D&D General D&D Editions: Anybody Else Feel Like They Don't Fit In?

[Micah Sweet]

i think 5e skills are boring too. I preferred 3e/PF1e system. PCs generally had more skills and granularity and I like assigning points. They also grew better. I dislike the flat prof bonus for skills in 5e.

Level Up has skill specializations, allowing you be better (or worse in my homebrew) at specific applications of a 5e skill, such as climbing for Athletics, or poisons for Medicine. This allows you to add (or subtract) an expertise due from the roll.

 

[Voadam]

PCs generally had more skills

I considered 5e a general upgrade for PC number of skills. Lots of classes in 3e and pathfinder had two skill points per level plus int mod minimum of one. It was real easy to have a lot of the party be real short on skills. Cleric, fighter, paladin, sorcerer were all two skill non int classes.

5e gives at least two on class and two from background so a minimum of four which seems a decent amount as a baseline.

3e high skill class with high int could get more than a similar 5e PC, but I prefer having skills not be so siloed to skill class PCs.

 

[payn]

That is what I guessed, but it seems so removed from play that I wouldn’t have described as boring. Skills function pretty much the same, you just have more/ more granularity in 3e/PF which to me is more boring in play. I find free wheeling more fun then strict structure. But I understand that is my fun, not yours.

I like skill based RPGs quite a bit. Traveller, for example is one of my faves. So, a reduction in skills for 5E was a bummer. The fact you don’t interact with the system during level up is also a bummer. I liked that PF had enough of a bucket that no two PCs were much alike. You got to develop at every level up and equipment had meaningful impact.

“Free wheeling” can work in some instances but with such a limited system and (dis)advantage on top, it’s not that interesting an interaction. In fact I find the lack of structure often leads to duller play by GMs, not expanded horizons. PF campaign traits, ultimate intrigue, provides a path to those interesting parts I want to focus on.

Don’t get me wrong I like 5E concept of Bounded Accuracy and it’s swift leveling, but I just want a bit more. If there is anything I want more free wheeling it’s combat. YMMV

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

I like skill based RPGs quite a bit. Traveller, for example is one of my faves. So, a reduction in skills for 5E was a bummer. The fact you don’t interact with the system during level up is also a bummer. I liked that PF had enough of a bucket that no two PCs were much alike. You got to develop at every level up and equipment had meaningful impact.

“Free wheeling” can work in some instances but with such a limited system and (dis)advantage on top, it’s not that interesting an interaction. In fact I find the lack of structure often leads to duller play by GMs, not expanded horizons. PF campaign traits, ultimate intrigue, provides a path to those interesting parts I want to focus on.

Don’t get me wrong I like 5E concept of Bounded Accuracy and it’s swift leveling, but I just want a bit more. If there is anything I want more free wheeling it’s combat. YMMV

Thank you for the response!

I should be clear that I don’t think character building at any stage is “fun,” just a necessary task. So not having to mess with skills at level up is a bonus for me.

2nd, I realize I wasn’t completely “honest” in my previous comment as I did not clarify that we used the background skill option from the 2014 DMG. At least I think that was in the DMG, it may have been our house rule. Basicallly, you had proficient in any task reasonably related to your background. So if you had the Soldier background you get your prof. Score added to an ability check related to warfare or similar.

We also used the rule that decoupled skills from specific ability scores.

All of that made skills more roleplay based, IMO, which is what I like.

 

[payn]

Thank you for the response!

I should be clear that I don’t think character building at any stage is “fun,” just a necessary task. So not having to mess with skills at level up is a bonus for me.

2nd, I realize I wasn’t completely “honest” in my previous comment as I did not clarify that we used the background skill option from the 2014 DMG. At least I think that was in the DMG, it may have been our house rule. Basicallly, you had proficient in any task reasonably related to your background. So if you had the Soldier background you get your prof. Score added to an ability check related to warfare or similar.

We also used the rule that decoupled skills from specific ability scores.

All of that made skills more roleplay based, IMO, which is what I like.

