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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6664073" data-attributes="member: 996">5e, even moreso than usual, is as good as the DM running it.  If you're more enthusiastic and feel more Empowered running 5e, that will be reflected in the experience of your players. So, they aren't playing casters or haven't reached 3rd level yet?   I mean, a 1st level 4e character has 4 powers, a 1st level 5e caster has two cantrips and prepares several spells, any one of which might be cast with the 3 slots available.  That's not a reduction in options.  Slots & spell levels vs class level vs character level and save DCs and proficiency and so forth are all jargon to the genuinely-new player, too, they're just jargon that's familiar if you've played before.  And, I don't see how having your 4 options neatly in front of you is less complicated than looking up your 6 or 7 options from an alphabetical list of 350+, either.  Nonsense.  Casters have more round-to-round options, not fewer, there are more classes and more sub-classes in the PH1 than ever.  This is not an option-lite or rules-lite edition of the game from the PoV of a new player approaching it for the first time.  It's familiar to us, and it's less bloated than late 2e or 3.5/PF or Essentials+, so it seems 'lite' because we're already used to lifting most of what's there, and notice the stuff that's not.  Your players are probably benefiting from your experience in that respect.  Even players who learned 4e aren't that 'new,' they're used to the d20 system and to dealing with lots of choices, even if those choices are presented in a legacy manner that might be unfamiliar....Now, I will agree that a 5e DM can present a simplified face of the game to new players, via the basic resolution:  player describes action, DM rules on how it will be resolved, DM describes results.  Give out some pre-gens and the new player can be isolated from much of the minutiae of the game, with the DM providing a sort of power-steering assist to the bits they do interact with.  And, that's a good thing, IMHO.  5e is ideal for an experienced DM, whether running for long-time players or complete newbies.   Not true, if you base your hand-waving on what's happening at table, in the moment, to make a good experience.  You're not modding the rules, you're ruling on the situation.  5e lends itself very neatly to that kind of DM judgement. A robust system is one that's balanced in spite of how you use it, not one that's balanced in spite of how you /change/ it - that latter's simply not possible.  And, it has to be balanced up-front.  5e doesn't have any kind of robust balance, because balance isn't front-loaded, it's left to the DM.  Adding the kind of balanced-choice complexity 5e lacks would be a matter of game-design, morese than system mastery, and, yes, that's not easy at all.  You can absolutely hand-wave complexity in 5e (and it does have a fair bit of it to hand-wave, even if there are some classes that are pretty simplistic in their available in-play options), and there's little risk of balance being harmed by doing so, since balance is something the DM is already empowered to impart upon the game in the measure he finds works best for his group.  In that sense, it takes care of itself, you can blow away any level of complexity you find unappealing in 5e, and impose the level of 'balance' (w/in the player experience) you care to, in a single exercise of DM judgement.  You don't even have to consider the two separately.  5e is very organic in that sense, if you think of it in terms of play experience, rather than getting bogged down in the system.There's a difference between a new option that is strictly inferior (chaff for most everyone, trap for anyone suckered in by it), and a meaningful/viable new option (chaff only for those who aren't interested in whatever it models).</blockquote>

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