D&D 5E (2024) Mearls has some Interesting Ideals about how to fix high level wizards.

[EzekielRaiden]

They didnt know where to go.They listened to the fans.

WHICH fans?

Because "We listened to fans!" is like saying "We listened to forum-goers!" You could've picked the great ones or you could've picked the terrible ones or you could've gotten both and tried to please both or any of a zillion other things.

Their surveys were inherently driving away any voices that might have said other things, and inherently (and very obviously) courting only one or two specific groups. That's not a big tent. That's "we decided who we would listen to before we started listening".

 

[CreamCloud0]

it was expensive but better, and it could have been improved.

now we got the cheap version but less powerful.

new twinned spell is basically just a roundabout method of upcasting most of the spells it affects, i agree it's a downgrade compared to the old version which actually had something unique it could contribute to the sorcerer.

 

[tetrasodium]

WHICH fans?

Because "We listened to fans!" is like saying "We listened to forum-goers!" You could've picked the great ones or you could've picked the terrible ones or you could've gotten both and tried to please both or any of a zillion other things.

Their surveys were inherently driving away any voices that might have said other things, and inherently (and very obviously) courting only one or two specific groups. That's not a big tent. That's "we decided who we would listen to before we started listening".

My guess is the "fans" who happen to be in the personal table with someone high up at hasbro or wotc and were able to answer their questions so answers could be interpreted and sent back to the designers as the goals that really matter for the next book or edition.

 

[HatWearingFool]

Then that should be done in advance, no? Don't waste your INCREDIBLY precious design time on "what do people even WANT?" Get that part done before your design deadline is set in stone.

Like I don't understand why ANYONE would start a project, and only then, after they're already embarked, only then ask, "Okay, what should our project be?".

I’d say there are 3 big reasons for this.

1) if the player base gets a even a whiff that a new edition is being worked on sales of the current edition drop off a cliff. So you can’t afford to let people know 5 years in advance.

2) people are really bad at knowing what they want before they see it. The old if I asked horse riders what they want they’d all say a better horse, no one would suggest an automobile.

3) there always seems to be massive staff turnover before a new edition. So those people just don’t have years. The current massive turnover looks suspiciously like an edition change

 

[Belen]

I love cantrips, their concept, and they work well at low levels. But the following criticism by @mearls suggests cantrips need improvement at the highest levels:

"Let's dump cantrips. At this level, they clutter the character sheet and rarely offer a good option. That's five spells you don't need to think about."

To scale better, cantrips might need to scale better by improving at levels 1, 5, 9, 13, and 17. An improvement per four-level tier.

Cantrips can be part of the solution for simplifying high-tier casters. Like the Warlock relying on the Eldritch Blast cantrip, if cantrips can remain meaningful options at the highest levels, there can be less need for more complex spellcasting apparatus.

Cantrips are like superpowers. Features like Mage Armor and speed improvement etcetera can also reorganize as superpower always-on at-will cantrips that work well at the highest tier.

My War Cleric using 5.5 uses cantrips all the time at 10th level to save resources.

 

[payn]

My main point is WotC successfully created a big tent with 5e, but going forward is more difficult when 5e's big tent could easily go in a myriad of different directions, each pulled by its own faction.

Yeap, I think they stayed true to big tent or what I like to call "everybody's second favorite edition" with 5.24. 5.24 is upsetting because of all this conventional wisdom begin shared here in this thread by super fans. The type of folks who play the crap out of the game, spend time during the day discussing it online, etc... Meanwhile, the average player who just plays it but doesnt care this much about it just buys and moves on.

 

[HatWearingFool]

Another issue they have is who do you want to target with a new edition?

Do you want to try to bring in new people who don’t currently play ttrpgs? How do you survey those? What does that game look like? This is how we got 4E (which I like) but didn’t go over well with existing players.

Are you catering to players that intially liked 5e but strayed away?

Are you catering to people new to the hobby ?

Are you catering to people that have been with 5e/d&d a long time and still play (the most likely to be upset with any changes)?

And I’m sure there tons of potential target groups I’m not thinking of (age, location, gender, video game players, etc).

Of course the answer almost all companies come up with is target everyone! Which almost never turns out. But any other choice means deliberately alienating groups from the start-or they certainly feel that way-and it’s an uphill battle to win them over.

But I doubt it’s up to the designers to determine the target audience. But as soon as the company tries to figure out whom it wishes to target the fan base will get suspicious of an edition change and sales will begin to fall so they have move fast.

And of course that’s ignoring the other fact that ttrpgs as currently designed don’t bring in much money. And I don’t think ttrpg designers are the people to design around that issue.

So likely WOTC needs business people to come up with a plan for a model that has higher profits and get the designers to design around that constraint space…

The ttrpg design team has an incredibly tough job ahead of it. They won’t have much time to work because sales start to fall as soon as people realize they have begun to work, they’ll be told their target audience, and they’ll be given design constraints designed for profit not enjoyment.