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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8355111" data-attributes="member: 6790260">Honestly, a huge problem with the 5e playtest was simply that they adamantly refused to settle on a design for two friggin years. They kept throwing systems out entirely and replacing them with something else. If something didn't poll super well, it was trashed, no iteration, no refinement, no second chances. That's not an effective way to design anything, because it means every model is an incredibly raw prototype.While bits and pieces of design were retained over the long haul of the public playtest, most of 5th edition only crystallized in the final six months of public playtesting and subsequent internal playtesting--the majority in the latter bit, so we never got to see it. They released one Sorcerer and one Warlock, it didn't poll well enough, so they pulled it and we saw nothing more until release. They built systems specifically dependent on the Specialties idea, and then scrapped it in something like the penultimate playtest doc. The whole playtest was riddled with these problems, and you can see it in the final product. It's a significant part of why the Beastmaster Ranger isn't up to par, despite the extreme overriding goal of the playtest being "did you find it fun?" to the exclusion of potentially-more-useful feedback.Honestly, it's worse than that. Their surveys were, and are, almost always terribly designed. Nearly every poll during the playtest was a push-poll, very clearly steering players toward a particular answer. And you can bet your britches they didn't actually have anyone trained in statistics to analyze the polls; they looked at raw data only and did only the most cursory analysis. ACTUAL survey-design and statistical analysis is expensive, and I guarantee you the D&D team believed they didn't need such expertise despite literally writing surveys and trying to interpret statistical data.Well, other than saving throws being an ongoing problem (e.g. the "ghoul surprise"), short rests being much too infrequent compared to long rests, CR being unreliable, players frequently complaining about monsters just being big fat bags of HP, the "a peasant can deceive the Prince of Lies himself 25% of the time while literally the most gifted being on the planet has a similar chance of failure" problem, and multiple subclasses being distinctly inferior compared to later replacements (e.g. Beastmaster vs the upcoming drake-taming subclass, Four Elements Monk vs. Sun Soul, Hexblades in general, etc.)It's not that 5e couldn't benefit from errata. It really, really could. But the developers are allergic to errata. When fans complained about Storm sorcerers getting bonus spells, when no other subclass did, what did they do? They didn't say, "Oh, hey, you're right. We'll issue some errata to grant those subclasses bonus spells known, 'cause it is kind of a problem that Sorcerers have so few spells." Nope, instead they said, "Ah, we hear you loud and clear! We'll nerf Storm to match all the other subclasses!" And how many times have they experimented with a new Ranger, only to never actually publish anything? No, 5e could DEFINITELY use some errata. But they won't actually do it, because that would upset the vocal minority who never want their books to change at all.Further, the only "fundamental math issues" were in the brand-new Skill Challenge system, in stealth (which has been a spicy subject in 5e as well!), and the controversy over the Expertise "tax" feats (which I still maintain was a very intentional design move, that they backed off of because players disliked it). 4e, by and large, had the most balanced math of any edition, ever. Yes, it had some spots that needed fixing. But at least its creators were willing to fix it, instead of trying to dance around the issue.</blockquote>

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