D&D 5E Blog Post by Robert J. Schwalb

[Jester David]

OMG!! War!!! Huh! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!!!

Declaration of war? Really? The guy came to realize what he enjoyed most about gaming and realized that it had nothing to do with the number of mechanical widgets available to play with. He shares these thoughts with the world and suddenly he is declaring war?

That's kinda my point.
The problem isn't him, the problem is US.

If someone wrote what he wrote on a message board it would be seen as edition warring because he *gasp* dared to criticize the past two editions. As everyone knows you're only allowed to be critical of 2nd Edition and earlier.
You can make fun of THAC0 all you want but don't even think about saying Prestige Classes were flawed, Level Adjustment was a bad idea, Encounter powers were awkward, or characters were overly complex.

Honestly, a review of 3e or 4e done in standard review format would be considered "edition warring" now because it mentions cons and not just pros.

We know that. Because that's our reality. We have a somewhat unspoken agreement not to point out the problems in 3e and 4e or compare the two (which we break every time it's convenient).
Mr Schwab likely doesn't as he doesn't spend too much time on the forums, like us. He didn't say it here, he said it on his blog, on his own personal space.
And everyone here seems intent on censoring him and slamming him for edition warring and having an opinion.

 

[Umbran]

The truth always does.

Posting like this in a thread that's already seen a moderator warning is what we in the business call a "dumb maneuver". Seriously bad judgement.

Look, folks, we understand having a passion for the game. We wouldn't be here without it. But EN World does not support a One True Way, no singular "truth" of gaming. Slamming games without so much as a shred of constructive ideas being added is edition warring threadcrap, plain and simple.

And, quite frankly, we've had enough of it. In the last edition change, the moderation staff erred on the side of caution, and allowed a lot of crap. Do not expect that this time around. Expect, instead, that we'll hold you to showing respect for people, their opinions, and the games they play. You don't have to like other games, but you have to show you understand that good people, fellow gamers, love them. Spitting on things others love is rude.

We are not here to absorb your hostility, arrogance, or negativity. Keep it civil, keep it constructive.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

That's kinda my point.
The problem isn't him, the problem is US.

If someone wrote what he wrote on a message board it would be seen as edition warring because he *gasp* dared to criticize the past two editions. As everyone knows you're only allowed to be critical of 2nd Edition and earlier.
You can make fun of THAC0 all you want but don't even think about saying Prestige Classes were flawed, Level Adjustment was a bad idea, Encounter powers were awkward, or characters were overly complex.

Honestly, a review of 3e or 4e done in standard review format would be considered "edition warring" now because it mentions cons and not just pros.

We know that. Because that's our reality. We have a somewhat unspoken agreement not to point out the problems in 3e and 4e or compare the two (which we break every time it's convenient).
Mr Schwab likely doesn't as he doesn't spend too much time on the forums, like us. He didn't say it here, he said it on his blog, on his own personal space.

And everyone here seems intent on censoring him and slamming him for edition warring and having an opinion.

By that logic you are intent on censoring and slamming everyone here for having an opinion. Is that what you are doing?

Rhetorical question (unless you are!)

Schwalb has an opinion, and people agree/disagree. They express their opinions. This is not censorship.

Saying that 3/4E do not reward clever ideas at the table is not something any reasonable reviewer would say. They would indeed be an edition warrior if they said it. Schwalb says this. Accusation of edition warring is thus, superficially at least, valid. Reading entire bit, which he admits is "ranty" does nothing to dismiss opinion that this is edition warring.

Calling something that is not "censorship". Schwalb is not posting here. He is free to edition war. To dismiss. To belittle. To be inaccurate or unfair. He chose to be so, pointing that out is not censorship. You fundamentally do not understand what censorship is, if you believe that (I imagine you are using hyperbole, rather than not understanding, but it is very poor hyperbole).

He wrote an interesting piece which makes one think. It would have been a better piece, I feel, if it had used different language, because it's outright wrong, abjectly so, if taken at face value. Writing style and word choice is his decision.

TLDR: If we seek to censor him, you seek to censor us. Do you?

 

[The Black Ranger]

I believe the main here is with the term "edition warring". These two words have become the universal catch all that people can use to stop anyone from saying anything negative about a previous edition. I think the term gets used way too loosely to the point where nobody can have a decent and legit criticism.

