D&D 5E Volo's 5e vs Tasha's 5e where do you see 5e heading?

[Yaarel]

On a related issue, @Minigiant.

I strongly prefer Theater of Mind style.

Therefore I find small differences in distance to be less helpful, even counterproductive.

I normally handwaive all distances to: 3 (melee), 10 (reach), 30 (move, throw), 100 (most spells), 300 (bow shot).

If you are using grid style, are these units of distance tolerable to you?

 

[Minigiant]

While my challenges are mainly humanoid, they and the party include many spellcasters. I dont feel your pain, but I understand how it could be repetitive if the challenges were mainly humanoid and nonmagical.

When I DM, I try to make the game world as close to the explanation of it so players can make logical and educated guesses.

So an enemy force who is primitive and values might would not have many spellcasters or complex tamed monsters. The orc raiding party, scout troop, or advance party won't have a bunch of shaman and chained giants. And even if they take over a ruined fort, 95%+ of the troops would not be casters.

 

[Minigiant]

On a related issue, @Minigiant.

I strongly prefer Theater of Mind style.

Therefore I find small differences in distance to be less helpful, even counterproductive.

I normally handwaive all distances to: 3 (melee), 10 (reach), 30 (move, throw), 100 (most spells), 300 (bow shot).

If you are using grid style, are these units of distance tolerable to you?

I mostly use theatre of the mind. I use the same distances as you. Minis only come out for boss fights and special encounters.

You can have heavily tactical games without a grid and minis.

 

[Yaarel]

When I DM, I try to make the game world as close to the explanation of it so players can make logical and educated guesses.

So an enemy force who is primitive and values might would not have many spellcasters or complex tamed monsters. The orc raiding party, scout troop, or advance party won't have a bunch of shaman and chained giants. And even if they take over a ruined fort, 95%+ of the troops would not be casters.

Heh, in my campaign, the "primitive" cultures are normally animistic, thus highly magical.

But yeah, I normally play Orcs as strictly nonmagical. (And I play Goblins as fey and highly magical.)

 

[Yaarel]

I mostly use theatre of the mind. I use the same distances as you. Minis only come out for boss fights and special encounters.

You can have heavily tactical games without a grid and minis.

Good! I actually feel relief from this.

As long as "tactical" doesnt bog me down with microdistances of slide, I can get more enthusiastic about helping a tactical module become a practicable option.

 

[tetrasodium]

On a related issue, @Minigiant.

I strongly prefer Theater of Mind style.

Therefore I find small differences in distance to be less helpful, even counterproductive.

I normally handwaive all distances to: 3 (melee), 10 (reach), 30 (move, throw), 100 (most spells), 300 (bow shot).

If you are using grid style, are these units of distance tolerable to you?

They are just as bad if not worse in a grid. Usually each square is 5 or 10 feet, anything nor a multiple of those needs to round up or down or an ability needs to be adjusted. If there are extreme variances it can further complicate things. For example, I mentioned anime5e being problematic wrt grid combat. Lots of races have one of two or one of one movement speed at 120 100 90 30 15 or.... four* while melee & short reach weapon ranges tend to be 5 10-20ft. ranged weapons are an area I haven't really got into yet in the couple hours I've had it.

That might sound bad, but I've had groups with multiple spell snipe+eldritch lance & sharpshooteer longbow users wanting to attack from max range from different directions while rogue or rogue tabaxi is already effectively able to move 30/60/90 to a dwarf's 25ft or most everyone else's 30ft so it just gives me more room to work with than "well alice & bob are 1200ft apart, where is everyone else?"

*ie a fairy has a walk speed of 4 & a fly speed of 90

 

[ph0rk]

1) No DM: Eliminating the DM is a huge but inevitable step. Good DMing is very hard and ultimately gets in the way of many players' wishes. To be clear, I strongly dislike this direction but fear it is inevitable. This, of course, will require major playtesting and a very different "engine".

Board game dungeon crawlers like Gloomhaven have already achieved this.

 

[Aging Bard]

Board game dungeon crawlers like Gloomhaven have already achieved this.

That's only if you assume that D&D is only combat. It's not. The combat part of D&D is the easiest to run without a DM. The rest is harder.

 

[Minigiant]

That's only if you assume that D&D is only combat. It's not. The combat part of D&D is the easiest to run without a DM. The rest is harder.

Not harder. Just different. You could board game exploration or social interaction easy. It's just that everyone disagrees what it should be.

I still wish WOTC would like some developer produce a modern 4X or Conquest games for D&D like GW and Warhammer FB/40K.

 

[Aging Bard]

>It's just that everyone disagrees what it should be.

That's the definition of harder. Ultimately they will need to take a view, many will disagree, and they will need to stay put. That's hard.