D&D 5E Final Playtest Packet vs. Finished Product
- Thread starter kmdietri
- Start date
Giltonio_Santos
Hero
Same spirit, same feel, improved math. That's what I'm waiting for.
Cheers,
Cheers,
Sword of Spirit
Legend
Somewhere in-between.
For PHB+DMG+MM:
The rules (as in "How to Play" document) won't be much different. A few tweaks.
We'll have the same classes and most of the same class features. A few features may be replaced, and definitely there will be adjustments and changes within the features.
We'll have additional sub-classes for many of the classes (I'm hoping for all, but I doubt they will go that far), and we'll have a sorcerer and warlock.
Racial abilities are going to be similar, but there is more room for variance there than with classes. Humans are going to be presented a bit differently. The actual races in the PHB will be human, elf, dwarf, halfling, half-elf, half-orc, gnome, and perhaps dragonborn and tiefling. The others will not be in the PHB, but will be found in later products.
We'll have new and revised feats. At least a good third of the current feats (and possibly many more) will be redesigned or tweaked, and we'll get another 25%+ additional feats. I'm hoping for at least 50% more, but that's just my hope. The way feats work (intended power level, get by trading in an ability boost) is going to remain identical.
Skills will be almost identical, but they might add or split one or two or rename them.
They won't add as many backgrounds as I hope they will. Perhaps 2-4 more beyond what is currently there, and they will rename 3. If you are reading this WoTC, add merchant, outcast, captive, and monastic.
It's possible that the proficiency bonus will change to max out at +5 (you can reverse engineer that from some materials).
Spell will be expanded to include all of the missing areas such as summoning spells. Tweaks will be made to other spells, and they might change the page format of presentation. The basic premise is locked in.
Monsters will be heavily revised. For one things, the MM will have a lot more of them. Dragons will have age categories (or I'll throw a fit), proficiency bonuses are likely to be standardized with characters, and monsters will have save and skill proficiencies. It appears likely that natural weapons are becoming non-finessible (must use Str for attack and damage). I think you can safely assume that the Bestiary is the least stable part of the packet we've seen, and the final product will look very different.
Magical items are going to be cleaned up and the number of them greatly expanded. Decisions we haven't heard about (or they haven't mentioned) regarding things like tests of will, intelligent items, cursed items, etc, are going to be finalized.
The sorts of module we are likely to see in the DMG include some of the things that meet two criteria: 1. Ease of implementation, and 2: Demand. There are a lot of things that meet 2 but not 1, and won't make it in. So, for instance, high probability of a couple options for faster or slower healing. Low probability for build your own class or weapon vs. armor AC adjustments.
Many of the "DM's Guidelines" materials will be changed, removed, or expanded upon. They'll revise the exploration rules heavily and add random terrain based encounter chances, more general rules for things like fighting underwater, etc. We'll get more social rules and the Inspiration mechanic they've been talking about for a long time.
When we get into the fluff, especially DMG stuff, I can't predict with as much confidence. We'll have to wait and see how much is presented there and and how much is left to later expansions.
We will get basic downtime rules for adding to your character (learning languages, earning income) but it's unlikely we will get domain rulership or epic destiny sorts of things. Those will all come in an expansion.
In the basic (Red Box) game, you are not going to see most of that. You will have the core four classes and races, a reduced spell, monster, and magical item list, and no feats or modules. Each class will have a background and subclass baked in to it and not presented as a separate entity--but if you take a basic character and compare it to the standard game it will be obvious that they are built with such and so subclass and such and so background.
That's as much as I can think of off the top of my head. I'm fairly confident that is mostly correct.
For PHB+DMG+MM:
The rules (as in "How to Play" document) won't be much different. A few tweaks.
We'll have the same classes and most of the same class features. A few features may be replaced, and definitely there will be adjustments and changes within the features.
We'll have additional sub-classes for many of the classes (I'm hoping for all, but I doubt they will go that far), and we'll have a sorcerer and warlock.
Racial abilities are going to be similar, but there is more room for variance there than with classes. Humans are going to be presented a bit differently. The actual races in the PHB will be human, elf, dwarf, halfling, half-elf, half-orc, gnome, and perhaps dragonborn and tiefling. The others will not be in the PHB, but will be found in later products.