I think this was merely an opinion that was directed at anyone. He stated what "he" thought about it. If I told you I liked blue and you told me that you didn't because of XYZ, then that should be okay. Now if you sat there and tried to tell me that I shouldn't like blue because of XYZ then that is where the mistake comes in.

We should be able to give our opinions, with in reason, without someone shouting "edition war" because they know it will get the mods running. I hope these boards don't become like the Wizard's one. I stopped posting there because we were almost forced to only say positive things about an edition. We learn from the critiques.

 

[Jester David]

By that logic you are intent on censoring and slamming everyone here for having an opinion. Is that what you are doing?
Rhetorical question (unless you are!)

No, it's what we as a community are doing.
(Me as a person and fine with the blog post and solidly agree with him.)

Schwalb has an opinion, and people agree/disagree. They express their opinions. This is not censorship.

But it's not just disagreeing. It's dismissing his entire post because of a couple choice sentences. And I've seen more than one poster saying he shouldn't have written the blog, or that Mistwell shouldn't have posted it here. His intentions have been questions and his ability to design D&D5 has been called into doubt. He's been insulted for what he wrote: here, on WotC, in the blog's comments, and more directly (Facebook, Twitter).

He's very likely going to second guess posting anything again, or being much more cautious with his language. We've limited his self expression. That sounds like censorship to me.

Calling something that is not "censorship". Schwalb is not posting here. He is free to edition war. To dismiss. To belittle. To be inaccurate or unfair. He chose to be so, pointing that out is not censorship. You fundamentally do not understand what censorship is, if you believe that (I imagine you are using hyperbole, rather than not understanding, but it is very poor hyperbole).

He wrote an interesting piece which makes one think. It would have been a better piece, I feel, if it had used different language, because it's outright wrong, abjectly so, if taken at face value. Writing style and word choice is his decision.

Or, in other words, it would have been a better piece had he not said anything critical of 3e or 4e.

Because that's what matters. He cannot criticize because that's all we'll see. We'll all blow what he says out of proportion, exaggerate his claims, read between the lines because he had the balls not to like something in 3e/4e. He either writes what we want him to write how we want him to write it or we won't read what he says.
It doesn't matter if he's right. It doesn't matter if he's addressing an actual problem in the game. He cannot criticize the last two editions. That's taboo.

I've seen more than one poster come down on the blog for perpetuating the old stereotype that you cannot roleplay if you optimize. Even though nothing in the blog is about roleplaying. We're so familiar with some of the arguments he's making that we mentally fill in the gaps, and insert the arguments we expect.

Saying that 3/4E do not reward clever ideas at the table is not something any reasonable reviewer would say. They would indeed be an edition warrior if they said it. Schwalb says this. Accusation of edition warring is thus, superficially at least, valid. Reading entire bit, which he admits is "ranty" does nothing to dismiss opinion that this is edition warring.

Except that's such a small part of the post, and is only slightly related to his point. And yet that's all we want to talk about here.

And that's not even *really* what he says. He's pointing out that creative thinkers are overshadowed in the game by optimizers, and that the best way to win is not to be creative but to crunch the numbers.

He never says that you can't be clever, he says that the game doesn't reward that. Which is true. DM's reward clevering thinking. Or rather, good DMs reward clever thinking. The game however does not have rules for clever thinking. Rewarding clevering thinking is pretty much a house rule.
There's no "Creative Solutions" forum on the WotC Community, but there is a "Character Optimization" forum. 4e does more to encourage creativity in combat with Page 42 but, by design, those solutions are mechanically inferior to Encounter powers. The game incentivizes you to prioritize your own powers. And it's been well documented that the power cards of 4e can focus some people's attention: by giving them a series of explicit choices people choose from them rather than considering other solutions.
And 3e was even worse with its rules for everything and reality shaping spells. One the wizard was high enough level creative thinking went out the window, as the wiz can just reshape reality.

 

[Dungeoneer]

I'm probably chiming in on this thread too late to do anything but get lost in the flow, but I have a thought about char-op:

I don't believe the rise of charop has anything to do with 3e or 4e. The rise of charop has to do with the rise of the internet.

