I thought you wrote it with the tongue in cheek sarcasm it looked to have ;D How about the fate fractal as an example of useful complexity in an rpg? All of the rules for it can be fit on a handwritten 3x5 index card (I've done it & handed it to players before) but the results are hugely complex & deep
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and that says nothing about all the relevant examples in the sections about character & npc aspects/stunts/etc elsewhere. In order to play fate, you need to have the understanding you can get from the first couple pages in this cheat sheet, however it takes about 200-300 pages of the fate core rulebook to truly explain what those rules mean & how they interact before you truly realize how deep that apparent puddle goes (especially from a gm point of view)
More importantly though, it's absurd for people to suggest that the sort of tactical combat enabled by meaningful rules for AoOs & the like are "complicated". Since some people have complained about 3.5 comparisons, back in 4e it looked like this View attachment 119883 View attachment 119887 View attachment 119885
with some abilities allowing you to react to one of those or do one as part of the ability.
Ignoring the 4e numbers it amounts to adding words saying that moving more than 5 feet when adjacent to a hostile opponent triggers an opportunity attack as some point in phb181/182 where movement is described & adding "this does(not) provoke an opportunity attack" to various abilities.
This whole discussion people have just been mking a blanket statement that things like tactical combat are too complex as if they were saying water is wet without making any attempt to prove or show how it was too complex. You can literally omit all of those rules and achieve 5e's AoO's with a single sentence along the lines of "for simpler less tactical combat a gm or group may want/choose to limit the number of things capable of provoking an opportunity attack to moving away from a hostile opponent without disengaging or firing a ranged weapon while in melee range with a hostile opponent." while still including rules for people who want those who want a more tactical combat or feel that level of simplicity is too much.
If you wanted to add a 5 foot step into 5e you could easily.
I prefer when people can’t easily break way from combat though. I don’t believe it’s tactical as the cost is negligible. The distance is irrelevant as the difference between next to and 5 foot away is massive unless the creature has reach.
You could also easily add a simple bonus for flanking if you chose to. Not sure you need to, but you could add that if you wanted to.
into what amounts to at will cantrips, screw with the long/short rest class balance, or break/invalidate a bunch of spells/class abilities . Of course that was not the intent, that is just the result of a half baked unfinished & poorly thought out variant rule wasting pagespace that could have been used for literally anything else that was complete or devoted to completing something else. The idea that gritty realism was intended to do that is so absurd that nobody is willing to even give it a halfhearted defense other than blaming people for wanting too much.
Again, you just don’t like them... and because you don’t like them, they’re a waste. I’m fine with the gritty realism rule (I’m using it in my campaign) because the examples of magic items you give are corner cases that are easily adjusted by any DM with a degree of familiarity or experience.
What would be a waste of space should be taking up a page to detail every possible impact and what a common sense would tell you to do anyway.
It seems you forget that a DM decides to add these things in. Any DM able to add them is also able to adjudicate any ramifications.
For instance if you’re playing a gritty realistic game don’t give the players a wand of fireballs!!!
So ... basically your definition is that it has to still be a cohesive game if you replace entire sections? Kind of like having a car good at going off road, push a button and it's a track car, pull a lever and you fly home?
I don't see how a good game with all those options of would even be possible.
As far as I'm concerned, it's not really a "modular" system. Modular systems are defined by interfaces, and as long as you provide the right interface, you can swap them out. 5e isn't built that way. 4e is probably a lot more modular than 5e in that regard.
It is, however, not a very tightly coupled system. There are two major reasons for this: the simplified action economy and the Concentration rule. These minimize the amount of interactions that things have. You can add homebrew rules for a variety of things, whether it's a homebrewed spell or weapon, or an entire new system like domain management, and not completely blow up the game.
There is the other side of the coin however. When they talked about it being modular they did it in the context of it being designed for gm's to play with the dials & knobs or change things so the game can be adjusted how they want, but they didn't really achieve that goal outside of an extremely narrow 6-8 encounters a day consisting of facerolling through every combat just like every other combat & rest>nova>nova>nova>rest.
There is the other side of the coin however. When they talked about it being modular they did it in the context of it being designed for gm's to play with the dials & knobs or change things so the game can be adjusted how they want, but they didn't really achieve that goal outside of an extremely narrow 6-8 encounters a day consisting of facerolling through every combat just like every other combat & rest>nova>nova>nova>rest.
The issue with the rest variants is less about how they interact with daily magic item powers (although that should have been at last spelled out and considered). It's that they seem fairly arbritrary.
If the standard rest is a problem in that it forces a very specific schedule on the party, gritty rests just force a different schedule. It just seems lazy.
And the one about not healing back to full hit points is pretty worthless because all it does is add to bookkeeping as everyone blows their spell slots on healing (because everyone gets those back - if you want slower recovery you absolutely must address that). It would be nice if the DMG gave us something more than what you can get spitballing on an internet forum.
Making a chocolate cake is more complex than making a plain/vanilla/white/yellow cake on an objective level because it has an extra ingredient but that doesn't make it complex.
You didn't say anything to prove or show how those things are complex or that they are too complex. Should they drop to one save & remove all the feats & spells because those are complexities that coul be layered in later? They already use my approach of having the rules there & allowing them to be used or not by the gm though, feats are there & built into the system, but you can choose not to use them & just take the ASIs given
As to just writing a suppliment for dmsguild, you keep throwing that out like there are not people in this & other threads on the topics with dmsguild titles. More importantly it ignores the fact that in order to simply add it to 5e you need to change a ton of stuff & pretty soon are no longer playing 5e because you are playing $dmsguildTitle.
Hmm you quoted me, but your response doesn't seem to address me. For example, you said: "As to just writing a suppliment for dmsguild, you keep throwing that out like...," yet this is the first and only time I have mentioned it. Also, your baking analogy is completely useless, and I was never try to prove anything. I just stated that I prefer the WotC approach of a simple base that is added too vs your suggestion of a more complex base that is subtract from. I also said that WotC didn't do a good job. I think we both agree the result was not the best, we just disagree on the approach to getting to a better solution.
To be clear, I think a "tactical module" should be/could have been a separate set of options that you can select to add to your game. These options would be / should have been integrated into the system from the beginning, but completely optional and more separate than multi-classing and feats.
That was my point, put crudely "put up or shut up." You & others keep saying complex bad simple good so justify that it's complex or show how it's a bad complexity
That was my point, put crudely "put up or shut up" You & others keep saying complex bad simple good so justify that it's complex or show how it's a bad complexity
It's hardly a secret that the reason they rushed the development of 4E was because 3.5 was tanking. One of the biggest complaints about 3.5 and Pathfinder is their complexity causing a barrier to entry.
But your turn. Prove that the best selling version of D&D ever is bad. Saying "because I say it is" doesn't count because millions of people keep proving you wrong by continuing to buy books.
While you're at it prove why you can't just add in some house rules or head over to the dmsguild to add tactical options.
Not sure you need to, but you could add that if you wanted to.
