D&D 5E D&D Next Design Goals (Article)

[thecasualoblivion]

No it isn't. It is a standard game action. 4e codified such actions into at wills.prior to 4e people were not really walking around with this at will power concept.

Improved Trip(or any standard maneuver modified or granted by a feat)
Reserve spells
The Binder and Warlock classes
ect...

At-Wills have a firm foundation in 3E at the very least.

An at-will power is anything that you can do at-will. These have existed in every edition. Same with daily powers. Encounter powers are the only novelty of 4E, and I believe they were introduced in 3E.

4E just gave those powers a name. Just like Napoleon Complexes existed before Napoleon.

Encounter powers were the centerpiece of 3E's Tome of Battle, and I believe they existed previously in some of the more obscure classes, feats, items, and prestige classes before then.

 

[Incenjucar]

I agree there were powers you could use at will, and I agree there were powers that had daily limits ( though some were more than once a day). But I dont think at wills as expressed in 4e are the same as the actions you could use at will in previous editions of the game. One look at the second half of your post shows how different this becomes inside the framework of 4e. 4e didn't just offer language for concepts that existed in previous editions, it attached things to those terms that greatly altered the game.

What I posted is exactly what the 3E Full Attack is. A rose by any other name.

 

[El Mahdi]

I get that it's still sacrelige to some 4e fans to say that perfect equivalence isn't a prerequisite for a damn fun game, but, well, it isn't. Balance can certainly improve a game, but if it was a prerequisite, D&D wouldn't have lasted 30-some years and garnered millions of fans before 4e imposed balance on it from on high.

Yes, the math is very important. It is not as important as the rest of those goals. If it gets in the way of those other goals, it must be sacrificed. Very few people play a game just because it gets the math right (or else 4e's sales would be much higher).

I don't really see them as being mutually exclusive. What I do see is balance and the math being good as important enough to the 4E community that they won't be able to build a D&D for everybody without it.

99% of the time, I think you're right.

But goals inevitably come into conflict at some point. Say, you're looking at illusion spells -- something like minor image.

To keep it true to the play experience that people expect out of D&D, you need to have a flexible, general kind of spell rule for that. It needs to be able to create an illusion of whatever the user desires. Part of the fun of playing a D&D illusionist has always been that creativity, that capacity to use the situation in a unique way limited mostly by your imagination, and what senses your spell can affect.

Of course, this makes it nearly impossible to balance. Sometimes that little low-level spell will negate an encounter. Sometimes it will have nearly no effect. There's little way of knowing which is which before the spell is cast.

If we were to "balance" illusion, it might look like 4e illusion: combat magic with specific, predetermined effects.

However, that's not true to the experience of playing an illusionist in D&D. It fails at being fun in the way many people want an illusionist to be fun.

So this is a situation where the potential ability to negate an entire encounter needs to be preserved. It's not exactly like you can balance damage-per-round against that. It's effectively infinite damage sometimes, no damage other times, up to DM interpretation almost always. You're not going to be able to make that balanced in a way that is going to be very satisfying for anyone who wants to play a classic D&D style illusionist and create images of whatever strikes their fancy.

I Agree. Even more, not only should things that can negate an entire encounter be preserved, I think it's impossible to actually get rid of.

I remember an encounter in the Secret of Saltmarsh trilogy. Our group had found the lair of the lizardmen and were working our way in (sneaking in), when we were suddenly surprised by a large contingent of lizardmen warriors. I think our DM was expecting a full on battle, but being the good DM that he was, roleplayed out the sudden meeting (instead of just going to initiative and starting the battle). He played the role of the leader of the Lizardmen guard unit and said "Drop your weapons and surrender!".

All of us players just looked at eachother, shrugged our shoulders, and in unison said "Okay. We surrender.", and dropped our weapons.

Our DM just kind of stared at us for a minute (probably trying to figure out if there was any way to save the combat encounter), and then just simply said "Crap!"

