D&D General 5E, A5E, or ToV?

[Morrus]

Has anyone at this point done a comparison of the ToV rules versus 5e that highlights the changes and overall design differences?

It's super new, but I'm sure there will be soon!

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

Seems like an odd subforum for you to be posting in then!

Do you hang around the Porsche forums to tell them their cars are too fast?

Some people hang out in the D&D forums saying D&D sucks and [their preferred game] is better, even though there is a forum for their game. shrug

 

[Mull Ponders]

We play 5e with A5e monsters and luck from ToV. One choice doesn't describe it adequately.

 

[Retreater]

I haven't seen ToV yet, but would want to try A5e first since I already own the books.

 

[RangerWickett]

I worked on A5E a bit, and while I like a lot of the intention, for now I stick with O5E, though O5E also doesn't really work the way I wish it did.

A5E definitely lets you make distinctive characters. Even two fighters will play differently. But much of the new content feels (understandably) mounted on atop the existing O5E chassis. I imagine a 2nd edition of A5E (A5E2E?) could make all the little flourishes feel more integrated and elegant.

E.g., dividing 'races' into heritages and cultures is great, but some of the cultures are very broad and some are weirdly specific in ways that I think would have been better achieved by making a 'pick and choose' suite of options to build your own culture, and then having a half-dozen examples.

That's just my preference, though. I don't like systems with tons of widgets. I would prefer a game with "energy blast" as a spell, with some ways for it to scale, and some options to personalize it, and a few fun, thematic examples to inspire players, rather than having 75 different spells that often feel just finicky enough that resolving them slows the game down: acid splash, ray of frost, sacred flame, scorching ray, magic missile, burning hands, acid arrow, etc etc.

 

[Deset Gled]

• Official D&D (2014)
• Level Up: Advanced 5E (2021)
• Takes of the Valiant/Black Flag (2024)

I am passingly familiar with Black Flag but I did not recognize the "ToV" abbreviation at all.

Moving past that, if 5e: The Next Generation wasn't coming out soon I'd be making an effort to convince my group to try A5e. But right now the group is content to stick with 5e and see what comes out later this year. The fact that I am not the DM also factors into this heavily.

 

[Shardstone]

I have to say, I looooove seeing how many people here are mixing and matching systems from different 5E games. I've long since wanted an OSR but for 5E where there is a culture about hacking your game from the available options to get what's best for your table; however, for a long time, everyone just used core WotC books. I know there are more options now, but regardless of the reason, this is dope.

 

[Remathilis]

So far, my intention is to stick with 5e/5.2 when it's out. I might use things from A5e or ToV to augment, but I have no intention of replacing 5.2 options with them .

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm an A5e fan through and through, everything it does differently from WotC is an improvement as far as I'm concerned. That being said, I am happy to incorporate elements from a variety of 5e games, even WotC, if I like them.

 

[jayoungr]

I'm not very interested in the new "Balkanized" landscape of 5E variants. The core game does what I want, and I don't want to bother with keeping track of each microvariant's peculiarities. I'm not even sure I'll bother with 5E 2024.