Imaro
Legend
Huh? So you did want backwards compatibility... but voted with your wallet against it when they did it?
D&D 5E I feel like the surveys gaslit WotC about """"Backwards Compatibility""""
- Thread starter Shardstone
- Start date
I think that wotc∆ bought into their own hype rather than gaslighting since it doesn't matter what people who never went through an edition shift thought about that hype at the time surveys were being done.
There were a lot of goals that were never even mentioned for people to notice (ie: shifting classes to have the same subclass feature progression levels) before they got yoinked as not well loved enough as they got their first mention. Beyond that is where things went bad with wotc messaging pointing every spotlight they could at talking up backwards comparability like it was binary compatibility or some new gasoline additives that's going to make your engine run better.
Once the vast segment of 5e players who had never gone through an edition change or only went through the tectonic shift from 4e to 5e were thoroughly misled on the importance of backwards compatibility you started to see wotc's backwards compatibility hype being reflected back and amplified like some kind of malformed self targeting Smurf attack where someone with authority mandated it from high up the chain when more experienced community members stopped trying to set reasonable expectations & understanding of edition change impact in play. That whole cycle could have been avoided by frank discussion about edition changes or demonstrated comparability by diving into the fact that work had long stated that old 2e & 3.x books were perfectly valid sourcebooks for old settings not yet published in 5e if people wanted to play those.
∆ or someone who doesn't play d&d from Zynga/Hasbro that had authority over 2024's decision making.
SpellObjectEnthusiast
Adventurer
This alone makes any backwards compatibility worthless.
Good thing you didn't buy the books then. The rest of us who have been adjusting encounters to fit our players and tables these entire 50 years are using the new books fine.
I refuse to believe you actually think TSR and WotC have been producing new editions of the game for the last 50 years just to try and "fix things" and "get things right".
No one is that ridiculous so as to believe that's why they make new editions. I take it on faith that you are just being facetious.
Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
No, it's mostly for the money.
Remathilis
Legend
While I won't disagree that the surveys could have been better, I think the biggest problem is a mismatch of expectations between WotC and customer. WotC wants UAs to be a vibe check: "does this still feel like D&D to you?" The playerbase treated it like an editor: "here are my specific edits you can use to make it better". WotC wasn't looking for advice, it was looking for smell test.
James Gasik
We don't talk about Pun-Pun
So I game with mostly people younger than me, by 10 years or more. What I've found is that there is a mindset, deeply ingrained into younger people, that older things are not as good as newer things. I blame the relentless gears of capitalism for this, as companies are constantly trying to sell you "newer & better"- even when "newer & better" doesn't live up to their hype (I still think Windows NT was superior to the dreck that came pre-installed on my new PC).
Just look at Hollywood's incessant stream of needless reboots as an example of this in action. Some years ago (in the before times, pre "global situation", as I've been asked to call it online), the older hands in my group had a problem with a newer player. We'd mention great fantasy movies that he should really watch, and he'd always refuse, acting dubious that anything old could be good. Somehow, the movie that became the biggest point of contention was The Princess Bride. Anytime we'd quote the movie, he'd get a confused look on his face, annoyed that he was locked out of the joke, but refusing to give the movie the time of day.
Finally, after much cajoling he said "if the movie is so good, they should put it back in theatres. I'd watch it then". Now, as many of you no doubt know, this blessed event actually happened, and he succumbed to peer pressure.
I'm happy to report he had a blast, and admitted the movie was quite good.
But the fact that it took so long to get him to see it is troubling. And D&D is no different. Younger people will hear tales of "Thac0", "Hulking Hurlers", "4e is just an MMO", "Housecats can kill 1st-level Wizards", and focus on that, no matter how much you explain the positives of previous editions. It comes down to "people say it wasn't good, so it must be bad, or there wouldn't have been a new edition"- it's like the flipside of the "it's popular so it must be good" argument!
Now maybe, if TSR (and later WoTC) kept reprinting the same books over the decades, with only minor tweaks (like how most book editions work), people would still be playing the older game. But I know that, by the mid-90's, D&D had gotten a reputation for being an archaic dinosaur of a game, as people were quickly moving onto the new shiny games like Vampire, Shadowrun, Earthdawn, etc.. (whether those new games were better or not is a matter of opinion).
