D&D 5E Why does 5E SUCK?

[Mishihari Lord]

Overall, 5E is my favorite D&D since AD&D, so I find little to hate. The short list of things I dislike:

Rest / hit point recovery take attrition of resources out of the game, for the most part

Initiative - 1E/2E initiative was a lot more fun

The ritual system seems underdeveloped

Would have like more general sorcerer backgrounds

The random tables in backgrounds were pretty lame. They give very, very limited breadth to characters. They should have been 10x longer or omitted altogether.

 

[Fralex]

The random tables in backgrounds were pretty lame. They give very, very limited breadth to characters. They should have been 10x longer or omitted altogether.

I find it helps to dip into tables from other backgrounds and just treat them as inspirations for coming up with traits of your own if none feel completely suitable.

 

[Wednesday Boy]

I hate how seriously broken the Simulacrum spell is. I tried casting it and bupkis. So instead of my clone going to work for me, doing my house chores, and being a dad while I play 5E, I have to do it all. (In fairness, I didn't participate in the open playtest, so maybe this is a bug I should already know about.)

 

[Hand of Evil]

don't say hate, but you would have thought with this being 5E they would have addressed a few questions that have been floating around from prior editions.

 

[justinj3x3]

The only thing I hate about 5e are how creepy halflings look. I mean if I saw one in real life I'd want to kick it (much like little yapping dogs).

Edit: Disclaimer; I do not kick little yapping dogs, I just want to sometimes. I do not condone the kicking of little yapping dogs either (wanting to is ok though). If you see a halfling in real life that looks like the halflings of 5e though... I say go ahead and kick it.

 

[TwoSix]

There's nothing I hate, there are simply places in the rules where I like what other editions have done better than 5e's approach.

 

[billd91]

I've found nothing to hate, but I have found some things that could use work:

1) More saving throw diversity - Intelligence is way underused as a save, Wisdom way overused. I'm not saying the different stats need to have an equal number of save, but each stat really needs teeth as a saving throw.

2) Too much stepping backwards on organization and presentation. I agree that, given the challenges of stealth rules out there in 3e and PF (c'mon, you really think they aren't watching developments for PF?), the stealth and vision rules in 5e are poorly communicated. For the Monster Manual, the "animal and whatever else" hodgepodge section is an organizational pain in the butt.

 

[procproc]

Wow. I would buy the everloving heck out of that product.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

What do you HATE about 5th Edition?

"Hate" is too a strong word for my feelings, as is "suck" (though I would call the latter less hyperbolic than the former...)

@doctorhook covered a goodly number of the things I'd have said. Here are a few more, starting with one of my few disagreements with the good doctor:

