Monte Cook leaving 5E

[koz]

I'm sure it helps that Richard Garfield has a PhD in Combinatorial Mathematics. But regardless of that, the amount of analysis and testing that the Magic guys do on their game is pretty amazing. If you read Mark Rosewater's regular column on the website he often talks about how they generate psychographic profiles of players, procedurally plan out their sets using a proven skeleton, and how the way they design and build sets has evolved over the years.

MtG is leagues ahead of D&D when it comes to analysing how their game works for one reason: tournaments. Whilst coming up with a broken Feat combo in D&D may earn you bragging rights or a thread on your favourite message board, coming up with something gamebreaking in MtG gets you real Ca$h Money. So there's a real incentive for people to abuse the system for fun and profit, and boy do they go for it.

Now, Wizards is so good at hammering out the math because they long ago started hiring the people who were best at breaking the game from off the Pro Tour to work in R&D. Seriously, the Development Team staff list reads like a Magic Hall of Fame, and these are all people that are used to testing the game to destruction.

Would this work for D&D? Without the product bringing in the big bucks and the accompanying tournament structure I'm dubious, however it's possible it could ride on Magic's coat tails and employ some of the same staff.

Except that the designers in MtG are just as retarded. That MaRo you just praised to the skies is the author of the 'creatures FOREVA' philosophy that has made every set from Lorwyn onwards worse than the last. Tom LaPille (now happily among fellow tards in DnD-division) is the worst thing to have happened to ANY competitive format EVER. The fact they plan at all and have to deliver a playable product at all is the only thing that makes them better than DnD RnD - and that's not saying an awful lot.

The fact is, they're just as vulnerable to the Mike Mearls 'throw out a lot of bullshit to explain crap' nonsense, and MtG is degenerating too - it's just that it's happening more slowly and player turnover and a lack of knowledge of past formats keeps people from realizing how shitty it's becoming.

[Stubbazubba]

Living XXX and Pathfinder society can substitute for this to an extent, showing up what becomes problematic in play ... the only problem is that D&D can't so smoothly be retroactively patched, 4e tried it and alienated a lot of players in the process.

How about if 5e had two sets of rules? The Living Rules, heavily patched and played in Living Faerun, and the core rules with errata only. Maybe condense the living rules occasionally and publish the changes at the time relative to core in an Unearthed Arcana book.

I think a better idea would be to host the thing online. Really expand the functionality of the VTT so as to include all the updated rules and what-not, and make it subscription-based. Or maybe even just pay-per-patch or something. If there wasn't such a high barrier to entry for the genre ($150 for the three core rulebooks is too daunting to a 13-year-old, and even a PHB at $50 is directly competing with video games which are arguably a much better value), you could get a lot of new blood quickly, and implement rules changes easier.

[Koumei]

"Raise Dead" spells, probably. It has a costly component, so a PC cleric might not want to waste precious gemeralds on bringing back other party members.

Oh right, yeah, raises as in Raise Dead.

[Red_Rob]

That MaRo you just praised to the skies is the author of the 'creatures FOREVA' philosophy that has made every set from Lorwyn onwards worse than the last. Tom LaPille (now happily among fellow tards in DnD-division) is the worst thing to have happened to ANY competitive format EVER. The fact they plan at all and have to deliver a playable product at all is the only thing that makes them better than DnD RnD - and that's not saying an awful lot.

Actually, the focus on powerful, useable creatures over i-win control spells comes from their market research. Most people would rather the game was decided through creature combat than spell combos, so that's the way they're pushing it.

You can say they're dumbing down to meet the mass market, but as all indications are that Magic is more popular than ever it sure seems to be working.

[koz]

That MaRo you just praised to the skies is the author of the 'creatures FOREVA' philosophy that has made every set from Lorwyn onwards worse than the last. Tom LaPille (now happily among fellow tards in DnD-division) is the worst thing to have happened to ANY competitive format EVER. The fact they plan at all and have to deliver a playable product at all is the only thing that makes them better than DnD RnD - and that's not saying an awful lot.

Actually, the focus on powerful, useable creatures over i-win control spells comes from their market research. Most people would rather the game was decided through creature combat than spell combos, so that's the way they're pushing it.

You can say they're dumbing down to meet the mass market, but as all indications are that Magic is more popular than ever it sure seems to be working.

Given that I've never seen any of this research except via MaRo's mouth, and that he's stated, on numerous occasions, that he wants creatures to be at the heart of MtG, and that dudes-on-dudes are his ideal game... I find the idea that most people want this both hard to believe and a little hard to prove. If this is what they really want... well, WotC hasn't been getting money from me for a while now, so I don't see that changing.

