D&D 5E Is 5E Special

Neither do I, I'll be honest, I think other factors are more important to 5e's success than whether it holds up under the kind of pressure that I'm discussing.

In terms of what makes 5e special, I would say that it came out at the perfect time, it sanded away a lot of the tactical complexity of the previous two editions of the game, which gave it a reputation for simplicity and streamlined play that I think made players a lot more patient with its fairly dense and often ambiguous rules.

The culture of play it cultivated for itself also prizes roleplaying, sometimes to the deliberate exclusion of mechanical play, so from what I've observed you see some people taking on the point of view that "you're having problems because that's the wrong way to play the game" and almost prefer that the system breaks down because it validates them. Others seem to have a sense that "its always been this way" about those problems and shunt it off into GM responsibility, which I've seen lead to GM burnout-- which is something some GMs who switched discussed not realizing was the system until they did. In some ways I think the 'rule of cool' culture we've seen develop is a movement that strives to deal with 5e's problems by limiting the system's influence over the game, its goal is essentially to Make System Matter Less.

One thing that makes the game special, in my eyes, is that since so much of its player base is new a lot of the people who play it don't have a point of comparison for it. In fact for some of them, if it started annoying them they'd probably decide they must not like tabletop games after all, I've met a few people like that. Because everyone is playing it, and its much easier to find players for it than anything else (if the person being frustrated is even open to the idea themselves), the idea of hacking it into shape becomes more appealing, which creates a cycle where everyone is still playing it, even after experiencing problems with it.

This functions to make it a common language between what is unquestionably most TTRPG players-- more or less everyone can talk about Eldritch Blast, or spells to summon a bunch of dinosaurs, because they're all playing with those common rule components to a deeper extent than another edition of the same game even could. This creates another source of investment in the dominant 5e TTRPG culture-- if you exit it, even to something like Pathfinder, you lose a lot of that common ground and culture. This is created by 5e being able to introduce a bunch of players into its sort of walled garden environment, where the walls are made of 5e as a common culture and framework.

I felt that loss when I left the 5e space, as I love the Pathfinder community we have, but its much smaller, and I have less in common with most TTRPG players I come across.
Yeah the current D&D edition will always have an outsized influence on TTRPG play. Most folks start there and the edition they start with likely will flavor their viewpoints for some time, if not forever. Dems da breaks. Though, the pendulum swings and we have gone from rulings not rules, to rules not rulings, and back. I think the truth is the designer's took the strategy setting down to a 3, and same with the tactics setting. At a mild approach to both, folks can get a taste of that kind of play, but not be overwhelmed by either. You can also lean on one or the other because the system is flexible enough. There you have it, everyone's second favorite edition.

I too once felt the communal loss of D&D as a young lad. I found a new place to call home for a time; and it was good. After awhile, it too, left me behind. Now I'm just an old nomad wandering around spreading unwelcomed wisdom to folks fighting for the foundation of the garden walls. You learn to depend on those walls after awhile so its hard to let go. Some dogs though just aint meant to be kept in the yard. You know what you are talking about, you frame it correctly as your opinions, you are already halfway ahead of most folks around. Eventually, the community will look to you once you stop worrying about it, and learn to love it in its many forms.
 

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One of the best things about 4E was that it had very clearly defined roles such as controller, defender and so on. When you picked a class you pretty much knew what you were getting into. In addition, every class (until essentials) had the same power structure of at-will (weak powers), encounter (better), daily (best). Then there were utility powers that primarily helped outside of combat. In addition, there was a very clear progression of magic items you should have for any given level range.

One of the worst things about 4E was that it had very clearly defined roles ... basically repeat the paragraph above.

For some that consistency was a good thing. I get it. Along with things like skill challenges (once they figured out the math), there was a fairly static, predictable progression. It just didn't add enough value for me, but I'm sure for others it did.
I think the "roles" were kind of weirdly overrated and overstated. I felt like they both had somewhat less impact on the game than I had expected, and that they actually had somewhat less of a "you know what you're getting into" factor than expected. Also correct me if I'm wrong, but they weren't very well rules-integrated, like rules didn't key off your role, it was just a vague "design philosophy" for your class.

The most distinct one was Leader, and that was solely because of the 3 per encounter heal thing.

