D&D 5E Sage Advice is back!

[Mordhau]

I think the ayse they have set up is pretty good at preventing thst cul de sac phenomenon that killed 3E, 3.5, 4E, and Essentials. And precisely through thst measured conservative testing regimen and iterative products.

They only get feedback from the people who do the surverys. The surveys are representative of their most engaged customers by their very nature. It's a slow process, but what the most engaged customer wants and what the average customer wants are not always the same thing, and there's the potential for that to diverge over time.

There's also this bizarre thing they are doing where they are presenting bits of an idea and then pulling back if they are not immediately popular. Some ideas need to be presented as whole packages. It's not surprising that people didn't like the cross class subclasses as they were made. The game as it is wasn't designed for them. But if the revised edition was designed more tightly (which they ought to be able to do now with a game that's over half a decade old) then they would probably work well - a lot better than basically shunting the idea off into feats. (Feats as they exist now have their own problems, the ASI system has it's own design constraints)

 

[Maxperson]

They only get feedback from the people who do the surverys. The surveys are representative of their most engaged customers by their very nature. It's a slow process, but what the most engaged customer wants and what the average customer wants are not always the same thing, and there's the potential for that to diverge over time.

There's also this bizarre thing they are doing where they are presenting bits of an idea and then pulling back if they are not immediately popular. Some ideas need to be presented as whole packages. It's not surprising that people didn't like the cross class subclasses as they were made. The game as it is wasn't designed for them. But if the revised edition was designed more tightly (which they ought to be able to do now with a game that's over half a decade old) then they would probably work well - a lot better than basically shunting the idea off into feats. (Feats as they exist now have their own problems, the ASI system has it's own design constraints)

I'm not sure that's entirely true. I think that they get feedback at conventions, though emails, D&D Beyond feedback, and maybe even a few other sources. Surveys are probably their single largest source, but I don't think it's the only one.

 

[Minigiant]

In a game where the basic challenges are well below the average PC starting point, what does suboptimal matter? If you're an optimizer, you already have a list of optimal and suboptimal feats, so chains won't really change much other than give you some more fun optimizing time. To everyone else suboptimal is irrelevant, since suboptimal still = good.

I'm talking about the fact that all the magic feats are just adding spells to classes will billy AND you are getting bonus feats from backgrounds.

So the current model of Feat Chains will massively boost spellcasters while being on par or worse for warriors and experts. The expert feats are already bad except prodigy and mobile.

 

[DEFCON 1]

They only get feedback from the people who do the surverys. The surveys are representative of their most engaged customers by their very nature. It's a slow process, but what the most engaged customer wants and what the average customer wants are not always the same thing, and there's the potential for that to diverge over time.

I don't agree. I don't believe the "average" customer wants anything. The "average" customer is probably playing D&D with a DM that owns a bunch of stuff and then when it comes time to make a character the "average" customer might look through a second book after the PHB but that's pretty much about it. But they certainly aren't buying their own copies of said products. If they use any bits, it's only cause the DM said a bit might work for them.

My tables through the life of 5E have included probably 20+ different players in all the various campaigns I've run, and if we're lucky, maybe half of them bought their own Player's Handbook. And that's it. The PHB. That's ALL half of the players own, the other half hasn't bought anything at all. And if any of them are using any character creation stuff from either those books it's only because they can use my D&D Beyond master subscription to see them and select them. But I'm the one who bought them and paid for them. Which means I'm the "engaged" customer, and the other 20 of them are the "average" ones.

So what does that mean? It means that ANY new products that WotC puts into the pipeline to create and produce WILL be for the most "engaged" customers (IE people like us), because we are the only ones who will actually buy the product when it comes out anyway. No "average" customers will do so. So those of us who answer the surveys ARE the ones WotC should be asking and taking cues from. They don't need to really think about how any new items will affect the "average" player, because that "average" player would only ever see it in practice if the "engaged" player decided to bring it into play at the table. And that "engaged" played would certainly know better than WotC would whether it was worth doing so.

 

[Maxperson]

I'm talking about the fact that all the magic feats are just adding spells to classes will billy AND you are getting bonus feats from backgrounds.

So the current model of Feat Chains will massively boost spellcasters while being on par or worse for warriors and experts. The expert feats are already bad except prodigy and mobile.

So your position is that they are going to forget martials and make no martial feats chains at all? That Great Weapon Master and Sentinel are just par feats or worse?

 

[jayoungr]

I don't think a Background coming with a Feat would break the system: We had Variant Humans....

Variant humans gave up something in exchange for that feat, though. None of the others do.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I don't agree. I don't believe the "average" customer wants anything. The "average" customer is probably playing D&D with a DM that owns a bunch of stuff and then when it comes time to make a character the "average" customer might look through a second book after the PHB but that's pretty much about it. But they certainly aren't buying their own copies of said products. If they use any bits, it's only cause the DM said a bit might work for them.

My tables through the life of 5E have included probably 20+ different players in all the various campaigns I've run, and if we're lucky, maybe half of them bought their own Player's Handbook. And that's it. The PHB. That's ALL half of the players own, the other half hasn't bought anything at all. And if any of them are using any character creation stuff from either those books it's only because they can use my D&D Beyond master subscription to see them and select them. But I'm the one who bought them and paid for them. Which means I'm the "engaged" customer, and the other 20 of them are the "average" ones.

So what does that mean? It means that ANY new products that WotC puts into the pipeline to create and produce WILL be for the most "engaged" customers (IE people like us), because we are the only ones who will actually buy the product when it comes out anyway. No "average" customers will do so. So those of us who answer the surveys ARE the ones WotC should be asking and taking cues from. They don't need to really think about how any new items will affect the "average" player, because that "average" player would only ever see it in practice if the "engaged" player decided to bring it into play at the table. And that "engaged" played would certainly know better than WotC would whether it was worth doing so.

Ya gotta keep in mind that 20 people is vanishingly small.

I can look at the same number of people and find players who all own the secondary books, though each group only has 1-3 PHBs because most players I know see no need for their own phb. In my main D&D group I have 3 players who own every single sourcebook and a few adventures for 5e, and own everything in the whole edition on dndbeyond.

So I don’t think we can take such small samples and draw conclusions about the game or it’s community from them.

 

[Minigiant]

So your position is that they are going to forget martials and make no martial feats chains at all? That Great Weapon Master and Sentinel are just par feats or worse?

Nope.

I said feat chains will let caster eat each other as little exploration of magical feat have been done in 5e because they gave metamagic to sorcerer instead of a real class feature.

 

[Maxperson]

I said feat chains will let caster eat each other as little exploration of magical feat have been done in 5e because they gave metamagic to sorcerer instead of a real class feature.

Can you clarify that? I don't understand what you're trying to say with that sentence.

 

[Minigiant]

Can you clarify that? I don't understand what you're trying to say with that sentence.

I mean all the magic feats are just gifts of new spells prepared with wide restrictions. This kills exclusivity especially with the weak mechanics in casters.