D&D 5E Additive versus subtractive modularity

[Nebulous]

Just perusing the spell list and I see 5 different resolution mechanics being used. This is just for spells in the Basic set. I mean I suppose its too much to ask to just have one singular resolution mechanic (d20 attack vs target number or always a saving throw for example) for all spells, but is it completely necessary for 5 variants on "roll d20, add some stuff, compare it to this other thing and see what happens" in the Basic game alone? That doesn't exactly scream "streamlined, simple core" (not sure if that was even a design intent though). I thought I recalled outcries against extraneous, fiddly stuff not too long ago.

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My theory....they tried the opposite in 4th edition. Everything was streamlined, consolidated, identical, workable and balanced and the fan base largely rejected it.

I love having different spell subsystems. It keeps it interesting. 5e does what I like, it totally works for me. Having everything vanilla and identical in 4e sucked the life out of the magic system and i despised it. But, that's just me, plenty of folks liked it for exactly that reason.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Basically 4E. Rapid overnight healing, +2nd wind+ HD based healing.

It's interesting how perspectives differ on this. From what you're saying, 100% healing, Second Wind for a single, specific class (as opposed to a generic ability), and HD (which are carefully used so they don't interact with any class/monster abilities and thus can be easily removed) mean "4E won!".

Whereas for me, from a 4E perspective, that seems like a pretty strong move away from 4E's model. Specifically:

1) Healing overnight was rarely a big issue in 4E, in practice, it was there largely to simplify book-keeping, rather than to "fix you up" (regaining all your Healing Surges was a far more important part of it, generally speaking - you don't even regain all your HD by default in 5E, I note).

2) Second Wind was a big 4E thing, I agree - but only because it was available to all classes, and metered by Healing Surges. The thing they've called Second Wind in 5E is a cool power, but it isn't in any way 4E's Second Wind, because it is class-specific and totally un-metered.

3) HD are only superficially similar to Healing Surges. They are actually close to the opposite, design-wise.

Healing Surges are the absolute core of 4E's healing system. Everything about it revolves around them. They allow you to potentially heal between 200% and 400% of your HP, per day, in practice (depending on a bunch of factors), sometimes even higher (with healing-oriented Clerics around, for example). But it is they who determine if you can be healed. If you're out of Healing Surges, you're in trouble.

HD completely excluded from 5E's core healing system, by design intent. Nothing revolves around them. They are simply a form of "bonus healing" that replaces stuff like bandaging in earlier editions, are actually more limited in many ways (especially at lower levels). Assuming default HP and no CON bonus, you can likely regain 60-90% of your HP with HD - vastly lower than you could via Healing Surges (even a class with only six healing surges, which I think was about as low as it went, and only using Second Wind and resting, could regain 150% of their HP in 4E D&D - any help at at all, or more surges, and it was vastly higher).

Please note that, as per the Basic set, 5E has no bandaging or equivalent, and Healers Kits can only be used to Stabilize people (they have no other formal purpose), and Medicine skill only to Stabilize people or diagnose illnesses. I presume DMs would allow more uses for it, and players find them, but there's no rules for bandaging or anything similar, that I can find.

So for me, it definitely isn't "basically 4E". It's not a "numbers" or "semantics" thing, either - it's a fundamentally different design, and one which doesn't actually closely resemble ANY previous edition of D&D. It looks a bit like 4E, in the same way that, at a glance, but it's a superficial resemblance at best.

Having followed the discussions of what they were going to do with healing in 5E pretty closely during development, to me it looks like they didn't "pick a side" at all, but rather they made a compromise decision. The sides, from what they were saying, appeared to be "like 4E" and "like 3E", by and large, and what we've got isn't really like either.

YMMV, etc.!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

My theory....they tried the opposite in 4th edition. Everything was streamlined, consolidated, identical, workable and balanced and the fan base largely rejected it.

I love having different spell subsystems. It keeps it interesting. 5e does what I like, it totally works for me. Having everything vanilla and identical in 4e sucked the life out of the magic system and i despised it. But, that's just me, plenty of folks liked it for exactly that reason.

The problem here is that the fan base did not "largely" reject 4E, to judge from sales, the continuing popularity of the DDI, and so on.

