Parmandur
Book-Friend, he/him
Oh, add that to my pile of Likes.
D&D General D&D Evolutions You Like and Dislike [+]
- Thread starter Reynard
- Start date
Remathilis
Legend
It annoyed me to no end that there was no percentile intelligence, wisdom or dexterity for other classes to access. I guess it was supposed to give warrior types a bonus over non warriors, but if so it was locked behind "naturally" rolling an 18 for your strength. I had completely patched it out prior to 3e, mostly adjusting the numbers a bit and nobody missed it.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Yeah, me too, for about five minutes bask in the day. Then I realized what they were going for, just blamed Conan, and stopped worrying about it.
The natural-18 strength requirement serves to nicely make exceptional strength the long tail on the bell curve that it's supposed to be.
This does, however, assume honest (or closely supervised) dice rolling.
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
Big 3 Likes:
Big 3 Dislikes:
- Actually thinking about game design. D&D was designed by vibes for a long time before anyone thought about the impact those mechanics would have in play. Starting at about 3e, the people at the helm started thinking more about how to actually use the rules at the table, and it's been a huge benefit. Bounded accuracy, advantage/disadvantage, class balance, unified XP tables, these are very good things.
- Imagination & Inclusivity. A more diverse game that is less closely wedded to specific historical or fantasy tropes is a game that can explore ideas and themes and kinds of fun that weren't in the original. D&D is fundamentally a game (a toy, some might say) about make-believe, and that is something that should be celebrated and encouraged.
- Simplicity-focused design. This is sort of a combo of the above points in that the threshold for playing D&D is already VERY high. We do not need it to be any higher than necessary. Character builds and feat tier lists and such are things that the game has been moving away from, and this is Good.
Big 3 Dislikes:
- Encounter focus over Dungeon/Narrative focus. Attrition, resource management, strategic thinking, these are good bits of game design that deserve to be leveraged over a whole session. Combats should be fast and tight, as part of an overall experience in the session, but they are in practice meandering and heavy with too many decision points, too much time dedicated to them, and with most of the fun buttons being things you get to do in a fight, it steals focus from the other areas of the game. This kind of crystalized for me after seeing what Draw Steel is, in that I am not looking for a monster fighting game for my TTRPG. Monster fighting is necessary in my TTRPG, but I do not want to play a game that is ABOUT monster fighting.
- Lack of innovation on the Social / Exploration side. There's been a little, but I think it's an area that TTRPG designers in general are challenged by. In a game of make-believe, it's easy enough to pretend to have a conversation or describe an exploration, but there's a lack of impactful options, tactics, or strategy here that can be addressed. There are ideas and mechanics out there, but they're foreign enough to D&D and often lack D&D's characteristic crunch. Some OSR games are doing interesting things with exploration that future D&D could back into (encumbrance, light, etc.). The social side is still very much in "Do whatever you can imagine!" territory, which doesn't help players who need a bit more. Ironically, the improvements in Alignment's rules have made this a bit worse as editions have marched on.
- B R A N D I N G. D&D as a brand to market rather than as a product to be sold. Aesthetics and tropes without much significance or meaning. "I understood that reference!" without understanding why things are that way or what power they have. Stop just looting cool stuff and think about why those cool things are the way they are, please and thank you.
dave2008
Legend
Oh, is that Jim Halloway art?! I also loved his stuff. He was the best add in the 1e MM2 art.
dave2008
Legend
IDK, I just looked through it again and there are a few good works (most if not all the good ones are recycled art I think) but man the overall art and graphic design I find incredibly uninspiring.
dave2008
Legend
Most of the art in the 2e PHB is black and white (or blue and white). Or are you taking about the later release with different art. I am talking about the original 2e PHB with stuff like this:
Marc17
Explorer
Likes:
2E: Crits and non-Weapon Proficiencies - There were countless home brew rules for crits and skills, many of which we liked more, but those were good enough and pretty much standardized what was typically radically different between many games.
3E: Unified XP chart, ascending AC, large skill system, more intuitive saves, and crafting rules.
5E: That they posit Interaction and Exploration are also pillars of D&D. Lifestyles, downtime actions, and bastions.
2E: Crits and non-Weapon Proficiencies - There were countless home brew rules for crits and skills, many of which we liked more, but those were good enough and pretty much standardized what was typically radically different between many games.
3E: Unified XP chart, ascending AC, large skill system, more intuitive saves, and crafting rules.
5E: That they posit Interaction and Exploration are also pillars of D&D. Lifestyles, downtime actions, and bastions.
dave2008
Legend
Somehow I missed your reply until now! Thank you for taking the time to respond. I don't agree with your desire, but I understand your frustration. For me, the art direction of most of 2e and into 3e bothered me enough that I mostly lost interest in the game. 1e and 5e are the height of D&D art for me (for often different reasons).
TwoSix
The Year of the TwoSix
I'm talking about the 1989 PHB, the one with the fighter charging with the orange-y background. I don't have it handy, but I remember it having like at least 8-10 different full page color art work. I think this one is the most famous.
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