So the Lizardmen gathered up our weapons, took us under guard to their leader, where after talking with eachother we realized the Lizardmen were just trying to defend themselves from Sahuagin, and they learned we were just trying to stop some smugglers. So we agreed to help the Lizardmen clear the Sahuagin out of their former home.

Not only did it negate a combat encounter, it almost virtually eliminated the entire second adventure of the trilogy! And there was no possible rules or mechanic that could have prevented it.

Was it a bad thing? Hell No! It ended up being one of the best adventures, and one of the coolest stories, our group ever had. A story that ended up being told and retold many times.

I've found that having an aspect of the game able to do something like that (like Illusion Magic) is a very good thing.

 

[El Mahdi]

That it was fun and that it worked that way in the past is not a good enough reason to go back.

I think that's the only good reason to go back, and the only reason that I think is needed.

 

[El Mahdi]

...I imagine most people playing D&D don't consider "unifying the community" to be a goal in itself, but are more interested in having a game they enjoy. They aren't going to switch to a game they can enjoy significantly less to unify the commuinity.

Well, I think that Monte and Company will be able to make a game that at least plays enough like each persons favorite game, that "significantly less enjoyment" will not be a factor.

But then again, I choose to see the glass half-full.

So with the game close enough to most gamers enjoyment factor, in places where it may be hard to put a group together because of such varied tastes (and it's not a completely uncommon occurance), I think the game's ability to "unify the community" will absolutely be an incentive to use 5E instead of a past edition.

 

[Bedrockgames]

What I posted is exactly what the 3E Full Attack is. A rose by any other name.

I dont dispute that they pretty much mechanically the same. What i dispute is that at wills as they operate in 4e existed in previous editions of the game. Just like the roles established in 4e weren't the roles that existed in prior editions. Personally I am tired of being told 4e is no different than previous editions through linguistic arguments.

In 4e most at wills are keyed to claasses as powers. I do not want to port those into 5e on the grounds that "at wills" always existed because 4e broadened coined a term around an old concept then broadened it to incude other things.

 

[El Mahdi]

Sorry for the string of posts. Just trying to keep up with a conversation that's gone ten pages since I last had a chance to read it (only a day and a half!).

The comment made by one of the D&DN designers that seemed closest to me to 4E bashing was "skill challeges need to die in a fire."

The "die in a fire" quote was from Robert Schwalb. The full quote, from a seminar at DDXP, is as follows:

"Rob: (jokingly) I really want skill challenges to die in a fire. The plan was great for those, but I always felt it subtracted too much from the narrative. I think we can do complex skill checks within the narative and provide a robust amount of information to help the DM just weave them into the story."

Make of that quote what you will.

Yes, the closest. But being the closest does not make it 4E Hate ( @shidaku ).

He's criticising a mechanic he doesn't like, not an edition. And even at that, it's the only clear criticism I've read from the design team criticising any mechanic specific to 4E.

However, I've read numerous instances from the design team praising specific mechanics of 4E, and stating that they need to continue as design elements of D&D Next, whether in the exact same form or modified.

For it to be "4E Hate", it needs to be endemic, consistent criticism of the edition itself, or such a large criticism of the mechanics exclusive to 4E that it may as well be the same thing.

That has not happened, at all, by any measurement.


I think it's time for people to stop trying to start a fire by claiming they smell smoke.

 

[El Mahdi]

I am fine with folks not liking pre-4E D&D. It is all preference.

Oh, I agree completely.

It'll be interesting to see how 5E "unites" the player base with such diverse gaming ideology.

I agree with Bedrockgames also.

My guess is that it doesn't. In the last years, the entertainment industry was full of great promises that sounded really good, but didn't had anything to do with the product they were actually making.
It's like politicians before an election. They don't care about informing people what they offer, they only tell what people want to hear.

I don't know if D&D Next will unite D&D fans either.

But I do know for a certainty that it won't unite those that have already made up their minds to be against it...

