Uniting the Editions, Part 2 Up!

[triqui]

5. The Advanced character add her Dex modifier plus Athetics skill ranks which are gained at some rate, plus feat bonuses plus maybe some skill synergy bonuses, plus racial modifiers etc. Put together, her bonus is most likely higher than the previous two characters, but not significantly so and she's probably slightly lagging behind them in other areas because of customisation/specialisation.

What if it goes like Mutant and Masterminds, where maximum bonus is capped by level? For example: at level 4, your maximum bonus is, say, 7. So no matter of what, you can't add more than 7. Even if you have a ton of customization, this will put you in the same league as everyone else.

 

[BryonD]

I'm significantly concerned they will try to make a game that is capable of pleasing everyone and ends up being none of the above.

I'm significantly excitied that they may make the ultimate tool kit for giving everyone the perfect game just for them that never would have otherwise been published.

 

[BluSponge]

Does it? Because what you've described is a house rule, not a feature of the system itself. To me, house rules are what you implement when the system isn't able to give you what you want on its own.

In other words, what you're describing is a patch to a break in the system, not a feature of the system.

It depends entirely on your view of the game. The developers can't, and shouldn't, cater to every single niche. Prior to 3e, D&D was a hobby game. It wasn't expected to be complete. Rather, part of your job, as DM, was to mold the game to fit the needs of your campaign. You didn't have 500+ classes in Dragon because the ame was broken and needed patching, but because it was part o the fun - part of the hobby. You (the DM) created stuff. You didn't sit around and wait for some rules supplement from on high to give you the tweak you needed for everything to fall into place. You did it yourself.

Now, I understand how and why that sentiment has changed since 3e. But if it's as modular as promised, 5e has a very real potential to bring this back into vogue. And what I'm talking about here is a very minor tweak on the feat system, which should be easy to do in a truly modular system.

Tom

 

[pauljathome]

What stood out for me from the article was this "Six ability scores ranging from 3 to 18" and what is applies to, character generation only or level progression?

What struck me about this quote is how WRONG it is .

In both 3rd and 4th edition point buy is the norm and abilities range from about 5 or 6 or so at the low end to 20 at the high end (after Racial Adjustments).

And thats just for starting characters. At higher levels stats in the mid to high 20's are common.

Heck, even in AD&D Strength ranged up to 18(00) for a starting character .

I disagreed with pretty much ALL of his examples of what D&D "is".

 

[pauljathome]

What if it goes like Mutant and Masterminds, where maximum bonus is capped by level? For example: at level 4, your maximum bonus is, say, 7. So no matter of what, you can't add more than 7. Even if you have a ton of customization, this will put you in the same league as everyone else.

Abe and Bob are both playing dextrous rogues with a Dex of 17.

Abe goes old school. No skills. He gets a +2 to roguey stuff for being a rogue.

Bob wants to really emphasize his Stealth, even at the cost of his Escape Artist skill being lower. He wants to be the sneakiest darn rogue ever not seen.

To sneak up on a particular somebody Abe needs to roll a 15.

To escape from some particular manacles Abe needs to roll a 15.

Bob presumably needs to roll significantly less than 15 to sneak up and significantly more to escape from the manacles or Bob is going to be unhappy (he WANTS his character to be REALLY good at sneaking).

It turns out that there are a LOT more opportunities to sneak up on people than to escape from manacles. So Abe notices that his character sucks.

That is the circle that has to be squared.

The only ways that I can see this working are
1) Keep the differences so small that they don't actually matter. That might actually work for many players. Its sort of what 4th Ed did (there tends to be huge efforts to get an extra +1 in all sorts of cases where it really doesn't matter that much)
2) Try and determine how much more valuable Stealth is than Escape Artist. So, for example, every 3 pts you lower your Escape Artist gives you a +1 to Stealth.

 

[Kynn]

It turns out that there are a LOT more opportunities to sneak up on people than to escape from manacles. So Abe notices that his character sucks.

That is the circle that has to be squared.

One possible solution is that Abe, noticing that Bob is a lot better than him, asks Bob how he did it and Bob teaches Abe how to use the Skills Have Ranks module. Abe gets permission from the DM and between adventures, converts his character over to the more complex, but more sneaky, rules set.

 

[Saracenus]

What struck me about this quote is how WRONG it is .

In both 3rd and 4th edition point buy is the norm and abilities range from about 5 or 6 or so at the low end to 20 at the high end (after Racial Adjustments).

And thats just for starting characters. At higher levels stats in the mid to high 20's are common.

Heck, even in AD&D Strength ranged up to 18(00) for a starting character .

I disagreed with pretty much ALL of his examples of what D&D "is".

You are conflating how you generate the ability score with range of scores associated with said ability score.

True, if your experience is primarily 3e and 4e the bottom half of the 3-18 bell curve was not super visible to the players, but you will notice the tables for those ability scores don't start at 6 and go up.

Further, they are looking at the entire history of the game which is over 30 years and 3e and 4e encompass, what, A third of that?

I have played pretty much every version of D&D there is (discounting the multiple versions of the basic set in the TSR days) and I see what they are trying to do. They are distilling the core essence of what D&D is in the base rule set.

By focusing on what D&D is over the breadth and depth of its existence they are trying to make a tight yet flexible foundation that we can then build off of with "official" modular add-ons, possibly 3rd party add-ons, and in likelihood our own add-ons.

Sure, the 3-18 range for ability scores may not be your current experience in D&D, but will it impede your ability to play the character you want? If the math for the new system provides a near identical play experience for 4e but has an upper limit on the ability scores of 18 + racial mods and any magic you does that kill the fun in your game?

Is the high number of the ability score more important than what you can do with that ability score?

I ask these questions because Monte did not promise that you will be able to play 4e or 3e or 1e with D&D Next, he said you can emulate it by adding or subtracting modular rules.

Basically WotC is trying to teach you to look beyond the surface of the game you are playing now and examine the core experience of your game. All the rest is fiddly bits.

My Two Coppers,

 

[Crazy Jerome]

2) Try and determine how much more valuable Stealth is than Escape Artist. So, for example, every 3 pts you lower your Escape Artist gives you a +1 to Stealth.

Alternately, develop mechanics, rules, and guidelines to put this determination in the hands of the people at the table and/or adjust it mid-campaign as it proves to be a problem.

I can think of several ways. One of the most obvious is to build a feedback mechanism into the "skill" structure so that those getting less play out of their choices get more picks, sooner.

 

[gyor]

The only way I can see a 1e style character being balanced with a 3e, 2e, and 1e character is by using character points. Certain features cost certain points and a character that doesn't want any of these features spends those points on something basic, like a pool of bonus dice or something or an extra +1 to something. And you get.more points as you level.

 

[RoboCheney]

I still don't get the need for a scaling complexity level within each character. 3rd edition is a fairly complex rules system (see number of skills, feat prereqs, number of modifier types, size of stat blocks), but that was also the golden years for D&D and sales were great. Complexity was not really a problem.

4e cleaned up a lot of those mechanics, and I think there's a lot more that could be done to streamline the game further (a smaller number of feats that are more important, less small / circumstantial bonuses, less powers that are more distinct). You could design a cleaner, simpler version of D&D that was easy to pick up and didn't sacrifice any customization. Just how many players actively dislike picking out abilities for their characters, anyhow?

And having different styles of skill systems and whatnot existing in parallel within the same game only makes the core system more complex and confusing. Why should two character each use a different set of rules if they want to, say, climb a wall?

So really, I don't get it.