If you work at it with intention I’m all for it. While I like the chargen work of PF, it’s not like the structure makes folks engage. If folks just want to have their characters mosey from one fight to the next no system will change that. Perhaps some of my 5E experience is colored by such play style.

 

[dave2008]

ER, thank you for taking the time to explain your position in your usual thorough detail. It is very much appreciated.

5e does not have novice levels.

I am going to agree to disagree. You don't think they are novice levels, and they may not fit your definition of novice levels, but you don't get to decided what "novice levels" means for everyone. I definitely consider levels 1-2 as novice and we added a 0-level (no class, just species and background).

It has two regular levels which have been saddled with needing to serve three different masters (OSR players who want a brutal, low-competence, minimalist experience; brand-new players who don't know what they're doing and need a gentle introduction; and simulationist players who want to grow naturalistically).

Actual "novice level" rules would be, effectively, levels "between" nothing at all and a 1st-level character. So, for instance, maybe you have at rock bottom 8's in all stats, 1 hit point (and no hit dice), zero proficiencies, no background, no species, no feats, nothing else. Obviously I haven't tested this in any way, so please don't rip it apart by mechanical analysis; the point is simply to illustrate, not to prescribe a specific fixed solution.

Novice levels would thus provide a structured framework for building up from this absolute rock-bottom minimal character, slowly filling in until, eventually, you build up to finally being an actual 1st level character. "Structured", however, does not mean "perfectly dot-by-dot spelled out with zero deviation". Novice level rules, if well-structured, could very easily be bent in multiple directions:

• OSR-style, you start out with pretty much just the above. Maybe everyone starts out with the Human species package, but otherwise completely blank. Gain (say) 200 experience, and you get one "novice level"--meaning, you pick up one single additional piece. Maybe you assign your Strength a high score for that level. Another 200 XP, you learn you have magic--perhaps divine magic, setting you on a course toward a melee caster like Paladin or Druid. By spooling these bits out slowly over a long period of time, a character might take six months before they finally have reached "first level" and thus start moving forward by regular level rules (but see below re: incremental advancement).
• Tutorial Adventure mode. WotC could use these rules to make those "choose your own adventure"-style structured hooks into an actual, "learn to play" process, which can then let players explore their choices before locking into something. So maybe you start out with 1st-level-character HP and HD (presumably d8, since that's pretty much "average" HP now), but no species and no other features, 10s in all stats. Present it as an amnesiac recovering their memory, trying skills to see if they can, that sort of thing. If monster-design stuff is made compatible with the system for novice-level rules, you can even have combat and real challenge, all while still being focused on building up the skills through play, rather than merely through being talked at by your DM or reading lines on a page.
• Traveller-like character creation. A character creation method you play through, rather than one you just crunch through before you can start playing proper. Character naturally builds up to a set of skills, and then the closest-fitting class is chosen once you've hit a critical mass and reached 1st level. Allows for players to express themselves and to explore the natural growth of a character responding to their environment, rather than having to artificially declare all this stuff about who they were and where they went and what they did etc., etc. that many simulationist fans dislike so strongly.

Under this paradigm, a 1st level character does in fact have a little experience under their belt. They might still be green, but they aren't completely untested. That's what novice levels are intended to capture. So you would be choosing things like your "subclass" (if we preserve such things) at 1st level, and folks who desire to build up to that would instead start somewhere in the novice level rules.

Those are interesting examples of novice levels, but that doesn't explain how people who don't want novice levels will find these palatable. My question was not how can you make novice levels, but how do you include novice levels for people who don't want them? For those people, the best answer is don't have them.

"Incremental advancement" is a similar but distinct thing, taken directly from 13th Age (a game that has many very very good design ideas). TL;DR: Instead of gaining a full level, you can pick just one benefit to enjoy as if you were a higher level--and you can do this repeatedly, getting just a little morsel here, a little morsel there. In 5e terms, let's use a Sorcerer as a pretty good example. So, maybe for your first incremental advance, you pick up a Sorcery point (since those are normally keyed to your level, once you get the feature). Second advance, you pick up another spell known. Third, maybe you're about to hit level 4 so you pick up a feat or ability score increases. Or maybe you increase your proficiency score 'cause you'll get that bonus at your next level. Etc.

