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%.

 

[tuxgeo]

So which do you guys think is more powerful: Barbarian, or Fighter?

Fighter fights best.

However, Barbarian is far more powerful when upwind.

 

[Mistwell]

Neither even exists at my tables. We use MC rules. No one takes just a fighter or just a barbarian.

Which multiclass character is more powerful at your table, the Fighter/X, or the Barbarian/X?

 

[Zardnaar]

Which multiclass character is more powerful at your table, the Fighter/X, or the Barbarian/X?

Fighter X only seen a 1 level dip in Barbarian.

 

[Uder]

unless you cheat...

Hey! You can't cheat if there are no rules.

 

[Li Shenron]

I'm starting to think this survey process is a horrible idea. The whole 'living edition' is a horrible idea.

Because the vast majority of respondents will be very opinionated gamers who can't resist blurting out a long list of pet peeves and nitpicks, even if they haven't actually seen the damn thing in play (really... in half a year there isn't that many who have seen in play all classes, much less all classes until 20th level). A lot of respondents will also probably feel afraid that their opinion won't be taken into consideration, and therefore they will lie about how much they have played the game, in an attempt at promoting their feedback as more valuable.

Then I am afraid WotC itself would largely overestimate the value of this feedback, and proceed with a huge rule update, thinking that 1000 gamers asking to tweak feature X of class Y means this is a welcome change, while the truth is that tweaking will cause an inconvenience to 10000 gamers who didn't give feedback on that simply because it was fine. Really 100% of the game is good enough, we gamers (esp. those active online) just have to find something to nitpick all the time, just to pretend we know better how the game should be played, just to feel we're better gamers than average.

I totally endorse [MENTION=22953]SteelDragon[/MENTION] suggestion to give positive feedback about what works for you, but it won't happen because that's not how feedbacks and polls ever work.

 

[BoldItalic]

We could create a survey about the survey ...

1. Have you taken the survey ?
1a. If so, how many times?
2. How satisfied were you with the survey?
Extremely Dissatisfied/ .. / Extremely Satisfied / Don't understand the question
3. Did you answer the question about comparing classes ?
If so, why ? (Write in your answer)
4. Did you answer the question about Feats?
If so, why ? (Write in your answer)
5. Did you lie about what levels you have reached ?
6. How many responses do you think they will get to the survey? None / Not Many /Quite a Few / Lots / Zillions
7. How badly do you want the game to be changed, based on the surveys? A Lot / Quite a Lot / Not Much / Not at all
8. How much weight do you think your answers should be given, compared to other people ? More / Same / Less
9. Would you like to see more surveys in the future? More / Fewer / None / Dunno, what's a survey?

Thank you for your feedback. We really appreciate it.

 

[Leatherhead]

I said: softcovers and pdfs.

Ditto.

Well not exactly in those words, but the same idea at least.

 

[S_Dalsgaard]

Perhaps they just wanted to put something out there to ease into the new year.

I agree that the questions and the way they are presented seems a bit unprofessional, but perhaps the goal isn't so much to get useful answers that they can base revisions on, but rather to get a feel for how many people will reply and get us used to doing surveys.

 

[Hawkwind]

IMO sneak attacks for the rogue happpen to frequently

 

[Eejit]

I suggested they make the -5/+10 feat abilities be restricted to 1/turn, they affect damage too much otherwise.

The "more powerful" questions will make sense on a large scale, with thousands of responses.

IMO sneak attacks for the rogue happpen to frequently

Mathematically that's incorrect, they happen at a pace to keep the rogue close to par with other martial damage dealers. If they reduced their frequency the sneak attacks would have to be even more powerful, resulting in even bigger nova.