Zero Buzz on 5E...Is It Dead Out The Gate?

[Josh_Kablack]

Wow, making a melee attack with a burning torch does one point of damage. Which doesn't leave a whole lot of design space for unarmed damage or non-burning torches at the low end.

[Lokathor]

Wow, making a melee attack with a burning torch does one point of damage. Which doesn't leave a whole lot of design space for unarmed damage or non-burning torches at the low end.

I would like to think that they mean "it deals 1 fire damage [in addition to the 1d4 damage from the torch]", but they probably don't and I'll probably be very sad.

[Cyberzombie]

Apparently you are proficient in tools now.

Not sure where I stand on that. On one hand it opens up the "Exploration pillar of the game" with hard coded role protection, but on the other hand you can be proficient with playing cards so Fuck you Mearls.

They had that in the last playtest packet and it was stupid. Basically instead of having a disable device skill, and having that skill tell you it requires tools, they instead just have you be proficient in the tools which let you do disable device stuff. So now new players may not even know picking locks even exists if they don't look at the equipment and see what kinds of tools they can be proficient in.

I don't really see a point in it aside from just confusing people. It leads to questions like if Climbing is actually a skill or it's proficiency with a rope.

[Koumei]

Wow, making a melee attack with a burning torch does one point of damage. Which doesn't leave a whole lot of design space for unarmed damage or non-burning torches at the low end.

I would like to think that they mean "it deals 1 fire damage [in addition to the 1d4 damage from the torch]", but they probably don't and I'll probably be very sad.

My guess is that normally a punch deals 1 damage that has the descriptor of "physical" or "bludgeoning" or "living" or something. And an unlit torch deals 1 damage that is "bludgeoning" or "physical" or "wood" or something. And lighting the torch doesn't increase the damage, it just changes it to 1 point of "fire" damage.

[Josh_Kablack]

I would like to think that they mean "it deals 1 fire damage [in addition to the 1d4 damage from the torch]", but they probably don't and I'll probably be very sad.

My guess is that normally a punch deals 1 damage that has the descriptor of "physical" or "bludgeoning" or "living" or something. And an unlit torch deals 1 damage that is "bludgeoning" or "physical" or "wood" or something. And lighting the torch doesn't increase the damage, it just changes it to 1 point of "fire" damage.

Either of those would be sensible.

Neither is what the available text says.

What's the wager that the unavailable text doesn't change anything?

[Drolyt]

I will point out that there is one difference between Dragonball and Naruto which matters to a certain percentage of the population-- the art style. Some people will prefer one (Naruto*) over the other (Dragonball*)

(*disclaimer: this is my personal opinion, and while I think it is the correct one, others will likely disagree.)

edit: oh, the writing style too, I suppose. But that one's harder for me to opine on, since I never watched Dragonball because I thought the art was that lame.

Are we talking the manga or the anime adaptations? Both anime have really shitty animation, but DBZ is older and arguably worse. If we are talking the manga, then I'm not sure where you are coming from, I rather like Toriyama's art and find Kishimoto's pretty generic.

Besides, things aren't really better now. For every Attack on Titan or Trinity Blood there's a Evangelion or School Days.

I'm confused, which ones are supposed to be bad? Those are all very popular and Attack on Titan and Neon Genesis Evangelion are both critically acclaimed yet you are apparently using one of them as an example of shitty anime.

[Kaelik]

I'm confused, which ones are supposed to be bad? Those are all very popular and Attack on Titan and Neon Genesis Evangelion are both critically acclaimed yet you are apparently using one of them as an example of shitty anime.

Ignoring for the moment that in the last 3 pages he has explicitly stated many times which he meant was bad, I wouldn't throw a shit fit if someone was really calling either of those shit.

Critically acclaimed NGE has been, but also critically derided in mass as well. Certainly more than one person has gone on and on about how incredibly bullshit every single moment in NGE is and how completely not characters each entity is, and how they act either one note, like Shinji's father or with complete wild abandon as is required to force the plot hit all the bullshit allegory possible, like Shinji, Rei, and Yaslkajsdhflkjasdfg.

And Attack on Titan has really really cheap animation. So I could see someone rightly pointing that out, despite the plot being pretty damn good. And the characters are all pretty much just archetypes instead of people, and some people understandably don't like that, but...

[darkmaster]

I believe you are confusing two different threads. But, yes, NGE is the one I was calling shit. You can tell because I paired it with the entirely deplorable School Days. While I pared Attack on Titan with the really very engaging and interesting Trinity Blood. Which, by the way, is like a much more complex Trigun. Actually, it kind of feels like Trigun meets a prequel for Vampire Hunter D. It's- weird, but good.

