D&D (2024) Do you plan to adopt D&D5.5One2024Redux?

[Oofta]

Not what I'm talking about. My comment was about the lines in 2014 core about how it's the DMs game, and the players need to check with them regarding house rules and the like. I wonder if they will explicitly maintain that in 5.5e.

I see no reason to think they would not. It's one of the main reasons D&D works for many people.

 

[S'mon]

No, I'll be contininuing several existing 5e campaigns but I took 2023 as a wake up call to try new stuff; I'm loving Dragonbane & Cyberpunk Red. My guess would be that it'd be around 2028-30 before I'd be looking at a revised D&D edition & really I'd prefer to see new management first, just as 3e got me back into D&D in 2000. My opinion of WoTC 2024 is quite similar to my view of TSR in the mid '90s. :/

 

[S'mon]

I think that we should keep in mind: 1) A large percentage of people that post "No" now will probably change their minds when other people in their group bring stuff into their games, or otherwise see the product; AND 2) If it turns out to somehow be disruptive or not good, some of the people who say "Yes" might buy the product and then drop using it.

Or in other words, this Poll (Which I'm not dismissing! Don't take this the wrong way!) is only meaningful to discover intent - which I don't believe will wind up matching reality terribly closely.

Yeah I had every intention of playing 4e but bounced off it in 2008 & only really got into it late 2010. Conversely I said I had no interest in 5e but it hooked me pretty fast! But I feel like 5e has been on a downward trend for years with lots of bad stuff being released, so 'more of the same' as 5.5 seems to intend is a hard sell for me, plus 2023 got me disliking WoTC as a company.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Yeah I had every intention of playing 4e but bounced off it in 2008 & only really got into it late 2010. Conversely I said I had no interest in 5e but it hooked me pretty fast! But I feel like 5e has been on a downward trend for years with lots of bad stuff being released, so 'more of the same' as 5.5 seems to intend is a hard sell for me, plus 2023 got me disliking WoTC as a company.

It's not WotC that I have a problem with - it's Hasbro. I fully believe that most* of the really dumb decisions that WotC has made lately have come from top-down decisions and internal politics, which either means Hasbro, or someone that Hasbro placed in the company to do their bidding.

* (I'd say all, but the one thing that Hasbro probably has very little influence on is content, and there's no doubt that the content hasn't been generally as good lately. Still, that could potentially be down to people being let go (or worrying about being let go) having an effect on the quality of their work. There's nothing quite like the Sword of Damocles hanging over your head to motivate you to do your worst work. Only idiots think that sort of thing aids production. It never does.)

 

[Lanefan]

So you're telling me that you cannot possibly keep in mind that maybe, ever few sessions or show, you could put in an opportunity for a player's background to matter or shine? That using a player's background choices to inform your campaign plotting in a meaningful way is too much of an ask?

I try my best to make any "campaign plotting" completely agnostic with regards to whatever characters might be involved at the time.

And for good reason. This coming session in my game, for example: due to various in- and out-of-game reasons I'm expecting about an 80% turnover in party membership and I'm not even sure who the remaining 20% will be yet. And thus, had I planned anything ahead of time for that group with any specific characters in mind, I'd highly likely have been wasting my time.

And when I'm writing an adventure I'm not even thinking about the characters' backgrounds; which means it's on the players to find ways to bring those backgrounds to bear if-when it makes sense, and sometimes the players will pleasantly surprise me in how they do so.

One example of this from long ago: the PCs had found a ruin that still had in it some very nice (and very valuable!) stained glass windows. They managed to get the windows out but had no idea how to get them back to town without shattering them. I-as-DM had completely forgotten (or maybe never knew) that one of the characters' backgrounds was as a glazier (glass-maker) and thus would reasonably know this stuff; so the player researched IRL how glass was transported in medieval times, and told the party in-character what to do. Result: their treasury gained an unexpected several thousand g.p. and we all learned something.

 

[Lanefan]

I mean, for decades now, I've had DM's ask the players for backstories, I write them, and then they are simply left forgotten.

Are you writing the backstory for the DM, or for you?

Any time I do a backstory for a character it's 95+% for me-as-player, so I've got something to base my roleplay on. My MU who spent a lot of time in the faux-Roman Legions as a staff mage, for example - as player I've made up various elements of that backstory (with DM approval); but the only time it becomes relevant in play is that on the rare occasions we ever have to deal with the Legions my character has an 'in' - assuming she happens to be in the party at the time, of course.

Otherwise it's all just stuff to base my in-character war stories on, and to explain her personality.