The charop community depends on being, well, a community. Different people try different things. They share ideas. They build on those ideas. Those big game-breaking builds don't appear out of thin air.

In the days of 2e there weren't big, easily accessible online forums were people could exchange charop ideas. People who were into min-maxing most likely had to do in isolation. It wasn't that the rules were less breakable or that the players were different or whatever. There was just less opportunity.

Basically what I'm saying is, D&D is just one more thing ruined by the internet.

People who don't think that 5e will be prone to charop are kidding themselves. You put enough minds together trying to break a set of rules and they will.

 

[billd91]

Thinking to look behind the wardrobe. No. That was never fun past age 12, for me or anyone I knew. That sort of "OH BUT YOU DIDN'T SAY YOU LOOKED BEHIND THE WARDROBE WHEN YOU SAID YOU SEARCHED THE ROOM LOLZ!" play, where every single action and idea had to be specifically narrated, was never fun for me as a teenager or adult, as a player or DM. It just seemed stupid. Groups clearly thought it was too. For example, my main group developed two mantras they related. The first, when they were progressing down a corridor, detailed how they were progressing cautiously, carefully, quietly and whilst looking at everything (I forget the exact wording of either, now), because they didn't want any gotchas or the like. The second was for searching rooms (again, the exact words are gone, because thankfully I've not heard it for nearly fifteen years), and it basically detailed how, no seriously, they carefully and quietly-as-possible searched everything, and didn't press any buttons, pull any levers, or the like.

Clearly your mileage may vary from mine. While you see juvenile bickering and pixel-bitching, I see players actually interacting with the description the GM gives for the room and the environment. I've seen a number of cases, in a 3e+ world, of players saying they're taking 20 searching the room without any indication that they're really thinking about what the room is like. The searching rules (spot, search, perception, whatever) may make it easy to use a PC's own abilities (which will differ from the player's) and help a goal-oriented/kill and loot style of play flow efficiently, but it's very easy to fall back to a game that doesn't involve rich interaction with the environment. And, for those of us who prefer a bit more of that interaction, having the easy dice roll there can be a shamefully lazy temptation.

Ideally, we can have both rich description and use the die roll. It's just a question of approaching the interaction of the two with the right emphasis and mix. Require the players to be more specific about their searching so they do pay attention and interact with the environment. They'll probably feel a lot more proud about things they figure out on their own rather than what they find by die roll (I know I do). Then call on the dice rolls for determining how successful their specific efforts were and then be flexible with those. I will even auto-success searches if the player actually mentions searching in a way that should find my hidden goodies (such as explictly searching under the mattress where I've hidden a pouch of pearls but rolling a terrible result).

 

[billd91]

I don't believe the rise of charop has anything to do with 3e or 4e. The rise of charop has to do with the rise of the internet.

The charop community depends on being, well, a community. Different people try different things. They share ideas. They build on those ideas. Those big game-breaking builds don't appear out of thin air.

In the days of 2e there weren't big, easily accessible online forums were people could exchange charop ideas. People who were into min-maxing most likely had to do in isolation. It wasn't that the rules were less breakable or that the players were different or whatever. There was just less opportunity.

I agree that charop existed before 3e and that charop communities would have grown with the internet regardless of the existence of 3e/4e. I will say, however, that the proliferation of character build choices in 3e compared to 2e certainly has had an effect on the nature of that community and the fallout it causes. It takes annoyance or mild tropical depression and whips it into something more akin to a perfect storm.

 

[Umbran]

He's very likely going to second guess posting anything again, or being much more cautious with his language. We've limited his self expression. That sounds like censorship to me.

You realize the logical problem with this, right? If the public cannot speak in response to Schwalb, then the public is being censored. So, "limit your self-expression so you don't limit *his* self-expression" is a bit of a boondoggle.

He posted an essay that he himself recognized was a bit rantish on the internet. Unless he's seriously unaware of how the world works, he *knows* there'll be a ton of negative feedback. He does not need you to defend him from it.

 

[JRRNeiklot]

He cannot criticize the last two editions. That's taboo.

Yep. And it's a double standard. Say anything you want about pre 3e D&D, that's fine. Say one thing that might be the tiniest criticism of anything post 2000, and you have to go stand in the corner.