D&D 5E How should WoTC address different playstyles of D&D Next?

[urLordy]

I don't want to bias the poll too much*, so I won't write a long OP. Needless to say, I have some strong opinions about this (I'm looking at you DoaM) and I'm curious how other Enworlders feel about the bigger picture of how D&D's design philosophy has, does and should support multiple (and sometimes conflicting) playstyles.

Poll clarification: "I think D&D [in general] already supports a hybrid of playstyles to my satisfaction" and "I think D&D [in general] does not properly support a hybrid of playstyles to my satisfaction". See below...

(I would've created the poll to allow anyone to vote, but somehow I missed that option and you have to be logged into Enworld to vote. I wasn't purposefully excluding anyone...)

* Oh what the hell, my bias on post #16

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

" I think D&D already supports a hybrid of playstyles to my satisfaction
I think D&D does not properly support a hybrid of playstyles to my satisfaction"

Were these supposed to say D&D Next, or just D&D? I might have voted for one or the other.

 

[Argyle King]

D&D Next has multiple playstyles?


edit: In some ways, I see that it does have more flexibility. However, in others, it still seems that all of the flexibility still leads to the ends result. I'm not quite sure how to explain what I mean by that yet. It's just how the playtest and doing Encounters makes me feel. I find that, in some vague way I like it, but it still seems to somehow be at odds with some of what I want to do. I had a conversation with one of the other players at last week's Encounters session, and the comment we arrived at was that there are many parts of the system we like, but somehow all of those parts put together -even though we like the individual parts- turns into something we feel sorta meh toward. How that relates to the playstyle question is that I feel a similar answer. It appears that there are a lot of individual parts which allow what I want to do to be flexible, but then those parts combine into something which appears to push in a particular direction. ...just my two cents

 

[Li Shenron]

It's hard for me to define playstyles.

At a higher level, it's fairly understandable that e.g. "heavy roleplay" is a playstyle, and so are "tactical combat", "narrative combat", "character building", "min-maxing", "fine-tuning"...

But at the same time for me something like spellcasting rules also define a playstyle. Traditional vancian plays differently than the current semi-vancian, which is in turn different from at-will magic, again different from spell points. I don't think the designers see these as "playstyles", but IMXP they really change the playing experience by affecting the way you handle your PC's resource management, problem-solving, tactics and strategies. Same thing if you compare a basic 3e Fighter with the Fighter that had round-based Deadly Strike management in previous 5e playtest rounds.

That said, I don't trust WotC having seriously addressed the issue. I rather have the feeling that they did maybe a brainstorming meeting two years ago, stick to what they brought up then, and never really analyzed all possible playstyles and figure out what they would need in the game to support them.

But still, what we currently have in 5e is clearly better than any previous editions, in terms of the range of playstyles supported.

 

[Mercurius]

Modules. Have a simple core game - which we've seen in the playtest - which an be adapted, or "grafted over" with different play-style and thematic templates.

The key, though, is keeping the core of the game simple and clean. Then you can offer all kinds of play-styles - tactical battle grid ala 4e, uber-customizations ala 3e, anachronistic house rules ala 1e, etc.

 

[Balesir]

I put a gestalt of "discuss with fans" and "manage expectations" type stuff. I think that expecting any set of rules *as written* to support multiple play styles is a pipe dream. You can make a ruleset support your chosen style - by changing the rules (maybe only subtly) - but as written they will generally either suffer style clashes or support one specific style well. As [MENTION=58416]Johnny3D3D[/MENTION] says, DDN has bits of rules to appeal to lovers of several styles, but in the end it still feels like its pushing to one particular "mode"...

P.S. Is everybody seeing the forum software try to post twice every time they post, or is it just me? I get a "you must wait 30 seconds between posts" message after every post, but then I go to the thread and my post is already there.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I think the sensible thing to do would be to build a really basic version of the d20 system and make sure it really works. Something very generic that could be used for genres other than fantasy, because it's just a really basic world simulator. Then build on the legacy stuff as needed. Then add on the variants as needed. The only people who can't be satisfied in this model are the ones who can't stand the world simulator aspect of the rules and want a narrative system with no connection between the rules of the game and the world it takes place in; which is alright because there are no versions of D&D remotely like that, and because one game can't be everything.

