Second 5th Edition Survey! Plus Results of the First Survey: The Ranger Gets Some Attention!

A new survey is up on the official D&D website. It looks like its covering the classes not in the last survey and the recent Eberron material. WotC also reports on what was learned from the last survey. "For our second survey, we’re focused on the final six classes in the game and the Eberron material that we rolled out in last month’s Unearthed Arcana. If you haven’t looked at that article and want to provide feedback, read it over and come back to the survey later. Even if you don’t have a chance to use the Eberron material in your game, your reactions to it are helpful. You can also skip over the Eberron questions if you don’t want to give feedback on that material."

Here's the overall feedback from the first survey:

"So, what did we learn from our last survey? Let’s take a look at some trends:

To start with, there are a lot of you. We had more people respond to this survey than any of our playtest surveys. A lot of people are into D&D these days!

There are a lot of new players and DMs out there. Welcome to D&D!

You are playing the game in droves. Only about 10 percent of you have read the books without yet playing.

Your campaigns are just getting started. Most of you are playing at 6th level and below.

You love the fifth edition of Dungeons & Dragons, and we’re overjoyed to be able to write that. The overall assessment was incredibly positive, surpassing our results from the playtest by a significant margin."
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The ranger, in particular, is getting some focus:

"To start with, a majority of players and Dungeon Masters are happy with the ranger overall. The game as a whole is grading well, so we don’t want to make a huge, sudden change to that class. But taking a deeper dive into the ranger, we can see that favored enemy and the beast master archetype received the lowest ratings. Our next step is to take a closer look at why that is.

We’ll start with an internal assessment mixed with feedback from our closed circle of testers. From there, we’ll work up some options and present them to you, most likely in the Unearthed Arcana column. That process allows us to determine if the track we’re on answers your concerns with the class.

The critical step is making sure that any changes we make genuinely improve the class. Remember, plenty of people are happy with the ranger, so any changes need to cover a number of options:

People who like the ranger as it is can simply keep playing their current characters.

People who don’t like the ranger should feel as though the new options allow them to play the ranger they want to create.

The new options are exactly that—new choices for ranger players to select from, as opposed to a rewrite of the Player’s Handbook.

DMs should always feel that they can take or leave the new options, just like any other material in the game beyond the Basic Rules."
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Hop on over here to take the new survey!

 

[Jester David]

To start with, a majority of players and Dungeon Masters are happy with the ranger overall. The game as a whole is grading well, so we don’t want to make a huge, sudden change to that class. But taking a deeper dive into the ranger, we can see that favored enemy and the beast master archetype received the lowest ratings. Our next step is to take a closer look at why that is.

We’ll start with an internal assessment mixed with feedback from our closed circle of testers. From there, we’ll work up some options and present them to you, most likely in the Unearthed Arcana column. That process allows us to determine if the track we’re on answers your concerns with the class.

The critical step is making sure that any changes we make genuinely improve the class. Remember, plenty of people are happy with the ranger, so any changes need to cover a number of options:

People who like the ranger as it is can simply keep playing their current characters.
People who don’t like the ranger should feel as though the new options allow them to play the ranger they want to create.
The new options are exactly that—new choices for ranger players to select from, as opposed to a rewrite of the Player’s Handbook.
DMs should always feel that they can take or leave the new options, just like any other material in the game beyond the Basic Rules.

I'm really hesitant about what a "new option" means. I really, really, really don't want the ranger fixed with a feat.

Although, an additive correction would be okay. Slipping a line or power into the ranger might fix things nicely.
For example, the beast master is handy but is mostly a lateral increase of power, not increasing damage per round and only absorbing minimal hits. Increasing its hit points would be one solution, but a revisionary fix. Allowing the beast master ranger to deal extra damage to a creature within 5 feet of his pet would be additive and easier to work with since the book is still correct, there's just this extra cue card of information to slip in as a bookmark.

 

[eMalc]

I was mostly positive as well. Main gripes were with Eberron races and Artificer class being mainly a bit bland and underwhelming compared to the classes & races in the PHB.

