D&D 5E What (if anything) do you find "wrong" with 5E?

[Oofta]

When it comes to monks, of course we could make them more popular. Give them super strength, abilities to fly and shoot laser beams from their eyes, only vulnerable to damage if exposed to kryptonite. Or make them the Last Airbender, on many ways more powerful than even mid-to-high level wizards at level one.

Classes in D&D are now quite self-referential. A wizard isn't really based on any other fiction than previous D&D wizards. Classes get tweaked and modified of course, but that's about it.

Wizards don't work like they do in Harry Potter, we don't expect them to. Why would we expect monks to change dramatically because of anime?

 

[Scribe]

It's interesting to me that "what's wrong with 5e" and "5e is special" are both derailed by 4e discussion.

 

[Helldritch]

Well, there's a couple problems here:
1. There's always the ability to claim that a rules set does not, in fact, do what it claims to do;
2. There's always the potential for a system to have more appeal in general even if its current design is something its fanbase is okay with. The question always is how much you want to leap into that unless you feel very sure you're going to gain more fans than you lose.
And, of course, in a way, 3. Its extent fans may not give a damn if you gain more market if they're not getting what they want. Almost no one wants their favorite game system to grow in the abstract; they want it to do so because they'll get more cool stuff and more people to play with. Otherwise, as far as they're concerned, the new game just took the one they loved, killed it and wore its skin.

And at the same time, the Palladium system has endured for 5 decades now. That longevity does speak for itself.
If the fans keeps playing it and buying new books as they come out, why change anything? We know what happened to Coke when they changed their recipe. We all know how 4ed turned off many of the fanbase away from D&D in the open arms of PF. (A shame, but it was understandable given how much was changed by this edition).
I know that I would not take such a risk. Palladium has a steady income. Its fans are happy. No change are necessary.

 

[Helldritch]

When it comes to monks, of course we could make them more popular. Give them super strength, abilities to fly and shoot laser beams from their eyes, only vulnerable to damage if exposed to kryptonite. Or make them the Last Airbender, on many ways more powerful than even mid-to-high level wizards at level one.

Classes in D&D are now quite self-referential. A wizard isn't really based on any other fiction than previous D&D wizards. Classes get tweaked and modified of course, but that's about it.

Wizards don't work like they do in Harry Potter, we don't expect them to. Why would we expect monks to change dramatically because of anime?

Could not say it better myself.
The monk's problems are minor and the correction we did was so minor that at first, onlookers to our Friday Night Dungeon were sure that monks were adding their wisdom bonuses to ki as the base line of monks. When I got challenged on that, I said: "With this, the monk works for us as intended. You can always do as you please. Try it and tell me after a few levels if it works out for you too." Guess what? It worked for them too. Sometimes, all that is needed is a little nudge. You do not need to rework the whole class.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Could not say it better myself.
The monk's problems are minor and the correction we did was so minor that at first, onlookers to our Friday Night Dungeon were sure that monks were adding their wisdom bonuses to ki as the base line of monks. When I got challenged on that, I said: "With this, the monk works for us as intended. You can always do as you please. Try it and tell me after a few levels if it works out for you too." Guess what? It worked for them too. Sometimes, all that is needed is a little nudge. You do not need to rework the whole class.

the monk was never good aside from in 4e it needs to change as what it is a copy of is more dead idea-wise than most things and blindly copying a failing past has not and never will be a good idea.
it is honestly insulting how underdeveloped it is as the fighter has the excuss of pulling triple duty with both noob and no magic as some of its design goals.
monk should be made better as we can at least agree on what the idea is at a basic level.

 

[Helldritch]

the monk was never good aside from in 4e it needs to change as what it is a copy of is more dead idea-wise than most things and blindly copying a failing past has not and never will be a good idea.
it is honestly insulting how underdeveloped it is as the fighter has the excuss of pulling triple duty with both noob and no magic as some of its design goals.
monk should be made better as we can at least agree on what the idea is at a basic level.

Well, as a Boss shutter, mage killer and incredible scout. The current monk is:
Top damage dealer.
A great scout.
The one to find trap and pick locks.
Can hold his own.
Can attack at range.
The monk uses both a short bow and a Kusarigama. A monk weapon consisting of a sickle with a dagger. A 10' chain links both of these together. So far, this monk is almost unkillable. Yeah, a weak class obviously. Ho and she is of the 4 elements. So when monsters make the mistakes of being to close to each other, a nice burning hand comes into play...

The monk's problem is at higher level when the fighter wins a third attack. But until level 11-12 no problems. And since most games ends before these levels, most people will never see any problem with the monk.
We often go higher than these levels. We are currently thinking of letting the monk gains a third attack instead of only two with flurry of blows at level 11. But we are still thinking about it as when the monk gets one on one with a boss or caster, the monk hose them like if there was nothing in front of him.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I'm of the opinion that nobody upstream cared.

I think that's a reach, honestly.

I think you have that backwards. 4e fans felt betrayed in response to a process which promised and "edition for everyone" and then making it clear they meant "everyone except 4e fans" (and then eventually abandoning the promise entirely). The feeling could hardly have predated the betrayal!

No, I think it well predated that, when it became obvious how much of the discussion of (what was it, D&D Now they called it? I've forgotten) was backing away from decisions in the 4e era. It didn't take much if you were paying attention to notice that what they were saying didn't add up (i.e. they were, in practice, lying to one group of fans or another, and people who'd payed attention toward the end of the 4e era probably could make an educated guess which one. Heck, I wasn't even involved in D&D during that period, and it looked pretty obvious to me).

 

[James Gasik]

It's interesting to me that "what's wrong with 5e" and "5e is special" are both derailed by 4e discussion.

Well it usually goes like this:

Step 1- Discussion.
Step 2- Strays into mechanics.
Step 3a- Someone says something derisive about 4e mechanics.
Step 3b- Someone says something positive about 4e mechanics.
Step 4- Someone else expresses an opposing opinion.
Step 5- This is now a 4e thread.

 

[Thomas Shey]

And at the same time, the Palladium system has endured for 5 decades now. That longevity does speak for itself.

Eh. As I've noted before, "close enough is good enough" in a lot of cases. A lot of Palladium games are, from lack of a better term, sparkly. A lot of players will put up with some pretty substandard mechanics if you manage to do that successfully.

If the fans keeps playing it and buying new books as they come out, why change anything?

It depends on how many of them are doing that, and presumably no one but Siembieda knows that. It appears to me from a distant view that its peak has long passed, but that doesn't mean its not still bringing in enough money to justify keeping it out there, and that has the benefit its low-effort.

We know what happened to Coke when they changed their recipe. We all know how 4ed turned off many of the fanbase away from D&D in the open arms of PF. (A shame, but it was understandable given how much was changed by this edition).
I know that I would not take such a risk. Palladium has a steady income. Its fans are happy. No change are necessary.

Change is only necessary when you're in a death spiral. Desirable is a different question. As I said, the question then turns on risk to benefit assessment.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Well it usually goes like this:

Step 1- Discussion.
Step 2- Strays into mechanics.
Step 3a- Someone says something derisive about 4e mechanics.
Step 3b- Someone says something positive about 4e mechanics.
Step 4- Someone else expresses an opposing opinion.
Step 5- This is now a 4e thread.

Its going to be fundamentally difficult in a thread that's focused on mechanics to not bring up how prior versions of the game did things, and 4e being the most recent version prior to this its going to evoke the most comparisons (but I'll note there has been at least passing discussion of a number of editions in regard to how they handled individual things).