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Arivia posted:That's still incorrect though. I loving love D&D. I have thousands of dollars of D&D books bought new. I have played hours upon hours of D&D and still call it my favourite RPG. I genuinely enjoy and prefer D&D. Jesus Christ. Let me make this clear. quote:I feel like there's this current of If you still like 5E, then you haven't tested enough, though. I know lots people who genuinely enjoy 5E, and I know first-hand they've played "better" games like Blades, and Cortex, and Fate. Maybe they haven't played whatever darling the poster below me loves, but it's not like they haven't sampled other games. They have, and they prefer 5E. And yet I feel like there's still this current of "Well, they haven't played enough other games." It just reeks of "no true Scotsman" territory. It doesn't matter how "defensible" 5E, because nobody's defending it. There's just a lot of people dunking on it. You want to dunk on 5E because it's got crap systems? Great. You want to dunk on 5E because it encapsulates racist and sexist architectures that we can be better than? I'm right there with you. You want to dunk on 5E because it's made by a bad company that does bad things? I'm with you. You want to dunk on 5E players because they merely haven't been exposed to enough or reflected enough and if only someone could drag them out of their cave to see the light? Get over yourself. But whatever. You've been exposed to a ton of games and you stan Pathfinder.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:07
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Every time I've been a part of conversations like this, it always seems like it's phrased like the people who don't like D&D 5e are being weird hipsters or something and we just never played D&D. When actually all the people who hate it are people who have played it for 20+ years across various editions and hate it on its merits as two pieces of wonder bread smothered in mayonnaise and nothing else. It's the blandest, least evocative derivative pastiche of warmed over mechanics possible. And also supportive of regressive douche-nozzles. It's like if your favorite band was Smashmouth, but also Smashmouth defended a rapist and employed a literally Nazi.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:09
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:05 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:10
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CitizenKeen posted:Jesus Christ. Let me make this clear. Yes, I am saying exactly what you are alleging I am saying. There is literally no good argument for playing 5e that doesn't end up boiling down to "I don't know any better", "all my friends play it", or "it's the current edition of D&D." None. People who are making that argument genuinely do not know any better, and I wish it was easier to help them figure out what game they actually want to be playing (including D&D clones, relatives, or older editions.) I play Pathfinder because the people behind it showed they had pretty good game design chops over time and it matched a particular kind of D&D I wanted to play. I was rewarded by 2e, which is fantastic from end to end and is definitely what I want for a modern (3.5 on) D&D relative. I made an educated decision and can defend it.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:17
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Absurd Alhazred posted:The grid-based combat rules are good enough. I don't want to say "good" because I simply don't have that much experience with different systems for grid-based combat aside from years playing 3.5 way back when, which just had way too many annoying details to be fun as I recall (and I'd be reluctant to run it). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJotVinhXJ4 You mean like the great tactical grid based combat that can only be interacted with via optional rules? And then only with certain feats, which are again an optional rule? Are you loving serious? FATE has better tactical combat.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:17
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Strike! is entirely made up of modular subsystems and the tactical combat one is good. I wouldn't ever want to use basically any of the others, but then again, I feel the same way about 4E. i contend that the chase rules are fantastic. i used them all the time in my star wars game to do spaceship chase scenes and i miss them in my other games
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Jul 13, 2020 23:18
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Serf posted:i contend that the chase rules are fantastic. i used them all the time in my star wars game to do spaceship chase scenes and i miss them in my other games The chase rules for Strike! or 4E?
