Rant After Play-Test

[Gansk]

We can't really audit the math yet because we don't know all the rules, but I do see some editing errors in the Caves of Chaos module.

Skeletons are listed as both immune to necrotic damage and resistant to necrotic damage. Huh?

The word "weak" on the gnoll pack leader's power is spelled as "week".

Combine that with the downloading issues that other people experienced (I did not have issues), it continues to give me an impression that WotC is not very professional.

Remember how the math of skill challenges was picked apart at the release of 4e and all of the editing mistakes in the 3e Monster Manual III?

I am not a professional editor, but I am positive that if I worked for WotC, those obvious mistakes in the playtest materials would not be there. I would be ashamed if silly mistakes like that made it out to the public.

I think we forgive these types of errors because our hobby is filled with material provided by fans and very small companies who cannot afford editors. But WotC is supposed to be the flagship company of our hobby, plus they are owned by a large corporation that produces professional marketing material. Even a beta test should be professionally edited IMO.

 

[ren1999]

We can't really audit the math yet because we don't know all the rules, but I do see some editing errors in the Caves of Chaos module.

Skeletons are listed as both immune to necrotic damage and resistant to necrotic damage. Huh?

The word "weak" on the gnoll pack leader's power is spelled as "week".

Combine that with the downloading issues that other people experienced (I did not have issues), it continues to give me an impression that WotC is not very professional.

Remember how the math of skill challenges was picked apart at the release of 4e and all of the editing mistakes in the 3e Monster Manual III?

I am not a professional editor, but I am positive that if I worked for WotC, those obvious mistakes in the playtest materials would not be there. I would be ashamed if silly mistakes like that made it out to the public.

I think we forgive these types of errors because our hobby is filled with material provided by fans and very small companies who cannot afford editors. But WotC is supposed to be the flagship company of our hobby, plus they are owned by a large corporation that produces professional marketing material. Even a beta test should be professionally edited IMO.

I'm going to go ahead and have to agree. You said what I was trying to more politely.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I actually do agree with spell and editing errors. Search for my early 4e posts if you want.
But remember: editing needs time. Even a professional editor needs time. In a alpha or beta test, this is wasted money, and more importantly: wasted time.

Would you like to wait another week for rules changes just to make sure a little spelling mistake is corrected?

And to most folks complaining: please do the playtest as intended. And if you do suggestion, please just suggest them without ranting.
Make a list. Post it. Maybe give some reasons, why you believe a rules element needs work.

And especially: tell them, which part of the adventure and the rules made your play experience worse than you´d like. And please, RTFM. A wizard with only 3 spells e.g. is better than he was in most editions, but in 5e he also has minor at-will magic. So getting a heart attack because you did not read thourougly could get you a darwin award.

 

[Dire Bare]

Now we're complaining about minor spelling and errata in a PLAYTEST document?

Wow. Just wow.

 

[Fifth Element]

But WotC is supposed to be the flagship company of our hobby

No, that's Paizo. The internet says so.

 

[nnms]

No, that's Paizo. The internet says so.

Well, Paizo does.

We’ve heard it our entire careers: “Are you crazy?” “It can’t be done.” “Nobody would buy that.” “It’s impossible.” Yet we have succeeded in doing the impossible, time after time after time.

...

Hold on—you’re going to create your own game to compete with Dungeons & Dragons? You’re wasting your time!

The Pathfinder Roleplaying Game is now the world’s best-selling tabletop RPG.​

The best thing about the OGL is that it means that future editions of D&D have to compete on quality against all open versions. 5E faces this challenge now.

WotC needs to step up their game if they want the majority of the market share back under their control (the real goal of 5E). My guess is that the amount of the market share needed to satisfy their revenue requirements is going to be a hard ask.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

And if you consider that pathfinder is not so good as many people make it out to be. If wizard would start selling 3.5 books again, pathfinder sales will instantly drop.