We'll have new and revised feats. At least a good third of the current feats (and possibly many more) will be redesigned or tweaked, and we'll get another 25%+ additional feats. I'm hoping for at least 50% more, but that's just my hope. The way feats work (intended power level, get by trading in an ability boost) is going to remain identical.
Skills will be almost identical, but they might add or split one or two or rename them.
They won't add as many backgrounds as I hope they will. Perhaps 2-4 more beyond what is currently there, and they will rename 3. If you are reading this WoTC, add merchant, outcast, captive, and monastic.
It's possible that the proficiency bonus will change to max out at +5 (you can reverse engineer that from some materials).
Spell will be expanded to include all of the missing areas such as summoning spells. Tweaks will be made to other spells, and they might change the page format of presentation. The basic premise is locked in.
Monsters will be heavily revised. For one things, the MM will have a lot more of them. Dragons will have age categories (or I'll throw a fit), proficiency bonuses are likely to be standardized with characters, and monsters will have save and skill proficiencies. It appears likely that natural weapons are becoming non-finessible (must use Str for attack and damage). I think you can safely assume that the Bestiary is the least stable part of the packet we've seen, and the final product will look very different.
Magical items are going to be cleaned up and the number of them greatly expanded. Decisions we haven't heard about (or they haven't mentioned) regarding things like tests of will, intelligent items, cursed items, etc, are going to be finalized.
The sorts of module we are likely to see in the DMG include some of the things that meet two criteria: 1. Ease of implementation, and 2: Demand. There are a lot of things that meet 2 but not 1, and won't make it in. So, for instance, high probability of a couple options for faster or slower healing. Low probability for build your own class or weapon vs. armor AC adjustments.
Many of the "DM's Guidelines" materials will be changed, removed, or expanded upon. They'll revise the exploration rules heavily and add random terrain based encounter chances, more general rules for things like fighting underwater, etc. We'll get more social rules and the Inspiration mechanic they've been talking about for a long time.
When we get into the fluff, especially DMG stuff, I can't predict with as much confidence. We'll have to wait and see how much is presented there and and how much is left to later expansions.
We will get basic downtime rules for adding to your character (learning languages, earning income) but it's unlikely we will get domain rulership or epic destiny sorts of things. Those will all come in an expansion.
In the basic (Red Box) game, you are not going to see most of that. You will have the core four classes and races, a reduced spell, monster, and magical item list, and no feats or modules. Each class will have a background and subclass baked in to it and not presented as a separate entity--but if you take a basic character and compare it to the standard game it will be obvious that they are built with such and so subclass and such and so background.
That's as much as I can think of off the top of my head. I'm fairly confident that is mostly correct.
The game engine will still look and taste like D&D Next, with the bulk of the change happening in the classes/subclasses, monsters, magic items and spells. I expect the finished product's equivalent of 'How to Play' will be much the same as the play test version, with some tweaks and polishes.
GX.Sigma
Adventurer
They only have a few months between the final playtest packet and the finished manuscript, so it probably won't be too different. The math will be better (if it isn't, the game will flop).
I hope they at least do a second pass on all the broken stuff in the playtest that they never fixed (humans, half-elves, flame tongue, etc.).
I hope they at least do a second pass on all the broken stuff in the playtest that they never fixed (humans, half-elves, flame tongue, etc.).
Dungeoneer
First Post
I predict that some things will be the same, BUT... other things will be different!!
You'll see if I'm right!
You'll see if I'm right!
Plaguescarred
Hero
I think D&D Next will be similar to the playtest but with some major overhaul and polish of game maths, rules etc.... when it will roll out of the shop.
Jester David
Hero
I'd like to agree with @Giltonio_Santos and say that the final product will be like the playtest but with firmer math, I really don't trust the dev team to be able to resist temptation. They're game designers by nature and profession. They design games. They tinker with mechanics, ever revising.
I imagine they will be making small revisions continually, slipping new fixes and tweaks into the game until the very last minute. They'll have brainstorms about fixes to problems, but they will come to late to apply everywhere so they'll fix or add as much as they can before running out of time.
I imagine they will be making small revisions continually, slipping new fixes and tweaks into the game until the very last minute. They'll have brainstorms about fixes to problems, but they will come to late to apply everywhere so they'll fix or add as much as they can before running out of time.
The Myopic Sniper
Hero
My gut tells me that the final product will be massively different from the final public playtest.
My brain tells me that might just be wishful thinking on my part.
My brain tells me that might just be wishful thinking on my part.
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