[shadzar]

MtG is leagues ahead of D&D when it comes to analysing how their game works for one reason: tournaments.

Living XXX and Pathfinder society can substitute for this to an extent, showing up what becomes problematic in play ... the only problem is that D&D can't so smoothly be retroactively patched, 4e tried it and alienated a lot of players in the process.

How about if 5e had two sets of rules? The Living Rules, heavily patched and played in Living Faerun, and the core rules with errata only. Maybe condense the living rules occasionally and publish the changes at the time relative to core in an Unearthed Arcana book.

i have said it before and i will say it again. Frank Mentzer is a good designer, but no matter what D&D should have no tournament environment.

it isnt intended for competitive play.

the whole idea behind this comes form conventions in the first place, and old wargame mentality.

the best thing to do for conventions is not muddle around with prizes or the likes or needing a winner, but to have things like the small adventures like D&D Gamesdays had. everyone got to keep their mini for it, the DM got to keep the adventure, and in more cases i played the other minis were partially distributed to the players. i recall getting a hellcat like that.

you got to play and see how the game plays, plus got a little something as incentive to want more D&D. its the free sample before getting you hooked.

the Living nonsense doesnt work that well either. you cant keep everyone at the same pace.. RPGA or WPN needs to have just a way to get D&D into stores without bothering with trying to make a sale until they have a customer to sell to. MtG does this with drafts and all other sorts of methods depending on the store you go to. it doesnt always involved recording records of wins or losses for some national ranking, but even non-standard (not 2.0 but the English word standard) tournaments can do what it wants, charge for space and someone to run it out, and give a prize.

what does D&D have like this?

MtG can choke up a $4 booster pack loss pretty easy. DDM couldnt choke up a $15 booster pack as easily, nor could it a book. so what does D&D have to incentivize playing in stores? nothing. D&D is a slow play game and slow purchase game after the initial core is out. miniatures was the only consumable people needed for it ever (other than paper and pencils or replacement dice), and the miniatures were not done in the way a consumer would buy them. too damn expensive and too much crap nobody wanted due to the minis game, and too hard to get the things you DID want, because they were the best things FOR the minis game....and random minis... meh

dump the idea of tournaments and such and make ONE game. they have enough trouble doing this already. they can find gimmicks for in-store play and continued purchasing of some sort of accessory later.

what they really should do is go back to old-school plastic minis. little things that arent painted but mass produced out of that child-safe plastic, like green army men (goblins and orcs), red indians (kobolds), yellow cowboys (mskeletons, mumies, zombies, etc)...back when board games did it right. those would be so cheap they could then worry about special minis or jsut painted versions as prizes, but bag em up like the green army men for little to nothing and cost a decent price.

another problem is the nature of D&D, that everyone else already has made some of the best stuff for RPG accessories, there is little left for D&D makers to make.

they should jsut try to make a single working game.

[Aryxbez]

Because I prefer turn-based, duh.

Well then the reason for your implied declaration of calling such people "idiots" doesn't really hold up just on opinion now does it? As yes can say most people who play games are idiots, and that tends to be true, same is said for those that are turn based fans. Even right now, Fallout fans have raged for years to have games basically just like their first two titles, and ideas they suggest is basically making the same game over again.

TTRPG and PNP games can not be realtime. you would need a DM for each player, which essentially is what computer games have and each individual computer is part or the DM group for those playing.

I'm open to the idea that maybe my post wasn't clear, so pardon in regards to any of it being vague. However Shadzar, if you actually had read my post and the ones following it that it had related to, then you know that we were talking in regards to video games. As yes, stating the obvious, quite true it'd be chaotic to try and do that, kinda why the aspect of turns and rounds exist in D&D combat and other RPG's.

Also, to any consolation PhoneLobster, I do enjoy some turn based games, like the Fire Emblem series. Also, Wasteland 2 Kickstarter was more than successfully raised its funds to exist, so that's something to look forward to in the future. In fact, if felt your thoughts on game design would be put to any use, could go to their respective forums to suggest ideas, and so forth.

Real time isn't bad, but for Dnd, which is turn based, why not just keep it turn based.? The last time they did that was DnD Tactics for the PSP.

I guess because developers feel to just get to the heart of what people feel D&D is about. In a video game format, suppose the whole dungeon delving to murder monsters is an easy enough endeavor to do. Especially nowadays that people like MMO-like gameplay for some reason, I feel it ruins RPG's as whole (Dragon Age, White Knight Chronicles, Xenoblade etc).

