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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 9636327" data-attributes="member: 4937">Wow.",,,it radically changes the dynamics of many D&D combats."I'll say.  It's probably the biggest change in D&D mechanics in the history of the game.  What it does is radically minimize the value of having good saving throws.  We're now fully at, "The best block; no be there."  The game has always had a tendency to push players toward "party turret" strategies where you solved all problems by having radically more powerful ranged attacks than your foes and killed them quickly before they could attack you.  This allowed the party to deal with all tactical situations the same way, ignoring terrain and moving only to kite when possible.  Avoiding that situation has been a big part of my design goals since 1e and is a big part of the reason I enjoy my 3e homebrew rules, as it forces combat into movement, positioning and choices of weapons and tactics depending on the type of foe.   When I ran combats in default 3.5e at an open table with 3.5e legal characters, parties naturally evolved into turrets that stayed in place and just unleashed ranged attacks, relying on exploits of the rules to not have downsides to using missile weapons.I'm looking at that change and that change alone means D&D has left me further behind than at any point in its history.  Heck, one of the things I had to fix in 3.5e is they made similar "simplifying" changes with spells like "Ray of Enfeeblement" leading to broken attacks were all the PC had to do was hit the target in order to nerf it (often sufficiently to take some foes functionally out of the fight).  Leaving aside everything else, which I also don't like, this is utterly game breaking for me and suggests a misguided notion to appeal heavily to the rules light side at the expense of the people who actually prefer rules heavy games.  I suggest they are unlikely to win over the rules light people who will prefer less crunchy games with more coherent designs anyway, while turning away everyone who was into the crunch had more process simulation.</blockquote>

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