D&D 5E (2024) Mearls has some Interesting Ideals about how to fix high level wizards.

[Belen]

Well, there are three factors here.

One, Mearls spent a VERY long time blaming nearly all of D&D's problems on stuff 4e did. So to....reinvent the wheel, after 15+ years of being at the helm and treating 4e like rotten flaming garbage, isn't exactly a great look. You're correct that it is good to recognize your mistakes. It's just that that isn't what this appears to be, at least at a superficial glance.

Two, perhaps you are not familiar with some of the things that happened along the road to 5e's publication. One of those things was Mr. Dancey's article where he floated the idea "What about what I call 'passive perception'?" Except...there was a game that had invented that term, and used it extensively. That game was 4th edition D&D. So, a lot of 4e fans are kinda sensitive about designers going on about having "fixed" some problem or "found" some solution....when that solution is functionally just D&D 4e. And you'll note that Mearls does not, even once, mention 4e--even though he's essentially reinvented 4e powers right from the jump.

Three, it seems clear that Mearls' primary goal is to leave the Wizard's total power functionally untouched, which likely isn't going to sit well with 4e fans, since there's still quite a gap between an optimized Wizard and an optimized Fighter, even if we presume that his proposal worked perfectly as proposed. That opens up reasonable questions about whether he has in fact "realized his mistakes", or is just pivoting from focusing on one mistake to focusing on a different mistake (at least in some folks' eyes; obviously there are

As apparently the only person on earth who has had a campaign go 1st to 20 (or higher) in 2e*, 3e, and 5e, I pity the rest of you who do not know the glory of high level play.

*One 2e campaign started at 20ish and went to upper demigod using the original WotC ttrpg product "The Primal Order".

My games routinely go to 16-18.

 

[Artamo]

I’m neutral on the idea here but I also don’t know that I’ve ever encountered the problem described at the table. I have seen people struggle with high level play but I think that was more because we played a high level adventure with brand new characters rather than play up through the levels. There’s a difference between learning a character and their abilities over time, and being overwhelmed all at once. But I’ve only made it to what I would call high level play a couple of times…period.

So is this really about players struggling with high level wizards, or is it about the scarcity of high level play at all?

 

[Tigris]

So is this really about players struggling with high level wizards, or is it about the scarcity of high level play at all?

i would say having rarely people play high levels has to do also with people struggling.

I see regularily even in low levels people struggle with spells and we lose time to look up exact wordings of spells.

 

[Artamo]

i would say having rarely people play high levels has to do also with people struggling.

I see regularily even in low levels people struggle with spells and we lose time to look up exact wordings of spells.

Rule language at the table can definitely be an issue. I was playing a Shadow of the Weird Wizard game and while I do like the system, I noticed a lot of spells and ability had multiple component parts. Knowing them ahead of time helps, but looking something up that you’re unfamiliar with at the table can bog things down. But it is also something that gets easier with familiarity, and there are so many games that have complexity curves, not even in just the TTRPG space.

 

[Horwath]

One of the reasons I stopped playing 5E mainly. It's bloated AF. Even level 1 characters have way to many abilities and powers etc. Get a few levels in and it's worse. I recall my players constantly forgetting abilities etc.

what?
1st level characters are mechanically boring AF to play.
Sure you can roleplay any level to what ever degree, but combat?

anything before level 5/6 is snoozefest mechanically.

 

[Horwath]

i would say having rarely people play high levels has to do also with people struggling.

I see regularily even in low levels people struggle with spells and we lose time to look up exact wordings of spells.

from what I have seen in 99% of the cases it's the problem of "I don't give a sh#", and I can't be bothered to read PHB and actually learn the rules of the game I am playing", those people play cause everyone play and they do not want to miss out.

For those is: here is your human champion fighter with sword&board!
you have 2 abilities: walk and kill.
we will turn Second wind and Action surge into +1 HP per level and +1 attack and damage.