• Fighters: Fighters really...*aren't* solid gold, IMO. They have good damage and good combat abilities...and that's just about the extent of their *class* mechanics. Champions can jump further! And make a few (almost exclusively *combat*) checks with half-proficiency. Battlemasters can check the...*combat*...stats of things, and get a tool proficiency or something. Only the Fighter *that casts spells* has even moderate potential for class-based, rather than "stuff everyone gets"-based, non-combat investment and contribution. Apart from (finally) fixing the Fighters-don't-do-skills , 5e is no better (and in certain ways worse) than prior editions in this regard.
• Terrible organization: Seems the only lesson 5e picked up from cool other games published in the past few years (cough13Acough) is "organize everything really poorly." Important rules buried in the middle of long semi-related or even unrelated passages. Confusing mentions of terms pages--even *chapters*--before they're defined. Etc. Far from being "new-player friendly," you practically have to have been a vet just to know what's going on much of the time.
• "You're the DM, you decide!": It's all well and good to say that the game has been made to be amenable to, or even improved by, DMs making calls. Unfortunately, 99.9% of the time when I see someone making a calm, perfectly legitimate request for advice or assistance, they get met with "JUST DO IT YOURSELF DO WHATEVER YOU WANT. GOD, WHY DOES EVERYONE NEED RULES SO BAD??" It's incredibly annoying simply by proxy; I can't imagine how frustrating it is for someone actually trying to run the game.
• Dragonborn: Oh, people regularly talk up the resistance, but when you compare the *long* list of stuff Elves or Dwarves get to the *literally two things* a Dragonborn gets (a resist and a breath weapon that *quickly* degrades in utility), it really irks me.
• Saves: Oh, boy, saves. Six stats for saves makes the "some good saves, some bad" problem worse. Because now there are twice as many "not very good" saves for you to be hit with. And any of your off-stat, non-proficient saves? Pretty much guaranteed to fail 'em past level 11 or so. If it happens to be one of your dump stats, all the worse; you may only succeed 20% of the time. Since people are LUCKY if they get one great save (prime stat + proficiency) and two moderate saves (prime stat ~or~ proficiency), you've now got three potentially-lethal/"situation-ending" (since I know I'll get *reamed* if I call it an "encounter" when I mean any kind of engagement, whether combat, exploration, or social) saves, one of which is practically guaranteed to be among the Big Three (Con, Dex, Wis).
• "Bounded Accuracy": As I've said in a different thread, "Bounded Accuracy" seems to be about...neither of those things. Accuracy still goes up, has to go up, and low-level threats really do become nearly auto-hit (not TRULY auto-hit, sure, but between Advantage being handed out like candy and gaining around +1 every other level, after ability scores, magic items, etc. are factored in, it gets to very nearly the same point anyway). And the thing that's *really* Bounded is supposed to be AC...which still goes up to the mid-to-high 20s anyway.
• "Natural" Language: It's often unnatural, or at least I've had to go through some mental gymnastics more than once to understand what the authors actually meant. There are numerous places--mostly spells, but a few fundamental rules too, such as the Paladin's smite damage cap--where just an extra phrase, maybe an extra sentence, would have cleared up an enormous amount of confusion.
• Since we've mentioned some meta-game/edition-comparison "hates," here's one of my biggest...
  "You must love it or hate it!": Since I have criticisms of the mechanical structures (like saves), certain class design..."choices" (Fighters and Warlocks), etc. I am a HUGE AWFUL HORRIBLE HATER who cannot have a reasoned opinion and simply hate the game. I *obviously* am a huge irrational 4e fanboy who would willingly sacrifice every possible form of D&D Fun upon the wicked and profane altar of balance. But it's perfectly fine for dozens upon dozens of threads to simply squee with joy. Yeah, I'm saying I think it's that 99.99999% of threads are "OMG THIS IS SO WONDERFUL!!" and that whenever anyone voices a complaint, they seem to get drowned with either "you're a hater" or "JUST CHANGE IT THEN," neither of which are useful responses.

With all of that said? While D&D 5e isn't my cup of tea, it's not an awful game by any means. It reminds me far too much of 3e to (ever?) want to play it, but it's got some good ideas. Had 5e been the game we got back in 2000, or even 2003, I'd probably consider it a triumph of game design; as it is, it feels too much like "one step forward, 1d6 steps back" in too many areas that are of major importance to me.

 

[exile]

I hate that I have been disenfranchised from 5e organized play. Part of it is my friends (who either dislike 5e or like it less than other systems), part of it is where I live (eastern ky is not flush with game stores; and stores within a reasonable drive still seem to be Pathfinder country). That said AL puts a strong emphasis on store play (with absolute emphasis on public play), and sadly that makes it that much harder for me to get into (whereas I was easily able to play/support LFR, and still play/support PFS). This is compounded by the fact that new product being released for 5e is optimally used in an OP venue. My frustration is further compounded by the shifty customer service I experienced from AL representatives at Origins this past weekend.

So, while I don't hate 5e, I do dislike the decisions made surrounding its OP support. In fact, I dislike these decisions so much that I will never register for another AL game at a convention again. I will never drive to a store to play an AL game. And I may not even buy any more 5e product. Yeah, I hate AL just that much.