D&D (2024) What does Backward compatibility mean to you?

[Maxperson]

Well, in this case...the user is the players, the DM is part of the system. As long as the difference is fairly smooth for non-DMs, I would say the metaphor is pretty exact.

Well, no. The DM is explicitly a player of the game, he's just not a Player. The program consists of the books, not the DM. The DM is the primary user of the program(the books), and the Players are minority users of the program(PHB and other PC rules). If I have to modify the program as a user, backwards compatibility has failed.

But what they mean colloquially is "you can keep using your old books, amd we'll facilitate thst on Beyond." And with Beyond, actual technical backwards compatibility is quite doable.

That automatically fails the backwards compatibility smell test. Many, if not most players do not use Beyond.

 

[Parmandur]

Well, no. The DM is explicitly a player of the game, he's just not a Player. The program consists of the books, not the DM. The DM is the primary user of the program(the books), and the Players are minority users of the program(PHB and other PC rules). If I have to modify the program as a user, backwards compatibility has failed.

That automatically fails the backwards compatibility smell test. Many, if not most players do not use Beyond.

The DM is the "computer," not just a user, in terms of the system. The rules need to be compiled and put into action, and the DM is not simply a user, and the system doesn't work without yhat interpretive matrix.

About 10 million active users on Beyond bow, and they clearly want to grow that. Thing is, if Beyond can manage it, so can any human DM in practice.

 

[Maxperson]

The DM is the "computer," not just a user, in terms of the system. The rules need to be compiled and put into action, and the DM is not simply a user, and the system doesn't work without yhat interpretive matrix.

About 10 million active users on Beyond bow, and they clearly want to grow that. Thing is, if Beyond can manage it, so can any human DM in practice.

The DM is not the computer. Everyone is using the computer(the rule books). The DM just uses aspects of the computer program to design adventures and such that are not available to the Players.

 

[delericho]

If they stick to the backwards compatibility claim* then I expect to be able to use any 5e adventure and almost any 5e supplement with minimal effort on my part - and I expect that effort to be detailed in a revision document available for download from one of their sites (a PDF from D&D Beyond is fine; having to actually visit DDB is not, for reasons I've detailed in other threads).

So if I can run "Curse of Strahd", but have to use a revised stat block for Strahd then that's fine by me, provided they provide the replacement.

By almost any supplement I mean anything except "Volo's Guide to Monsters" and "Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes", as those two have been explicitly deprecated. And I have no problem completely switching out the core rulebooks.

* Speaking for myself, I wouldn't have a problem if they end up allowing scope creep to move this closer to a 5.5e edition than has previously been indicated, and thus abandoning backwards compatibility... provided they state that up-front. Just don't claim it and fail to deliver!

 

[delericho]

Speaking as a DM, if I'm having to act as a translator for the supplements between the old and the new, then that fails the backwards compatibility test. I'm not a computer and I'm not part of their system, so don't treat me as such!

 

[CleverNickName]

An interesting poll!

I voted "I can use content from 5E and 1D&D in the same PC" because that's genuinely what I'm hoping for, and it's really the only way I can use the new material. I need these new updates to work in 5th Edition.

I'm kicking off a new D&D campaign this October and it's three years in the making. Everything's already written, and all of the materials have been acquired and configured to run on Roll20. So if 2024 rolls around and I can't drop the updated material into my existing 5E Roll20 game, it's not going to be used. (Not until my next campaign, anyway, which could be 3-5 years.) It's not personal; it's just an unfeasible amount of work and money for me to change game editions at this point in time.

(I think we'll be fine, for the most part: Tasha's Cauldron of Everything came out just in time for me to incorporate into the campaign, get it added to the Compendium, etc. It sounds like that, along with Xanathar's Guide to Everything, will cover a large portion of these rules revisions.)

 

[Parmandur]

The DM is not the computer. Everyone is using the computer(the rule books). The DM just uses aspects of the computer program to design adventures and such that are not available to the Players.

The books are software, the DM is the hardware. At least of we are going to insist on a highly liberal reading of "backwards compatibility," otherwise the metaphor makes no sense.

 

[Parmandur]

If they stick to the backwards compatibility claim* then I expect to be able to use any 5e adventure and almost any 5e supplement with minimal effort on my part - and I expect that effort to be detailed in a revision document available for download from one of their sites (a PDF from D&D Beyond is fine; having to actually visit DDB is not, for reasons I've detailed in other threads).

So if I can run "Curse of Strahd", but have to use a revised stat block for Strahd then that's fine by me, provided they provide the replacement.

By almost any supplement I mean anything except "Volo's Guide to Monsters" and "Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes", as those two have been explicitly deprecated. And I have no problem completely switching out the core rulebooks.

* Speaking for myself, I wouldn't have a problem if they end up allowing scope creep to move this closer to a 5.5e edition than has previously been indicated, and thus abandoning backwards compatibility... provided they state that up-front. Just don't claim it and fail to deliver!

So far, we've seen that theybare willing to provide sidebars at the relevant juncture thst explain how to make the rulesnwork, like using a SCAG Race.option with a new Background. Adventures are easier, because the old Monster stat blocks work fine, we've been mixing them in practice for years now. The bolded monster entries can be easily keyed to a nee Mosnter Manual, but a few old style Mosnters will work fine in practice.

 

[Iosue]

I will be satisfied if the old adventure content in compatible with the new core books and new adventure content is more or less compatible with the old core books. I don't expect slight math tweaks in character generation or monsters to significantly effect bounded accuracy.

I don't mind a little bit of adjustment to convert old characters to new characters. If old PHB characters can play alongside new PHB characters, that's a bonus.

They put out 5e and essentially left it alone for 10 years, come 2024. To me, they've earned the right to shake things up a little bit.

 

[Maxperson]

The books are software, the DM is the hardware. At least of we are going to insist on a highly liberal reading of "backwards compatibility," otherwise the metaphor makes no sense.

It makes perfect sense. The system(the rulebooks) have to do all the work for me or they are not backwards compatible. 5e explicitly says that the DM is a player, so he is. He's using the system just like everyone else is, but he has access to restricted portions that the other players do not.