What would it take to make 6e not garbage?

[Username17]

@FrankTrollman: What's your reasoning for why player's shouldn't be required to pick alignment at chargen? I thought the reason it was included in the 1st place was as part of the 'backgrounds & history' part of making your char seem like a person who existed before Level1.

I find it obvious that players should be allowed to join organizations later in the campaign, or to change what organizations they are members of as the campaign progresses.

Further, since characters at first level might be asked to "complete the introductory adventure" and "defend the caravan" or "whatever the fuck Mister Cavern has prepared," that player character long-term goals or organizational affiliations are basically meaningless a lot of the time at that point in the story. Such things can be fleshed out later when you've got a feel for the character via flashbacks, or characters can ally with organizations once it becomes clear which organizations are going to actually matter in the campaign.

-Username17

[ArmorClassZero]

Does anyone want to talk about 'Leveling' and the pros and cons it brings to D&D?

Opinion: I dislike the idea of 'levels'. The whole carrot-and-stick motivation / drip-feeding 'rewards' to the players / Skinner box setup doesn't sit well with me. I like 'unlocking' stuff and powering up as much as the next gamer, but I don't like the idea that whole moves and tactics - that should be something my character could do just by virtue of being a defining thing that makes their class what it is - not available to me. Besides 'game balance' is there a good reason that I have to get to level 7 with my Rogue before he can suddenly grasps how Evasion works? Or my Fighter realizes he can attempt to Parry?

"Alignment in the real world means 'allied with in some sense.'"

On a similar note, and this is also related to how D&D does its 'class abilities', I think D&D gets Feats all wrong. A feat is, by definition, "an achievement that requires great courage, skill, or strength", i.e. something you're renowned for, something that in itself is legendary. D&D portrays feats the way other games portray character traits. "Athletic", "Tough", "Alert", etc. A Feat should be like, "struck down the frost-giant Lord Gunther the Cruel in single combat", or "went undefeated in the Death Pits of Thay, earning your freedom", stuff that references or tells a story or harkens back to past campaigns.

[Trill]

Well, uh
Pros:

• Ideally it gives a handy guide to powerlevel. If correctly implemented (whether that is possible is another question) you can say you have a Level 5 Rogue, a Level 4 Rogue, a Level 7 Fighter and a Level 4 Wizard and directly know that the Fighter is the most powerful of them, the first rogue is more powerful than the second and that the second rogue and the wizard are of approx. equal power (although they may show power in different aspects).
• It also gives you the possibility to see how a high level/low level character will look, since you can say "after X levels he will have gotten powers V,N,U and G"
• And ideally it keeps you capable since most things that are important are set, while secondary things are free to you. So a level 5 rogue WILL be able to sneak up on people, pick pockets and be generally stealthy, but the players can decide what abilities they want to focus on.

Cons:

• As often said before: Ideally. In Reality it often fails due to varying reasons. Some because they advance too fast (Wizards), some because they advance too slowly (Fighters), some because they don't advance at all (Monks)
• As you said it's often hard to rationalize why the character apparently wasn't able to do this but suddenly is. (Which may be solved by allowing them to try, but have a penalty until they learn it)
• And another problem that can happen is that the character advancement is too rigid, which leaves all characters feel samey.

[Username17]

Does anyone want to talk about 'Leveling' and the pros and cons it brings to D&D?

There are games that work better as unleveled skill-based games. I do not think that fantasy adventure games fit into that category.

The kind of even playing field "anyone could do it with the right skills and equipment" model is good for science fiction and modern adventures. Similarly, I think class and level systems work extremely badly in those genres. But levels work really well in fantasy adventure games, and I think they'd work pretty well in four color comic book adventure games too.

The issue is what an expected reaction is supposed to be to armed people coming into the room in the various genres. In pulp adventures that are noir detective stories or cyberpunk thrillers or space opera romances, when someone comes into the room with a gun, you put your hands up because you've been captured. In Sword and Sorcery or 4 Color Superheroes, someone walks into the room with a weapon and the combat music starts.

In a skill-based system it is literally true that Rando + Circumstance Bonus + Firearm is a deadly threat. And in a level-based system it is literally true that it is not. A Kobold with a crossbow is still just a fucking Kobold, and if you're an 8th level Ranger you can probably beat it to death with the candlestick next to the bed. And that's genre appropriate for Aragorn in a way that it would not be genre appropriate for Marlow.

