It's difficult to discuss this topic without referring to previous editions. The closest analogy to new Coke was the switch to 4E. WOTC looked at World of Warcrack and decided that they needed to create a tabletop version. Don't forget that there was supposed to be a fully supported online VTT as well.
Now that doesn't mean that 4E was a bad game, it's just that it took a fundamentally different approach. Yes, 3E had changed the math around but ignoring that, 2E to 3E was a relatively gradual evolution. I could, and did, take a 2E characters, monsters, adventures and fairly easily convert them to 3E. The gameplay felt the same to me. Meanwhile the difference in feel and structure, giving all classes powers that felt much like the structure of Vancian casting with the AEDU structure didn't feel right to a lot of people. While I embraced 4E (at least for a while), to many people it simply didn't feel like the same game.
So for the 2024 edition I don't expect any huge changes, likely less than what we saw in the switch from 3 to 3.5. The game has been out a long time, it could use some minor tweaks. But major change? I just don't see it. So it's a tough balancing act, add enough to make it worth switching over, don't change it so much that people don't like it as much after playing a session or two.
Now that doesn't mean that 4E was a bad game, it's just that it took a fundamentally different approach. Yes, 3E had changed the math around but ignoring that, 2E to 3E was a relatively gradual evolution. I could, and did, take a 2E characters, monsters, adventures and fairly easily convert them to 3E. The gameplay felt the same to me. Meanwhile the difference in feel and structure, giving all classes powers that felt much like the structure of Vancian casting with the AEDU structure didn't feel right to a lot of people. While I embraced 4E (at least for a while), to many people it simply didn't feel like the same game.
So for the 2024 edition I don't expect any huge changes, likely less than what we saw in the switch from 3 to 3.5. The game has been out a long time, it could use some minor tweaks. But major change? I just don't see it. So it's a tough balancing act, add enough to make it worth switching over, don't change it so much that people don't like it as much after playing a session or two.