D&D (2024) It goes to show you can't please everbody!

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

i hear/read this all the time and can't imagine why you would want to BOTH stay with D&D AND buy other company stuff...

Because D&D is the easiest to find players for and is the ideal gateway drug for other roleplaying and because, since they're not trying to sell to the same huge audience, third party D&D books tend to be a lot quirkier and more flavorful.

I've got books with procedurally generated demiplanes and urban campaign books large enough to kill a housepet if they fell on them, neither of which WotC is likely to make anything like any time soon.

 

[occam]

What I am learning on this forum is that there is no point, however obvious, that folks won't debate.

I won't argue that.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

In Cyberpunk 2020, published in 1991, there were a myriad of brand name firearms you could purchase. Your character might buy a cheap piece of junk pistol like the Dai Lung Cybermag 15 or spend a few more eddies for a Sternmeyer Type 35 which was more reliable. In Cyberpunk Red, you just pick the pistol type (medium, heavy, or very heavy) and decide whether it's poor, standard, or of excellent quality. The book gives you some brand names to associate with each quality level, but it's not the same. It's not as fun.

On the flip side, you tended to see PCs selecte the same weapons. They weren't getting a POS Dai Lung they were purchasing a reliable Sternmeyer instead. And D&D is kind of like that, there are all sorts of weapons and armor you don't see players picking all that often for a variety of reasons. They'll typically pick the ones that give them the most bang for the buck.

To me, that's an argument for knocking weapons down into simple, light, heavy, martial or some other simple set of categories. Make them each do the same amount of damage, but allow the players to call them whatever they like.

I like rogues and I love swashbucklers, but every rogue in D&D using a rapier is a bummer.

 

[occam]

Right. Baseline 5E doesn't do what you want so you made a game that did. And, at a guess, most 3PP are much the same. They put out products for 5E that they'd like to see. But, importantly, for there to be any hope of selling books, 5E has to not actually do the thing well already. You're filling a gap in 5E. Either rules or content. If 5E was amazing in that particular thing, there'd be no need for 3PP to fill that gap. 5E is lacking this specific thing...so 3PP are there to fill that gap. 5E's great, but you need more cool monsters...so here's a dozen high-quality monster books. 5E's great, but you need more modules...so here's dozens of high-quality modules. 5E's great, but you need more detailed exploration rules...so here's a dozen high-quality books for that. Call me crazy, I'd rather 5E not be riddled with huge gaps in the first place.

So, you're saying the basic D&D product should contain thousands of monsters, all the adventures that could ever be played, and every version of exploration rules that any table might want? That would resolve "huge gaps" you've identified?

That would make for a pretty big book; I'd hate to see the price tag on it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Eh. You’re positioning it as better/worse. We see it as different. Ice cream isn’t better or worse than pizza. It’s different.

Any given fan may see A5e as better or worse than O5e, because we all have different preferences. In my case, in just about every place you deviated from O5e, I preferred your version.

 

[overgeeked]

To clarify again, that is not how we feel or our motivation for making A5E.

Cool. I didn’t say it was. It is, however, how a lot of people feel in general. Not about you and your motivation, but about 5E and gaps in design. Some people are tired of being told to patch 5E with 3PP books. I want a complete game in as few books as possible. Not three half-done books and six bandaids from three other companies. It shouldn’t be hard for the biggest company in RPGs.

 

[MGibster]

To me, that's an argument for knocking weapons down into simple, light, heavy, martial or some other simple set of categories. Make them each do the same amount of damage, but allow the players to call them whatever they like.

Mechanically that's a lot easier to do. But it's boring. Instead of getting a Malorian Arms 3516 or a Constitution Arms Hurricane Assault Weapon I get get a Very Heavy Pistol or a Shotgun. Yawn. Don't get me wrong, I tend to lean more towards simple, light, heavy, etc., etc. But, man, it's dull as dishwater.

In Conan from Modiphius, weapons have certain qualities that make them attractive or unattractive depending on the situation. A weapon might be easy to hide, only used one-handed if your strength is high enough, inflicts mental damage as well as physical damage, knockdown opponents, etc., etc. Something like that might be neat, but not if it would slow the game down.

 

[overgeeked]

Because D&D is the easiest to find players for and is the ideal gateway drug for other roleplaying and because, since they're not trying to sell to the same huge audience, third party D&D books tend to be a lot quirkier and more flavorful.

I've got books with procedurally generated demiplanes and urban campaign books large enough to kill a housepet if they fell on them, neither of which WotC is likely to make anything like any time soon.

And in some cases it’s literally the only game some people will bother playing. If you want to play an RPG, in some cases, it’s 5E or nothing.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

In Conan from Modiphius, weapons have certain qualities that make them attractive or unattractive depending on the situation. A weapon might be easy to hide, only used one-handed if your strength is high enough, inflicts mental damage as well as physical damage, knockdown opponents, etc., etc. Something like that might be neat, but not if it would slow the game down.

Yeah, I lived through AD&D and puzzled over the weapon chart with its speeds and everything else and the added complexity just weren't worth it to me, then or now.

I'd rather just say "your 1d6 weapon as a light weapon user can be any of these forty items, as you wish." Not satisfying to the folks wanting more nitty gritty detail, but that's why, in an ideal world, there'd be a weapons supplement that let you plug in much more detailed systems for those who wanted them.

 

[tetrasodium]

Yeah, I lived through AD&D and puzzled over the weapon chart with its speeds and everything else and the added complexity just weren't worth it to me, then or now.

I'd rather just say "your 1d6 weapon as a light weapon user can be any of these forty items, as you wish." Not satisfying to the folks wanting more nitty gritty detail, but that's why, in an ideal world, there'd be a weapons supplement that let you plug in much more detailed systems for those who wanted them.

The 2d20 system used by conan is a dice pool thing that's pretty different from d&d. IIRC you got an extra die in your pool if you had something like a weapon/skill/etc that had a relevant property to what you were attempting to do. It wasn't at all like the abomination of those speed factor tables