D&DNext: Playtest Review

[hogarth]

Monte Cook delivered once, which is more than Mearls can actually say.

Monte and a big group of other people delivered something pretty good (3E), and he by himself delivered a version of 3E that's worse than the original (Arcana Evolved). That doesn't speak very glowingly of his design abilities.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Monte and a big group of other people delivered something pretty good (3E), and he by himself delivered a version of 3E that's worse than the original (Arcana Evolved). That doesn't speak very glowingly of his design abilities.

Well, considering that one of the three co-designers is writing 13th Age and the other is Skip "Sorcerer Hatin'" Williams, I think it'd be fair to think that the whole is stronger than the sum of its parts.

[RobbyPants]

Maybe I should start filling the surveys with praise to speed the process along.

This is like a Democrat voting for Santorum in the Republican primaries. I agree with Maxus' assessment.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Do you think that we could stuff the suggestion box with troll responses? Stuff like:

A.) I strongly support magical item dailies because it allowed me as the DM to control the flow of adventures more.

B.) I really really liked the 4E skill challenge framework. With the saner numbers of 5E D&D it can be re-inserted with little modification.

C.) I'd love to see you as the 'face' of the default campaign setting, Mike Mearls-sama, like Elminister or Mordenkainen. ^.-

[Juton]

I think it would be better for the community to have 5e fail massively as opposed to just sucking mildly or never being released. If 5e fails it won't have real defenders, people won't want to emulate it, people won't remember it with nostalgia. If 5e fails massively it wipes the slate clean and allows the possibility that a new king can be put forth to reunite the disparate fantasy RPG fandom.

[RadiantPhoenix]

Do you think that we could stuff the suggestion box with troll responses? Stuff like:

A.) I strongly support magical item dailies because it allowed me as the DM to control the flow of adventures more.

B.) I really really liked the 4E skill challenge framework. With the saner numbers of 5E D&D it can be re-inserted with little modification.

C.) I'd love to see you as the 'face' of the default campaign setting, Mike Mearls-sama, like Elminister or Mordenkainen. ^.-

That last one is the only one I think is a good idea.

[hogarth]

Well, considering that one of the three co-designers is writing 13th Age and the other is Skip "Sorcerer Hatin'" Williams, I think it'd be fair to think that the whole is stronger than the sum of its parts.

Definitely. Which is why "we should totally get one of those parts for the next version of D&D" is a poor idea.

If 5e fails massively it wipes the slate clean and allows the possibility that a new king can be put forth to reunite the disparate fantasy RPG fandom.

I have no idea why you think "clean slate" D&D is a good idea, considering that 5E is apparently what you end up with when you start with a clean slate.

[Username17]

I have no idea why you think "clean slate" D&D is a good idea, considering that 5E is apparently what you end up with when you start with a clean slate.

D&DNext isn't a clean slate. It's 4e written by two of the main "Mr. 4e" fuckers. All the 4e design principles are basically there. "Exception Based Monsters", "We can do the math later", "People don't need to interact with the world outside MTP", and so on. I mean, it's 4e with a bunch of jack-ass-random elements taken from AD&D to try to sell it all to Grognards, but it's basically just another 4e reboot from a slightly culled list of people who brought us the last couple of 4e reboots.

The bottom line is that the people need to be cleared out of there. We're never going to get anything good as long as Mike Mearls and James Wyatt are in charge of anything. They are bad at their job and have extremely stupid ideas. Yes, we need a robust team with rules guys and idea guys and process guys on it. But first and foremost we need to have a team that doesn't have these useless assholes in leadership positions.

-Username17

[hogarth]

I have no idea why you think "clean slate" D&D is a good idea, considering that 5E is apparently what you end up with when you start with a clean slate.

D&DNext isn't a clean slate. It's 4e written by two of the main "Mr. 4e" fuckers. All the 4e design principles are basically there. "Exception Based Monsters", "We can do the math later", "People don't need to interact with the world outside MTP", and so on.

I've heard a lot of criticisms about 5E so far, but "5E is basically 4E" isn't one of them!

I'm having a hard time imagining a game that's less like 0E-4E D&D than 5E that still has any discernable D&D DNA at all.

[Previn]

I have no idea why you think "clean slate" D&D is a good idea, considering that 5E is apparently what you end up with when you start with a clean slate.

D&DNext isn't a clean slate. It's 4e written by two of the main "Mr. 4e" fuckers. All the 4e design principles are basically there. "Exception Based Monsters", "We can do the math later", "People don't need to interact with the world outside MTP", and so on.

