D&D 5E What Makes 5E "5E"?

[Shardstone]

I think this is a deeper conversation than what makes 5E different than 4E or 3E or B/X or whatever edition of D&D you're into.

It's also about the numerous games that have come out in the last 10 years that are in response to or adjacent to or borrowing from 5E.

Reynard mentioned Shadowdark. I'm thinking of Shadow of the Demon Lord. He believes those are not really 5E, despite some similar mechanics. I think they are.

I'd be interested to hear what others think about games that aren't 5E but share some mechanics or influences.

I think SotDL is a little too far away to be strictly 5E. It's a game primarily about a 10-20 session adventure. In some ways, you are a superheroic fantasy character, but I don't think that's a requirement for a 5E game.

 

[Shardstone]

Ah, the refreshing negative spin putting things in the worst light possible. Have fun with dissing the game this forum is dedicated to and that I, and millions of others, have gotten countless hours of enjoyment from. I am not impressed.

In other words if you don't like D&D play something else. Why go to a forum dedicated to the game just to yuck on people's yum?

Oofta c'mon man, people are allowed to have harsh opinions. You shouldn't try to run people out, even if they disagree with you to the extreme.

I agree a bit with you, I think D&D isn't as bad as ol' Garthanos is saying, but let's not try and turn this into an echochamber.

 

[Reynard]

That's just D&D going all the way back to the White Box.

"Natural language" in 5E exacerbates the problem.

 

[Remathilis]

That’s not really a unique issue or motivation for 3e considering it was a cited reason for 2e as well. So, I’m not really sure how interesting their statements are to that effect.

One of the motives for 3e’s more structured rules, as discussed at the time by Skip Williams, was to improve a player’s understanding of what they could accomplish and how probable success would be, giving them, in effect, the ability to make better informed decisions. Hence, rules got a boost relative to rulings.

Every revision tries to correct the issues of the one before. AD&D is an attempt to codify and expand the rules of Basic. 2e was an attempt to add some structure and clean up failed ideas. 3e was an attempt to fix the sprawling mess 2e became. 4e was to fix the issues of math and balance that 3e had become notorious for. 5e was a step back to simpler systems and more traditional play. 6e will fix 5e's shortcomings. That's how this works.

 

[Reynard]

Every revision tries to correct the issues of the one before. AD&D is an attempt to codify and expand the rules of Basic. 2e was an attempt to add some structure and clean up failed ideas. 3e was an attempt to fix the sprawling mess 2e became. 4e was to fix the issues of math and balance that 3e had become notorious for. 5e was a step back to simpler systems and more traditional play. 6e will fix 5e's shortcomings. That's how this works.

I might quibble with some of your reasons (there were legal and cultural reasons for each change, too), but I agree in the broad sense: if WotC decides they need an actual new edition (rather than a freshening up as we got in 2024/25) they will make changes based on the perceived weaknesses of 5E that caused sales to slip. If sales never slip, 5E will be D&D in perpetuity.

 

[Shardstone]

I don't think Natural Language was ever an identity factor of 5E. I say this because 5R now has a lot of Keyterms, capitalized and put into a Rules Glossary, referenced now throughout both the PHB and DMG and likely all adventures and other books to come. Natural Language, even in 5E, wasn't all that natural; it was more Keyterms disguised as natural language, because the writers would consistently need to use the same phrases in order to keep rules parity with other aspects of the game. For example, if you have to distinguish between "melee attack," "weapon attack," "melee attack with a weapon," then you don't have real natural language; you have lower-case sloppy keyterms.

That being said, 5R has, again, clearly moved away from that. For the better. Makes the game much easier to write for now.

 

[Remathilis]

I might quibble with some of your reasons (there were legal and cultural reasons for each change, too), but I agree in the broad sense: if WotC decides they need an actual new edition (rather than a freshening up as we got in 2024/25) they will make changes based on the perceived weaknesses of 5E that caused sales to slip. If sales never slip, 5E will be D&D in perpetuity.

My list was not all inclusive. There were lots of business reasons to change things, but the mechanical reasons end up looking like that.

 

[Yaarel]

I suspect 5e (with ongoing tweaks) is the final version of D&D as tabletop game.

Technology is more likely to evolve faster than the D&D game will.

For example, the next "version" of D&D is the DM telling an AI program the favorite aspects of D&D, and the AI returning a new core rules, tailored to the DMs preferences. Perhaps everyone at the table describes the preferences and the AI negotiates and optimizes the rules as best as possible for each person at the table.

Of course, the "table" is likely virtual. Players might opt to interact with the game, via theater-of-the-mind, minis on a grid, or first-person POV virtual reality.

 

[Reynard]

I don't think Natural Language was ever an identity factor of 5E. I say this because 5R now has a lot of Keyterms, capitalized and put into a Rules Glossary, referenced now throughout both the PHB and DMG and likely all adventures and other books to come. Natural Language, even in 5E, wasn't all that natural; it was more Keyterms disguised as natural language, because the writers would consistently need to use the same phrases in order to keep rules parity with other aspects of the game. For example, if you have to distinguish between "melee attack," "weapon attack," "melee attack with a weapon," then you don't have real natural language; you have lower-case sloppy keyterms.

That being said, 5R has, again, clearly moved away from that. For the better. Makes the game much easier to write for now.

I agree that reading the new PHB and DMG feel a lot more like reading the PF2ER books from that perspective. not to the same extent, but definitely leaning on keywords and tags.

 

[Reynard]

I suspect 5e (with ongoing tweaks) is the final version of D&D as tabletop game.

Technology is more likely to evolve faster than the D&D game will.

For example, the next "version" of D&D is the DM telling an AI program the favorite aspects of D&D, and the AI returning a new core rules, tailored to the DMs preferences. Perhaps everyone at the table describes the preferences and the AI negotiates and optimizes the rules as best as possible for each person at the table.

Of course, the "table" is likely virtual. Players might opt to interact with the game, via theater-of-the-mind, minis on a grid, or first-person POV virtual reality.

I don't know. The actual meatspace table is pretty resilient even in this age of GenZ and Gen Alpha doing everything online. Once you leave the table behind, you just have an MMO.