Mistwell
Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)
Hey guys, I haven't posted in years because I've been away from D&D. I've done some private writing about D&D to understand why I don't like it anymore, and I'm curious what peoples' thoughts on these cultural elements I've identified are. If I'm alone or if there are actually some subcultures that I might find I agree with (and actually start playing D&D again, since 5E rules look playable to me).
Before I go into them though I want to ask if you think I should pose them all for discussion in one thread (this one). Or make a separate thread for each since they can be pretty big topics on their own. They are:
Rules "balance" and rules lawyering
The importance for rules to "realistically" portray what "could happen" in a given situation
The concept of speccing and character builds in D&D
Those are the things that have been keeping me away from modern editions of D&D and I want to see what thoughts different folks in the community have about them. Thanks.
I would say all three of those things were directly addressed in this newest edition (5e). The new rules take a big step away from all three of those ideas, and put a lot more into the idea of story, and the rules being there for the DM to use as an adaptable toolset more than a bible for players. It also made the rules more simple (which reduces "realism" to aid ease of play), and made things like multiclassing less appealing (moving some better abilities further down to level three, requiring some ability score prerequisites for multiclassing, not stacking additional attacks, etc..).