I am sorely disappointed and even offended by this system for four reasons.
First, it awards experience, treasure, and renown to DM characters. I can't count the number of times that I was called upon to explain the League's reasoning on limited experience, treasure, and renown rewards for DMs as an RC. In a nutshell, it was that they wanted people to play their characters and earn rewards in game to feel invested in their characters, they wanted people to know how to play them when they did play, and they did not want other players to feel undermined by characters who had the same rewards but had not earned them through play. At least these rewards are earned through DMing. However, I thought that reasoning was quite sound from my own personal experience with Living Forgotten Realms and Pathfinder. The existing rewards structure already awards so much experience that people like me who DM a lot can start characters at 4th level. Under this new system, I'll be able to start them at 5th or even 6th level. I already don't feel invested in my characters and will probably just skip awarding this xp to my characters.
Second, it adds a lot of magic items to the campaign. Here again, on a number of occasions as an RC I was called upon to explain to people that 5th edition D&D was designed to make magic items unnecessary and so that those few found would become signature items that helped to define a character. Moreover, I frequently fielded complaints by players that Adventurer's League games felt like magic items hunts and that players were gaming the system in ways that detracted from their enjoyment. I can't see adding all these magic items doing anything but fanning the flames of those problems.
Third, it doesn't award rewards for playtesting, undermining that system. A substantial portion of the games I have run since the League started were playtests, both of League adventures and of Wizards' published adventures. If I continue to do so, I am essentially penalized in comparison to DMs running the finished products, despite the fact that I donated my time to help improve the adventures. Now, in light of my earlier points, it's no skin off my back, as I'm not thrilled with these rewards anyway. However, I resent the fact that my contribution in DMing playtests is discounted in this way.
Fourth, the new system doesn't recognize extensive contributions in prior seasons. It only has one reward for all of the DMing many of us have been doing since the League's inception, regardless whether we ran one session a season or a hundred. On my birthday in August, I'll get over 15,000 xp to apply to a character. As I've already stated, I think awarding that much DM XP to one character is a mistake. A new character would be 6th level! Therefore, I am disappointed with the actual reward. Moreover, that's the same reward I would've earned for running one session each season. The League missed an opportunity to recognize serious achievements in earlier seasons. I honestly feel insulted.
The whole program has not rolled out yet. I suppose I may be eating crow on Monday when some additional material is released, but at the moment I am sorely disappointed and somewhat offended.