Nobody wants nameless cardboard cutouts who only exist to murderhobo in their role-playing game, right?

Well, they gotta have a name. Everything else is purely optional.

 

[Clint_L]

I'm similar in that I also try to make the setting as character agnostic as possible, because the characters don't really matter. At first. However, since I don't start with a big campaign plot in mind, the character's backgrounds are vital; they completely drive where the campaign goes. In my home campaign, the party just resolved a huge chunk of the druid's background story, after almost a year's worth of games, and the current arc is now driven by the barbarian's, after some bounty hunters managed to lure him away from the party and kidnap him. So now they are focused on that. And the players themselves are adding details that I don't know about - for example, their next destination was decided because that's where the barbarian's player announced that his former mentor is currently hiding.

On the other hand, my spouse has given me very little background for their character, and is happy going along with the flow, though occasionally dropping little hints. That's cool, too! I love it that the story is unfolding for me as much as for them, and look forward to finding out what will happen in each game. For my preferred style of play, my job is to keep the world percolating away in the background, and the players decide how they want to interact with it. So character backgrounds supply many of the story beats.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I see no reason to think they would not. It's one of the main reasons D&D works for many people.

Sure, but it's also not really with their "buy our rules, run our adventures" business philosophy.

 

[Parmandur]

there's no doubt that the content hasn't been generally as good lately

I would contest that: they released 5 books in the last year, 5 of which were total bangers (Keys to the Golden Vault, Bigby's, Planescape, and the Book of Many Things) and even the Shattered Obelisk was more good than bad. I'd put that positively against any other year of 5E, though 2019 is probably my favorite slate of books overall.

 

[Hriston]

My campaigns typically have the players traveling to other realms/planes or halfway across the world.

What you typically do at your table is not typical of play in general.

I'm not "invalidating" anything, I think it would be stupid for someone to have a criminal contact in a city they've never heard of, much less been to.

The background feature, Criminal Contact, doesn't say your contact is always present in the same city where you happen to be. I can see why you might think that would be stupid, but that's not what it says. It says you know how to get messages to and from them "even over great distances" which it sounds like are involved if you're in a city of which you've never heard. Surely, the PCs aren't the only contact between where the criminal contact is located and this distant city where they happen to be at the moment. I think that would be stupid.

Exploring a heretofore unheard of culture that's been isolated for centuries? Why would they give a fig about a noble title from a place they don't even believe truly exists?

Why wouldn't they? As they say, breeding recognizes breeding.

Almost all the background features, especially from the PHB, only make sense if they happen in the sphere of influence of the PCs. That sphere of influence or notoriety is frequently going to be a city or perhaps the surrounding area for perhaps a hundred miles or so. It's not like most fantasy worlds have world wide broadcasts. Look at the background feature list. Several of the more recent ones like Anthropologist are okay, you have training in communicating with others that don't speak your language. I have no problem with that. But take criminal. You have a reliable and trustworthy contact. Sure, that's fine and works in your home city; I'll create an NPC and we'll work on a bit of backstory. But what happens if you betray that NPC or they believe you did? They aren't going to be reliable contact any more. Once you aren't on your home turf, you no longer have that contact. You can't just waltz into a city and go down to the "Rogues are Us" depot and send off a telegram whenever you want.

Why, do you think no one ever sent messages? You don't have to be notorious to send someone a message. Neither should getting a response rely on there being a world wide broadcast. The feature contains suggestions of what the means might be of sending and receiving messages if the table is having trouble coming up with ideas of their own.

Performer? Again, in your home town or where your reputation precedes you, fine. In a different city that's never heard of you? It's not automatic.

I'm not sure what you're saying is not automatic. Assuming you're talking about the Entertainer background in the PHB, By Popular Demand says you can find a place to perform. Surely, that's what entertainers do - go to different cities in some of which no one's ever heard of them and do performances there. I don't think it's a stretch they could get free room and board from the venues in exchange for their nightly performances. Most taverns like to have entertainment because it brings in customers. It also says once you've performed in a place, you become somewhat of a local figure there, but at that point it's no longer a city that's never heard of you, so I'm not sure what you're saying here.

The background features from the PHB are almost all like this. They depend on you knowing someone or being instantly recognized. They fall apart once the PCs leave their home territory. So it's not like I'm "allowing" anything when I think 90% of the original backgrounds simply don't work outside of a local area. Instead I tell people how I run it. Take a background and I'll give you a benefit but I'm not going to have verisimilitude and logic breaking benefits apply unless the background feature makes sense for the current situation. Background features are not magic.

I'm sure they appreciate you being upfront with them.