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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ratskinner" data-source="post: 6234587" data-attributes="member: 6688937">This is a big part of why I no longer see D&D as appropriate for running story-oriented games. At least with mechanics like Fate points, there's never a reason for the character to be aware of the metagame. HP, and spell slots, and AC, and...well a lot of D&D's little 'abstract' mechanics make it very hard to conceive of a D&D world where the characters aren't keenly <s>genre</s>system-saavy like the characters of Order of the Stick or Goblins.Character decisions are just too tied into mechanical information that they have no real reason to be aware of. I can't say how many times (especially back in the day) I saw fighters swinging newly-found magical swords trying to determine if it made their attacks 5% or 10% more accurate (god only knows how they determine its effects on damage, given HP).  They're not necessarily what he called out. To me, the article read like:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">D&D magic and why it can't feel like genre-fiction magic.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">D&D's game worlds' arms and armor can be nothing like reality or even genre-fiction. (in the ironically named Choices and Consequences section: Do you want the +1 armor or the +2 armor which are otherwise identical?...Gee, lemme think).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">I want to say that combat should be fast and interesting, but I know it won't be.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">People like "immersion", but I won't use that word. (Is "Narrative Cohesion" somehow more politically correct?)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Narrative Cohesion and why the Rogue/Thief classes make it impossible in D&D. ...or...</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">We don't have a clear concept of how to make the Rogue work within other D&D conceits.</li> </ul>So, I guess 5 things really. Also, the last three articles have felt really apologetic to me. Like the titles should be Elegance and why we can't have it in D&D, The feel of D&D IS clunky, and D&D is its own genre now so deal with it.  I just get the subtle undercurrent of a feeling the Mike feels that 5e can't satisfy some of the more "sophisticated" folks out there and is trying to excuse the design team. Which I find very odd, given the state of the playtest. My group has been trying different systems for the last few weeks, and Next is honestly one of the better iterations of D&D we've played recently. Certainly, given the understanding that a D&D designer is a bit hampered by that chain of sacred cows dragging behind him like the Ghost of Jacob Marley's sins, we can't expect a Cortex+ or Fate out it. Nor, honestly, should we, IMO.</blockquote>

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