By having incremental advance rules, DMs can choose to spool out the levelling process almost as long as they like, while still giving their players tangible, obvious progression. Characters aren't stuck, utterly unchanged for 5 months and then suddenly getting a spurt of growth: instead, they slowly creep up to that, getting a bennie here, a bennie there until finally they cross the threshold.

I am familiar with incremental advancement (I am looking at it for my D&D heartbreaker), but I don't see how they transform something you dislike into something you like (which was the intent of may original comment). Maybe the next paragraphs will explain!

Between the two, it is (at least in principle) entirely possible to construct a game, including reasonable threats and well-built encounter-design methods, which actively supports both the brutally-hard, outright-zero-to-hero, slow-methodical-growth experience that OSR fans love, and the baseline-competence, adventurer-to-legend, snappy-progress experience that contemporary fans love, without either side being treated as lesser or deprecated or inferior. Indeed, both sides can even get into dialogue with each other, possibly sharing some of the good side of their experience with the other, who might not otherwise have considered it.

Given these rules need to be treated with equal respect as any other approach to play, they obviously need to be put front-and-center, and their usage needs to be truly supported, meaning, they aren't just a fire-and-forget, they get ongoing attention and new content over time. I am quite serious when I say that, if I were in charge of developing 6e, making sure players who use these rules never feel sidelined would be a top priority, even though I personally have negative interest in ever using these rules myself.

I get your passion bleeding through this words - I love that! However, IMO, your assertion that it is "entirely possible" is a very big hypothetical. It may work in your mind, but that is, IME, highly unlikely to satisfy everyone or even most D&D people (and by most D&D people I say the people on these forums has I have no idea what the border public things). People (again, EnWorld D&D people) complain all the time about things being included that they don't want included when they can literally just ignore it.

Heck, if didn't want novice rules (I do like them), I would be upset if they were as detailed and took up as much space as the standard rules. I might also be upset that they are called novice levels and not simply level 1-3 or whatever. You can't predict every scenario that is going to upset people and I don't see how providing more detailed and respectful rules of something people don't want making those people happy. Your solution could, instead of making Paul or Peter happy, make both Paul and Peter unhappy. Sometimes getting what you want is excluding what you don't want (I might even say a lot of the time form what I observe).

 

[dave2008]

On the topic of learning to DM/learning to play for new folks... I've seen a lot of people say the most recent Pathfinder starter box is the best of the best for people learning the ropes of an RPG. I think they might be right. Now personally, after having looked over the rules and seen discussions and such, I might guess Pathfinder 2e has moved a little too far from D&D for my tastes. But it does have some really cool basic options for martial/melee characters during tactical battles. That starter box was so juicy, I went ahead and picked it up for some random weekend when we want to change things up.

I don't usually buy starter sets, but I am interested in the new 5e starter set coming out this year. It looks interesting: What's In D&D's New Starter Set?

 

[Lanefan]

ER, thank you for taking the time to explain your position in your usual thorough detail. It is very much appreciated.

I am going to agree to disagree. You don't think they are novice levels, and they may not fit your definition of novice levels, but you don't get to decided what "novice levels" means for everyone. I definitely consider levels 1-2 as novice and we added a 0-level (no class, just species and background).

Those are interesting examples of novice levels, but that doesn't explain how people who don't want novice levels will find these palatable. My question was not how can you make novice levels, but how do you include novice levels for people who don't want them? For those people, the best answer is don't have them.

I think the intent is that there would be multiple suggested starting points presented in the DMG. Using current level numbers but adding in a few lower levels (counting down from 1st) to fill the design gap between commoner and current 1st level, the DMG might say:

For a very dangerous novice-level play experience start the PCs at -3rd level (i.e. commoner; 250 xp per level until reaching 1st)
For an extended novice-level play experience start the PCs at -1st level
For the default novice-level play experience start the PCs at 1st level
To largely skip over novice-level play start the PCs at 3rd level.

