Why no new packs since late September?

[tetrasodium]

I have never seen exhaustion show up in any of my games. But this new version seems much more usable.

It is harder to waste (or forget), but you get less uses.

The old Barkskin was nearly useless. So replacing it didn't change anything.

The new one is effectively Heroism, which any cleric could of cast since 2014. No one thought it was overpowered before.

Not sure how that is a new problem. Healing word and Aura of vitality yo-yo has existed.

Though my personal house rule for this play test was going unconscious gave you a level of (new) exhaustion.

Worked really nicely IMO. It provided a slow ramp to more and more dangerous territory and some tense decisions. Do you push on to the final fight with -2, let the rogue the front line for a bit, or is discretion the better part of valor.

More powerful <---->over powered is a spectrum not the same thing. When excessive & unreasonable levels of risk insulation that might be called a moral hazard elsewhere gets stripped away it becomes justified in replacing the insulation with power. Without stripping the risk insulation some changes become.... Bewildering

 

[MechaTarrasque]

It is a terrible idea to put out any sort of survey (where you actually care about the results) around the holidays. Even more so if you want groups to make the assessments. Too many distractions and too much travel. Most likely, we will get the next one as a "12th day of Christmas" present in January.

 

[Kobold Stew]

They're releasing zero D&D editions, since it's all "Just D&D" according to their video.

Because they say it doesn't make it true. They are incentivized to minimize the difference, because, as has been said, they are rightly concerned about splitting the fanbase.

The changes we have seen proposed in the playtest documents so far are greater than the changes from 3.0 and 3.5. And their claims of "backwards compatibility" have not been specific enough to say anything with confidence. We have, however, seen a fundamental re-imagining of how races work, and how feats and ASIs are to be implemented. What, then does this mean?

Here is what I think will be the case:
* adventures from 5e can still be run with 1D&D characters. (= "backwards compatibility")

* 5e characters will be able to be played in new 1D&D adventures (new stat blocks for monsters will still be able to be fought with old characters). Players technically will not need to buy new PHBs (= "backwards compatibility")

* It will be possible for players to have 5e characters alongside 1D&D characters in a party, and for most players, it will run smoothly. They will not be at the same power level, and 5e players will sometimes wish they had the extra toys that 1D&D will have, but they can coexist (= "backwards compatibility").

* Rule expansions for 5e (esp. Tasha, Xanathar, MotM) will not be 100% compatible with the new PHB. Once they release 1D&D, there will be a market for ever more rules expansions, to fill the gaps for players (esp. for race and subclass options). It will not be possible to mix-and-match player options from 5e and 1D&D, without at-the-table adjustments and house rules.

For each of the first three of these, I think it is possible with a straight face to say that 1D&D is "the same game", and they are backwards compatible. It is the fourth point, however, where I feel they cannot succeed in making it backwards compatible, nor do they want to. They have a fiscal obligation to shareholders to continue to release new books, and the changes we have seen in the playtest appear to be premissed on changes that will leave a window for new subclass, feat, and race options for players. They also have a fiscal obligation to maintain this imprecision, so they can sell books in 2023.

It is also the fourth point that many players, particularly on these boards (based on what people discuss) care most about. If we hold out for backwards compatibility for all player options (something they have not said, again and again), we will be disappointed.

Do I know this? No -- no one does. But I have seen nothing that makes me think otherwise, and the result will still let them say they've fulfilled their promise. I will be happy if I am eventually shown to be mistaken.

 

[dave2008]

care to share your sources?

I'm pretty sure @UngeheuerLich was being sarcastic.

 

[dave2008]

The math isn't the only thing that matters. If you change the basic components of characters and rewrite the core books (including what I assume is a massive-rewrite of the Monster Manual), it's hard for anyone looking at it, especially newer players, to not see that as a new edition.

If MotM is a precedent (which it is supposed to be) then there will not be a massive rewrite of the Monster Manual. In fact, it could use a much bigger rewrite than it is likely to get, and that would still be 100% compatible.

 

[dave2008]

I'm talking about how they're portrayed in the lore write-ups, not the mechanics. We can't have humanoids portrayed as evil anymore, remember? Beyond that, culture is being drastically cut except in setting books, so what are they going to write about? Ohysical characteristics only? We may end up with a lore dearth similar to 4e's original MM.

Actually 4e had a good amount of lore. It often compared will to older editions. It just tended to be spread out more.

 

[mellored]

More powerful <---->over powered is a spectrum not the same thing.

Yes, there is a spectrum. But it goes from under powered <---->over powered.
And all the changes so far have pushed things towards the middle.

When excessive & unreasonable levels of risk insulation that might be called a moral hazard elsewhere gets stripped away it becomes justified in replacing the insulation with power. Without stripping the risk insulation some changes become.... Bewildering

I'm not entirely sure what your trying to say here.

But the death save rules hasn't changed.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Actually 4e had a good amount of lore. It often compared will to older editions. It just tended to be spread out more.

In general over the course of the edition,, yes.. but the 4e MM sure didn't.

 

[Corinnguard]

Can't say I pay much attention to the lore. But culture (background) and race are kind of 2 different things now. That allows for more combinations, which is a good thing IMO. I can more easily make goblins wizards and tiefling barbarians.