[Lago PARANOIA]

and find Kishimoto's pretty generic.

I liked Kishimoto's artwork from the earlier chapters. It wasn't as polished and slick as his stuff from, oh, Rescue Sasuke Arc I onwards. But it was more dynamic and distinctive.

I don't know why he changed up his technique so much. I guess maybe to make it look more like the anime? It doesn't look awful or even mediocre but it lost a lot of the charm.

I like the guy on the whole, but Toriyama's artwork with characters that look like or almost like humans (so Tien but not Piccolo) is really hit-or-miss. Sometimes he can hit it out of the park with Chrono Trigger, other times his character designs just looks like crap. Like with the DQs that are not DQ8, 9, or 4. Unfortunately, for the post-Raditz Dragonball it was mostly miss IMO even though I liked stage 3 Frieza and all of Buu's designs a lot.

[Prak]

This shit--I hate this shit , it's never looked good to me.

This:

while it may be more generic, is at least attractive. Idiosyncratic is not a synonym for "good."

[Maxus]

Dragonball is older, really. It's from a time before the manga/anime art style was super-codified. Dragonball Z's art got generally more polished as time went on.

Sure, it maintains the style but at least the palette and some of technicall skill's been polished up.

And then you get into the early 90's, when you have stuff like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wLAmGMxSYQ (little distortion from the format)

And by the mid/late 90's, it's polished up a little more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVIDpfVBv18

So you know. Progression of a genre, I suppose.

[Prak]

It's the actual artistic style of DBZ I hate. The Kenshin style is much more bearable to me.

[AndreiChekov]

It's the actual artistic style of DBZ I hate. The Kenshin style is much more bearable to me.

Seconded. Even though I hate Naruto with a passion, I hate DBZ with a greater one.

[Drolyt]

I believe you are confusing two different threads. But, yes, NGE is the one I was calling shit. You can tell because I paired it with the entirely deplorable School Days. While I pared Attack on Titan with the really very engaging and interesting Trinity Blood. Which, by the way, is like a much more complex Trigun. Actually, it kind of feels like Trigun meets a prequel for Vampire Hunter D. It's- weird, but good.

Trinity Blood is pretty awesome, yes. As for School Days, I'm not very familiar with it, but it seems to be a quite popular multimedia franchise with a visual novel, light novels, manga, anime, and a concert film. At first glance it seems an odd choice as an example of crappy anime, especially when it is primarily a visual novel. Perhaps you could enlighten me as to what is so awful about it?

This shit--I hate this shit , it's never looked good to me.

Only the middle is Dragon Ball, and even that doesn't really look like the manga.

and find Kishimoto's pretty generic.

I liked Kishimoto's artwork from the earlier chapters. It wasn't as polished and slick as his stuff from, oh, Rescue Sasuke Arc I onwards. But it was more dynamic and distinctive.

I don't know why he changed up his technique so much. I guess maybe to make it look more like the anime? It doesn't look awful or even mediocre but it lost a lot of the charm.

I agree the earlier chapters look nicer, I would guess the change came about as Kishi worked to refine his drawing process. He isn't a bad artist, but most of what he puts out is bland and generic.

I like the guy on the whole, but Toriyama's artwork with characters that look like or almost like humans (so Tien but not Piccolo) is really hit-or-miss. Sometimes he can hit it out of the park with Chrono Trigger, other times his character designs just looks like crap. Like with the DQs that are not DQ8, 9, or 4. Unfortunately, for the post-Raditz Dragonball it was mostly miss IMO even though I liked stage 3 Frieza and all of Buu's designs a lot.

I agree that Toriyama has trouble drawing realistic humans, but I don't really see it as mostly miss post-Raditz. What characters in particular don't you like?

Dragonball is older, really. It's from a time before the manga/anime art style was super-codified. Dragonball Z's art got generally more polished as time went on.

Sure, it maintains the style but at least the palette and some of technicall skill's been polished up.

And then you get into the early 90's, when you have stuff like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wLAmGMxSYQ (little distortion from the format)

And by the mid/late 90's, it's polished up a little more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVIDpfVBv18

So you know. Progression of a genre, I suppose.

