D&D (2024) So Will 'OneD&D' (6E) Actually Be Backwards Compatible?

[Hussar]

Because there's a lot of other 5e out there, and WotC is demonstrably not the most quality stuff. Given the recent crisis, I would think that now is the best opportunity to give 3pps the attention they deserve.

Again, nothing wrong with promoting the stuff you like.

But, coupled with unrelenting negativity it's not really going to fly. "WotC is demonstrably not the most quality stuff"? Seriously? 3pp should get "the attention they deserve"? Hrm, I guess the fact that we have a dedicated forum for Pathfinder, things like the Ennies and tons of threads talking about various 3pp isn't giving them enough attention?

Look, half my D&D collection is 3pp. And that's been true since the first days of the OGL. I love 3pp. But, I don't feel the need to yuck in everyone's yum every single day for the past two years or so. Play the stuff you like. Trumpet the stuff you like. Telling me that WotC is teh suxxors endlessly and we should all jump on the Level Up bandwagon just pushes me further and further away from even considering anything you are promoting. Don't tell me why WotC is bad, because, well, I don't agree. I've got no major beef with WotC stuff. Some I like, some I don't. But, if the only reason I should look at 3pp is because you think WotC sucks, well... that's not good enough and just poisons the well AFAIC.

 

[dave2008]

So, has anyone tried it with the playtest rules as they stand? I offered to allow my players to try out OneDnD characters, but no one took me up on it. As a DM, I'm using the new Inspiration rules as a house rule. Obviously, we don't have new monsters yet, but I'd be tempted to plug in a few into a my current campaigns to see if there's a difference.

Yes, they work great as is or mixed and matched with '14 classes. I can't say we have tried all the rules, as they don't all come up and I didn't like the idea of inspiration on a 1.

 

[dave2008]

Sort of. We've been told that we can play the 2014 PCs along side the 2024 characters. The rules for 2014 characters can't change for that to be true. That means that there will be conflicts between the rules for 2014 characters and the ones for 2024 characters. They won't be compatible. For the other rules, you can replace them with new rules and if they work seamlessly then compatibility is preserved.

The problem is their promise of backwards compatibility with characters. It inherently creates incompatibility. If they just updated the edition to 5.5 and went on with things... No 2014 and 2024 clerics in the same group. Just 2024 clerics.

You can have '14 and playtest clerics in the same group. It has worked fine for us.

I have to ask, have you playtested these options? You keep talking about all of these problems and you can't do this or that...but people actual do it and it is fine, great even. I realize we all have our hang-ups (I refused to play with inspiration on a 1), but give it a try and let loose a little.

 

[Yaarel]

I am not sure I follow. 'Donating the future product' is how compatibility is maintained (and it is not the entire product, much like the SRD today is only a bare-bones PHB + DMG + MM)

What I mean is.

When 5e came out, a 5e SRD also came out.

There will not be a 2024e SRD. (At least that is the intention, barring actual math or structural incompatibility.)



The 5e SRD has a minimalist set list of gaming features. For example, the Wizard class has one of its subclasses, Evocation.

2024e will be a noticeable edition change. (I am on board with the 1e to 2e comparison, in the sense of reorganizing and recharacterizing.) But 5e content will continue to be usable in the 2024e version of the game.

However. 2024e will add new options for the Wizard class, and continue to add new options as the years go on.

Hasbro-WotC doesnt want players to access these new option without monetization.

Hasbro-WotC will leave the minimalist 5e SRD Wizard as-is.

The official Wizard will evolve. The 5e SRD Wizard will be left behind. For example, maybe there are new subclasses that redefine the Wizard class, similar to the way the Hexblade redefines the Warlock. Perhaps features relating to subclass at level 3 become a big deal. Whatever. The 5e SRD will see none of this.

Hasbro-WotC will make it difficult to both rely on the SRD and integrate new official features.

It is somewhat like the distinction between SRD and DMsGuild is now. But the gap will increase. The conceptual differences will diverge, and what they share in common will be less and less recognizable, like the stark differences between some settings.

Hasbro-WotC wants independent "competitors" to split far away from the new products it monetizes.

The history of friendly back-and-forth between official inspiring independent, and independent inspiring official, are now less friendly.

Hasbro-WotC doesnt want independent options in official platforms, except when strictly under its own terms that can be draconian. Viceversa, it doesnt want official options in independent platforms.

Hasbro-WotC wants a walled garden and unambiguous control of it.





Moreover, technology in this century is a game changer.

Especially, Hasbro-WotC wants control of online monetizable ways of playing D&D.

