Quote from: robiswrong;760632Exactly.  That's not hostile, that's just "okay, cool.  We'll see."

I take issue with that! The anguish part was definitely meant to be passive-aggresively hostile!

Quote from: robiswrong;760576I always liked to think about "gross balance" and "fine balance".

"Gross balance" is stuff like "can the fighter take more of a punishment than the wizard?"  It's relatively important.  If the wizard is actually better than the fighter at what the fighter's supposed to be good at, then what's the point of playing a fighter? (note: presumption of what a fighter's supposed to be good at.  It's an example for discussion purposes.)

"Fine balance" is stuff like "oh, the fighter can take eight rounds of hits from a CL level 3 critter, when he should actually take seven."  Not super important.

While I can agree with the sentiment, I feel like this kind of mirrors the arguments of "micro-evolution" vs. "macro-evolution."

I mean... your example of fine balance is basically just a specific example of the gross balance, yes? How else would you find the points of gross imbalance, if not through a number of instances of fine imbalance?

Or is there something more to this distinction that I'm missing?

This sounds like you'll be seeing a FAQ and little else.

Anticipating the shit storm that accompanies anything D&D, I hope they are intelligent enough to set up an explicit and unambiguous nomenclature to indicate the types of changes. They need categories something like;

1 Typos that must be corrected and accepted as part of the rules
2 Design change that is now cannon
3 Optional design change

If they describe each change it will lead to arguments, etc. They need something like; "X is a category 1 change". Then the rules lawyers will be happy.

What you are describing is part of the problem inherent in errata that's anything more than typographical corrections. It's part of the reason some of us are wary of seeing anything of the sort.

Quote from: Stainless;7609261 Typos that must be corrected and accepted as part of the rules
2 Design change that is now cannon
3 Optional design change

No rules changes or corrections from a publisher or designer are mandatory at any table when I am running the game. I do not change play at my table because some outside force/entity tells me to. Even "mere" typo corrections might be ignored if correcting the typo changes the meaning of what was written and I as GM need (or even just prefer) the original meaning. Games where the designer or publisher claims such authority for the published rules annoy me on general principle (the principle that once I buy something it is mine to use as I see fit no matter what the producer wants me to do).

Quote from: RandallS;760945No rules changes or corrections from a publisher or designer are mandatory at any table when I am running the game. I do not change play at my table because some outside force/entity tells me to. Even "mere" typo corrections might be ignored if correcting the typo changes the meaning of what was written and I as GM need (or even just prefer) the original meaning. Games where the designer or publisher claims such authority for the published rules annoy me on general principle (the principle that once I buy something it is mine to use as I see fit no matter what the producer wants me to do).

Unless you take part in organized play, you can ignore errata.

But this is damned-if-they-do-damned-if-they-don't issue for game publishers. A lot of gamers get real pissed if a publisher doesn't release updated rules and errata. Terms like 'stubborn', 'turning a blind eye',  'unsupported', etc get thrown around. In the boardgame hobby, maintaining a living rules set and making it available online is pretty much mandatory.

Quote from: Haffrung;761006Unless you take part in organized play, you can ignore errata.

But this is damned-if-they-do-damned-if-they-don't issue for game publishers. A lot of gamers get real pissed if a publisher doesn't release updated rules and errata. Terms like 'stubborn', 'turning a blind eye',  'unsupported', etc get thrown around. In the boardgame hobby, maintaining a living rules set and making it available online is pretty much mandatory.

Yeah. I think it's a much thornier issue for RPGs due to the nature of how they're often played, and some of the culture that has sprung up around them.

Quote from: Bobloblah;760627Their anguish sustains me.

Quote from: GnomeWorks;760775While I can agree with the sentiment, I feel like this kind of mirrors the arguments of "micro-evolution" vs. "macro-evolution."

I mean... your example of fine balance is basically just a specific example of the gross balance, yes? How else would you find the points of gross imbalance, if not through a number of instances of fine imbalance?

Or is there something more to this distinction that I'm missing?

Balance is relative (kinda by definition).

If we say that "fighters should survive longer than wizards", that's great.  That's a point of gross balance.

If the fighter survives seven rounds against monster X while the wizard survives four, gross balance has been attained.  If we expect the fighter to have survived eight, that's a matter of fine balance.

