D&D (2024) Does anyone else think that 1D&D will create a significant divide in the community?

[Li Shenron]

I don't expect a big split this time, but only a very small splinter group, similar to what happened between 3.0 and 3.5. I will be in the splinter group like I was back then.

Most of all, I think WotC is counting on the fact that a large portion of the gamebase is always made of two kinds of people:

• heavy consumers who "need" frequent change and constant novelty in their hobby, some which are lucky to really play a lot and exhaust all the options, some others whose hobby is more focused on buying, collecting and talking instead of actually playing (it happens in all hobbies) and they just need something new all the time so for them a new edition is the best thing that can happen
• newcomers who simply buy whatever is current because they have no cognition or opinion about previous versions

I have long ago turned into a minority kind of RPGamer. I like taking a ruleset or edition and treating it more as a toolset. I could easily play all my life with a single edition, although I've eventually gravitated around three of them (BECMI, 3.0 and 5e) which is two more than I need. In addition, I've grown to detest fandom, the attitudes/habits of most regular gamers, I care nothing for "official" labels, and I am suspicious of everything that is "en vogue". If the masses go one way, I pretty much immediately look for the other direction. More specifically in RPGing, I nowadays run the game almost exclusively for "casual gamers" i.e. friends, workmates, family which usually don't know much about D&D and just want to have some fun trying it out, they won't buy books (and I won't encourage them to do it) so the edition of choice is entirely up to me. As a player on someone else's table, I play pretty much anything they want, it doesn't have to be D&D so it also doesn't have to be a specific, but I'm not going to buy anything, so I'll be the "casual gamer" for them.

 

[TwoSix]

It will only cause a problem if some groups decide that say "You can't use that subclass from Tasha's, we're playing a ONE only game."

 

[Thomas Shey]

One thing I realized looking at this thread title is One D&D may create confusion with D&D 1E, as I imagine a lot of people are going to swap out "one" with "1".

The alternative, which I've also seen, is people confusing it with Original D&D by using "O".

 

[Bill Zebub]

It will only cause a problem if some groups decide that say "You can't use that subclass from Tasha's, we're playing a ONE only game."

Which isn’t/won’t be a new problem.

 

[TwoSix]

Which isn’t/won’t be a new problem.

The newest iteration of an age-old problem, for sure.

 

[Clint_L]

I'm dying.

If the changes to 5e are superficial, then it is not a new edition. So far they have been pretty minor and a little boring and so hence its maybe a 5.5e but I don't think they can decide what to call it. D&D "Next" was never a thing, I don't think "One" is going to be a thing, its an insult to 1st edition.

WotC addressed this in the original announcement video. The project is called OneD&D. They want the game to henceforth just be called D&D or Dungeons and Dragons. No edition appended, unless you are playing one of the old ones.

So instead of "5e" or "D&D5e," it will just become "D&D," even though it will still be 5e rules, as they have evolved and keep evolving.

 

[Marandahir]

One D&D is the prototype name, the same as D&D Next.
The books won't say One D&D or D&D 6th Edition or even ADVANCED D&D 5th Edition ESSENTIALS PLUS PRO ADVANCE.

They'll just say Dungeons & Dragons.

WotC has a financial incentive to have a singular product series on the market that is their brand identity. There's no need to subdivide the brand. So if you had older edition books, or even older 5e books, it's still D&D. It's ALL D&D. But these are building on the matrix of the 5e rules. It's like how 3e dropped the Advanced title. There was no need to keep the ADVANCED when the Basic line was dead as of 5 years earlier. Now they're just dropping the initials numbers.

In any case, owning up to a new edition with huge changes would be very financially problematic for them. They don't need that messiness. They don't want to split the party again like at every edition change in the past. They want to unify the party while updating the core to build on everything they've learned from selling us the expansions and playing them with us over the last 10 years.

This is 5.5e MAYBE. 5.1e was the updated SRD that came out just a few months after the 5.0e SRD in 2016, alongside the finalized 5e Basic Rules v1.0. 5.2e would then be Xanathar's in 2017, 5.3e would be Tasha's and the changes it brought in 2019, and 5.4e would be Mordenkainen Presents and the changes that it brought this year (2022).

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

No, I don’t think. Not anymore than any other edition shift and most likely a lot less.

 

[Cadence]

So, in the case of an actual edition change 1 -> 2 -> 3 -> 3.5 -> 4 -> 5 was a huge percent of the sales of the core books, at least at first, to those who played the previous edition?

On the other hand, was there much of a big rush to get the new 1e covered core books by the previous owners at all?

So, assuming Yes and No respectively, what's the marketing gimmick to get all of the current 5e owners to buy a definitely not new edition set of core books when they already have a set?

 

[Incenjucar]

Overall it's going to be bigger than the number of books people buy multiple times with zero changes, and may sell to people who have been holding off from 5.0E to avoid buying a stale edition.