In this era, when most players are active online and college friends move to different parts of the country and planet, virtual D&D is increasingly the way to play D&D. Hasbro-WotC has sought to monopolize this.

5 friends sipping beer playing D&D around a table, isnt where the money is. This isnt the future of what official D&D will be about. The 5e SRD will matter less and less, as 2024e D&D changes more and more. It is a "sea change". In the corpse in the deep waters, "those are pearls that were his eyes". Technology is a different way of experiencing D&D.

D&D is evolving. Hasbro-WotC wants independent publishers to cease to be part of this.

 

[Krachek]

I guess that OneDnD will look like what we have seen in the first playtest.
Roughly the same power level but more cool to play.
That mean that older adventure, monsters will still be fine.

Will they update the CC SRD with for OneDnD? I guess yes.
Updating the life cleric of the actual SRD with a one similar to the playtest is not a commercial threat. there is no secret to hide updating the guidance spell for a better version.

 

[mamba]

Sort of. We've been told that we can play the 2014 PCs along side the 2024 characters. The rules for 2014 characters can't change for that to be true. That means that there will be conflicts between the rules for 2014 characters and the ones for 2024 characters. They won't be compatible.

the 2014 rules are not changing, the 2024 rules simply are different. I consider compatibility more that the 5e adventures still work the same for 1DD chars (and vice versa), which means they chars must be relatively compatible in power they have per level, at least to about the degree that is true today.

I am not actually expecting 2014 and 2024 chars to be in the same game but if the above holds true, then that too should work, even if two level 8 clerics are different from each other.

Your definition / interpretation of compatibility is much more strict than WotC can have intended. Yours basically means no two versions can be compatible, they can only release another Tasha’s for 5e if they want to maintain compatibility.

 

[mamba]

When 5e came out, a 5e SRD also came out.

There will not be a 2024e SRD. (At least that is the intention, barring actual math or structural incompatibility.)

yes, but then no new SRD is needed in the first place

The official Wizard will evolve. The 5e SRD Wizard will be left behind.

that happened with Xanathar and Tasha too, so I would not be surprised if this trend continues

 

[SteveC]

The target audience for D&D products is aged 12-24. They don't particularly need you or I to buy anything.

If people keep playing D&D, then more new players will eventually buy in. If the 2014 PHB is out of print, bit the 2024 is in print and compatible, that's what they will buy.

And, yeah, a lot of us will buy it for new art and book loving as much as new rules.

I guess I just have to disagree with this. What you're talking about seems like a minor blip in sales and then back to the same place the game was at. And that's not bad, Amazon tells me that they're selling a lot of 5E PHBs at this point, so they can stick to that formula. But ... there's an expectation that the game is going to expand, explode, break out ... get even bigger. Doing that with a game that's pretty much the same as the edition that will be about 10 years old at this point doesn't seem likely to generate that boost. WotC needs people like me and other veterans if they want the game to really take off at launch.

I do think you're right about the art and production: that will be a draw for some veteran players, to be sure. I just can't believe that is going to be the central selling point for the new game. I'm sure that nostalgia will be a factor too.

No one really knows what WotC is going to do, and their plans may have really changed recently. I'm just betting on 6E being something significantly different to lock other publishers out if nothing else.

I'm playing a 5E game now, we did session two of Dragon Heist and I'm already seeing why I prefer other companies takes on the 5E rules set: we have a player with difficulty with the Second Wind mechanic for their fighter, and spell casters who can't wait to get enough spells to not be using cantrips for much of the adventuring day. So we're finding the game simultaneously too complex and not complex enough. Can 6E address this? Don't know.

 

[Parmandur]

Sort of. We've been told that we can play the 2014 PCs along side the 2024 characters. The rules for 2014 characters can't change for that to be true. That means that there will be conflicts between the rules for 2014 characters and the ones for 2024 characters. They won't be compatible. For the other rules, you can replace them with new rules and if they work seamlessly then compatibility is preserved.

The problem is their promise of backwards compatibility with characters. It inherently creates incompatibility. If they just updated the edition to 5.5 and went on with things... No 2014 and 2024 clerics in the same group. Just 2024 clerics.

Yet we have actual play reports in this thread of there being no compatability problems in practice when mixing and matching.

 

[payn]

Because there's a lot of other 5e out there, and WotC is demonstrably not the most quality stuff. Given the recent crisis, I would think that now is the best opportunity to give 3pps the attention they deserve.

Id like to learn. Mind starting some threads of your own on the subject?