Uniting the Editions, Part 2 Up!

[Saracenus]

LINK: Dungeons & Dragons Roleplaying Game Official Home Page - Article (Uniting the Editions, Part 2)

Monte talks more about how both players and DMs have responsibilities over various dials to the game.

He also talks about how the next year is going to be an exploration of how we get to the design goals because he and the design team do not have all the answers yet.

He also makes it clear D&D Next will not be a bridge between editions (you can't play 1e characters with 3e PCs) but will be able to emulate your edition preference. Heck you can even create your own preference by mixing and matching various modules.

 

[Kynn]

Monte wrote:

Some choices then—such as whether a character has a long list of skills and feats; or skills, feats, and powers; or just ability scores, hit points, Armor Class, and an attack bonus—are up to the player.

So I'm trying to envision this as pertains to skill checks, and I'm finding it a little odd. Let's say we have the following:

* Player T, who has a long list of skills and feats (a la third edition).
* Player F, who has a short list of skills, feats, and utility powers (fourth edition).
* Player B, who just has ability scores and AC (original D&D).

They come up to several obstacles, including a stuck door (that DC 13 door that showed up before) and a chasm that can be crossed with a rope, like Luke and Leia in Star Wars. They decide to cross the chasm first.

Does player B make an ability check to swing across, player F make an Athletics check, and player T make a Rope Use check?

What if they're not trained in any of these, is it worse than a simple ability check? Do they all use the same DC? Is player B going to be hosed because he's using a less complicated system and doesn't get a "+3 for trained" bonus? Is player T hosed cuz he chose "Rope Use" but didn't invest enough points in "Swing" skill also?

This kind of decision -- what granularity is right on skills for the game -- seems to fall more into a DM's decision about what the campaign will be like than it does the choice of individual players. But Monte presents it as a player choice that the DM doesn't need to worry about. That doesn't seem 100% right to me, anyone else feeling dubious about that?

 

[Keefe the Thief]

They've set themself a couple of hard-to accomplish aims, but as an interested DM and playtester, i think this will be a journey worthy undertaking, both for them and for us.

 

[Traken]

That doesn't seem 100% right to me, anyone else feeling dubious about that?

I've been dubious about it the entire time but it might get better when we see it in action.

What might end up happening is that the DM will have to judge each character by different standards. The pure ability-score player gets by because he has a high ability and rolled decently. The athletics and use rope players get by because they beat the DC.

I hope this isn't the case because DM's already have enough on their plate but it is a possible solution.

 

[Keefe the Thief]

Monte wrote:


So I'm trying to envision this as pertains to skill checks, and I'm finding it a little odd. Let's say we have the following:

* Player T, who has a long list of skills and feats (a la third edition).
* Player F, who has a short list of skills, feats, and utility powers (fourth edition).
* Player B, who just has ability scores and AC (original D&D).

They come up to several obstacles, including a stuck door (that DC 13 door that showed up before) and a chasm that can be crossed with a rope, like Luke and Leia in Star Wars. They decide to cross the chasm first.

Does player B make an ability check to swing across, player F make an Athletics check, and player T make a Rope Use check?

What if they're not trained in any of these, is it worse than a simple ability check? Do they all use the same DC? Is player B going to be hosed because he's using a less complicated system and doesn't get a "+3 for trained" bonus? Is player T hosed cuz he chose "Rope Use" but didn't invest enough points in "Swing" skill also?

This kind of decision -- what granularity is right on skills for the game -- seems to fall more into a DM's decision about what the campaign will be like than it does the choice of individual players. But Monte presents it as a player choice that the DM doesn't need to worry about. That doesn't seem 100% right to me, anyone else feeling dubious about that?

I think what Monte means is that they'll try to build the system in a way that players could choose different ways of building their char without wrecking the game. In the end that will look more than the Slayer / Fighter - split in 4e. Which means: if the DM allows all these choices, the players can then choose what they want.

Or to rephrase it: to take characters of radically different complexity, the DM has to say at first "we are using modules a, b, c, and you can mix'n'match your chars".

 

[Kynn]

I think what Monte means is that they'll try to build the system in a way that players could choose different ways of building their char without wrecking the game. In the end that will look more than the Slayer / Fighter - split in 4e. Which means: if the DM allows all these choices, the players can then choose what they want.

Or to rephrase it: to take characters of radically different complexity, the DM has to say at first "we are using modules a, b, c, and you can mix'n'match your chars".

What YOU say makes the most sense, but it's not at all what Monte said.

 

[The Shadow]

I'm getting a little annoyed by these very uninformative Legends & Lore articles ever since the announcement was made. I feel I just read this one and know almost nothing I didn't know before. Why can't they let some of the details slip? We're going to be playtesting soon, or at least I hope we will!

 

[Traken]

I'm getting a little annoyed by these very uninformative Legends & Lore articles ever since the announcement was made. I feel I just read this one and know almost nothing I didn't know before. Why can't they let some of the details slip? We're going to be playtesting soon, or at least I hope we will!

It will keep being this way until the playtest actually arrives. Right now, they are just buttering us up with what they hope the next edition will achieve. That way, when the playtest does start, you won't have everyone going "this is completely bonkers!" because they didn't have any idea what they were aiming for.

I think the more telling thing in these articles are the polls. Not only how people are responding but which questions they are asking. So far, they seem to be asking the right ones.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Maybe the figure if they build enough buzz and aniticipation, they'll get such enthusiastic buy-in that no one will notice that they don't deliver?

I can't imagine that's ever happened, but we nerds are funny customers...

 

[Kynn]

I'm getting a little annoyed by these very uninformative Legends & Lore articles ever since the announcement was made. I feel I just read this one and know almost nothing I didn't know before. Why can't they let some of the details slip? We're going to be playtesting soon, or at least I hope we will!

Yeah, I think they're heading for a bit of a PR disaster by announcing this early (with press release and NY Times interviews and so on) and then not offering up anything for the masses to chew on.

(Their "select bloggers get details on this but are under NDA" strategy also seems a poor choice from a PR perspective.)