People have experimented with point-based and skill-based fantasy adventure games since the 1970s (see: Runequest). Some, like the GURPS people, have actually put a lot of good and hard work into the idea. And it doesn't honestly work very well. Classes and Levels is kinda dumb in a lot of ways, but it's honestly the right answer for Fantasy Adventure gaming.

Doesn't mean classes and levels is the right idea for everything. D20 Modern is still a warcrime. But a new edition of D&D should still have people be 3rd level Elvish Rangers. Not just because of nostaliga, but because it's actually the correct way to handle that kind of storytelling. The kind of storytelling in which adventurers go out and fight Manticores in the middle of the street while the city watch huddles in fear.

-Username17

[Cervantes]

keeping "Alignment" makes it seem like it's somehow reflective of your character's values and goals in some deeper personal sense as opposed to "what you're doing right now"

The thing is that that's not what alignment means.
-Username17

That's what alignment is typically taken to mean in DnD. I know it's not correct but when you say "my dude has a Chaotic Good alignment" people have an understanding of what that means

if the intention is to change that then that's okay, but "that's not what alignment means" isn't a fair critique if we're talking about DnD 6e, which has to deal with the baggage of the previous editions

---

what i'm not getting is these two ideas:

None of the available alignments should be "Lawful Good." Available Player Character alignments should be things like "Calimshan" and "Harpers" where they are signifiers that there is some in-world faction that you are aligned with.

If you change it to affiliation, it probably doesn't need a spot on the character sheet. Shadowrun characters can be affiliated with the Yakuza or whatever, and that shit does goes into the Contacts section.

How is a PC being aligned with the Harpers distinct from being affiliated with them? I'm thinking some setting conceit that you're part of one team and only one team but I'm not too sure here. Why wouldn't we just use Contacts instead of Alignments if we're changing "Alignments" to reflect in-world factions?

[erik]

keeping "Alignment" makes it seem like it's somehow reflective of your character's values and goals in some deeper personal sense as opposed to "what you're doing right now"

The thing is that that's not what alignment means.
-Username17

That's what alignment is typically taken to mean in DnD. I know it's not correct but when you say "my dude has a Chaotic Good alignment" people have an understanding of what that means

What it means how? Alignment means precisely jack because you can reasonably justify about any behavior with any alignment. The only objective things you can determine from D&D alignment is what alignment tags affect you for things like spells, class restrictions, and what flavor other plane your spirit is supposed to go to.

[Wiseman]

Yeah the planes work even better if you ditch alignment and focus more on themes. Just from the basic descriptions even in the manuals and what not, you can get plenty of adventure ideas, but sadly none of the official writers every follow up on that.

Come to think of it, I've noticed that a lot in setting books. Adventure hooks if there at all seem to just be afterthoughts. There really does need to be a dedicated section in setting books for hooks, springboards, and ideas.

[Thaluikhain]

The only reason to use the term "alignment" is nostalgia. No one in the real world has ever had a "Good Alignment."

In reality, yes, but isn't it still a popular idea in fantasy to have black and white, good and evil? Serious question, I see D&D (and other fantasy) doing similar stuff, don't know if it's something that tends to appeal, or just something they keep doing out of momentum.

Though, perhaps that should be an opt-in for settings, rather than opt-out.

[Cervantes]

What it means how? Alignment means precisely jack because you can reasonably justify about any behavior with any alignment. The only objective things you can determine from D&D alignment is what alignment tags affect you for things like spells, class restrictions, and what flavor other plane your spirit is supposed to go to.

it's more of an aesthetic understanding. it brings to mind images of rebelliousness and whatnot

it's not objective of course, and really works best as fluff/a roleplaying prompt

[FatR]

Does Weapon Immunity need to be a thing at all?

It does. First "this monster is vulnerable to one specific thing, or maybe a few things, and superhumanly resistant at best immune at worst to everything else" is very common in fantasy. Second, damage resistances or even outright immunities are the simplest way to tell hordes of mooks to fuck off in a game where stats grow relatively linearly and we use d20 for RNG.

DnD just traditionally applied damage immunity/resistance unfairly. Resistances to physical damage were blanket and extremely common. Resistances to damage that wizards threw around were specific and relatively rare.

