5e isnt even D&D....

[Previn]

I'm bored, full Online Playtest Agreement text spoiled for space.

WIZARDS OF THE COAST
D&D NEXT PLAYTEST AGREEMENT
UPDATED April 3, 2012
PLEASE READ CAREFULLY AND IN ITS ENTIRETY. Welcome and thank you for participating in the Wizards of the Coast
LLC (“Wizards”) D&D Next playtest. While we typically do not accept Feedback (defined below), in certain instances we
look to you, as part of our community, to provide input on specific products. By participating as a D&D Next playtester
(whether or not you provide Feedback to Wizards), you acknowledge and agree that in consideration for being a D&D
Next playtester, you agree to be bound by the terms of this Online Playtest Agreement (the “OPTA”) as well as Wizards’
Code of Conduct

(http://www.wizards.com/Company/About.as ... enu=Awards), Privacy Policy
(http://www.wizards.com/Company/About.as ... enu=Awards) and Terms of Use
(http://www.wizards.com/Company/About.as ... enu=Awards.

Unless stated otherwise, Wizards may modify this OPTA at any time and the changes will become effective upon posting
to the Wizards website located at www.dndnext.com. If you have participated in the D&D Next playtesting under
preexisting OPTAs, this OPTA supersedes those terms and conditions and is effective as of the updated date above. Your
continued participation in the D&D Next Playtesting constitutes your acceptance of this updated OPTA.

1. Eligibility. To be eligible to be a D&D Next playtester, you must have a current and valid Wizards.com Account.

2. Playtest Materials. As part of your participation as a D&D Next playtester, you may receive, download from the
official Wizards of the Coast D&D Next web site, or otherwise have access to proprietary Wizards intellectual property
(including physical and online game related products and materials) (“Playtest Materials”). Wizards grants you a limited,
nonUexclusive, nonUtransferable, nonUassignable license for your personal use of such Playtest Materials solely for the
purposes of playtesting the Playtest Materials and providing Feedback to Wizards regarding the same. Any use of the
Playtest Materials not expressly permitted under this OPTA is strictly prohibited and Wizards may, in its sole discretion,
revoke this license at anytime and for any reason with no liability to you as a result.

3. Feedback. As part of your participation as a D&D Next playtester, you may provide Wizards with comments,
feedback, thoughts, questions, ideas and suggestions regarding the Playtest Materials via the means indicated by
Wizards including, posting information on any website forums identified by Wizards for such purposes (“Forums”) or via
email and responding to certain surveys provided to you from time to time (individually and collectively, “Feedback”).
You are solely responsible for any and all Feedback you provide and such Feedback will not violate the intellectual
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and Code of Conduct.

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trademarks and copyrights, and (d) any and all derivatives of the foregoing as defined by the Copyright Act (17 U.S.C.
§101) and applicable case law. Additionally, any and all Feedback submitted by you to Wizards via any medium is
deemed a workUmadeUfor hire as defined in the Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. §201) and owned by Wizards. To the extent
necessary, you hereby convey, transfer and assign all rights in and to the same and disclaim any and all proprietary and
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registering any of its right, title and interest in or to the above. If you are unavailable, or fail to execute such documents
when requested to do so for any reason, Wizards may execute the aforementioned documents as your attorney in fact,
which appointment will be irrevocable for this sole purpose.

5. Confidentiality. As part of your participation as a D&D Next playtester, you will receive Playtest Materials that
are proprietary and highly confidential to Wizards. You agree not to copy, excerpt, distribute (either in physical or digital
format), publish, display, disseminate, release and/or transmit, in whole or in part, or create derivative materials from any Playtest Materials provided to you. You further agree that you will not use the Playtest Materials for your own
benefit (other than to participate in the online playtest) or to the benefit of any third party. Notwithstanding the
foregoing, you may publicly discuss your thoughts regarding the D&D Next Playtest Materials and your playtesting
experience.

If you have previously executed a Nondisclosure Agreement with Wizards related to D&D Next playtesting, the terms
and conditions of that NDA are still effective regarding the content of Playtest Materials, however, Wizards releases you
from any and all confidentiality requirements related to your thoughts regarding the D&D Next Playtest Materials and
your playtesting experience.

