D&D (2024) Class spell lists and pact magic are back!

[Maxperson]

He's probably talking about the optional 2e rule on

Spoiler: phb pg113

View attachment 292373

Unfortunately in it's efforts to ensure that the things are so loose wrt what's in your hands & the failure to be explicit about needing as focus or loudly/with pourpose/etc for verbal 5e kinda makes this sort of thing awkward to even make into a meaningful change during actual play.

That doesn't mean what he thinks it means if that's what he is talking about. The wizard still needed a spellbook, and had to learn and memorize spells. Nothing was innate. You just might or might not need components .

 

[tetrasodium]

That doesn't mean what he thinks it means if that's what he is talking about. The wizard still needed a spellbook, and had to learn and memorize spells. Nothing was innate. You just might or might not need components .

Yea I agree. I'm pretty sure that all the way up till 5e the VSM was important to casters on almost every spell∆ or the system was designed* in a way where you couldn't just choose to ignore some stand in. 5e made what was in your hands into some kinda quantum state of "sigh... whatever" with out any meaningfully explicit focus in hand needs or risk to juggling your gear around like a circus show in a pitched melee.
∆ like a large enough percentage that the only time exceptions ever came up was weird niche builds built around leveraging one or two specific spells.

* not really sure how 4e handled it but there was a lot of X*weapon stuff

 

[Maxperson]

Yea I agree. I'm pretty sure that all the way up till 5e the VSM was important to casters on almost every spell or the system was designed* in a way where you couldn't just choose to ignore some stand in. 5e made what was in your hands into some kinda quantum state of "sigh... whatever" with out any meaningfully explicit focus in hand needs or risk to juggling your gear around like a circus show in a pitched melee.

* not really sure how 4e handled it but there was a lot of X*weapon stuff

Yeah. I honestly didn't even remember components being optional during 2e. All of the DMs I played with and at least a large majority of the players all came from 1e, so of course we used components.

3e brought in the sorcerer with the innate casting concept. Prior to that it just didn't exist unless you pretended wizards weren't wizards, spellbooks weren't spellbooks, and you didn't have to memorize spells to cast after you cast them. I certainly never encountered anyone with a) with that level of ability to ignore game reality, and 2) actually asked to do it.

In 5e you need a hand free for the somatic components of a spell, and also to manipulate the material component or focus.

 

[Mistwell]

I am not subtracting anything, there was one question with one result, I have no idea where your second one comes from

You said "40% prevented the 60% majority opinion." Nothing was "prevented." Most of the 60% ALSO supported the 70% that was going to be approved. You're commenting on a system where it's an assumption something will gain 70% approval. By default you're arguing people liking multiple things should be discounted, but only for the thing you don't like.

Multiple people have pointed out this flaw in your logic, you seem to have no response to it other than 1) ignore it or 2) deny it was even a question.

It's time to end this "tyranny of the minority" argument. It's a false argument. It does not hold up to even basic level statistical or mathematical scrutiny.

 

[Charlaquin]

my bad, should stick to the descriptions… so how do you differentiate dissatisfied between ‘do not want this’ and ‘needs improvement’, or should the latter always vote satisfied?

Knowing how WotC conducts their polls, I don’t think it’s ever in one’s interest to vote “dissatisfied” on something they want to see improved. Like I said, I think the practical way to engage with these surveys is to vote “very satisfied” if you want something to remain as-is, “satisfied” if you like it but think it needs improvement, and “very dissatisfied” if you don’t like it and don’t want it, with the “dissatisfied” not really having any utility.

and what percentage do you think is that?

I’m not sure what you mean.

 

[tetrasodium]

Yeah. I honestly didn't even remember components being optional during 2e. All of the DMs I played with and at least a large majority of the players all came from 1e, so of course we used components.

3e brought in the sorcerer with the innate casting concept. Prior to that it just didn't exist unless you pretended wizards weren't wizards, spellbooks weren't spellbooks, and you didn't have to memorize spells to cast after you cast them. I certainly never encountered anyone with a) with that level of ability to ignore game reality, and 2) actually asked to do it.

