D&D 5E 8/5/2013 Playtest: Exploration Rules - Do they make surprise too common?

[Stalker0]

Looking over the new exploration rules, you basically have two ways in which you can surprised:

1) The other group sneaked by you.
2) You failed your readiness check.

Since in theory every malicious encounter will start with a readiness check, it seems that a good portion of your party will start nearly every combat surprised.

Am i missing something, overreacting? Because right now it looks like to me that wisdom is way more important than dex for initiative. Who cares about going first in a round....if i don't get to go at all.

 

[GX.Sigma]

Seems alright to me, since PCs always win initiative anyway.

 

[Warbringer]

[MENTION=6690511]GX.Sigma[/MENTION]

You have not played in my games

 

[Klaus]

Well, a single feat negates that.

And a Horde Breaker ranger with Pack Awareness and the Alert feat makes the *entire party* immune to surprise.

 

[I'm A Banana]

...which basically indicates that it's really really binary. Not sure if that's a good thing. Pretty sure it's not? The expectation should be that there is no surprise, but a party trying to gain surprise should generally (60-75%) succeed at it.