Jeremy Crawford: “We are releasing new editions of the books”

[UngeheuerLich]

If I were playing 6e and wanted something from 5e, I would just convert it. Same as I've done with scores of game elements from pre-5e editions for 5e. Most of the time its not even that hard. But it's my choice, and there would be a clear line for those like me who prefer that line to be there.

I had no problems with that either. But I think it would be a dumb marketing choice considering what the changes from 3e to 4e meant for the game.

 

[Maxperson]

They seemed to be sure hiwever that they are right. But I also say. Let time decide if optimism or pessimism was correct.

I think that surety exists with the posters on both sides of the issue here. That doesn't mean, though, that the posters(on whichever side is wrong) will refuse to admit the error once the rules are released and some time has passed to see if there are issues or not with compatibility.

I know that if I can be shown hard proof that I'm wrong, I will generally back down. I say generally, because sometimes what is being told to us by the official source is clearly wrong. As a recent example, when WotC announced the new OGL and that they were getting rid of the old OGL, they had language in the new OGL that would allow WotC to essentially steal the work of third party providers without compensation and forbid them from using it any further.

Everyone here, their mothers, and their mothers' 29 cats(Thanks to @OldSchoolGamerGirl for putting the cat lady image into my brain) immediately saw what the language would allow WotC to do. WotC's initial statement, though, was that nobody saw that possibility. That would have to mean that all the officers who read and approved the language, and who deal with legal documents in their business, their assistants, and all the lawyers involved with drafting and reviewing the language, all missed what we clearly and immediately saw. And hell, the job of the lawyers is to think about and recognize the potential pitfalls of what they are drafting. It's what they are trained to do. WotC's statement was clearly a lie, so if someone had quoted that statement to me as proof that they didn't know, I wouldn't have accepted it.

In this thread @mamba showed me a quote from an article regarding the naming convention for the 2024 rules. I acknowledged that I was wrong about the naming being unknown. There have been other instances where I have acknowledged that I am wrong and changed my tune as well.

Probably something in between. And I agree with @mamba that working to have as much compatibility as possible is a better goal than either throwing the baby out with the bathwater (6e) or closing the eyes for existing shortcomings and expecting people who are coming to the hobby to buy phb 2014, xanathar, tasha and johnny and pauls and elsas x of everything and some sourcebooks to have halfway up to date rules.

Sure, but "as much compatibility as possible" doesn't necessarily mean backwards compatibility will be achieved. This is a truly binary thing. Either you achieve the backwards compatibility or you don't. I don't think it will take long after the release of the 2024 rules for the masses of people out there to find broken combinations of 2014 and 2024 rules, requiring a good amount of work on the the part of the DM to make it work, or else causing the DM to throw up his hands and just declare for one year or the other, ruling out books from the other release.

Edit: corrected typo

 

[mamba]

Its like you believe one should continue following a recipie for a cake when all you have in front of you is squid ink and raw chicken.

no, it’s like you believe we have squid ink and chicken, while I have eggs, flour, milk, ….

You do know that foresight is a genuine thing and that it is, in fact, possible to assess a situation and make an educated guess at how things are going to turn out, right?

yes, I am aware, I think things are going ok

And you can miss me with the predictable "but its just a guess!!" response.

I noticed that you think your statements are more than that, despite there being no reason to believe so. I at least acknowledge that I do not know.

 

[Micah Sweet]

No. I disagree. I had a problem with that. I would tolerate it, but I would not want to spend money on something I already own. I think 10 years i a good time for an update that fixes some problems instead of just putting band aids on it.

You fix problems by making a new edition that fixes problems, not by making a half replacement, half confusing splatbook with different versions of the same-named things, including all the classes and the title, but still telling people they can use the fixed and un-fixed versions at the same time. That is marketing, not design.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I had no problems with that either. But I think it would be a dumb marketing choice considering what the changes from 3e to 4e meant for the game.

My point. This is not good design work, it's good marketing work, and part what makes the marketing good is never saying it's marketing.

Sometimes I hate the business world. And other times I REALLY hate it.

 

[Emberashh]

UA has always been seen as  exceedingly optional.

Not just optional but literally not official content in the same vein as published material is.

but I would not want to spend money on something I already own. I think 10 years i a good time for an update that fixes some problems instead of just putting band aids on it.

So you do want a new edition?

And thats without getting into the fact that you basically just called OneDND band aid lol.

I noticed that you think your statements are more than that, despite there being no reason to believe so. I at least acknowledge that I do not know.

explicitly calls my own assessments educated guesses

You: "you think they're not just guesses"

 

[Remathilis]

If I were playing 6e and wanted something from 5e, I would just convert it. Same as I've done with scores of game elements from pre-5e editions for 5e. Most of the time its not even that hard. But it's my choice, and there would be a clear line for those like me who prefer that line to be there.