I've heard a lot of criticisms about 5E so far, but "5E is basically 4E" isn't one of them!

I'm having a hard time imagining a game that's less like 0E-4E D&D than 5E that still has any discernable D&D DNA at all.

To paraphrase from Frank on the design goals of 4e from July of 2009:

- One player should roll all of the dice during the action.
- Your choices at first level should not be things you can outgrow.
- Your class should not be defined by your character at the moment.
- Monsters should not be integrated with the world and the mechanics.
- Players should not be integrated into the economy at all levels.
- Actions should not be decided in one or two rolls.
- Players should not be active participants and traders in the action economy.
- Proper tactics and advantageous situations should not push the RNG to the end.
- Doing damage to enemies should be the only choice.
- Players should go most if not all combats with healing in the middle of them.
- Effects should not have sharply distinct durations to distinguish one from another.
- Characters should have MMO combat roles defined for them.
- Characters should not be allowed to keep their starting stuff if they want to without hamstringing themselves or the party.
- Severe wounds should not be severe, and a wound's effect should be variable.
- Things should be by default very easy and players should normally win.
- Challenges should have no relationships to the world.
- The abilities and tactics one uses to best an opponent should always be the same.
- A character should be defined by their equipment.
- All actions should be useable with minimum thought on consequences or resource limits.
- The game should use squares and not acknowledge long distances.
- The players should not have abilities in their hands that affect the world and change the direction of the plot.
- Battles by default should end in one sided butchery.

Strike throughs represent things 5e isn't carrying through.

[Lago PARANOIA]

- Actions should not be decided in one or two rolls.
- Effects should not have sharply distinct durations to distinguish one from another.
- Characters should have MMO combat roles defined for them.
- All actions should be useable with minimum thought on consequences or resource limits.
- The game should use squares and not acknowledge long distances.

Explain yourself, Previn. I haven't looked at 5E since the first playtest packet, but from what I've seen the game actually does all of these.

Original thread in case people want to read it:
http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=105997

[ishy]

I actually don't understand how 5e is carrying this one through.
- Proper tactics and advantageous situations should not push the RNG to the end.

I guess you could say that 5e is never on any RNG so it can't be pushed off.

[Previn]

Explain yourself, Previn. I haven't looked at 5E since the first playtest packet, but from what I've seen the game actually does all of these.

Original thread in case people want to read it:
http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=105997

- Actions should not be decided in one or two rolls.
Actions are generally decided in one or two rolls, or the roll was completely pointless because the DM already decided if you were going to succeed or not and the roll was showmanship.

- Effects should not have sharply distinct durations to distinguish one from another.
4e effects are all basically some variation on 'around a turn' or 'until you make a 50% save' 5e is moving back into minute and hour durations and things that will last an entire combat for melee.

- Characters should have MMO combat roles defined for them.
They're not explicitly designing toward roles, even if it might be in the back of their minds. You don't have the marking mechanics and given how the numbers work, a rogue could be a passable 'tank.' Everyone can deal damage, you don't need a dedicated healer. I could see it argued that it's still in, but it really looks like they got the message that forcing it on people was actually bad wrong fun.

- All actions should be useable with minimum thought on consequences or resource limits.
Ok, this one is shifting back some with the more recent playtests. The intervening ones between the first and current saw no real management besides spells. Right now the worst offender for having to manage resources are casters who basically get screwed on spells per day. Fighters spam moves until they're out of dice and then recharge/use/recharge/use.

- The game should use squares and not acknowledge long distances.
They moved out of measuring in squares and back to feet, and they having plenty of stuff that goes more than 100' which was ultra rare in 4e where a longbow was close to the ultimate weapon. Heck in the 5e playtest darts go out to 120'. Lots of spells go out to 100', though it's true they don't have the 400' +40' level like 3.x, I'm not sure that's a bad thing in the long run. Both because it helps keep archers more relevant, and I'm not sure if enough encounters really take advantage of 300'+ ranges.

[Previn]

I actually don't understand how 5e is carrying this one through.
- Proper tactics and advantageous situations should not push the RNG to the end.

I guess you could say that 5e is never on any RNG so it can't be pushed off.

It is a completely bjorked rng, so it doesn't work in any direction mechanically, despite the intention, but it is clearly the intention that there is a rng that you don't fall off of (capped stats, no skills, no bonuses EVAH). That was a goal of 4e too, they just took a different approach and railroaded you to being where they wanted you (and feat taxed you when they screwed up).

