D&D General How has D&D changed over the decades?

[tetrasodium]

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I clicked "Like" then realized I have no idea what either "Lodoss War" or "Slayers" is referring to.

The closest I can get to either is the metal band Slayer, but they never had that trailing 's'.

They are a pair of 80s anime series. Record of lodos war is what happens when a group plays first edition for years while keeping notes, has someone use those notes to write some books, and someone bases an anime off it.

Slayers is two (eventually 3) insanely overpowered characters in a semi d&d like world going on adventures that often result in Lina inverse especially & sometimes gourey cluelessly engaging in mass destruction deep into combat as sport

 

[Vaalingrade]

I believe a lot more people could greatly enjoy a classic dungeon crawling campaign, that has vastly more to (potentially) offer than a board game or Roguelikes and Diablo-type videogames, but most just don't know anything about it.

I know about it. Still don't wanna do it.

 

[Vaalingrade]

It's more tiers

1-4: Goblin Slayer, Princess Connect, Grimgar
5-10: DanMachi
11-15: Konosuba, Log Horizon, Fairy Tail
16+: Sword Art, Overlord

I haven't seen Princess connect, but 1-4 sounds terrible.

Can we get some Spice and Wolf instead? Or So I'm a Spider, So What?

...Why are all the pleasant start-at-low level fantasy shows about animal ladies?

 

[MGibster]

To you, what are the main ways D&D has evolved it’s tone, theme, genre, and aesthetics since you first started playing?

In a lot of ways, we've moved far beyond dungeon crawling. When I've looked at some classic AD&D adventures from the early days of 1st edition, many of them are just unplayable for a modern audience. Some still hold up well, Castle Ravenloft is still a good scenario today, but a lot of modules that came before that were just kicking down the door, killing, and looting. I think they were tournament modules they decided to publish.

In the late 80s and early 1990s, running into a pack of goblins or orcs was going to lead to a fight no matter what. These days, unless the goblins or orcs are obviously aggressive, players in my games are far more likely to try to engagement these greenskins peacefully than start out with violence. That's a significant shift I think.

Bugbears. At least for me, bugbears were a race I never used because, well, why? I had orcs to fill that role of evil humanoid enemies. Maybe my perceptions are out of whack, but bugbears seem to be a rather popular choice for PC race these days. I didn't see that coming.

Over the last few decades the importance of alignment has diminished to the point where in 5th edition it's now a vestigial artifact of a bygone era. I don't even ask my players what alignment their characters are as they're going to behave however they're going to behave. And there's not much in the rules relating to alignment anymore so why bother?

 

[MGibster]

Which points directly at another change over the decades: at one time the PCs were for the most part seen as being an integral part of their community in the setting. Joe the farmhand who became a low-level Fighter was very much still Joe the farmhand underneath it all. Callie the low-level Cleric was still very recognizable by her fellow villagers as Callie the sometimes-bumbling acolyte. And so on.

Really? Because I've always felt that "adventurers" were disconnected from whatever community they came from. They travel from place to place as mercenaries, will likely die young, and once the job is done they'll move on to another area. But then in 1st edition PCs could establish strongholds.

 

[Cruentus]

@Crentus Yea, but how does a Basic Kobold or Orc compare t a 5E kobold or orc? I haven't actually looked (because I'm not going to dig out my old books), but I suspect they scale about the same. i.e. same number of rounds to kill each or be killed by one.

Yup, you're spot on. Kobolds, Orcs, and such have HP bloat, higher bonuses to hit and damage to compensate for the increase in player power. That being said, the CR as presented in the 5e books is worthless. All it has really done is make PCs feel invulnerable (they can still mow down orcs and kobolds at low level), and at levels 3-10 walk all over equal CR threats. And sure, the DM can adjust, but in Basic, a 1 HD creature is about on par with a 1st level fighter (both d8 HD). And a 4HD creature is about on par with a 4th level fighter.

Whereas a my character in 5e out to 4th would be 36 HP, all of its 3rd level Battlemaster Abilities, an ASI or a FEAT to further increase its ability.

That Basic Fighter? 3d8 more HP, and Thaco 16.

But yes, the threats of equal "level" are more equal. But it also seems like a vicious circle now where all the choices and abilities further push the curve up, and the monsters have to be increased to compensate. Heck, an Ad&d Ancient Red Dragon has 88 max hit points. A 5e Ogre sits at 59 (average, 91 max) and a CR2. Appropriate for a party of 4 Level 2 characters. I find the combats and monster stuff in 5e tedious as a result. But that's me, and YMMV.

 

[Minigiant]

I haven't seen Princess connect, but 1-4 sounds terrible.

Can we get some Spice and Wolf instead? Or So I'm a Spider, So What?

...Why are all the pleasant start-at-low level fantasy shows about animal ladies?

Princess Connect issome cutesy silliness based on gacha. But the hero get owned by derpy common wolves.

1-4 is terrible. Again, PCs are weak until level 5.
I don't know where this "My PCs are unkillable" comes from. As a DM, I have to hold back at low level. Must be one of those "At my tables" things.

Yup, you're spot on. Kobolds, Orcs, and such have HP bloat, higher bonuses to hit and damage to compensate for the increase in player power.

Not character power but character class features.

In the olden days a fighter only got +1 to hit and+1d10 HD a level.
In 5e a fighter gets a Fighting style, Second wind, Action surge, and whatever their subclass gives.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Princess Connect issome cutesy silliness based on gacha. But the hero get owned by derpy common wolves.

1-4 is terrible. Again, PCs are weak until level 5.
I don't know where this "My PCs are unkillable" comes from. As a DM, I have to hold back at low level. Must be one of those "At my tables" things.

My thought is that it's hard to kill characters 'on accident' with plausible deniability that you're actually out to kill them.

 

[Remathilis]

It's connected. It's people reading the rulebook and seeing how tough and powerful the characters are and writing backgrounds to match. 5E 1st-level characters are not zeros. They're at least heroes. Explicitly so. Head and shoulders above. In comparison to starting characters of older editions, they're explicitly superheroes.

And there is a reason for that; being a zero sucks. You either kept rolling toons to throw to the meatgrinder until one of them got enough levels to earn themselves a literal name (Elf 4 became Alara) or the DM played everything with kid gloves and pulled nearly every punch so that characters could actually be played. Those days when your wizard had a single spell slot, your thief's chance to successfully thieve was below 20%, and your fighter had single digit hp was fine when the game didn't care about things like backstory, motivation, or personality (which is why alignment worked fine as personality indicator then, "Chaotic Neutral" was a good indicator of what kind of shenanigans you'd be up to before you died).

Come Dragonlance and 2nd edition, the game was maturing to focus on characters and not just toons. Unfortunately, the rules didn't start catching up with it until the third edition. And there is nothing inherently wrong with the "roll up PCs fast and throw them at the dungeon until one of them sticks" method of play, but I think the market and player-base wanted something a little more refined and the game has moved towards that.

 

[Azzy]

I clicked "Like" then realized I have no idea what either "Lodoss War" or "Slayers" is referring to.

You might be either too old or too young to get that reference, then. Both were extremely popular D&D-inspired anime from the late 80s/early 90s. Record of Lodoss War is specifically based on a BECMI campaign that was serialized in a Japanese magazine.