[FatR]

Does anyone want to talk about 'Leveling' and the pros and cons it brings to D&D?

Leveling is a handy tool of handling character progression in a setting with massive power level differences between characters. Nearly ALL fantasy has massive power level differences between characters, I mean "low-tier mage can barely speak with ghosts or some shit, high-tier mage can slay hundreds of people by wishing so and cause natural disasters" massive and a significant part of fantasy allows for lucky guys to move up tiers. Skill and point-buy bases system just don't work when the difference between baseline and top is comparable to difference between an average Imperial landsknecht and a Chaos champion. Even GURPS fantasy was extremely prone to getting broken by hyperspecialization.

Opinion: I dislike the idea of 'levels'. The whole carrot-and-stick motivation / drip-feeding 'rewards' to the players / Skinner box setup doesn't sit well with me. I like 'unlocking' stuff and powering up as much as the next gamer, but I don't like the idea that whole moves and tactics - that should be something my character could do just by virtue of being a defining thing that makes their class what it is - not available to me. Besides 'game balance' is there a good reason that I have to get to level 7 with my Rogue before he can suddenly grasps how Evasion works? Or my Fighter realizes he can attempt to Parry?

That has nothing to do with the idea of levels and everything to do that in 3.X martial characters were not real classes to start with.

[Voss]

keeping "Alignment" makes it seem like it's somehow reflective of your character's values and goals in some deeper personal sense as opposed to "what you're doing right now"

The thing is that that's not what alignment means.
-Username17

That's what alignment is typically taken to mean in DnD. I know it's not correct but when you say "my dude has a Chaotic Good alignment" people have an understanding of what that means

Yep. It means you want the character to be a mouthy asshole but still get to use the holy damage property on weapons.

[violence in the media]

Does anyone want to talk about 'Leveling' and the pros and cons it brings to D&D?

Opinion: I dislike the idea of 'levels'. The whole carrot-and-stick motivation / drip-feeding 'rewards' to the players / Skinner box setup doesn't sit well with me. I like 'unlocking' stuff and powering up as much as the next gamer, but I don't like the idea that whole moves and tactics - that should be something my character could do just by virtue of being a defining thing that makes their class what it is - not available to me. Besides 'game balance' is there a good reason that I have to get to level 7 with my Rogue before he can suddenly grasps how Evasion works? Or my Fighter realizes he can attempt to Parry?

This question speaks more to a disagreement about what a level is and how competent someone at level 1, 5, or 15 is supposed to be. If you think "level 1 Rogue" is supposed to be the equivalent of modern day special forces soldiers, you're going to clash with someone that views them as the equivalent of filthy Victorian street urchins. Is "level 1 Wizard" supposed to be a new student at Hogwarts, or one of the professors? Is a "level 1 Fighter" a kid at his first karate class or a professional UFC competitor?

[Trill]

If you think "level 1 Rogue" is supposed to be the equivalent of modern day special forces soldiers, you're going to clash with someone that views them as the equivalent of filthy Victorian street urchins. Is "level 1 Wizard" supposed to be a new student at Hogwarts, or one of the professors? Is a "level 1 Fighter" a kid at his first karate class or a professional UFC competitor?

And of course the question what they should be at level 20.
Is a "level 20 Rogue" a personified avatar of stealth, capable of hiding in plain sight, steal concepts and pull off attacks that leave the victim thinking they are alive until three minutes later they die? Or are they just supposed to be people very good at sneaking, but limited to human limits?
Is a "level 20 Wizard" a being beyond gods, capable of creating planes and worlds at his whims, being able to ignore the rules of reality and substitute them for his own? Or is he just someone with a few cantrips and 1-2 large scale attacks?
Is a "level 20 Fighter" a (demi-)god, capable of cleaving mountains in two, destroy opposing armies just by shouting once, able to withstand everything you could throw at him, and a leader capable of leading armies to victory? Or just some guy that swings a sword really well?

This is the basic problem behind Martial-Caster-Supremacy. Wizards become demigods and ignore the rules of reality, while mundanes are supposed to be strictly realistic (or at least what the writers believe is).
The problem is not that fighters are still "realistic" at high levels.
The problem is not that wizards are incredibly powerful at high levels.
The problem is that both of the above apply at the same time.

