What 5e got wrong

[Tony Vargas]

The reason for this is obvious - it's bad for game balance

So only important to the degree that game balance is prioritized as a design goal. Oberoni may have been terribly relevant to 3.5 when it was dreamed up, but less so to 2e or 4e - and not at all to 5e. The 5e DM isn't just allowed to change the rules, he's expected to overrule them consistently. Complaining about Oberoni in your 5e D&D is like complaining about macaroni in your Kraft Mac & Cheese. It's a foundation, not a fallacy.

The problem with the Oberoni Fallacy is that it assumes the ideal is to take the DM out of the equation and make a game that can run irregardless of good or bad DM adjudications.

5e's fundamental underlying principle is that, when you try to do this you end up taking away the quality that makes D&D most appealing.

The idea of the Oberoni fallacy is that you can't defend the quality of a rule by pointing out that you can fix it. Nothing much to do with taking the DM out of the equation - nor is refraining from pushing game-(re)-design work on the DM fundamental to D&D being 'really D&D' (other in the nostalgic sense of it being like D&D when it was at it's most primitive).

5e tries to appeal to as broad a set of current and past D&D fans it possibly can, that requires a lot of flexibility, and leaving large swaths of play open to (or even in need of) DM rulings is a big part of delivering that. It's not that you can't have a clear/consistent/expansive/complete system that handles a broad range of styles, either, but the alternative of 'Empowering' the DM has the virtue of evoking the way we ran games back in the day, when the game "needed fixing."

Today, it's not that 5e is broken, but that it's open.

Bottom line, Oberoni doesn't apply to 5e.

let go of the strict interpretations of the rules and strict usages of powers and positions and just ran with the free-form of roleplaying. That's something you can only do with when "Rule 0" is made the centerpiece of the game.

It doesn't matter how good a system is, you can always toss it and go free form if you want to. No one can stop you. With an at least basically functional system, you just also have the option of playing 'RAW.'

 

[I'm A Banana]

My point is that combat is already where balance is disproportionately handled in the basic rules. Most aspects of balance are explicitly handled within the combat rules, and when there's an attempt at balance outside of that context (like with the PHB Ranger class) - it immediately becomes subject to criticism for being too finicky and weak in general gameplay.

Your point is slippery!

I don't agree that most aspects of balance are handled within the combat rules, or that the criticisms of the ranger revolve around a lack of combat effectiveness. I see plenty of nods to exploration and interaction balance within 5e, and the ranger criticisms have revolved around the beastmaster not playing in a way that represents the fiction of a person fighting alongside their animal friend, not a lack of combat effectiveness in general.

What's more, if you're only really concerned with combat effectiveness, nothing is stopping you from making a character devoted to DEX, CON, and WIS who dumps the other stats (or making a D&D game where those three stats are the only ones that exist). This is by far a simpler solution than plugging Charisma into some defense and increasing the math load. You could also occupy a middle ground and take a 4e tactic of making DEX, CON, and WIS each have a secondary ability score that can sub for them in combat (INT, STR, and CHA, respectively).

That 5e D&D isn't already like this isn't a significant criticism of it, because D&D isn't exclusively concerned with combat. Nor should it be, IMO.

 

[Jester David]

Sorry, but the reality of D&D's rules don't really mesh with this mentality. It's not that other pillars of gameplay aren't important or are usually absent, because that clearly isn't the case. It's that the rules for combat are much, much more detailed than the rules for other pillars. This creates a situation where the DM and his/her group are pushed into creating their own style around dealing with the other pillars (which, in my experience, often becomes very vague and theater-of-the-mind). As such, they don't factor into the game's mechanical balance as much as the pillar for which extremely detailed rules exist and whose usage are the norm for almost all play groups - combat.

Combat gets the most rules because it needs more precise adjudication.

Keep in mind that originally in D&D you gained experience for treasure acquired not monsters slain. You were encouraged NOT to engage in combat because there was no reward and a risk of death. You were encouraged to find other ways to get the treasure and considered combat as a last resort. Same rules, same focus, but a subtle change alters the tone of many games.
If you doubled xp for non-combat solutions everyone would be a lot more chatty and creative...