Quote from: Haffrung;761045http://randalrauser.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/schadenfreude_pic.jpg

Wait...I'm supposed to feel guilty over watching the impotent gnashing of teeth amongst a group that not only contributed to the highly dysfunctional culture surrounding late 3.x, but who also helped create the catastrophe that was 4E and took every opportunity to dump on anyone disappointed with the ultimately brand-damaging direction that went? I think not. It's not like I forum hop looking for such folks and mocking their bitter tears; I just have zero sympathy for such individuals. As for the rest of the 4E-lovers? I do feel sorry for them, in that their favoured game is going to become unsupported, a disappointing thing to have happen.

Having said that, few things have left me feeling more like RPG fora are populated by idiots than watching the arguments play out in almost exactly the same way with Next as they did after the launch of 4E. Often with the same posters who cried loudly about "4vengers" (or whatever the current term of endearment is) now taking the role of "5aviors" - you got the rules wrong, you don't know what you're talking about, that doesn't matter because you can houserule it, blah, blah, blah. No one can speak ill of the game without being thoroughly denigrated. You could swap a few of the terms and names of the posters and I probably wouldn't be able to tell which edition-war it was. It's the rather pathetic expression of the worst kind of ingroup/outgroup behaviour.

The colossally stupid part of the above is that many of the posters (such as myself) on the receiving end of the latest edition fanaticism are cautiously optimistic. I want D&D5E to succeed. A successful D&D with a marketing budget is the best thing that can happen to the RPG hobby as a whole, and I suspect it's the only thing that can actually grow the RPG hobby's player-base. Not only that, but a "lingua franca" edition of the game reinforces the network effect and makes it easier to get a game together for anyone who isn't gaming with their longterm group of friends. Those are both good things in my eyes, even if Next has no hope of ever being my favourite edition.

Quote from: Bobloblah;761101Wait...I'm supposed to feel guilty over watching the impotent gnashing of teeth amongst a group that not only contributed to the highly dysfunctional culture surrounding late 3.x, but who also helped create the catastrophe that was 4E and took every opportunity to dump on anyone disappointed with the ultimately brand-damaging direction that went? I think not. It's not like I forum hop looking for such folks and mocking their bitter tears; I just have zero sympathy for such individuals. As for the rest of the 4E-lovers? I do feel sorry for them, in that their favoured game is going to become unsupported, a disappointing thing to have happen.

Hey, I'm right with you brother. The impotent raging over 5E of the system-wonks on the RPGsite is music to my ears. Their theorizing is being proven, once again, completely irrelevant the development of D&D. The demonstrable fact that there's little connection between their notions of 'good' mechanical design and what people actually want to play makes the tiny gears in their head smoke and shudder.

Quote from: Bobloblah;761101Having said that, few things have left me feeling more like RPG fora are populated by idiots than watching the arguments play out in almost exactly the same way with Next as they did after the launch of 4E. Often with the same posters who cried loudly about "4vengers" (or whatever the current term of endearment is) now taking the role of "5aviors" - you got the rules wrong, you don't know what you're talking about, that doesn't matter because you can houserule it, blah, blah, blah. No one can speak ill of the game without being thoroughly denigrated. You could swap a few of the terms and names of the posters and I probably wouldn't be able to tell which edition-war it was. It's the rather pathetic expression of the worst kind of ingroup/outgroup behaviour.

The fact 4E disappointed a lot of people doesn't mean that all the criticism of 4E leading up to its release was rational and well-founded. If there's any commonality, it's that much of the criticism of 5E, like that of 4E before, is coming from:

* A ferocious hatred of WotC.

* D&D tribalism, where people are inclined to attack something that is being praised by members of a tribe they hate (which, ironically, is what makes so many 4E fans hate 5E - because some long-time grognards are expressing optimism about it).

Pretty much any criticism with the word 'Mearls' in it has fuck all to do with the game and is based on dark undercurrents of nerdfury that surge through the D&D forum community.

Quote from: Bobloblah;761101The colossally stupid part of the above is that many of the posters (such as myself) on the receiving end of the latest edition fanaticism are cautiously optimistic. I want D&D5E to succeed.