Rather 4E and PF together (for PF is not some innocent beneficiary here - it was a very calculated business), as well as the OSR stuff which had been emerging WELL before 4E was even envisioned, managed to split market to such a degree that 5E pretty much had to try something different to 4E. It was, I think, a much safer bet that plenty of 4E DMs/players would be okay with "old-fashioned" spells, than that OSR and/or PF DMs/players would be.*

I think you overstate how "vanilla and identical" 4E's magic actually was, though - especially if you look beyond PHB1. Of course this is 4E's biggest problem - it started out vastly less impressive than it became. If all of 4E had been PHB1/MM1-levels of "MEH", I suspect we'd have given up on it years ago. So it's hard to blame people for thinking the way you are here.

* = It's definitely not a completely safe bet, though - both the "new to RPGs" players in my 4E group loooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaathe the 5E style of spellcasting. They really bloody hate it. They have not been encouraged to think that way, either - I always put a positive spin on whatever I am running, and found myself arguing for the benefits for 5E's system during the playtests I did! But gosh, those two, who are not 4E fanatics (happy to play other RPGs), they just do not like spell memorization/preparation, lots of spell slots, nor spells with mechanics such that you need to read the entire spell in detail to understand how they work.

Obviously, they can "just not play casters", but when one of them is the only player I've ever met who enjoys playing Clerics and healers generally, and the other pretty much always wants to be a robed finger-wiggler, conceptually, it's kind of an issue...

I'm not saying "5E NEEDS TO CHANGE MAAAAN!", just that, the spell system they've gone with - wow some people REALLY hate that (I don't, to me it just looks like a much better version of 1/2/3E's system, which I survived!).

I dunno what I'll do with them in practice if I run 5E. Mostly hoping I end up playing rather than running and don't have to deal with the issue! Maybe the alternate spell-point system will somehow fix things (both of them have played plenty of spell-point-based CRPGs happily enough).

 

[Nebulous]

I think you overstate how "vanilla and identical" 4E's magic actually was, though - especially if you look beyond PHB1. Of course this is 4E's biggest problem - it started out vastly less impressive than it became. If all of 4E had been PHB1/MM1-levels of "MEH", I suspect we'd have given up on it years ago. So it's hard to blame people for thinking the way you are here.


I dunno what I'll do with them in practice if I run 5E. Mostly hoping I end up playing rather than running and don't have to deal with the issue! Maybe the alternate spell-point system will somehow fix things (both of them have played plenty of spell-point-based CRPGs happily enough).

yeah, i heard through the grapevine that Essentials was a big improvement in 4e, but by then i'd quit playing. If Essentials had been 4e out of the gate things might be different, it's hard to say.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

yeah, i heard through the grapevine that Essentials was a big improvement in 4e, but by then i'd quit playing. If Essentials had been 4e out of the gate things might be different, it's hard to say.

I think if they'd avoided the idiotic negative marketing, and come out with Essentials-style stuff initially, and MM3-style monsters (which obviously, would be impossible, because those were the result of them learning about what worked and what didn't!), then 4E wouldn't be anywhere near as divisive. PF would still have been popular, I think, because so many people were using it more for the APs and backwards-compatibility than love of the rules, but yeah... paths not taken and all that...

I hope 5E can continue to stay away from negative marketing. The last thing D&D needs is the marketplace even more fragmented.

 

[Manbearcat]

I can think of two reasons why we'd see such an admixture:

1) Many designers were working on spells and the resolution mechanics were relaxed as a constraint to permit the speed necessary for completion.

2) No single resolution mechanic envisioned gave the precise resolution probabilities the designers imagined and that level of precision was considered valuable.

I'm going with the first.

A likely surmise. I'd go with that too.

My theory....they tried the opposite in 4th edition.

Or a combination of both of these. 5e's design ethos and attendant system is clearly and presently allergic to the ethos and most relevant system components of 4e (the ones that are the bedrock of the system and produce the unique play experience).

 

[Tony Vargas]

I mean, I know it's your opinion and all, same as mine, but D&D has always tried to garner new players.

It's not my opinion that WotC is trying to appeal to the whole fan-base, in spite of (and specifically to 'heal') the rifts of the edition war, they've come out and said. They've also said they want to attract new players, but the way they talk about doing that is by making the game more like it was when /they/ were new players. That strikes me (my opinion, now) as either a mistake, or just another way to appeal to the existing fan-base (nostalgia - play the game that's like it was when you were young!)

