WotC Jeremy Crawford Interview: Playtests from experimental to focused. By Christian Hoffer at GenCon.

[Parmandur]

That depends on how unbalanced it is, and how much people like it how it is.

Personally, I’d love to have fireball do even more damage but be harder to use safely. Really I want magic to interact with the world more in general. Whether that’s written into spell descriptions or general rules for Spellcasting and DM guidance on running the game, I want an ice AoE to create a patch of frozen ground, a wall of fire to radiate heat above it and catch things on fire within 10ft of it if they’re flammable and dry, and fireballs to fill the space they’re in.

But since that won’t happen, I’m fine with fireball doing a couple dice less damage, I guess. (Or whatever spell being lightly “nerfed”)

I'm thinking stuff like the weird interactions of "Hold Person" versus "Hold Monster" with newer Species options. That could use cleaning up, but doesn't necessarily need detailed feedback to plug the holes.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Defcon, @Charlaquin and all the rest — all that nonsense about this playtest process being healthy, good, or effective can go straight to the trash. This playtest was sabotaged just like the DND Next playtest was. Incredible. Just incredible.

If I'm not mistaken... you've already said in another thread you've lost all respect for me, so I'm not exactly sure why my opinions matter to you?

 

[Parmandur]

No, it was the threshold to iterate on it, they did not iterate on it and instead threw it out. There is nothing to argue about here, you are denying facts.

70% isn't a guaranteed threshold, it's a minimfor consideration.

 

[Parmandur]

I hope that it's something that was so universally loved by the internal playtesters that they decided that it didn't need to reach open playtesting, and that we can be surprised and delighted by it.

Probavly inane language cleanup and math tweaks.

 

[mamba]

Has WotC squandered a lot of potential in this playtest? Absolutely. Have they still managed to get a positive net result? Also yes, in my opinion. Exactly like what happened with D&D Next.

I am not disagreeing, but I am disappointed by this. Right now the improvement is so small already, and they still have plenty of time to whittle it down more. I am not sure anything worthwhile is left by the end of this.

Right now I am much more interested in looking at other games than at the 2024 disgrace.

 

[darjr]

Disgrace?!

snrk

I too am looking at other games but cmon!

 

[mamba]

70% isn't a guaranteed threshold, it's a minimfor consideration.

That is just them sabotaging their own process, I have no reason to like it, regardless of outcome.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

It would be exceptionally cunning of Kobold Press and Cubicle 7 to include a version of the popular-but-not-popular-enough WotC playtest ideas in their own versions of the 5E rules. Everyone wins that way.

 

[mamba]

It would be exceptionally cunning of Kobold Press and Cubicle 7 to include a version of the popular-but-not-popular enough WotC playtest ideas in their own versions of the 5E rules. Everyone wins that way.

Certainly hoping for the same thing. If they do it, WotC has seen the last of me.

 

[Parmandur]

That is just them sabotaging their own process, I have no reason to like it, regardless of outcome.

Not really, this is them following the same process they have for years. If the satisfaction reaches 70%, barely but the qualitative feedback from the "satisfied" users is clearly tepid, theybare not obligated to continue trying to push something on people.