D&D 5E Justin Alexander's review of Shattered Obelisk is pretty scathing

[Retreater]

I do agree with you that a number of 5e products - especially some of the adventures - have been underwhelming. That being said - just because the adventures/settings aren't to your taste, doesn't mean the rules are the issue. You can use 3rd party products or make your own adventures with the 5e rules.

... unless you don't like them either, of course.

It's hard to tell. Rules without actual gameplay is like selecting a new car without a test drive.
I've seen constant failure with the 5e rules because the adventures are (IMO) bad.
When I try to run 5e even with my own content, it still fails because (again, IMO): the monster design is way underpowered (or the characters are overpowered), the encounter math doesn't work, there's nothing to spend money on, bonus actions are confusing and bad design, and there's not enough tactical interest.
Maybe others (MCDM, EN Publishing) have figured out ways around some of these issues. WotC has certainly shown no steps to addressing what I think are the shortcomings of the system for the past decade - and judging from the playtests, it's unlikely it will be improved for the next decade.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It's hard to tell. Rules without actual gameplay is like selecting a new car without a test drive.
I've seen constant failure with the 5e rules because the adventures are (IMO) bad.
When I try to run 5e even with my own content, it still fails because (again, IMO): the monster design is way underpowered (or the characters are overpowered), the encounter math doesn't work, there's nothing to spend money on, bonus actions are confusing and bad design, and there's not enough tactical interest.
Maybe others (MCDM, EN Publishing) have figured out ways around some of these issues. WotC has certainly shown no steps to addressing what I think are the shortcomings of the system for the past decade - and judging from the playtests, it's unlikely it will be improved for the next decade.

This is why I don't use WotC. 5e is a decent base for D&D, but it needs work IMO. Level Up and other 3pp do most of that work for me, and I do the rest.

 

[Retreater]

This is why I don't use WotC. 5e is a decent base for D&D, but it needs work IMO. Level Up and other 3pp do most of that work for me, and I do the rest.

The strange thing is, I started running games in 1989 - just when 2nd edition AD&D was released.

If I want to break down my issues with prior editions, it would look like...
2nd Edition - I can't find enough players. People think I'm a nerd.
3rd Edition - There are too many fiddly rules. I wish something simpler would come out. (I kinda miss 2nd edition.)
4th Edition - Everything about this system makes sense, but why are these combats close to 2 hours long?
5th Edition - This is a deck of cards built on the back of a rampaging rhinoceros. And - whoops - it fell over.

5e is in the unfortunate position of needing extensive houserules, but unlike 2E, it is so player-focused that the DM is powerless to really houserule anything. It is also woefully under-designed compared to 3E and 4E, so it needs more to keep it from falling apart. And it gives worse tools to a DM wanting to houserule anything (practically nothing compared to 3E and 4E).

5E is basically the worst of all possible worlds.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The strange thing is, I started running games in 1989 - just when 2nd edition AD&D was released.

If I want to break down my issues with prior editions, it would look like...
2nd Edition - I can't find enough players. People think I'm a nerd.
3rd Edition - There are too many fiddly rules. I wish something simpler would come out. (I kinda miss 2nd edition.)
4th Edition - Everything about this system makes sense, but why are these combats close to 2 hours long?
5th Edition - This is a deck of cards built on the back of a rampaging rhinoceros. And - whoops - it fell over.

5e is in the unfortunate position of needing extensive houserules, but unlike 2E, it is so player-focused that the DM is powerless to really houserule anything. It is also woefully under-designed compared to 3E and 4E, so it needs more to keep it from falling apart. And it gives worse tools to a DM wanting to houserule anything (practically nothing compared to 3E and 4E).

5E is basically the worst of all possible worlds.

Fortunately, 5e has been so popular that many folks have iterated on it. The tools are there now, even if WotC made us create them.

 

[nevin]

1

this is my take.

