D&D (2024) Jeremy Crawford: “We are releasing new editions of the books”

[Micah Sweet]

I had to do a lot of conversion during the 4e era before essential came around, because the errata of the classes were filling folders...

2e skills and powers also changed a lot of the structures, so class kits also did not work perfectly smooth. And so on.

So wherever someone wants to draw a line. There are som many historical precedents regarding edition changes and not that any argumentation finds a counter example...

4e was infamous for its phantom release, "The Never-Complete Errata Handbook", and Skills & Powers for 2e was a whole new way of making characters, intended as a replacement for that part of the PH. Not what's happening here.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It's the kobayashi maru: if they don't update the rules, people will ignore the 24 update. If they do update the rules, people will complain it's no longer compatible. If they say the old rules are compatible, people will complain it's not 100% compatible and it invalidates the old stuff. If they say it's a brand new start, people will complain that it's a cash grab and they want to resell you an entire edition's worth of stuff again. And if WotC hadn't announced a refresh, people would complain WotC isn't updating the game and it was getting stale.

But they wouldn't all be the  same people.

 

[Vaalingrade]

over the Big N Tasty or Angus Burger?

I feel like the Big N Tasty was a ressurected Arch Deluxe. And you'd have to specify with Angus Burger. The Mushroom and Swiss was excellent.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

But they wouldn't all be the  same people.

You're technically right that they wouldn't all be the same people. But it's pretty apparent that there are people who want it all to crash and burn, so yeah, there are going to be people who will pounce if they smell blood, and try to hurt Wizards as much as possible no matter what happens. They aren't subtle about it. Wizards has had some blunders. And some people will never let that go.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So you're saying if enough grognards that want THAC0 back make enough noise, we'll get D&D Classic with more THAC0?

I never understood why people hated on THAC0 so much anyway.

 

[Micah Sweet]

You're technically right that they wouldn't all be the same people. But it's pretty apparent that there are people who want it all to crash and burn, so yeah, there are going to be people who will pounce if they smell blood, and try to hurt Wizards as much as possible no matter what happens. They aren't subtle about it. Wizards has had some blunders. And some people will never let that go.

Any reason they should?

 

[Micah Sweet]

short of releasing an actual incompatible 6e

Not a universally shared opinion, clearly.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

'We are releasing new editions of the books,” Crawford emphasized. “We are not releasing a new edition of the game. And so that, I think, is a really important distinction — that it is still 5th edition, but yes, we are releasing revised versions of the books, which anywhere else in the publishing world would be called new editions.”

Such a nice quote. Exactly what I want to hear. Too bad it's not only kind of true.

I don't care about the terminology. Whether or not it's a "new edition", OneD&D is a more substantial redesign than I wanted, and, I would argue, more of a change than a 5e player whose only knowledge of OneD&D is this quote would expect.

I would have loved getting a modest update to the 2014 PHB to bring it in line with late 5e design principles (even if I think some of those principles are silly... I'm looking at you Mr. Ubiquitous Repurposing of the Proficiency Bonus For Everything). I wanted PHB Ranger and Sorcerer subclasses to get some free spells, Magic Initiate to be rewritten to work like later, similar feats, and a few other tweaks, and would have also been happy with a more substantial reworking of races given what a mess that had become post-Tashas. The 2014 Monster Manual always needed another pass and was just too much material to create all at once for a game that hadn't had much roadtesting, so even if I wasn't crazy about some of the Monsters of the Multiverse era tweaks I think 5e monster design definitely got better and the MM needed an update. The DMG... well I don't really care, it's not something I get much use out of, but it could probably be organized better, maybe then I'd get a little more use out of it.

Anyway that's what I wanted, that's what I think I would have expected if my only OneD&D knowledge was this Jeremy Crawford quote. After the 1st playtest I thought that might still be what we were got. But then we entered this weird world of the later playtests which I see as generally being an approach of pushing the boundaries of what can be called 5e compatible. While I am on the "yes OneD&D is still compatible" side of that debate, that doesn't mean it's not still more of a change than I would like or than I would say this Crawford quote implies.

Of course the product I really wanted would be a big book of all the 5e player option materials, so I wouldn't have to truck around and crossreference a small library just to run a PC, and that would be a great place to do the level of light updating I wanted to PHB content. But that was never going to happen. WotC would much rather people buy many books than one, whether or not it's convenient to actually use.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Such a nice quote. Exactly what I want to hear. Too bad it's not only kind of true.

I don't care about the terminology. Whether or not it's a "new edition", OneD&D is a more substantial redesign than I wanted, and, I would argue, more of a change than a 5e player whose only knowledge of OneD&D is this quote would expect.

I would have loved getting a modest update to the 2014 PHB to bring it in line with late 5e design principles (even if I think some of those principles are silly... I'm looking at you Mr. Ubiquitous Repurposing of the Proficiency Bonus For Everything). I wanted PHB Ranger and Sorcerer subclasses to get some free spells, Magic Initiate to be rewritten to work like later, similar feats, and a few other tweaks, and would have also been happy with a more substantial reworking of races given what a mess that had become post-Tashas. The 2014 Monster Manual always needed another pass and was just too much material to create all at once for a game that hadn't had much roadtesting, so even if I wasn't crazy about some of the Monsters of the Multiverse era tweaks I think 5e monster design definitely got better and the MM needed an update. The DMG... well I don't really care, it's not something I get much use out of, but it could probably be organized better, maybe then I'd get a little more use out of it.

Anyway that's what I wanted, that's what I think I would have expected if my only OneD&D knowledge was this Jeremy Crawford quote. After the 1st playtest I thought that might still be what we were got. But then we entered this weird world of the later playtests which I see as generally being an approach of pushing the boundaries of what can be called 5e compatible. While I am on the "yes OneD&D is still compatible" side of that debate, that doesn't mean it's not still more of a change than I would like or than I would say this Crawford quote implies.

Of course the product I really wanted would be a big book of all the 5e player option materials, so I wouldn't have to truck around and crossreference a small library just to run a PC, and that would be a great place to do the level of light updating I wanted to PHB content. But that was never going to happen. WotC would much rather people buy many books than one, whether or not it's convenient to actually use.

If Crawford had not doubled-down on the, "it's the same edition" claim he keeps making, sales of all books between now and 2024 might drop. It's just a money thing.

 

[mamba]

Not a universally shared opinion, clearly.

no idea, maybe they hadn't thought of that