This is sort of what 3e is, and 3e does support a much broader variety of playstyles than any other version of D&D because of its generic and flexible core, but it has some flaws at its heart, a lot of unnecessary bloat and some of the potential assets of the system were never adequately leveraged. All of which went way downhill with 4e. This is what 5e sounded like it would be, but really isn't.

To that effect, I answered that they'd adequately (if not perfectly) addressed the issue in the past, that 5e so far looks hackneyed and limited in the variety of what I could do with it and I thin it's fair to draw conclusions at this point, and that yes, they should be discussing this issue.

 

[urLordy]

" I think D&D already supports a hybrid of playstyles to my satisfaction
I think D&D does not properly support a hybrid of playstyles to my satisfaction"

Were these supposed to say D&D Next, or just D&D? I might have voted for one or the other.

Thanks for the opportunity to clarify. I edited the OP accordingly.

I intentionally kept it vague to mean "just D&D" . Partially to get a general baseline, and partially because the last playtest is incomplete in its indication of what D&D Next will be, so we can't ascertain the details of how/how much D&D Next will support various playstyles. However, in hindsite, any conclusions drawn from that are equally vague; one person might say "yes" because edition X supports a hybrid of playstyles, or "yes" because edition X supports playstyle A and edition Y supports playstyle B.

 

[urLordy]

As @Johnny3D3D says, DDN has bits of rules to appeal to lovers of several styles, but in the end it still feels like its pushing to one particular "mode"...

Although it does seem like D&D Next is its own unique mechanical animal in many ways, I don't know if it's pushing one particular mode of playstyle. Different people are still viewing the rules differently. Hit points remains contentious as ever; one person views it as something like "buffer against total defeat" while another person looks at the exact same mechanic and sees "some amount of physical wear and tear" and every variation inbetween. The mechanical result might be the same, but the story results are not necessarily so. Any recents descriptions of hp in the playtest or articles hasn't changed any of that contention.

This flexibility in interpretation of hit points is probably what allowed D&D to support multiple playstyles in the past, but I don't think it's working so well these says, and I suspect you'd agree with that... is that what you meant by "any set of rules *as written* to support multiple play styles is a pipe dream"?

Anyway, I can imagine two gaming tables with the playtest, and one campaign is, say, about hp-as-meat and "will we get out of this dungeon alive?" and another campaign is hp-as-plot-points and "we are epic heroes -- let's experience how we got here in flashbacks" and it's two different playstyles and the same rules. Are we talking about the same thing?

 

[Manbearcat]

Although it does seem like D&D Next is its own unique mechanical animal in many ways, I don't know if it's pushing one particular mode of playstyle. Different people are still viewing the rules differently. Hit points remains contentious as ever; one person views it as something like "buffer against total defeat" while another person looks at the exact same mechanic and sees "some amount of physical wear and tear" and every variation inbetween. The mechanical result might be the same, but the story results are not necessarily so. Any recents descriptions of hp in the playtest or articles hasn't changed any of that contention.

This flexibility in interpretation of hit points is probably what allowed D&D to support multiple playstyles in the past, but I don't think it's working so well these says, and I suspect you'd agree with that... is that what you meant by "any set of rules *as written* to support multiple play styles is a pipe dream"?

Anyway, I can imagine two gaming tables with the playtest, and one campaign is, say, about hp-as-meat and "will we get out of this dungeon alive?" and another campaign is hp-as-plot-points and "we are epic heroes -- let's experience how we got here in flashbacks" and it's two different playstyles and the same rules. Are we talking about the same thing?

It would be nice if 5e presented the options of:

1 -

a) Abstraction of the combat round contest which is Attack versus Armor Class (which is the conflation of physical mitigation, magical warding, reflexes/dodge, skill (parry/block, luck et al).

b) If the conetest of (a) is successful, it ablates your High HP pool (plot protection, manifest destiny, skill, luck, dodge, physical mitigation et al)

and

2 -

a) Contest of (singular) Attack vs DC that is a combination of Reflexes/Dodge + Skill (parry/block) + Luck et al.

b) If the Contest in (a) is successful then a (true) hit occurs which is mitigated by Armor Class. Armor Class is physical damage reduction which combines damage reduction from armor and magical warding (that is a buffer against collisions and dissipates energy)

c) Any excess from (a) and (b) affects your Low HP pool (meat).

Don't care which is default. Just make them coherent and siloed.