You haven't been subjected to any fanaticism. The following criticisms of 5E are totally legit and pass completely unchallenged by the people you dub 'fanatics':

* I don't know enough about 5E yet to make a judgement.

* I'm not really interested in a game with feats or skills (or higher power level than OD&D, etc).

* I already have an edition of D&D that I'm happy with.

But what we've seen time and again on this forum is people panicking or getting enraged over snippets of information, only to have one of the 'fanatics' who is optimistic - and knowledgeable - about 5E provide more substantive and concrete information to dispel the assumption. If you think that's intolerable because it's the kind of thing that people who supported 4E did - counter dimly grasped assumptions with concrete information - then I don't know what to say other than you must be a shell-shocked veteran of too many edition wars.

If you can't see that much of the criticism of 5E on this forum and elsewhere is coming from people who are predisposed to want 5E to fail, then there's probably nothing I can say to change your mind. But you might have more credence as a voice of reason if you were as eager to point out the 'fanaticism' of some of the critics of 5E as you are the defenders. Try forgetting about grognards, TSR, WotC, 4E, Mike Mearls, and 5aviors and assess the game on its own merits. Why should the barrier for legitimately criticizing 5E be set any lower than the barrier for legitimately criticizing AD&D?

I wouldn't consider myself part of either group.

I thought 4e was okay.  Better than 3.x, but the fights took too damn long.  I can see where some people wouldn't like it, and I think WotC made some colossal presentation errors (hint:  Don't give new mechanics that do things never before seen in D&D the same name as old mechanics.  Kthx.)

I pretty much look at 5e as any other (broadly speaking) retroclone.  The fact that it's written by people that are employed by the company that bought the D&D IP has little bearing on whether I find it usable.  The only reason to stick with "the original company" is for the continuation of the 'tradition' and deep insight into the original designs that you might expect to find.  And I don't expect to find that with 5e.

That said, due to name recognition/etc. it'll probably be my "second favorite D&D" for many of the reasons posted, especially around acceptability and network effect.  Luckily, most of the people I game with aren't wedded to a single game and are willing to try other stuff, so that will likely not be an issue for me.

I'm a fan of where 5E is going, but I can tell you it had some flaws in the playtest, and plenty of things I personally don't care for. Monsters seemed incredibly underpowered. The "death save" system is not to my liking (it's still pretty hard to die in 5th--for some folks this is likely a good thing).  Fighters seemed a bit overpowered (if you can believe that).  Don't care at all for inclusion of tieflings, warforged, drow, etc. as playable races (but they're optional, so I guess I'm placated).  It also looks like higher level characters are gonna be ridiculously powerful, as HD don't cap at all, all the way to 20. And don't get me started in"damage on a miss" (ridiculous!), DEX as a meta-stat, and martial healing.  

That said, this version has been more fun, so far, than my experiences with 3E, 4E and 1E (I'm a b/x fan).  There's enough differentiation for players, and, as GM I CAN houserule things away. The ability to houserule, rather easily, I might add, is something I would think a lot of OS gamers would enjoy.

Just because some of us don't talk about everything we don't like about the game doesn't mean we're blind. Nothing wrong about being positive about the game. The worst case scenario is we might be disappointed. I can live with that, because I have several versions of microlite available. To be honest, if the free PDF doesn't measure up, that's likely what I'll play. In the meantime, fingers crossed. As mentioned here, a game that a lot of us will tolerate and playa is aa good thing. Or we actually like would be a great thing. We'll see if it happens.

Quote from: honesttiago;761124I'm a fan of where 5E is going, but I can tell you it had some flaws in the playtest, and plenty of things I personally don't care for. Monsters seemed incredibly underpowered. The "death save" system is not to my liking (it's still pretty hard to die in 5th--for some folks this is likely a good thing).  Fighters seemed a bit overpowered (if you can believe that).  Don't care at all for inclusion of tieflings, warforged, drow, etc. as playable races (but they're optional, so I guess I'm placated).  It also looks like higher level characters are gonna be ridiculously powerful, as HD don't cap at all, all the way to 20. And don't get me started in"damage on a miss" (ridiculous!), DEX as a meta-stat, and martial healing.  .

That pretty much sums up all of my issues with it as well.  Not a fan of bonds/traits mechanics either, and I think the healing rate is too fast.