Design and support for every level from commoner on up would then be presented in both the PH and the DMG, in full knowledge not every table would use all of it. Same as design and support for the very high levels are presented now even though the designers likely know full well most tables will never use that design.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Those are interesting examples of novice levels, but that doesn't explain how people who don't want novice levels will find these palatable. My question was not how can you make novice levels, but how do you include novice levels for people who don't want them? For those people, the best answer is don't have them.

You...don't. That's the whole point.

If you don't want to use them, don't. Nobody is making you.

That's why 5e as it exists does not have novice levels. It has mandatory levels at which characters are extremely fragile and have very few choices or resources--your ONLY choices are either to play fewer actual levels, or go through playing levels you don't want to play.

Actual "novice level" rules are separate from the regular levelling progression. They're opt-in, not opt-out. That's why I keep emphasizing that, despite being opt-in, they are not in any way deprecated, derided, or concealed. They're front-and-center, but optional; fully-supported, but in no way mandatory; usable and indeed quite useful, but not enforced.

I am familiar with incremental advancement (I am looking at it for my D&D heartbreaker), but I don't see how they transform something you dislike into something you like (which was the intent of may original comment). Maybe the next paragraphs will explain!

It's...it's not a matter of "transforming" anything into anything else. It's a matter of creating a system which actively supports a wide variety of preferences. Of necessity, having active and enthusiastic support for many different preferences means that there will be rules--perhaps lots of rules!--that any given user has no interest in. But D&D is, and has been for some time, positioning itself as the big-tent TTRPG, the RPG that can embrace a wide variety of styles and processes. Some of this comes from its history, as "D&D" has been many different things across five decades, but some of it simply comes from the necessities of a product appealing to a diverse audience. That is, "Prego" is no longer one, singular recipe: it is a whole family of recipes with different focuses, from ultra-classic minimalist "classic" flavor to "extra chunky" to "robust" to "parmesan" to (etc., etc.) For D&D to survive as the kind of product it's being sold as, it must follow that same lead, and offer many different flavors under the one umbrella.

Your position seems, fundamentally, to be that the game cannot be anything other than one singular thing, and thus any rules proposals must be ones that somehow trick players into playing things they don't like. That is false. The game can, in fact, be multiple distinct things despite all living under a single metaphorical roof. You just have to have well-supported opt-in rule structures that facilitate different approaches, weaving in, around, and through a common core. We can, in fact, actually have one single system, which gives real, and more importantly well-made, support to the old-school player who wants gritty zero-to-slightly-more-than-zero-to-a-modicum-more-than-zero-to-[insert many variations on 'slight growth' here]-to-maybe-possibly-hero-ish, AND giving just as much support to the new-school player who wants satisfying narrative arcs and exploration of the story of a specific group of characters and the way they interact with each other, AND giving just as much support to the mid-school player who loves nothing more than setting the world running and seeing what drops out while having their character naturalistically and procedurally grow in the ways that make the most sense for them.

It isn't a zero-sum game. It's eminently achievable, we just have to reach for it.

Heck, if didn't want novice rules (I do like them), I would be upset if they were as detailed and took up as much space as the standard rules.

Anyone "upset" by having useful rules that aren't for them in the book, isn't welcome in any D&D I would want to design. "All of the rules must be made for me and my preferences" is not an acceptable negotiating position.

Sometimes getting what you want is excluding what you don't want (I might even say a lot of the time form what I observe).

Sometimes. But in the designing of an RPG's rules, exclusion is rarely actually required. That's my whole point here. Your "sometimes" absolutely is not "always", and my "perfectly possible" is a lot more achievable than you give credit for.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Anyone "upset" by having useful rules that aren't for them in the book, isn't welcome in any D&D I would want to design. "All of the rules must be made for me and my preferences" is not an acceptable negotiating position.

Yeah, that's pretty much a giant sign saying "I'd like to gatekeep my game so its only for people like me".

Sometimes. But in the designing of an RPG's rules, exclusion is rarely actually required. That's my whole point here. Your "sometimes" absolutely is not "always", and my "perfectly possible" is a lot more achievable than you give credit for.

Yeah, its not like optional rules aren't a thing in a lot of games. But the fact they're "optional" seems to sometimes be, well, offensive.