D&D 5E The difference between the internal and public playtest *pure speculation*

[Gundark]

I have an acquaintance who was given the first internal packet back around the beginning of 2012, there was talk around doing internal playtesting and I was going to be a part of that. It never materialised, but I was given access to the first packet (I think it was labeled version 1.0 or something like that). It included character creation, feats, levels until 10 (if memory serves), and special rules for weapons (meaningful differences between taking a dagger vs. a short sword for example). Sure it was rough, but there were some interesting ideas in there.

Then I got my hands on the first public playtest and saw that it was very “safe”, no character creation, no feats, no special rules for weapons, really boring to be honest. We were given a pretty small sandbox to play in, a big contrast to what I had seen in the internal packet.

We’ve seen glimpses of cool stuff (Warlock, Sorcerer, Gladiator build for the fighter) but for the most part I’m thinking that we really just got these very
…well “safe” releases. There isn’t really anything in there that will shake the apple cart.

I suspect that WotC is testing interesting ideas, and cool stuff. I suspect that this is internal though, in fact I’d wager the internal play testing is way more interesting than what we’ve gotten as a public. I suspect that the finished product will contain this stuff, or we’ll see sourcebooks that have this stuff shortly after release.

The question is why? Why wouldn’t you give us the interesting stuff to test? I suspect it’s due to the fact that these ideas are in flux, and they are very concerned about how we perceive 5e. Notice that they use words like “iteration” instead of “edition”, “next” instead of “5th”. The public playtest could have gone nutty if they didn’t keep it safe (WHAT?! THAT DOESN”T FEEL LIKE D&D). Keeping it safe means that they’ve had people go “meh!” over the 5th ed. My guess is they have done a cost analysis and figured that they’ll lose less people this way then they would it they had ideas that people thought was crazy (and maybe even easier to get backl).

Thoughts?

 

[Dausuul]

The question is why? Why wouldn’t you give us the interesting stuff to test? I suspect it’s due to the fact that these ideas are in flux, and they are very concerned about how we perceive 5e. Notice that they use words like “iteration” instead of “edition”, “next” instead of “5th”. The public playtest could have gone nutty if they didn’t keep it safe (WHAT?! THAT DOESN”T FEEL LIKE D&D). Keeping it safe means that they’ve had people go “meh!” over the 5th ed. My guess is they have done a cost analysis and figured that they’ll lose less people this way then they would it they had ideas that people thought was crazy (and maybe even easier to get backl).

Thoughts?

I agree that part of it is public perception. The system has to be brought up to a certain level of polish before showing it to the public, or the screams of "5E SUCKS!" will be deafening.

But I think another, larger part is the sheer time investment required for each iteration of the public playtest. The open playtest is not the place for trying out crazy experimental mechanics, because crazy experimental mechanics often turn out to be broken and unworkable, and you don't want to waste time on them if they are. So you put them through the internal playtest first, giving you rapid feedback which you can quickly adjust to. (For similar reasons, you can't really fine-tune balance through an open playtest--responses are too slow and iterations too few.)

The benefit of the open playtest is allowing WotC to judge community response and set the general direction of the game.