So in the name of Keeping The Lights On, it was decided to massively overhaul the game for the new millenium. And pretty much set the precedent for what a new edition is (not necessarily what it should be).
Now we reach today. 5e has been out for 10 years. The game has changed a lot in that time- 5e as it was in the first 5 years isn't the same as it is in the last 5. 5e didn't have to be anything more than "not-4e". No real expectations were placed upon it beyond "get old and new players to buy it"- if this ostracized people who actually liked 4e, well, too bad, we gotta get back the 3e fans, the TSR fans, and the Pathfinder fans!
But to sell everyone new books now? That's a bit harder. You want to get the people who didn't jump aboard 5e, keep the people who did jump aboard with early 5e, and keep people who jumped aboard with later 5e- all of whom have very different wants & needs.
Also, probably a good idea to change things enough that it isn't a repeat of 3.5, where it gets the reputation of a cash grab. So how to proceed with this impossible task?
Well, you'd probably be best off realizing it's impossible and not trying, but alas, your parent company's shareholders demand more money, which means new books.
Any changes you make/don't make are going to annoy people (this thread alone has evidence of that!). I don't know what the actual discussion was at the company, but someone had the bright idea of shifting the blame onto the players with another open playtest! But unlike the last one, we can't just shut the game down for 2 years, no no, we have to keep our current customers on board!
This may be why we got the "don't worry, it's the same game/it's going to be backwards compatible" claims. I don't know, I wasn't there. And when the final product isn't what everyone hoped it would be, well, "hey we did market research, and it says this is what most of you wanted! It's not on us!"- again, wasn't there, don't know for sure, but it sure sounds believable to me!
Because it really was an impossible task. There's no way to keep everyone who loves D&D happy without making someone else unhappy. And some of those people they are trying to please simply cannot be swayed without setting the clock back to 1984! Meanwhile, you got to make the game look "new & improved" for the next generation (again, whether it is or not).
We've come to the point where there is no good answer. Make D&D a modular omnisystem? New players and DM's will be confused about what version of the game would suit them best. Make multiple D&D games? More of the same, and you might end up competing with yourself! (I mean, how wants to play "Basic D&D" when there's "Advanced D&D" out there! I don't want to be accused of playing "kid D&D"!*)
*I'm wildly aware that wasn't the case- non-AD&D has quite a bit of complexity under the hood, but between the D&D cartoon and Morley the Game Wizard, the marketing would certainly have you believe such lies! Younger, stupider me fell for it, to my shame.
If you feel modern D&D isn't for you, there's no life preserver for you, I'm sorry to say. You either have to make do with the older D&D, alternative D&D from 3rd party publishers, or some kit-bashed "looks like modern D&D but totally isn't".
Or you wait and hope the pendulum swings back in your direction 5-10 years down the road.
And in most of these cases, you may have to deal with newer players turning up your "old person D&D"- after all, if it was so good, then why is there a new edition?
Just look at Hollywood's incessant stream of needless reboots as an example of this in action. Some years ago (in the before times, pre "global situation", as I've been asked to call it online), the older hands in my group had a problem with a newer player. We'd mention great fantasy movies that he should really watch, and he'd always refuse, acting dubious that anything old could be good. Somehow, the movie that became the biggest point of contention was The Princess Bride. Anytime we'd quote the movie, he'd get a confused look on his face, annoyed that he was locked out of the joke, but refusing to give the movie the time of day.
Finally, after much cajoling he said "if the movie is so good, they should put it back in theatres. I'd watch it then". Now, as many of you no doubt know, this blessed event actually happened, and he succumbed to peer pressure.
I'm happy to report he had a blast, and admitted the movie was quite good.
But the fact that it took so long to get him to see it is troubling. And D&D is no different. Younger people will hear tales of "Thac0", "Hulking Hurlers", "4e is just an MMO", "Housecats can kill 1st-level Wizards", and focus on that, no matter how much you explain the positives of previous editions. It comes down to "people say it wasn't good, so it must be bad, or there wouldn't have been a new edition"- it's like the flipside of the "it's popular so it must be good" argument!
