What in the world is left to be in core?

[I'm A Banana]

I'm being Captain Obvious and saying, "Yeah, well, has anyone considered how lame that's going to be to everyone, instead of just patting themselves on the back for their brilliant and elegant, yet totally impoverished and unworkable model?"

Y'know, there's folks who play OD&D and love it to death, and that's 3x4 right out of the box (fighter, magic-user, cleric; human, elf, dwarf, hobbit).

So clearly, not everyone needs thousands of player options to be happy with the game.

In fact, if you are going to be a player in one D&D campaign for about a year, you only functionally need ONE character class and ONE character race, and that'll last you the WHOLE YEAR (and if you die, you PLAY IT AGAIN!).

Unless they're going to publish a 10-page pamphlet for $1, I'd wager that the first book is going to contain quite a bit more than just those options. And if they ARE going to publish a 10-page pamphlet for $1, I'm into buying more robust rules.

 

[WheresMyD20]

In other words, you're saying that yes, you do honestly believe that a 4x4 model D&D might possibly satisfy a significant portion of gamers.

I guess that's what I get for asking what I thought was a rhetorical question.

Yes, I absolutely do believe it will satisfy a significant portion of gamers.

Consider Basic D&D (1977 - 1992). It was 4x4 and successfully ran alongside AD&D 1e and 2e for 15 years. It was quite popular, acted as a gateway for new players, and was an alternative to the more complex AD&D. It was also mechanically close enough to AD&D that modules and supplements could be used interchangeably.

 

[Aramax]

I did think of the 4x4 model as a hamburger. That's when I made the comment that gamers everywhere are going to ask "Where's the beef?" I don't need a long analogy; I know the theoretical framework. I'm being Captain Obvious and saying, "Yeah, well, has anyone considered how lame that's going to be to everyone, instead of just patting themselves on the back for their brilliant and elegant, yet totally impoverished and unworkable model?"

In other words, you're saying that yes, you do honestly believe that a 4x4 model D&D might possibly satisfy a significant portion of gamers.

I guess that's what I get for asking what I thought was a rhetorical question.

$X$ would not be satisfying from a cost/sales pespective I think more like 8x8

 

[Hassassin]

Depends on what you are talking about. I think we'll see a product like 4e Essentials, which was 4x4. That will of course be a small fraction of all the options out there in supplements and campaign settings. There may also be a PHB-type book that includes both the basics and some more popular options.

 

[Fanaelialae]

I think the core will just be the basic system.

No races, no classes; just a bare bones d20 resolution system. Essentially, the polar opposite of the 4e "everything is core" philosophy.

I also expect we'll see plenty of optional systems in the "core" 3 books. So you'll still have your elves, dwarves, fighters, and mages, but everything will be by default up to the DM as to whether or not to include. Want to run a low magic campaign without wizards, or hate elves; you don't have to use them because they're "not Core".

One of the Mearl's quotes (you can find it above in D&D 5E Info) actually mentions being able to drop in the combat chapter for a military campaign. If they intend to make combat officially optional for the first time in D&D history, I think you can bet almost everything else will be optional as well.

Of course, that does beg the question, what modules will we see in the core 3 and which will be reserved for later supplements?

 

[mkill]

Y'know, there's folks who play OD&D and love it to death, and that's 3x4 right out of the box (fighter, magic-user, cleric; human, elf, dwarf, hobbit).

Which is all fine and dandy. But let's face it... it's a niche demographic that no other edition could win over since the 1970ies. At best, they'll be like "yeah, fifth is nice", and then they'll go back to their vintage books or retro-clones.

The players that 5E needs to win over are the 4E players, the 3E players, the Pathfinder crowd, the casual gamers who don't care about edition wars, and the D&D-curious who don't play RPGs (yet, or not anymore). This is the big sea of potential players, and with just the 3E/4E rift, it's going to be hard enough to win them all over.

As for what is core, I've said it before, it's a useless, purely academic distinction. As a player, I'll make the character I want, and I'll pick from everything that is available. Why would I restrict myself? As a DM, I have to work with whatever the PCs have on their sheets, regardless of where it came from.

 

[Desdichado]

Y'know, there's folks who play OD&D and love it to death, and that's 3x4 right out of the box (fighter, magic-user, cleric; human, elf, dwarf, hobbit).

So clearly, not everyone needs thousands of player options to be happy with the game.

Yes. I accounted for the outliers when I said "most" and used other qualifier words like that. I know that there's folks out there who would be satisfied with a 4x4 model. That was never my question. My question was, from the posts here, it seems there's an implicit assumption--at least amongst some posters--that that number of people is significant, and that 5e will be a success for WotC by catering to that crowd.

That's a totally different question altogether.

Yes, I absolutely do believe it will satisfy a significant portion of gamers.

I guess that's where I strongly disagree, then.

