D&D (2024) First playtest thread! One D&D Character Origins.

[TwoSix]

Do you have the standard deviation formula for the new average damage so that I don't use finding it as an excuse to avoid work?

Working out a formula is a bit more time than I want to invest. I mean, for values from 1 to R, each value will occur R times; for values from R+1 to N, each value will occur N+R times, over a total population of values that's N^2. I'm sure it could be calculated from that, but seems much easier just to do analytically.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I agree to a point...

Insert Rant

I certainly expect our stat majors and grad students to be able to derive stuff. But after they've shown they know what's what I'm not going to say they can't look up and use the formulas for a standard distribution or other result if they haven't done that particular derivation before themselves. (I'm sorry, you only "proved" the CLT for the binomial, and even then you glossed a lot of the MGF things, so no CLT for you!).

For the humanities majors in our general education stat course I'd be happy if they could quickly calculate and interpret a sample mean and contrast it's properties with the median, and give me the hand wavy interpretation of the standard deviation and some of the weaknesses it has, and use a formula correctly. (Bonus points if they can explain why we use SD instead of mean absolute deviation). Making them derive the formulas for the mean and standard deviation of a distribution before sharing it with them feels like a pharmacist not letting me use a medication until I can demonstrate how to make it on my own.

I'm guessing a lot of folks on here aren't stat majors?

End Rant

Totally derailing the thread now. The problem I have with your rant is the assumption that people can't do this unless they are stat majors (or otherwise are 'math people'). Which I think most people would agree with.

I disagree, because I think that distinction...between math people and non-math people...is the result of that assumption. It's not circular: it starts with the mistaken assumption. We think people need to memorize formulae and algorithms because they won't be able to actually understand the logic, so we teach them to memorize...and they never end up actually understanding.

I'll stop there, but I would encourage anybody/everybody to read Paul Lockhart:
https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdf

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I'm willing to bet that while technically possible, mixing and matching 1D&D and 5e character options is going to be more awkward than it's worth, so that by 2025 most tables will be using one or the other almost exclusively.

I bet that for most tables it will be 2014 phb or 2024phb... I do wonder though, will there be 2014+tasha +motm tables that just do 1/2 upgrade?

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I hope that's the case (since I want some pretty significant changes to some classes), but I remain curious how much they'll let themselves be constrained by a desire to be backwards compatible with subclasses in old books. We'll know a lot more once the class playtest docs start dropping. Agreed though that I don't expect there to be some massive outcry, most people I've talked to are broadly positive what we've seen so far.

The thing is, if they make any significant changes to the core class at all, it's likely to become incompatible with some subclasses, and once that happens, there's no point trying to make it compatible with others - it'd almost be worse to have, say, a 6E Fighter compatible with 50% of old subclasses than one cleanly compatible with 0%. And it's not breaking their word if 5E classes only work with 5E subclasses, so long as mechanically they fit into the 6E system generally.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Personally, I think spells are going to be where a lot of the pain points might arise when you start to run pre and post revision material together at a table. Making an early judgment from feats, they're going to be quite willing to have the same named object (whether that be a feat name or a spell name) use very different rules. And what makes spells distinct is that they aren't personal to the character, they have an in-fiction existence that's shared among all the characters, and the NPCs as well.

So DMs are going to have to say "Ok, we're only going to use the revised version of the spells at this table, but we'll still use the old versions of spells X, Y, and Z because I like those versions better." It's not a case where the guy happily playing his half-elf wizard from 2014 can just use the spells from his 2014 book without causing some ripples at the table.

Absolutely agree - I hadn't thought about this yet but you're right, and I think there's significant appetite for rules changes to quite a few spells (and even some spells being maybe... deleted or at least profoundly reworked), so I think that definitely won't get a ton of pushback.

 

[Haplo781]

A +2 bonus might be adequate for showing the difference in strength between a gold medalist weight lifter and a typical competitive weight lifter.

It seems completely inadequate for showing the difference in strength between a typical offensive lineman and typical jockey.

A jockey would have a strength of 10-12.

 

[Jahydin]

When it comes to attributes, I think PF2e knocked this out of the park.

All stats start at 10.
Race gives a fixed stat bonuses and a stat penalty, but then you get to pick another as well.
Background gives a fixed stat bonus, but then you get to pick another as well.
Class gives a fixed bonus to the primary stat.
You then get to pick 4 stats to increase.

No randomness, bonuses that make narrative sense, complete control of customization.

 

[rooneg]

The thing is, if they make any significant changes to the core class at all, it's likely to become incompatible with some subclasses, and once that happens, there's no point trying to make it compatible with others - it'd almost be worse to have, say, a 6E Fighter compatible with 50% of old subclasses than one cleanly compatible with 0%. And it's not breaking their word if 5E classes only work with 5E subclasses, so long as mechanically they fit into the 6E system generally.

I personally agree, because I think there are classes that really do need enough of an overhaul to make reusing old subclasses pointless (Fighter, Ranger, Warlock, etc), but I can definitely understand people who feel that "backwards compatible" means "I can use Gloomstalker with the PHB2024's version of the Ranger". I think this is actually one of the big questions WotC will be looking to answer, how far can they push this stuff while still leaving people with a revision that feels sufficiently backwards compatible to the majority of players. Anyway, we'll know a lot more once the first classes start to drop.

 

[Cadence]

Totally derailing the thread now. The problem I have with your rant is the assumption that people can't do this unless they are stat majors (or otherwise are 'math people'). Which I think most people would agree with.

I disagree, because I think that distinction...between math people and non-math people...is the result of that assumption. It's not circular: it starts with the mistaken assumption. We think people need to memorize formulae and algorithms because they won't be able to actually understand the logic, so we teach them to memorize...and they never end up actually understanding.

I'll stop there, but I would encourage anybody/everybody to read Paul Lockhart:
https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdf

I mean, I've bitten my tongue recently about posts that said folks shouldn't be expected to add or subtract two digit numbers on the fly, so I kind of get it.

And I certainly strongly agree that most folks could successfully take the time to take a few semesters of stat and prob courses if they wanted to.

And I'm appalled by the glib way a lot of America excuses being bad at math in ways they don't excuse not being able to read.

But I also think we should all learn more history and science and econ and coding and... And we don't have time to do it all.

We could all also all take some pharmacy and car repair courses and make our own medicine and fix our own cars.

And so I'm not sure why asking people to derive things on their own in the middle of a thread is a reasonable ask just because it's something we can do quickly with little effort.

Also pretty sure my derail here wasn't all that reasonable of a use of space in this thread either

And I totally agree that teaching there is one way to do things right is awful too.

 

[HammerMan]

Convention and store play isn't normative, only a fraction of players interact with that. Loose goosey mixing is the norm from what I can see.

I’m sorry but what makes store games not normal?