Still don't see why the monster manual needs to change. The stereotypical sneaky evil goblin works just fine.

But I was more commenting on power creep. Which I just don't see. It looks more balanced, not less.

Culture and background aren't the same thing. Culture is the society you grew up in (ex. Mountain Dwarf, Hill Dwarf, Deep Dwarf, etc.). Background is the job you worked in prior to becoming an adventurer. Now some cultures and backgrounds can compliment one another. You could have grown up as part of a caravan culture, traveling from city to city while never really settling down and learned the ways of the merchant background. You could also be a member of a culture and choose a background that don't really compliment one another.

It all depends on which race/background/class combo you pick.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Culture and background aren't the same thing. Culture is the society you grew up in (ex. Mountain Dwarf, Hill Dwarf, Deep Dwarf, etc.). Background is the job you worked in prior to becoming an adventurer. Now some cultures and backgrounds can compliment one another. You could have grown up as part of a caravan culture, traveling from city to city while never really settling down and learned the ways of the merchant background. You could also be a member of a culture and choose a background that don't really compliment one another.

It all depends on which race/background/class combo you pick.

Welcome to Level Up.

 

[Corinnguard]

Welcome to Level Up.

Exactly. Combos in Level Up involve heritage (who your parents are), culture (the society you grew up in), background (the job you had before you became an adventurer), destiny (your goal as an adventurer), class and subclass.

In general over the course of the edition,, yes.. but the 4e MM sure didn't.

The 4e MM was a little too crunchy. Monster entries need to be a cross of crunch and fluff for the DM to set up a challenging encounter for the players. The 5e MM and Level Up's Monstrous Menagerie do this.

 

[tetrasodium]

Yes, there is a spectrum. But it goes from under powered <---->over powered.
And all the changes so far have pushed things towards the middle.

I'm not entirely sure what your trying to say here.

But the death save rules hasn't changed.

If you think that 5e characters are under powered, I don't know how to bridge a disagreement that many light-years across.

 

[Maxperson]

Crawford said something like this number is their threshold for regular UA feedback. I don’t remember the source. I’d imagine they want similar for this. Not that they’re going to get it.

The UA used to be 70% and they gave up on even that number.

 

[Maxperson]

So if you are still playing through, say, Lost Mines of Phandelver but now your Ranger is better, I don't think most of us would see that as fundamentally a new experience. But you try and run 2014 PHB rules with a 4e adventure and see how that goes.

If the old adventures were made for weaker classes and you are playing stronger classes, then the adventures need to be tweaked or they will be too easy.

 

[Maxperson]

Switching from 4d6 damage to 2d6+7 is not charging the math.

Of course it is. 4 1's = 4, which is impossible to roll with 2d6+7. 4-24 =/= 9-19.

 

[Neonchameleon]

The books haven't been released. But a few playtest packets have. So I can go off those.

Let's see. Where's the power creep in the playtest? Oh, right. Everywhere.

Everywhere that isn't already overpowered. The overpowered stuff took nerfs. To take

• Great Weapon Master gained +1 to your Str and replaced the -5 to hit/+10 to damage with +Prof damage 1/round
  • For average characters this is obviously a significant buff
  • For power-characters with an accuracy boost this is a significant nerf as you no longer offset the damage buff with the Barbarian's Reckless Attack or the Battlemaster's Precision Attack, power attacking all the time and reliably hitting
• Polearm Master gained +1 Str but became a 4th level feat and lost the ability to be used with spears or staffs. And the reaction attack stopped being an opportunity attack
  • For average polearm users this is obviously a significant buff
  • For power-using Vumans Polearm Master is at its most OP at level 1, so it's a non-trivial nerf in low level campaigns
  • For power using spear, shield, and duellist stance it's a significant nerf. Due to how bad Great Weapon Fighter is with 1d weapons Spear + Duelist does more damage after the butt-strike than Great Weapon with a glaive
  • For power using multi-featers this is a significant nerf as Polearm Master + Sentinel no longer lets you stop foes from moving ten feet away from you, leaving them flailing at thin air

I could go on. But in general the OP stuff is being hit with a nerf bat while the things no one took are being buffed.

 

[Blue]

Because they say it doesn't make it true. They are incentivized to minimize the difference, because, as has been said, they are rightly concerned about splitting the fanbase.

I was saying the same thing. You grabbed only part of the paragraph and that fractional quote makes it sound like I beleived them, as opposed to the whole thing that was dripping with sarcasm.

"They're releasing zero D&D editions, since it's all "Just D&D" according to their video. It's just the 50th Anniversay books being published in 2024 that is still the same game. As they say. Again and again. There is no new edition. Really. They promise. Buy books in 2023, it's all one happy edition."

Oh, and I also remember when they said on video both "compatible" and "fully compatible", not just "backwards compatible". It's like marketing is putting out one word (which will preserve the book sales prior to 2024 and not inflame the fanbase) but the dev team playtests are doing a half edition (for some value of half) shift.