Believe it or not, if 5e will be as good as it seems to be, wotc is back to top rather fast... especially if you consider, that pathfinder should have lost its momentum in 2 years and most groups have as many PHBs as they need.

 

[LordGraz'zt]

I love how people make claims that if they were part of the team there would be ZERO spelling mistakes or maths errors.

Anyone that has been part of anything even remotely similar understands that mistakes and errors are inevitable.

 

[Greg K]

And if you consider that pathfinder is not so good as many people make it out to be. If wizard would start selling 3.5 books again, pathfinder sales will instantly drop.

Believe it or not, if 5e will be as good as it seems to be, wotc is back to top rather fast... especially if you consider, that pathfinder should have lost its momentum in 2 years and most groups have as many PHBs as they need.

Here is an opposite opinion (just mine and not saying it represents anything other than my opinion). While Pathfinder failed to appeal to me, nearly everything about 5e presented in the playtest fails to appeal to me as well. The only decent things I have heard about 5e
1. Flatter math
2. Backgrounds
3. Supporting 2e specialty priests (one of the best things about 2e)
4. How starting HP are handled (something I liked about 4e)
5. Skills being allowed to be used with different ability scores as applicable (a rules variant that I like from the 3e DMG and used)

The above go me to set aside my initial concern about Mearls, Thompson and Cordell heading up the design as major players in the design. The last thing I saw from Mearls that appealed to me was the Book of Iron Might (note: that is not Iron Heroes which I thought was pretty, horrible). His writings about game design from his blogs didn't thrill me either. Rodney Thompson? Star Wars Saga was okay (I probably would have liked it more if it was not Star Wars and had a different skill system, but his name happens to be on d20 Future and the Future Player's Companion, two pieces of drek that I am sorry to have wasted money on (and I payed less than half price for each). Bruce Cordell wrote Lords of Madness, but that is the only thing I have liked of his since 2e. As for Robert Schwalb, I am not a fan of some of his blog postings about D&D. and I am also concerned when he says that his favorite 1e class is the assassin. Furthermore, SOIF for Green Ronin while a beautiful book didn't appeal to me. On the other hand, I thought his 3e Cavalier and Unholy Warrior Handbook for Green Ronin were decent and better than average WOTC 3e product (which I found disappointing). I also thought he wrote some decent 4e articles. So, right now, I don't have an opinion one way or the other.

The actual playtest arrives and we get the Caves of Chaos, a product Mearls had rippped apart in a review. Sorry, this is not a module that makes me want to playtest their game (I own the original and while I admire the sandbox nature, the composition of the adventure areas don't sit right with me) . On top of that, everything else revealed about the playtest, has been a major turn off with the importance of ability scores over skills (one reason that I left pre-3e was the importance of ability scores) and hit points as a spell effect threshold assuring that I will never play 5e as long as they are part of the design. Other dislikes include skill DC difficulty names (I wish they would go back to the 3e common standard and explain it in the rulebook rather than Dragon which was a mistake), racial immunities, taking damage from failed stabilization and negative hit points, rogues seeing the dark, and a host of other things

I know this is the initial playtest, but I hope, once we start seeing the modules, we get something different than this initial playtest and that I find better (based upon what I have read here at ENWorld, at RPG.net, and WOTCs boards). In the meantime, I am still waiting for something that makes me want to pick up the playtest and am back to being concerned that this design team cannot design a game that I like.

 

[Janaxstrus]

And if you consider that pathfinder is not so good as many people make it out to be. If wizard would start selling 3.5 books again, pathfinder sales will instantly drop.

Believe it or not, if 5e will be as good as it seems to be, wotc is back to top rather fast... especially if you consider, that pathfinder should have lost its momentum in 2 years and most groups have as many PHBs as they need.

Paizo makes it's money on APs and other things, more so than PHBs (I'd guess somewhere in the 10times more area). Wizards can't hold a candle to Paizo adventures. The game itself might not be that much better than 3.5, but the adventures are head and shoulders better and the region specific books are easily equal to WotC's work.