Is there a 'New school" crowd?
D&D 5E Should the Fighter's "Second Wind" ability grant temporary HP instead of regular HP?
- Thread starter The Black Ranger
- Start date
Is there a 'New school" crowd?
Yeah that is a good analogy. No-one likes to pick out toppings they don't. Of course, it's impossible to add new toppings.
D&D Next is a game that is missing the toppings I like and it has toppings I can't stand. I think that's true for most people.
Lalato
Adventurer
Weird. I add toppings to pizza all the time. I also add sauces. Generally speaking, I rarely remove anything from a pizza, mostly because I'm a voracious omnivore that likes just about everything on a pizza. When I do remove something, it's usually because it's (a) easy to remove and (b) is really gross (like say slimy okra on a pizza).
Odd analogy.
Back to the topic at hand. Some people don't like something in a product that they haven't actually seen yet. Got it. Some people want to dissuade those people from their dislike. OK. They argue back and forth. Nothing is resolved.
I'm sure there is a haiku buried in their somewhere. I'm just not good enough to tease it out.
Odd analogy.
Back to the topic at hand. Some people don't like something in a product that they haven't actually seen yet. Got it. Some people want to dissuade those people from their dislike. OK. They argue back and forth. Nothing is resolved.
I'm sure there is a haiku buried in their somewhere. I'm just not good enough to tease it out.
Several of those too. Even if you're only counting within D&D.
In terms of healing, new school (non-magical healing) is several orders of magnitude larger than old school (no non-magical healing). Per actual data. Not people whining on internet boards. Funny how data points out inconvenient truths.
Obryn
Hero
Okay, I think it will be splendid if there's a published option. I sincerely hope there'll be something.
But! If there's not, niche playstyles have literally always been best-served by house-rules, and 5e will be no different here. Name me a system that's been as extensively house-ruled as D&D. As always, it's a question of effort and benefit. In this specific case, the effort is basically nil; there have been several totally fine solutions right here in this thread.
So I just simply can't parse the idea that a lack of an "official" alternative to one game mechanic (or two! or three!) could possibly overrule every other presumed positive if you're thinking of running 5e regularly, anyway. I mean, if you're looking at picking it up, there has to be some reason for it, right? No; this is another "heart and soul of D&D" argument, and seriously, screw those.
I don't think WotC should cater to rage-quitters from any school of thought, because you don't design your game based on your loudest objectors. It's not up to fake-daddy WotC to pat gamers on the head and tell them their way of pretend elf-ing was right all along.
FireLance
Legend
Ah, that's another point of difference, then. I see the non-meat portions of hit points working like temporary hit points, which are expended first. And while a hit will leave behind some physical injury - a scratch, a cut or a bruise, maybe - it is small enough that it wouldn't even kill a 1 hp commoner.
Can you direct me to the data you are referring to?
Right. But the analogy is inaccurately applied because it doesn't describe what's going on, here.
It's plain to see that - to use your analogy - there is no one pizza that will really please everyone you mentioned, and any pizza that some people like will be one which other's won't touch at all.
And that's fine, because D&D isn't the pizza - the pizza is your game. It's important that, within your gaming group, you have a set of people who like compatible things - so, if your group consists of some people who will only eat vegetarian pizza and some people who only want meat and cheese (and leave the sauce off, because they won't touch most vegetables)... then either you're going to find some rare combination that you do all enjoy, or you're going to stop playing together. But the pizza is your game, and the options that you pick for it.
D&D is the pizza restaurant. They have a default pizza - some combination of pepperoni and onion, maybe, with some herbs. For this edition, the default pizza includes olives and garlic. Some people like it, some people don't... but you can customise it.
Of course, there's a limit to how much you can customise by ordering from the restaurant - there's a set number of different bases, sauces and toppings. We do not, currently, know what the full set of options are going to be (and there's a lot of hyperbole going about on hearsay and comments from the designers taken out of context [1]). However, the designers have gone on record again and again saying this is supposed to be the most customisable pizza... er, I mean, edition of D&D there has ever been.
The point is, though, that you don't go to a pizza restaurant expecting everyone to eat the exact same pizza. If you go out and order the default, you should expect to get something that will be enjoyed by most people, but not necessarily you. Similarly, WotC are trying to make an edition of D&D that supports the widest range of playstyles they have the development resources for. However, if your playstyle is markedly different from the default, you should expect that you'll need to change some options. The unanswered question right now is how much effort it will be to support different playstyles. There is no way to answer that conclusively until the DMG is out - there will surely be some people who are better served with other games. A measure of WotC's success will be how small that group is. D&D shouldn't
I think that, for the most common playstyles, it should be possible to eyeball the PHB (hell, Basic for some) and say "yep, that's supported". For rarer playstyles [2], it's reasonable to wait until the DMG is actually in people's hands before deciding what is and isn't supported. I expect that there will be playstyles they don't have development time to support at all; it's better they support a set of game styles well rather than trying to support all of them and doing badly. Good material on how to tweak the game without breaking it will matter a lot there. They've said the DMG will include it and that's one of my personal markers for how well they do.
[1] Including the quotes going around, I haven't seen anything that actually says 5e will not support any specific playstyles; I believe the quote about no options existing for Second Wind is being taken out of context. Even if it wasn't, the DMG is supposed to contain a guide to building subclasses. Either that guide is a total failure (in which case I'll grab my flaming torch and pitchfork and join in with you) or it works and you now have a tool that would allow you to completely replace SW. Is that enough for you? Pass. I guess it'll depend how much work it is and how well the system is able to reduce unintended consequences.
[2] Yes, people who passionately care one way or the other about Second Wind represent a (totally valid, but) uncommon playstyle. I feel comfortable declaring this to be true since WotC just spent two years surveying the things the D&D community want out of 5e and they ended up including SW in their default game; the only sane inferences I can draw from this are that either a huge proportion of the playerbase fall on the positive side of the apathy line OR WotC are deliberately sabotaging themselves by alienating a big, important segment of their market.
Abraxas
Explorer
I've stayed out of all these discussions, but you've mentioned actual data a few times and I'm curious - where is this data? Did the Devs put out a bunch of info somewhere?
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