D&D Releases Playtest for Updated Artificer

Wizards of the Coast has dropped a new Unearthed Arcana Playtest for the Artificer, bringing the often neglected 13th Dungeons & Dragons 5E class into alignment with the 2024 rules update. The playtest was released via D&D Beyond today, with feedback launching on December 24th.

The Artificer gains several new abilities, many of which are designed with an eye to making the class more versatile. For instance, players can now craft low-cost items quickly with a revamped Magical Tinkering ability, while Infuse Item ha been changed to Replicate Magic Item and allows players to replicate magic items of certain rarities and item type. Players can also use the Magic Item Tinker ability to convert a Replicated magic item into a spell slot. The capstone Soul of Artifice ability has also received a buff, with the Artificer no needing a Reaction in order to utilize its ability to skip death saving throws and restoring more health as well.

The subclasses were also updated. For example, the Alchemist's Experimental Elixir producing more elixirs and Chemical Mastery getting a big boost with extra damage, resistance, and the ability to cast Tasha's Bubbling Cauldron. The Armorer has a new Dreadnought option and Armor Modifications was replaced with a new ability called Armor Replication. The Artillerist's Eldritch Cannon can switch between various options instead of being set to one option and the Explosive Cannon ability does more damage and only requires a Reaction to use. Finally, the Battle Smith has received minor adjustments to its Steel Defender construct.

Compared to many other class updates in the 2024 Player's Handbook, the Artificer's changes are much less drastic. There are some obvious updates that bring the class in line with the design updates to other classes, but it didn't receive a major rework like several other classes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

.

I doubt they have an AI good enough to sort though the comments otherwise.

No one does. There are plenty of AI that can trick you into think they’ve done a good job without some external review, but none that are actually good at anything remotely involving judgement.

 

[Shardstone]

agreed

What Makes an Artificer?

A while back, I picked apart what Rangers were in pop culture and games and how all of that congealed in my head to create my core concept of what I wanted in a Ranger character class. Now that Wot…

whatdoiknowjr.com

A buddy of mine just did a pretty good analysis that I'd love them to read to help develop the class and better reflect the various archetypes.

Where is his Ranger article? I can't find it anywhere.

 

[Shardstone]

Considering how many fans think they can out-design WotC and then make the most broken, convoluted rules imaginable, I think WotC is wise to limit their feedback. I can only imagine how many people posted their own manifestos and house rules rather than discuss what WotC is working on.

I don't think your observation has any bearing on what's being discussed here. When you solicit public feedback, you are going to get a lot of chafe. That's no reason to not allow feedback on Green and Red selections, and to prevent feedback on some features. It's a really naughty word survey, and as someone who does research, I think they need to up their game in this specific area.

 

[Shardstone]

A lot of people throughout this thread for some reason want to boil down an incredibly complex task -- creating new content for D&D that will please many -- and seem to think that a massive company in the form of Hasbro can't afford the expenses or manpower required to actually do said complicated task. I'm not asking for perfection, but the bar is just so low that it really shocks me. Like, is it wrong to think that a company making hundreds of millions in WotC alone should be able to afford more people to go through the huge amount of feedback that would be garnered with an actual well-designed survey?

Ask more of corporations, not less.

 

[Zaukrie]

A lot of people throughout this thread for some reason want to boil down an incredibly complex task -- creating new content for D&D that will please many -- and seem to think that a massive company in the form of Hasbro can't afford the expenses or manpower required to actually do said complicated task. I'm not asking for perfection, but the bar is just so low that it really shocks me. Like, is it wrong to think that a company making hundreds of millions in WotC alone should be able to afford more people to go through the huge amount of feedback that would be garnered with an actual well-designed survey?

Ask more of corporations, not less.

I mean, marketing interns could do this work....

 

[Remathilis]

I don't think your observation has any bearing on what's being discussed here. When you solicit public feedback, you are going to get a lot of chafe. That's no reason to not allow feedback on Green and Red selections, and to prevent feedback on some features. It's a really naughty word survey, and as someone who does research, I think they need to up their game in this specific area.

I've seen what people claimed* to put in the One D&D surveys. The one thing I can say is a safe bet is that D&D players think they are good at making rules for the game and have an overinflated opinion of their capacities. They don't want your suggestions, they want to know if you liked their suggestions. That is an important distinction.

* Obviously, I haven't seen what people put down. But hanging out in any D&D space during that playtest had plenty of people saying they sent large amounts of unsolicited designs and diatribes on if X should even be in the game. (One long ago thread on Reddit showed a person who rated every barbarian option as poor and pasted "barbarian should be a fighter subclass" as the feedback for each. I too would have felt red options don't need commentary if that was what I was getting).

 

[Shades of Eternity]

Where is his Ranger article? I can't find it anywhere.

What Makes a Ranger?

Something I hear a lot from people is “what even is a ranger?” I’ve seen people argue that if someone is a stealthy archer, they count as a ranger. I think that’s an oversimplification. The foundat…

whatdoiknowjr.com

As requested.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

That's no reason to not allow feedback on Green and Red selections

Sure there is. It really would be dishonest to allow people to give feedback that isn't even going to be glanced at. Majority green = keep as is. Majority red = throw in the bin. There is no reason to look at feedback on those, it's just a waste of money. It doesn't matter why someone doesn't like a feature if it's going to be thrown out anyway.

as someone who does research

As someone who does research, you have a vested interest in making it much more complex, and require far more people to analyse the data.

 

[Shardstone]

Sure there is. It really would be dishonest to allow people to give feedback that isn't even going to be glanced at. Majority green = keep as is. Majority red = throw in the bin. There is no reason to look at feedback on those, it's just a waste of money. It doesn't matter why someone doesn't like a feature if it's going to be thrown out anyway.

As someone who does research, you have a vested interest in making it much more complex, and require far more people to analyse the data.

It isn't a waste of money, but I'm not sure we'll find any common ground in a debate, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.

 

[Chaosmancer]

What I find darkly amusing about all this is how quick people are to make claims.

WoTC changed their survey method. They said nothing about why they did so. They said nothing about what they are planning going forward. For all we know this survey method is an experiment to see how it works.

And yet, we immediately got people claiming how unethical it is for WoTC to manipulate the data this way. How they clearly don't want real feedback. How this is a result of them firing the people in charge of the data gathering...

With nothing more than the fact that WoTC did change their survey method for this one survey.