D&D 5E BoardGameGeek at a 5e Seminar

[Li Shenron]

On a related note, will anyone interested in 5th Edition wait for Christmas to buy it?

If the amount of errata is high (my guess is that it'll take but a few weeks for readers to start finding errors), then I'll wait for a possible second print, but then Xmas is not a relevant variable for my decision.

 

[TarionzCousin]

If the amount of errata is high (my guess is that it'll take but a few [-]weeks[/-] MINUTES for readers to start finding errors)....

Fixed for Grammar and Punctuation Nerds everywhere!

 

[Blackbrrd]

If the amount of errata is high (my guess is that it'll take but a few weeks for readers to start finding errors), then I'll wait for a possible second print, but then Xmas is not a relevant variable for my decision.

They don't do errata re-prints though? At least not to my knowledge. You would probably have to wait for D&D 5.5e in 2020.

 

[Agamon]

The reason for the 4-month stagger is to edit the books more thoroughly. I know, we'll believe it when we see it, but I, for one, will appreciate it if we don't get 40 pages of errata.

 

[darjr]

The plan, as far as I know, is for this to be an edition that lasts a while. A few months to wait for polishing the books is trivial. I mean I'd prefer for them to be out all at once, but I'd much rather they were better for the wait.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

I don't think there will be any character creation information at all in the Starter Set. The free online document will only be able to make BASIC characters. Which, unless I miss my guess, means that it'll create characters with no feats, no custom backgrounds, no subraces, and maybe will be restricted to the "basic" version of each character class. Also, possibly no custom equipment.



This means that character creation will be: Roll stats, pick a race, pick a class, pick a background, write down the equipment given to you by your class and background.



In other words, character creation in 2e except with a background and equipment made easier.



If you want to have a bunch of different class options for each class, subraces, feats, and information on how to create custom backgrounds, and multiclassing...you'll likely only find them in the PHB.

I agree, except that I believe backgrounds will be baked into each class, and the option for buying your equipment from scratch will be presented.

 

[Li Shenron]

They don't do errata re-prints though? At least not to my knowledge. You would probably have to wait for D&D 5.5e in 2020.

I am not sure, but I think in 3.0 there was a first print and a second print with some (not all) errata fixed.

...at least I seem to remember that people were talking about some errata in the 3.0 PHB, that I could not find in mine...

 

[delericho]

They don't do errata re-prints though?

They don't do reprints just to incorporate errata, no, but in the past (certainly in 2nd Ed and 3e) when the time came for a new printing they did quietly incorporate the errata at that point.

You would probably have to wait for D&D 5.5e in 2020.

You're optimistic! 3.5e hit after 3 years, Essentials after 2. So we may well see 5.5/"5e Essentials"/whatever hit February 2016. Maybe that's why there's no product announced beyond the end of this year - Mearls and the team will be moving straight on to working on the revision.

[/joke]

I am not sure, but I think in 3.0 there was a first print and a second print with some (not all) errata fixed.

Agreed. I made sure to pick up a second-printing 3.0e PHB for exactly that reason.

(And the reason it didn't include all the errata was the obvious one - after they'd printed it they found some more mistakes.)

 

[Blackbrrd]

...You're optimistic! 3.5e hit after 3 years, Essentials after 2. So we may well see 5.5/"5e Essentials"/whatever hit February 2016. Maybe that's why there's no product announced beyond the end of this year - Mearls and the team will be moving straight on to working on the revision. [/joke]...

The transition from 3.0 til 3.5 was very smooth for me, and I think 3.5 was a better game than 3.0. In other words, it's actually something I would appreciate. Sure it looks/feels like a money grab, but you get a really polished game you can't get at launch. It just isn't possible to see everything that is broken/doesn't work right before the game is "live".

4e essentials isn't a new edition to me. It's just a twist on the old, and you can use new/old material interchangeably. It basically felt like another splat-book. I would rather have seen a 4.5e with math fixes built into the system, the feats cleaned up and a fix for conditions/interrupts/minor actions which really slows down combat. Instead we got 5e, which I am looking forward to.

 

[delericho]

The transition from 3.0 til 3.5 was very smooth for me, and I think 3.5 was a better game than 3.0. In other words, it's actually something I would appreciate. Sure it looks/feels like a money grab, but you get a really polished game you can't get at launch.

I agree. I would probably have preferred another year or so before 3.5e, and probably somewhat fewer changes (since some of the 'improvements' turned out to be nothing of the sort), but the principle was fine, IMO.

4e essentials isn't a new edition to me.

To a large extent, I consider Essentials to be "4.5e done right" - by keeping the core of the game fully compatible they avoided some of the "money grab" aspect of it, while at the same time they were able to fix some things that really needed it (Skill Challenges, p42 - both of which had been superseded since the DMG was published; this brought them back into the 'core'). And, of course, they were able to push some of the class designs by, for example, presenting a Fighter with no Daily abilities.

But I can certainly see the desire for a 'real' 4.5e.

(Personally, though, I was glad not to see it. 4e simply wasn't for me, so a 4.5e that would have extended the life of the edition would have been a bad thing for me. My needs are better served with the development of an entirely new edition - but it is unfortunate that doing so has a negative effect on 4e fans.)