In 5e you need a hand free for the somatic components of a spell, and also to manipulate the material component or focus.

I think we might have used it with a couple specific consumable exceptions that may as well have been magic item mcguffins I'm 2e but pretty skeptical on that.

The 3.x shift didn't matter in play though. Even the 3.x sorcerer was subject to asf when casting spells in armor without using still spell or something. Even if there was some sort sorcerer skip needing a component pouch element there were very very few spells that had one without the other so casters tended to just equip as if all spells were vsm and gish builds tended to assume that all but these spells were off limits

 

[Neonchameleon]

Spell components have in practice not really been a thing since 3.0 introduced the Spell Component Pouch (in theory containing an infinite number of live spiders) so you didn't have to track them. 4e introduced the focus in place of spell components.

5e uses a spellcasting focus (where you don't have to use non-expensive material component pouches) or a material component pouch (which is assumed to contain all the non-expensive material components you need) so you don't have to track them.

In my experience almost every player uses the much more character-expressive spellcasting focuses and even the one wizard I've seen who used the component pouch used it as a character-expressive spellcasting focus and winged rather than looked up any material components.

Other than a couple of rare and in universe expensive cases (mostly diamonds for resurrection) spell components so far as I can tell have been dead for 20 years and almost no one missed them.

 

[mamba]

A like in this poll is not automatically a dislike for the old ability and vice versa.

ok, yes, but it becomes a question of which one you like better, because there can be only one (template or animal wildshape), and whichever one loses is out. So the question that needs answering is which one you like better, esp. since WotC threw out the ‘loser’ without warning.

If they iterated instead, you could afford to answer what they pretended they were asking and see if you like their proposal better next time.

The saving grace is that ‘I like’ and ‘I prefer’ are usually correlated, so they can still land on the right conclusion, but you are no longer telling them you want it thrown out or iterated on directly

Two different scales.

I think you were one of those implying or saying that if 60% like the new ability, that means there is a majority who prefers the new version over the old version. Which is not necessarily true (or false).

I guess that is my problem with it. They ask ‘how do you like it’, but then act as if I answered ‘which one do you like better’ by throwing it out if I picked too low, even if I wanted them to take a second shot

I would prefer if I could tell them which of the two I meant instead of them drawing conclusions . A dissatisfied’ to me means ‘please improve this’, a ‘satisfied’ means ‘we are good to go’, a ‘very satisfied’ means ‘this is perfect, don’t you dare change it’

 

[mamba]

You said "40% prevented the 60% majority opinion." Nothing was "prevented." Most of the 60% ALSO supported the 70% that was going to be approved. You're commenting on a system where it's an assumption something will gain 70% approval. By default you're arguing people liking multiple things should be discounted, but only for the thing you don't like.

Multiple people have pointed out this flaw in your logic, you seem to have no response to it other than 1) ignore it or 2) deny it was even a question.

or maybe I do not make myself clear…

They ask one question at a time. They essentially ask ‘which one do you prefer’, because if they otherwise throw the proposal out, rather than iterate on it, then that is exactly that should be answered.

So if 60% answer that with a ‘I prefer the proposal’, then the 40% are preventing the iteration and result in it being thrown out

Is that clearer?

 

[mamba]

Knowing how WotC conducts their polls, I don’t think it’s ever in one’s interest to vote “dissatisfied” on something they want to see improved.

I agree, that is the conclusion you have to arrive at. I am less sure everyone filling it out is aware of that at the time, esp. since ‘satisfied’ to me means ‘this is good already, no need to improve it, just not perfect’

Like I said, I think the practical way to engage with these surveys is to vote “very satisfied” if you want something to remain as-is, “satisfied” if you like it but think it needs improvement, and “very dissatisfied” if you don’t like it and don’t want it, with the “dissatisfied” not really having any utility.

pretty much, which begs the question why the poll has the 4 options when one is basically a trap

As I said, ‘satisfied’ and ‘needs improvement’ are not generally considered the same thing. If I think my meal / hotel room / … needs improvement, I would not call myself satisfied with it, dissatisfied is a lot closer to how I then feel