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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 7190177" data-attributes="member: 29398">Yes it was, if memory serves.Many of which are absolutely spot-on.And determine the general story as well, where one existed. Combine that with limited if any playtesting and the recipe for disaster is complete. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Overall, this is perhaps the biggest shift...the loss - be it perceived or real - of a DM's authority to remove unwanted aspects from her game.And let's face it, if someone really wants to break the game they can, in any edition.  To me, not deliberately trying to break the game is just a matter of playing in good faith.  Unfortunately, some players simply don't get this concept; leading to ever-tighter and ever-blander rules for the rest of us...though in fairness 5e has tried to backpedal on this a bit.I didn't think the array method was default-by-RAW in any edition...yet.However, the introduction of it as first a trial-balloon option and then as a core option had the effects you note.Interesting and astute observation.It sometimes seems that character build has become more important than character play in some circles.Even more reason that standard-array will never be used here. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />It more or less matches my own in its general principle; and who cares about minor specifics.This is a big one.  Both as player and DM I still see it as the DM's game.Another aspect to this is the advent of the internet.  Things that weren't cared much about before except at some isolated tables (such as various versions of imbalance) are now out there for everyone to see - and complain about.The same thing happened in M:tG.  A lot of cards that were great in 1996 are pretty hopeless now.And the rules becoming the bigger (biggest?) part of the game comes as no surprise when the game is held by the same company responsible for M:tG - perhaps the rules-heaviest game that has ever existed.With the balance, however, came a previously-unseen degree of sameness, and in my view blandness.  The idea behind it was laudable in some ways, the execution...well...4e badly needed a very simple "starter" class, much like the 1e Fighter often was in its day, and just didn't have it.I knew a guy like this: good M:tG  player, but when he tried his hand at D&D (3e) it didn't go quite so well.And, the rules will probably be the same every place you play the same game.  Houseruling board games or card games happens, sure, but nowhere nearly as often as it does in RPGs; another big difference.This might be the one place where I disagree with your analysis, at least for 3 editions out of 5.In 1e, 2e and to a large degree 5e the rules mostly are there to tell you what can't be done.  After that, anything goes...if something isn't covered by a rule a player is free to try it and the DM has to figure out what comes of it if anything.  There weren't really any boundaries, and the rules were in many cases only guidelines anyway.In 3e-4e there was much more of a sense of the rules telling you the limits of what could be done, and if the rules didn't cover it the default was it could not be done.  Also, the rules were much more hard-and-fast; no guidelines here.  I gather some people play 5e this way as well, though rulings-not-rules as a philosophy would seem to want to fight this.Lan-"it might speak to my lack of optimization skills and-or desire that my favourite way to play M:tG is to grab some random cards, shuffle and shoot"-efan</blockquote>

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