I left a note in about the Sorceror's subclasses being quite underwhelming to me as well. Maybe it's just me, but the Dragon Sorceror's features just feel pretty bland, and the Wild Sorceror's Wild Magic table doesn't hit all the notes I'd quite like. Would quite like to see a third sub-class in there as well, to do with reckless magic or a more arcane focused Spell Thief.

 

[Staffan]

I'm afraid I expounded at some length in the comments about all the things that were wrong with the artificer.

 

[Nebulous]

Yes, I imagine they'll just have a different version of the ranger side by side with the existing build.

 

[CapnZapp]

As someone playing a wild mage, one of my complaints was that there's not much to the class that doesn't depend on the whim of the DM, at least at low levels. Wild surges are fun, but if your DM never triggers one, you're basically the 1/day free advantage guy...which is kind of yawn. Give me more surges, or give me other weird random stuff to do that isn't surging!

I suggest you don't play a wild mage at all unless you
1) realize almost all of its power comes from getting advantage. If you don't have wild surges all the time, wild mage is probably the weakest subclass in the book. It's "Tides of Chaos" you need to activate all the time.
2) make sure your DM realizes 1) and agrees beforehand to not actually use any of the ways the rulebook allows for that restricts wild surges. If your DM talks in terms of "perhaps wanting to see one wild surge a day" or similar - do not play this subclass.

It's very common for players and DMs to discuss the wild mage in terms of how often to allow wild surges. That completely ignores the fact that any restriction fatally throttles the class.

Let me illustrate, since this point is lost on so many people:

A 5th level sorcerer gets 4+3+2=9 non-cantrip spell slots. This means her potential is getting advantage on ten rolls each day (attacks, checks, saves). (In fact more, since you can convert sorcery points).

However, be warned the Wild Mage is still difficult to optimize. I have found that even when I do manage to come close to full efficiency, I'm still having trouble justifying why I didn't simply play a Draconic Sorq instead. This is because the most powerful use of Tides of Chaos is getting advantage on attack spells. But there are very very few of them in the PHB. Remember, you can't use your class ability on spells that make enemies make a save, only spells that give you an attack roll.

So even if you are aware of all these issues, I still think the subclass will have to wait until there are more suitable spells on the Sorcerer spell list.

 

[AverageCitizen]

The more I looked into the Beastmaster the more I realized that it is more conceptually unsatisfying than it is actually weak. I hope they add a way to shift more of a ranger's power into his animal companion so that the beast can feel like it is a contributing part of the character and not a footnote. Perhaps an option to forego spells in favor of a more active animal companion.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I suggest you don't play a wild mage at all unless you
1) realize almost all of its power comes from getting advantage. If you don't have wild surges all the time, wild mage is probably the weakest subclass in the book. It's "Tides of Chaos" you need to activate all the time.
2) make sure your DM realizes 1) and agrees beforehand to not actually use any of the ways the rulebook allows for that restricts wild surges. If your DM talks in terms of "perhaps wanting to see one wild surge a day" or similar - do not play this subclass.

Those are true, but not immutable truths. In the context of a poll, it's worth mentioning that if "do not play this subclass" is not an answer you're just willing to accept, you can say that you don't like it on the poll. Given their reaction to the beastmaster ranger, it sounds like they'd be willing to entertain the idea that they might want to take another look at the subclass.

 

[The Grand User]

I wish they had made a general companion rules that any character could have, and the Beastmaster ranger would just have some extra stuff to add on to that.

 

[Zaran]

I honestly don't like the sorcerer as a class but it and the Wizard need a "regular" version for those who don't want to specialize. I am very surprised that the Druid wasn't talked about. Also it seems like they haven't read any of the comments in the surveys or I'm betting Concentration would have come up, which I feel greatly affects the Ranger and Paladin.

Eberron is missing a High Magic module. Plus the Artificer class doesn't reflect the 4e version at all and this would be an issue for people wanting to change editions without restarting characters. Also the Artificer needs to be able to disable traps and pick locks without needing to pick a background for it.

 

[Psikerlord#]

I was mostly positive, including the Eberron material. I suggested sorcerors should get more metamagic abilities over the 20 levels.

I'm very glad to hear some ranger beastmaster love will be released via the Unearthed Arcana column. Exactly the sort of thing I was hoping they might use UA for.