D&D 5E Only three pillars?

[Andvari]

Not knowing what your spells do could be a whole pillar at some tables.

 

[Li Shenron]

In D&D 5E the three pillars are combat, exploration, and social interaction.

The categorization is a simplification made by designers at some point in D&D history to streamline designing and balancing the game.

I would say that what distinguishes the three different categories is mainly the pace and the state of mind of the players, rather than the rule subset being used for resolution (which is distinctive in combat due to the turn-based, but there are nevertheless a lot of cross-overs of rules between pillars).

So to play along with the idea, I would say that two more "pillars" of the game are downtime and character development.

Combat is characterized by slowing the pace significantly and thinking in terms of chunks of time (turns, rounds, actions) and chunks of space (squares, feet, meters) with micromanagement of resources and a typical mindset of optimizing space by movement and time by trying to do as much as you can during your turn. A lot of focus is on running the rules by the book, with limited narrative wiggle-room. The player's state of mind is mostly directed towards calculating the odds of their actions, estimating the relative powers of the parties and the value of the resources left to use, and how to gain tactical advantages to increase their chances.

Exploration can be defined as a single category containing different scales, from the step-by-step exploration of a treacherous environment to the larger scale of overland travel (if threats are expected to the point of having to follow up the whole travel, otherwise it will be played as downtime), with intermediate scales such as navigating a city. Narrative and rules are strongly connected and share the focus, even though some people prefer to lean more towards rules (e.g. skimming over descriptions and resolve all tasks by rolls) and others prefer to lean more towards narrative (e.g. talking accurately about where and how the characters are conducting their exploration actions): there is in fact a large range of options in resolution between the two extremes. Unless the group is strongly skewed towards roll-playing, the player's state of mind is only partially worried about chances and resources, and more focused on using common sense to figure out practical solutions (problem-solving), such as where it makes sense to look for threats or how to get past a locked door.

Social interaction happens in the presence of NPCs, and mostly refers to communicating with them, because when interaction is done in other ways (sneaking, pickpocketing) then it is approached as problem-solving and resolved similarly to exploration. When it's real communications, the players themselves are using social and language skills to obtain what they want, be it information or permissions or support and so on. In theory this pillar has the same large range of options in resolution between full-narrative/no-rules and full-rules/no-narrative, but the latter is very rare, almost every group uses roleplaying in this pillar.

Downtime could be an additional category to include everything that happens "off camera" and often doesn't need resolution mechanics (although some occasional roll of dice can also be used), but mainly evaluating options and making decisions. I keep this category a bit ambiguous, as it may or may not be narrated at all, but at least it is typically not under significant time constraints. This includes stuff like purchasing equipment or spending treasure in other ways, casting spells or using skills in the free time, basically it's about investing resources into short/mid term benefits. It could be casting Mage Armor in the morning, scribing a scroll, repairing your armor, training your horse or buying the expensive materials for a specific number of casting of a certain spell, but most commonly it is about resting and healing the party (and preparing spells).

Character development could be included in downtime, however here I mostly mean level advancement, and since this is about making permanent choices for long-term benefits* then I think the players are thinking in very different terms, making trade-off calculations based on observations of the past and speculation of the future, as well as thinking about their character vision, in other words they are playing strategically. This not only happens off-camera, but often it is also done by players in their own time between group gaming sessions, so for me it can definitely goes into its own pillar.

*applies until 5e since it looks to me like since Tasha everybody can just retrain overnight so character development can just be lumped as downtime

 

[GMMichael]

The fourth pillar is Downtime.

This pillar includes domain work (i.e. home/base/castle/stronghold construction and management), treasury division, training, spell research, potion/scroll/item construction, family dealings, business dealings, investments, and all the other stuff not done in the adventuring field; each at either the party or individual PC level.

Can we include shopping scenes in this one?

 

[Minigiant]

Downtime- Things you do while not adventuring

Recovery- Getting back to full resources. Healing HP. Crafting ammunition. Brewing potions. Charging items. Not very important in new editions.

Security- Setting up a safe place to rest or getting to the safe place. Alarm spell.Tiny Hut spell. Mansion spell.

 

[pukunui]

The fourth pillar of play should be a fishing mini-game.
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(I'm only half-kidding. I'd really like to see a supplement that has a bunch of mini-games in it for all sorts of situations: fishing contests, drinking contests, escaping pursuit, carnival games, etc. I know that these would fall under the "Social" pillar, but if done right, they'd be a lot more fun than the typical series of Charisma checks.)

I’m pretty sure the Icewind Dale and Dragonlance books both include 5e rules for fishing mini-games.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The fourth pillar is Downtime.

This pillar includes domain work (i.e. home/base/castle/stronghold construction and management), treasury division, training, spell research, potion/scroll/item construction, family dealings, business dealings, investments, and all the other stuff not done in the adventuring field; each at either the party or individual PC level.

Mass combat is something of a cross between downtime and combat though. Not sure where I'd put it. Probably downtime.

 

[Micah Sweet]

In my homebrew campaign, the party's hometown (and "home base" for their adventures) is a retirement community of old adventurers. All of the shop keepers, temple clergy, and government officials are high-level NPCs who all smirk and roll their eyes when these adorable little characters start trying to threaten or talk down to them.

I roll everything out in the open (we play on Roll20) so the players got a glimpse of the bartender's stats when he broke up a bar fight. "Plus ten?! The friggin' old bartender is swinging at plus ten to hit?!" They decided to behave themselves for the rest of the night, and every night since.

Like a shop keeper in Nethack!

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Three is the right number of pillars. You might change what those pillars are, but fewer makes the whole unstable, more makes it overcomplectated.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Three is the right number of pillars. You might change what those pillars are, but fewer makes the whole unstable, more makes it overcomplectated.

Architecture suggests that four pillars are perfectly stable.

 

[John R Davis]

Yeah.4 for me.
World-building is as important as the other three for me.