[OgreBattle]

Especially nowadays that people like MMO-like gameplay for some reason, I feel it ruins RPG's as whole (Dragon Age, White Knight Chronicles, Xenoblade etc).

I really dislike auto-attack for a game where I just control one dude, makes me feel like I'm playing starcraft.

[CapnTthePirateG]

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx ... l/20120430

I honestly don't know what to make of this. So now the fighter is best at fighting (whatever that means), is still limited to doing fairly mundane things, and will rely on AC and HP for defense. No mention is made of saves.

I still think wizards are going to be better than fighters, because all of the "epic fighter" shit in the articles is all stuff mid-level wizards can do.

From now on, instead of swearing, I will invoke the name of Mike Mearls.

[ishy]

hmmm

We’ll start from a set of pregenerated characters, and then we plan on leveling up those characters to walk everyone through the first ten levels of the game. Once that is done, we’ll then loop back and release material for building your own characters.

Only 10 lvls of testing?

Too often in D&D, the high-level fighter is the flunky to a high-level wizard. It’s all too easy for combinations of spells to make the wizard a far more potent enemy or character, especially if a wizard can unleash his or her spells in rapid succession. A wizard might annihilate a small army of orcs with a volley of fireballs and cones of cold.

Yeah fireballs and cone of cold were the problematic wizard spells

[Zinegata]

Given that I've never seen any of this research except via MaRo's mouth, and that he's stated, on numerous occasions, that he wants creatures to be at the heart of MtG, and that dudes-on-dudes are his ideal game... I find the idea that most people want this both hard to believe and a little hard to prove. If this is what they really want... well, WotC hasn't been getting money from me for a while now, so I don't see that changing.

I actually do tend to find a creature focus to be overall better, because the issue with "spell" decks is they often rely on combos which turn the game into a single player game.

Also, MaRo has an annual "I screwed up in X, Y, Z" thread. Which is better than "4E was perfect!" shit we get from Team D&D.

MtG really is leagues ahead of D&D in terms of design; they may make mistakes, but at least they seem to learn from them better and they have a much more honest system to make sure there are no repeats.

[hogarth]

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx ... l/20120430

I honestly don't know what to make of this. So now the fighter is best at fighting (whatever that means), is still limited to doing fairly mundane things, and will rely on AC and HP for defense. No mention is made of saves.

Didn't they say that every 1E/2E/3E/4E PHB class will be in 5E? So I guess the barbarian will be like a fighter, except worse at fighting. Sweet.

Some dude made this comment: "the language of the article makes it seem as if the fighter is going to be (gods help me for saying this) too powerful and too versatile and too good." Idiotic comment or brilliant satire? You decide.

[Zinegata]

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx ... l/20120430

I honestly don't know what to make of this. So now the fighter is best at fighting (whatever that means), is still limited to doing fairly mundane things, and will rely on AC and HP for defense. No mention is made of saves.

Didn't they say that every 1E/2E/3E/4E PHB class will be in 5E? So I guess the barbarian will be like a fighter, except worse at fighting. Sweet.

Some dude made this comment: "the language of the article makes it seem as if the fighter is going to be (gods help me for saying this) too powerful and too versatile and too good." Idiotic comment or brilliant satire? You decide.

After reading that article I feel like I just talked to a used car salesman desperately trying to sell me a burnt-out wreck.

[Dean]

I think it is very clear from this article that Mearls actually doesn't understand what the problems with the Fighter are.

I mean that. I think he is literally totally unaware of where the actual problems lie. I mean look at that article, LOOK AT IT. It looks like what might constitute someone's very first post on TGD. It ignores high level playtesting, says Fighters shouldn't have special abilities or magic powers, demonstrates a blatant ignorance of what the actually powerful Wizard spells are, thinks things like HP and AC increases could make the fighter valid, clearly shows you could still kill the fighter with Will attacks, etc etc etc

I mean it's just really fucking ignorant

[ishy]

Well he is saying fighters should be limited to mundane stuff, but fantasy mundane.

Which you know, doesn't tell me anything at least. Seeing as how mundane stuff in fantasy is between 'our world' physics and people cleaving through entire mountains etc

[MfA]

How is a mundane sword blow supposed to be "taking down waves of orcs each round" ... the guy is in cognitive dissonance.

Any way, the only real example given is tearing the arm off a troll ... if the fighter can at least tear the arm off a troll and beat him to death with it then that would be an improvement ... but I doubt it.

