Unpopular opinions go here

[deganawida]

The only thing unique about the Shadowdark ranger that captures some flavor that wasn't there before is the ability to combat buff using alchemy to create potions and weapon oils. The sort of combat buffs available are exactly the sort you'd expect for a simplified 'Witcher'. There is even some correspondence to the way Witcher 3 simplified inventory management. It's cute. I like it. But I don't get the derision for past Rangers or why this is suddenly definitive.

Huh, weird. I'll be honest with you in that I did not see any Witcher influence until you mentioned it. To me, the herbal remedy is more like Strider's use of athelas than anything else.

As for WotC-era rangers (and, to be frank, D&D rangers in its entire history), they've never pinned down the central conceits of a ranger to me. They lack a distinct identity, IMO, and there's been a history of fumbling around to try to get it right.

Only speaking of myself here, but when I think of a ranger, what pops into my head first and foremost is Robin Hood. That's the feel that I look for more than anything else, the canny woodsman who can use a bow, sword, and staff, is lightly armored or unarmored, and is accustomed to always being outnumbered.

With the above, I would like to amend my previous statement, and say that the game which best encapsulates what I consider to be a ranger is Palladium Fantasy. I love that ranger, but never have had the chance to play.

 

[Atomoctba]

Multiclass should be banned from every D&D-like game.

Restrictions are very fine. All clerics of Elistralee must be female. All bladesinger must be elf, and so on. If you want to play with one of these, abide to the restrictions.

 

[Faolyn]

There's absolutely no reason D&D needs its core rules split across 3 books. The "core 3" paradigm could easily be compacted to the "core 1" with some decent editing and reduction of monsters and spells in the core.

Especially since you're going to publish 4 or 5 new monster manuals and spell handbooks for every edition anyway.

I dunno about one book, since that would end up as a ginormous book, even with extreme editing. Not too bad for a pdf, terrible for a dead tree book.

But I'm of the opinion that the number of dragons and giants should be reduced to one each (with age/size categories), with options/templates/whatever to give them different elemental abilities and a few ways to differentiate them. (I'm also tired of D&D-alikes having the whole list of chromatic and metallic dragons and the hill/fire/frost/stone/storm giant list--we don't need them in every game).

But yeah, culling the monster list would be helpful. 5e has done a lot to making each type of humanoid monster different, but there's still too many. I'm one of those people who do not like Always Evil humanoids, but if your game has to have them, just have a "monstrous humanoid" or "brute-folk" entry because you honestly don't need different entries for orcs, hobgoblins, goblins, bullywugs, duergar, sahuagin, ogres, and whatever else is there when most of the differences are really down to culture, alignment, choice of weapons, and tactics--all things that can be explained in a paragraph each, along with a couple of traits one could possibly add. Instead of a dozen different sections in the MM, have one, with statblocks for Warrior, Lieutenant, Chosen, Leader, Assassin, Caster, and Arch-Caster (with Chosen as the warrior with evil-god-given powers), and notes on how to change each of them for Small and Large brute-folk.

 

[Reynard]

Convention GMs should be paid for their work since it is the games being run that draw the players to the con.

 

[Gradine]

The only D&D system to get multi-classing right was 4e

 

[overgeeked]

Multiclass should be banned from every D&D-like game.

Multiclassing is a bandaid solution to the prepackaged classes being insufficient to cover even the broad archetypes of fantasy. Subclass is another bandaid for this and it’s telling that many subclasses are themselves “level dips” and theme swaps for other classes. Pick one: true customization with no classes or 3-4 core classes that can be taken a la carte. The current class-based system is the worst of all possible worlds in this regard.

 

[overgeeked]

The only D&D system to get multi-classing right was 4e

Mostly because it got class design right.

 

[Gradine]

Mostly because it got class design right.

4e's best classes were the ones invented wholecloth for the system

 

[overgeeked]

4e's best classes were the ones invented wholecloth for the system

I miss the swordmage so much.

 

[Aldarc]

I don't think that there is much of anything that's great about the Great Wheel.