[Previn]

I have 2 big issues with levels and class, and I guess they both kind of stem from the same source: there's too much variance between people at the same level, or of the same class for those be really useful distinctions, and I think it's been that way since 3e came around, maybe even back into 2e's skills and powers a bit.

The HP range between 10th level characters, without any magical gear in 3.5 is basically 10 to 160 The total attack bonus or AC difference between two 10th level characters, again sans gear, could easily be more than 20. You've got no assurance of what anyone will have, what their numbers will be, or well, anything really. Short of levels being spaces where you kind of see things like flight, fireball or what not become available, levels really don't tell you anything about how any individual character or group's power actually is.

Likewise for classes, being a rogue used to convey a lot of information in 2e, because all rogues were essentially the same. In 3e and onwards, there are so many options that 'rogue' doesn't really tell you much about any individual character, besides that they probably have sneak attack. 5e reigns this in a bit just by having less options, but I still can't use someone telling me they play a rogue to reason out much useful information on it's own.

[Voss]

You can't? Because your second paragraph is basically the (exaggerated) justification for 5e.

Because anyone can tell you pretty much exactly what a 5e rogue is capable of at any level - a single attack that will have about a 60% chance to hit with slightly scaling damage that utterly fails to keep up with monster hit points, a movement shenanigan they're probably too stupid to use effectively, and a constant use of their reaction to halve damage against them every goddamn round because they're squishy and easy to hit.

And unlike most version of rogue for D&D, they never ever want to go first, because then they won't have allies standing around to allow them to sneak attack. (Except assassins, but then only at the exact start of the fight and never again)

2e rogues ended up the same because only two of their skills really mattered(find traps and open locks or move and hide) most rogues couldn't do both reliably until mid levels. By tenth level all rogues started to converge into sameness, but at low levels is was just a lot of ineffectual flailing of percentile dice.

[Hiram McDaniels]

@FrankTrollman: What's your reasoning for why player's shouldn't be required to pick alignment at chargen? I thought the reason it was included in the 1st place was as part of the 'backgrounds & history' part of making your char seem like a person who existed before Level1.

I find it obvious that players should be allowed to join organizations later in the campaign, or to change what organizations they are members of as the campaign progresses.

Further, since characters at first level might be asked to "complete the introductory adventure" and "defend the caravan" or "whatever the fuck Mister Cavern has prepared," that player character long-term goals or organizational affiliations are basically meaningless a lot of the time at that point in the story. Such things can be fleshed out later when you've got a feel for the character via flashbacks, or characters can ally with organizations once it becomes clear which organizations are going to actually matter in the campaign.

-Username17

I never used flashbacks when running a game. Have you ever seen that implemented in a way that doesn't come off like a videogame cutscene?

[Omegonthesane]

@FrankTrollman: What's your reasoning for why player's shouldn't be required to pick alignment at chargen? I thought the reason it was included in the 1st place was as part of the 'backgrounds & history' part of making your char seem like a person who existed before Level1.

I find it obvious that players should be allowed to join organizations later in the campaign, or to change what organizations they are members of as the campaign progresses.

Further, since characters at first level might be asked to "complete the introductory adventure" and "defend the caravan" or "whatever the fuck Mister Cavern has prepared," that player character long-term goals or organizational affiliations are basically meaningless a lot of the time at that point in the story. Such things can be fleshed out later when you've got a feel for the character via flashbacks, or characters can ally with organizations once it becomes clear which organizations are going to actually matter in the campaign.

-Username17

I never used flashbacks when running a game. Have you ever seen that implemented in a way that doesn't come off like a videogame cutscene?

Vague memories of the mini-campaign between my own D&D and some Arthurian Savage Worlds thing run by the more usual GM, in which we were doing a heist and the understanding was "when obstacle is encountered, we cut back to you working out what contingency you totally planned for this honest guv" rather than expect actual meticulous planning for possibilities that might not come up.

[Previn]

Because anyone can tell you pretty much exactly what a 5e rogue is capable of at any level - a single attack that will have about a 60% chance to hit with slightly scaling damage that utterly fails to keep up with monster hit points, a movement shenanigan they're probably too stupid to use effectively, and a constant use of their reaction to halve damage against them every goddamn round because they're squishy and easy to hit.