 

[Incenjucar]

I dont dispute that they pretty much mechanically the same. What i dispute is that at wills as they operate in 4e existed in previous editions of the game. Just like the roles established in 4e weren't the roles that existed in prior editions. Personally I am tired of being told 4e is no different than previous editions through linguistic arguments.

In 4e most at wills are keyed to claasses as powers. I do not want to port those into 5e on the grounds that "at wills" always existed because 4e broadened coined a term around an old concept then broadened it to incude other things.

You get the arguments because they're accurate. You want at-wills to operate in a different manner, sure, but they're still at-wills, just like the slayer's basic attacks are still at-wills even if the class uses them more like a 3E fighter would, but with stances instead of feats.

At-wills have always been and will always be, in D&D and many other games. That's just how it works.

 

[Andor]

An at-will power is anything that you can do at-will. These have existed in every edition. Same with daily powers. Encounter powers are the only novelty of 4E, and I believe they were introduced in 3E.

4E just gave those powers a name. Just like Napoleon Complexes existed before Napoleon.

--

Warrior Melee Full Attack
You steady yourself, then lash out with a flurry of deadly blows.
At-Will * Weapon
Standard Action Melee weapon
Target: One creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC
Requirement: You must not have moved during this turn, except to shift up to one square.
Hit: 1[W]+Strength modifier damage
Level 6: Make a second attack against the same or a different target. This attack has a -5 penalty to hit.
Level 11: Make a third attack against the same or a different target. This attack has a -10 penalty to hit.
Level 16: Make a fourth attack against the same or a different target. This attack has a -15 penalty to hit.
Special: After using this power, you are unable to use actions to move, except to shift up to one square, until the end of your turn. If you have already shifted this turn, you cannot shift again until the end of your turn.

An at-will power is an action you can take at will. Every action you can take at will is not an at-will power however.

Defining something as a power brings a lot of baggage with it. In your example you include a "warrior" tag for some reason, even though in 3e iterative attacks are not restricted by class types, merely BAB. Likewise you were forced to use a kludge to mimic a full attack being a full round action, although as written it will still permit you to move and then full attack but not the reverse. Awkward.

In 3e on the otherhand, it fit neatly into the action economy, and was not specific to any class, race, weapon or role. It was a standard action type. In 4e you had the Basic Attacks on page 287. On page 289 however I'll note that you have 11 actions which are specified by action type in the combat system but not described in the text. Administer a potion, Equip or stow a shield, Draw or sheath a weapon, Drink a potion, Drop prone, Load a crossbow, Open or close a door, Pick up an item, retrieve or stow an item, drop held items, talk. None of these are defined in 4e power lingo. Neither is breathing, spitting, doing up your fly, getting dressed or daydreaming about your childhood sweetheart.

Does that mean these things are not at-will powers? Or does it mean that some things are perfectly fine existing outside the rigid framework of the AEDU system?

And AEDU is hardly the only way to manage power economies. For example every previous edition of D&D included variable or static recharge rates on some powers with dragons breath being the classic example, but binder 5 round cooldown powers or Bo9s style maneuvers also qualifying.

Other approaches include diminshing returns (truenamer), power points, inventory, power pool (Incarnum) and even stretching a resource allocation across an entire level (artificers.)

4e does not encompass the length and breadth of everything D&D has ever been or done, nor does everything fit neatly into it's slots. The basic attack does actually fit pretty neatly into the 4e framework, as well it should. But even something as simple as the 3e full attack shows that action systems can cover more ground than 4e does. AD&D style mutli-round casting times for example don't work well in 4e, and would actually be a disaster to attempt in such a high-mobiltiy tactical system.

Each iteration of D&D has its own strengths, and should be examined for it own merits when valuating applicability for 5e, rather than insisting on viewing everything through the lens of your favorite system, whether that's a 4e fan claiming everything is a power, or a 3e fan claiming every class in 4e is a caster.