D&D 5E (2024) Preferences in a New Official 5.5e Specific Setting

[Corinnguard]

Diners, Dungeons, and Delves

This sounds like it belongs on the Magic Food and Potions Network.

 

[Maxperson]

This sounds like it belongs on the Magic Food and Potions Network.

Or an adult network.

 

[Corinnguard]

Or an adult network.

One of several considering that each species has their own idea of who counts as an adult.

 

[Minigiant]

Back to the results, and maybe it is just this forum, but it amazes me how many people want Swords and Sorcery or Dark Fantasy, yet D&D doesn't address it. I don't mean bend their game towards it. I don't think they have to. But a five-page blurb in the DM's Guide with alternate rules - that seems like a no brainer.

Swords and Sorcery settings are amazing.

Swords and Sorcery mechanics when it relates to player characters are not so great except in the hands of a small subset of DMs or makes jack squat* financially if you try to hard coded it.

*for a major publisher

 

[tetrasodium]

Because what Wizards thinks the people want has been warped by a disconnect from reality, they have been lead astray.

While I agree & think there is probably some level of validity to that theory, there might be an alternate & more charitable explanation. Both 2014 & 2024 5e are practically shooting hard for coziest of cozy ultrahigh fantasy basking in the glow of freaking NightSun. It would almost take a near total rewrite of significant chunks of the ruleset monsters & PC options before 5e could sorta fit those. Trying to do it without significant rewrite would probably come off like trying to pass off the recent 3stooges ironman blue beetle movie as a serious take on a body horror version of the originally & already fairly serious serious ironman. Even if there are folks at wotc who would like to do it, they might recognize that it would be more jarring than useful

 

[Scribe]

While I agree & think there is probably some level of validity to that theory, there might be an alternate & more charitable explanation. Both 2014 & 2024 5e are practically shooting hard for coziest of cozy ultrahigh fantasy basking in the glow of freaking NightSun. It would almost take a near total rewrite of significant chunks of the ruleset monsters & PC options before 5e could sorta fit those. Trying to do it without significant rewrite would probably come off like trying to pass off the recent 3stooges ironman blue beetle movie as a serious take on a body horror version of the originally & already fairly serious serious ironman. Even if there are folks at wotc who would like to do it, they might recognize that it would be more jarring than useful

Early 5e wasnt. Its really not till we get into the blight of Tasha's era that we see the real shift.

Core + Volos + Tome of Foes? No problem. Its after that, the plot was lost.

 

[Scott Christian]

Swords and Sorcery settings are amazing.

Swords and Sorcery mechanics when it relates to player characters are not so great except in the hands of a small subset of DMs or makes jack squat* financially if you try to hard coded it.

*for a major publisher

I agree. But, that is why it should just be a five-page rule variation in the DM's Guide.

 

[tetrasodium]

Early 5e wasnt. Its really not till we get into the blight of Tasha's era that we see the real shift.

Core + Volos + Tome of Foes? No problem. Its after that, the plot was lost.

Ne even early 5e still had pretty solid overlap with that part of the venn diagram. A lot of the reason for that inescapable fact boils down to the way death saves and the removal of a need to heal all damage between 0 & neg ten from hovering on death's door birthed yoyo/wackamole healing. That first bit of cozy poisoned fruit was turbocharged by how all of the monsters have math assuming a bonkers trifecta of A: deliberately under optimized PCs with no feats in a game where feats are such an expected default that they are practically a trope B: no magic items in a game that has been literally swimming in magic items since the earliest editions C: the choice to give PC's an absurd 6-8 medium-hsrd adventuring day gas tank that makes the grindiest of ultra grindy grindfests say "whoa... Wait a second". Saying it was done in service of roleplay and storytelling while so gratuitouslt lighting the Hickman manifesto that kicked off the story in d&d trend just makes even the 2014 phb alone scoot further into the overlapping bit of the venn diagram

Spoiler: Hickman manifesto

1. A player objective more worthwhile than simply pillaging and killing.
2. An intriguing story that is intricately woven into play itself.
3. Dungeons with an architectural sense.
4. An attainable and honorable end within one to two sessions playing time

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Early 5e wasnt. Its really not till we get into the blight of Tasha's era that we see the real shift.

Core + Volos + Tome of Foes? No problem. Its after that, the plot was lost.

Oof. Volos and Tome are hot garbage, and Tasha's is when the game got back on track.

 

[Minigiant]

I agree. But, that is why it should just be a five-page rule variation in the DM's Guide.

If I were to make a fantasy heartbreaker, one thing I do is except for a section in the DM book that contains the variant rules, I would create a chapter of setting guides with the variant rules for those settings in those subjects.

Because quite frankly Ford and sorcery is a genre that is, for the most part, by the general audience preferred to be watched than played.

The majority prefer hearing a sword and sorcery story then actually running a character in it.