

And again, even if that does happen, it isn’t because of how skills work in 5e, it’s because the advice in the books is terrible on nearly every topic. Hopefully the write the anniversary core books better than they did the originals.

 

[Scruffy nerf herder]

When I first got it I played it for 23 hours straight. I forgot to eat, sleep, or go to work.

Funny and weird though how wisdom is the most important stat because you get huge XP from various dialogue options and wisdom gives you a flat increase to XP gained.

 

[Scruffy nerf herder]

This is fun, because the source pretty much makes the case that the rules are breakable when it's convenient and usually self-serving. I mean, you're referencing pirates that say this so that they can easily double-deal when it's convenient! Why is this presented as good?!

Ummm because it is? It never occurred to you that was a completely valid attitude for someone to have?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

That only free form resolution, or minimal mechanical frameworks, allow for the satisfactory resolution of social or exploration scenarios.

It's not a case of being the only satisfactory way to resolve social situations. It's just a matter of, for many people, being a more fun way to do it than rolling dice.

But that really goes back to why people are playing D&D in the first place. If you think the only way you can be having fun is to win, then removing win/lose from social situations is making it less fun.

 

[Aldarc]

If you think the only way you can be having fun is to win, then removing win/lose from social situations is making it less fun.

IMHO, this reply demonstrates a fundamental, if not gross, misunderstanding of how social mechanics contribute to play and people's enjoyment thereof, and it's pretty darn insulting to boot. In many roleplaying games, the purpose of social mechanics is not for people who think the only way to have fun is to win. Far from it. Like almost diametrically opposed to what function social mechanics in these games serve or even how most people in favor of such mechanics approach gaming.

 

[Hussar]

Okay I see what you’re saying now.

No one is opposed to adding optional social mechanics. Well, okay, there are the people who scream about wizard school on twitter, but I’m not willing to take seriously such people as part of the conversation.

People quite reasonably dislike the game being changed to not have broadly defined “framework and tools” resolution mechanics for social scenes. Add all the optional modules you want.

You remember that this thread is about people claiming that D&D is 90% combat, right?

What. Are you…genuinely serious about this?
I gotta tell ya…I’ve literally never seen that happen in an actual game. Hell I don’t think I’ve seen it in an actual play game, but I tend to tune out and basically “skim” sections of actual plays, sometimes, so I may have missed some.

And again, even if that does happen, it isn’t because of how skills work in 5e, it’s because the advice in the books is terrible on nearly every topic. Hopefully the write the anniversary core books better than they did the originals.

This is how it plays out under every single dm I’ve ever had. Bar none. As far as I can tell, this is always how it plays out.

Heck I’ve seen modules where this is the default. The Final Enemy in Ghosts of Saltmarsh works exactly this way.

 

[Hussar]

IMHO, this reply demonstrates a fundamental, if not gross, misunderstanding of how social mechanics contribute to play and people's enjoyment thereof, and it's pretty darn insulting to boot. In many roleplaying games, the purpose of social mechanics is not for people who think the only way to have fun is to win. Far from it. Like almost diametrically opposed to what function social mechanics in these games serve or even how most people in favor of such mechanics approach gaming.

See I look at it more like people just really, really have no idea how social mechanics actually work but oppose them anyway.

Makes these sorts of conversations difficult when there just isn’t any common language being used.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

IMHO, this reply demonstrates a fundamental, if not gross, misunderstanding of how social mechanics contribute to play and people's enjoyment thereof, and it's pretty darn insulting to boot. In many roleplaying games, the purpose of social mechanics is not for people who think the only way to have fun is to win. Far from it. Like almost diametrically opposed to what function social mechanics in these games serve or even how most people in favor of such mechanics approach gaming.

Then you need to explain, because I simply can't see what else social mechanics can bring to the game.

I mean, "skill challenge". The clue is right there in the name. It's turning a social situation into a competitive situation.

And I have to say, I don't see anything wrong with wanting to play that way. You seem to be the one who thinks a competitive rather than social game is somehow lesser.