D&D 5E What are the "True Issues" with 5e?

[mamba]

Alright, but if we grant that, doesn't that mean we just have to treat the Good Idea, Bad Idea thing as a wash? Just seems like the whole argument boils down to "whoever has a good idea has an advantage," but good ideas come and go. The underlying mechanics remain. Just because they can't completely overwhelm someone choosing a faulty approach doesn't mean there's no bias. It's just a bias that isn't absolutely determinative.

yes, that is true, the higher CHA is an advantage in itself. Not sure what your point is…. higher STR or DEX is an advantage in other situations. Why would this not be true for CHA

Believe it or not, I don't want to nerf casters really.

I can believe that

I think skills should be powerful and diverse, containing multitudes, and that spells should be a little bit more limited and much more focused. Those do not entail nerfing casters into the ground, but they do pretty much require that casters lose some amount of power and flexibility that they possess, even in 5e.

I am mostly talking flexibility here, don’t care about combat, but out of combat I want most of the ‘I just cast a spell and that is the solution to any given problem’ to go the way of the Dodo

 

[James Gasik]

Wait, 4e had a 5MWD? The advantage of 5e was that, with encounter and at-wills, you could keep adventuring until the healing surges ran out! Were there actually people who wanted to spam their three Daily Attack Powers and go to bed?

 

[Mannahnin]

Wait, 4e had a 5MWD? The advantage of 5e was that, with encounter and at-wills, you could keep adventuring until the healing surges ran out! Were there actually people who wanted to spam their three Daily Attack Powers and go to bed?

No, 4E did not. It was one of the virtues of the system, that it was basically the only edition which eliminated the issue of the 5MWD.

 

[Oofta]

Wait, 4e had a 5MWD? The advantage of 5e was that, with encounter and at-wills, you could keep adventuring until the healing surges ran out! Were there actually people who wanted to spam their three Daily Attack Powers and go to bed?

Yes. Whether it actually happened just depended on the DM and group, much like 5E.

 

[Cadence]

No, 4E did not. It was one of the virtues of the system, that it was basically the only edition which eliminated the issue of the 5MWD.

Is 13th Age the ultimate game for removing the 5MWD. The day is literally defined by the number of encounters (4 by default iirc).

 

[Mannahnin]

Yes. Whether it actually happened just depended on the DM and group, much like 5E.

You'd have to really work hard at it to misplay 4E that badly. Or, I guess, have both a group of players terrified of going into a fight without their Dailies, and a DM unable or unwilling to create scenarios with any time pressure? That's so bizarre to me. Dailies weren't SO much more powerful that you needed them for every encounter.

 

[Oofta]

You'd have to really work hard at it to misplay 4E that badly. Or, I guess, have both a group of players terrified of going into a fight without their Dailies, and a DM unable or unwilling to create scenarios with any time pressure? That's so bizarre to me. Dailies weren't SO much more powerful that you needed them for every encounter.

I'm not saying it was common, but I absolutely played with people that wanted to blow their dailies and be done.

If you can avoid the 5 MWD in 4E, you can avoid it in 5E. I have fewer 5 MWD issue in my 5E games at higher levels because fights took so long in 4E in real time that it just wasn't practical to have that many fights if you wanted to do anything else to move the campaign forward.

 

[cranberry]

IMO, the biggest issue is that zero to hero happens to quickly, and that the monsters (as written) don't scale well with PC power at the higher levels.

 

[Gammadoodler]

I think fundamentally WOTC didn't use their surveys to provide the content that 5e fans would want. That's why there is this "real life human" conversation.

For example by Xanatar's, there should have been a fighter subclass that uses all the common origin tropes for a hero.

1. Magic. You know magic: Eldritch Knight, Psi Knight, Echo Knight, Rune Knight
2. Accident. Some event or series of events infused you with power. Werewolf Warrior, vampire Warrior, Shadow Soldier. Chaos Warrior
3. Technology. You know how to craft magical gear. Arcane Archer. War Machine. Gunsmith
4. Mutant. You are not normal for your race. Demigod. Paragon. Noble Bloodline
5. Natural. You trained hard and have access to secret techniques which border impossibility or divert to another realm of skill. Warlord. Warblade, Swordmaster. Lord.

In the old days with the fast schedule, WOTC would have been forced to eventually provide these.

5e's slow schedule forced many ideas that require heavy playtesting to go into the Houserules sphere without the feedback and high recognition.

5e's book schedule is a bit too slow Especially with WOTC's light content in their releases.​

Almost exactly the old City of Heroes gamut of heroic origins. Didn't meant much in that game but it's a great reference point for thinking about where powers might come from.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

yes, that is true, the higher CHA is an advantage in itself. Not sure what your point is…. higher STR or DEX is an advantage in other situations. Why would this not be true for CHA

It's not just the higher Charisma. It's having friends and charm person and Bardic Inspiration (since, y'know, you can inspire yourself), and JOAT if you don't have proficiency for some reason, and enhance ability, and...

I can believe that


I am mostly talking flexibility here, don’t care about combat, but out of combat I want most of the ‘I just cast a spell and that is the solution to any given problem’ to go the way of the Dodo

I don't necessarily think it needs to completely die out. But I think that what problems you can just wish away with a single spell should be either limited to only really really early level difficulties, or to only a very small subset for each individual caster, so even a full team of 4-6 casters would struggle to achieve that.