D&D (2024) What playtest package is next?

[Vael]

Place ya bets, place ya bets! What new marvel of One DnD will be playtested, and how divisive will it be?

 

[JEB]

Betting on warriors, since the others will depend more heavily on changes to spells in 1D&D.

 

[tetrasodium]

I think that warrior group is all but certain. I wonder if weapons & armor will be part of that or a later packet. I'd be disappointed if one d&d keeps the same "choose the largest damage die/ac you can use effectively" style of weapons & armor.

 

[MechaTarrasque]

The priest group probably has the easiest "fix", give the druids a "channel nature" (which would be wild shape for circle of the moon druids, summon a pet for shepherd druids, etc.) and you are 90% done, since the three classes now have a unifying feature (channel).

I hope the unifying feature for the warrior class is some kind of bloodied feature that lets you become more superhuman for long fights. Anything that applies to rangers or paladins (like fighting styles or making more than one attack a turn) would be insufficient for a unifying feature for the warrior group, and the bloodied idea isn't the only one out there, but most are actually pretty big, and I am guessing they will go easy (like expertise and channel) first.

I don't know what the unifying feature for mages will be, but, for the love of Lolth, please don't make it yet another spell slot recharging system. That is just creative bankruptcy. I had rather they stole the alchemist from the artificer and say wizards make potions by following recipes, sorcerers do it by instinct, and warlocks get their potions by DoorDash from their patrons.... Again, something like that (unless they go with yet another spell slot recovery system) would be big, so I think they will go easy first.

 

[tetrasodium]

The priest group probably has the easiest "fix", give the druids a "channel nature" (which would be wild shape for circle of the moon druids, summon a pet for shepherd druids, etc.) and you are 90% done, since the three classes now have a unifying feature (channel).

I hope the unifying feature for the warrior class is some kind of bloodied feature that lets you become more superhuman for long fights. Anything that applies to rangers or paladins (like fighting styles or making more than one attack a turn) would be insufficient for a unifying feature for the warrior group, and the bloodied idea isn't the only one out there, but most are actually pretty big, and I am guessing they will go easy (like expertise and channel) first.

I don't know what the unifying feature for mages will be, but, for the love of Lolth, please don't make it yet another spell slot recharging system. That is just creative bankruptcy. I had rather they stole the alchemist from the artificer and say wizards make potions by following recipes, sorcerers do it by instinct, and warlocks get their potions by DoorDash from their patrons.... Again, something like that (unless they go with yet another spell slot recovery system) would be big, so I think they will go easy first.

Given bardic inspiration reaction healing the new barkskin & the lessons learned by reactions to twilight cleric we might also see changes to healing in general.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I think they'll want to ring out the year with something to impress the audience, so I'm going to go with the Mage group, and a boatload of revised spells. Hey, they did push it back (again), so something's gotta be big.

We shall see, though.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think that warrior group is all but certain. I wonder if weapons & armor will be part of that or a later packet. I'd be disappointed if one d&d keeps the same "choose the largest damage die/ac you can use effectively" style of weapons & armor.

I don't see any reason, given WotC's current design philosophy, why they wouldn't. It's simple, and that's their watchword.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Fingers crossed, I hope its the new rule for tying knots and sleeping in armors!

 

[Amrûnril]

I think Mage is the least likely option. Sorcerers and Warlocks in the 2014 rules are both known-spell casters with unique spell lists, so it wouldn't make much sense to release their playtest before reviewing the Bard feedback. In contrast, Clerics and Druids are already prepared casters, and they still get spell lists mostly built around them under the Arcane/Divine/Primal system. So while I think Warrior is most likely, I wouldn't be particularly surprised by Priest.

I'm sure we can also expect another iteration of the rules glossary, probably with alternate versions of inspiration and natural 1s/20s. I am curious whether there will be anything analogous to the feats in the Expert playtest. Perhaps a second pass on some of the options from the Origins playtest?

 

[Ibrandul]

At the very end of the long video discussing the Expert playtest doc, Crawford told Kenreck that there would be more feats coming in the Warrior playtest doc, and that there would be exciting new ways to use weapons. Since he raised this topic at the very end of the video, I assume this was intended as a teaser for the next doc, so I think it's a good bet that Crawford intends to release that doc next—or at least intended to do so at the time of recording that video.