Easier said than done. There is no conversion for the 4e warlord. Or 3e psion. Most of it is rebuilding from the same concept. And that takes time and talent.

And I want new players to have an updated rules book I can wholeheartedly point to, instead of gringing my teeth if some new player buys only the phb and creates a ranger without tasha's fixes. Or if I want to play a bard with tasha's new spell list and the DM says no.

(Of course, the UA bard needs some fixong in that regard too, but we are not at the end of the playtest yet.)

Exactly. It annoys me to no end that the new player in our group wanted to play a ranger and is frustrated because all the fixes for his class are in Tasha's and he can never find them when looking in the PHB.

Sure, sure. But I mean, that's an argument for a half-edition, or at least errata, rather than keeping the old with the new. I take it you'd be okay with whatever 1D&D is replacing the older material, right?

Prior to Tasha, I used the UA ranger for a while. I got no problem replacing things that don't work.

 

[mamba]

When you spend 20+ years arguing on the internet you get a pretty good knack for asessing how people will behave based on how they communicate.

yeah, finding something I have been saying for days now and expecting me to still say so when you trot out the same tired old points sure takes 20+ years of experience…

 

[Micah Sweet]

Easier said than done. There is no conversion for the 4e warlord. Or 3e psion. Most of it is rebuilding from the same concept. And that takes time and talent.

And yet tons of people have done it. Lots of great 3pp and homebrew out there.

 

[OldSchoolGamerGirl]

And yet tons of people have done it. Lots of great 3pp and homebrew out there.

there is also no pact magic (that we know about as of now) in the 2024 book, and you would have to rebuild it from ground up too...

so as of this playtest we have at least 1 class that is as big an issue as the warlord and other 4e classes

 

[UngeheuerLich]

And thats without getting into the fact that you basically just called OneDND band aid lol.

No. I called tasha and so on band aids. Probably I misunderstood you that you said you wanted just a compilation of previous changes.

 

[mamba]

They exist concurrently because Wizards says they do.

yeah, because what WotC says is always what happens. They can exist concurrently because WotC designs them that way. WotC has no control over whether you stay with 5e, move to 1D&D entirely, or mix the two. Just like they had no control over who stayed with 3e and who moved to 4e.

The difference now is that there is a third option and even those who decide to stay with 5e are not being left behind, they way they were with 4e

 

[mamba]

I think thats something everyone here should be able to agree on, that if this was just a genuine update and nothing else, nobody here would have a problem with it.

I am not even sure you agree with that… or we have a very different understanding of what a genuine update is

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Deleted.

 

[mamba]

if it is a continuation why will new player facing content not support it?

because the continuation is the 2024 Warlock

 

[Vaalingrade]

yeah, because what WotC says is always what happens.

Whoa there now. Wouldn't want someone to come along and harangue you for three days and 17 pages accusing you of calling Mighty WotC liars.

 

[mamba]

explicitly calls my own assessments educated guesses

You: "you think they're not just guesses"

If you think yours are guesses and I say mine are guesses, then why do you hound me for acknowledging that?

And you can miss me with the predictable "but its just a guess!!" response.

 

[Remathilis]

UA has always been seen as  exceedingly optional.

So flip your script, if a DM was only using the UA spellless ranger and you just wanted to play the bog-standard PHB one, what should happen?

 

[mamba]

Whoa there now. Wouldn't want someone to come along and harangue you for three days and 17 pages accusing you of calling Mighty WotC liars.

you seem to do it all the time

I only said they cannot predict the future or control our decisions

 

[UngeheuerLich]

You fix problems by making a new edition that fixes problems, not by making a half replacement, half confusing splatbook with different versions of the same-named things, including all the classes and the title, but still telling people they can use the fixed and un-fixed versions at the same time. That is marketing, not design.

If adventures work with either rules, I am totally fine.
If old subclasses work with minor home fixes: even better.

If at some point those old subclasses receive an update. Totally ok.

So I like the half variant because of that.
It won't be confusing for most people.


There will be 3 kinds of people:

- Using old books and not buying new books.

- Owning old books and buying the nw one, totally conscious of the changes.

- Newcomers who buy the new books which will have a big disclaimer, that books printed before 2024 need to be prepared to do some updates to subclasses. The UA already has such a disclaimer (without the receipe to fix it).
On top of that: old books won't be reprinted.

The third group might encounter minor confusion when buying old books nontheless. But my brother bought a 3e arkham horror for his 2e arkham horror game. So calling it a new edition does not necessarily prevent that from happening. Also calling it 6e might people wonder why the old 5e adventures still work fine enough with the new rule set.
So I am all for 5e with revised written in big letters on the cover and a big disaimer on a few pages so you just can't miss it.