D&D (2024) D&D playtest feed back report, UA8

[ART!]

I want to make a Kung-Fu: The Legend Continues joke here, but one escapes me.

I avoided the phrasing "__ scored in the 90s" for similar reasons.

 

[mamba]

@Morrus they confirm that the 24th of may is NOT the release dates of the books.

“that is not the release date, that never was the release date, in fact we will still be working on the books then”….

around 8:00

 

[Kurotowa]

I mean, man I was hoping to be shown the err of my perspective... But it is nice to see I'm not the only one with a deeply cynical view of this process.

I don't even consider that a cynical view. It's just a realistic take that open player feedback is of limited value and is not appropriate for all situations. Over the years and in different situations I have seen so, so many horrible takes and attempted suggestions from the players of various games.

As is often cited, players are good at flagging problems and terrible at devising solutions. They don't see the big picture, they don't understand the under the hood mechanics, they don't know any of the behind the curtain business concerns. UA releases are for flagging potential problems with an idea. It is not an all purpose system. Random anonymous players are not equal co-participants in the design process. That's how it is and how it should be.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

I mean, man I was hoping to be shown the err of my perspective... But it is nice to see I'm not the only one with a deeply cynical view of this process.

Is anybody really shocked that the UA is a market acceptance test rather than a real playtest. Trying to construct a game from a bunch of randos on the internet giving feedback on material that most of them have never played would be worse than herding cats.

 

[Quickleaf]

Did they say exclusively, or just that's what they've done so far?

It's around the 10:00 mark


"We are also doing tons of internal playtesting on the revised monsters.... along with the new encounter building approach.... You and I have chatted in previous videos that we might send out that new encounter building in an Unearthed Arcana... Right now we are focused on playtesting that internally instead..."

"What we have discovered is that just us iterating on it over and over and over again is bearing amazing fruit. What I can report is that what people are going to see in the revised DMG is a much streamlined encounter building system.... where you are able to figure out your budget for monsters.... and you spend that budget...the end...it's going to be that simple of a process. I'm looking forward to us sharing that with people later this year."

Basically, there's no plan that he's sharing to playtest monsters/encounter building externally. Maybe they'll do it, maybe they won't. Sounds a little like it won't be public until the DMG, but that's trying to read tea leaves. Up till now, though, yes it has been exclusively internal. That's the important bit - what's happening functionally.

The issue there is...

(a) With all the heavy design work done for the classes... it was being done in absence of external feedback on the other half of the game – the monsters/challenges/GM-facing stuff that the classes are built against. That's a huge problem, in my eyes.

(b) Secondarily, the context of this issue is that they (WotC) have a history of botching monsters/encounter building - so it's an area that needs attention, and many many D&D fans know it needs attention. We have Mike Shea, Teos Abadia, Shawn Merwin, Mike Mearls – all commenting about these issues, and publishing resources to address them.

 

[mamba]

The issue there is...

(a) With all the heavy design work done for the classes... it was being done in absence of external feedback on the other half of the game – the monsters/challenges/GM-facing stuff that the classes are built against. That's a huge problem, in my eyes.

I don’t think that is a big deal. The CRs will stay what they are, a 2014 CR 5 will not become a 2024 CR 2 or CR 8. All they do is make monsters of a certain CR less ‘swingy’ based on which skills you use in combat.

The rest is updating them to the new conventions, done.

The power levels on the monster side stay essentially the same (required for compatibility), the monsters just get better at matching them, so testing the classes against the 2014 monsters for balance is fine. Also keep in mind that the playtests are not about balance anyway, so it would not even really matter if this were not the case

 

[Mistwell]

I'm excited for them, and I love Jeremy and Todd's enthusiasm, but man their playtesting priorities seem bizarre to me. All the points they keep congratulating themselves for, are the very points that have me raising my eyebrow.

We have a public playtest...of exclusively player-facing content...so the only metric of monsters/challenges for us to compare this player content to...is the old stuff we have.

And then... we're informed they are changing some things in their monster/challenge design... and they are exclusively internally testing their new monsters and encounter building... why on earth?

I didn't perceive his comments about that as "exclusively" internally testing any of it. My impression was they are "currently" internally testing it. Much like they initially internally playtested the Player's Handbook materials. I think we will see UA's with new monsters. Possible also with the encounter building design.

Then the questions that are NOT asked during their playtest feedback process are enormous. It's this very very pigeonholed process (yes, I gave that feedback on Playtest Packets 1-6, got too tired to keep saying the same thing when 7-8 came out).

For example...they talk about honoring the history of D&D on its 50th anniversary...and we still have low level spells like Goodberry or the heavily powered-up 5e Leomund's Tiny Hut that are radically disruptive to exploration styles of play which were historically a big part of D&D. Did we ever get playtest material addressing these spells?

That's a narrower subset of players with preferences that can be addressed with a very easy solution already at hand - remove those spells from the game. The game will function just fine without them.

No. Did we ever get playtest material reimagining the scant exploration rules for a modern audience? No.

I hope we do. I expect we could for the DMG material as I think that's where those systems will be found. I guess we shall see but I agree with you I'd like to see more there.

It's absolutely mind boggling to me. Please, someone help me understand?

They had to start with something and it makes sense to start with the first book they plan to put out.

 

[Quickleaf]

I don’t think that is a big deal. The CRs will stay what they are, a 2014 CR 5 will not become a 2024 CR 2 or CR 8. All they do is make monsters of a certain CR less ‘swingy’ based on which skills you use in combat.

The rest is updating them to the new conventions, done.

The power levels on the monster side stay essentially the same (required for compatibility), the monsters just get better at matching them, so testing the classes against the 2014 monsters for balance is fine. Also keep in mind that the playtests are not about balance anyway, so it would not even really matter if this were not the case

What is the CR of a quickling? Is it 1 like VGtM says or 3 like the DMG maths say?

Will a 2024 hobgoblin hit like a 2014 hobgoblin?

Why are they (WotC) upturning higher CR monsters to be more threatening if there’s nothing wrong with them?

I strongly disagree with you.

 

[Mistwell]

Well, yes. Anything on top of full casting should be just a ribbon...

I do wish the Druid class wasn't forced to pull double-duty like that, just because of tradition. Or we at least got bolder subclasses that turn you into a half-caster but make the shapeshift go wild. Or that the Wild Shape entry at least covered such basic questions as 'is turning into a mouse just an auto-win at stealth rolls?' without forcing every GM to separately decide whether their world's guards routinely chase mice.

I was trying to think how you could do a class similar to the druid portrayed in the recent D&D movie and I just couldn't come up with adequate alterations in power with levels gained. It seemed to be a "Change into any animal any time as often as you like, and that's it" type thing. You could of course put some level limits on it, but it's not really enough to make a complete class out of it. Nor did it seem to mesh well with spells. It's a melee combat class that isn't really about magical spells.

 

[Mistwell]

I mean, man I was hoping to be shown the err of my perspective... But it is nice to see I'm not the only one with a deeply cynical view of this process.

I didn't view Kurotowa's comment as cynical at all. I think it's possible you view the purpose of the playtest very differently from a lot of other people.