Do you realize how many gazillion 10-13 year olds are going to download the Basic Rules, love it, and then beg their parents to buy them the Starter set and then the advanced?

I do not have that data, and don't think you do, either. But, I'd be shocked if there was any awareness at all of the new ed of D&D among that demographic. Heck, in spite of 2 years of public playtesting, I still bump into existing fans who are barely aware of it.

What's WotC doing to create awareness - let alone demand - among potential new players?

And I cannot understand your "reasoning" that 1st level characters will drive away new players. I disagree completely, I think it would fascinate and attract them.

The 1st level of 5e is a low-hp, high-danger crapshoot. Genuinely-new player need a more forgiving first experience then that. Unless, as I said, the idea is to appeal to old players wanting to introduce new players to the old traditions of D&D in a sort of indoctrination or hazing ritual. ("Yeah, we all died. Dhat's because we didn't have a cleric: 1st rule of real D&D, always have a cleric.... Yeah, we all died. Second rule: never split the party....&c")

But just the idea that a set of new players will buy the starter box, one of them will DM, and that randomly deadly 1st level won't result in confusion, disappointment and frustration enough to drive at least some of them away, strikes me as unduly optimistic, and maybe smacking of projecting long-time D&Der attitudes and expectations on said new players. I'm not saying you'll never get new players to try the game - D&D does have /some/ name recognition in the mainstream - I'm just saying that 1st level is set up to enchant old players looking for nostalgia, not new ones trying to understand & enjoy the game for the first time.

Obviously, it's not something we're going to get to see first hand, since any group of new players we get to see first hand is going to be influenced by the old hand watching over them. Nor are we likely to hear testimonials from potential new player who never heard of, never try, or try and immediately give up on, the latest D&D.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I dunno what I'll do with them in practice if I run 5E. Mostly hoping I end up playing rather than running and don't have to deal with the issue! Maybe the alternate spell-point system will somehow fix things (both of them have played plenty of spell-point-based CRPGs happily enough).

Funny, I have the opposite feeling. I'm not exactly itching to play 5e, but I was happy to run the playtest as much as I could. I ran AD&D for a long time, that's a lot of hard-won skill & experience that didn't apply much to running 3.5 (which I didn't much care for running, though I liked playing it and enjoyed the nigh-separate-mini-game of crafting builds) or 4e (which was just very easy to run, almost 'too easy' if you're used to a greater challenge). I'm quite looking forward to running 5e once there's enough interest at my FLGS. The playtest never attracted much interest (one table worth of players, /some/ seasons), but I'm hoping actual books on the shelves will do the trick.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Funny, I have the opposite feeling. I'm not exactly itching to play 5e, but I was happy to run the playtest as much as I could. I ran AD&D for a long time, that's a lot of hard-won skill & experience that didn't apply much to running 3.5 (which I didn't much care for running, though I liked playing it and enjoyed the nigh-separate-mini-game of crafting builds) or 4e (which was just very easy to run, almost 'too easy' if you're used to a greater challenge). I'm quite looking forward to running 5e once there's enough interest at my FLGS. The playtest never attracted much interest (one table worth of players, /some/ seasons), but I'm hoping actual books on the shelves will do the trick.

I can't think of any meaningful DM skills or experience that I gained from a decade of 2E that DO apply to 5E, but DIDN'T apply to 3.XE or 4E, or any of a hundred other RPGs. That seems pretty odd.

 

[Emerikol]

The problem here is that the fan base did not "largely" reject 4E, to judge from sales, the continuing popularity of the DDI, and so on.

Largely is too much I agree. I do think though that a significant market share that Wotc formerly held was lost due to 4e's approach on certain things. Significant as in the 50% range give or take 10%.

I'm not saying "5E NEEDS TO CHANGE MAAAAN!", just that, the spell system they've gone with - wow some people REALLY hate that (I don't, to me it just looks like a much better version of 1/2/3E's system, which I survived!).

I believe there is a cadre but that cadre is small and most 4e players are more like yourself than the cadre. Whereas, those who really love traditional magic are very much willing to vote with their feet.


As for healing. There are two major views. 4e and 5e come from the same viewpoint even though the actual rules are different. 1e,2e, and 3e at least allowed for the other view to flourish even if some people were still using the first view.