 

[Remathilis]

I think this thread shows that any attempt to "fix" 5e results in recreating Pathfinder 2e or Shadowdark. 5e was the compromise edition, everyone's second favorite version and the one that nobody loves but everyone agrees to play. With that in mind, WotC was absolutely correct to update it rather than create 6e. Any attempt to actually fix it will result with it losing to more seasoned options by the OS community or Paizo. I think WotC should keep its niche as the Goldilocks game (not too crunchy, not too bland, boringly predictable and comfortingly reliable) because 6e is going to get beaten at its own game if it tries anything else.

 

[Tigris]

from what I have seen in 99% of the cases it's the problem of "I don't give a sh#", and I can't be bothered to read PHB and actually learn the rules of the game I am playing", those people play cause everyone play and they do not want to miss out.

For those is: here is your human champion fighter with sword&board!
you have 2 abilities: walk and kill.
we will turn Second wind and Action surge into +1 HP per level and +1 attack and damage.

This is really not what I experience. I have this experience even with experienced people who know many classes and spells, but they forget some details about it etc.

And even beginners who have problem with the system do not want to play a champion fighter. The only person I know who liked the champion fighter is one guy who likes to min max and play a champion for a one shot.

 

[Tigris]

I think this thread shows that any attempt to "fix" 5e results in recreating Pathfinder 2e or Shadowdark. 5e was the compromise edition, everyone's second favorite version and the one that nobody loves but everyone agrees to play. With that in mind, WotC was absolutely correct to update it rather than create 6e. Any attempt to actually fix it will result with it losing to more seasoned options by the OS community or Paizo. I think WotC should keep its niche as the Goldilocks game (not too crunchy, not too bland, boringly predictable and comfortingly reliable) because 6e is going to get beaten at its own game if it tries anything else.

Definitly not.

PF2 is far far far away from what people want to create. People want to streamline things and make it easy to understand.

PF2 is exactly the opposite. It wants to create depth by complexity and has as the target audience people who like to feel clever by having system mastery.

Sure these people also play 5e and like to create overpowered multi class abstrusities, but PF2 is not in any way a fix for 5e.

PF2 is a game created for 1 specific target audience, which cares about complexity especially.

You can fix a lot of things in D&D without going anywhere in the PF2 direction. Making classes more balanced can be done in the 4e way, by giving martials also cool varied things with ressources, not just making basic attacks numerical superior.

Making high level wizards less complex is also about streamlining, the opposite of PF2.

 

[Horwath]

I think this thread shows that any attempt to "fix" 5e results in recreating Pathfinder 2e or Shadowdark. 5e was the compromise edition, everyone's second favorite version and the one that nobody loves but everyone agrees to play. With that in mind, WotC was absolutely correct to update it rather than create 6e. Any attempt to actually fix it will result with it losing to more seasoned options by the OS community or Paizo. I think WotC should keep its niche as the Goldilocks game (not too crunchy, not too bland, boringly predictable and comfortingly reliable) because 6e is going to get beaten at its own game if it tries anything else.

I think that 5E can be made both bland and crunchy at the same time.

it's just how you make feats(features) in the game.
I's all about ratio of active vs passive abilities
like you have champion vs battlemaster vs EK fighter.

sure wizard is a little harder to "make simple" but maybe you could sacrifice preparation slot to gain something extra for one prepared spell.

IE:
Fireball:
add +1 damage per damage die if you sacrifice one preparation slot.
remove all spell components and double range for one preparation slot
have all targets have disadvantage on save vs this spell for 3 preparation slot.
have fireball ignore fire resistance and deal half damage to fire immune targets for one preparation slot.
cast fireball as Bonus action for 2 preparation slots.

now you can have less spells prepared but certain spells are more powerful and it's all "passive" you write it down when preparing and don't need to think about it later.

maybe add that certain spell cannot be augmented more then once or twice.


maybe 5th level rogue does not need uncanny dodge so you don't need to think about it but gets +1 damage per sneak attack die.