D&D General Ultimate D&D Post 5E

[Lanefan]

Only if you force Encumbrance or add more STR skills

Edit: but that's what your list says.

.

Things can't be STRorDEX unless you nerf DEX or buff STR.

Nerf Dex. Give melee to Strength only (Dex can keep ranged). No more weapon finesse, ever*. No more initiative modifiers, ever*.

* - effects of rare-expensive-powerful magic items excepted.

 

[Minigiant]

Edit: but that's what your list says.

Nerf Dex. Give melee to Strength only (Dex can keep ranged). No more weapon finesse, ever*. No more initiative modifiers, ever*.

* - effects of rare-expensive-powerful magic items excepted.

I'd keep finesse but cut it down to daggers, rapiers, scimatars, and whips.

But the blades need a Fighting style.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So assume you are designing your own D&D or someone else will.

What would you take from 5E to build your personal D&D?

Side Trek. Anything you would tweak. Eg skill system but more skills, bounded accuracy but +10 over 20 levels.

What if anything would you take and possibly blend with other editions.

I would add a long-term injury system to Level Up. Otherwise I'm pretty darn happy with it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Ability Score wise I'd combine the features of all 5 editions in some ways

• STRENGTH
  • All Melee Weapon Attacks would be Strength based
  • Thrown Weapon that are also Heavy can use Strength for Ranged Weapon Attacks (5E)
• DEXTERITY
  • All Melee Weapon Attacks would be Dexterity based
  • Finesse Weapon that are also Light can use Dexterity for Melee Weapon Attacks (5E)
  • The "Weapon Finesse" Fighting Style/Feat can also Dexterity Melee Weapon Attacks with nonLight Finesse Weapons (3E)
• CONSTITUTION
  • Get a bonus HD equal to your Con modifier (4E)
  • Add your Con Mod to any HD rolled on short rest (5E)
• INTELLIGENCE
  • Gain/Lose bonus Skills equal to Int mod (3E)
  • Gain bonus languages equal to Int mod (1E)
  • Gain/Lose bonus vs Illusions spells (2E?)
• WISDOM
  • Gain/Lose bonus vs Mind Altering spells (2E?)
• CHARISMA
  • Number of Permanent Henchmen/Familiars/Companions (1E)
  • Group Reaction roll (1E)

Yup if you have 8 Charisma, your familiar stops listening to you due to your 0 Henchmen base. You now need to cast find familiar on the familiar to charm it. Too bad. Too sad. You can't keep you foot out your mouth.

I love the group reaction roll. I'm bringing that back too!

 

[payn]

Agree on the skill system - it seems to broad. I think I would change History to Lore, and then have some sort of way to specialize in a subset of a skill. The broad skills would still be useful to everyone, but true specialists could stand out (for example, a sage specializing in Lore (History) versus a wizard's general Lore skill). I think I would add Melee and Ranged as a skill (with the ability for martials to get specialization and/or expertise), and have spellcasters use Arcana, Religion or Nature for their spellcasting attack rolls (and maybe saves?).

I would carry over subclasses, but certainly would tweak them here or there. Redo the monk class from the ground up, add in a psionic (& possibly a psion/martial) class and a fighter/mage base class.

For me, the big thing would be Cantrips. I want the casters to keep some general effects and combat spells, but get rid of the ability to infinitely spam them (though likely to move Eldritch Blast to a class ability and not a cantrip, but still give some sort of usage limit). Guidance abuse needs to go, for sure.

You know, I really didnt think I would like spammable cantrips that scale. However, with the scaled back amount of slots in 5E, I find it works out great. You got your magic pew pew cannons, and players started taking more interesting utility spells. Since they are limited it wasnt really a problem. I did not expect to be saying that right now, but there you go.