D&D 5E Is Tasha's More or Less The Universal Standard?

[Micah Sweet]

Eh, I also enjoy complexity, but I'd rather it be optional than have to decrease complexity in places I don't want it.

If they were catering to "casuals", which is a somewhat pejorative term when used that way, the game would have been more complex and harder to play in 2014. It wasn't. The Champion Fighter (Standard Human) is the most popular character, and has been since day one, including when you only look at people who have at least the whole PHB purchased on DDB. So, absolutely not "casuals".


No, it's not. It's just not needlessly complex.

Whether any amount of complexity is "needless" is absolutely a matter of opinion.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Whether any amount of complexity is "needless" is absolutely a matter of opinion.

I get what you're saying and broadly agree, but as a point of pedantry there are times when complexity is demonstrably needless in any functional sense, i.e. when it's not even serving a PB-sim end, or even a gamist end, it's just complexity for the sake of complexity. This is rarely seen in even remotely mainstream TT RPGs, but it's something that we have seen a bit in videogames, particularly certain indie ones which either are RPGs or contain heavy RPG elements in a mechanical sense.

Of course beyond the functional the argument might be made that the complexity serves an aesthetic purpose, in some cases.

 

[Micah Sweet]

In case it isn't coming across clearly, @Micah Sweet , a preference for simplicity is not an indicator of casual engagement with the game or with gaming in general. Many of us have developed simpler preferences as we have become more and more deeply engaged with the hobby, in fact.

Many of the most dedicated dnd players i know, the ones who have 1 hobby and it's TTRPGs and primarily DnD, prefer to play mostly at-will very simple characters in 5e, because they don't feel constrained by lists of abilities that way.

I have already heard from people who've played a few months of level up that they immediately saw a reduction in improvisational play, or what some folks call "shennanigans", because people are more inclined to stick to what's on their sheet, the more little mechanical knobs and dials and widgets they have on their sheet.

Many people who are quite the opposite of "casual" strongly prefer simpler mechanics that put the onus of creativity in play more strongly on the players and DM. That isn't a casual preference, it's actually rather an advanced preference, IME.


The other point that is worth noting, here, is that wotc has made the game more complex and less "easy mode" over the last several years, not less. No longer can you just look at what your class needs for stats and pick one of the races that gets that, you have to actually look at the races and think about them in order to make a choice that you won't be dissatisfied with later. The monster design has shifted to giving monsters more bang for their CR, on average, and making them harder to counter, both by making more abilities not be spells or even magical, and by making PC race magic resistance into spell resistance.

Frankly, that last one is overkill, at least for the gnome, IMO, so my group will be treating the trait as advantage against all magical effects that target the mind. Still, it's absolutely not a case of dumbing anything down, making anything easier, or making the game more "casual friendly".

Fair enough. I was a little hot admittedly. I purposefully did not use the phrase "dumbing down", and that's not what i meant. 5e has been at a level that is more simplistic than I want since it started, and their recent changes have not done them any favors as far as I'm concerned. There's nothing wrong with the style they chose, but it is not the style I want.

I apologize if my words denigrated your preferences. As the minority for preferring process-sim, I get defensive.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Fair enough. I was a little hot admittedly. I purposefully did not use the phrase "dumbing down", and that's not what i meant. 5e has been at a level that is more simplistic than I want since it started, and their recent changes have not done them any favors as far as I'm concerned. There's nothing wrong with the style they chose, but it is not the style I want.

I apologize if my words denigrated your preferences. As the minority for preferring process-sim, I get defensive.

Yeah it's fine. I'm always ready to get defensive when someone starts talking about "the casuals" and stuff like that.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah it's fine. I'm always ready to get defensive when someone starts talking about "the casuals" and stuff like that.

I love Dropout! That's a great video.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I love Dropout! That's a great video.

Brennen Lee Mulligan is one of my favorite humans that I don't know IRL

The whole crew is hilarious to a truly absurd degree.

dimension20 has become my goto recommendation for people wanting to watch a dnd game to see what it's all about.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Brennen Lee Mulligan is one of my favorite humans that I don't know IRL

The whole crew is hilarious to a truly absurd degree.

dimension20 has become my goto recommendation for people wanting to watch a dnd game to see what it's all about.

My crew follows them religiously. Brennen Lee Mulligan is my Platonic Ideal of a DM (and a comedian for that matter): his personal outlook and preferences seem to lean closer to mine than many, but he is able to have a lot fun running for people who clearly game in a looser way.

 

[Parmandur]

Really? So dexterity isn't objectively better to other stats?

Not according to the people who built the underlying math of the game, no. Is it useful? Yes. So are all 6 Abilities. There is no balance difference between the bonuses.

 

[Parmandur]

The whole argument is about point buy or standard array.

Neither of which have to do with the balance assumptions of D&D. The rules assume rolled stats, for balance. The array is a Mulligan a player can take instead of rolling, and point buy is a variant rule entirety. Neither is a factor to the game's core math.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Not according to the people who built the underlying math of the game, no.

You keep citing this as if it were some kind of strong evidence. If in fact they make the claim you are ascribing to them, is it possible they are wrong? I find myself much more persuaded by math than I am by claims of design intent.