Can they cast spells, if so how many? Can they sneak? Do they have social skills? Are they ranged or melee combatants? Do they have maneuvers? What saves are they proficient in?

10 of the rogue's 22 class 'features' are unknowable with just 'rogue' as information. Knowing what archetype they are still leaves 6 features that you can't discern even knowing the class and archetype.

So, no, you can't tell me exactly what a rogue is capable of, you can tell me the sub-set of abilities that most (all?) rogues will have, and maybe kind of roughly how effective they are with them. But if you asked a player what they did in a game, and they answered "I'm a rogue" you'd basically be totally lost, and that's my point on classes.

[FatR]

I don't think anyone, except maybe OSR grogndards, seriously want classes to set characters in stone. Even people advocating for shitton of narrow classes also mentioned having shitton of feats to customize them the last time I checked.

To me personally the purpose of classes is giving the general idea of a character's approach to fantasy heroics, reflected through their power access schedule and/or a couple of key tricks, and the purpose of levels is giving the general idea of a character's badassery, reflected through their general numbers, but more importantly through access to level-gated circles of powers.

[Voss]

Because anyone can tell you pretty much exactly what a 5e rogue is capable of at any level - a single attack that will have about a 60% chance to hit with slightly scaling damage that utterly fails to keep up with monster hit points, a movement shenanigan they're probably too stupid to use effectively, and a constant use of their reaction to halve damage against them every goddamn round because they're squishy and easy to hit.

Can they cast spells, if so how many? Can they sneak? Do they have social skills? Are they ranged or melee combatants? Do they have maneuvers? What saves are they proficient in?

10 of the rogue's 22 class 'features' are unknowable with just 'rogue' as information. Knowing what archetype they are still leaves 6 features that you can't discern even knowing the class and archetype.

So, no, you can't tell me exactly what a rogue is capable of, you can tell me the sub-set of abilities that most (all?) rogues will have, and maybe kind of roughly how effective they are with them. But if you asked a player what they did in a game, and they answered "I'm a rogue" you'd basically be totally lost, and that's my point on classes.

That YOU specifically don't have any idea what a rogue does? Because the answers to all those questions are really obvious:

No, unless they're arcane tricksters, in which case they have a tiny number of non-level appropriate spells of very specific schools (And essentially 2 wild cards at 7th level) that do not interface with their rogue abilities- spells can't be used with sneak attacks, and their defense ability isn't compatible with defensive spells like shield. This is essentially flavor bullshit. It matters not at all to how a rogue is going to actually contribute in any fashion.

Sneak: does not matter. The 5e rules for sneaking, by the book, basically boil down to: fuck you, the party fails. Anything else is pretty much fiat giving the rogue a single sneak attack attempt, and then they go back to requiring a combat buddy like I already described.

Social skills: sure. This is pretty class independent though- they can get it through their background bullshit and once again boils down to basically fiat.

Ranged vs. melee. They're both. They have to be, or they suck really hard. A melee-only character in 5e is simply a failure. And any ranged specialized rogue can just dagger stab people and lose nothing except maybe 1 point of damage per round.

Maneuvers? Obviously no.

Saves: Dex and Int. That is seriously hard coded. If rogue, character has dex and int save proficiency. Which is why I'm pretty convinced you don't even vaguely know what you're talking about.

If a 5e player tells me 'I'm a rogue,' I'm literally the opposite of totally lost. They're going to want a melee monkey standing at the enemy, so they can through bonus dice on their otherwise shitty attacks, and spend a lot of their turn mitigating damage or maneuvering not to be attacked. I'm at a loss that you need to know much more or that you got so many of the basics completely wrong or that you think of them as unknowns.

[Previn]

No, unless they're arcane tricksters, in which case they have a tiny number of non-level appropriate spells of very specific schools (And essentially 2 wild cards at 7th level) that do not interface with their rogue abilities- spells can't be used with sneak attacks, and their defense ability isn't compatible with defensive spells like shield. This is essentially flavor bullshit. It matters not at all to how a rogue is going to actually contribute in any fashion.

Well, you're wrong. They can also take a feat to cast spells in place of an ability score increase.

Sneak: does not matter. The 5e rules for sneaking, by the book, basically boil down to: fuck you, the party fails. Anything else is pretty much fiat giving the rogue a single sneak attack attempt, and then they go back to requiring a combat buddy like I already described.