[Voss]

I don't know about that. There does seem to be a fairly predictable range of numbers, but it gets a bit silly, and it quite easy to break the RNG. Based on the current playtest docs.

PC spell DCs go from around +5 to around +10 (7 to 12 for illusionists). While stat bonuses vary from -5 to +8 (with asmodeus having a +10 to charisma checks as an extreme outlier, and Int 1 creatures forming the bottom of the negatives, though this isn't an outlier, but a standard thing with beast type critters). Although no current spells target int, any effect that does is pretty much an auto-win against beasts.

Even something simple like hold person against a bugbear is +0 vs DC 16, using reasonable starting numbers, that is 70% failure rate before even trying to break the game- they're starting at failing end of the RNG, and it wouldn't take much at all to push them off. With mearls feat=ability bonus system, at level 4, that becomes DC 17, Phantasmal force from an illusionist pushes it to DC 19.

Attacks are pretty similar- monster AC ranges from 8 to 18 (with 12-14 being most common). Basic attack bonus is +5 at level one and probably around +13 at level 20. If bless and prayer stack, add +2 (otherwise +1). A level 20 sword guy (of any class) is smacking asmodeus about on roughly a 4+, and monsters are still AC 13 or 14 well into the teens, where they can easily be hitting or 2s or 3s. The RNG is completely irrelevant at that stage. You can simply start skipping hit rolls and just go straight to damage. Twice, because there isn't any reason not to throw haste around.

Also, for breaking both more, see potion of heroism. +2 to attack and spell DCs. RNG: broken. For spellcasters, Robe of the archmagi adds +2 to magic attack rolls and another +2 to DCs. You are officially off the charts against many monsters. They have either 0% chance or possibly nat 20s to save.

Player AC's I don't even want to think about, because haste and shield alone can contribute a +4 bonus to AC. Granted, anything above a +1 bonus is pretty rare, but unless you are a moron and wear medium armor,
your base AC is going to hit 18 pretty quickly. +2 for a shield, and +1 for some sort of magic bonus. So AC 21. +4 for haste and shield (which can be cast out of action). another +1 for shield other if necessary. And this AC 26 is happen around level 6. At this stage, some things (demons, devils, death knights, dragons) need an 18+ to hit you. A black dragon gets all the way down to 17+. Asmodeus himself needs a 16+. Almost everything else: nat 20s or nothing.
And this is at level 6, with minimal effort. The RNG is not only completely fucked, but you do go off it quite easily.

But to make this even more fucked up, let's consider poor Asmodeus again. Hold monster from a level 10 wizard has an 18 DC (probably. Assume point buy, human, int 18 to start. With the feat trade thing, it might be 19, but those aren't in the current rules). Poor Azzy needs a 12+ to make this save cast by a wizard half his level. Against a wizard actually his level, it is DC 20 (since stats can't advance beyond 20). And consider that for a moment- 10 levels of advancement, and your save DC changes by... 2, and you have exactly 4 more spells, 1 each of levels 6-9.
But give those characters a potion of heroism and robe of the archmage, and wow. Asmodeus needs a 16+ or 18+ to break hold monster from some random wizard. 18+ or 20+ to break a damned illusion from an illusionist.

On the other hand, if he gets initiative, Azzy is going to throw a DC 20 hold person or trap the soul against anyone who isn't a cleric. And unless they've built their wisdom scores up, they're going to be rolling for 20s to not fail the encounter.

[tussock]

Cook, Tweet, and Williams had it easy with 3e. They had at least three years on the last design run, they had a thousand very experienced, active, and dedicated players to playtest/QA, they had a concrete set of guidelines about what they could and could not change (the famous sacred cows, taken from massive surveys about what the player-base liked), and they had a large and long-known set of complaints about AD&D that people wanted fixed.

That's three years to fix specified problems around an unchangeable baseline with thousands consistently checking your every change, while converting everything over from AD&D with only very minor changes. That's a simple engineering problem. A bugfix run on D&D. And it got a massive patch as soon as they could start selling it because it was still full of game-breaking bugs.

5e is trying to design a whole new game that brings together oldschool/casual/dropped players with 3e/PF players with 4e players and convince them it's all the same game under the hood. But design specs are super open-ended beyond that, and the playtest is highly informal with dodgy surveys and not at all like the massive QA process 3e used.