1st edition - relatively balanced but a mess of mixed up ideas that didn't always go well together. (but no one telling us we had to use it all either)
2nd Edition -My favorite edition to date but they tried to have a rule for everything.
3rd Edition - Began with the Dev's publicly stating Balance was never going to be a design issue they made stuff and DM's could use what they wanted.
4th Edition - The LOCK IT DOWN BOYS edition. >>>>>>>>>>>
5th Edition - The (admittedly fun). Anime internet easy mode edition.

Now to make it make even more sense in your head think of it as a Never ending Pinball game and each edition is the ball bouncing in a different direction.

Each version is bad for a certain type of game. It would be nice if there weren't so many people that felt they were failing if they didn't play the latest greatest and everyone just played what they liked best.

 

[Retreater]

Fortunately, 5e has been so popular that many folks have iterated on it. The tools are there now, even if WotC made us create them.

I have never had to create a "rules addendum" - some 20 page house-rule document to print out and pass out like a syllabus to my players.
There are better designed games out there that don't require that I take a Death Save rule from Reddit, a different interpretation of Counterspell from the D&D Twitter account, an opinion of Gritty Rest mechanics from an EN World thread, etc.
So, if the game is salvageable by running Level Up as written, then that's great. I can pass those books, PDFs, online tools, etc. to my players and encourage them to learn that game. But when something is intensively house-ruled, held together with Duct tape and a prayer, I'd rather look at another system.
There are games with more creativity, artistic vision, and care put into them than D&D 5E.

 

[Retreater]

Each version is bad for a certain type of game. It would be nice if there weren't so many people that felt they were failing if they didn't play the latest greatest and everyone just played what they liked best.

The marketing juggernaut of Hasbro is a potent foe, indeed.
What I want to run, I'd have a hard time convincing anyone locally to play.

 

[nevin]

The marketing juggernaut of Hasbro is a potent foe, indeed.
What I want to run, I'd have a hard time convincing anyone locally to play.

Honestly Matt Mercer seems to be a bigger problem when it comes to finding new players for old stuff. Too many newbies who only want to do what the "internet Star" told them to do.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Nope. DC has nothing to do with character level, only the difficulty of what they are trying to do.

Higher level characters have a better chance of succeeding at more difficult things.

I did not say they were caused by character level.

I said something that would tell you a DC that would be an easy, medium, or hard check for a given character level.

The character's level does not cause the check to be anything. But if you need a DC, and you know that it is already supposed to be hard, then it is supremely useful to have a reference for what "a hard DC" should be. You already know the DC is hard. The table just tells you what the number should be, so that that known difficulty is achieved reasonably.

Most GMs must by trial and error kludge together a mental list for this. They know that a check should be hard, but us 15 hard? Is it ridiculously easy or effectively unwinnable? They must slowly memorize it by, in brief, screwing it up enough times first. It is one of the ongoing tragedies of TTRPG design that people vilify a written list of such things, which would let fresh GMs (or even just forgetful ones, hello hi how are you) focus their attention on the more interesting parts of GMing.

If characters' skills grow in power, then a difficult check for a high level character should be more difficult than that for a low level character. Hence, level matters for the meaning of "difficult check." That doesn't mean level causes a check to be difficult.

 

[tomBitonti]

Nope. DC has nothing to do with character level, only the difficulty of what they are trying to do.
Higher level characters have a better chance of succeeding at more difficult things.

In 5E, with bounded accuracy, that is largely the case. But bounded accuracy is a relatively new idea.

Another principle is that the environment should scale with the player. A "locked door" is expected to be a "more well locked door" at 10'th level than at 5'th level.

This was more pronounced in prior editions. Although tangentially applicable (ACs vs DCs), I find it to be especially prevalent in the escalation of ACs in 1E (and largely continued until 5E), where natural armor is added to monster AC's to match players to-hit abilities. This is visible in the progression of the G-D module series, which grants players ever escalating bonuses (via drow equipment) while also escalating the ACs of creatures which don't wear armor (magical beasts, demons and devils, dragons, and so forth) to match the players bigger numbers.

My sense is that bounded accuracy evolved as an idea is a way to oppose this sort of arbitrary level based bonus escalation.

TomB