Now maybe, if TSR (and later WoTC) kept reprinting the same books over the decades, with only minor tweaks (like how most book editions work), people would still be playing the older game. But I know that, by the mid-90's, D&D had gotten a reputation for being an archaic dinosaur of a game, as people were quickly moving onto the new shiny games like Vampire, Shadowrun, Earthdawn, etc.. (whether those new games were better or not is a matter of opinion).
So in the name of Keeping The Lights On, it was decided to massively overhaul the game for the new millenium. And pretty much set the precedent for what a new edition is (not necessarily what it should be).
Now we reach today. 5e has been out for 10 years. The game has changed a lot in that time- 5e as it was in the first 5 years isn't the same as it is in the last 5. 5e didn't have to be anything more than "not-4e". No real expectations were placed upon it beyond "get old and new players to buy it"- if this ostracized people who actually liked 4e, well, too bad, we gotta get back the 3e fans, the TSR fans, and the Pathfinder fans!
But to sell everyone new books now? That's a bit harder. You want to get the people who didn't jump aboard 5e, keep the people who did jump aboard with early 5e, and keep people who jumped aboard with later 5e- all of whom have very different wants & needs.
Also, probably a good idea to change things enough that it isn't a repeat of 3.5, where it gets the reputation of a cash grab. So how to proceed with this impossible task?
Well, you'd probably be best off realizing it's impossible and not trying, but alas, your parent company's shareholders demand more money, which means new books.
Any changes you make/don't make are going to annoy people (this thread alone has evidence of that!). I don't know what the actual discussion was at the company, but someone had the bright idea of shifting the blame onto the players with another open playtest! But unlike the last one, we can't just shut the game down for 2 years, no no, we have to keep our current customers on board!
This may be why we got the "don't worry, it's the same game/it's going to be backwards compatible" claims. I don't know, I wasn't there. And when the final product isn't what everyone hoped it would be, well, "hey we did market research, and it says this is what most of you wanted! It's not on us!"- again, wasn't there, don't know for sure, but it sure sounds believable to me!
Because it really was an impossible task. There's no way to keep everyone who loves D&D happy without making someone else unhappy. And some of those people they are trying to please simply cannot be swayed without setting the clock back to 1984! Meanwhile, you got to make the game look "new & improved" for the next generation (again, whether it is or not).
We've come to the point where there is no good answer. Make D&D a modular omnisystem? New players and DM's will be confused about what version of the game would suit them best. Make multiple D&D games? More of the same, and you might end up competing with yourself! (I mean, how wants to play "Basic D&D" when there's "Advanced D&D" out there! I don't want to be accused of playing "kid D&D"!*)
*I'm wildly aware that wasn't the case- non-AD&D has quite a bit of complexity under the hood, but between the D&D cartoon and Morley the Game Wizard, the marketing would certainly have you believe such lies! Younger, stupider me fell for it, to my shame.
If you feel modern D&D isn't for you, there's no life preserver for you, I'm sorry to say. You either have to make do with the older D&D, alternative D&D from 3rd party publishers, or some kit-bashed "looks like modern D&D but totally isn't".
Or you wait and hope the pendulum swings back in your direction 5-10 years down the road.
And in most of these cases, you may have to deal with newer players turning up your "old person D&D"- after all, if it was so good, then why is there a new edition?
Parmandur
Book-Friend, he/him
But those theoretical new players weren't taking surveys 2 years ago: and those existing players not making a clean break is a big part of getting new players, who will then be attached to the existing game.
Old fashioned reds of the entire game just don't make any business sense.
mamba
Legend
of course they did not take the survey, which is one part of why the emphasis on backwards compatibility is overrepresented in the polls.
I don’t think a slightly less compatible 2024 would have posed a problem in getting existing players onto it. Adventures remain compatible, we are strictly talking about classes and subclasses here. People are dropping the 2014 subclasses anyway and move fully onto 2024. Having to do slightly more work to adjust them to 2024 would not have made a difference.
Some holdouts will move fully onto 2024 once the first of Everything fills that gaps. People who even then stick with 2014 subclasses imo by and large do that because they rejected 2024 outright, not because they are mixing & matching.
So the level of compatibility 2024 has to me was never needed. What it does is hold back changes but not get more people to go with 2024. Maybe I am wrong, but I am not seeing a benefit here
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