What Mearls is doing is harder. Much so. There's no base to work from, no list of problems to fix (just hurt feelings to sooth, no numbers to port over (because 4e changed everything), the player-base is strongly opposed about which things are foolish and which are gold), and no actual mechanical goals to achieve anyway.

It doesn't help that the man can't see that people's feelings about things are totally affected by the mechanics. He sees feelings are primary and mechanics just slapped on, because people did like Iron Heroes after all. At least for long enough to land him a full time job, not so much play the thing.

[Previn]

I don't know about that. There does seem to be a fairly predictable range of numbers, but it gets a bit silly, and it quite easy to break the RNG. Based on the current playtest docs.

Voss, you are entirely missing the point. It's not if they keep people on the RNG, it's if that was a design goal and if that design goal was in 4e as well.

What Mearls is doing is harder. Much so. There's no base to work from, no list of problems to fix (just hurt feelings to sooth, no numbers to port over (because 4e changed everything), the player-base is strongly opposed about which things are foolish and which are gold), and no actual mechanical goals to achieve anyway.

I actually don't think it is. It's more work, but I really don't think it's harder work. They also have a lot more mechanics and market research to draw from. They're not rewriting the core mechanic, they're still using classes, the same 6 stats, they have decades of material to draw from.

The problem is Mearls is just a bad designer. He doesn't have a vision, his mind changes weekly based on the latest internet survey. He is bad a math, having shown repeatedly that he cannot follow through on even the simplest checks to make sure a system works. He fails to follow through with an idea, either leaving it half finished, or tossing it out and rewriting it completely because it didn't work perfectly on the first sort-finished draft.

[Username17]

- Proper tactics and advantageous situations should not push the RNG to the end.

Not only is 5e following the same design guidelines here as 4e did, it's using the same methodology and failing in exactly the same way and for exactly the same reasons. In 4e, they decided to make a patch of ice or a locked door be an obstacle at all levels by putting a level-scaling factor onto both the PC and the DC, and then made all the additional bonuses bullshit small. That, they announced, meant that the "math just worked". In 5e, they decided to make a patch of ice or a locked door be an obstacle at all levels by setting the level scaling factor of the PC and the DC to zero, and then making all the additional bonuses bullshit small. That, they announced, meant that the "math just worked". It's just 4e where they decided to fill-in the +X/level factor with X == 0. That's it. That's as far as the rabbit hole goes. And obviously it fails for the same reason that 4e does, which is that firstly that's fucking retarded and secondly once you pick up five different +2 bonuses you scarcely give a shit about individually you're off the RNG in any case.

- Actions should not be decided in one or two rolls.

The basic "skill challenge" mechanic is that you make 6 die rolls and declare how many hits you get (not how they explain it, but that is what it is). The basic system for 5e to succeed at a difficult task is that you roll a d20 over and over again until you get an 18+ on the die and report how many rolls it took you to get there. That's different from skill challenges, but on average you're still rolling a d20 six times to open the door.

- All actions should be useable with minimum thought on consequences or resource limits.

I really screwed up in gauging their design goals at the time. the whole thing was so stupid and the characters so playable by die roll if that's what you wanted to do, that I thought that was the design goal. Turns out the reality was that they had a game that used complex resource management systems and scrapped the entire system (doing a half-ass port of three of the resource systems to make Tome of Battle), on the grounds that it didn't have Daily Power Attrition. Because apparently Vancian Magic was such a sacred cow that they had to scrap their draft entirely if it didn't do Vancian Magic.

So really what we're looking at with 4e is a design goal that the resource management system can and should be as fucking braindead as possible as long as it absolutely positively definitely has something which is at least nominally a daily power use limit that can be attritioned. And 5e is... basically doing exactly that. Minimal lip service is being paid to Vancian Magic, every other character decision could be made by rolling a die and it wouldn't change shit.

-Username17

[Previn]

The basic "skill challenge" mechanic is that you make 6 die rolls and declare how many hits you get (not how they explain it, but that is what it is). The basic system for 5e to succeed at a difficult task is that you roll a d20 over and over again until you get an 18+ on the die and report how many rolls it took you to get there. That's different from skill challenges, but on average you're still rolling a d20 six times to open the door.

I'm not quite sure that's the same design goal, even if the mechanics give the same output in the long run.

[Voss]

I don't know about that. There does seem to be a fairly predictable range of numbers, but it gets a bit silly, and it quite easy to break the RNG. Based on the current playtest docs.

Voss, you are entirely missing the point. It's not if they keep people on the RNG, it's if that was a design goal and if that design goal was in 4e as well.

