D&D 5E (2024) How I would do 6E.

[Reynard]

The reason for 6E is to have a game that fans of all of those can play together with a similar style that they prefer. Having a drawsteel, daggerheart, and shadowdark characters in the same party..

That was the promise of D&D Next and they failed to deliver. Why do you think they would get it right with 6E, or even be motivated to try?

 

[Minigiant]

That was the promise of D&D Next and they failed to deliver. Why do you think they would get it right with 6E, or even be motivated to try?

Money

They quit before because they really didn't have competition in that realm..

Now, any specific RPG Taylor twist specific style exists and is well-known within the community. So the only thing they have going for them is to be a jack-of-all-trades that provides a system that multiple types of people can play together..

 

[djotaku]

go the draw steel/daggerheart route and roll 2 dice to make the probabilities less swingy

control spells by mana points (like JRPGs and modern TTRPGs) instead of circles

if I understand this correctly, go the nimble/daggerheart way where the amount of attacks by a monster depends on the party size for automatic scaling to party size

I don't mind that sometimes characters miss, but maybe do like Nimble where you only miss on a crit fail. I once had a 3 stooges-level fight where (for 5 rounds) NEITHER the characters NOR the monsters hit. It was ridiculous.

Simplify the action economy to the way Pathfinder 2e, Cosmere, (others?) do it - 3 actions. (instead of action, bonus, etc) You could go pathfinder way where each successive attack has a penalty on it to encourage variety or not.

Borrow from Cosmere (and others?) and don't have everyone have attack of opportunity by default. I know how it's intended to be used, but in reality it makes everyone do like the fish slapping fight from Monty Python.

Finally, while I'm not on the same page as Nimble when it comes to completely dropping the flavor description text for monsters (based on what I understand, I don't own the books...yet) I am DEFINITELY on board with Nimble's (and based on what I've seen Draw Steel's) attack visual language. When you look at a Nimble monster's stat block (I've seen what this looks like from his YT videos) it's immediately understandable what the creature can do and how it works. 5e is TOO wordy (whether that's D&D or Tales of the Valiant). Again, I like the flavor text. I like being able to flip through the monster books and learn about the creatures which helps me for the RP part of TTRPGs. But I don't need the actions to be so complex that for a new monster I've never used before it can take a few rounds to truly run them correctly. (for higher level monsters with recharges and legendaries and so on)

 

[Tigris]

Between Draw Steel, Daggerheart, Shadowdark, Nimble, and 5.0, I really question if a 6e is needed at all.

These are all games heavily inspired by (or even heavily copying from) D&D. The reason such games exists is Dungeons and Dragons in different versions exist. So yes a D&D 6E is necessarily, since D&D is THE biggest driver of change/innocation in the RPG scene.


Thats also a reason why it should be its own thing and not a D&D 5E clone. Do you really think there cant be anything new anymore?

 

[Scribe]

D&D is THE biggest driver of change/innocation in the RPG scene.

I don't think so.

 

[Tigris]

go the draw steel/daggerheart route and roll 2 dice to make the probabilities less swingy

control spells by mana points (like JRPGs and modern TTRPGs) instead of circles

if I understand this correctly, go the nimble/daggerheart way where the amount of attacks by a monster depends on the party size for automatic scaling to party size

I don't mind that sometimes characters miss, but maybe do like Nimble where you only miss on a crit fail. I once had a 3 stooges-level fight where (for 5 rounds) NEITHER the characters NOR the monsters hit. It was ridiculous.

Simplify the action economy to the way Pathfinder 2e, Cosmere, (others?) do it - 3 actions. (instead of action, bonus, etc) You could go pathfinder way where each successive attack has a penalty on it to encourage variety or not.

Why copy other systems trying to be D&D?

Especially when the ideas are not good.

Rolling 2 dice is not bad per se, but makes modifiers matter even more and makes big modifiers a lot harder to have. I dont think this is a bad idea per se, but I dont think its better than a d20 per se.

Mana points make combats more repetitive, since you just use the same ability over and over again. See PF2 encounter mana points vs original 4E encounter abilities.

PF2 is the absolute oppisite of simplification. The "3 action system" does make things not simpler, but more complicated in the end. PF2 is soooo much more complicated than 5E and part of it is this 3 action economy and its need for multi attack penalty, and not having the ability to actually balance abilities with different action costs. It needs even for even the most basic classes which just do basic attacks "action compression" because there would be hardly movement without. (In addition to the heavy multi attack penalty).

Having a distinct movement action solves this. It also allows to have "minions" and other characters which just move and attack, not needing to do/filling 3 actions with mass enemies allows for more enemies. (Thats the reason why PF2 had to change the 4E math the built upon to 1 same level enemy per 2 players instead of per 1).

 

[Reynard]

Why copy other systems trying to be D&D?

Which are those?

Especially when the ideas are not good.

Ah. Never mind.

 

[Reynard]

I don't think so.

Reaction TO D&D drives innovation, so I guess that sort of counts?

 

[M_Natas]

My 6e would be... a heavily modified 5e.

Design principles is to make running the game at the table as easy as possible. So focus in support for In Person Play.

Fixing Rests:
A good night's rest gives you 1hp+Con and the lowest spent spellslots / or 1 mana + spell casting ability modifier.
Add more health potions and Mana Potions to the game.
More grittyness, more longer lasting impact of battles. Not this unrealistic and game pacing destroying 100% reset after each long rest anymore.

