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<blockquote data-quote="CleverNickName" data-source="post: 8582003" data-attributes="member: 50987">Well, the design intent of all editions of the game has always been twofold: make it fun, and make it sell.&nbsp; The trouble is that both of those things change over time.&nbsp; To keep hitting those marks, the game had to change...which meant new editions were written.&nbsp; But yep, you make excellent points.When 2E was being written, the game was much more story-focused as you said.&nbsp; But there was enough demand from the customer base for more structured rules and such, so 2E ended up with a much more &quot;mechanical&quot; feel than the earlier versions.&nbsp; If only to distance it from the &quot;Basic D&amp;D&quot; product line that was becoming less popular.3E was written by the authors of Magic: the Gathering, so it wasn't any surprise that the game was written to appeal to the M:tG player base:&nbsp; lots of math, lots of standardized rules mechanics, lots of build strategy (or &quot;system mastery,&quot; as you put it.)&nbsp; Magic: the Gathering was invented by a math teacher, after all.&nbsp; But I digress:&nbsp; at the time 3E was written, it was the kind of game that was considered fun, and the kind of game that people were buying: lots of crunch, not much fluff.When 4E was written, the kinds of games that were considered fun and marketable were Everquest, World of Warcraft, and other big-budget MMORPGs.&nbsp; So to capture that demand (and sales), the next edition of the game focused on team-building, synergy between classes, per-encounter actions, and similar mechanics from popular games at the time.&nbsp; Apparently this is a bad thing, because every time I bring this up I get yelled at.&nbsp; But I insist that it was not only a good thing, it was the right call at the time.&nbsp; WotC had no way of knowing that the MMORPGs were about to fall out of fashion.But they did.&nbsp; Times change, and when 5E was being written the shift had started moving back to story-based, &quot;classic&quot; D&amp;D.&nbsp; Retro-clones were all the rage at the tabletop, and on screens people weren't playing MMORPGs as much...instead, they were playing more lore-rich games like Skyrim and Final Fantasy XII.&nbsp; So it's no big surprise that 5E shifted to a more lore-rich, rules-flexible format.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="CleverNickName, post: 8582003, member: 50987"] Well, the design [I]intent[/I] of all editions of the game has always been twofold: make it fun, and make it sell. The trouble is that both of those things change over time. To keep hitting those marks, the game had to change...which meant new editions were written. But yep, you make excellent points. When 2E was being written, the game was much more story-focused as you said. But there was enough demand from the customer base for more structured rules and such, so 2E ended up with a much more "mechanical" feel than the earlier versions. If only to distance it from the "Basic D&D" product line that was becoming less popular. 3E was written by the authors of Magic: the Gathering, so it wasn't any surprise that the game was written to appeal to the M:tG player base: lots of math, lots of standardized rules mechanics, lots of build strategy (or "system mastery," as you put it.) Magic: the Gathering was invented by a math teacher, after all. But I digress: at the time 3E was written, it was the kind of game that was considered fun, and the kind of game that people were buying: lots of crunch, not much fluff. When 4E was written, the kinds of games that were considered fun and marketable were Everquest, World of Warcraft, and other big-budget MMORPGs. So to capture that demand (and sales), the next edition of the game focused on team-building, synergy between classes, per-encounter actions, and similar mechanics from popular games at the time. Apparently this is a bad thing, because every time I bring this up I get yelled at. But I insist that it was not only a good thing, it was the right call at the time. WotC had no way of knowing that the MMORPGs were about to fall out of fashion. But they did. Times change, and when 5E was being written the shift had started moving back to story-based, "classic" D&D. Retro-clones were all the rage at the tabletop, and on screens people weren't playing MMORPGs as much...instead, they were playing more lore-rich games like Skyrim and Final Fantasy XII. So it's no big surprise that 5E shifted to a more lore-rich, rules-flexible format. [/QUOTE]

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