D&D 5E GAMA Trade Show and Game Developer Conference start Monday - announcement Tomorrow?

[Holy Bovine]

I'm officially giving both of you a -1 penalty to your next die roll for Excessive Use of Bad Jokes. Please inform your respective DMs of this or if you are DMs yourselves deduct it from your next monster attack roll.

 

[Agamon]

I'm officially giving both of you a -1 penalty to you next die roll for Excessive Use of Bad Jokes. Please inform you respective DMs of this or if you are DMs yourselves deduct it from you next monster attack roll.

That's not fair. I already can't roll higher than 5. Sigh.

 

[Holy Bovine]

That's not fair. I already can't roll higher than 5. Sigh.

Since when has a Rat Bastard DM *ever* been fair?!?!?!

Careful or I'll up it to -2!!

 

[variant]

I really wish they would just reveal all the release details. Why are they even hiding the covers if they are finalized?

 

[jrowland]

Color me as an old grognard if you must, but I'd like to see an homage to the 1E AD&D covers. Not exact, but similar enough to get it

PHB e.g would have a rogue stealing something (big gem on statue eye), wizard casting something (identify on loot?), Cleric Healing Warrior, and Warrior Cleaning blade with dead monster at feet.

DMG: An Efreet coming out of a portal, city of brass in the background, into a countryside with a castle nearby (background), fleeing peasants and a lone party scared SH*TLESS as they "confront" the Efreet.

MM: Red Dragon. Preferably By Larry Elmore.

 

[Ichneumon]

I hope not! Including 4e things in 5e books is a total non starter for me and would sway purchasing decisions against the books for me. Now, if they want to continue supporting and releasing 4e only books I've no problem with that and they can happily do it for any previous edition but please WotC don't mix edition support together.

I was thinking more of the online supplements that go with products like Murder in Baldur's Gate. But I wouldn't object to the occasional appendix with conversion material, for example, the 4e version of the Druid of Surfing subclass presented in the main part of the book. Since that content is shunted off to the end, the reader is unlikely to catch 4e cooties from its presence.

 

[Ichneumon]

As for requiring the starter set to play, I don't think so. But if this was true, it would be equivalent to the original version of D&D requiring Chainmail. D&D would then truly have come full circle.

 

[orangefruitbat]

Umn, this is normal marketing behaviour - in about virtually every multi-tier industry on the planet. Car manufacturers reveal product information about their new line-up to dealerships well in advance of auto shows and public releases. Computer manufactures (other than Apple, which reveals nothing), talk to their biggest corporate customers well before public launches. WOTC does not primarily sell to fans directly, but instead sells to distributors, book sellers, (and resellers), who typically need to place orders well in advance of the release date (assuming WOTC has it even locked in yet). Trade shows are a good way to gauge customer (i.e., distributor) interest. There is also a lot of co-ordinated discussion, effort and financial details that need to be worked out that is never even seen by the public.

So yes, distributors get this info first. Besides, it's not like their is a big public event coming up in March with plenty of media coverage that they could have a big reveal...

Dear WotC, any time you want to talk to your fans about your plans, that would be dandy. Every time I have to get information by reading someone else's summary/interpretation of a trade show I wasn't able to attend, that just pisses me off.

At the moment, you're doing a worse job selling me this edition than you did 4e.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

So yes, distributors get this info first. Besides, it's not like their is a big public event coming up in March with plenty of media coverage that they could have a big reveal...

I doubt it'll be at PAX East if that's what you are insinuating. Mike Mearls answered that some of them would be going to PAX East but their work schedule wasn't allowing them time to have an organized presence or gaming there this year.

It sounds like they are still frantically trying to finish the game on time. A bunch of us on another thread were guesstimating that the book would need to be finished by the end of this week in order to release at Gen Con but some of Mike Mearls tweets insinuated that they are still in the middle of a final pass and rework on the math this week based on feedback from the private beta. Which implies they are a little behind.

 

[Argyle King]

"In summary, the main focus is on story, not mechanics."


At first glance, I think that's cool.

However, upon second thought, I'm a bit cautious. I'm cautious because, thus far, the design mentality has used language I liked, but with apparently different meanings to the words than I thought they meant. With that in mind, I question what exactly is meant by the quote above. I do like a focus on story; however, I also believe that some mechanics lend themselves toward certain types of story and stories better than others. If the thought toward D&D's future is that mechanics don't matter at all, then I feel as though the game will be far different than what I want... despite multiple editions being supported. I feel that way because I believe certain editions of D&D do better at some types of stories than others; as such, an edition agnostic approach to adventure design and story is something I question.