Again, thank you for participating as a D&D Next playtester

[hogarth]

OK, but what was the response to the question? That seems actually important.

The (very short) interview is linked above, but the answer was "yes, for playtest purposes we erred on the side of making the fighter pretty strong, but we might end up scaling back everyone's HP and damage a bit".

[ishy]

OK, but what was the response to the question? That seems actually important.

Well the interview link was mentioned twice above but here:
http://www.koboldquarterly.com/k/front-page12578.php

That’s a great question, because it points to a big part of the playtest process. The fighter leans on the basic math of the game a fair bit—how hard should a strong guy with a big weapon hit, stuff like that. The math is still a bit up in the air, and I suspect that we’ll drop both hit point and damage numbers down to keep things easy to work with at the table.

With all that in mind, getting the feel right is a big part of the playtest. We want to see if a fighter unleashing big damage numbers feels right, or should fighters be more durable, and so on. With the fighter, we’re erring on the side of powerful out of the gate.

[Voss]

Ah, well, a lot of things are blocked by my employer's filters (though not the den, because their blocker is an incoherent piece of shit)

But... that is an absolutely fabulous stupid answer. Haven't set a final balance point is almost coherent, but reducing hit points and damage doesn't make anything _easier_. Or even address the problem in any meaningful way. Whether its n vs x or n-5 vs x-1 is irrelevant, as long as you are dealing with a relatively fixed range of integers. The only way to make things _easier_ is if the damage calculation currently involves a lot of tiny bullshit modifiers like 3rd or 4th, and you have to keep track of 3x+y+z+c+f

And in fact reducing _both_ potentially changes nothing at all!

[CapnTthePirateG]

The links for the playtest are apparently bad or their servers can't handle all the requests. Yay.

[Voss]

The links for the playtest are apparently bad or their servers can't handle all the requests. Yay.

Yep. My email finally showed up (only an hour so after they said it would) and the link is just spinning.

Rather stupid, since they were sending them out in waves based on when people signed up for the playtest to avoid that very issue.

And yes, the email specifically states that you can't playtest with anyone who isn't signed up for the playtest. Which is awesome, because you certainly don't want any filthy outsiders getting their different views mixed in with the yesmen.

[shadzar]

yeah cause that will work. people sign up over a month time at different times, and the email batches will solve people trying to download from the special link all at the same time. it would have been better to stagger the emails over the course of a week or so to prevent bottleneck, since everyone knew to expect it today, or to have anough servers to handle the load. of course WotC knows nothing about computers, so the failure is to be expected.

[malak]

failure is to be expected.

A property that WotC shares with shadzar posts.

[sake]

https://www.rapidshare.com/#!download|2 ... t.zip|5738

Download link for anyone who didn't get their email thingie or just plain didn't want to deal with the sign-up and/or ToS bullshit.

Please delete me if posting links like this isn't kosher here.

[ishy]

It isn't kosher to post non working links at least, try this:

https://www.rapidshare.com/#%21download ... zip%7c5738

[Lago PARANOIA]

I'm going to dust off my old WotC account and download the playtest over the weekend.

However, considering how close they are to a release date, the playtest better be shiny platinum-plated sex. Or at least polished silver. Because if this shit sucks, there's not enough time to turn back the clock.

[Prak]

Because it is the gaming den and we need more fighter vs wizard posts:

The kobold playtesters found that D&D Next fighters kick a lot of ass. No, really, massive damage with that two-handed great flail, to the point where the 1st-level fighter is sort of scary on a charge, taking down minotaurs. Are you worried the fighter is (for once) overpowered?

I guess it is bad if the fighter can actually kill stuff? I mean the fighter can actually kill minotaurs on a charge! Overpowered!

It sounds like Fighters are taking down Minotaurs at first level, which is a problem if Minotaurs are CR 4 or more.

[ishy]

I'm going to dust off my old WotC account and download the playtest over the weekend.

However, considering how close they are to a release date, the playtest better be shiny platinum-plated sex. Or at least polished silver. Because if this shit sucks, there's not enough time to turn back the clock.