That is a fairly ridiculous assertion, even in the face of their failings. I can't accept the idea that having the basic system actually work isn't a design goal. That player AC vs monster attacks is a completely failure by level 6 is a fucking absurdity. It isn't like the math falling apart at the upper levels that most people don't care about and barely ever reach (especially the made up god-tier that D&D didn't even really pursue before), but it falls apart completely a couple levels into the the level range that people actually enjoy. And not with the bullshit skill stuff either, but the fucking combat simulator that is the basis of the entire game. Even 4e combat more or less worked from levels 4-14. 5e combat seems to have a functional span of levels 2-4, and I'm not even sure about that.

@tussock- that is absurd. mearls & company could have had solid design goals as well. But they deliberately chose not to have a solid design doc and instead rely on player input. Because having the player base as a scapegoat for their failings was easier than designing a real system from the ground up. They can keep trying to import whatever random shit they are using this week from anywhere, and anything popular fulfills their requirements, regardless of how shitty it is. It is doomed to failure, but its loads easier than putting a real product together.

[hogarth]

Strike throughs represent things 5e isn't carrying through.

And almost all of those apply to 0E D&D as well.

Certainly, tossing out Barnum statements is a fun game! For example, a goldfish is:
-Not made out of stone.
-Not 1000' long
-Not a fighter jet.
-Not something you usually eat for lunch.

Therefore, 5E is basically like a goldfish.

[Previn]

That is a fairly ridiculous assertion, even in the face of their failings. I can't accept the idea that having the basic system actually work isn't a design goal.

Stop and think about what you just wrote. That's like saying having a lightblub that actually produces light is a design goal. It isn't. You don't have something that ridiculously obvious as a design goal. You have things like how much light it produces, or how much or little power it uses or things like that.

That player AC vs monster attacks is a completely failure by level 6 is a fucking absurdity. It isn't like the math falling apart at the upper levels that most people don't care about and barely ever reach (especially the made up god-tier that D&D didn't even really pursue before), but it falls apart completely a couple levels into the the level range that people actually enjoy. And not with the bullshit skill stuff either, but the fucking combat simulator that is the basis of the entire game. Even 4e combat more or less worked from levels 4-14. 5e combat seems to have a functional span of levels 2-4, and I'm not even sure about that.

We know the math doesn't work, we've know the math doesn't work, it's not even a remotely question that their math doesn't work. That has absolutely nothing to do with the design goal of wanting everyone to stay on the rng, besides showing their incompetence at reaching that goal.

[Voss]

That is a fairly ridiculous assertion, even in the face of their failings. I can't accept the idea that having the basic system actually work isn't a design goal.

Stop and think about what you just wrote. That's like saying having a lightblub that actually produces light is a design goal. It isn't. You don't have something that ridiculously obvious as a design goal. You have things like how much light it produces, or how much or little power it uses or things like that.

You've... never actually written design docs, have you?

Yes, if you are designing a light bulb, you do write 'produces light' on the design doc. You'll generally follow it up with how much and at what power cost, but the fundamentals do go down on paper.

Partly because a lot of companies like being obvious and completely clear about what they are spending money on, but also so it doesn't get mixed in with shit like blacklight bulbs, infrared projects or what-have-you.

[tussock]

Haven't they been clear that the math is something they'll "fix at the end", after they've got the flavour right? You know, because mechanics don't affect how people feel about the game because no one uses them anyway, or something.

So it's on the design doc, it's just at the end, just before fitting the text around the art around the text. Hell, at the same time, because changing a +1 to a +7 doesn't change the size of the paragraph or table. If 4e (and 2nd edition) says anything, it's that fixing the numbers is something you try to sell splatbooks with, so maybe it's even post-publication.

[CapnTthePirateG]

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx ... l/20130422

There is no way in hell this can possibly work.

So feats are supposed to be worth a +1 to an ability score. Classes are designed around just getting straight up +1s, and not feats. Feats are explicitly NOT going to give numerical bonuses, because that's what the +1 ability score is for. So either:

a)Feats give a grab bag of abilities. These abilities suck, because they are measured against a bonus which Mearls admits is useless half the time. If you are dumb and take these you fall off the RNG as the monsters are all designed to you having these numbers.

b)Feats give a grab bag of abilities which are awesome, and the +1s are a noob trap.

Most likely there will be a mixture of each.

Skills are still make shit up and thus have no purpose.

I really, really want this shit to be released so it can flop already and we can get competent design.