[+] Here's my ideal future 5E supplement

[Jester David]

I know that's not going to happen, but sometimes a dream is nice eh?

I too dream of nice things....
At least until the damned alarm clock rings.

My point was it wasn't the book that's a dream. It's the idea that WotC will publish it that's a dream.
This book could very, very easily be done.

Step One: Work on the Classes.
Design a way to make each class more complex and add options and choices into more levels.
This can be done on a class-by-class basis with each made into their own document and released separately on the DMsGuild.

Step Two: Work on the Other Options
Do the feats and other options required.
Again, release this as a book on the Guild.

Step Three: Compile
Take the profits made from sales of the individual books and use that to get more art.
Merge all the individual files into one book, incorporating playtest feedback gathered from people using those options.

Step Four: Play
Use the options against existing monsters. See where more oomf is needed.
Figure out which monsters need more options and power. Increase as needed.

Step Five: Work on the Monsters
Release several monster books, like the class books. Likely grouped by CR.

Step Six: Compile. Again.
Take money from the sales of the compiled player book and individual monster books. Get art.
Put out a big complete monster book.

It's also potentially workable using DrivethruRPG rather than the Guild, which would also allow Kickstarter as a way to get even more funds. Likely for the compiled books.

This is likely a two-three year process. At least. And requires a lot of work. But there's nothing here that's impossible or a pipe dream.

 

[Sacrosanct]

This is just how I envision the concept in my head, so take with a grain of salt. Also, I'm an analyst by day job, so forgive how I break this down lol

There are three key requirements here that I see: 1. give more decision points in chargen/progression with a level of sophistication that allows complex build combinations. 2. None of these decision points will be a trap option, and system mastery won't allow an uber build combo exploiting loophoes. 3. A PC created with the basic and core rules will need to be able to feel just as effective as an "advanced" PC

Assumptions: A basic PC decision point includes a sublcass/subclass features, and an ASI. By including several more decision points, those new decision points have to mechanically be individually less impactful than any subclass feature or ASI since you get more of them than you do a subclass feature or ASI. I.e. if each ASI, class feature, subclass feature, and new decision point have a certain value, regardless of which method of chargen you do, the total value has to be the same

Someone mentioned it earlier, and I agree. The only way I can see this is to remove subclasses altogether. Not only does that free up subclass feature slots to be used for new decision points, but they are kind of moot if you can select from a giant pool of new abilities to choose. I'm thinking of it as moving from a class based system, to a sill based system. Or a hybrid anyway. Obviously still classes, but instead of baked in class, subclass, and ASI features, you just have the ability to make whatever choice you want from the pool of new features based on that class. Essentially, it looks like a version of 3e turned to 11 to me, with even more feats and less baked in class features.

I think something like that could be fairly easy to do, and has a place. The biggest hurdle, as mentioned, is the balance aspect to adhere to one of the requirements above. That would require a huge amount of playtesting, because we often don't even think of many of the scenarios that can come up where one aspect might really throw a wrench into how things are balanced. Especially when you start talking about combos and builds. That was a huge problem with 3e's expansive feat list, as pretty much everyone knows.

 

[CapnZapp]

Anyway. Great to see we're back on topic

Advanced Player's Handbook
What this would do is, instead of handing out bonuses and abilities automatically, is make the player "work" for it - choosing between menus, at each level.

To increase choices, the level-up bonus represented by proficiency in the Basic Player's Handbook could be removed, so there is design space for giving individual bonuses for making choices on skills and attacks. Just to take a single example.

Furthermore, there would be no absolute boons in my ideal supplement. No "you can't be surprised" things. No "this feat makes you immune to opportunity attacks". No "this ability removes penalties from long distance". All such things would be rephrased into relative terms and thus empower the DM to still feature enemies that manage to evade and overcome them.

Instead of a magic item that says you "can't" be surprised, it would give a bonus to whatever check that determines surprise. Instead of a feat that "removes" penalties for distance or cover, you get a bonus that makes it easier for you to overcome distance or cover penalties (but where distance and cover remains a factor).

Same with "you can't be tracked". Or, "you detect the CR of your foe". Absolutes are stupid, and rob the DM of the license to fudge results in order to create a better play experience.

Advanced Monster Manual
I got the suggestion to include monster tactics. That's a great idea.

I can easily see each monster entry include a typical or default three round routine, to help a DM short on time to not forget a particular ability or combo.

This especially goes for spellcasting monsters, but also epic ones with loads of different abilities. Blogs such as "The Monsters Know What They're Doing" or Sly Flourish make great examples of what to expect with this.

No more than a three round routine should be included, or it defeats the purpose (becoming so long it takes too much time to digest it's better to just skip it).

 

[CapnZapp]

There are three key requirements here that I see: 1. give more decision points in chargen/progression with a level of sophistication that allows complex build combinations. 2. None of these decision points will be a trap option, and system mastery won't allow an uber build combo exploiting loophoes. 3. A PC created with the basic and core rules will need to be able to feel just as effective as an "advanced" PC

1. Yep, more fine-grained control is basically what it is all about. Each decision point is smaller. In return you get more of them. The APHB would be geared for those who want more crunch. To be brutally honest: more minutae.

The biggest point that is important to keep in mind:
4. This is all about the front-end. The chargen. Once the character is in play, all of the details and choices and calculations should be done away with.