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Jul 13, 2020 23:19
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:05 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:25
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Absurd Alhazred posted:"Feats are an optional rule" is as convincing for 5E as "non-weapon proficiencies are an optional rule" was for AD&D 2E. As in, yes, it says on them that they are, but they are also well-developed and smack in the middle of the basic guide for players, and expansion books build upon them, to the point where it makes more sense to say not using them is the optional, rather than the default. I have used 5E tactical combat and it's good. You don't need much to make tactical combat interesting and engaging. No, tidus laughing.mov is a very appropriate response to the idea of 5e has "good enough" grid combat. I recommend you look at games with good tactical combat (like 4e) to understand how loving absurd and uneducated your statement was.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:31
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My person. If you honestly think 5e's tactical combat is engaging I have no idea what to say to you. What even is there to engage with tactically in 5e? Like, give an example. "If people are playing with feats and someone happens to take Pole-arm Mastery and the DM has decided to deign to play with a grid, positioning could be relevant"? I'm not just being lovely when I say FATE has more tactical buttons to push. At least it has zones and poo poo. 5e has nothing.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:35
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:05 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:35
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CitizenKeen posted:The chase rules for Strike! or 4E? strike. for me they really nailed the feeling of an action movie chase scene where its more about style than specific car speeds and stuff
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Jul 13, 2020 23:37
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Absurd Alhazred posted:I played 4E a few times and I wasn't particularly impressed with some amazing improvement over 3.5's grid combat at the time. Did you actually read how the game sets up hazards, terrain actions, damage zones, and has large detailed sections on battlefield design? Were you possibly one of the early players at launch who tried Kobold Hall and Keep on the Shadowlands and got frustrated at them being kinda lovely and thought the whole edition was like that? (this was me, fyi)
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Jul 13, 2020 23:39
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See, this is what I was talking about when I said this thread is a bunch of posters inventing New Coke. You're not going to convince the viewers/players/fans to leave 5th edition when you don't understand why they've formed a fandom around it. Better tactical combat isn't the solution.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:43
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:46
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Tibalt posted:why they've formed a fandom around it Time travel to the 70s and pre-empt the first publication? D&D is big because D&D was big because D&D was always big. It's a brand developed over decades, a sub-genre of fantasy, that's why there's a fandom. The only way 'around' that is to keep pushing the game you think is better, or to win the lottery and invest in marketing it.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:48
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:49
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Absurd Alhazred posted:I played 4E a few times and I wasn't particularly impressed with some amazing improvement over 3.5's grid combat at the time. I have been playing tactical grid-based combat since I was a kid. It's extremely my poo poo. My point is that 5e's support is literally... nothing. There is nothing in the game to support it. O you can add it for sure, but nothing in the mechanics gives a poo poo about it. Except, again, for particular parts of optional systems. I brought up FATE to make a point because it at least has rules for "yo this zone as the On Fire aspect" or whatever, which 5e doesn't. It's literally just house-ruling. I could be holding up the car from Monopoly and making little pew pew noises for all it matters to the rules as written. This is a loving terrible hill to die on.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:49
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:52
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Absurd Alhazred posted:This is straight up delusional. I asked you for an example. Got one?
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Jul 13, 2020 23:54
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:57
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I'm glad the loving edition wars have taken over the thread, that's swell.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:57
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Mister Olympus posted:Time travel to the 70s and pre-empt the first publication? D&D is big because D&D was big because D&D was always big. It's a brand developed over decades, a sub-genre of fantasy, that's why there's a fandom. The only way 'around' that is to keep pushing the game you think is better, or to win the lottery and invest in marketing it.
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Jul 13, 2020 23:58
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 13, 2020 23:59
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Absurd Alhazred posted:You can do a lot of that in 5E. I don't know what "terrain actions" means but there's "lair actions" in D&D with some enemies, those were fun to play with. I don't know if I was with a bad early playtest or whatever, I didn't really find it particularly engaging, I wasn't really all that excited during later sessions with friends who were all in with 4E, and then I lost touch with the whole realm of things for about a decade until I started up again with 5E. No, see, this is the thing. You don't know what actual good grid-based combat is like, and you've lowered your expectations to fit 5e without knowing how much better they can be. Everyone knows what a lair action is, we just don't care because it's been a thing for forever? Let's break down this edit of yours for things 5e is missing that other editions (primarily 4e, but also 3e) have: Absurd Alhazred posted:All you need is the combination of the grid, interesting things to put on the grid (walls, doors, other constraints and paths, maybe some hazards), attacks of opportunity, advantages and disadvantages depending on where you're situated for melee/ranged combat, and the additional interesting things you can do with the special abilities of rogues (sneak attack), and especially if you have a battle master's maneuvers. This is not even including feats. I'm baffled that you find FATE more engaging. What are zones but fluffier ranges? Maybe you just don't like grid-based combat? It's fine, you don't have to, I've run exciting zone-based combat, too. "interesting things to put on the grid" what about difficult terrain and buff/debuff zones? what does a hazard mean to you? I THINK 5e MIGHT have encounter traps now, that's like a swinging pendulum that runs across an area once a round and hits everything in its path (at the most basic). You've forgotten cover, both hard and soft. How about items on the map that need to be interacted with or can be interacted with for special bonuses or effects (that's the terrain actions [edit: named terrain powers in the dmg2] I mentioned, rules for setting up things like turning over an acid vat to spray everything next to it)? Attacks of opportunity are just damage. Can your defenders actually prevent enemies from getting to squishier party members behind them? How engaging and useful is that mechanic? It doesn't need to be marking, you could do this in 3e in the PHB with a spiked chain fighter. What do those advantages and disadvantages look like? How quickly does the system fall apart if someone's flying? How does it handle multiple vertical levels, which are generally a bitch to draw on a single battlemap? How much support and guidelines does it provide for any of this? When you run 4e you set this all out beforehand. The game tells you how, and it gives you a lot of tools for providing exciting set pieces that your players can clearly interact with and that are easy for you to run. You don't have to improvise it, you don't have to think about how something might work or if a PC can do something. It's just THERE. Can you really, truly, honestly say the same about 5e? Arivia fucked around with this message at 00:03 on Jul 14, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:00
