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The Model T was a great product for Ford for over 20 years. But that doesn't mean that car would compare to modern standards. Time passes, we improve our products, and our bar of expectations gets higher. We forgive a system when it has issues, but we are far harsher if the system that follows...

It is possible that with all of the testing WOTC did in the early days of 5e, they just did not know people played 1-2 encounters per day instead of 6-8. I think someone needs to question how their playtest data was so messed up that they didn't catch this, but I can relent that point. However...

Since this is becoming a crux of some of this debate, we want to dig a bit more in the details. 2e. Alright if the fireball is 6d6, there is a 72.06% chance you will do enough damage to one-shot them, IF, they fail the saving throw. If they pass the save: Its 0%. I have no idea what 2e saving...

If a sizable portion of your player base is not playing the game to your settings....than yes that is a design flaw. For example, in boardgame design one of the most important elements is blind playtesting. Where you watch the players play with 0 interaction (and sometimes you don't even want...

Funny enough....I don't see your point. I think this was in response to some other critiques in another thread, but removing the answer from that thread removes all the nuance and context, and so we are left with a series of just statements...but I don't know what conclusion the statements even...

I do think this is a good technique for DMs to use. That said, there is a flaw here depending on your style of player. I find most of the time when I have players debating...the need to ask me questions to push to the decision. Ok how far away is that monster, am I capable of doing action X, etc...

This is also why 5e's system tends to favor control over damage. 5e's spell damage does does not autoscale (which is the principal measure of damage) but its DC do scale (which is the principal measure of control). In 3e you have all these spells, but you only have a few control spells at a...

I would argue one of the reasons for that is, when your in a single campaign, its the rule of fun right. So when a player with a big history wants to make a check about some magical X, the DM might finangle it a bit to make that history so the player can enjoy their bonus rather than arcane...

A capital ship that can shut off the fundamental force of inertia at a whim...the manueverability of those things should be insane.

One mechanic I created when I DMed 4e was "escalating damage" and "immediate damage". In 4e, it was common to have an effect do 5 damage at the start of your turn. Then you would roll a saving throw (which is NOT a saving throw from 5e, closer to a 50/50 coin flip most of the time), to see if...

I will say this. 4e combat's could be long its true, and the grind in the early days was a real thing (that was thankfully fixed in later products). But as a DM I can say this about 4e, it was a lot easier to make encoutners engaging and interesting. There was something there about how they...

So just to ensure I'm being fair, there are things about 4e that I think were great, but it had plenty of flaws as well. The number one issue was presentation. 4e reads like a textbook, not a player's guide. It is clinical, replacing flavor with cold, hyper formatted keywords. It really feels...

Right....which is basically what is happening right now. Instead of the 6 or so fights and then the boss fight, people are doing one warmup and then a boss, or just going straight into high challenge encounters. They are skipping all of the warmup. The attrition model isn't creating the...

Sure but that was my point. That one tweak had a massive impact on the experience of the game went for different groups.

Potions as a bonus action was such a popular 5e houserule, that is why they updated 2024 to make it canon. It makes consumables actually worth using.

It depends on what the meaning needs to be. If your goal is for each combat to have "meaning" in terms of challenging the party....well that's not happening now. The attrition model isn't working because people aren't using it (as the OP stated). So most fights are "meaningless" already in that...

What 4e tried to do was divide the "combat spells" and the "non-combat spells" into two different buckets. The combat spells were at-will/encounter/daily powers. And most were your old trusties like "fireball". They did make some of them encounter powers, and it mostly worked fine. The...

Case in point, the 3e cure light wound wand. Playing 3e without access to that wand (or some equivalent of it) is a NIGHT AND DAY different experience.

There was a minor amount of attrition in 4e based on what you described, especially around the dailies. But the healing surges was more of a binary element. Losing surges wasn't a big deal, it did not stop your ability to go "full out" in a fight. But once your surges got low or to 0, that was...

Ford's Model T once made a lot of money. I'm glad they never fixed anything or improved upon it.