D&D 3E/3.5 The DMG: A CRITICAL HIT at 93.5%!

The 5th Edition Dungeon Master's Guide is still pulling in rave reviews, and is trending at 93.5%. io9 says its "like a Hacker's Manual for D&D", and Geekdad reports that "this 5e ruleset has completely won me back!" There are dissenters, of course - 5 Minute Workday feels its "a whole lot of appetizers but no real main course" - but these are outweighed by reviews from the likes of boingboing who called it "gorgeous, evocative, hefty, organized, and readable".

So, clearly the Dungeon Master's Guide has garnered critical praise. You can look at the list of critical reviews from outlets around the web. The critics have given it an aggregate score of 85%; but fans have shown more support and weigh in with a whopping 93.5%!

Fun with stats: D&D 5th Edition Dungeon Master's Guide is ranked #3 out of 24 products with 10 or more reviews, placing it in the 92% percentile. It is rated 15.1 points higher than the overall average product rating of 78.4%. With 43 reviews, this is the #3 most reviewed product.

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[Windjammer]

I think there is a lot of desperation involved of wanting 5E to be good. Also historically Enworld has always been "very enthusiastic" about new D&D editions. And, marketing from WotC went into overdrive and convinced their customers that vague and incomplete rules are a good thing. So the requirements for a book to be perceived as good are now a lot lower.

There is absolutely no desperation in this thread. None whatsoever!

On the definition of dissent/er, Monty Pythons Life of Brian captures it best, in my opinion:

Brian: You are aaaaallll individuals.
Crowd (as one): We are aaaaallll individuals.
Squeaky lone voice in the back: No, I'm not.

That review on 5mwg comes off like that squeaky voice in the back, and I'm sure with the onset of time its evenhanded, articulate content will be linked to when others have been forgotten.

Personally, I'm curious to see how the 5.0 DMG will be regarded in a year or two.

 

[weldon]

I think the promise of a "hacker's guide" is a bit overstated. The only direct reference I can find is this interview…

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/art...the-New-Dungeons-Dragons-With-Designer-Mike.4

Mearls: []…So it's really for getting under the hood of how the system works and building up your campaign.

Bolding: So really, besides maybe Unearthed Arcana, there's never really been a hacker's guide, as it were, for D&D.

Mearls: No, exactly. And that's what we were inspired by. People like to tinker with their campaigns, and especially if you've been DMing for a while and you kind of want to do something different. Really going into in-depth [changes]. And now, it's not going to be deconstructing everything, but it's giving you the tools you need to make your own changes…[]​

It's a lot different (IMHO) for Mearls to say that they were inspired by the idea of a hacker's guide than to say that they are promising a hacker's guide. Maybe I'm missing other statements elsewhere?

 

[weldon]

Indeed. I've been wondering about weighting reviews by time, making more recent reviews weigh more.

I don't know that I would give more recent reviews a different weighting, but it might be interesting to show the current trend (up or down) or a trendline over time.

 

[Windjammer]

It's hard to look back at the PR speak from ca 2 years ago and not think that an awful lot ended up on the cutting floor. For good or ill, the DMG was announced as the one core book that would carry the majority of those promises, and it simply doesn't. Look for instance at this discussion slot where full on modularity and a fully fledged combat maneuver system you can slot into 5e core were repeatedly sold to us as what will make this edition stand out in D&D's logical "progression":

http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/v2cu5/ama_mike_mearls_head_of_dd_research_and_design_at/

E.g:

"I think that as the game takes shape, the breadth of mechanical options for DMs will make this game stand out as the next step in D&D's progression.
This is the first time that we're building D&D from the bottom up to account for house rules and expansion. The simple rules we've shown off so far are about as complex as we want the core. I want the game to be easy to understand not just from the POV of learning how to play, but also in terms of understanding how all the parts work together.
Once you understand that, you can much more easily house rule, add rules modules, tinker with things, and otherwise make the game yours. Really, our goal isn't to make everyone happy by making a game. It's to make a range of options that any individual DM can modify and reconfigure to make the specific type of D&D they always wanted and that no other edition was able to exactly deliver."

