D&D General What D&D Thing Has Changed The Most

[Neonchameleon]

The one element that hasn't changed at all (despite some who might say it has) is the act and art of roleplaying a character, giving it some personality, and making it both memorable and entertaining; in part because doing these things does not rely on mechanics.

But the level of both desire and support in doing so has changed. We no longer have Bob III replaced by Bob IV or a collection of brothers Bigby, Rigby, and Sigby because they keep dying. Also in 5e every character has a background - and not all fighters are mechanically identical so the baseline for characterisation is higher even if the peak is unchanged.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Starting with a little 2e and progressing through 3rd, 4th, and 5th, I'd say one thing that has changed is that there has been a reduction in barriers to playing the character you want.

The transition to 3rd knocked down racial limits for classes and opened up multiclassing. However there were still a lot of steps you had to take to be, say, an effective Two Weapon Fighter, or to take a Prestige Class.

4e introduced At Will powers that let spellcasters always cast spells, let fighters do cool things from Level 1...

And 5e really opens up the possibility to play what's in your mind in levels 1, 2, or 3. Bounded Accuracy means there's not as much difference between, say, an Orc Barbarian and a Halfling Barbarian (both get to be effective). Multiclassing is very open and manageable, especially with spellcasting levels! And with Tasha's, you can even modify the core archetypes of the races to match the character you want to play.

I feel like this is overall a positive, and matches the fact that most modern groups don't play really long campaigns with time for characters to progress through many levels. But it is a change from having to "earn" the abilities and items that matched the character you wanted to play!

 

[Retreater]

For me, the biggest change in D&D happened between 2nd edition and 3rd. Honestly, 3.0 and onward don't resemble the game I started playing in 2nd edition. Sure, the game switched to the d20 system and got far more tactical with precise movement, measuring, etc., and got much more codified. But I think the change was more drastic, because I apparently wasn't playing D&D as the designers intended - and of course, I had no way of knowing until the heavily codified rules were released.
I was a more laid back DM when I started, and I created story-driven and character-based campaigns. Players were free to come up with cool solutions to problems, not necessarily reflected on their character sheets and class abilities. In the 20+ years since I started 3rd edition, I've seen the role of the DM is the ignorant muscle of the rules, the oracle of the designers by reading the augurs of published adventures and campaign settings.
I didn't use a lot of published adventures until the complexity of 3.0 made it necessary. And they didn't resemble what I ran for my group. It was practically as great of a departure as thinking sci-fi was Call of Cthulhu and being told, "no, it's Star Trek."
Trying to present a unified experience similar to what other tables were having, judging myself and my group by the standards of the growing influence of D&D messageboards - that was probably my first "Matt Mercer effect."
I think a lot of the joy (and innocence) I had with the game ended when I left the TSR era. It was a Pandora's Box moment, and I don't think it will ever come back.

 

[BookTenTiger]

My answer and opinion : D&D no longer pulls from sources such as myths, legends, or literature, but is now entirely self-referential. Whether that is good or bad is up to an individual’s taste. For myself, I feel as though something precious has been lost in the transition.

I'm curious about this. I agree that as D&D grows, it inevitably becomes more self-referential (why else would we still have studded leather except that it's a reference to D&D itself?). But I also feel like a number of recent products do pull a lot from myth, legend, and literature:

Wild Beyond the Witchlight heavily references Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked This Way Comes," plus legends of fey and faeries.

Strixhaven is obviously an homage to the Harry Potter series, and other "magic school" stories.

The upcoming Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel features adventures that are explicitly based in the culture and mythology of many different real-world cultures.

 

[Minigiant]

My answer and opinion : D&D no longer pulls from sources such as myths, legends, or literature, but is now entirely self-referential. Whether that is good or bad is up to an individual’s taste. For myself, I feel as though something precious has been lost in the transition.

I think it's more that the sources that D&D pullsfrom are from more sources of myths, legends, and literature than before.

And the only way to make all of these things converge into the same classes and races is to create races and classes with hug amounts of family within. And that is the self referential part.

Basically,it the old day, you'd creat ewhole new classes and races to represent new myths, legends, and media characters, If you wanted to plat as Aragorn, a Ranger class was made.

Now the Ranger class has to represent Aragorn, Faramir, Tarzan, Grizzly Adams, John Snow, Dar the Beastmaster, Aquaman, Green Arrow, Falcon, Geralt of Rivia, Goblin Slayer, and Ol' Drizzle himself.

 

[Ogre Mage]

The Internet. From the early days in the 1990s with players congregating on message boards to the current environment of livestream plays and online games, this has had a revolutionary effect on how D&D players meet and interact with one another (this site is one example). There are even D&D social media "influencers" who don't work for WotC but make a living producing D&D content. I would have never thought that would be possible as a teenager in the 1990s.

 

[Lanefan]

But the level of both desire and support in doing so has changed. We no longer have Bob III replaced by Bob IV or a collection of brothers Bigby, Rigby, and Sigby because they keep dying.

Well, you could if you wanted to...

Seriously, though: even though you might have had Bigby, Rigby and Sigby go through the party in rapid sequence, a half-decent player will still find something - a hook, a quirk, a signature move, a catchphrase, whatever - to make each one memorable and-or entertaining, even if only for the short time its career lasts.

My current game has run for well north of 900 sessions and seen a few hundred characters pass through (multiple parties, each player has had numerous characters, etc.). Many of those characters have been in some form unique or entertaining or memorable, yet of all those characters the one by far that was most memorable, entertaining, and hilarious - the legendary Deporo, Wizard of Light - lasted exactly 17 sessions.

I kid you not, we'll tell stories about that guy until we're dead of old age...or laughter, whichever.

Also in 5e every character has a background - and not all fighters are mechanically identical so the baseline for characterisation is higher even if the peak is unchanged.

The whole point of what I'm getting at is that mechanical similarities or differences are of no concern here: roleplaying is roleplaying no matter what.

 

[pogre]

The rules are much better written overall.

 

[Neonchameleon]

The whole point of what I'm getting at is that mechanical similarities or differences are of no concern here: roleplaying is roleplaying no matter what.

And I'm saying that this is outright wrong and that (a) system matters and (b) what is successful within the game will influence what you do.

 

[Yora]

Early D&D was a structured exploration game.
Since Dragonlance, D&D has been a storytelling game with lots of combat.