Nobody talks about lack of vertical progression?

[Blackbrrd]

I does to me look like there is little direct vertical progression in 5e. You get more spells, abilities and hp, but it doesn't look like you get more to-hit. If this is something they are going to go with, it makes the whole "sandbox" type of gameplay much more viable.

One of the worst thing about 4e to me was the "you need x amout of gear, y amount of progression in stats and z innate to-hit bonus from level" to hit anything. It was true in earlier editions as well, but they scaled HP a lot faster than AC was scaled in 4e.

There was a good amout of progression in earlier editions as well, so removing this nearly completely from 5e does makes me very interested to see where they are taking the rest of the game.

To me it does look like they could cut back on the HP progression as well, or just cap it at a certain level.

Dnd has always been a game with a big sense of progression vertically, but I am starting to wonder if more horizontal progression with more options available to the character is what they are going for.

 

[DogBackward]

It's been touched on. For the most part, the response was "Cool, this is good." then we moved on to other discussions.

 

[slobo777]

I currently expect D20 bonuses to scale less than e.g. 3.5 or 4E, but damage to scale faster. Would also make sense to add more elements of character "rounding" such as situational effects and skills from each of race, class, background and theme, although not sure if these won't be modular, as for some people they add needless detail.

 

[CleverNickName]

I expect your base attack bonus and your save throws to improve as you gain levels, but I don't expect them to improve EVERY time you gain a level.

Under the Basic/Expert rules, your character's THAC0 and save throws improved around 4th level, then again around 8th, and so on. I imagine D&DNext will do something similar.

 

[DerekSTheRed]

Where in the play test does it say you gain more skills? It seems to me the only things you get when you level up is more hit points, more damage (although each class is different), and new feats. Someone from WotC (I think in the chats but I can't remember) said that characters would be able to find orcs a threat at low, medium and high levels without having to adjust the stats of the orcs. The only difference would be the quantity of orcs. This would be because the to hit and AC numbers wouldn't be that different between levels. A handful of orcs would be a tough battle at low level, while those same orcs could come in waves against a high level party. Flat math definitely has some interesting benefits.

 

[Blackbrrd]

It's been touched on. For the most part, the response was "Cool, this is good." then we moved on to other discussions.

Funny, it's the feature I think is most revolutionary.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

I think this is good design that will widen the "sweet spot" of the game. As others have noted: this was a feature of OD&D/BD&D/1E, where you changed lines on the "to hit"table only once every few levels.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Dnd has always been a game with a big sense of progression vertically

Yes. I think the problem was that steep progression on to hit rolls and armour class didn't really work well with the d20. Too much progression takes a character outside the scope of other characters or monsters, to the point where they are only missing on a 1, or only being hit on a 20. At that point, I feel the d20 roll isn't working and the game is, to some extent, broken.

There are two solutions - lose the to hit/AC progression or lose the d20 (the more radical solution). Personally I rather like steep progression on everything, I like the idea of crazy awesomely powerful beings kicking around on the same planet as average Joes. But losing the d20 is probably too big a step. Perhaps there are other ways to make dudes sufficiently crazy awesome for my taste.

3e attempted to solve this problem with Power Attack and iterative attacks - turning a to hit bonus so high it has become useless into damage, which is always useful. 5e's approach is somewhat similar to that of 3e, but instead of giving characters BAB, then turning it into damage, it dispenses with BAB and just gives you more damage.

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

Funny, it's the feature I think is most revolutionary.

Agreed. Flat math is the only halfway interesting thing I see in the play test, and I honestly didn't think WotC had the balls to do it.

Sort of, at least. +X items still seem to be in, so high level PCs will still be more-or-less impervious to low [level, no, CR? Er, HD?] monsters. I can see the DM appeal of flatter math, but I'm not convinced it's going to be the best thing since spaghetti.

PS: Seriously, how is 5e ranking monsters?

 

[jadrax]

PS: Seriously, how is 5e ranking monsters?

At the moment, by XP is the only real yardstick.