However, if I look at 3.5's Unearthed Arcana, or 4e's DMG 2 (inherent bonuses; or 4.5's underscoring of how ritual magic was an easily extractable module), then the 17 pages in the 5.0 DMG look like a poor man's substitute for modularity, rather than what - quote, unquote - "no other edition" was previously "able to deliver". It's just presently unclear what, if anyhing, has been delivered to match the promises explicitly made for his game in 2012.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Seems to me the promised modularity is this...

With the exception of a couple specific modules that are larger (like the chase rules for example)... almost all of the rest are variants and and options that are so simple and obvious that many of them had already been bandied about by people here on the boards for months now. We've already come up with most of the variants and options on our own... or else can look at the ones they've given us and they make us say "Yeah, that makes sense, that's probably what I would have done."

Which means the real point is... anything we come up with here on these boards are just as valid and balanced as anything WotC can offer us. We don't NEED WotC to give us all these variants and options, because what they'd give us would be pretty much in line with what we are already coming up with.

Now yes... I know we all have this niggling little feeling in the backs of our minds that makes us feel like we HAVE to have "official rules" written down for us so that we can play the game "the right way" and play it "Ruled As Written"... but that kinda goes against the entire philosophy of the design of 5E in the first place. The game was written so basic and simple to begin with so that any of us *could* create our own rules and modularity and have it fall within acceptable levels of balance and detail. Creating a new race or sub-race isn't that difficult if you pay attention. Creating a new sub-class isn't that difficult if you pay attention. Creating new monsters, realms, planes and game rules aren't that difficult if you pay attention, because the game itself was built so that this would be the case.

Does the DMG have less variants and options than perhaps we thought might appear? Quite possibly. But are the ones they did give us hands-down better than the ones we've already created for ourselves here on ENWorld already? Not a chance. So if the couple healing variants the DMG did give us don't float your boat... you can easily just swap in any of the other seventeen versions we have also already created and know that it's pretty much just as worthwhile, even though it wasn't published in a book. And I can speak from experience on this. My campaign has a Shade PC that is a Dark pact warlock (both of which I created myself before I even had the DMG) and there has not been a single time that it's felt anything but a natural part of the game.

The options WotC gave us in the DMG are good. Just as good as the stuff you can get in the Downloads section here on ENWorld. So if you can't find what you want in the one... take a look at the other and know that it all works, and feel comfortable in that knowledge even if it doesn't have WotC's logo on the front.

 

[Reynard]

E.g:

"I think that as the game takes shape, the breadth of mechanical options for DMs will make this game stand out as the next step in D&D's progression.
This is the first time that we're building D&D from the bottom up to account for house rules and expansion. The simple rules we've shown off so far are about as complex as we want the core. I want the game to be easy to understand not just from the POV of learning how to play, but also in terms of understanding how all the parts work together.
Once you understand that, you can much more easily house rule, add rules modules, tinker with things, and otherwise make the game yours. Really, our goal isn't to make everyone happy by making a game. It's to make a range of options that any individual DM can modify and reconfigure to make the specific type of D&D they always wanted and that no other edition was able to exactly deliver."

However, if I look at 3.5's Unearthed Arcana, or 4e's DMG 2 (inherent bonuses; or 4.5's underscoring of how ritual magic was an easily extractable module), then the 17 pages in the 5.0 DMG look like a poor man's substitute for modularity, rather than what - quote, unquote - "no other edition" was previously "able to deliver". It's just presently unclear what, if anyhing, has been delivered to match the promises explicitly made for his game in 2012.

It is explicitly stated in the quote you included above that the core was to be simple and that the intent was to design a game the DM was free to house rule, not that the DMG was supposed to give you every option in one book. I don't understand how "this game is modular by design" turned into "every possible modular rule set will be in the DMG."

 

[Argyle King]

I wanted to add to my previous thoughts...

