D&D 5E 2/11/13 L&L: This week in D&D

[Ratskinner]

With modern RPGs, I just could not see myself playing without skills, even if it is "roll your ability score or less to do X". I'm not sure how many people might agree with me, but I would look very poorly on a game that didn't have some sort of skill system boiled into it. I think I could even say I wouldn't buy it nowadays.

I feel som,ething similar, but I could be convinced otherwise if it is over all good and provide other means of pc differrentiation.

I doubt that (other than the adventure, maybe) the Basic box will be targeting many posters on this board as their main game. However, if the big box adventures all come with pre-gens and are playable almost out of the box in "basic mode", that vastly increases WotC's audience for those products. The fact that players of Standard D&D can pick them up and ignore the pre-gens would just be gravy.

Yes, I know the skill system isn't a requeriment for completeness, however we know the basic game is going to feature a limited skill system (you get a skill dice to ability checks of a given ability score) but in said limited skill system you are entirely devoid of choice, you are stuck with what is most stereotypical for your class. And that lack of choice artificially reduces the system longevity. Roleplaying can easilly account for what isn't there, but clashes when it is rigidly defined. Either we get no skill system at all, or we get choice.

What if there are 5 different Fighters with different races and backgrounds that change how their bonuses are distributed, and there is similar variety amongst the other "big four" classes?