D&D (2024) Playtest Druid and Paladin One D&D survey is live.

[doctorbadwolf]

I agree with the THP argument, but if for some reason they continue going without it, you could put a concentration-like mechanic on tiny forms that makes them less resilient.

Agreed. And it’d be an awesome later level upgrade to go from tiny forms being low damage and low durability, and then suddenly be right up there with medium sized beasts.

 

[Gladius Legis]

I completed the survey. Marked disapproval on a lot of it. The Druid, I see the direction it's going and it could work, but it needs A LOT of work to get there. And the Paladin is just a weak version of the Cleric now.

 

[billd91]

Took the survey. Didn't really have too many complaints about the paladin, but ranked the druid low. I'm 100% on board with having standard wildshape templates in order to reduce players digging through the critter lists to find the most broken ones to exploit - but the ones they've got designed now and the schedule they come up as the druid levels... not it yet. Not even really close.

 

[Eubani]

I made two main points, 1 for each class. 1. Clerics use Paladin spells better than Paladins. Things that are class features should not be done as a spell. 2. Wildshape whilst going in in a good direction but needs more work and suffered from what I think is the biggest problem with 5e. That is when they simplify something they oversimplify it and suck out all the flavor, choice and granularity.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Oh Eberron Gnomes were fantastic, because they were given their own unique identity. And 4e did help them a bit by giving them a tie to the Feywild that was stronger than even the Elves (if memory serves). But before then, they were a real mishmash of concepts.

The real point is; WotC made it look like they removed the Gnome for flavor reasons and joked about it, and replaced them with Tieflings (previously only seen in Planescape and the Monster Manual) and Dragonborn (I think introduced in Races of the Dragon? Maybe?), and that stuck in a lot of people's craw, so that when the PHB2 came out, everyone took it as an "apology" from Wizards.

The ironic part then being, I never saw a Gnome played, lol. Though I had Svirfneblin Druid at one point.

obligatory personal anecdote of many gnomes being played in my games, and gnomes being a favored heritage by more than one player at my table

 

[James Gasik]

obligatory personal anecdote of many gnomes being played in my games, and gnomes being a favored heritage by more than one player at my table

You know, it's ironic, just yesterday at this D&D game, we got to talking about the playtest, and one of the newer players wondered why we even have a Druid class, and it's not just a Cleric subclass. The DM and I chuckled, and we related the hassle WotC had with removing Gnomes from the PHB, and I commented, "I can count the number of Gnome characters I've seen on the fingers of one hand"...literally, a Gnome Cleric I played in one session of a Ravenloft game who died to a Greater Wolfwere, a Gnome Fighter/Illusionist a friend of mine's girlfriend played (who, I'll add, is probably the most successful illusionist I've ever seen played), my Fighter/Priest (still alive and kicking at 5/5!), and a Svirfneblin Druid in 4e (who probably doesn't count, being a superior Gnome subrace, lol).

The rest of the table thought about it, and they came up with one Gnome, a 5e Thief Rogue they played with in AL.

And that's with me being the "old man" of the group, playing since 1988 (I think). I guess it just goes to show how radically different play experiences can be.

I've got nothing against Gnomes, mind you, I just think that in a lot of settings, their niche is not well explored, and they still feel like that hodgepodge of several racial archetypes blended together.

 

[Micah Sweet]

You know, it's ironic, just yesterday at this D&D game, we got to talking about the playtest, and one of the newer players wondered why we even have a Druid class, and it's not just a Cleric subclass. The DM and I chuckled, and we related the hassle WotC had with removing Gnomes from the PHB, and I commented, "I can count the number of Gnome characters I've seen on the fingers of one hand"...literally, a Gnome Cleric I played in one session of a Ravenloft game who died to a Greater Wolfwere, a Gnome Fighter/Illusionist a friend of mine's girlfriend played (who, I'll add, is probably the most successful illusionist I've ever seen played), my Fighter/Priest (still alive and kicking at 5/5!), and a Svirfneblin Druid in 4e (who probably doesn't count, being a superior Gnome subrace, lol).

The rest of the table thought about it, and they came up with one Gnome, a 5e Thief Rogue they played with in AL.

And that's with me being the "old man" of the group, playing since 1988 (I think). I guess it just goes to show how radically different play experiences can be.

I've got nothing against Gnomes, mind you, I just think that in a lot of settings, their niche is not well explored, and they still feel like that hodgepodge of several racial archetypes blended together.

I like tinker gnomes, but otherwise don't see much use for them. My players, on the other hand, feel differently.

 

[James Gasik]

I like tinker gnomes, but otherwise don't see much use for them. My players, on the other hand, feel differently.

Yeah, the times I've played Dragonlance, the DM's pretty much explicitly said their opinion of Tinker Gnomes was about the same as Kender. So they were not available as options.

 

[Parmandur]

Heh heh... WotC didn't push Gnomes out of the first 4E PHB cause no one played them... they pushed them back 9 months to when they knew they were releasing PHB2 that had the Bard in it... since the Gnome was the archetypical Bard race from 3E.

People often forget that WotC had planned from the beginning to have 16 classes available to players before Year 1 of 4E was done.

I don't forget that, because that is an aggravating factor, not a mitigating one. Spreading out core Race and Class concepts across three years of full priced releases was ridiculous and offensive. I am so glad that the PHB 2/3 approach died on the vine.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I don't forget that, because that is an aggravating factor, not a mitigating one. Spreading out core Race and Class concepts across three years of full priced releases was ridiculous and offensive. I am so glad that the PHB 2/3 approach died on the vine.

That's overstating things a wee bit.

First off, it wasn't three years, it was a year and nine months. PHB 1 was Jun '08, PHB 2 was Mar '09, and PHB 3 was Mar '10. Secondly, of the 3E "core races", Human, Elf, Dwarf, Halfling, and Half-Elf were all in PHB 1, and Gnome and Half-Orc were in PHB 2 nine months later. And for 3E's "core classes"... Cleric, Paladin, Fighter, Rogue, Ranger, and Wizard were in PHB 1, and Barbarian, Druid, Bard, and Sorcerer were released 9 months later. Monk was the only 3E core race or class that was held off until PHB 3 21 months later when the Psionic power source appeared.