In no way do I feel the DMG is bad. I simply don't feel it deserves the 90+ rating. It does have some good information, but I didn't find anything mindblowing within the contents of the book. I think the DMG offers a good toe-dip into the pool of a lot of different subjects, and that will likely encourage people new to DMing to think about those subjects more, but there aren't many of those subjects in the DMG that I feel were covered exceptionally well. The DMG does the job it is supposed to do, but -for me personally- if I compare it to other DM-centric books I have, it doesn't stand out. That's not in any way saying it's bad; there are actually some things I do really like about the 5th Edition DMG, but I came away from it feeling it was average or adequate; not exceptional. Of the three core books I currently have for 5th Edition, I'd say it's the least exciting of the three books.

As for modularity, there are options offered. Some of those options are things I like, but, overall, the level of modularity is a bit more shallow than I'd personally like. The amount of options wasn't my issue; it was the lack of depth from the presented options. I'd like 5th Edition to feel like it has a little more depth. I don't feel that is currently provided. I'm hopeful that future products will offer that; I somewhat suspect they will. However, right now, looking at only the products I have, it feels average, and the DMG embodies that. I loved the PHB; I liked the MM1 a lot; the DMG feels average to me, so that's the rating I gave. Some specific sections of it were things I really liked, but, as a whole product, I felt it was average. The information is good, and I like things about it, but there's not something among the pages which strikes me as being a 90+ rating.

 

[Mistwell]

However, if I look at 3.5's Unearthed Arcana, or 4e's DMG 2 (inherent bonuses; or 4.5's underscoring of how ritual magic was an easily extractable module), then the 17 pages in the 5.0 DMG look like a poor man's substitute for modularity, rather than what - quote, unquote - "no other edition" was previously "able to deliver". It's just presently unclear what, if anyhing, has been delivered to match the promises explicitly made for his game in 2012.

It's WAY WAY WAY more than 17 pages. Are you going off the index and making assumptions, or have you looked at the DMG and done an actual page count on the pages with options? Because the later totals a whole heck of a lot more than 17 pages.

 

[Reynard]

As for modularity, there are options offered. Some of those options are things I like, but, overall, the level of modularity is a bit more shallow than I'd personally like. The amount of options wasn't my issue; it was the lack of depth from the presented options. I'd like 5th Edition to feel like it has a little more depth. I don't feel that is currently provided. I'm hopeful that future products will offer that; I somewhat suspect they will.

I feel like what you are really looking for is granularity and mechanical complexity when you use the word "depth" and I don't think that is the design intent behind 5E. It seems, based on the three core books, that they are aiming more for versatility via broadly defined rules and a few key core mechanics. This is exactly what I am looking for in D&D, since if I want granularity and complexity I have Pathfinder for that.

 

[Argyle King]

I feel like what you are really looking for is granularity and mechanical complexity when you use the word "depth" and I don't think that is the design intent behind 5E. It seems, based on the three core books, that they are aiming more for versatility via broadly defined rules and a few key core mechanics. This is exactly what I am looking for in D&D, since if I want granularity and complexity I have Pathfinder for that.

I'd say granularity is probably a good word to use. I would like some of the modules to provide more of it. I like that 5E can be simple and be set up in a relatively casual manner without much prep, but, for a home campaign, I'd like a bit more substance to keep me interested. The modules -while good- are currently so broad that I'm not sure they really add the substance I'm looking for. (Though I will say that I was pleasantly surprised by the lasting injuries option.)

Unfortunately, Pathfinder isn't what I want either. While I also enjoy that game (and honestly believe it did improve upon 3rd Edition,) it still contains a lot of the things that bothered me about 3rd. Most notably, there is too much of a gap between levels. I also vastly prefer the encounter design mentality behind something like D&D 4th Edition in that there should be a lot of moving parts during an encounter as opposed to one or two creatures against the party. I had hoped that the "bounded accuracy" and "modularity" of 5th Edition would combine to provide a game closer to what I want. However, while I am capable of enjoying the game, neither the bounded accuracy nor the modularity have produced results I was looking for. That is part of why I think the DMG fell short for me; it was a good book, but it didn't add (for me personally) anything to the game; also, even with more in depth encounter design guidelines, I still don't have a good feel for what kind of game 5th is trying to be.