D&D (2024) 4e design in 5.5e ?

[Garthanos]

Yeah. The parts of 4e I was fond of ended up in PF2 (tight math, unique monster design, rituals, cool stuff for martials, modular character design, skills that matter). The parts I was less fond of ended up in 5e.

I am certain things I like are missed by both . For instance for me, one thing I call the sense of empowered skills where you know that skill can "match" the utility of magic. Between Skill Challenges, Skill Powers(explicitly a match for utility spells) and Martial Practices (explicitly intended to be a match for rituals), and even basic things in the skill description show this Acrobatics lets you do something like feather fall, and Arcana let's you detect magic and so on.

I know you are a big fan of PF2 so you can use this as an opportunity to refute my take..

PF2 has a bit of it but It (their skills have a certain measure of potence) but it really does look like spells are just as potent or more so and more reliable and have less random hijinks than skills.

(In 5e there is an unsettling ease in determining which class or character will likely be more effective == "how much magic do they have", heck the best melee build designed to defend is 85 or so percent caster - yes a wizard)