Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
I think we can safely say that 5E is a success, but will it lead to a new Golden Era?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6361287" data-attributes="member: 996"><p>I've been attending conventions regularly since '83. And, yes, IMX, DMs prepped for conventions a little more elaborately, so would often have not only minis (big, heavy cases of them, because they were all lead back then), but pre-drawn maps or even elaborate terrain. </p><p></p><p> Some of those are actually pretty easy - you just track adjacent vs 5' vs w/in a move and you can handle it pretty well. But there are lots of things that go either way with different eds. 4e has more forced movement for instance (annoying in TotM if you try to track everything precise-to-the-square), but it's area's are these easy-to-visualize cubes, while 3e has area templates (annoying in TotM if you try to track everything precise-to-the-square), but it's melees tend to be static, with little movement. 5e, like AD&D, has movement, positioning, range and area granular to the foot, and the areas can be a variety of geometric shapes (annoying, in TotM, if you're trying to track everything precise-to-the-foot), but it does things like let the rogue SA when an ally is adjacent to the same enemy, rather than flanking (in contrast, AD&D had facing that determined AC from shields or DEX, and contributed to whether the thief could backstab). None them /say/ you have to be all that precise, but they don't exactly give you an alternative, either. Then you have systems like 13A that /do/ have rules to facilitate TotM, which much less move/position/range/area granularity, just 'adjacent,' 'near' and 'far' or something like that. </p><p></p><p>Much is made of this or that edition being grid-dependent or 'Roll-playing,' or not - or 5e trying to be TotM, but D&D has never been and still doesn't have the kind of rules that facilitate TotM. It's not like they'd be hard to include - they tend to be of the 'rules lite' sort - and maybe there'll be something like that in the DMG. It just seems odd to call out TotM as the assumed mode of play, and then fail to support it.</p><p></p><p> Of course, everything is essentially optional in an RPG. But, the grid in 3e was explicitly an option, a way of making dealing with movement/positioning /easier/ than using a bare surface or TotM. Diagonal movement, areas, and reach turned out to be a bit of a problem, though, and led to those nifty wire templates. 4e certainly assumed a grid, and used it in a simplified way (no diagonals or templates), but it was a 5' grid, so, just as all you needed to use a grid in 3e was to divide by 5, all you needed to get off one in 4e was to multiply by 5. </p><p></p><p>The whole thing was wildly blown out of proportion - and 5e's odd lip-service to TotM (while just using feet like "grid-dependent" 3e), seems to be based on the fake controversy, itself, not on the supposedly-controversial mechanics.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 6361287, member: 996"] I've been attending conventions regularly since '83. And, yes, IMX, DMs prepped for conventions a little more elaborately, so would often have not only minis (big, heavy cases of them, because they were all lead back then), but pre-drawn maps or even elaborate terrain. Some of those are actually pretty easy - you just track adjacent vs 5' vs w/in a move and you can handle it pretty well. But there are lots of things that go either way with different eds. 4e has more forced movement for instance (annoying in TotM if you try to track everything precise-to-the-square), but it's area's are these easy-to-visualize cubes, while 3e has area templates (annoying in TotM if you try to track everything precise-to-the-square), but it's melees tend to be static, with little movement. 5e, like AD&D, has movement, positioning, range and area granular to the foot, and the areas can be a variety of geometric shapes (annoying, in TotM, if you're trying to track everything precise-to-the-foot), but it does things like let the rogue SA when an ally is adjacent to the same enemy, rather than flanking (in contrast, AD&D had facing that determined AC from shields or DEX, and contributed to whether the thief could backstab). None them /say/ you have to be all that precise, but they don't exactly give you an alternative, either. Then you have systems like 13A that /do/ have rules to facilitate TotM, which much less move/position/range/area granularity, just 'adjacent,' 'near' and 'far' or something like that. Much is made of this or that edition being grid-dependent or 'Roll-playing,' or not - or 5e trying to be TotM, but D&D has never been and still doesn't have the kind of rules that facilitate TotM. It's not like they'd be hard to include - they tend to be of the 'rules lite' sort - and maybe there'll be something like that in the DMG. It just seems odd to call out TotM as the assumed mode of play, and then fail to support it. Of course, everything is essentially optional in an RPG. But, the grid in 3e was explicitly an option, a way of making dealing with movement/positioning /easier/ than using a bare surface or TotM. Diagonal movement, areas, and reach turned out to be a bit of a problem, though, and led to those nifty wire templates. 4e certainly assumed a grid, and used it in a simplified way (no diagonals or templates), but it was a 5' grid, so, just as all you needed to use a grid in 3e was to divide by 5, all you needed to get off one in 4e was to multiply by 5. The whole thing was wildly blown out of proportion - and 5e's odd lip-service to TotM (while just using feet like "grid-dependent" 3e), seems to be based on the fake controversy, itself, not on the supposedly-controversial mechanics. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
I think we can safely say that 5E is a success, but will it lead to a new Golden Era?
Top