What release date? And don't reply with a fan guestimate please, because that would only make you sound retarded.

[Voss]

It isn't kosher to post non working links at least, try this:

https://www.rapidshare.com/#%21download ... zip%7c5738

Your link generates a 'file not found' response

[Wrathzog]

I'll have to get at this stuff when I get home. I'm pretty excited about this.
Also, are we going to do analysis on DANDDNEXT here or should we do this in another thread?

[Voss]

Another thread is probably best. A real analysis has nothing to do with insane, incoherent rantings about how something is or isn't D&D. It should involve things like logic, reason and math.

[Lago PARANOIA]

What release date? And don't reply with a fan guestimate please, because that would only make you sound retarded.

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx ... l/20120109

We have begun obtaining feedback from a limited Friends & Family playtest consisting of internal employees and their gaming groups and soon we will be expanding that group to consist of members from our existing body of playtesters. Then at the D&D Experience convention in late January, Wizards of the Coast will conduct a special playtest of ideas currently in development. The D&D Experience will be moving to Gen Con in 2013, so as a convention special this year, we will be offering show attendees a first-look at a draft of the new set of rules.

Note: This was the boilerplate press release for D&D Experience of this year. As in January 2012. So don't get confused by the 'we will be offering show attendees a first-look at a draft of the new set of rules'.

Gen Con Indy 2013 August 15–18, 2013

Now, since D&D Experience is still technically a playtest rather than a release date, they could totally go 'lol still not finished'. But that's a hard cap on the date for a late beta unless WotC is even more incompetent than I imagined. It's one thing to snow D&D Experience fans because only sperglords like yours truly have even heard of it. But you can't snow Gen Con attendees. If D&D 5E doesn't have a more-or-less finished product by Gen Con 2013, it will join the ranks of Legendary Announcement Fail like Bill Gates demoing Windows 98 that crashed on CNN.

So. That gives then about 14 months to collect playtest data, refine it, and make it good. Unless they've somehow hit the magic number of mechanics that made the product surprisingly good except for the fail points that we've seen OR 5E D&D rehashes a previous system that's just not enough time to significantly polish the blatant turds we've seen.

[virgil]

[quote="D&DNext Playtest Notes]Invisible

• The creature is impossible to see. For the purposes of hiding, it is heavily obscured. The creature can still be detected by the noise it makes, the tracks it leaves, or the shadow it casts.[/quote]Bolded for emphasis. That is really weird.

[Maxus]

[quote="D&DNext Playtest Notes]Invisible

• The creature is impossible to see. For the purposes of hiding, it is heavily obscured. The creature can still be detected by the noise it makes, the tracks it leaves, or the shadow it casts.

Bolded for emphasis. That is really weird.[/quote]

Probably from the Hobbit.

Which is definitely against the point of being invisible. Well, badlighting would help, but...

[ishy]

It isn't kosher to post non working links at least, try this:

https://www.rapidshare.com/#%21download ... zip%7c5738

Your link generates a 'file not found' response

Wasn't my link, it was sake's -
But it works fine here.

[Username17]

[quote="D&DNext Playtest Notes]Invisible

• The creature is impossible to see. For the purposes of hiding, it is heavily obscured. The creature can still be detected by the noise it makes, the tracks it leaves, or the shadow it casts.

Bolded for emphasis. That is really weird.

Probably from the Hobbit.

Which is definitely against the point of being invisible. Well, badlighting would help, but...[/quote]

Also "The Shadow". Invisibility where you still cast a shadow is incredibly common in fiction.

-Username17

[tussock]

Invisible things cast a shadow in 3e too, you just couldn't see it.

[ishy]

Invisible things cast a shadow in 3e too, you just couldn't see it.

But could you hide in it as a shadowdancer?!

[tussock]

I'm pretty sure there's always "some sort of shadow" within 10' of the shadowdancer.

[RobbyPants]

Also "The Shadow". Invisibility where you still cast a shadow is incredibly common in fiction.

-Username17

Yeah, this works really well if you define your invisibility as affecting the minds of the observers rather than making light pass around the subject. Although, this sort of invisibility would explicitly grant a save.