 

[Sacrosanct]

The ideal way to design a game is for every stat to carry unique mechanical benefits irrespective of class, so that character building is engaging and you can build a diverse array of potential characters without gimping their ability to support a party..

So....exactly how many award winning and/or popular games have you designed?

 

[Einlanzer0]

So only important to the degree that game balance is prioritized as a design goal. Oberoni may have been terribly relevant to 3.5 when it was dreamed up, but less so to 2e or 4e - and not at all to 5e. The 5e DM isn't just allowed to change the rules, he's expected to overrule them consistently. Complaining about Oberoni in your 5e D&D is like complaining about macaroni in your Kraft Mac & Cheese. It's a foundation, not a fallacy.

Sorry, I just think this is flat-out wrong. What's the point of having rules at all if it's all completely subject to the whims of a DM? DMs are empowered to make adjustments so things work for their games, they are not empowered to just casually rewrite the combat mechanics. While they can certainly do that, it is not the assumption of 5e that they will or that they should. The combat rules in particular are intended to create a set of rails for the gameplay, otherwise mechanics like Hero Points, Inspiration, and Advantage/Disadvantage wouldn't exist.

So, the idea that it's okay for Wizards of the Coast to publish imbalanced rules just because they provide the caveat that a "DM can change it" (which has always been the case) is laughable in its absurdity. It is every bit as much now as it was during 3.5 and 4e. The Oberoni fallacy still carries plenty of weight. WotC carries a responsibility to strive for a well-balanced ruleset. And they have done a relatively decent job with it a lot of the changes they made from previous editions.

 

[Einlanzer0]

Combat gets the most rules because it needs more precise adjudication.

Keep in mind that originally in D&D you gained experience for treasure acquired not monsters slain. You were encouraged NOT to engage in combat because there was no reward and a risk of death. You were encouraged to find other ways to get the treasure and considered combat as a last resort. Same rules, same focus, but a subtle change alters the tone of many games.
If you doubled xp for non-combat solutions everyone would be a lot more chatty and creative...

Yep. I never denied this, and it just reinforces my point about the greater necessity of combat rules being balanced in and of themselves.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Which again, assumes the rules are imbalanced. Which is your opinion and hardly fact. Based on some of the phrases you've used ("suboptimal") it seems like you're more of a powergamer who focuses on combat. Newsflash. Most people actually don't powergame, and lots of people have actually done entire sessions where combat never even occurred. So by your logic, stats like INT and WIS are overpowered compared to CON because no one ever went into combat.

Of course stats are situation and don't apply evenly to all things. If they did, why have them at all? Why not just rename everything to "primary stat" and "secondary stat" if mechanically they all did the same thing.

 

[Einlanzer0]

Which again, assumes the rules are imbalanced. Which is your opinion and hardly fact. Based on some of the phrases you've used ("suboptimal") it seems like you're more of a powergamer who focuses on combat. Newsflash. Most people actually don't powergame, and lots of people have actually done entire sessions where combat never even occurred. So by your logic, stats like INT and WIS are overpowered compared to CON because no one ever went into combat.

Of course stats are situation and don't apply evenly to all things. If they did, why have them at all? Why not just rename everything to "primary stat" and "secondary stat" if mechanically they all did the same thing.

You're just being contrary. You have no idea how I like to play D&D. I, in fact, am not a power gamer; I like to build interesting characters. And, who the hell ever argued that the stats should all do the same thing? That is the opposite of what I'm arguing.

 

[Sacrosanct]

I can only go by what you say. And when you use phrases like "suboptimal", that infers a powergaming aspect. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's hardly unusual for people to come to those sorts of conclusions.

You never answered my question. How many award winning/popular games have you designed, since you seem to profess how a game should ideally be designed?

 

[Ristamar]

This may be the some of the finest first post trolling I've seen at ENWorld in quite some time. It is both disgusting and beautiful.

3.x tried to turn a lot of the non-combat portions of D&D into something much more granular and predictable, and it turned out to be a bloated mess that wasn't elegant or efficient.