How's D&D Working Out For You? First official feedback survey looks at CLASSES and FEATS!

D&D 5th Edition has been out for 7 months now, with a boxed Starter Set, a free basic game, three core rulebooks, two hardcover adventures, and range of accessories. and WotC has just launched the first of its feedback surveys. From the start, WotC promised 5E would be a "living game" and that they would periodically survey the fan base to find out how the game is working and what areas need to be looked at. This first survey is focused on character classes and feats. "Future surveys will touch on other areas of the game. We’ll also launch more detailed surveys of classes or feats as needed to refine the information we gather and better understand your feedback."

You can take the survey here. It can take up to about 18 minutes to complete if you answer all of the questions. But once you've done it, please do feel free to comment here and share what you think for others to read, too!

Most of the released products have high ratings when looking at consolidated ratings from fans and reviews from popular sites like GeekDad, Forbes, The Escapist, Examiner.com, The Mary Sue, Aint-It-Cool-News, Boing Boing, and iO9. The Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide both current have 92.5%, and the Monster Manual is not far behind with 91%. The Starter Set, also, has a strong 84%. The adventures have not fared quite so well; Hoard of the Dragon Queen has only 55%, although Rise of Tiamat is more popular with 76.5%. The initial DM Screen from Gale Force 9 is unpopular with a rating of 30%, but the new one from WotC was much better received with 84.5%.

 

[Queer Venger]

Just completed it. This is a great sign, Im hoping for this feedback to expand the core classes and options. I made suggestion for a few more books on expanded class features, particularly Feats.

 

[exile]

I said good things about clerics, especially life clerics on the survey. That is about all that I am honestly prepared to answer.

 

[Jester David]

The comparing classes set of questions is ridiculous to me. Is (class a) stronger than (class b) is poorly conceived at the least, since every class has different strengths, weaknesses and purposes. I could understand maybe(I want to emphasize maybe here) martial vs martial and caster vs caster, ie:Fighter vs Barbarian or Wizard vs Sorcerer but to compare Wizard to Fighter? Take for example the Ranger, the Beast Master is comparatively weak vs the Foe Slayer build(or most builds really), so I rated it lower when it came up even though that's not always the case.

It's a numbers thing. If you get 1000 people rating all the classes like that and one is consistently at the bottom when compared all classes and one is consistently at the top it's informative.

And finally my last one isn't really an issue but a generalized comment from my personal experience which may or may not have any bearing on the rest of the community. The last question is about gender and I roughly understand why they want to know. However... In my old group in NY our group was made up of equal numbers of males and females if you discounted the DM. That said only the males in my group would do this survey, why you may ask? Because the females I know don't peruse forums or follow through with the newest information and may not notice something like this till it's after the fact, they also have a tendency to play for things being more fluffy and because they like it more than for optimizing effectiveness. Also gender has no bearing on any of the actual questions. I know they are trying to figure out demographics but honestly my experience is that more men are going to answer your survey even with the female players around. Hell my future wife was sitting here watching me do the survey but doesn't have any interested in doing it herself. It's not that she doesn't have an opinion, it's that she doesn't care enough or want to take the time to analyze the book enough to where she feels she can make an honest informed opinion for some of the questions. Which to me does seem like a solid reason to not do it. Again this is all just based on my experience, I'm not trying to come off as sexist or any number of other things I'm sure people could accuse me of, I'm just making an observation. That said, I'm a purple unicorn for gender...

I imagine they're hoping to get some demographic information from people at the same time.
It's not a big deal, especially as it was write in, so you could be any gender or just write "pass".

 

[JEB]

Disappointed in the survey. I was hoping for more specific questions than "do you like this? yes/no/maybe". Outside of pointing to the really blatant problem areas, I'm not sure how much these will contribute.

 

[Osgood]

I was hoping there would be a spot for general comments about the classes... my biggest issue is the lack of subclass options for some classes.

 

[BoldItalic]

That's odd. I tried to answer the survey, but I didn't get any questions about classes or feats at all. If asked me how long I've been playing D&D (25+ years, what levels I'd reached as a player (12th) and as a DM (12th), then it asked me my age group (55+) and gender, then finished. Is it broken?

 

[halfling rogue]

If you are only using the Basic rules or Starter set, like I have, the survey is gonna be kind of pointless

I kind of thought so too. I answered what I could and when offered an opinion box I just said I've only really used the Basic document.

 

[Giltonio_Santos]

Finished it now. I wanted to tell them, basically, how I'm very satisfied with the game. I agree with [MENTION=92511]steeldragons[/MENTION] that it is very important for the silent crowd to take their time and don't let vocal minorities shape the future of the game.

While I was there, I happened to remember how the beastmaster sucks and how I miss the playtest version of the sentinel feat, and decided it was good to let them know how I feel about those things...

 

[Gecko85]

That's odd. I tried to answer the survey, but I didn't get any questions about classes or feats at all. If asked me how long I've been playing D&D (25+ years, what levels I'd reached as a player (12th) and as a DM (12th), then it asked me my age group (55+) and gender, then finished. Is it broken?

Maybe it has a built-in anti-Grognard filter? lol. (I kid, I kid...)

Have you tried it a second time with the same result? Maybe use a different browser?

 

[steeldragons]

That's odd. I tried to answer the survey, but I didn't get any questions about classes or feats at all. If asked me how long I've been playing D&D (25+ years, what levels I'd reached as a player (12th) and as a DM (12th), then it asked me my age group (55+) and gender, then finished. Is it broken?

Maybe it has a built-in anti-Grognard filter? lol. (I kid, I kid...)

Have you tried it a second time with the same result? Maybe use a different browser?

Maybe it seriously does! That sounds very odd. And disturbing, if so.

It did ask how long as the 2nd thing. But I wasn't asked gender or age group til the end. Last, in fact.