WotC Jeremy Crawford interview: they read your feedback. An exclusive interview by Christian Hoffer at GenCon.

[Hussar]

Funny how the complaint is Witchlight and Radiant but ignores Candlekeep (straight up body horror, slavery, and assisted suicide). Or Saltmarsh which has tons of very adult themes.

It’s almost like WotC already included tons of mature stuff already and then balanced it out with a couple of more PG level offerings.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Funny how the complaint is Witchlight and Radiant but ignores Candlekeep (straight up body horror, slavery, and assisted suicide). Or Saltmarsh which has tons of very adult themes.

It’s almost like WotC already included tons of mature stuff already and then balanced it out with a couple of more PG level offerings.

Given how many adventures in Radiant Citadel are about the aftermath of slavery, colonialism or war, I'm not sure how shiny and happy it actually is. The folks on the citadel are striving for a better future, but it's quite clearly aspirational, rather than a realized status quo.

 

[MockingBird]

Funny how the complaint is Witchlight and Radiant but ignores Candlekeep (straight up body horror, slavery, and assisted suicide). Or Saltmarsh which has tons of very adult themes.

It’s almost like WotC already included tons of mature stuff already and then balanced it out with a couple of more PG level offerings.

The great thing about D&D is ine could add more gore and sex in the game if they wanted it. WotC doesn't have to do it for anyone.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Given how many adventures in Radiant Citadel are about the aftermath of slavery, colonialism or war, I'm not sure how shiny and happy it actually is. The folks on the citadel are striving for a better future, but it's quite clearly aspirational, rather than a realized status quo.

Whiz, there was color on the cover.

Clearly Disneyfied kid stuff.

Never mind that the last thing I watched from Disney had a woman getting mercced in public as part of a terrorist attack.

 

[FrogReaver]

Pretty much every big entertainment company has people pulling customer/fan/media comments. It would be weird if WotC didn't.

Back in the day, there was literally an industry of "clipping services" that would cut out every reference to a company or product from magazines and newspapers and send them to companies regularly.

Yea but IMO, the playtest surveys are more than a simple poll - they are hour long nightmare polls.

 

[FrogReaver]

I haven't been paying attention to the playtest surveys, or the results and reactions to them, very much. However, while I know a lot of people think it's great that WotC is taking feedback into account, I worry that they're giving the survey results too much weight.

Leaving aside issues with self-selection bias, players and DMs aren't game designers. Insofar as I'm aware, they don't (and shouldn't be expected to) approach potential changes from the standpoint of "does this make the game better overall?" While it's easy to conflate "better" with "fun," the two are (in this context) a Venn diagram rather than perfect synonyms.

History tells us this. Spellcasters had a lot of restrictions that people didn't like in AD&D 1E and 2E. When D&D 3rd Edition got rid of those restrictions, we got complaints about "martial-caster disparity" and "linear fighters, quadratic wizards." WotC gave people what they wanted, and in the process created problems that the community didn't anticipate. Based on the (admittedly very little) I've heard, there's at least some real fears that history is repeating itself (specifically, the example I heard was that the sorcerer's twin spell change didn't meet the 70% approval threshold. Why? Because it was nerfed).

It's good that WotC is listening to their customer base (though, again, who answers the survey is an issue unto itself), but I'm always struck by how one of the earliest contexts in which the saying vox populi, vox Dei was used was as a warning against letting popular opinion alone dictate a course of action.

Hopefully WotC is taking their survey results with a hefty grain of salt...but based on what I'm hearing, that's not their stance, and that worries me.

5e turned out fine going with the same process. Not perfect but pretty good.

As long as a person likes 5e they will probably like 5.5e. Maybe they like it a little better or a little worse but still like it. Not everything is going the exact way I would prefer but I don't see any fundamental issues (at least that weren't already present in 5e).

 

[Hussar]

5e turned out fine going with the same process. Not perfect but pretty good.

As long as a person likes 5e they will probably like 5.5e. Maybe they like it a little better or a little worse but still like it. Not everything is going the exact way I would prefer but I don't see any fundamental issues (at least that weren't already present in 5e).

Again this is the very definition of evergreen isn’t it? While I might be disappointed that some of the proposed charges aren’t seeing the light of day, I can’t really fault WotC for that.

And I can always hold out the hope that those proposed changes might develop into later books.

 

[Vaalingrade]

5e turned out fine going with the same process.

Heh.

And I'm not even sure if that's for '5e turned out fine', or the idea that they actually used the playtest process to make 5e instead of calling a swarm of audibles at the last minute.

 

[Scribe]

Candlekeep

How was it marketed? Art style? Tone? I thought it was a mystery anthology?

 

[FrogReaver]

Again this is the very definition of evergreen isn’t it? While I might be disappointed that some of the proposed charges aren’t seeing the light of day, I can’t really fault WotC for that.

And I can always hold out the hope that those proposed changes might develop into later books.

Kind of.

It's a fine line they have to walk IMO. Too different from 5e and the risk another 3e to 4e style split (even if to a lesser degree). Too similar to 5e and they risk people just playing with their old 5e stuff and not adopting the new.

It may just be me but I'm feeling that people are starting to lose a bit of interest in the 5e system as a whole. Which for me causes some concern over 5.5e being too similar to 5e. Though maybe the fresh coat of paint and some minor renovations will be enough to reinvigorate interest (assuming i'm not alone in that feeling).