Fixing 5-minute work days and battles being front-loaded:

Battle Rush Dice: At the end of your turns in combat you gain a battle rush die (d4) up to a maximum of your Proficiency Bonus. You can spend battle rush dice to add to Attack bonus, saving throw dc, damage roll ...
So, the longer you wait to use your big abilities in combat, the more effective you can make them.

Fates Favor:
After you finish a combat (or a difficult non combat encounter determined by the dm, your Battle Rush die increases to the next higher die (d4 --> d6 --> d8 --> d10 --> d12 --> 2d6. A rest resets the die to a d4.
Fate favores the bold. The more you push instead of resting, the stronger you get in combat.

Fixing Spellslots:
Switch to a Mana based system for Wizards and Sorcerers.

Fixing Spellcasting (especially Wizards):
Spells are now gated behind proficiency and expertise. A Wizard need proficiency/expertise in a school of magic to be able to learn and spell of a certain level from that school. Turn some subclass abilities into spells and add some spells to even out spell schools, so you only need one wizard subclass for all schools of magic(gain expertise im one school of magic).
Bards become a wizard subclass.

Also Make Warlocks to something that is really a warlock, not a cleric with an outsider god-replacement. A warlock looks for Power everywhere, so it is a feat based classes (basically everything in that class is an invocation, giving access to different Branches of Invocations (Wizadry, Witchcraft, Alchemy, modyfying your body ...)


Fixing Skillsystem:
More granular 6 tier Skill proficiencies.

Untrained (no Prof. Bonus, roll with disadvantage
Familiar (no prof Bonus)
Practised (0,5 PB rounded down)
Proficient (PB x1)
Skilled (PB x1,5, Skill perks)
Expert (PB x2, additional skill perks)
Master (PB x2,5, Capstone Skill perk)

Also add levels of succes/failure (succed by 5, 10, fail by 5, 10) for checks.

Fixing encumbrance and tracking of ressources (Food, Water, Arrows ...):
Switching to a slot based abstracted system that is easy to use at a table.

Fixing Species/Race/Backgrounds:
Characters are created by choosing five life ingredients, outside of the class:
- Bios (Species) – Your biological nature.
Grants creature type, physical traits, and 1 Major + 1 Minor biological trait.
- Upbringing – Where and how you grew up.
Defines social background, a small feature, and languages.
- Vocation – What you did before adventuring.
Provides a skill or tool proficiency and a practical feature.
- Hobby – What you do for yourself.
A personal interest with a light, flavorful perk.
- Adventure Spark – Why you adventure.
When you act in line with it, you may declare Heroic Inspiration once per long rest (DM approval).

Mixed Heritage:
Characters with parents of different species choose a Major Trait from one Bios and a Minor Trait from another, with age, size, and type blended.

That are the biggest changes so far, and I have them all worked out already, just need to put them in the 5e2024 CC SRD and can start my own game ^^.

Edit: Forgot a more granular non magical gear progression and breakable weapons and armor.

 

[djotaku]

Why copy other systems trying to be D&D?

Especially when the ideas are not good.

Rolling 2 dice is not bad per se, but makes modifiers matter even more and makes big modifiers a lot harder to have. I dont think this is a bad idea per se, but I dont think its better than a d20 per se.

Mana points make combats more repetitive, since you just use the same ability over and over again. See PF2 encounter mana points vs original 4E encounter abilities.

PF2 is the absolute oppisite of simplification. The "3 action system" does make things not simpler, but more complicated in the end. PF2 is soooo much more complicated than 5E and part of it is this 3 action economy and its need for multi attack penalty, and not having the ability to actually balance abilities with different action costs. It needs even for even the most basic classes which just do basic attacks "action compression" because there would be hardly movement without. (In addition to the heavy multi attack penalty).

Having a distinct movement action solves this. It also allows to have "minions" and other characters which just move and attack, not needing to do/filling 3 actions with mass enemies allows for more enemies. (Thats the reason why PF2 had to change the 4E math the built upon to 1 same level enemy per 2 players instead of per 1).

Don't know about the ideas being not good - tons of people play Pathfinder 2e, Nimble and/or other games with mana points. Now, they might not be your taste, which is fine.

The only thing about mana that I disagree - if you look at jRPGs (the place I'm most familiar with mana) more powerful spells cost more mana so you can't necessarily spam those. You have to do resource management. Especially in a TTRPG where you don't control all the players so you can't force another player to use their turn to give you more mana supply.

For the PF2 stuff, I'll definitely not disagree that it's considered a more complex game. I know in Cosmere (which uses the same 3 action economy) it seems to work just fine. Maybe as a newer game they were able to design around PF2's faults? But, sure throw in free movement plus 3 action economy.

In the end, your comment does make me think of a video I saw yesterday. I can't remember the guy's name (because I'm bad with names), but it's the guy who did the YT videos for D&D in 2024 and got fired recently. He said that any changes to D&D are hard because the game has 50 years of baggage. In the end, it might be the case that there's D&D for people who like that and then Daggerhart, Draw Steel, etc for people that don't. Any radical change to D&D would end up splitting the player base just as now there are still folks who play D&D 3.5 and refuse to try 5e. Or people who think Pathfinder 1 is SOOO much better than Pathfinder 2. So maybe the true answer to how D&D would change for 6e is .... minimally.