Strawman, and wrong. A rogue may or may not be sneaky. That the sneak rules are garbage isn't relivant. If a rogue doesn't take the sneak skill, they're just not sneaky.

Social skills: sure. This is pretty class independent though- they can get it through their background bullshit and once again boils down to basically fiat.

Wrong again. A rogue may not have any social skills, depending on what skills they choose.

Ranged vs. melee. They're both. They have to be, or they suck really hard. A melee-only character in 5e is simply a failure. And any ranged specialized rogue can just dagger stab people and lose nothing except maybe 1 point of damage per round.

On this on you're right, 5e lets them be both probably without a noticeable difference.

Maneuvers? Obviously no.

Wrong, they can pick them up with a feat in place of the ability score increase.

Saves: Dex and Int. That is seriously hard coded. If rogue, character has dex and int save proficiency. Which is why I'm pretty convinced you don't even vaguely know what you're talking about.

Except for when they pick up a feat for additional proficient saves, using a feat in place of their ability increase.

If a 5e player tells me 'I'm a rogue,' I'm literally the opposite of totally lost.

Well, you got 1 (sort of) for 5 on what a rogue could have right, so you'll forgive me if I disagree with you.

They're going to want a melee monkey standing at the enemy, so they can through bonus dice on their otherwise shitty attacks, and spend a lot of their turn mitigating damage or maneuvering not to be attacked. I'm at a loss that you need to know much more or that you got so many of the basics completely wrong or that you think of them as unknowns.

That's a super generalized overview of how combat-only sort-of-kind-of works if the rogue is built and played exactly how you expect them to be. The fact that you basically just answered everything about what a 5e rogue can or cannot do wrong, seems to pretty much prove my point.

[Previn]

I don't think anyone, except maybe OSR grogndards, seriously want classes to set characters in stone. Even people advocating for shitton of narrow classes also mentioned having shitton of feats to customize them the last time I checked.

To me personally the purpose of classes is giving the general idea of a character's approach to fantasy heroics, reflected through their power access schedule and/or a couple of key tricks, and the purpose of levels is giving the general idea of a character's badassery, reflected through their general numbers, but more importantly through access to level-gated circles of powers.

I don't want characters set in stone (I'm a big fan of point buy conceptually), but the more customization you have the less having classes means. There's value in how much information being a "halfing rogue" conveys when you know exactly what that means, and how they'll work (and what roles they'll cover) in a group.

When you have to say that you're a "whisper halfing, rogue/arcane trickster with social skills instead of sneak or finding traps, and I also used some alternate class features..." even bothering to say you're a rogue really doesn't do or mean anything.

Like-wise, if there are going to be levels, I really want them to explicitly allow me to reasonably accurately measure character and party power so that I can plan encounters and challenges that are appropriate for them. If they can't do that, I 'm not overly enthused with them.

[Voss]

Oh go fuck yourself with the biggest rusty pole you can find.

You are not going to seriously claim that setting fire to ability score increases to cast a single fucking first level spell utterly changes the capability of the rogue and then turn around and accuse me of strawmanning on top of that. Get right the fuck out.

You're snivelling about window dressing shit. While mechanically 5e retreats from 4e, philosophically, they're playing the same game: shit in combat matters, shit outside of combat is window dressing.

Which is why (outside first round) sneak and speech and all that crap you're snivelling about does not matter. It is essentially flavor text and has fuck all effect on the game. Because while you can dig really deep into the DMG and find a universal DC chart, it does not matter, because it never tells you what the effects of passing or failing those checks are. You can have a rogue that auto-passes DC 20 speech checks forever, and it doesn't fucking matter because the DM still has to adjucat what each and every one of those checks does on completely individual asspulls.

Even stacking on an additional real saving throw doesn't fundamentally change the nature of the class or what its capable of. Mathematically it's a tiny increase (literally 10-20%) for most of the entire game. By the exact same argument a 1e/2e saving throw item or 3e stat increaser is bigger change to what a rogue is capable of. You're full of shit on every level.

[Previn]

WHAAAA, I was wrong, so now I'm going to move goal posts, ad hominid, straw man and make personal attacks! WHAAA

You're clearly not willing to have actual civil discourse as to how customization and class interact, so whatever I guess.