Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Ahtman wrote:
When using passive perception to determine if something is noticed, normally WIS mod + 10, you add +5 for advantage or -5 for disadvantage. That is the only +/- 5 I can recall.

Thanks. Was there a reason they did this instead of roll two d20's? I wasn't following the playtesting.

ced1106 wrote:

 Ahtman wrote:
When using passive perception to determine if something is noticed, normally WIS mod + 10, you add +5 for advantage or -5 for disadvantage. That is the only +/- 5 I can recall.

Thanks. Was there a reason they did this instead of roll two d20's? I wasn't following the playtesting.

Passive perception doesn't use any dice rolls, it just compares (mostly) fixed numbers.

And +/-5 is the maximum modifier conferred by advantage/disadvantage.

They did an interview about the inclusiveness of their new edition over at The Mary Sue:

http://www.themarysue.com/sexuality-and-gender-diversity-dungeons-and-dragons-next/

The devs sound like pretty awesome guys.

I was struck at how the community was surprised that someone from Wizards of the Coast was able to attend [the "Queer As A Three-Sided Die" panel at GenCon in 2013]. I had always felt that we were a fairly progressive company, but it drove home that people can’t read our minds. Our intentions don’t mean anything unless we reflect them in our work and our actions.

Interesting point.

Meanwhile, GF9's 5E spell cards:

http://www.gf9-dnd.com/gameAcc/tabid/87/entryid/87/Default.aspx

Now I REALLY wish I was going to Gencon THIS year, instead of aiming for Gencon 2015.

Being at Gencon when a new version of D&D is released has go to be a pretty cool experience!

That is why I am making the proverbial hajj to Indianapolis this year. I managed to get into a few "official" sessions of 5E so I will be sure to report on those but non-attendees are as likely to know any GenCon news as attendees, maybe even more likely to know it first.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Example of 5E feat:

That is one long feat. I wonder if all feats will have a bonus ability or only some of them.

Wow. That's a big feat.

Feats will be optional and overall you get less of them, but the ones you can get will be more encompassing then the previous iterations.

 Melissia wrote:
They did an interview about the inclusiveness of their new edition over at The Mary Sue:

http://www.themarysue.com/sexuality-and-gender-diversity-dungeons-and-dragons-next/

The devs sound like pretty awesome guys.

Yeah. I'm actually glad they got rid of the rules preventing all that from previous editions.

It looks to me that 5E feats are closer to background elements than the 3E concept of mechanical tweaks.

Ahtman wrote:Feats will be optional and overall you get less of them, but the ones you can get will be more encompassing then the previous iterations.

Manchu wrote:It looks to me that 5E feats are closer to background elements than the 3E concept of mechanical tweaks.

This fits with what is presented above. Interesting!

 Alpharius wrote:
Now I REALLY wish I was going to Gencon THIS year, instead of aiming for Gencon 2015.

Being at Gencon when a new version of D&D is released has go to be a pretty cool experience!

I was there for 4th edition. It was meh. But then, my group wasn't interested.

However, we had a blast for Pathfinder's release! Drinking and roleplaying, roleplaying and drinking.

Good times!

From what I'm seeing, I'm leaning towards giving it a try.

 kronk wrote:
However, we had a blast for Pathfinder's release! Drinking and roleplaying, roleplaying and drinking.

Gee I wonder why.

Finally got around to looking through the basic rules with at a bit more than a casual glance. I like what I see mostly. There is a clean efficiency to what they've presented here. It feels like a trimmed and toned successor to 3.X. I can certainly see where 4th-edition fans would be turned off as there scarcely even a nod to it's existence in the product.

I'll reserve final judgement for the players guide to see how I think it holds up under the weight of additional options. I share some of the sentiments I've seen fearing this is going to continue to be lopsided for casters. They've left some things open enough I think some good DMing could work around most problems in that vein, but the inclusion of things like Knock and Find the Path is worrying.

I'd certainly like to give the ruleset a test session or two if my group gives me a chance. The beta play test (in a much earlier iteration than this), left a sour taste in some of their mouths however. It may be a tough sell even with this being a very different game than that was.

 Ahtman wrote:

 kronk wrote:
However, we had a blast for Pathfinder's release! Drinking and roleplaying, roleplaying and drinking.

Gee I wonder why.

Hint: It was the drinking.

Sorcerer ahoy!

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/136372-Exclusive-The-Table-of-Contents-and-Sorcerer-From-the-D-D-Players-Handbook

So many classes and races in one book, as Pelor intended.

 Chongara wrote:
Finally got around to looking through the basic rules with at a bit more than a casual glance. I like what I see mostly. There is a clean efficiency to what they've presented here. It feels like a trimmed and toned successor to 3.X. I can certainly see where 4th-edition fans would be turned off as there scarcely even a nod to it's existence in the product.

I'll reserve final judgement for the players guide to see how I think it holds up under the weight of additional options. I share some of the sentiments I've seen fearing this is going to continue to be lopsided for casters. They've left some things open enough I think some good DMing could work around most problems in that vein, but the inclusion of things like Knock and Find the Path is worrying.

I'd certainly like to give the ruleset a test session or two if my group gives me a chance. The beta play test (in a much earlier iteration than this), left a sour taste in some of their mouths however. It may be a tough sell even with this being a very different game than that was.