Back to your points:
2. Sure we all wish the devs never made any trap options... but to be realistic: this can't be more of a goal than "let's hope for good QA" or the project becomes impossible.
3. Likewise. The biggest deal is relative balance between options from the same source. That is, class 1 and 2 from APHB should be roughly equal in power, just as classes 3 and 4 from the existing PHB are. But just like it's possible to minmax one PHB class and make a hopeless build of another PHB class, this parity can only be very very rough. (Maybe more of a theoretical problem than one in practice. If WotC managed to keep the PHB together, with no class worse off than maybe the Four Elements Monk; let's just assume they can keep the APHB together to a similar degree too )

As long as the community does not percieve the APHB to be generally stronger (or weaker, though I don't think anyone thinks that's a real concern), it is a success. Just like with Ancestral Guardian vs Berserker Barbarians, I'm okay with a certain amount of definite upgrading taking place. Case in point: there's no reason to replicate a Champion Fighter, a subclass specifically designed to cater to the simple-loving crowd, in a product called "advanced"* something!

*) not in the sense of "better" but "more difficult". Remember, naming this project the Diseased Kobold's Guide to Candles is fine by me...

 

[Tony Vargas]

To be fair, a major point of such an expansion is to give greater support to the playstyles promoted by 3.x, which thrived on customizability and system mastery - that's why a DMsG or 3pp (other than Paizo, perhaps) offering would be futile, it absolutely needs the seal of RAW & officialdom to establish a defining system to master, and rules that the DM is also expected to abide by. And, yes, some (sub)optimal stuff is inevitable in any system, but 3.x design when the extra mile with M:tG 'Timmeh Cards'-style designs to challenge system mastery, as well. Balance isn't a meaningful target in such a design - choice, breadth, depth, and interest, an engaging chargen/level-up meta-game, are.

(And, yes 'Advanced,' may not be the best title, maybe Robilars Secrets & Techniques or Zagyg's Guide to Eldritch Wizardry or something... to match 5e's shelf presence, and disguise rules expansions as esoterica for obsessive fans rather a natural path all players are expected to tred )

 

[robus]

Someone mentioned it earlier, and I agree. The only way I can see this is to remove subclasses altogether. Not only does that free up subclass feature slots to be used for new decision points, but they are kind of moot if you can select from a giant pool of new abilities to choose. I'm thinking of it as moving from a class based system, to a sill based system. Or a hybrid anyway. Obviously still classes, but instead of baked in class, subclass, and ASI features, you just have the ability to make whatever choice you want from the pool of new features based on that class. Essentially, it looks like a version of 3e turned to 11 to me, with even more feats and less baked in class features.

I might be confused but this is sounding something like talent trees? And that might be a cool option to go to with non-caster classes.

Talents are locked by level and as you level up you get access to higher level talents. (The shield abilities listed earlier would be an example of a "Shield Master talent tree" perhaps? The amount of times these talents can be used would need some consideration (once per encounter, short rest, long rest etc) to avoid overpowering.

Anyway - casters get a lot of choices as they level up. Non-casters should get something equivalent in an Advanced PHB.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I might be confused but this is sounding something like talent trees? .

That's pretty much the vision as I see it. But less of a tree and more of a bush

 

[Oofta]

I might be confused but this is sounding something like talent trees? And that might be a cool option to go to with non-caster classes.

Talents are locked by level and as you level up you get access to higher level talents. (The shield abilities listed earlier would be an example of a "Shield Master talent tree" perhaps? The amount of times these talents can be used would need some consideration (once per encounter, short rest, long rest etc) to avoid overpowering.

Anyway - casters get a lot of choices as they level up. Non-casters should get something equivalent in an Advanced PHB.

I was thinking the same thing. Steal talent trees from video games. Not only the shield master example (just on of many) but also trees for multiple attacks, two weapon fighting, etc. You could even have spell casting trees, so if you want your PC to have spells you can decide how much you want to invest in that specialty. Spells, and spell slots available do become a little problematic though if you continue the "pooling" allowed with 5E.

That might effectively get rid of multi-classing altogether, and limit the ability to take a couple level "dip" to gain specific abilities.

Not sure if it would feel like it limited creativity, or would just give enough structure and visual presentation to make options cleaner. The other issue of course is that you only have so many levels to play with and D&D has far fewer total options than many video games.

 

[robus]

1. Yep, more fine-grained control is basically what it is all about. Each decision point is smaller. In return you get more of them. The APHB would be geared for those who want more crunch. To be brutally honest: more minutae.

The biggest point that is important to keep in mind:
4. This is all about the front-end. The chargen. Once the character is in play, all of the details and choices and calculations should be done away with.

Could you give an example of what you're thinking about here? Perhaps this is an opportunity to sketch out what one of these chargen's might look like?

Is the end result something that can be put on a standard character sheet?

 

[CapnZapp]

That's pretty much the vision as I see it. But less of a tree and more of a bush

Agreed.

Being locked out of a whole bunch of special abilities for the entire game just because of a choice you made at, like, level 3 is not fun. And not fun is not good.

I'm completely up for a system where things you haven't focused on gets more expensive at higher levels, just as long as it's not outright impossible.

So, if we assume a simple "build point" based system, you could get 1 point's worth of discount for each previous ability within the same set you've already got. So an high-level ability would cost you, like, 5 points instead of 9 because you have four previous abilities.

But you can still splurge 9 points if your character has an epiphany, has found a secret training monastery, or just an appropriate magic item, that lets you switch over to this thing.

At this stage, examples are probably in order. If I may lift from d20 just for the sake of example: there were various trip, improved trip, trip expert, reach trip, double trip, hippety trip, trip master... feats that would belong to the same "set". The same with other things that in regular 5E probably ended up as Battlemaster Maneuvers.

Actually this is so important I probably need to add it to my initial post: no lock-outs that only serve to force you to map your entire career out already at level 1, that makes you unable to switch gears when the story or campaign would otherwise benefit from it!