I think this is a mixture of economics and technology. Top quality hand drawn animation from decades ago stands up pretty well to modern animation because it isn't as limited by technology as live action special effects or purely computer generated animation. The problem is that that shit is expensive, which is a big part of why traditional animation has been mostly replaced by computer animation even though that isn't exactly cheap either. You simply cannot maintain the same quality standards for a show where you put out 24 minutes of animation every week for years on end that you can for a feature film, so you cut corners, which can mean things like reducing framerate, reusing frames, including less detail, and simply rushing things. All of this means that traditionally animated TV shows tended to be pretty crappy, although this wasn't universal. Computers changed all that. Although computers can help even top quality animation (see the CGI in Princess Mononoke for example) it really shines in helping cheap animation look less horrible. Examples include using programs like photoshop for coloring which can be much faster than coloring by hand* and tweening, where a computer automagically generates intermediate frames so you don't have to draw quite so many.

*Edit: In fact all major animation since Princess Mononoke uses this technique, called digital ink and paint. Basically scanning images to computers is a lot more efficient than using cels.

[darkmaster]

Here is a complete synopsis of the Shool Days anime.

[shadzar]

While that would be a good thing to do even for those of us that dislike this "damage type" kind of crap. It looks like a lit torch is the ONLY torch that can do damage. like the flask of oil can do damage, but neither of the lanterns can.

this is 1E level fuck up in descriptions and confusion. bet it is further described in chapter 7, which is hidden in a building on another street, in the office on the 72 floor, two blocks away from the dungeon you are using your torch or lantern in.

[OgreBattle]

Anime adoptions are going to look different from the manga they're based off of. Toriyama Akira's a really skilled artist with a great sense of paneling action scenes together and very precise with mechanical details.

His non Dragon Ball stuff is also a lot of fun, like doing covers for model kits:


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[Krusk]

Bets on quality?

http://www.codenamemorningstar.com/

Has anyone ever heard of Trapdoor technologies? have they done... anything? Their website appears to be non-existant. http://www.trapdoortechnologies.com/

[Scrivener]

Bets on quality?

http://www.codenamemorningstar.com/

Has anyone ever heard of Trapdoor technologies? have they done... anything? Their website appears to be non-existant. http://www.trapdoortechnologies.com/

Given WoTCs track record I expect less than nothing.

I still don't see how they couldn't push out a digital tabletop in 5 years. Anyone who believes that they will get a product, or that the product won't be replaced with a less functional version deserves to be disappointed.

[Previn]

Bets on quality?

http://www.codenamemorningstar.com/

Has anyone ever heard of Trapdoor technologies? have they done... anything? Their website appears to be non-existant. http://www.trapdoortechnologies.com/

Well, their flagship product is apparently a book reader for Android that's had something like less than 50 downloads and hasn't been updated since 2012. They've done some book publishing, I think? In fact, it looks like they only thing they have any experience in is distributing pdfs... poorly.

Company size is listed as 1-10 on Linkedin, which is the minimum choice, so I wouldn't be surprised if it really is 1-2 guys.

Looks like either a project that's going to crash and burn, or a really crappy 'enhanced' pdf job. I'm guessing that one of the dudes is a friend with someone in the D&D branch at WotC because they look entirely like a fly by night company.

[shadzar]

. http://www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx ... x/20140612 .

Full Metal Alchemist & Dragons huh?

Here they go overusing a thesaurus again and trying to follow anime naming and word use to change the alteration school to Edward Elric's Transmutation...

and Divination still should NOT be a school of magic, because most of the schools need parts of it to perform their stuff! Divination is to magic as learning to count is to math! Thus why Read Magic was always part of the divination "school".

At least they kept the definitions from 2nd edition of the schools.

not sure how those spell shapes are going to go over with many people that don't want that stupid math involved, unless they just make some Warhammer templates to use on the HeroClix combat grid. but the "Cone" is written as if it were just a triangle....


too bad there isnt any explanation of any of the spells....

CRAP, I can't figure out how to make the pic smaller so hope it isnt stretching the page for anyone else. (fixed, thanks)

[virgil]

Here they go overusing a thesaurus again and trying to follow anime naming and word use to change the alteration school to Edward Elric's Transmutation...

Are you retarded? It's been Transmutation since 3rd edition, which predates FMA. And Transmuter has been the title for specialists since well before 3E, so making their name match the school of magic is perfectly rational.

[Korwin]

Dont you know there is no D&D after AD&D?

[deaddmwalking]

CRAP, I can't figure out how to make the pic smaller so hope it isnt stretching the page for anyone else.

Spoiler

[virgil]

Dont you know there is no D&D after AD&D?

That still doesn't make the "damn weeaboo thesaurus" accusation any less stupid. You don't need high-falutin' book smarts to the school of magic match the name of its own specialist. Even then, negging anyone involved in D&D for use of synonyms is just...what? This is a game that included four distinct variations on the guisarme along with its plethora of polearms and the random harlot table.