D&D (2024) What could OneD&D to bring YOU back to D&D? (+)

[Micah Sweet]

Sure. Everyone has their preferences. For me, clearly stated rules in a game book beat all other considerations. I found 4E to be fantastic for that, which made them more readable to me. I also liked the fluff a lot more than 5E. Far more actual lore, inspirational bits and bobs, adventure seeds, immediately useable content, etc.

Totally. I feel that 2e did a better job with lore on every point you mentioned, for example. 4e lore was ok, but to me I would have preferred it for a different fantasy game.

 

[DEFCON 1]

That's the trouble with "natural" language. It's open to interpretation. The designers meant one thing but instead of flat out saying that they couched it in ambiguous "natural" language, which a lot of people interpret in a lot of different ways...so they have to come in and "fix" things that are due to people interpreting the "natural" language differently than they intended.

It's a game. It should be designed and written like a game. The rules should be explained like game rules typically are. The fluff can be as flowery and "natural" as they like.

I would suspect that 'open for interpretation' is exactly what the designers want, because that way more people can make the rules the way they want it, rather that be beholden to one narrow and niche game play.

With hundreds of RPGs on the market, all catering to very specific people and game styles / genres... D&D is positioned as the big tent. And that's part of the reason why it can be as big as it is... since it can be anything to anybody.

The game right now has rules than can be interpreted as a game like you prefer. Not as airtight as you might want, but is doable. And you can bang them into a better shape for yourself if you feel you need to. But the rules are also open enough that those people who don't want the same sort of airtight mechanics that you want, can hammer them in the way they prefer as well. Again, not perfect... but doable.

And the reason we all do that hammering rather than find and play that one specific game that is 100% what we want is because I think we all actually like the idea of having a wider pool of people to game with. We like the varieties of D&D players we can sit down with and game with and enjoy playing with. That variety is the spice of life, so we swallow whatever distaste we might have for certain D&D styles and gameplay and stay with the game (or a variant of it). After all... we wouldn't all be here on this D&D message board if we didn't want to play it in some form or fashion.

 

[Incenjucar]

5E's lack of solid rules is one of the reasons I've not wasted my time or money with it. If I'm making my own rules, I don't need to buy broken books.

Homewbrewers can homebrew, but you don't put that responsibility on people and then demand money for it.

 

[Mistwell]

I am not at all burned out on 5e. I've still never played a Barbarian, Paladin, Monk, or Warlock beyond a couple sessions. I'm still in two great campaigns per week.

For One D&D to grab me it just needs to be not a horrible disruption to what's already there. And so far the playtest isn't that. It's almost all improvements from what I've seen, though some of the nerfs are irritating. Nothing I've seen in there would turn me away from what I love about 5e.

As for adventures I actually think they've been doing very well on that front for a while now (with one exception). But I truly would like Greyhawk.

 

[Mistwell]

5E's lack of solid rules is one of the reasons I've not wasted my time or money with it. If I'm making my own rules, I don't need to buy broken books.

Homewbrewers can homebrew, but you don't put that responsibility on people and then demand money for it.

Man how is this a plus thread with stuff like this? This is not the thread for you. Like, specifically, this isn't the place for this kind of stuff.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

honestly, I would do the digital release first and keep it for levels 1-10.

Then once it's run through the basics, it would be easy to expand and/or have the books of a higher quality due to actual play feedback (it's easier to adjust after the fact).

5e currently seems to hit a wall after 10+ and knowing how the rules work before releasing it would help a lot to get high levels playable.

 

[panny]

Dark Sun could tempt me back but they'd have to do a bang up job on it.

 

[MNblockhead]

5E's lack of solid rules is one of the reasons I've not wasted my time or money with it. If I'm making my own rules, I don't need to buy broken books.

Homewbrewers can homebrew, but you don't put that responsibility on people and then demand money for it.

When D&D came out, I played it entirely RAW for a while just so I could get familiar with the rules as they were published before I started playing around with or tweaking them. In fact, I still play almost entirely RAW in the sense that my homebrew is mostly adding on certain down-time subsystems rather than changing any core mechanics.

My friends and I have enjoyed playing this "broken" game for nearly a decade.

If the game isn't fun for you to play then absolutely, no reason to buy it. But despite it being amenable to homebrewing, homebrewing is not required to play it.

 

[Incenjucar]

When D&D came out, I played it entirely RAW for a while just so I could get familiar with the rules as they were published before I started playing around with or tweaking them. In fact, I still play almost entirely RAW in the sense that my homebrew is mostly adding on certain down-time subsystems rather than changing any core mechanics.

My friends and I have enjoyed playing this "broken" game for nearly a decade.

If the game isn't fun for you to play then absolutely, no reason to buy it. But despite it being amenable to homebrewing, homebrewing is not required to play it.

You can play with anything, but there are fully-designed games out there, and I don't feel a need to waste my time and money on a half-baked product where I have to do extra work. If WotC decides to make being a DM obnoxious again, I will continue to contribute to the DM shortage. If they want my money, they need to sell me a product that actually has a RAW in the first place. This goes double for any design I'd do - I don't want to have to guess how the average DM fills in the blanks in the rules to design content for them to use those rules with.

 

[Tonguez]

Reduce reliance on magic in all classes (a magic subclass is fine)
Make skills useful
Dont use spells when skills can do fine (eg Alarm - just make it a Skill use)
Use Feats to define Subclass features and let them be swappable.
Just use custom lineage with a series of background/heritage feats
Better monsters, logical CR, a way to add class and roles to creatures
Lairs for all creatures (ie monsters are just one possible component of an encounter)

and bring back Birthright* (though I’ve been looking the Duchy of Karameikos and thinking how it could be adapted as a domain-based game with PCs as Barons)