Playtesting vs a .5 Edition

[Brother MacLaren]

3.5 already has some per-encounter abilities. They were introduced in 3.5. I agree that the increasing importance of per-encounter abilities is one of the biggest changes in 4E. But they're not new.

Aside from the barbarian's rage, per-encounter abilities are not a part of core 3.5. And even rage is more like "X/day" -- when it lasts the duration of an encounter, as it nearly always does, defining it as "per encounter" is meaningless. The new material with per-encounter abilities for fighters and at-will abilities for wizards were SUCH a major change to D&D's game balance principles that I consider late 3.5 really a "3.75."

A game that includes Bo9S, Complete Arcane (the warlock), Complete Mage, Complete Champion, and FCII (the hellreaver) is a very different game in terms of resource management than one using core 3.5. It seems to me that the change from "core 3.5" to "3.75" is greater than the change from 3.0 to 3.5.

 

[HeinorNY]

"core 3.5" to "3.75"

3.75? I missed that, when was it?

 

[Brother MacLaren]

3.75? I missed that, when was it?

What I'm saying is that certain non-core materials for 3.5 changed the game so drastically that they were almost a new edition. Not officially, but in terms of how different they made the game.

 

[catsclaw227]

The new material with per-encounter abilities for fighters and at-will abilities for wizards were SUCH a major change to D&D's game balance principles that I consider late 3.5 really a "3.75."

A game that includes Bo9S, Complete Arcane (the warlock), Complete Mage, Complete Champion, and FCII (the hellreaver) is a very different game in terms of resource management than one using core 3.5. It seems to me that the change from "core 3.5" to "3.75" is greater than the change from 3.0 to 3.5.

This is where we have a different opinion. The 3.5 edition of D&D is not just PHB/MM1/DMG. It also includes the splatbooks and the environment books and the campaign settings and the regional sourcebooks that WOTC put out under the Dungeons and Dragons moniker. It is not just core.

So, in my opinion, the 3.5 version of D&D did, in fact, introduce per encounter mechanics.

 

[Vigilance]

Uh... we did get a 3.5 because there were things that needed to be changed because there wasn't enough playtesting on that edition right?

?

So, you think they should playtest the game with hundreds of thousands of people, for several years then?

Because it was THAT sort of stress testing that led to 3.5

 

[Gloombunny]

If you think there's such a thing as "enough playtesting", then you've never tried to design a game. There are always things that didn't get polished enough, data that wasn't complete enough, problems that no one caught in time. Complaining that there are flaws in a game because it wasn't playtested enough is like complaining that a machine is wasting energy on entropy.

That's not to say that "they should've done more playtesting" is never a valid complaint, much as "it's not as efficient as it could have been" is sometimes a valid complaint about a machine. But you have to be realistic about it. There are practical limits on these things.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

This is where we have a different opinion. The 3.5 edition of D&D is not just PHB/MM1/DMG. It also includes the splatbooks and the environment books and the campaign settings and the regional sourcebooks that WOTC put out under the Dungeons and Dragons moniker. It is not just core.

Unearthed Arcana, a splatbook, is seen as a "1.5" edition by some because it introduced such drastic changes. It was not officially a new edition.
The "Players' Option" series in 2E are considered "2.5" by many because they changed the game so much. They were not officially a new edition. The earlier Complete Book of X series offered a very few things in the way of fundamental rules changes (psionics and weapon style specialization). Not enough to be 2.5, but Players' Option was.
If you are willing to accept the classification of "1.5" and "2.5", then you accept that splatbooks can represent such a drastic change that they are in effect, if not in name, a new edition. If you do not accept the existence of a "1.5" or a "2.5," then I can see why you would not accept the existence of a "3.75."

 

[catsclaw227]

If you are willing to accept the classification of "1.5" and "2.5", then you accept that splatbooks can represent such a drastic change that they are in effect, if not in name, a new edition. If you do not accept the existence of a "1.5" or a "2.5," then I can see why you would not accept the existence of a "3.75."

I never thought of them as 1.5 or 2.5 editions either. Just more options for the 1E and 2E editions.

 

[JoeGKushner]

So, you think they should playtest the game with hundreds of thousands of people, for several years then?

Because it was THAT sort of stress testing that led to 3.5

I take it that's what you meant when you posted this before?

3e was very heavily playtested.

Just not playtested by millions of people for 5 years.

That was the process that revealed some of the problems they addressed in 3.5

Are you suggesting they should do that?

Seems to me if you are a company saying there will be no .5 editions that you'd want to playtest the new edition MORE than the last one before letting the fans hit it.

As you noted, the fans will find issues. If the game isn't as robust in playtest length as it was previously, are you thinking that the new designers are of such high caliber that the shorter playtesting time will reveal less issues needing another .5 edition fix or ?

 

[rjdafoe]

I'm with you. 3.5->4e, from our limited information, strikes me as by far the biggest change in DnD history.

But, alot of the concepts are already in other WOTC products, that was playtested and in production now. Star Wars Saga and Tome of Battle. Incorperating them into the main game, while there could be problems, is not all that big of a change compared to the mechanic changes that needed to happen between 2nd and 3rd.