 

[MockingBird]

All I care about is will I be able to run all the published 5e adventures I have with no problems. If it doesn't look like I can by 2024 then I'm staying with 5e. So far it looks like a non issue. Time will tell though.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Exactly. Combos in Level Up involve heritage (who your parents are), culture (the society you grew up in), background (the job you had before you became an adventurer), destiny (your goal as an adventurer), class and subclass.

The 4e MM was a little too crunchy. Monster entries need to be a cross of crunch and fluff for the DM to set up a challenging encounter for the players. The 5e MM and Level Up's Monstrous Menagerie do this.

That all depends on what you personally find inspiring. I've opened the 5e MM at random and turned up the page on Gargoyles (p140) and found the matching 4e MM page.

What do I get from 5e? Five paragraphs an indent and a statblock:

• The paragraphs:
  • A basic description
  • One saying that they are animate stone
  • One saying they have a deadly reputation
  • One saying they are cruel servants (on re-reading there are two just only a little is marked in bold)
  • One line and a half that belongs in the statblock saying they don't need to eat drink, breathe, or sleep
• A section on their link to Ogremoch
• A statblock where there are only a couple of differences between it and an oversized bear
  • It can fly
  • You do half damage if you hit it with normal weapons and shouldn't try to petrify or poison it (but for some reason the stone doesn't e.g. resist fire any better than flesh)
  • It disguises itself as stone

Honestly it reads to me as if the authors were paid by the word. In particular you do not need two paragraphs to say that gargoyles are cruel servants when you also say that gargoyles delight in creating terror and causing pain.

Meanwhile I look at the 4e one and I see about as much and at least for me it's far more inspiring. Three general sections, not one but two statblocks, and two tactics sections.

• An introductory paragraph
• A section of Gargoyle Lore with an appropriate difficulty check
• A section on encounter groups, giving you a suggestion as to who they are likely to work with that you can just drop into play
• Two different statblocks - one for your standard gargoyle and one for a higher level one
• A distinctive special ability with two signature abilities
  • The ability to turn to stone as a standard action giving it DR 25/All, regeneration, and tremorsense (and that it leaves as a minor action)
  • A flyby attack which recharges after it turns to stone
  • (Oh, and it can fly and is immune to petrification)

With that statblock the tactics section is almost redundant. It is on its own a memorable encounter with the gargoyles turning into stone and even if you know which they are they are still almost indestructible while stone. And the suggested encounters also help.

The next page I flicked through to in the 5e MM was Goblins - and even comparing the two is absolutely unfair as 5e is not in the same league as 4e here. I'll give 5e its due and say that when you compare it to any edition except 4e it looks good, with the basic Goblin having Nimble Escape while the Goblin Boss can also pull people into its way.

But in terms of inspiration 4e leaves 5e in the dust for me. We've the encounter groups of which there are half a dozen (and they would be so much better if instead of just saying "Encounter Group" they gave each one a name). But instead of two stat blocks - "Normal goblin" and "Boss Goblin" there are Goblin Cutter Minions, the Goblin Blackblade with a 1d6 Sneak Attack, the standard Goblin Warrior that likes to run around, the Goblin Sharpshooter (again with Sneak Attack), the Goblin Hexer (Goblins have their own type of mages with really cruel magics - and it's this that the 5e Underboss gets its signature ability from), the Goblin Skullcleaver who rages, and the Goblin Underboss who has a quasi-warlord ability and who has strong survival instincts.

Sure 5e spends an entire paragraph to say that goblins have Challenging Lairs while 4e spends about half a sentence saying "[goblin lairs are]... often easily defensible and often riddled with simple traps designed to snare or kill intruders".

But are you really telling me, hand on heart, that you can not see why I find the monster manual that gives goblins their own type of spellcasters (which is really useful and evocative fluff), gives most goblins extra damage for having combat advantage (again fluff made manifest), and gives me encounter groups I can use straight out of the book containing multiple types of monster (some using just goblins, some using goblins and other animals, and some where the goblins are getting bossed around by hobgoblins or bugbears - more fluff made manifest) is much better for setting up challenging encounters and inspiring than the one that just has blank prose, no tactical advice, and only "goblin" and "goblin boss" even if the 5e one spends literally eight lines saying "the strongest goblins are bosses but often ousted and some are replaced by hobgoblins and bugbears"?

I find that the 4e monster manual has more fluff than any other edition because it follows the rule "Show, don't tell". When you write the fluff as text boxes you are telling. When you write it into the encounter groups, and into the character's abilities you are showing. But telling is more basic and easier to understand.

 

[SkidAce]

Most of these arguments are just pedantic. Tasha's came out and the sky didn't fall. Monsters of the Multiverse, which very much is a revision of earlier 5e books, didn't fundamentally change anything. I suspect the same will happen here. Every time WotC announces anything, it's the end of the world according to a tiny but vocal segment. But the reality is that most of us barely notice.

I look at the stuff being proposed for OneD&D and...it's minor. It's all small potatoes. A tempest in a teapot. There's nothing there that is going to fundamentally change my tabletop. The one thing that might have done so, the changes to critical hits, were almost immediately withdrawn.

You don't think the potential changes to prepared casters is significant?