D&D General One innovation per edition

[Mannahnin]

And the total circulation of The Strategic Review in these parts at the time was, at my best guess, exactly zero.

Which means for us, the Ranger is a 1e invention.

By that argument the Ranger is a 2E invention if a given area didn't get circulation of 1E. Say the various European countries which didn't get D&D until BECMI was released there.

The Ranger was first published for OD&D.

 

[DammitVictor]

Sticking with 1e as the base ruleset...

I know I'm a "race-as-class" guy, but I'm not going that direction.

Classic:

• B/X: ???
• BECMI: Weapon Mastery.

Advanced:

• 2E: Specialist Mages (of Effect and Thaumaturgy) and Specialty Priests. Replace the generic Mage and Priest classes. Runner Up: Kits.
• Player's Option: Give the players a little wiggle room with customized races/classes.

d20:

• 3.0: Feats. Divide them into WP Feats and NWP Feats. Give Warriors more WP feats and Rogues more NWP Feats.
• 3.5: Ability score modifiers.
• Unearthed Arcana: Incantations. They're like Rituals from 4E and 5E, except with flavor.
• PF1: Psychic magic and the psychic magic classes, as an alternative to psionics.
• Pathfinder Unchained: Grouped Skills and Skill Unlocks. Rogue subclasses get bonus unlocks and unlocks are limited to class skills.
• Bonus: DSP psionics, 3.5 and PF1.
• Conan d20: Ability score increases. (Replacing the Christmas Tree.)

Modern:

• 4E: Bloodied condition.
• 5.14: Pretty much the whole spellcasting system, prepared/spontaneous/hybrid, augmented spells. At-will cantrips.
• 5.24: Backgrounds w/Feats.
• A5E: Racial Gifts and Paragon Gifts. Runner Up: Fighting Syles.

 

[Mannahnin]

Sticking with 1e as the base ruleset...

I know I'm a "race-as-class" guy, but I'm not going that direction.

Classic:

• B/X: ???

Not crediting it for the invention of race-as-class??

• 5.14: At-will cantrips.
• 5.24: Backgrounds w/Feats.

These are from 4E. 4E Backgrounds weren't didn't exactly give feats, but a wide variety of benefits, some of which were equivalent to feats.

 

[Moving Pictures]

3e: Ascending AC. While I have real issues with the implementation of the d20 system, mostly because it totally same-ified all mechanics in the game and rendered ability scores (as opposed to ability modifiers) largely irrelevant

One of the first things I did when I re-wrote my homebrew was to go with ascending AC. It never, ever made sense.

5e: I'm gonna go with the Dis/Advantage mechanic. There's a lot to love about 5e, but ditching endless charts of modifiers for a simple alternative is my desert island feature.

I'd agree. In fact, the "advantage" feature for surprise situations is probably the one mechanic I've pillaged from 5e.

 

[kigmatzomat]

As a forever DM here's my takes

BECMI - yay, rules for my toys!
AD&D 1e- rules for social interactions (honorable mention: splitting races & classes)
2e -organized rules(yay!) that edited out stuff like Appendix C "Random harlot"
3e - Rules that are universal (same for PCs, NPCs and monsters!) and patterned (good, moderate, poor) in intuitive ways (advancing BAB over descending ThAC0)
4e - Roles and mooks (honorable mention: rituals)
5e - Dis/Advantage (honorable mention: the caster debuff & and undoing the CRPG-ificaction of 4e)