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Tibalt posted:Except you've got a market that is made up of young fans who were first introduced, and loyal to, 5e. That's my point. They're loyal to 5e because that's what they were first introduced to and because 5e has the D&D logo printed on its cover, and thus the weight of decades of kids hearing about D&D behind it. The solution is to not introduce people to RPGs with D&D, and to break D&D's lovely hold on this hobby.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:02
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Absurd Alhazred posted:Several, in what you quoted up there. Here, let's hone in on that: Point this out in the rules, you goofball.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:03
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:03
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Absurd Alhazred posted:No, I don't think 5E gives you a lot of that out of the box. Some of the middle part is covered by feats, and the battle master maneuvers can at least make it conditionally difficult for an enemy not to attack you, or let you get another character to safely leave a bad situation. Then it is missing a lot of support and good grid combat. Period. You genuinely just don't know what you're missing.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:04
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HopperUK posted:I'm glad the loving edition wars have taken over the thread, that's swell. I've seen edition wars and this is more fifth edition saber rattling. I wasn't expecting "I looked at 4e once but this is better" to come up for a few pages, if at all.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:05
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honestly, while D&D has a lot of momentum behind it and that does account for a lot of its success, i think there's a deeper problem namely, that a mushy product that does all things badly and can thus be marketed to (and played by) everyone, no matter what they actually want, is in fact a natural and powerful market niche. a game or movie series or whatever doesn't necessarily have to be the best at everything, and in fact, being the best at X might actually shrink its range because focused design necessarily involves prioritizing one thing over another, which will alienate people who liked the de-prioritized thing. the key to mass success is to be so bland that nobody is actively put off, to constantly fly just beneath their comfort level -- not to be exceptional. there are aesthetic arguments for why this is bad, but if your goal is financial success or popularity, there's no practical argument against it, and no solution that can be achieved through market logic. the only way to truly defeat D&D once and for all, therefore, is to overthrow capitalism 
Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 00:11 on Jul 14, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:07
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I'm not even trying to edition war just "5e has good tactical combat" is such a bald falsehood that I can't let it go. It's like saying the sky is the color of depression or something. It's just so trivially false.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:07
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:10
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Having recently finished playing in about a 2-year-long campaign in 5E and recently started playing LANCER, 5Es combat is boring as poo poo especially for non-casters. Rogues will 99% be either hiding to set up Sneak Attack or just attacking and it s boring as hell.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:14
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Absurd Alhazred posted:I mean, okay, sure, fair enough, 4E has way more content for grid-based combat. But it sounds really intimidating, way too much to manage. I'd straight up not want to be expected to present several combats using all of this stuff throughout a campaign. That's the thing though: having good tools makes all of this really easy to set up and use. Like I just looked at a 1st level 4e adventure and the climactic set piece had not one, not two, but three different hazards AND difficult terrain AND monsters. And that seems like a lot but they all have clearly written and understandable stat blocks, interactions with other parts of the rules, systems and so on. So I, not having run 4e in years, can look at this and go "yeah I can see how these pieces come together" and could run it with maybe 15 minutes of prep? I could make another encounter like that in 30, and most of that would be finding the relevant tables with pre-calculated damage expressions because I've forgotten where they are. I know they're there, they work great, I'd just have to find them again. And not every encounter needs to be that involved. You do need something (a 4e encounter without some sort of hazard to push people into sucks, a lot) but you can modulate your complexity. And when you really do want to pull out all the stops? The game can and does support you and let you tell that epic finale without you having to wing it with "cunning actions."
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Jul 14, 2020 00:19
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Absurd Alhazred posted:A lot of people are really okay with, even excited about, a system that lets them meaningfully customize a cool fantasy character without having to minmax it too
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Jul 14, 2020 00:22
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:22
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i literally play 5e (and, occasionally, good games), with children age 6 to 16, for a living. it is my job. Kids like D&D exclusively because it's the first RPG they play. When I've had the opportunities, over the summer, to introduce kids to RPGs through, say, Dungeon World, they love that poo poo - and are always more interested in playing it. Games like Voidheart Symphony and Overlight captivated one homeschooled teenager so completely it was instrumental in our team de-radicalizing him from alt-lite bullshit. I, myself an autistic man with ADHD, led a team of GMs and social workers to help kids on the autism spectrum and with anxiety disorders using guided therapy and collaborative storytelling. The further away they got from 5E the more pronounced the improvements in social dynamics - while 5E's trivia and Nerd Cred only stifiled their ability to self-express and relate to one another. Our best sessions were games like For the Queen. gently caress D&D all my homies hate D&D. It's less than useless and if it disappeared tomorrow the world would be a better place.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:24
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Absurd Alhazred posted:Wait, what? A very, very common kind of ability in 4e lets you reposition enemies in some way. If there's no disadvantageous place to put an enemy in (push them off a cliff, put them in the burning hot flames, etc), then these abilities are significantly reduced in effectiveness and become pretty boring to use.
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Jul 14, 2020 00:26
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e: nm
Absurd Alhazred fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Jul 22, 2020 |
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Jul 14, 2020 00:28
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