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It definitely helps to use some of the optional rules in the DMG, such as Cleaving Through Creatures (p. 272) and Handling Mobs (p. 250). This lets you have the hordes of gobbos without too much slowdown. 5E doesn't have swarm or pack rules beyond what's in Handling Mobs, but I think a good way...

I don't know their data specifically, or their general structure, but a mechanism that more clearly reveals the intent of the user would very much improve the nature of the data, so long as it was cheap to gather and consistently filled out. Otherwise there's uncontrolled heterogeneity in the...

The U1-3 series was published a few years after the 1E PHB was released. The date on U1 is 1981. The PHB is from 1978.

I've never checked out Numenera due to the really high likelihood of not being able to run it and not needing a lot of new books in my house, but I am a big fan of that kind of Gene Wolfe/Jack Vance style so far future its fantasy. So this would be pretty cool for me.

If it's just those, I agree with your point. I mean, Tales from the Yawning Portal was rather... appropriately named. However, I could see a nice setup for a campaign that expands things out, making use of the Saltmarsh series as a basis.

It was very loosely set in Greyhawk. I ran Saltmarsh (but not the other two) in my own campaign world. I ran that in 1999 and, with a number of lengthy pauses, that game is still going! The PCs are 11th level (in 2E that's pretty good) and they're now world-hopping through the Astral.

I'm running Desert of Desolation now. This is a great series which would be a fantastic rerelease. Not a "spiritual successor" like some of the other things they've done which references it the way Greta Van Fleet cops Led Zeppelin's sound, but the real deal. There's just so much there...

When you have a fairly numerate fan base, expect issues like the fact that the percentage of Life Clerics exceeds the percentage of Clerics to generate a WTF?!? reaction. This happened because comparing the one-way margin of subclasses is a strange thing to do. Not actually having your data, I'd...

They do, but WotC's propensity to put lots of DM information in means that those books are largely or mostly for DMs, with only fairly minimal player info, often not enough to drive sales to players. Just considering my own group, only one person bought Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. While it does...

You're welcome. I'm a firm believer that one needs to acknowledge the presence of luck in many situations. It's way too easy to analyze situations in hindsight. Yeah, I don't quite get that either. From knowing someone in the publishing world, one thing that is a fairly hard constraint they...

If you could multis in the simple way there's going to be a lot of double counting and thus, you're right it would mess up the class breakdowns. Cleric and fighter are both very common level dips, just as an example.

They did add a good bit to DND Beyond recently, so, for instance you can now add extra feats, skills, etc., without too much pain, say to accommodate a campaign that gave all PCs a bonus feat at first level. It's still fairly rough to integrate a home built race or class. It can be done by...

I don't pretend to know WotC's strategy. I do get their point about releasing too many player options (see prior editions for why) and trying to present fratricidal competition among their own releases. From a sales standpoint, starving the market before releasing Xanathar's meant it really...

tl;dr: If all these data are being used for is to confuse and/or amuse some posters on EnWorld, no harm. If decisions are actually being made from them, for instance to guide future product development, I'm not sure that would be a good analysis, at least as presented. I'm not 100% sure what...

It also has a propensity to generate misleading "facts" that last long past when they were shown to be in error. I agree that there are some clear problems in the data as presented. In particular, it looks like the subclass numbers are actually conditional probabilities that are being listed as...

You didn't, but the implication was that these data (and experiences on DM's Guild) justified WotC's decision to focus on DM content and to release no "splatbooks" of player options. Hands down, the best selling release WotC made was Xanathar's; most of the sales were driven by players wanting...

Not sure I agree there. At least when it comes to third party content, PC options are things that generally require DM permission, which necessarily limits the sales, whereas DMs often buy things they may or may not use. Xanathar's sold quite well. It was featured in the window at the Amazon...

I think what "useless" meant was "miscalculated." As in "how is it that the subclass percentage exceeds that of the base class given that all life clerics are, necessarily, clerics?" That's really, really... weird. Part of it might be due to the fact that archetype is only chosen at particular...

IQ tests are certainly not total garbage. They're highly useful in many circumstances, for instance generating an assessment of a low performing student for learning disabilities. However, what they are is more limited than people tend to think. Other than that, I agree---Maher is a smug...

Movies had a much easier market 40 years ago. Most people didn't even have a video cassette recorder or cable. Once VCRs and cable hit, the "let's go to the movies" started dying out. Now with streaming, forget it. I generally think so but I think nominally the same hobby could well change...