Whereas Strikers and Defenders were somewhat fungible. Like a lot of Defenders did a ton of damage. A lot of Strikers were pretty tough. Controllers were in the mix too - most of them just seemed kind of underpowered period, I feel like that's where we saw the weakest class design in 5E, but there were Strikers and Defenders and even Leaders who could effectively exert as much or more control than most Controllers, and a couple of Controllers who could do Striker-like damage, or were very hard to kill.

I feel like you could have just deleted roles as a stated fact or a thing described, people would have been a lot happier with 5E, and would have still gravitated to the same classes.

I agree with the rest of what you're saying.
 

Because you can use them as they are presented and you don´t have to try to balance every encounter. The game works fine if you just use them as they are. So why does the poster I responded to have to learn balancing everything new for every character?
Encounters in adventures are examples and suggestions. They are intended and assumed to be modified by the GM to better fit the party -- not just for difficulty but for fun. You can use them as is, but it's not a rule.

As to the other part: with the current slate of classes and subclasses there is something like 1.5 million possible combinations for a 5 pc party. Do you really think a game designer can write adventures balanced for that?
 

I think the "roles" were kind of weirdly overrated and overstated. I felt like they both had somewhat less impact on the game than I had expected, and that they actually had somewhat less of a "you know what you're getting into" factor than expected. Also correct me if I'm wrong, but they weren't very well rules-integrated, like rules didn't key off your role, it was just a vague "design philosophy" for your class.

The most distinct one was Leader, and that was solely because of the 3 per encounter heal thing.

Whereas Strikers and Defenders were somewhat fungible. Like a lot of Defenders did a ton of damage. A lot of Strikers were pretty tough. Controllers were in the mix too - most of them just seemed kind of underpowered period, I feel like that's where we saw the weakest class design in 5E, but there were Strikers and Defenders and even Leaders who could effectively exert as much or more control than most Controllers, and a couple of Controllers who could do Striker-like damage, or were very hard to kill.

I feel like you could have just deleted roles as a stated fact or a thing described, people would have been a lot happier with 5E, and would have still gravitated to the same classes.

I agree with the rest of what you're saying.
Actually that was deliberate usually by power source--

The class had a designated role, but each power source had a role it was associated with that made every class in it have a little of that capability tucked into its powers and mechanics. For example, Arcane was associated with the Controller role-- so every Arcane Class of every other role got a little bit of Control tucked into what they do, Sorcerers had more AOE than other Strikers (but less than any actual controller) to go along with its Striker level damage, the Warlock inflicted debuffs along with its striker tier damage, the Swordmage hindered enemies a bit more with its abilities than other defenders or could do so from further away.

Meanwhile, Divine classes all had a little bit of healing and support tucked into them-- you can see it in the small buffs and heals the Paladin, Invoker, and Avenger all have in their powers. Martial offered striking as a secondary, which meant that the Warlord and Fighter both offer more damage than a Leader or Defender normally would. I don't remember what Primal, Shadow, or Psionics shook out with, especially since Shadow was kind of broken, and Psionics ended up with Monk, which was initially meant to be be the 'ki' power source, plus they came out so late the design focus may have shifted away from the earlier patterns.
 

I mean that the same group of players will produce parties of wildly different combat prowess between campaigns. I have been playing with (largely) the same group for 5 years or so now and every time we do a new campaign -- Avernus, Rime, Storm King -- the party composition is different (because people want to play something new) and as a result I have to completely relearn how to balance encounters for them. I can't give you any numbers because I did not track it that closely; I just know what my experiences were.
Hmm. Interesting. My experience is the same wrt changing party makeup, I just have never found I needed to change how I balance encounters as a result.

Probably a difference in how we run the game, I’d guess.
 

I think the "roles" were kind of weirdly overrated and overstated. I felt like they both had somewhat less impact on the game than I had expected, and that they actually had somewhat less of a "you know what you're getting into" factor than expected. Also correct me if I'm wrong, but they weren't very well rules-integrated, like rules didn't key off your role, it was just a vague "design philosophy" for your class.

Well strikers had a bonus damage ability and Defenders had a mark of some type.

I think WOTC just can't communicate the hows and the whys of the game in an effective manner. That's why I advocate that they shouldn't bother trying and instead make the text as vague and obtuse as possible so people will subscribe their own interpretations.

That's what they did for 5E and look how well that turned out!
 

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