Magic's probably not going to quite break in core, but once the splats start bulging their way out of someone's tumescent wand, I think it's probably pretty likely that they'll explode back up to deific power again. Maybe not quite as hard as 3.5, so it might, for example, be limiting them to teleporting only one god per round into the nearest star.

Then again, maybe they'll maintain some semblance of balance.

 Seaward wrote:

 Chongara wrote:
Finally got around to looking through the basic rules with at a bit more than a casual glance. I like what I see mostly. There is a clean efficiency to what they've presented here. It feels like a trimmed and toned successor to 3.X. I can certainly see where 4th-edition fans would be turned off as there scarcely even a nod to it's existence in the product.

I'll reserve final judgement for the players guide to see how I think it holds up under the weight of additional options. I share some of the sentiments I've seen fearing this is going to continue to be lopsided for casters. They've left some things open enough I think some good DMing could work around most problems in that vein, but the inclusion of things like Knock and Find the Path is worrying.

I'd certainly like to give the ruleset a test session or two if my group gives me a chance. The beta play test (in a much earlier iteration than this), left a sour taste in some of their mouths however. It may be a tough sell even with this being a very different game than that was.

Magic's probably not going to quite break in core, but once the splats start bulging their way out of someone's tumescent wand, I think it's probably pretty likely that they'll explode back up to deific power again. Maybe not quite as hard as 3.5, so it might, for example, be limiting them to teleporting only one god per round into the nearest star.

Then again, maybe they'll maintain some semblance of balance.

Core is broke what 3.X, mostly at least. All the most egregious differences in power-level were in core, with splat offenders mostly being limited to relatively narrow gimmicks (Uber Charger), outright editing mistakes (Shivering Touch) , non-functional systems (Truenamer), or broad applications of narrowly intended designs (Nightsticks). If it's going to break anywhere it's going to break in core. Typically it seems as a system matures the creators getting a much better sense of how it works "In the wild", later content taking this into account and being more tuned to real play experiences.

 Manchu wrote:
Sorcerer ahoy!

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/136372-Exclusive-The-Table-of-Contents-and-Sorcerer-From-the-D-D-Players-Handbook

That seems...pretty straight forward. I like it.

I guess I need to check out the combat rules and such.

 Manchu wrote:
Sorcerer ahoy!

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/136372-Exclusive-The-Table-of-Contents-and-Sorcerer-From-the-D-D-Players-Handbook

Hmm, interesting: looking at the table of contents, it strikes me that each class is relatively similar in terms of pages alloted (3-5). Which implies a general parity... except,

the spells: about 80 pages for those.

According to the link t the cards above the number of spells, by class, is as such:

Arcane 230
Bard 120
Druid 110
Cleric 106
Ranger 46
Paladin 44

I imagine there is some overlap between Ranger and Druid, Bard and Arcane, as well as Paladin and Cleric.

I guess "Arcane" covers Wizard, Sorcerer and Warlock with all their respective individual class abilities?

Ya know... the one weapon that I disagree with being "Martial" is the axe.... If a PC is wielding a standard axe (by this I mean, not a battle axe, or some other strangely named weapon), they should know how the feth to use it.... as a "simple" weapon, they aren't going to be fancy, or have many flourishes with the weapon, it'd be a simple "chopping wood" exercise of fighting.

There's a massive difference between chopping a tree down with a logging axe and hewing someone in platemail with a battleaxe, both in the styles of axes and in how you use them.

Eh, I find the divide on things like that to be largely a legacy of a poorly thought out system then anything else. True, indeed there is a difference between a battle ax and a woodcutter's ax, but there are two things that represent skill: proficiency and class bonus. A class geared towards fighting will always be better then a class that is not, even if they are both using weapons they are proficient in, so the reason for strong (and arbitrary) restrictions on weapon use seems pretty silly much of the time.

Certainly there are weapons where a lack of training should all but disqualify a character from using it, but an ax scarcely seems to fall into that category. Rapiers, spiked chains, blowguns and even bows, okay, each of those needs a lot of hard effort before you can use then to any degree (and with regards to the spiked chain, without hurting yourself). But an ax? A reasonably intelligent sapient can learn to use an ax in an afternoon. It may take a lifetime to master, but, again, that's down to class advancement, rather then proficiency.

Not that much of this matters, this is the playdough edition after all.

In 5E, being proficient with a weapon means you get to add your (level- not class-dependent) proficiency bonus to attacks with said weapon. Therefore, my Dwarven Wizard gets to add her STR modifier and proficiency bonus to melee attacks she makes with a battleaxe ... because she is a Dwarf. All other things being equal (which they are admittedly not), she can wield a battleaxe as well as a Fighter. Here the rules are explaining something about Dwarven culture.

The weapon proficiency mechanic appears to simulate whether the PC knows how to use a given implement as a weapon. The designers do not seem to think lots of experience chopping kindling amounts to knowing how to fight with an axe. By contrast, a mace is essentially a stick that is heavier on one end than the other -- even including fancy maces like the one pictured. It makes sense that most (although not all) adventures would know how to use an unbalanced stick as a weapon.

Of course, anyone can pick up an axe and use it as a weapon without a penalty in 5E. She just might not get to add her proficiency bonus to the attack roll.