[hogarth]

I think it is very clear from this article that Mearls actually doesn't understand what the problems with the Fighter are.

I'm sure he's aware what the basic problem is: wizards are better than fighters. That's why 4E went so far in removing non-combat powers; then you just have to make sure a wizard doesn't do much more damage than a fighter.

I'm not sure that you appreciate his problem, though. He has to make two sets of people happy: those who think that 1E/2E/3E fighters are just fine the way they are, and those who think that 1E/2E/3E fighters need a major power-up.

[shadzar]

TTRPG and PNP games can not be realtime. you would need a DM for each player, which essentially is what computer games have and each individual computer is part or the DM group for those playing.

I'm open to the idea that maybe my post wasn't clear, so pardon in regards to any of it being vague. However Shadzar, if you actually had read my post and the ones following it

why would i read the entire thread, just to comment on an earlier post? my post contained two more parts. did you read my post entirely? wherever it is and your on whatever page, may contain more info related to it, cause at this point in time i dont even remember your post or replying to it. that oversized image pretty much screwed up the last two pages for this thread so i wont be going back to try to scroll left-right to read them to find it.

my point still remains, in the context of D&D and video games.

[MisterDee]

In fairness to Mearls, "blasting metric shittons of orcs with Fireballs" sounds cooler than "make an invisible wall appear" or "inflict minus-2 to all enemies", and raising the real fucked-up shit wizards can do with planar binding and the like would hijack an article that's supposedly about the fighter. I don't think we should expect any high-level analysis in a promo piece.

And seeing as he's in charge of the design process for 5e, I wouldn't be surprised if he's nerfed every mage build except blasters anyways. Easier to say "the math just works" if the only calculation is DPR, after all. I'm more worried by his implication that the real test is whether or not the fighter can withstand anything the mage throws at him. Because player-vs-player combat is why I'm playing D&D of course.

But yeah... unless there's a massive change to spellcasting, on the order of SKR's monk-hate applied to wizards and clerics, it looks like the fighter will still be the casters' bitch.

On the plus side, it seems that overspecializing in a single weapon is a thing of the past, which *maybe* means that endlessly stacking pluses is gone. I mean, clearly they want stuff like "Weapon Focus: 3'7'' Longsword with a Ruby Hilt and a Notch on the Blade" gone.

I'm mostly intrigued by the "especially if a wizard can unleash his or her spells in rapid succession" line. Does that mean a return to casting times for spells (and by implication, an actual chance of spells being interrupted?) Maybe it just means that they've gotten rid of Quicken Spell, however.

[Dean]

I really doubt they are getting rid of overspecializing in a single weapon. In fact what he's written speaks to the opposite. He said the greatest swordsman would be a Fighter, and so would the greatest Archer and so on. He didn't say those would all be the same guy. So apparently yes you must spec your build for Swords, Bows, Lances and so on depending on how you want to work

@Hogarth: I get where you're coming from and that's true. The point is though you have to tell one of those people to shove it because they can't both be "right". You either need to make the Fighter valid or not. No middle ground. Personally I would prefer the former and since the Fighter is restricted to "Mundane" abilities in a supernatural world then that can't happen. Honestly if the Fighter they are making can't EVER fly then he can't play and fuck anyone who thinks different. And that's an article title I would be interested in.

[hogarth]

How is a mundane sword blow supposed to be "taking down waves of orcs each round" ... the guy is in cognitive dissonance.

You realise that in AD&D, a 10th level fighter could kill 10 goblins per round, right? Nobody I knew had a problem with that (although maybe that's because rounds used to be longer).

[MfA]

Never played it ... I thought you had a 1 or 2 extra attacks and that was it? How would your level 10 fighter describe his action to take down 10 goblins?

[hogarth]

Never played it ... I thought you had a 1 or 2 extra attacks and that was it?

Against creatures with less than one hit die, a fighter got one attack for each level he had.

How would your level 10 fighter describe his action to take down 10 goblins?

"I walk up to the crowd of goblins and start hacking them to pieces."

[Winnah]

I can't be bothered looking up the exact text, but an AD&D fighter (maybe all warrior classes), would make a number of attacks per round = to their level vs. chaff enemies like kobolds and goblins.

There may have been an optional rule in one of the sourcebooks (Combat and Tactics, I think), that increased the threshold of what constituted a chaff opponent at higher levels.

[hogarth]

By the way, when 3E came out, it was clear to me that Cleave/Great Cleave were likely based on the same principle.