Consider Basic D&D (1977 - 1992). It was 4x4 and successfully ran alongside AD&D 1e and 2e for 15 years. It was quite popular, acted as a gateway for new players, and was an alternative to the more complex AD&D. It was also mechanically close enough to AD&D that modules and supplements could be used interchangeably.

So, you see this "core" D&D as something like the Basic Set with everything else like either portions of AD&D or the fuller BECMI/RC line?

I think that was a bizarre sales strategy, with a confusing product line, and that it worked OK at all was more a case of luck and good brand identity at the time, if anything. At it's worst, its associated with the excesses of unsold and unsellable books during the TSR Dark Ages.

 

[Jawsh]

In fact, if you are going to be a player in one D&D campaign for about a year, you only functionally need ONE character class and ONE character race, and that'll last you the WHOLE YEAR (and if you die, you PLAY IT AGAIN!).

Hmm, I sense you're exaggerating for effect, but I'm going to take the bait.

As a DM, that would not work for me at all. I have done the thing where the player brings me one of his books that I don't own and asks me if he can play this class. I said yes, and then I had to deal with never knowing what the player could do. I could have just bought that book, but I was a poor student at the time.

Now imagine if every class worked that way. 4E had it bad too, because during my 4E days, I would travel between different people's houses. And I wouldn't always have the book that I wanted.



However, with 4E there were days when it worked out beautifully for character creation, because we would be passing around PH1, 2, and 3, all from one person's library (typically that evening's host). And it was quite rare that people had to wait for the book they needed.

Back in 3.5, if we only had access to one person's library, the PH was in high demand, and we were lucky if that person owned two copies, or maybe a dog-eared copy of the 3.0 PH.

 

[MoxieFu]

Yes. I accounted for the outliers when I said "most" and used other qualifier words like that. I know that there's folks out there who would be satisfied with a 4x4 model. That was never my question. My question was, from the posts here, it seems there's an implicit assumption--at least amongst some posters--that that number of people is significant, and that 5e will be a success for WotC by catering to that crowd.

That's a totally different question altogether.

I guess that's where I strongly disagree, then.

So, you see this "core" D&D as something like the Basic Set with everything else like either portions of AD&D or the fuller BECMI/RC line?

I think that was a bizarre sales strategy, with a confusing product line, and that it worked OK at all was more a case of luck and good brand identity at the time, if anything. At it's worst, its associated with the excesses of unsold and unsellable books during the TSR Dark Ages.

Because many new players, especially kids can't plunk down $100 for a game they want to try. There has to be an entry point to the game and it can't be priced out of their range and it can't be a stack of big, intimidating books to first-time buyers.

Supplements and other books can come out to please the hardcore, long-time players of the game. WotC can't ignore bringing in new players if they want to succeed in the long run.

Edit to add: The boxed set is only for the first entry point into the game. After that it switches over to either a single book like the Rules Cyclopedia or a multi book set like the PHB/MM/DMG. This way they can implement the Complexity Dials that have been discussed. Different groups can buy as many or as few books as they want. The "Beer and Pretzels" gamers can stop with the "rules cyclopedia" book and those who want more options can buy as many books as the market will bear.

 

[WheresMyD20]

So, you see this "core" D&D as something like the Basic Set with everything else like either portions of AD&D or the fuller BECMI/RC line?

I think that was a bizarre sales strategy, with a confusing product line, and that it worked OK at all was more a case of luck and good brand identity at the time, if anything. At it's worst, its associated with the excesses of unsold and unsellable books during the TSR Dark Ages.

Actually, at the time when Basic D&D was released in the early 80's it was the golden age of D&D, long before the unsold and unsellable books of the 2e era in the 90s, the 3e/3.5e switchover era of the early 2000s, and the current 4e era. The 1983 Red Box Basic Set is still, by far, the biggest selling D&D item of all time (per Frank Mentzer - he claimed that unit sales were orders of magnitude larger than anything published for 1e since it was sold in mainstream toy stores... it's *very* unlikely that anything in the 3e/4e era even comes close).

I see "core" D&D as being the absolutely essential rules of the game. Everything else is a rules expansion. What's so confusing about that?

You buy a small 64-128 page book that's the core rules. If you want more races and classes, there's an expansion for that. If you want more monsters and magic items, there's an expansion for that. If you want grid-and-minis combat, there's an expansion for that. If you want detailed character customization, there's an expansion for that.... etc, etc, etc...

Some of those expansions could possibly be packaged together in the same book. Back in the day, RoleMaster (which, incidentally, Monte Cook worked on) would put out a rules expansion every year or so, similar in some ways to the old Unearthed Arcana for 1e. They were labeled "Companion I", "Companion II", etc. Each of these companions had a variety of optional rules GMs could choose to add to their game. In the later companions, there were even checklists so a GM could quickly document which optional rules were used in his game. I wouldn't be too surprised if WotC tried something like that for 5e.